Chapter LXXII: Section 3: of this law of 1903 recites ‘that whenever the (2)

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1904-1905 (OCTOBER-MAY).

RUEF, ABRAHAM.

See (in this Volume)
MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT: SAN FRANCISCO.

RUNCIMAN, Mr.:
President of the English Board of Education.
Statements.

See (in this Volume)
EDUCATION: ENGLAND: A. D. 1909.

----------RUSSIA: Start--------

RUSSIA: A. D. 1870-1905.
Increase of Population compared with other European Countries.

See (in this Volume)
[Other countries or regions]: A. D. 1870-1905.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1901 (July).
Russianizing of the Finnish Army.
Autocratic Violation of the Constitution of Finland.

See (in this Volume)
FINLAND: A. D. 1901.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1901-1904.
Persistent Occupation of Manchuria, despite Treaty with China.
Japanese Complaints and Demands.

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1901-1904,
CHINA: A. D. 1901-1902.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1901-1904.
The Disaffection among the Students of the Universities.
Famine in Eastern Districts, and Industrial Depression
in the Cities.
Assassination of Sipiagin.
Advent of Plehve to Power.
Atrocities of his Administration.
Witte, Minister of Finance.
Assassination of Plehve.

In Volume VI. of this work, which went to press in the spring
of 1901, the record of events in Russia was brought down to
March and April of that year. The revolutionary temper, then
rapidly rising in heat throughout the Empire, found its most
active manifestation among the students of the universities,
whose outbreaks of disaffection were punished mercilessly, by
Siberian exile, by draft into the army, or more summarily by
the Cossacks’ knout. The Tsar, however, had seemed at last to
recognize the special grievances of the students and to wish
to have remedies found for them. To succeed M. Bogoliepoff,
the late Minister of Instruction, whom a student had shot on
the 27th of February, the Tsar appointed to that office a
General Vannovsky, who was credited with having a clear and
sympathetic understanding of the wrongs to the student body
which provoked their disorderly conduct. It was believed, too,
that full powers had been given to him for reforming the
government of the universities. But, whatever may have been
the excellence of disposition in General Vannovsky and in the
Tsar, the projected reforms were so obstructed, in some
manner, that the students became more and more openly
revolutionary in their action, and the new minister resigned
in the second year of his endeavors.

A number of immediate causes of misery in the Empire were now
added to the many causes which a despotic and corrupt
government kept always in operation. Harvests in large parts
of Eastern Russia had failed, bringing the horrors of famine
on some 24,000,000 people. Simultaneously with this, an
industrial crisis came, to close great numbers of factories
and shops and to create a vast army of the unemployed. M.
Witte, as Minister of Finance, had been extraordinarily
skilful and successful in developing new industries in Russia;
but had done so by measures of unnatural stimulation which had
this unfortunate result. High tariffs for the protection of
home manufactures from foreign competition, and the offer of
attractive inducements to foreign capital, had brought about
many investments which proved to be unprofitable, and the time
had come, as happens always and everywhere in such cases, when
the unsound structure of productive enterprise must collapse.
Thus the country, having all of its industrial centers filled
with suffering unemployed workmen and many of its rural
districts filled with starving peasants, was a field most
perfectly prepared for the seed of insurgent passion which
countless agents were now busied in sowing.

Students and workmen became associated in flagrant
revolutionary demonstrations, flaunting the red flag of
rebellion and singing seditious songs, at St. Petersburg,
Moscow, Kieff, Kharkoff, Odessa, and other cities, fighting
vain battles with savage Cossacks and police. To excite the
peasantry to action, a forged ukase was circulated among them,
in the districts of Poltava and Kharkoff, announcing that the
land, held wrongly by the nobles, had been restored to them by
the Tsar; that they could take possession of it, and, with it,
the present contents of granaries and barns. They proceeded
accordingly to strip many estates (see below, Russia: A. D.
1902), and suffered piteously from the soldiery that came in
haste to stop their deluded work. It was at this time that M.
Witte set on foot an extensive inquiry into agricultural
conditions, the important political outcome of which will be
spoken of later on.

On the 15th of April, 1902, the Minister of the Interior, M.
Sipiagin, was killed by a student named Belmatcheff. This
murderous exploit of the revolutionary terrorists brought a
man into power who gave Russia an experience in the next two
years, of heartlessness and foulness in despotism which
surpassed all that it had known before.

{564}

"Sipiagin, when Minister of the Interior, had already brought
matters so far by his reactionary policy of violence that the
news of his assassination at the hands of Belmatcheff was
received with unmixed joy in all classes of Russian society.
But the fullest proof of the irreconcilableness of autocracy
with things like improvement and progress was furnished by the
successor of Sipiagin, Von Plehve, who soon proved himself to
be the complete personification of all evil, heartlessness,
and corruption. … The attention of the highest circles was
drawn to his person when, after the assassination of Alexander
II., he conducted the prosecution at the arraignment of the
participators in the deed. Later, on being appointed State
Secretary, he was able, by his persistent zeal in the service
of the reaction, to place himself on a good footing with those
in power, particularly with the Procurator of the Holy Synod,
Pobiedonostseff, who, when the policy of destroying the
Finnish constitution was determined upon, found a good tool in
Von Plehve. In the anti-Finn _coup d’état_ he played a
considerable part, particularly as member of the secret
committee which drafted the plan for the Russification of the
Finnish Grand Duchy, and drew up the manifesto; while, still
later, as Secretary for Finland, together with the then
Governor-General Bobrikoff, he conducted and carried out the
well-known policy of suppression.

