Women Fighters in the Days of the Great October Revolution

Alexandra Kollontai November 1927

The women who took part in the Great October Revolution – who were they? Isolated individuals? No, there were hosts of them; tens, hundreds of thousands of nameless heroines who, marching side by side with the workers and peasants behind the Red Flag and the slogan of the Soviets, passed over the ruins of tsarist theocracy into a new future...
If one looks back into the past, one can see them, these masses of nameless heroines whom October found living in starving cities, in impoverished villages plundered by war... A scarf on their head (very rarely, as yet, a red kerchief), a worn skirt, a patched winter jacket... Young and old, women workers and soldiers' wives peasant women and housewives from among the city poor. More rarely, much more rarely in those days, office workers and women in the professions, educated and cultured women. But there were also women from the intelligentsia among those who carried the Red Flag to the October victory – teachers, office employees, young students at high schools and universities, women doctors. They marched cheerfully, selflessly, purposefully. They went wherever they were sent. To the front? They put on a soldier's cap and became fighters in the Red Army. If they put on red arm-bands, then they were hurrying off to the first-aid stations to help the Red front against Kerensky at Gatchina. They worked in army communications. They worked cheerfully, filled with the belief that something momentous was happening, and that we are all small cogs in the one class of revolution.
In the villages, the peasant women (their husbands had been sent off to the front) took the land from the landowners and chased the aristocracy out of the nests they had roosted in for centuries.
When one recalls the events of October, one sees not individual faces but masses. Masses without number, like waves of humanity. But wherever one looks one sees men – at meetings, gatherings, demonstrations...
They are still not sure what exactly it is they want, what they are striving for, but they know one thing: they will put up with war no longer. Nor do they want the landowners and the wealthy... In the year of 1917, the great ocean of humanity heaves and sways, and a large part of that ocean is made up of women...
Some day the historian will write about the deeds of these nameless heroines of the revolution who died at the front, were shot by the Whites and bore the countless deprivations of the first years following the revolution, but who continued to bear aloft the Red Banner of Soviet power and communism.
It is to these nameless heroines, who died to win a new life for working people during the Great October Revolution, to whom the young republic now bows in recognition as its young people, cheerful and enthusiastic, set about building the basis of socialism.
However, out of this sea of women's heads in scarves and worn caps there inevitably emerge the figures of those to whom the historian will devote particular attention when, many years from now, he writes about the Great October Revolution and its leader, Lenin.
The first figure to emerge is that of Lenin's faithful companion, Nadezhda Konstantinovna Krupskaya, wearing her plain grey dress and always striving to remain in the background. She would slip unnoticed into a meeting and place herself behind a pillar, but she saw and heard everything, observing all that happened so that she could then give a full account to Vladimir Ilyich, add her own apt comments and light upon a sensible, suitable and useful idea.
In those days Nadezhda Konstantinovna did not speak at the numerous stormy meetings at which the people argued over the great question: would the Soviets win power or not? But she worked tirelessly as Vladimir Ilyich's right hand, occasionally making a brief but telling comment at party meetings. In moments of greatest difficulty and danger, when many stronger comrades lost heart and succumbed to doubt, Nadezhda Konstantinovna remained always the same, totally convinced of the rightness of the cause and of its certain victory. She radiated unshakable faith, and this staunchness of spirit, concealed behind a rare modesty, always had a cheering effect upon all who came into contact with the companion of the great leader of the October Revolution.
Another figure emerges – that of yet another faithful companion of Vladimir Ilyich, a comrade-in-arms during the difficult years of underground work, secretary of the Party Central Committee, Yelena Dmitriyevna Stassova. A clear, high brow, a rare precision in, and an exceptional capacity for work, a rare ability to 'spot' the right person for the job. Her tall, statuesque figure could be seen first at the Soviet at the Tavrichesky palace, then at the house of Kshesinskaya, and finally at Smolny. In her hands she holds a notebook, while around her press comrades from the front, workers, Red Guards, women workers, members of the party and of the Soviets, seeking a quick, clear answer or order.
