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Ultimately, what part do you believe the war played in securing the fate of the Tsarist regime? What other elements do you feel contributed to the Romanov downfall?

Trotsky said: 'There is no doubt that the fate of every revolution is decided by a break in the loyalty of the army'. What did he mean by this? Do the events of March 8-15 support this view?

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'We Nicholas the Second... declare to all our loyal subjects:

The rioting in the capitals and in many localities of our empire fills our heart with great and deep grief. The welfare of the Russian Emperor is bound up with the welfare of the people, and its sorrows are his sorrows. The turbulence which has broken out may confound the people and threaten the integrity and unity of our empire.

[The Tsar decided the following:]

1. To grant the population the inviolable right of free citizenship, based on the principles of freedom of the person, conscience, speech, assembly, and union.

2. Without postponing the intended elections for the State Duma.... to include in the participation of the work of the Duma those ckasses of the population that have been until now entirely deprived of the right to vote...

3. To establish as an unbreakable rule that no law shall go into force without its confirmation by the State Duma...

Tsar Nicholas

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7 March, Tzar left Petrograd for his military head quarters. The next day riots broke out over the shortages of food in Petrograd. Striking workers from the factories swelled to about 90 000 by the end of the day. This continued on into the next day, while some police fired on protesters, the Cossack troops refused to. Nicholas had a poor understanding of what was happening in the capital and ordered the military commander in Petrograd to quell the disorder. He received warnings from Michael Rodzianko, the president of the Duma, that there was anarchy in the capital and that it was essential to form a new government. Nicholas ignored this advice.

Monday March 12 was he turning point in revolution. The previous day saw 400 troops mutiny for around an hour, by 10am Monday, 1000 troops had mutinied. Nicholas had given orders to suspend the Duma, but it continued to meet, an act of rebellion.

Nicholas finally grasped the seriousness of the situation, unable to return home, as revolutionaries had seized the railways he received news that his generals had deserted him and the newly formed provisional government urged him to abdicate.

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'...the government is taking every possible measure to create as many dissatisfied people as possible and is succeeding completely at it. We are assisting at an unprecedented spectacle of revolution from above rather than below'

Radzinsky 1992.

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Oppositional cartoon - The Tsar and Tsarina dominated by Rasputin

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Russia was inadequately prepared for modern war. The war minister, Sukhomlinov severely underestimated the needs of the army. factories couldn't produce enough ammunition, commanders were planning attacks with maps over 18 years old. By 1916 soldiers were fighting without shoes due to shortages and only one in three had a rifle. Artillery commanders were rationed to 3-5 shells per gun, the wounded were often left un cared for, with inadequate clothing and food and by the end of 1915 Russia had suffered 3.5 million casualties.

The economy soon suffered, trade routes through the Baltic sea and the Black Sea were virtually cut off. Exports fell 86.7% in the first full year of the war while budget expenditure rose from 3.5billion roubles i 1914 to 15.3 billion roubles in 1916. The government tried to fix the economy by borrowing from the allies and by printing more money. The result was inflation, which saw the price of flour double and the price of meat triple between 1914-16. Banks flourished, owning a third of all grain stocks.

The war hit rural areas particularly hard, with around 15 million men mobilised during the war, most form the countryside. The loss of fathers and sons and even horses to the war effort meant fewer people and animals to work the soil. Though the 1916 harvest was good, most went to the army and peasants were reluctant to sell grain for devalued money that bought little.

In cities the situation was no better. Food was hard to come by as an increasingly overloaded rail network had trouble transporting grain from farming areas of the south to the cities in the north. Wages remained low and as the prices rose, discontent showed itself in strike activity: these were 268 in January and February 1917, resulting in a total of 403295 lost working days.

As long as the state's main priority was the equipping of conscripts there would be no economic improvement on the home front. increasingly, thoughts turned towards ending the war. if the war showed up Russia's economic weakness, it also confirmed the views that the corruption and ignorance of key individuals were leading the country to ruin. The principal objects of this corruption amidst the rumours, was the relationship between Gregory Rasputin, 'the mad monk' and the Tsarina, Alexandra. After the diagnosis of their son Alexis, the Tsar and Tsarina were disheartened by the failure of royal doctors to help the boy, the tsarina put her trust in Rasputin a Siberian born 'healer' who began to accompany the royal family as his 'powers' were beleived to help Alexis's pain and ailments. Rasputin's appearance was often shocking, he wore peasants robes, his hair was a mated shock and his teeth were deadened and foul. Alexandra's faith in the healer was the centre of much speculation, Rasputin seemed to have complete control over the Tsarina, influencing her decisions and Rasputin openly boasted about his influence over the court. Soon lewd posters of the healer and Alexandra emerged alluding that the pair were embroiled in a scandalous royal affair.