"As Minister of the Interior, Von Plehve lost no time in
showing what policy he intended to follow, as he declared the
general dissatisfaction in Russia to be solely the result of
the conspiracy and machinations of a handful of evil disposed
persons, who could easily be rendered incapable of harm if
only the police were sufficiently strengthened and received
extensive powers. … The Minister came into conflict, shortly
after his appointment, with a number of his colleagues,
especially with the Finance Minister, De Witte, who had
previously been practically omnipotent, and with the Minister
of Justice, Muravieff. The difference with the latter hinged
on the question of the treatment of 'political criminals,' the
trials of whom Von Plehve wished to allocate to a special
court-martial, the proceedings being conducted with closed
doors, whilst the Minister of Justice required a public trial
before the ordinary courts. The Tsar, as usual, followed the
most reactionary counsel. … Of deeper significance and more
far-reaching effects was the conflict with the Finance
Minister, who, indeed was far more menacing to Von Plehve’s
exalted position. Without being imbued with really liberal
views, but being possessed of intelligence and a clear view as
regards all social phenomena, De Witte, doubtless one of the
most able statesmen Russia has possessed in recent times,
recognized that, if matters in the Empire continued much
longer in the same way, a catastrophe was unavoidable. …

"De Witte obtained the consent of the Tsar to the formation of
committees, in the different parts of the country, consisting
of representatives of agriculture, and including both large
estate owners and men of the people, to whom was allotted the
task of declaring their views as to the cause of the decline
of Russian agriculture, and of indicating steps for the
improvement of agricultural conditions. De Witte himself urged
the committees to express themselves freely and openly as to
the causes of the prevailing misery, and as to the means of
remedying it. But in all probability he hardly expected that
these utterances would go so far in their openness as they
really did. Quite a number of committees were perspicacious
enough to deal not merely with the economical, but likewise
with the general political position, though recognising that
the former was very closely connected with the latter. In this
way the ice was broken. One committee after the other
criticised the existing system of government with astonishing
boldness, and required an unconditional and radical change
therein. … it was the representatives of the _zemtsvo_
assemblies who played the chief part in the agricultural
committees, and consequently hopes began to be cherished more
or less everywhere that these assemblies would now receive
amplified rights, and that in this way the basis would be laid
for the future and for the constitution dreamt of by all. Such
hopes were, however, not to the taste of Von Plehve, the new
Minister of the Interior. … Finally they [the committees] were
dissolved, without having achieved any other result than a
number of reports which had been drawn up by them, and which
ended by being pigeon-holed in one record office or the other.
Von Plehve had conquered the Finance Minister. But his success
was a Pyrrhic victory. At one stroke he converted a large
number of liberal friends of reform into radical adherents of
the emancipation movement, while to all others who had
followed the proceedings of the agricultural committees with
interest and expectancy he brought home a clear apprehension
of the fact that a régime, under which the will or the whim of
an irresponsible official could bring to naught plans having
for their object the amendment of the conditions of life of
many millions of people, could never contribute to the
promotion of national development. Similar fruits were borne
by Von Plehve’s policy in many other directions. …

"Never have the police been so numerous or so powerful as
under Von Plehve’s regime; never were such trifling causes
sufficient to deprive both sexes of citizens of their liberty,
to expose them to ill-treatment, and to send them into exile.
But never, on the other hand, have such means proved to be
more powerless. … The so-called ‘Organisation of the
Struggle,’ the same that had slain the previous Minister of
the Interior, Sipiagin, also sentenced to death the Governor
of Ulfa, Bogdanovitch. … At last Von Plehve, too, was
overtaken by his fate. On the 28th of July, 1904, a member of
the ‘Organisation of the Struggle’ threw a bomb into the
carriage of the Minister as he was driving towards the Warsaw
railway station in St. Petersburg, on his way to an audience
with the Tsar. He was killed instantaneously; while the
assassin, Sasonov, and a second terrorist, Sickocki, who had
lent him assistance, were arrested and condemned to twenty and
eleven years respectively of penal servitude."

_K. Zilliacus,
The Russian Revolutionary Movement,
chapter 16 (New York, Dutton and Company)._

{565}

RUSSIA: A. D. 1902.
The Political Awakening of the Common People.
Ideas of the Stundists.
Peasants taking Possession of the Granaries.
Floggings and Butcheries in Progress.

"The discontented crowds are unarmed, their only weapons are,
so far, shouts, banners and martyrdom for Liberty, while the
auto-bureaucratic regime meets these with the infliction of
wounds and death. Still there are features in this uneven
struggle which are of very ill-omen for auto-bureaucracy. Such
is, in the first place, the hearty compact between the factory
workers and the masses of the towns on the one hand, and the
forward elements of the classes, mainly represented by
students of the different higher educational institutions, on
the other. Secondly, there is the persistency with which the
cries ‘Down with Autocracy!’ ‘Long live Liberty,’ are now
resounding throughout the Empire of the Tzars. The shooters
are invariably beaten down, even shot down, as we shall see
later on; but the cry is raised again and again. Revolutions
are, unfortunately, not accomplished by shouts alone; but does
not the Tzar’s Government take all possible pains to teach the
population this simple truth? …

"Merciless wholesale flogging goes on in the Poltava province.
Rifles have also been used; and a number of women and children
have been wounded and several peasants shot dead. One of the
bodies had fourteen bullets in it. In the Kharkov province
‘peace and order’ has been enforced with a still greater
‘respect to uniform and arms.’ The soldiers themselves state
that the number of blows doled out with the bundles of birch
to the peasants amounted at times to 250 per person. When
fleeing from the torture eight peasants hit on a patrol. The
commanding officer being drunk ordered ‘fire!’ and all the
eight unarmed and helpless victims fell dead!

