Armed uprising
The decisive moment of the February Revolution was the transition on February 27 (March 12), 1917, to the side of the demonstrators of the Petrograd garrison, after which the rallies grew into an armed uprising. Historian Richard Pipes wrote: “It is impossible to understand what happened [in February-March 1917] without taking into account the composition and conditions of the Petrograd garrison. The garrison consisted, in fact, of recruits and retirees enrolled in the replenishment of the reserve battalions of the guards regiments that had gone to the front, stationed in Petrograd in peacetime. Before being sent to the front, they had to undergo general military training for several weeks. The number of training units formed for this purpose exceeded any permissible norm: in some reserve companies there were more than 1000 soldiers, and battalions of 12-15 thousand people were met; a total of 160 thousand soldiers were squeezed into the barracks, designed for 20 thousand "(R. Pipes." Russian Revolution ").
The first to revolt was the training team of the reserve battalion of the Volyn regiment, headed by senior non-commissioned officer T. I. Kirpichnikov. Interestingly, the Volynsky Life Guards regiment was one of the most disciplined in the army. He stood out even against the background of other regiments of the 3rd Guards Infantry Division - famous for "hard labor" discipline. Iron discipline in the soldiers of the 3rd Guards was forged at every step. For this, they sought from them an exemplary appearance, ideal drill training and unswerving observance of internal order. Informal methods were also used, such as massacre. The instigator of the mutiny himself, senior non-commissioned officer Timofey Ivanovich Kirpichnikov, had the appropriate nickname "Mordoboy". The Volyn regiment retained its discipline at the front and fought, not paying attention to death. "Discipline was visible in everything and manifested itself at every step" - so, according to the recollections of the then commander of the regiment, it was at the beginning of 1917. And in the training team, non-commissioned officers were trained, those who had to teach the soldiers order themselves.
Kirpichnikov on the night of February 26 was appointed by the head of the training team, staff captain I. S. On February 24-26, both companies dispersed the demonstrators on Znamenskaya Square. According to Kirpichnikov's story recorded later, he quietly ordered the soldiers to aim over their heads, and on the night of the 26th, he suggested that the NCOs of both companies not shoot at all. On the evening of the 26th, he summoned the commanders of the platoons and squads of the main training team and suggested that they refuse to pacify the riots altogether. They agreed and instructed their soldiers. And on the morning of February 27, the team, built for the arrival of Lashkevich, demonstratively and grossly violated discipline. The rebels refused to obey Lashkevich's orders and then killed him. After the assassination of the commander, Kirpichnikov persuaded the non-commissioned personnel of the preparatory teams to join the main training team. Then the 4th company joined them.
Why did one of the most elite units of the Russian army raise a mutiny? The answer is in the general position of the imperial army by the beginning of 1917. Almost all the old servicemen of the Volyn regiment died in 1916. The battles of the 1916 campaign, including the famous Brusilov Breakthrough, finally depleted the cadre core of the imperial army. By the beginning of 1917, there were very few old career non-commissioned officers. As noted more than once before, the regular army of Russia, which was one of the main pillars of the empire, and with the help of which the revolution of 1905-1907 was suppressed, bled to death on the battlefields of the First World War. As the best minds of the empire had warned, Russia was not allowed to enter the big European war. The composition of the Russian army has changed in the most radical way. Old cadres (officers and non-commissioned officers), loyal to the throne and the oath, mostly perished. Millions of peasants joined the army, who received weapons, but saw no point in the war, and thousands of representatives of the intelligentsia, basically liberal, who traditionally disliked the tsarist regime. And the top generals, who were supposed to defend the empire and autocracy, decided that the tsar would not lead the country to victory, so he must be eliminated by supporting the conspiracy. In addition, many generals hoped to seriously improve their position in the country, "make a career." As a result, the army, from the support of the empire, itself became a source of confusion and chaos, it was only necessary to ignite the fuse (destabilize the capital) so that the systemic crisis of Russia would develop into a general collapse.
All this was reflected in the Volyn regiment. The February "Volyntsi" were recruits who served only a few weeks and the soldiers and most of the non-commissioned officers of the reserve battalion did not test the drills in full. Almost all of the senior soldiers were killed. In addition, some of the recruits had a front-line past. They were in the reserve battalion for the second time. In between, there was a front and a wound. They went through the wild meat grinder of the offensive battles of the summer and autumn of 1916, when the Russian armies tried to break through the Austro-German defenses and literally bled to death, fulfilling their "allied duty." Those who went through these terrible battles were no longer afraid of God or the devil, and they did not want to return to the front. The soldiers did not see the point in the war, the "straits" and Galicia had no meaning for them. The war, despite the patriotic propaganda, was imperialist, not patriotic. Russia fought for the interests of England and France, the ruling elite, which dragged the people into the slaughter. Obviously, the soldiers, with their peasant ingenuity, understood all this. Thus, the soldiers who passed the front and the survivors were not afraid to rebel, the front line will not be worse!