Stassova carried responsibility for many important matters, but if a comrade faced need or distress in those stormy days, she would always respond, providing a brief, seemingly curt answer, and herself doing anything she could. She was overwhelmed with work, and always at her post. Always at her post, yet never pushing forward to the front row, to prominence. She did not like to be the centre of attention. Her concern was not for herself, but for the cause.
For the noble and cherished cause of communism, for which Yelena Stassova suffered exile and imprisonment in tsarist jails, leaving her with broken health... In the name of the cause she was like hint, as hard as steel. But to the sufferings of her comrades she displayed a sensitivity and responsiveness that are found only in a woman with a warm and noble heart.
Klavdia Nikolayeva was a working woman of very humble origins. She had joined the Bolsheviks as early as 1908, in the years of reaction, and had endured exile and imprisonment... In 1917 she returned to Leningrad and became the heart of the first magazine for working women, Kommunistka. She was still young, full of fire and impatience. But she held the banner firmly, and boldly declared that women workers, soldiers' wives and peasant women must be drawn into the party. To work, women! To the defence of the Soviets and communism !
She spoke at meetings, still nervous and unsure of herself, yet attracting others to follow. She was one of those who bore on her shoulders all the difficulties involved in preparing the way for the broad, mass involvement of women in the revolution, one of those who fought on two fronts – for the Soviets and communism, and at the same time for the emancipation of women. The names of Klavdia Nikolayeva and Konkordia Samoilova, who died at her revolutionary post in 1921 (from cholera), are indissolubly linked with the first and most difficult steps taken by the working women's movement, particularly in Leningrad. Konkordia Samoilova was a party worker of unparalleled selflessness, a fine, business-like speaker who knew how to win the hearts of working women. Those who worked alongside her will long remember Konkordia Samoilova. She was simple in manner, simple in dress, demanding in the execution of decisions, strict both with herself and others.
Particularly striking is the gentle and charming figure of Inessa Armand, who was charged with very important party work in preparation for the October Revolution, and who thereafter contributed many creative ideas to the work conducted among women. With all her femininity and gentleness of manner, Inessa Armand was unshakable in her convictions and able to defend what she believed to be right, even when faced with redoubtable opponents. After the revolution, Inessa Armand devoted herself to organising the broad movement of working women, and the delegate conference is her creation.
Enormous work was done by Varvara Nikolayevna Yakovleva during the difficult and decisive days of the October Revolution in Moscow. On the battleground of the barricades she showed a resolution worthy of a leader of party headquarters... Many comrades said then that her resolution and unshakable courage gave heart to the wavering and inspired those who had lost heart. 'Forward!' – to victory.
As one recalls the women who took part in the Great October Revolution, more and more names and faces rise up as if by magic from the memory. Could we fail to honour today the memory of Vera Slutskaya, who worked selflessly in preparation for the revolution and who was shot down by Cossaks on the first Red front near Petrograd?
Could we forget Yevgenia Bosh, with her fiery temperament, always eager for battle? She also died at her revolutionary post.
Could we omit to mention here two names closely connected with the life and activity of V.I. Lenin – his two sisters and comrades-in-arms, Anna Ilyinichna Yelizarova and Maria Ilyinichna Ulyanova?
...And comrade Varya, from the railway workshops in Moscow, always lively, always in a hurry? And Fyodorova, the textile worker in Leningrad, with her pleasant, smiling face and her fearlessness when it came to fighting at the barricades?
It is impossible to list them all, and how many remain nameless? The heroines of the October Revolution were a whole army, and although their names may be forgotten, their selflessness lives on in the very victory of that revolution, in all the gains and achievements now enjoyed by working women in the Soviet Union.
It is a clear and indisputable fact that, without the participation of women, the October Revolution could not have brought the Red Flag to victory. Glory to the working women who marched under that Red Banner during the October Revolution. Glory to the October Revolution that liberated women!

