October Revolution

Question 1

unity of workers and soldiers

Answer 1

‘real discord and hostility between the two groups’ Donald Filtzer

• surmovo strike, nizhnii novgorod
• 24 June soldiers dissented in Soviet
• ‘workers live better, but demand more than soldiers.. the strikes must end’

Question 2

Bolshevik majority in Moscow soviet

Answer 2

• 37.8% growth in seats June-Sep
• gained a majority 19 September
• ‘political alternative for the dissapointed and disenchanted’ Rex Wade
• 50% less participation that in June
• ‘the apathy of the uncommited had much to do with Bolshevik success’ Figes
• Soviets had become ‘complex bureacratic structures’
• Kadet vote up from 17 to 30%

Question 3

Bolshevik majority in Petrograd

Answer 3

• 25 September
• 25 September the leadership of the Petrograd Soviet was
  completely revamped, with the Bolsheviks occupying four of
  the seven seats on its executive and Trotsky replacing
  Chkheidze as its Chairman

Question 4

disproportionality of bolshevik success in the soviets

Answer 4

• Samara province Bols made up 75% of the executive but only 26% of the assembly

Question 5

Bolshevik growth in membership October

Answer 5

24,000 in Feb
350,000 in October
- majority are blue-collar workers

Question 6

MRC

Answer 6

• first meeting 20th October
• ‘Bolshevik control over MRC gave them 3/4 if not 9/10 of their victory’ Trotsky
• executive = 3 Bols, 2 LSRs
• ‘But in fact the MRC was a Bolshevik organization’ Figes
• LSRs not there when MRC resolved to launch the seizure of power

Question 7

Decline of opposition - PG

Answer 7

• 24 September Third Coalition Formed
• Kadets in key posts
• 24th the Preparliament had effectively passed a motion of no confidence in it, Figes
• ‘The failure of the Democratic Conference was a public cofession of the political bankrupcy of the Soviet leaders - Figes

Question 8

Decline of opposition - Mensheviks

Answer 8

• vote fell 8% in Moscow
• ‘Menshevik Party had practically ceased to exist in Petrograd by the end of September’ Figes
• workers wanted factory self-control - impatient with Menshevik labour leadership
• failure to recognize the social and political forces which had been unfolding during 1917

Question 9

Decline in opposition - SRs

Answer 9

• vote fell 44%
• believed land reform could be put off until CA
• provincial Soviet in Saratov, home of the Srs, went Bolshevik during September

Question 10

October Revolution - push for soviet power

Answer 10

• Only a Soviet government could hope to command any real authority in the country at large - Figes
• 1 Sep, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets received demands from 126 local soviets urging it to take power into its own hands
• October 25th in Moscow alone, 38 plants representing 54,000 workers had written resolutions calling for transferring all power to the Soviets
• 8 September the Baltic Fleet declare that they will not recognize the authority of the PG, nor will they execute any of its orders

Question 11

land seizures OCtober

Answer 11

• 958 incidents in September
• villages had soldiers back
• Kerensky re-introduced public flogging September 18

Question 12

October lenin’s push

Answer 12

15 September letter to Central Comm

• ‘We were all aghast’ Bukharin
• ‘History will not forgive us if we do not take power now’
• CC continued to ignore advice, print earlier articles with Kamenev line

29 September

• denounced Bols ‘miserable traitors to the proletarian cause’
• workers solidly behind, peasants staring own war on manors, ruling out the danger of a petty-bourgeois counter-rev
• threatened to resign from CC, take uprising to rank and file

Question 13

October Rev, importance of timing

Answer 13

transfer of power through Soviet vote

• Bols would have to rule together with others
• result = coalition of all Soviet parties
• political victory for Kamenev, Lenin’s arch rival
• power would be with Congress, not party

transfer of power before Congress (25 Oct)

• Lenin central
• Congress would probably endorse Bol action
• if Mensh + SRs reject, they go into opposition
• ‘although the result would inevitably plunge the country into civil war, this was something Lenin himself accepted - and perhaps even welcomed - as part of the rev process

Question 14

10 October meeting

Answer 14

• of 21 members, 12 present
• agreed on principle of armed insurrection
• resolution passed 10 to 2
• ‘This in effect was a Leninst coup within the Bolshevik Party’ Figes
• counter-res by Zin, prohibit uprising before Bol SC delegates consulted (defeated 15/6, suggests that was dissent)
• Bolshevik Part Conference 17 Oct cancelled ‘no doubt on lenin’s insistence’ Figes

Question 15

October revolution - rank and file thoughts

Answer 15

• trade unions ‘Bolshevik rising is not popular and rumours of this even produce panis’ Shlyapnikov
• fear of dismissal held workers back
• ‘no one is ready to rush out to the streets but that everyone will come out if the Soviet calls’ Volodarsky
• BMO, soldiers fighting spirit falling

Question 16

October Rev - Bol plot exposed

Answer 16

• Kamenev and Zinoviev open letter on the 18th
• against revolt ‘we have no right to stake the whole future on the card of an armed uprising’
• ‘made it difficult not to act’ Fitz
• Soviet Congress delayed until 25th (lent credibility to charge that Soviet leaders were planning to ditch SC)
• gave Bols extra time

Question 17

October Rev - Kerensky proven counter-rev

Answer 17

23-24 october shut down printing presses, raised bridges linking working class districts to rest of city

• ‘I would be prepared to offer prayers to produce this uprising. They will be utterly crushed’ 20 oct
• ‘To hell with Petrogad’ Rodzianko
• plans to transfer PG to Northern Front
• sparked mutiny, switched allegiance to MRC
• Trotsky tells MRC to re-take city

Question 18

25 October developments

Answer 18

• control of telegraph, post, bank, electricity, trains
• Ker leaves
• CC gives formal approval

Soviet Congress opens

• 300/670 delegates are Bols
• disproportional rep 14 bols on executive, 7 SRs, mensh refused 4 seats offered to them
• martov proposed united democractic govt, bols couldn’t oppose, passed unanimously
• Mensheviks and SRs denounced violence against PG, would have nothing to do with this ‘criminal venture’
• walked out, proven counter-rev
• support for coalition down
• ‘dustbin of history’ Martov walked out and left

Question 19

Assault on Winter palace

Answer 19

25-26 oct
- sailors from Kronstadt 3 hours late
- defences were 140 WDM, disabled soldiers, cadets, most slipped away to retaurants, 300 left
- ‘legendary storming of the Winter Palce, where kerenky’s cabinet held its final session, was more like a routine house arrest’
26 october issued ‘To all workers, soldiers and peasants’ provided illusion that the insurrection was the culmination of a revolution by the masses

Question 20

Popular involvement in October Rev

Answer 20

• Trotsky claimed 25,000-30,000 ‘at most’, 5% of all workers and soldiers in petrograd
• many of those who took part in uprising were the instigators of the drunken riots that followed
• leaders of railwaymen union Vikzhel issued ultimatum 29 Oct demanding that the Bols begin talks with other socialist parties
• Hundreds of factories, garrisons, Fron and Fleet assemblies sent petitions to Smolny in support of the Vikzhel plan
• Among the soldiers’, declared a petition from the 35th Division,
  ‘there are no Bolsheviks, Mensheviks, or SRs, but only
  Democrats

Question 21

Oct Rev - bread

Answer 21

February = 675 g for manual workers, 450 g for others
October = 110 g for all

per person/per day