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Russian Revolution of 1905

The Russian Revolution of 1905,[a] also known as the First Russian Revolution,[b] began on 22 January 1905. A wave of mass political and social unrest then began to spread across the vast areas of the Russian Empire. The unrest was directed primarily against the Tsar, the nobility, and the ruling class. It included worker strikes, peasant unrest, and military mutinies. In response to the public pressure, Tsar Nicholas II was forced to go back on his earlier authoritarian stance and enact some reform (issued in the October Manifesto). This took the form of establishing the State Duma, the multi-party system, and the Russian Constitution of 1906. Despite popular participation in the Duma, the parliament was unable to issue laws of its own, and frequently came into conflict with Nicholas. The Duma's power was limited and Nicholas continued to hold the ruling authority. Furthermore, he could dissolve the Duma, which he did three times in order to get rid of the opposition.[2]

The 1905 revolution was set off by the international humiliation that resulted from the Russian defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, which ended in the same year. Calls for revolution were intensified by the growing realisation by a variety of sectors of society of the need for reform. Politicians such as Sergei Witte had succeeded in partially industrializing Russia but failed to adequately meet the needs of the population. Tsar Nicholas II and the monarchy narrowly survived the Revolution of 1905, but its events foreshadowed what was to come in the 1917 Russian Revolution.


Many historians contend that the 1905 revolution set the stage for the 1917 Russian Revolutions, which saw the monarchy abolished and the Tsar executed. Calls for radicalism were present in the 1905 revolution, but many of the revolutionaries who were in a position to lead were either in exile or in prison while it took place. The events in 1905 demonstrated the precarious position in which the Tsar found himself. As a result, Tsarist Russia did not undergo sufficient reform, which had a direct impact on the radical politics brewing in the Russian Empire. Although the radicals were still in the minority of the populace, their momentum was growing. Vladimir Lenin, a revolutionary himself, would later say that the Revolution of 1905 was "The Great Dress Rehearsal", without which the "victory of the October Revolution in 1917 would have been impossible".[3]

The Russian State is one and indivisible.

The , while comprising an inseparable part of the Russian State, is governed in its internal affairs by special decrees based on special legislation.

Grand Duchy of Finland

The Russian language is the common language of the state, and its use is compulsory in the army, the navy and all state and public institutions. The use of local (regional) languages and dialects in state and public institutions are determined by special legislation.

 – Governor-General of Finland. Killed 30 June [O.S. 17 June] 1904 in Helsinki.

Nikolai Bobrikov

 – Minister of Interior. Killed 10 August [O.S. 28 July] 1904 in Saint Petersburg.

Vyacheslav von Plehve

 – Killed 17 February [O.S. 4 February] 1905 in Moscow.

Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia

 – Procurator of Justice of Finland. Killed 19 February [O.S. 6 February] 1905 in Helsinki.

Eliel Soisalon-Soininen

 – former war minister. Killed 5 December [O.S. 22 November] 1905 in Saratov

Viktor Sakharov

 – the commander of the Black Sea Fleet. Killed 24 July [O.S. 11 July] 1906 in Sevastopol

Admiral Chukhnin

 – Killed 22 December [O.S. 9 December] 1906 in Tver

Aleksey Ignatyev

The years 1906 and 1907 saw a decline of mass movements, strikes and protests, and a rise of overt political violence. Combat groups such as the SR Combat Organization carried out many assassinations targeting civil servants and police, and robberies. Between 1906 and 1909, revolutionaries killed 7,293 people, of whom 2,640 were officials, and wounded 8,061.[70] Notable victims included:

11 May 1905: The 'Group', the revolutionary leadership, called for the workers at all the textile mills to strike.

12 May: The strike begins. Strike leaders meet in the local woods.

13 May: 40,000 workers assemble before the Administration Building to give Svirskii, the regional factory inspector, a list of demands.