"But do these ‘energetic measures’ produce the desired effect?
In the village of Kourlak, Province of Voronezh, the same
merciless flogging was to be administered to all its
inhabitants. When the thirty-seventh peasant received his
portion of the torture, the villagers, after consultation,
declared that they submitted. But they collected carefully
_all_ the birch-bundles which served for the execution.
‘ They will be of use to us,’ said the peasants, ‘when
_we_ shall flog _you!_’ All the official
explanations given them by the authorities on this occasion
led them to the conclusion that the administration
acknowledged the righteousness of their claims on the land,
and flogged them only for using wrong means for its
recovery;—that therefore they would soon have the upper hand
over the officials and landlords, and would then flog them in
their turn.

"Nor does the movement in the Poltava Province (see above,
Russia. A. D. 1901-1904) show any sign of abatement. According
to the latest private information, which dates from the last
day of April, the peasant movement there does not at all bear
the character of devastation; although the landlords are
undoubtedly ruined by the quiet doings of the villagers. There
is no pillaging. The peasants, headed by their elective
elders, open the granaries of the landlords and distribute the
grain among themselves according to the needs of each family
(the well-to-do receiving nothing), while the remaining grain,
if any, is transferred to the communal stores. Part of this
appropriated grain has already been used by the peasants for
sowing their own fields, as well as those they have
appropriated from the gentry. As soon as the troops are
marched into the rebellious locality, they take possession
of the appropriated grain still remaining in the communal
granaries, and return it to its former owners. But as soon as
the soldiery, after wholesale flogging of the peasantry, leave
the locality, the peasants again take possession of the
landlords’ grain. The prison at Poltava is crammed with
peasants and students, and yet clandestine manifestoes are
published with the regularity of the local official paper, and
are distributed even among the soldiery. …

"The present peasant movement is not confined to the three
provinces already mentioned. In these it originated simply on
the ground of starvation, and similar events are reported from
the provinces of Koursk, Ekaterinoslav and Podolia; also in
those of Tomsk, Tobolsk, etc., in distant Siberia, where
governmental grain stores suffered the fate of the landlords’
granaries in Europe. But the tension of the peasants’ spirit,
their utter distrust of the present Government, and their
readiness to take justice into their own hands may be said to
be universal throughout the Empire.

"At the beginning of the Social Democratic movement in Russia
no hopes of the Russian peasant were cherished by its leaders.
But powerful agrarian organisations have since sprung up."

_Felix Volkhovsky,
The Russian Awakening
(Contemporary Review, June, 1902)._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1902.
Russo-Chinese Treaty concerning Tibet.

See (in this Volume)
TIBET: A. D. 1902.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1903 (April).
The Massacre of Jews at Kishineff.

The British Vice-Consul at Odessa, Mr. Bosanquet, visited
Kishineff in July, to learn the facts of the barbarous attack
on the Jewish population of that town, which had been made by
a mob in the previous April. The following particulars are
taken from his official report, published soon afterward as a
Parliamentary Paper:

"The riots began on Easter Sunday (O. S.), (the 19th April, N.
S.), in the afternoon, in the eastern extremity of the town …
and on that day were confined to the ordinary acts of a
turbulent crowd—_e. g._, the smashing of windows and
door-panels in Jewish houses. The area of Sunday’s disturbance
was comparatively small." Early the next morning they began
afresh in the same quarter, and spread to other parts of the
town. "They were directed entirely against the Jews." "Monday
was the day when the worst crimes were committed, and these
were perpetrated by bands of rioters in different parts of the
town. Many people believe the riots to be the work of
organized companies."

"Besides the murders committed, the interiors of houses were
utterly dismantled, pillows ripped up, Jewish Scriptures torn,
floors destroyed, and furniture thrown into the street; while
at an early stage wine was broached, that which was not drunk
pouring into the street. The local authorities took no
effective step to stop the riots, which continued unabated
till 4 P. M., or later, the soldiers meanwhile being passive,
if not sympathetic, spectators, and the police contenting
themselves with the arrest of minor criminals; then the
Governor, who had remained at home giving orders by telephone,
which were disregarded, at length ventured to sign the
necessary order for the troops to be employed.
{566}
The only case I heard of in which the latter used their
weapons occurred shortly after the issue of the Governor’s
order, when a Christian boy, pursuing a Jew with a stone, and
refusing to desist, was knocked down and bayoneted by
soldiers. An eye-witness of the scene related the facts to me.
This boy (with one doubtful exception) was the only Christian
killed in the disturbances. If resolute action had been taken
by the authorities, it is believed that the riots could have
been checked at an early stage. The more usual opinion seems
to be that all the murders occurred on Monday. It is certain
that none were perpetrated on Sunday, and very doubtful
whether any took place after the order to employ the troops
had come into effect. The disorders did not entirely cease, as
next day (21st April) houses in the outskirts were pillaged;
but, roughly speaking, the riots may be said to have ended on
Monday. Some students are said to have taken part in the
riots."

"Apparently a feeling existed among the lower classes that the
Jews ought not to be in a majority at Kishineff. The fact is
that they form about 50 per cent. of the population, which
amounts to some 115,000 inhabitants, the other half consisting
two-thirds of Moldavians, and after them of Russians, Greeks,
Armenians, Poles, Germans, &c."

The victims of these melancholy occurrences are officially
estimated at 41 Jews killed, or who died subsequently of
wounds, 3 severely, and 300 slightly, wounded. Among the
killed was one child accidentality suffocated by its mother. The
deaths are placed by another (Jewish) authority at 43,
including 2 young children, and by some even as high as 47,
but this figure seems to include persons who died from shock,
and not directly from violence. The official estimate of
deaths is identical with the figure communicated to me at the
Jewish hospital.