In addition, the soldiers, like other rebels, noticed the inaction of the authorities. Nicholas II was removed from the capital, did not have complete information and considered the excitement "nonsense". The top leadership in Petrograd was paralyzed, lacking will and decisiveness, or participated in a conspiracy of the top. Seeing that there was no decisive answer, several dozen passionaries like Kirpichnikov rebelled and ensured the success of the uprising.
Having rebelled and killed the officers, Kirpichnikov and his comrades realized that there was nothing to lose and tried to involve as many other soldiers as possible in the rebellion. Kirpichnikov with his rebellious team moved to Paradnaya in order to raise the reserve battalions of the Preobrazhensky Life Guards and the Lithuanian Life Guards regiments stationed in the Tauride barracks. Here, too, they found their own brickworkers - senior non-commissioned officer Fyodor Kruglov raised the 4th company of the reserve battalion of the Transfiguration. Turning to Preobrazhenskaya, Kirpichnikov raised a reserve company of the Life Guards Sapper Regiment. At the corner of Kirochnaya and Znamenskaya, the rebels mutinied the 6th reserve sapper battalion, killing its commander, Colonel V. K. Further along Kirochnaya, at the corner of Nadezhdinskaya, the Petrograd gendarme division was quartered. The gendarmes were also taken out into the street, followed by the cadets of the oblique Petrograd school of warrant officers of the engineering troops. "Well, guys, now work has begun!" - Kirpichnikov said with relief. In the afternoon, the Semyonovsky and Izmailovsky regiments joined the uprising. By the evening, about 67 thousand soldiers of the Petrograd garrison had rebelled.
It was a landslide. Thousands of rebel soldiers joined the protesting workers. The officers were killed or fled. The police could no longer stop the uprising, police officers were beaten or shot. The outposts, which still held back the protesters, were crushed or joined the rebels. General Khabalov tried to organize resistance to the rebellion, forming a consolidated detachment of up to 1,000 people under the command of Colonel Alexander Kutepov, who was one of the few officers who actively supported the tsar during the February Revolution. However, due to the huge numerical superiority of the rebel soldiers, the detachment was quickly blocked and dispersed.
According to the tradition of all revolutions, prisons were smashed, from which the crowd freed the prisoners, which automatically increased the chaos in the streets. Those gathered on Liteiny Prospect set fire to the building of the District Court (Shpalernaya, 23). The rebels seized the investigative prison adjoining the courthouse - the Pre-trial Detention House (DPZ "Shpalerka") at 25 Shpalernaya Street. On the same morning, the insurgent soldiers of the Keksholm regiment and workers of the Putilov factory stormed another prison - the Lithuanian Castle (on the bank of the Kryukov Canal), also freed the prisoners, and set the building on fire. The rebels also freed the prisoners of the largest Petrograd prison "Kresty", which held about two thousand people. Robberies and looting began to spread throughout the city.
Among the released prisoners were K. A. Gvozdev, M. I. Broydo, B. O. Bogdanov and other Menshevik defencists - members of the Working Group under the Central Military-Industrial Committee, arrested at the end of January 1917 for organizing a demonstration in support of the State thoughts. The crowd enthusiastically greeted them as true revolutionary heroes. They declared that now the main task of the rebels was to support the State Duma, led a huge mass of soldiers and workers to the Tauride Palace - the seat of the State Duma.
At 14.00 the soldiers occupied the Tavrichesky Palace. The deputies found themselves in a difficult situation - on the one hand, they had already been disbanded by the tsar, on the other, they were surrounded by a revolutionary crowd, which saw in them an alternative center of power to the tsarist government. As a result, the deputies continued the meeting in the form of "private meetings", which resulted in the creation of the Interim Committee of the State Duma - "The State Duma Committee for the establishment of order in St. Petersburg and for communication with institutions and individuals." The Committee included the Octobrist M. V. Rodzianko, appointed chairman, members of the "Progressive Bloc" V. V. Shulgin, P. N. Milyukov and some others, as well as the Menshevik N. S. Chkheidze and the "Trudovik" A. F. Kerensky. In the evening, the Provisional Committee of the State Duma announced that it was taking power into its own hands.
On the same day, the Bureau of the Central Committee of the RSDLP published a manifesto "To all citizens of Russia." It put forward demands for the establishment of a democratic republic, the introduction of an 8-hour working day, the confiscation of landlords' land and an end to the imperialist war. The leaders of the Menshevik faction in the State Duma, representatives of soldiers and workers, "socialists", journalists announced in the Tauride Palace the creation of the Provisional Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet, which included K. A. Gvozdev, B. O. Bogdanov (Mensheviks, leaders of the working group of the Central Military District), N. S. Chkheidze, M. I. Skobelev (deputies of the State Duma from the Menshevik faction), N. Yu. Kapelinsky, K. S. Grinevich (Menshevik internationalists), N. D. Sokolov, G. M. Erlikh.