When Nicholas appointed himself commander-in-chief of the army in 1915, Rasputin spent much of his time in the military head quarters influencing the Tsars military decisions.

As the war turned even worse for Russia the people turned further against the Tsar, targeting Alexandra, the former German Princess and spreading rumours about German spies and sympathisers at the very top. By the time Rasputin was murdered by Prince Felix the damage was unfixable. The political appointments he had made had caused widespread corruption in the court,  and tarnished Alexandra's image and she became known as the 'German Woman'. This made it clear to the nobility and those in the extended royal family that a change was needed at the top only the timing of that change was now in question.

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When war was declared between Germany and Russia in August 1914 it seemed that the conflict could save the Romanov throne, not destroy it. Volunteers hastened to join the army. The Tsar blessed the troops as they left for the front. Political differences were put aside as Russians joined to fight the common enemy in defence of the homeland.Even urban discontent, which had been expressed in an increasing number of political and economic strikes at the beginning of the year vanished. No strikes of any kind were recorded for the month of August 1914.

At first it seemed a success story, In the south the Austrians were pushed back in Galicia, while in the north the Germans were defeated at Gumbinnen. Then Came the German response. At Tannenberg in August 1914 the Germans inflicted a huge defeat on the Russians. Masses of prisoners, stores and guns were taken and the Russian commander Samsonov shot himself. In September came a heavy defeat at the Masurian Lakes, this confirmed the end of the advances against the Germans and the beginning of a three year attempt to hold back the German advances into Russia's western provinces. Though further successes were gained against Austria, the optimistic mood that had greeted the war changed to one of increasing disillusionment.

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The Tsar bitterly opposed the concession of a Duma and tried desperately to reassert his position by issuing a series of Fundamental Laws on 2 May 1906. These Laws confirmed the Tsar's power to appoint his own ministers, to legislate by decree and to have complete control over foreign affairs. Laws passed by the Duma required his approval to have any legal holding and an Imperial Council, half of whom were appointed by the Tsar, would share power with the Duma.

The elections for the first Duma took a clear anti-government stance. The Duma met for just 10 weeks, May-June 1906, after which it was dissolved by the Tsar. A second Duma faired little better making it three months before it's criticism of the Tsar saw it dissolved also.

Before the third Duma began, the Tsar altered the electoral laws to ensure that the representation of peasants, small land owners and urban dwellers was drastically reduced. This subdued Duma served it's full tern 1907-1912 with the fourth and final Duma following a similar pattern (1912-1917).

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Consider the sources and ONE other you find yourself, this could be a primary sources, ie. a cartoon. Do you think these suggest that revolutionary activity will increase or diminish for the Tsarist regime after the manifesto?

How does Leon Trotsky's comments contradict the statements in the October Manifesto source?

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Source Study - A comment by Leon Trotsky

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Source Study - A comment by Leon Trotsky

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And so we have been given a constitution. We have been given freedom of assembly, but our assemblies are encircled by troops. We have been given freedom of speech, but censorship remains inviolate. We have been given freedom of study, but the universities are occupied by troops. We have been given personal immunity, but the prisons are filled to overflowing with prisoners. We have been given Witte, but we still have Trepov. We have been given a constitution, but the autocracy remains. Everything has been given, and nothing has been given.

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On 26 Oct the first St Petersburg soviet was formed, with Leon Trotsky as one of its leaders.

Nicholas asked Prime Minister Witte for advice and was told the regime could only be saved by granting the people a constitution. This document, the October Manifesto, marked a watershed in the events of 1905, but ultimately it solved little and pleased very few.

The soviets, with their concerns for working conditions i.e. the 8 hour day, condemned the Manifesto as it did very little to actually address the needs of the workers.

Nicholas hated the Manifesto, he hoped to buy peace with concessions and felt betrayed when strikes and protests continued. Nicholas quickly abandoned the Duma and returned to ruling as a autocrat.

In the countryside, loyal tsarist troops moved through villages with a campaign of floggings and hangings to subdue rebellious peasants. On 16 Dec the St Petersburg soviet was closed down and 190 members arrested. A general strike in Moscow led to street fighting from 21 Dec to 2 January 1906 resulting in defeat for strikers, with over 1000 dead.

awebster@uow.edu.au

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By the end of January 1905 almost half a million workers were on strike. Unions flourished with doctors, teachers, engineers, waiters and lawyers all joining forces.

In May the Union of unions was formed and by June, a congress of representatives from 86 city councils across Russia formed in Moscow to demand civil liberties including the formation of a democratically elected legislative assembly.