"Three hundred and eight persons have already been convicted
of thefts and other minor offenses [in connection with the
riots], and have been sentenced to terms of imprisonment
ranging from one week to three months. … The accused still
awaiting trial number 360. … Of the above prisoners 260 are
accused of participation in the riots without actual violence
and are out on bail in sums ranging from 200 to 300 roubles.
Those in this category who are found guilty will be sentenced
to imprisonment without hard labour in the Maison
Correctionnelle, where the discipline is more severe than in
prison. The remaining 100 are charged with murder in addition
to other crimes, and those found guilty will be transported to
undergo penal servitude in the Island of Sakhalin."

RUSSIA: A. D. 1903 (May-October).
Intrigues against Opening Ports in Manchuria to Foreign Trade.

See (in this Volume)
CHINA: A. D. 1903 (May-October).

RUSSIA: A. D. 1903-1904.
Concert with Austria-Hungary in submitting the Mürzsteg
Programme of Reform in Macedonia to Turkey.

See (in this Volume)
TURKEY: A. D. 1903-1904.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1904 (February-July).
Opening of the War with Japan.
Battles at the Yalu.
First operations in Manchuria.
First movements against Port Arthur.

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1904 (FEBRUARY-JULY).

RUSSIA: A. D. 1904 (July-September).
War with Japan:
Japanese Success in Manchuria.
The great battle of Liao-Yang.

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1904 (JULY-SEPTEMBER).

RUSSIA: A. D. 1904-1905.
Reforming attempts of Prince Mirsky.
Meeting of Zemstvo presidents.
The Revolutionary Workman.
Father Gapon.
The Appeal to the Tsar.
The answering Massacre of "Bloody Sunday."
Assassination of Grand Duke Sergius.
Witte’s practical premiership.
The Call of the First Duma.
The General Strike on the Railways.
The Great General Strike.
The Ukase of October 30, called the Constitution of Russia.
Beginning of Reaction.
The Postal Strike.
Fatal Rising at Moscow.

The hated Plehve was succeeded by Prince Svyatopolk Mirsky, a
broad-minded statesman, who began earnest efforts to set the
government on a different course. One of the first measures of
the prince was to win authority from the Tsar for a meeting of
the presidents of the zemstvos, or provincial councils, which
are bodies of a considerably representative character,
exercising a limited power in their rural districts over
matters of sanitation, public roads, and common schools.
Ostensibly, the meeting was to concert measures of relief for
the wounded in the war with Japan; but everybody knew that
political questions could not escape discussion if such a
meeting was held.

All the interests that uphold autocracy, aristocracy, and
bureaucracy in Russia were quick to scent danger, and had no
difficulty in persuading the weak-willed sovereign to recall
his consent to the meeting. In his feeble, half-way manner of
doing things, he forbade it as a public assembly, but allowed
its members to meet unofficially and privately, in November,
with no publication of their discussions or acts. They adopted
resolutions setting forth a bold demand for a representation
of the people in their government, and these were laid before
the Tsar. He gave a public reply to them on the 26th of
December, ignoring the demand for representative institutions,
declaring that the government must remain autocratic, but
making vague promises of reform in the laws, with especial
assurances of liberty to the press and in religion; but
everything granted must flow by gracious favor from the
autocracy, through the channels of the bureaucracy, where it
could not by any possibility run true and clear. The words of
the Tsar, vague as they were, produced some encouragement, and
a feeling of trust in his good intentions; but the effect was
soon destroyed.

It was at about this time that Prince Trubetskoi, in authority
at Moscow, addressed a letter to Prince Mirsky, from which the
following was published in translation soon after:

"Through this letter I wish to explain myself to you, and ask
you not to refuse me the privilege of representing to the
Emperor, most humbly, the motives which prompted me to give
the zemstvo permission to assert itself. According to public
opinion, in which I concur unreservedly, Russia is, at
present, facing an epoch of anarchy and revolutionary
movement. What is going on is, by far, no mere agitation by
the youth. The youth stands forth only as a reflection of the
general state prevailing in society. This state is most
dangerous and terrible for our entire country, as well as for
all of us, and particularly so for the holy person of the
Emperor. It is, therefore, the duty of every truly loyal
subject to ward off the disastrous calamity with any and all
means at his disposal.
{567}
A short time ago, I had the good fortune to be received by the
Emperor, and to tell him, straightforwardly and truly, to the
best of my effort and knowledge, about the present state of
society. I endeavored to explain to him that what is going on
is not a riot, but a revolution; that the Russian people is
thus being drawn into a revolution, which it does not desire,
and which can be forestalled by the Emperor. Yet there is but
one way out of it, just one, and that is by the Emperor
placing confidence in the strength of society and of the
masses. In the depths of my soul I am firmly convinced that if
the Emperor only wanted to confidently group these powers
around himself, Russia would free itself from all the terrors
of the impending disturbance, and would support its Czar, his
will, and his absolute sovereignty. In view of the state of
mind of all the people, who are filled with fear and horror
over the things referred to above, it is really beyond human
power to refuse them to speak about that which is vexing and
tormenting everybody so fearfully."

"The opening of the next year (1905) was marked by the
appearance of a new element in revolution. Certainly, there
had been strikes and riots in the great cities before; there
had been peasant risings and other forms of economic agitation
in various parts. But as a whole the revolutionary movement as
such had been inspired, directed, and even carried out by the
educated classes—the students, the journalists, the doctors,
barristers, and other professional men. It had been almost
limited to that great division of society which in Russia is
called ‘The Intelligence.’ … It was ‘the Intelligence’ who
hitherto had fought for the revolution. … At length the
first-fruits of their toilsome propaganda, continued through
forty years, were seen, and the revolutionary workman
appeared.