Thus, new centers of power appeared in the capital. As the leader of the cadets P. N. Milyukov, "the intervention of the State Duma gave the street and military movement a center, gave it a banner and a slogan and thus turned the uprising into a revolution that ended with the overthrow of the old regime and dynasty." The Februaryist conspirators led a largely spontaneous popular protest and a soldier's revolt in order to realize their main goal - to liquidate the autocracy.
In the second half of the day, the insurgent soldiers seized the Kshesinskaya mansion, the Kronverksky arsenal, the Arsenal, the main post office, the telegraph, stations, bridges, etc. were also occupied. The Vasileostrovsky region and the Admiralty part remained under the control of the authorities. The uprising had already begun to spread beyond the borders of Petrograd. The First Machine-Gun Regiment rebelled in Oranienbaum and, after killing 12 of its officers, unauthorizedly advanced to Petrograd through Martyshkino, Peterhof and Strelna, adding a number of units along the way. The crowd burned down the house of the Minister of the Imperial Household VB Fredericks as "German." In the evening, the Petrograd security department was defeated.
At 4 pm, the last meeting of the tsarist government took place at the Mariinsky Palace. It was decided to send Nikolai Alexandrovich a telegram with a proposal to dissolve the Council of Ministers and create a "responsible ministry". The head of the government, Golitsyn, recommended the introduction of martial law and the appointment of a popular general with combat experience in charge of security. The government also dismissed Interior Minister Protopopov as one of the most irritating to the opposition. In reality, this only led to an even greater paralysis of power - during the mass uprising in the capital, the monarch's supporters were left without the Minister of Internal Affairs at all. In the evening, the members of the Council of Ministers, without waiting for the monarch's answer, dispersed, and the tsarist government actually ceased to exist.
The last barrier remained - autocratic power. How will the tsar act in the face of a large-scale armed uprising? At 19.00, the situation in Petrograd was again reported to Tsar Nicholas II, who announced that he was postponing all changes in the composition of the government until he returned to Tsarskoe Selo. General Alekseev suggested sending a combined detachment headed by a commander endowed with emergency powers to restore calm in the capital. The emperor ordered to allocate one infantry brigade and one cavalry brigade from the Northern and Western fronts, appointing Adjutant General N. I. Ivanov as chief. Nicholas II ordered him to go at the head of the Georgievsky battalion (guarding the Headquarters) to Tsarskoye Selo to ensure the safety of the imperial family, and then, as the new commander of the Petrograd military district, take command of the troops that were supposed to be transferred from the front for him. When the remnants of the Moscow garrison units loyal to the government surrendered, preparations began for a military operation against Petrograd. The total number of forces allocated to participate in the "punitive expedition" reached 40-50 thousand soldiers. Under the most favorable circumstances, the shock group near Petrograd could be assembled by March 3. It is difficult to predict how events would develop if Nikolai decided to fight. However, apparently, the units from the front line had good chances in the fight against the rebel troops (deprived of experienced commanders), which, under the conditions of the uprising, had already become an armed crowd, and not a well-organized and disciplined force. True, a lot of blood could no longer be avoided.
In Petrograd, Chairman of the State Duma Rodzianko began to persuade Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich, the younger brother of Nicholas II, to assume dictatorial powers within Petrograd, to dismiss the government and ask the tsar to grant a responsible ministry. At 20.00 this idea was supported by the prime minister of the tsarist government, Prince Golitsyn. At first, Mikhail Alexandrovich refused, but in the end he sent the tsar a telegram at night, which said: "To immediately calm the movement, which has taken on a large scale, it is necessary to dismiss the entire council of ministers and entrust the formation of a new ministry to Prince Lvov as a person who enjoys respect in wide circles."
At 00:55 a telegram was received from the commander of the Petrograd Military District, General Khabalov: “I ask you to report to His Imperial Majesty that I could not fulfill the order to restore order in the capital. Most of the units, one by one, have betrayed their duty, refusing to fight against the rebels. Other units fraternized with the rebels and turned their weapons against the troops loyal to His Majesty. Those who remained faithful to their duty fought against the rebels all day, suffering heavy losses. By evening, the rebels captured most of the capital. Small parts of different regiments, gathered near the Winter Palace under the command of General Zankevich, remain faithful to the oath, with whom I will continue to fight."
The revolt of a huge garrison in the capital (an entire army), supported by the workers and the liberal community, became a serious challenge for the tsarist regime. but the situation was not hopeless. At the disposal of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief Nicholas II, there were still multimillion-dollar armed forces. The generals, until Nicholas abdicated the throne, generally submitted to the established order. And the country in this situation took the side of the winner. Obviously, if a man with the character of Napoleon was in the place of Nicholas, then the autocracy had a chance to withstand, introducing a real martial law, and brutally suppressing the liberal Februaryists and revolutionaries.