OCTOBER DAYS

PART- 2
NADEZHDA KRUPSKAYA(1869-1939)-an active participant in the revolutionary movement in Russia and a member of the Communist Party from 1898. In 1894 met Lenin, with whom she linked her destiny for life. N. Krupskaya was one of the leading figures of the October Re-volution, a member of the Vyborg District Committee of the RSDLP during the armed uprising in Petrograd. After the establishment of Soviet power, was a prominent state and public figure, one of the founders of the Soviet system of public education and an honorary member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Krupskaya was the author of many works on Lenin and the Party, and also on problems of public education and of the com-munist upbringing
one-man management must, he said, be combined with ability to work with the masses. Ilyich strove to make use of everybody's experience in building up a state of a new type. Soviet power, at the head of which Ilyich then stood, was faced with the problem of creating a type of state machinery such as the world had never before seen, one which relied on the masses and which would remake the entire social fabric in a new, socialist way, and reshape all human relations.First of all, however, it was necessary to defend Soviet power against the enemy's attempts to overthrow it by force, and to undermine it from within. We had to strengthen our ranks.November 9 to 15 were crucial days during which the very existence of Soviet power was at stake.Ilyich, who had made a careful study of the experience of the Paris Commune, the first proletarian state in the world, noted that the leniency with which the working masses and workers' government treated their known enemies had disastrous conse-quences for the Paris Commune. That is why when speaking of the struggle against the enemy Ilyich, fearing that the masses and he himself would show unnecessary leniency, always "put it on thick", so to speak.In the early days of the revolution there were many instances of this unnecessary leniency: Kerensky was allowed to get away, so, too, were a number of ministers; the cadets who had defended the Winter Palace were released simply on their word of honour;General Krasnov who had commanded the troops of Kerensky was kept only under house arrest. I happened to overhear the conversation between Comrade Krylenko and General Krasnov who had been brought to Petrograd under arrest. The two of them entered the room, in the Smolny, where I was sitting on a heap of greatcoats waiting for somebody, sat down at the small table standing in the middle of the room and quietly began to talk. I remember how surprised I was at the peaceful nature of their conversation. On November 17 (4), speaking at the session of the Central Executive Committee, Ilyich said: "Krasnov was given soft treatment. He was only placed under house arrest. We are against civil war. But if it nevertheless goes on what are we to do?"Kerensky who was released in Pskov organised the attack on Petrograd; the cadets who were released on their word of honour started a revolt on November 11, and Krasnov who escaped from house arrest fled to the Don where, with the assistance of the German Government, he formed a whiteguard army nearly a hundred thousand strong.Weary of the imperialist slaughter the people wanted a blood-less revolution, but their enemies forced them to take up arms. Ilyich who was thinking mainly about the socialist reorganisation of the entire social system had to give first thought to the defence of the revolution.On November 9 Kerensky captured Gatchina. Comrade Podvoisky in his article "Lenin-Organiser of the Victorious Octo-ber Uprising" (Krasnaya Gazeta, November 6, 1927), gives a vivid description of the colossal work carried out by Lenin during the defence of Petrograd. He describes how Lenin arrived at military district headquarters and demanded a report on the situation. Comrade Antonov-Ovseyenko7 there and then explained the general plan of operations, showing on a map the position of our forces and the probable position and number of enemy troops. "Comrade Lenin closely examined the map. With the acuteness of the profound strategist and observant general he demanded to know why some point was not being guarded, why some particular step was being suggested and not another, why Kronstadt, the Vyborg District, or Helsingfors were not asked for reinforcements, etc. After an exchange of opinion we saw that we had, indeed, made a number of blunders, had not displayed the necessary activity at the critical moment in organising forces and resources for the defence of Petrograd." In the evening of the 9th Ilyich got in direct touch with Helsingfors over the wire asking them to send two destroyers and the battleship Respublika to defend the approaches to Petrograd.Ilyich also went to the Putilov Works together with Comrade Antonov-Ovseyenko to see whether the needed armoured train was being built fast enough. While there he talked things over with the workers. It was decided to transfer headquarters to the Smolny. Thenceforth Lenin closely began to follow its work, began to help mobilise the masses. Comrade Podvoisky writes that he was able particularly to appreciate Lenin's work at the conference of representatives of workers' organisations, district Soviets, factory committees, trade unions and military units, convened by Lenin."Here I saw Lenin's strongest point. He had a special ability to concentrate our forces and resources to the extreme limit in time of need. We had acted without any plan. As a result our actions were not coordinated and this led to irresolution and lack of initiative among the masses. They did not feel the iron will and the iron plan where, as in a machine, everything was perfectly fitted and worked smoothly in its proper place. Lenin hammered one single idea into everybody's head-everything must be con-centrated on defence. Out of this basic idea he evolved a plan which could be understood by all, a plan in which there was a place for everyone, for his factory and for his fighting unit."Everyone at the conference had a clear conception of his own plan of future work and saw what contribution he could make towards the defence of the Republic. Because of this each one became fully aware that the fate of the dictatorship of the prole-tariat depended on him from that moment."Lenin strove constantly to get the people to understand that the leaders could not do everything for them, that they them-selves, with their own hands, would have to build a new life and defend their own state; in this he proved himself to be a real people's leader, able to show the people the way forward and induce them to take the first step forward fully conscious of their aim, instead of following blindly behind the leaders."Comrade Podvoisky is absolutely right. Ilyich was always able to rouse the masses to activity, to point out to them their concrete aims.Rising in defence of their city, the workers of Petrograd, both young and old, left for the front to head off Kerensky's army. The Cossacks and other units called up from the provinces least of all wanted to fight. The workers of Petrograd carried on vigorous agitation among them and convinced them to lay down arms. Kerensky's army disintegrated, the Cossacks and soldiers simply deserted, taking their guns and rifles with them. Still, many of the Petrograd citizens lost their lives in the defence of the city. Among them was Vera Slutskaya, one of the leading Party functionaries in the Vasilyevsky Ostrov District. On her way to the front on a lorry she was hit by a shell. Also many of our people in the Vyborg District lost their lives. We buried them there, the whole district turning out for the funeral.On November 11 (October 29), when Kerensky was still on the offensive, the cadets who had been released from the Winter Palace after pledging their word of honour staged a revolt. I was living with Vladimir Ilyich's family at the time on the Petrograd Side. The fighting started early in the morning near the Pavlovsky Officers' Training School which was not far from our house. On learning of the revolt the Red Guard units and workers of the Vyborg District hastened to the scene of action. Guns opened fire. Our whole house shook, frightening us to death. As I stepped out of the house our neighbour's maid came running towards me crying: "What are they doing?! I just saw a cadet bayoneted like an insect." On the way I encountered a fresh detachment of Vyborg Red Guards who were bringing up another gun. The revolt was speedily crushed.That day Ilyich addressed a meeting of regimental representa-tives of the Petrograd garrison. "Kerensky's bid is just as pathetic a gamble as Komilov's.But the situation is a difficult one. Vigorous efforts must be made to get some order into the food situation, and put, an end to the misery at the fronts. We cannot wait, nor can we tolerate Kerensky's mutiny a single day. If the Kornilovites launch another offensive, they will get what the mutinous officer cadets got today. The cadets have only them-selves to blame. We took power almost without bloodshed. If there were any losses they were on our side... The government set up by the will of the workers', soldiers' and peasants' deputies will not tolerate any nonsense from the Komilovites."On November 14 the Kerensky revolt was crushed. Gatchina was recaptured. Kerensky fled the country. Petrograd emerged victorious. But the Civil War raged.