"He was ushered in by Father George Gapon, at that time a
rather simple-hearted priest, with a rather childlike faith in
God and the Tsar, and a certain genius for organization. His
personal hold upon the working classes was probably due to
their astonishment that a priest should take any interest in
their affairs, outside their fees. … Father Gapon, with his
thin line of genius for organization, had gathered the
workmen’s groups or trade unions of St. Petersburg into a
fairly compact body, called ‘The Russian Workmen’s Union,’ of
which he was President as well as founder. In the third week
in January the men at the Putiloff iron works struck because
two of their number had been dismissed for belonging to their
union. At once the Neva iron and ship-building works, the
Petroffsky cotton works, the Alexander engine works, the
Thornton cloth works, and other great factories on the banks
of the river or upon the industrial islands joined in the
strike, and in two days some 100,000 work-people were ‘out.’

"With his rather childlike faith in God and the Tsar, Father
Gapon organized a dutiful appeal of the Russian workmen to the
tender-hearted autocrat whose benevolence was only thwarted by
evil counsellors and his ignorance of the truth. The petition
ran, in part, as follows:—

"‘We workmen come to you for truth and protection. We have
reached the extreme limits of endurance. We have been
exploited, and shall continue to be exploited under your
bureaucracy. The bureaucracy has brought the country to the
verge of ruin and by a shameful war is bringing it to its
downfall. We have no voice in the heavy burdens imposed on us.
We do not even know for whom or why this money is wrung from
the impoverished people, and we do not know how it is
expended. This is contrary to the Divine laws, and renders
life impossible. It is better that we should all perish, we
workmen and all Russia. Then good luck to the capitalists and
exploiters of the poor, the corrupt officials and robbers of
the Russian people!

"‘Throw down the wall that separates you from your people.
Russia is too great and her needs are too various for
officials to rule. National representation is essential, for
the people alone know their own needs. Direct that elections
for a constituent assembly be held by general secret ballot.
That is our chief petition. Everything is contained in that.
If you do not reply to our prayer, we will die in this square
before your palace. We have nowhere else to go. Only two paths
are open to us—to liberty and happiness or to the grave.
Should our lives serve as the offering of suffering Russia, we
shall not regret the sacrifice, but endure it willingly.’

"On the morning of Sunday, January 22, 1905, about 15,000
working men and women formed into a procession to carry this
petition to the Tsar in his Winter Palace upon the great
square of government buildings. They were all in their Sunday
clothes; many peasants had come up from the country in their
best embroideries; they took their children with them. In
front marched Father Gapon and two other priests wearing
vestments. With them went the ikons, or holy pictures of
shining brass and silver, and a portrait of the Tsar. As the
procession moved along, they sang, ‘God save our people. God
give our orthodox Tsar the victory.’

"So the Russian workmen made their last appeal to the autocrat
whom they called their father. They would lay their griefs
before him, they would see him face to face, they would hear
his comforting words. But the father of his people had
disappeared into space. As the procession entered the square,
the soldiers fired volley after volley upon them from three
sides. The estimate of the killed and wounded was about 1500.
That Sunday—January 9th in Russian style—is known as Bloody
Sunday or Vladimir’s Day, after the Grand Duke Vladimir who
was supposed to have given the orders. Next morning Father
Gapon wrote to his Union: ‘There is no Tsar now. Innocent
blood has flowed between him and the people.’"

_Henry W. Nevinson,
The Dawn in Russia, Introduction.
(Harper’s, New York)._

If the atrocity of the 9th of January was intended to
terrorize and paralyze the opposition to absolutism it failed.
It maddened the more violent revolutionists, and increasingly
desperate enterprises of assassination were provoked. The
provocation was made greater by the appointment of Trepoff,
notorious for brutality of temper, to a newly created office,
of Governor-General of St. Petersburg. On the 17th of February
the Grand Duke Sergius, uncle to the Tsar, Governor-General of
Moscow, and conspicuously heartless and foul in his exercise
of power, was assassinated as he drove through the streets.
Strikes and riotous outbreaks were of constant occurrence in
the industrial cities, especially violent in Warsaw, Lodz, and
other Polish towns.

{568}

The Tsar issued a piteous manifesto on the 3d of March,
appealing for a "rally round the throne" by all "who, true to
Russia’s past, honestly and conscientiously have a care for
all the affairs of the state such as we have ourselves." On
the same day he published a rescript in which he said: "I am
resolved henceforth, with the help of God, to convene the
worthiest men, possessing the confidence of the people and
elected by them, to participate in the elaboration and
consideration of legislative measures." But, even if this
expressed the personal disposition of the weak-willed
sovereign, it promised nothing to correspond to it in the
action of government; as was shown by the promotion of Trepoff
to be Assistant-Minister of the Interior and Chief of Police.
Prince Mirsky, baffled in his undertakings and hopeless of
good from his service, had resigned the Ministry of the
Interior, and his successor, M. Buliguine, held the office but
a short time. M. Serguei Yulievitch Witte, former Minister of
Finance, and latterly President of the Imperial Ministers, now
acquired a substantial premiership in the administration,
which does not seem to have belonged to his office before.
Nothing of satisfaction came from the December promises of
reformed law. Bureaucratic commissions were understood to be
working on measures to make good the Tsar’s word, but months
passed with no result. There were fitful relaxations of the
censorship of the press, so capricious that no editor could
know what he might and might not say.

