The Russian Revolution
U5/Ch. 25
AP European History
Ms. Tully - UHS
Contributing Factors
• Tsarist autocracy –
Nicholas II
• Bloody Sunday &
Revolution of 1905 
No real reform
• Tsarina Alexandra &
Rasputin
• WWI  Severe
Russian losses
The March (February) Revolution
• Food shortages  Riots & Strikes
• Russian soldiers sided w/ demonstrators
• Duma dissolved  Ignored tsar, declared
prov. gov. on March 12th
• Nicholas II abdicated March 15th
• Creation of soviets  councils of workers
• Army Order No. 1  Issued by Petrograd
Soviet
Lenin & The Bolsheviks
• Radical wing of Marxist
Social Democratic Party
(split with Mensheviks)
• Vladimir Ilyich Ulianov
 Lenin (1870-1924)
• April Theses
• July Days  Bolsheviks
accused of attempting
revolution
The November (October)
Revolution
• Bolsheviks gained
majority in Petrograd &
Moscow Soviets  Leon
Trotsky chairman of
Petrograd Soviet
• Nov. 6th  Bolsheviks
took control of
Petrograd
• Council of People’s
Commissars  New
gov’t w/ Lenin in charge
• Program of
nationalization &
consolidating power
• Creation of Cheka 
secret police
• Social & political
reforms  Alexandra
Kollontai
• Bolsheviks 
Communist Party
• Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
 March 3, 1918
The Russian Civil War
• Opposition to
Bolshevik regime 
White Army
• Red Army  New
Bolshevik army led by
Trotsky
• War Communism 
nationalization of
banks & industry
• Red Terror  Power of
the Cheka
• Execution of royal
family  July 1917
• Red victory  1921
• High cost of war 
approx. 27 Russian
casualties