14 May: Workers' delegates are elected. Svirskii had suggested they do so, as he wanted people to negotiate with. A mass meeting is held in Administration Square. Svirskii tells them the mill owners will not meet their demands but will negotiate with elected mill delegates, who will be immune to prosecution, according to the governor.

[77]

15 May: Svirskii tells the strikers they can negotiate only about each factory in turn, but they can hold elections wherever. The strikers elect delegates to represent each mill while they are still out in the streets. Later the delegates elect a chairman.

17 May: The meetings are moved to the bank of the Talka River, on suggestion by the police chief.

27 May: The delegates' meeting house is closed.

3 June: break up a workers' meeting, arresting over 20 men. Workers start sabotaging telephone wires and burn down a mill.

Cossacks

9 June: The police chief resigns.

12 June: All prisoners are released. Most mill owners flee to Moscow. Neither side gives in.

27 June: Workers agree to stop striking 1 July.

Ivanovo Voznesensk was known as the 'Russian Manchester' for its textile mills.[76] In 1905, its local revolutionaries were overwhelmingly Bolshevik. It was the first Bolshevik branch in which workers outnumbered intellectuals.

Estonia[edit]

In the Governorate of Estonia, Estonians called for freedom of the press and assembly, for universal suffrage, and for national autonomy. On 29 October [O.S. 16 October], the Russian army opened fire in a meeting on a street market in Tallinn in which about 8 000–10 000 people participated, killing 94 and injuring over 200. The October Manifesto was supported in Estonia and the Estonian flag was displayed publicly for the first time. Jaan Tõnisson used the new political freedoms to widen the rights of Estonians by establishing the first Estonian political party – National Progress Party.


Another, more radical political organisation, the Estonian Social Democratic Workers' Union was founded as well. The moderate supporters of Tõnisson and the more radical supporters of Jaan Teemant could not agree about how to continue with the revolution, and only agreed that both wanted to limit the rights of Baltic Germans and to end Russification. The radical views were publicly welcomed and in December 1905, martial law was declared in Tallinn. A total of 160 manors were looted, resulting in ca. 400 workers and peasants being killed by the army. Estonian gains from the revolution were minimal, but the tense stability that prevailed between 1905 and 1917 allowed Estonians to advance the aspiration of national statehood.

Artists , Boris Kustodiev, Ivan Bilibin and Mstislav Dobuzhinsky published their works dedicated to the 1905 Revolution in the satirical magazine Zhupel.

Valentin Serov

Novels (1907) by Maxim Gorky and The Silver Dove (1909) by Andrei Bely were written under the impression of the 1905 Revolution. The same authors depicted it in their later works: Andrei Bely in his Petersburg (1913/1922) and Maxim Gorky in The Life of Klim Samgin (1927–1931).

Mother

(1925), Sergei Eisenstein originally intended this film to be a pro-Bolshevik narrative of the 1905 Russian Revolution.[84][85][86]

Battleship Potemkin

a 1957 novel by Boris Pasternak which takes place from the years between 1902 and World War II.

Doctor Zhivago

subtitled The Year 1905, written in 1957.

Symphony No. 11 (Shostakovich)

Bibliography of the Russian Revolution and Civil War § The Revolution of 1905

Łódź insurrection (1905)

David Shub

Bourgeois revolution

Russian Revolution of 1917

Gurian Republic

at marxists.org

1905 Russian Revolution Archive

Archived 5 December 2008 at the Wayback Machine

Russian Chronology 1904–1914, including the Revolution of 1905 and its aftermath

by Rosa Luxemburg, 1906.

The Mass Strike

by Leon Trotsky

The Year 1905

by Bernard Pares

Russia and reform (1907)

An article on the events of 1905 from an anarchist perspective (Anarcho-Syndicalist Review, no. 42/3, Winter 2005)

1905

(in Estonian)

Estonia during the Russian Revolution of 1905

From the collection of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University

Russian Graphic Art and the Revolution of 1905.

(in Polish)

Revolution of 1905 in Poland

The Soviet Archives