In April, religious liberty was proclaimed, with special
rights and privileges reserved to the Russian orthodox church.
M. Witte had advocated a separation of the church from the
state; but that was beyond hope. There must, however, have
been an important weakening of church influence in the
government, since the long despotic procurator-general of the
Holy Synod, M. Pobiedonostzeff, resigned before the close of
the year.

Early in the summer the heads of provincial zemstvos held
another meeting, and discussed the popular demand for a
constitutional and representative government without
restraint. Then the Czar gave them a friendly audience, and
declared to them that "the admission of elected
representatives to works of state will be regularly
accomplished"; but this was followed speedily by an official
explanation that his majesty’s remarks must not be understood
as containing "any indication of the possibility of modifying
the fundamental law of the empire." This was to check an eager
leaping of the public mind to high hopes.

On the 19th of August the long wavering imperial mind seemed
brought to a definite intention at last, in a proclamation
which summoned a national assembly, or duma, to meet "not
later than the middle of January, 1906."

"The Empire of Russia," said the Tsar in his preamble, "is
formed and strengthened by the indestructible solidarity of
the Tsar with the people and the people with the Tsar. The
concord and union of the people and the Tsar are a great moral
force, which has created Russia in the course of centuries by
protecting her from all misfortunes and all attacks, and has
constituted up to the present time a pledge of unity,
independence, integrity, material well-being, and intellectual
development. Autocratic Tsars, our ancestors, constantly had
that object in view, and the time has come to follow out their
good intentions, and to summon elected representatives from
the whole of Russia to take a constant and active part in the
elaboration of laws, attaching for this purpose to the higher
state institutions a special consultative body, entrusted with
the preliminary elaboration and discussion of measures, and
with the examination of the state budget. It is for this
reason that, while preserving the fundamental law regarding
autocratic power, we have deemed it well to form a State Duma,
and to approve regulations for the elections to this Duma."

By the terms of the call it will be seen, "the fundamental law
regarding autocratic power" was preserved with care. And, said
the proclamation, "we reserve to ourselves entirely the care
of perfecting the organization of the duma." It was to have no
power to initiate legislation, but only to discuss and pass
judgment upon measures brought before it by the ministers of
the Tsar, who thus held fast to the substance of his
autocratic power.

The Duma was to consist of 412 members, representing 50
governments and the military province of the Don, and only 28
members representing towns. It was to be elected for five
years, unless dissolved sooner by the Tsar. Its meetings were
to be secret, except as the president, in his discretion,
might admit the reporters of the Press.

The limited functions proposed for the Duma, and the
indefinite prescription of procedure in its election, left not
much in the Tsar’s project of a national assembly to satisfy
the nation. In September a large meeting of representatives of
the zemstvos, from all parts of the Empire, was held privately
at Moscow, and it was there agreed that they should exert
themselves to secure as many seats in the coming Duma as
possible, with a view to making it instrumental in the
movement for something better. The ultimate aim of present
endeavor was defined in a programme which included: a
representative national legislature; a systematic budget
system; freedom of conscience, speech, press, meeting and
association; inviolability of person and home; equal rights of
all citizens; equal responsibility of all officials and
citizens under the law; the abolition of passports.

In October, on the 21st, the workingmen organized their first
great general strike, on the railways, which paralyzed travel
and traffic, except as the government could operate some
military trains. The strikers made bold demands, presented to
Witte on the 24th: "The claims of the working classes," they
said, "must be settled by laws constituted by the will of the
people and sanctioned by all Russia. The only solution is to
announce political guarantees for freedom and the convocation
of a Constituent Assembly, elected by direct, universal and
secret suffrage. Otherwise the country will be forced into
rebellion." Witte replied: "A Constituent Assembly is for the
present impossible.
{569}
Universal suffrage would, in fact, only give preëminence to
the richest classes, because they could influence all the
voting by their money. Liberty of the press and of public
meeting will be granted very shortly. I am myself strongly
opposed to all persecution and bloodshed, and I am willing to
support the greatest amount of liberty possible. … But there
is not in the entire world a single cultivated man who is in
favor of universal suffrage." Two days after receiving this
reply the Council of Labor Delegates, or "Strike Committee,"
declared a general strike of workmen throughout Russia, and
about a million workingmen are said to have taken the risk of
starvation by dropping work.

No doubt it was that evidence of determination in the
revolutionary spirit of the country which drew from the Tsar,
on the 30th of October, the famous ukase which was
characterized hastily at the time as "the Magna Charta of
Russia," "the surrender of autocracy," the founding of
constitutional government. In reality, the document was no
more than an injunction to the ministers of the autocrat to
carry out his "absolute will" in certain matters, most of
which were set forth with characteristic vagueness of terms.
The following is a translation of the entire manifesto, as
communicated to the Government of the United States from its
embassy at St. Petersburg:

By the grace of God we, Nicholas Second, Emperor and Autocrat
of all the Russias, Tsar of Poland, Grand Duke of Finland,
etc.

The rioting and agitation in the capitals and in many
localities of our Empire has filled our heart with great and
deep affliction. The welfare of the Russian Emperor is united
with the welfare of the people, and its troubles are his
troubles. The agitation which has broken out may bring
confusion among the people and threaten the entirety and unity
of our Empire.

The solemn vow of the imperial service commands us, with all
the strength of intelligence and of our power, to endeavor to
stop as quickly as possible agitations so dangerous to the
Empire. In ordering the competent authorities to take measures
to avert the disorders, the troubles, and violence, and to
guard peaceful people who are eager to fulfill quietly the
duties placed upon them, we have found it necessary, in order
to insure the proper execution of the general measures marked
out by us, to unify the action of the supreme government.

