VCE History: Unit 3
Revolutionary Crisis Begins
• Finance Minister Sergei Witte had an influence in creating a
revolutionary situation.
• The growth of industrialisation had attracted thousands of
peasants to the industrial centres.
• There had been a recession in 1899 and people had expectations
of a better life.
• These were not met due to poor living conditions and, later, a
lack of jobs.
• There was also the psychological and military weakness shown
by Russia’s defeat to the Japanese in 1904-5.
Revolutionary Discontent
• Economic distress drove workers to action.
The sacking of five men from the Pulitov Steel Works
resulted in strikes of sympathy throughout the city,
growing to 105,000 workers by Friday 7 January, 1905.
• On a freezing Sunday morning on the 9th of January
the largest strike in Russia’s history occurred. 111,000
men, women and children marched towards the Tsar’s
Winter Palace in St Petersburg.
Bloody Sunday Massacre
• The Putilov strikes and the Sunday march were organised by
Father Gapon, a priest from the Orthodox church and head of
the Assembly of Russian Factory and Mill workers.
• The marchers carried crosses and religious icons and sang
‘God save thy people’, carrying portraits of the Tsar and
Tsarina.
• The aim was to present a petition, signed by 135,000 workers,
that outlined grievances and requested reforms.
Gapon’s Petition
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
Analysis Activity 1
• Reports vary on what happened when
the groups joined together and reached
the Winter Palace.
• Gapon stated that they were confronted
by the Tsar’s troops, along with the
Cossacks.
• Maxim Gorky (an influential socialist)
witnessed the brutal death of a fellow
worker.
• The Tsar’s security police wrote that
pleas to retreat were ignored, forcing
the backlash by the police and cavalry.
Confrontation
• Nine days later the government
published an account in Pravo (which
means ‘Justice’) that claimed the
petition contained ‘rude demands of a
political nature’.
• The government report declared that 96
had died and 333 were wounded but
modern historians believe it was much
higher.
• The Tsar was criticised for not
considering the requests ‘attentively
and without anger’ but instead with
violence.
The Tsar’s initial response
• This changed the public perception of Nicholas from
the trusted ‘Little Father’ to the hated ‘Nicholas the
Bloody’.
• Cartoons in magazines, such as the British Punch,
focused on his symbols of privileged royalty.
• Some historians claim that the cause of the march
was a rise in national consciousness due to
urbanisation and improvement in literacy.
• Others question this as the differences in material
conditions (wealth/living conditions) and the limited
and disjointed (sporadic) spread and acceptance of
socialist ideas was not considered a likely cause of
this united force.
Changing perceptions
• The march on the Winter Palace in
January was the first of many. The
most significant were the strikes in
October 1905, which led to the Tsar
promising reforms.
• Other events included Battle of
Tsushima (key defeat of Russia by
Japan), mutiny of Potemkin (loss of
support from armed forces), army
troops mutiny on Trans-Siberian
railway, establishment of All-Russian
Union of Peasants in June and St
Petersburg Soviet by Trotsky in
October (development of resistant
forces with representation).
Key crises of 1905
• Powerful action provokes significant reaction.
The economy was paralysed by strikes in
Moscow and St Petersburg.
• This forced a reluctant Nicholas to submit to
demand for political reform. The Russian
people wanted an elected government (the
Duma) to represent them.
• Nicholas responded with the October
Manifesto which granted the establishment of
a Duma and saved his regime from collapse.
Tsar’s response
1)
2)
3)
4)
Analysis Activity 2
• Tsar was reluctant about his own manifesto, drafted by
Witte (Finance) and Obolensky (Education). He saw it as
necessary to avoid further violence but at the risk of his
autocracy.
• Marxists claimed that the 1905 revolution showed that
the tsarsdom was the ‘sworn enemy of the people’ and
that only its removal would solve Russia’s problems.
Trotsky said that the freedoms were invalid because of
the restrictions of the military and censorship.
‘Everything is given and nothing is given’
Reactions to the Manifesto
• Liberal opponents of tsarism (Octobrists and Kadets)
had varying opinions. The Octobrists supported the
reforms as an end to the conflicts. The Kadets
compained that they did not go far enough.
• Chemodanov’s cartoon ‘the lion, the bear and the rabbit’
infers an opinion by revolutionaries that the liberal
‘bourgeoisie’ parties were weak in pushing for reform
and that the more radical Marxist parties were responsible
for the ‘power of the proletariat’.
Reactions to the Manifesto
1)
2)
3)
Analysis Activity 3
1)
2)
3)
4)
Practice Paragraph Answers
Bloody Sunday (video)
Nicholas & Alexandra (video)