By August the increasing discontent led Nicholas to yield and promise a legislative assembly, know as a Duma. However, Nicholas would only seek its opinion when he wanted and it would have no actual authority to make laws against his wishes.

The promise of a Duma on such limited terms did not satisfy the monarchs opponents, strikes and protests intensified. On 21st October a railway strike was declared in Moscow and spread across the entire nation.

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Aftermath of Bloody Sunday - The Beggining of the end

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Aftermath of Bloody Sunday - The Beggining of the end

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After the march, those considered responsible were arrested by police and forced into internal exile, however this just helped to spread the word of the events across all of Russia.

On the 17th Feb, Nicholas II''s uncle, Grand Duke Sergei was killed by a bomb that was thrown by a socialist revolutionary, highlighting the growing tensions in Russia. Civil revolts also begin in Feb 1905 and got increasingly worse as the year progressed. Across the districts, land owners were being forced off their land and their property was being seized.  in June, a national Peasants' Union was formed as peasants took up the socialist revolutionary cause, under the cry 'land for the peasants.'

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Do you think autocracy was an effective style of rule for Nicholas? Explain and justify your answer. 

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Do you think autocracy was an effective style of rule for Nicholas? Explain and justify your answer. 

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Hypothetically, do you think Nicholas could have changed the fate of his family's dynasty if he had of adjusted his system of ruling?

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Consider the written sources regarding the 1905 march the the Winter Palace, why might they differ? What does this tell us about the reliability of different sources?

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Source Study - Robert McCormick, US Ambassador in St Petersburg 

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Source Study - Robert McCormick, US Ambassador in St Petersburg 

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I have heard the assembled crowd accused of nothing worse than jeering at the troops, hustling the officers and using language to them that will not bear repetition – although they came, it is said, armed with knives, pieces of piping, sticks, and some even with revolvers.

I do know that the commanding officer of the infantry..... twice warned them to disperse, adding that if they did not, he would be compelled to fire on them..... The officers, on foot, would go right in among the people and try to reason with them, seeming to do everything in their power to persuade the people to disperse peaceably.

M. Bucklow & G. Russell, Russia: Why Revolution?, 1987

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Source Study: Father Gapon's account of the 1905 march

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Source Study: Father Gapon's account of the 1905 march

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At last we reached within two hundred paces of where the troops stood. Files of infantry barred the road, and in front of them a company of cavalry was drawn up, with their swords shining in the sun...A cry of alarm rose as the Cossacks came down upon us...the soldiers drove their horses, striking on both sides. I saw the swords lifted and falling, the men, women and children dropping to the earth like logs of wood, while moans, curses and shouts filled the air.

At last the firing ceased...I cried to them to 'Stand up!' But they lay still...and I saw the scarlet stain of blood upon the snow...'There is no longer any Tsar for us!' I exclaimed...We had gone unarmed.

G Gapon, The Story of my Life 1905 (reprinted in Bucklow and Russel, Russia Why Revolution?)

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"Along the Nevsky Prospect from the direction of the working-class districts came row upon row of orderly and solemn faced workers all dressed in their best clothes. Gapon, marching in front of the procession, was carrying a cross, and a number of the workers were holding icons and portraits of the Tsar...

We had already reached the Alexander Garden, on the other side of which lay the Winter Palace Square, when we heard the sound of bugles, the signal for the cavalry to charge. The marchers came to a halt, uncertain as to what the bugles meant and unable to see what was happening.

In front, on the right, was a detachment of police, but since they showed no signs of hostility, the procession began moving again. Just then however, a detachment of cavalry rode out...The first volley was fired in the air, but the second was aimed at the crowd, and a number of people fell to the ground. Panic-stricken, the crowd turned and began running in every direction. They were now being fired on from behind...I cannot describe the horror I felt at that moment. It was quite clear the authorities had made a terrible mistake, they had totally misunderstood the intentions of the crowd...the workers went to the palace without any evil intent. They sincerely believed that when they got there they would kneel down and the Tsar would come out and meet them or at least appear on the balcony."

A Kerensky, The Kerensky Memoirs: Russia and History's Turning Point, 1965.

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"Nicholas was not only unstable but treacherous. Flatterers called him a charmer... because of his gentle way with courtiers. But the Tsar reserved his special caresses for just those officials he decided to dismiss. Charmed beyond measure at a reception, the minister would go home and find a letter requesting his resignation.