We lay upon the government the fulfillment of our absolute
will:

1. To grant to the population the inviolable basis of free
citizenship, on the ground of actual inviolable personality,
freedom of conscience, speech, meeting, and unions;

2. Without stopping the intended elections for the State Duma,
to include now in the participation of the Duma as far as
possible, in view of the corresponding short term which
remains before the convocation of the Duma, those classes of
the population which up to now were entirely deprived of the
right to vote and to allow in future the further development
of the element of a general right of election which is to be
established by new legislation; and

3. To establish as an inviolable rule that no law shall take
effect without its confirmation by the State Duma and that the
persons elected by the population should be guaranteed the
possibility of actual control over the legal activity of the
persons appointed by us.

We call on all the true sons of Russia to remember their
duties toward their fatherland, to assist in combating these
unheard-of agitations, and together with us to unite all their
strength in establishing quietness and peace in their country.

Given in Peterhof on the 17th day of October in the year of
our Lord 1905 and the eleventh year of our reign.

(Signed in his own hand.)
NICHOLAS.

At the same time, the ministers of the autocrat were enjoined
to "abstain from any interference in the elections of the
duma;" they were to "maintain the prestige of the duma and
confidence in its labors, and not resist its decisions so long
as they are not inconsistent with the historic greatness of
Russia." In the exercise of executive power they should embody
"(1) straightforwardness and sincerity in the confirmation of
civil liberty;"
"(2), a tendency toward the abolition of exclusive laws;"
"(3), the coordination of the activity of all the organs of
government;"
"(4), the avoidance of repressive measures in respect to
proceedings which do not openly menace society or the state."

These orders and injunctions from the autocracy to the
bureaucracy were to be the constitution of government for
which Russia had made demands. They did not satisfy the
demand—or satisfied only the small party who were afterwards
called "Octobrists," because they asked for no more than was
granted in this ukase of October 30, 1905. The general strike
was not called off, but demands for a Constituent Assembly
were reiterated persistently. Agitation was kept alive, and
with it the murderous warfare waged by revolutionists against
high officials and the police. At the same time, reactionary
officials and army officers, enraged by what the Tsar had
done, stirred up mobs in various parts of the country to
attack the Jews, and add to the state of public disorder, thus
furnishing arguments for a fresh resort to repressive measures
by the military arm. Presently there were serious outbreaks of
mutiny in army and navy, at Odessa, Kronstadt, and Sevastopol,
and all the foundations of public order seemed really, for a
time, to be breaking up.

It is evident there was serious alarm in the circles of the
autocracy. Pobiedonostzeff, the bigoted Procurator of the Holy
Synod, and Trepoff, the savage head of the police, resigned.
On the 4th of November an amnesty to political offenders was
proclaimed, and the ancient liberties of Finland were
restored, by a decree which abolished that of February, 1899
(see, in Volume VI., FINLAND), and that also annulled a later
military law, of 1901, by which the Finnish army had been put
on the Russian footing.

These signs of yielding to the claims "of the nation soon gave
place, however, to symptoms on the reactionary side of revived
courage and obstinacy among the keepers and masters of the
Tsar’s mind and will. A manifesto on the 12th of November
declared that reforms would not be possible till the country
was quieted. Another on the 13th proclaimed martial law in
Poland; whereat the "strike committee" called another strike
in sympathy with Poland.
{570}
On the 14th Witte published an appeal to the workmen, saying:
"Brothers! Workmen! Go back to your work and cease from
disorder. Have pity on your wives and children, and turn a
deaf ear to mischievous counsels. The Tsar commands us to
devote special attention to the labor question, and to that
end has appointed a Ministry of Commerce and Industry, which
will establish just relations between masters and men. Only
give us time, and I will do all that is possible for you. Pay
attention to the advice of a man who loves you and wishes you
well." The renewed strike was not successful. Not many of the
workingmen would face the suffering from non-employment which
they had gone through already. The attempt was ended on the
20th; but the Committee which called it, in annulling the
order, enjoined the workers of the Empire to organize "for the
final encounter between all Russia and the bloody monarchy now
dragging out its last days."

Meantime, on the 17th, the Tsar sought to conciliate the
peasants by reducing for one year the payments on land that
were due under the land distribution which went with
emancipation in 1861, and remitting them entirely after
January, 1907.

See (in Volume IV.)
SLAVERY, MEDIEVAL AND MODERN: RUSSIA.

On the 20th of November a Peasants’ Congress of 300 delegates
met in Moscow and formulated demands for the nationalization
of land and for a constituent assembly. The delegates were
arrested. An alarming mutiny in the fleet and army at
Sevastopol broke out on the 26th, but it was soon suppressed.
Two days later the whole body of employees in the postal and
telegraphic service at Moscow began a most troublesome strike,
which spread from there and was continued for some weeks. Mr.
Nevinson, who was in Moscow at the time, describes it in one
of his chapters:

"In those happy weeks when freedom still was young and living,
two things ruled the country—speech and the strike, the word
and the blow. The strike was everywhere felt. No letter or
telegram went or came. Each town in Russia was isolated, and
the whole Empire stood severed from the world. … In Moscow the
cooks struck, and paraded the streets with songs never heard
in the drawing-room. The waiters struck, and heavy proprietors
lumbered about with their own plates and dishes. The
nursemaids struck for Sundays out. The housemaids struck for
rooms with windows, instead of cupboards under the stairs, or
sections from the water closets. Schoolboys struck for more
democratic masters and pleasanter lessons. Teachers struck for
higher pay. … But at the back of the strikes and all the
revolutionary movement lay the motive force of speech. … After
these centuries of suppression, all Russia was revelling in a
spiritual debauch of words."

On the 6th of December General Sakharoff, formerly Minister of
War and now Governor-General of a district on the Volga, was
shot by a woman, to avenge the sufferings he had caused to the
peasants. On the 7th the Strike Committee called on the
workpeople to withdraw their money from the savings-banks;
and, a little later, a joint manifesto, issued by that
committee and committees of Peasants, Social Democrats, and
Social Revolutionists, appealed generally to the people, not
only to withdraw money from the savings banks, but "to refuse
to pay taxes, or to take bank-notes, or to subscribe to
loans," as a means of crippling the government financially.
All papers which published this manifesto were suppressed and
their editors arrested.

Then, in the last twelve days of December, came the fatal
rising at Moscow, which the government, forewarned by its
spies, precipitated, while the revolutionists’ preparations
were but half made, and which it crushed mercilessly, with
ease. From a diary of the occurrences of these tragical days
at Moscow, given in the report of the resident American Consul
to Ambassador Meyer, at St. Petersburg, the following entries
are taken:

"_December_ 24.
Barricades were continually built during days and nights. The
revolutionists were in hope that about 20,000 or 30,000
workmen from the factories in the suburbs would enter the city
and join them, but this was not accomplished, as the military
forces were sufficient to prevent this. The revolutionists
spread a rumor amongst the workmen that the soldiers were in
sympathy with the strikers and that they would not fire on the
mob and would join their ranks, but this rumor turned out to
be untrue, as the troops were loyal to the Government. …

"_December_ 27.
At 6 o’clock P. M. the house where the chief of the secret
police, Mr. Voilochenkoff, resides, was surrounded by a
revolutionary party and by their insistent demands the front
door was opened. Six men rushed into his apartments and
arrested the chief, and read the death sentence of the
revolutionary party to him. His wife and three children
pleaded to the revolutionists for mercy, but the
revolutionists would not listen to their pleading, and they
gave Mr. Voilochenkoff a short time to prepare for death and
then took him out into a side street where he was shot to
death, and his body left in the street. Disturbances and
shooting were carried on in the different parts of the city,
and new barricades erected.

"_December_ 31.
The troops bombarded the large Prochoroff spinning mills,
where a large number of revolutionists made their last stand.
Many houses in the vicinity of the mill were either burnt down
or wrecked by cannon balls. Many of the revolutionists and
strikers were killed, wounded, or captured and the weapons
confiscated. The general strike has been called off."

This was practically the end of the abortive rising. On the
5th of January, 1906, Ambassador Meyer wrote to the State
Department at Washington:

"In my cable of December 25 I stated that although fighting
had been stubborn and gatling guns had been used, I believed
that the estimates so far given out as to loss of life were
much exaggerated. It appears now that I was correct in my
surmise, for in a semi-official statement given by one of the
papers, from statistics taken at all the hospitals and
accident bureaus, the deaths were given as about 750 and the
wounded as a little over a thousand.

"I am glad to state that as yet I have heard of no injuries
occurring to American citizens in Moscow; in fact in all these
disturbances that have taken place in the various cities the
revolutionists and strikers have refrained in all instances
from attacking foreign consulates, and I believe this also
applies to the property of foreign individuals."

{571}

On the 29th of January Ambassador Meyer wrote to Washington:
"The revolutionary party seems to have spent its force for the
time being. Instead of aiding reforms, they have greatly
hampered them. By the attempted capture of Moscow, by their
riots and rebellions in other parts of the country, followed
by destruction of life and property, they have forced the
Government into repression and reactionary methods in order to
restore law and order. All this has necessarily caused a delay
in the classification of the newly enfranchised voters and has
given an excuse for a continued waste of precious time due to
bureaucratic formality.

"Some of the factions are finally waking up to the necessity
of giving attention to registration and a better comprehension
of the coming elections. The Constitutional-Democratic party
have decided by a large majority to take part in the elections
and the Douma. The Social Democrats have also decided to
participate. On the other hand, the Russian
Social-Revolutionaries, at their first meeting in Finland,
lately, voted in favor of a boycott of the elections.

"At its last meeting, the Constitutional-Democratic party, in
view of obstacles to free election campaigning which the local
authorities are using against all opposing parties, voted to
protest against the government policy, which in any way
impeded free elections to the Imperial Douma, and further
urged the most energetic participation of its members in the
approaching elections.

"At a meeting of the marshals of the nobility, held at Moscow
last week, the following resolutions were adopted: 1.That the
final settlement of the agrarian question should be made the
first task of the Douma. 2. That in deciding the agrarian
question, it should be based on the principle of inviolability
of private property."

RUSSIA: A. D. 1904-1905. War with Japan:
Siege and Surrender of Port Arthur.

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1904 (FEBRUARY-AUGUST) and
1904-1905 (MAY-JANUARY)

RUSSIA: A. D. 1904-1905 (October-May).--War with Japan:
Voyage of the Baltic Fleet.
Its Destruction in the Battle of Tsushima.

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1904-1905 (OCTOBER-MAY).

RUSSIA: A. D. 1904-1905 (September-March).
War with Japan: Campaign in Manchuria.
From the Battle of Liao-Yang to the end
of the Battle of Mukden.

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1904-1905 (SEPTEMBER-MARCH).

RUSSIA: A. D. 1904-1909.
General Consequences in Europe of the Weakening of Russian
Prestige and Power by the Russo-Japanese War.

See (in this Volume)
EUROPE: A. D. 1904-1909.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1905.
Action with other Powers in forcing Financial Reforms
in Macedonia on Turkey.

See (in this Volume)
TURKEY: A. D. 1905-1908.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1905 (February-November).
Naval Mutiny.
Army Revolt.
Peasant Risings.
Conflict in the Caucasus.