Nicholas recoiled in hostility from anything gifted and significant. He felt as ease only among completely mediocre and brainless people"

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Source Study: Watch this short video explaining the causes of civil unrest and the events of the Bloody Sunday March

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Source Study: Watch this short video explaining the causes of civil unrest and the events of the Bloody Sunday March

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A short description of Bloody Sunday, January 22, 1905.

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At the beginning of the 20th century, Russian society was quickly becoming more educated, urban and complex and literacy rates were rising around the county. This newly educated generation would prove problematic for the Tsarist regime as many educated young Russians were opposed to autocracy and would become more revolutionary as discontent with the monarch mounted. The 1900s started badly for the new monarch with a poor harvest in 1902 intensifying the poverty and hardships of the peasant class. Civil unrest occurred as peasants were unable to feed their families, disorder spread to the cities and by 1903 a wave of strikes in the oil industry, engineering works and railways threatened to halt the entire economy of Russia.

In 1904 a war with Japan began and the general sentiment in Russia was that a quick, cheap victory would ensure over an inferior enemy. Tensions were further heightened when the war dragged on, putting extra economic strain on the already struggling Russia and taking peasants sons away to war and further disturbing the agriculture and food supplies. Nicholas’s decision to associate himself with the war by becoming commander-in-chief caused further damage to his popularity, associating him with an unpopular war.

Agitations in 1905 began on Jan 16 with a strike at the Putilov Steelworks in St Petersburg. This was caused by the dismissal of men belonging to the Assembly of Russian Workers, a union established with police assistance by father George Gapon, a popular young priest of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Gapon established himself as the ehad of the protest movement in Russia and organized a peaceful protest march and petition to be presented to the Tsar at his Winter Palace on January 22. Gapon led around 150 000 people from all across the city with a respectfully written partition that requested:

1.  guaranteed civil liberties such as freedom of speech

2. measure to alleviate poverty

3. better working conditions i.e. 8hour day

To many of the protesters, and many of the peasants across Russia, the Tsar was seen as a father figure, who cared for the people of Russia, but was prevented from understanding their struggles due to official circumstances and privilege. The protesters believed that if they could meet Nicholas and discuss their situation, he would put measures and laws into place to protect the people. However, the problem arose because Nicholas was not home at the Winter Palace on the day of the protest and things took a horrible turn…

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1. What year was Nicholas born and when did he marry Alexandra?

2. What disease did Alexis suffer? What potential problems might this ailment present to the Tsar's rule?

3. What was the October manifesto and why did it occur?

4. list positives and negatives of the war for the Tsar.

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The Russian Royal Family 1914. Before the outbreak of World War I

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The Russian Royal Family 1914. Before the outbreak of World War I

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1868 - Nicholas Romanov is born
1894 - Nicholas Marries Princes Alxandra (Hesse-Darmsdt
1894 - Becomes Tsar
1895 -1904  Births of royal children Olga (1895), Tatiana (1897), Marie (1899), Anastasia (1901) and Alexis (1904). Alexis, the only male heir suffers haemophilia, an extremely life threatening disease in which blood fails to clot and the sufferer may bleed out.
1905 - The October Manifesto. After a year of riots and civil unrest, this concession promises a constitution.
1906 - First Russian parliament (Duma) meets. The Tsar dissolves the Duma after just 10 weeks as it questioned his authority.
1914 - WWI breaks out, country temporarily unites behind the Tsar.
1915 - Nicholas becomes army commander-in-chief. This links the Tsar's image directly to Russia's war failings. Military losses, ammunition shortages, poor medical facilities were all blamed on him.
1916 - Rasputin is murdered.
1917 - Nicholas II faced with revolution, abdicates and Russia becomes a republic.
1918 - Nicholas, his wife and children are murdered at Ekaterinburg.

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Historian Orlando Figes on the autocratic Tsars:

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Historian Orlando Figes on the autocratic Tsars:

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"It was their tragedy that just as Russia was entering the 20th century, they were trying to return it to the 17th"

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“I am not prepared to be a Tsar. I never wanted to become one. I know nothing of the business of ruling”

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Like Alexander III, Nicholas was determined to rule as an autocrat. An autocrat is an individual who rules with no limitations to their power. Within an autocracy, the ruler's will is law and no consultation is required, if a parliament exists, it has no actual power.

Nicholas was opposed to political reform or any infringement on his power, this became the root of his destruction and would result in the end of the monarchial rule of Russia, and ultimately lead to the execution of the royal family.

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Nicholas II and wife Alexandra 1890 approx.

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When Tsar Alexander III suddenly died in 1894 of kidney failure at just 49, his son Nicholas Romanov succeeded him as Nicholas II, Tsar of the Russian Empire.

Nicholas was ill-prepared for the task of ruling the expanding Russian empire.