OCTOBER DAYS

PART- 1

NADEZHDA KRUPSKAYA(1869-1939)-an active participant in the revolutionary movement in Russia and a member of the Communist Party from 1898. In 1894 met Lenin, with whom she linked her destiny for life. N. Krupskaya was one of the leading figures of the October Re-volution, a member of the Vyborg District Committee of the RSDLP during the armed uprising in Petrograd. After the establishment of Soviet power, was a prominent state and public figure, one of the founders of the Soviet system of public education and an honorary member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Krupskaya was the author of many works on Lenin and the Party, and also on problems of public education and of the com-munist upbringing.

The Smolny Institute was brightly lit and the whole place was seething. Red Guards, factory representatives, and soldiers came from all parts for instructions. Typewriters rattled, telephones rang, our girls were bent over piles of telegrams and the Revolutionary Military Committee was in constant session on the second floor. On the square in front of the institute armoured cars had their engines running, a three-inch gun stood there and stacks of firewood had been made ready in case it should become necessary to build barricades. At the entrance there were cannon and machine-guns and sentries stood guard at the doors.At 10 o'clock on the morning of November 7 (October 25) a message from the Revolutionary Military Committee of the Petrograd Soviet addressed "To the Citizens of Russia!" was sent to the press; the message said:"The Provisional Government has been deposed. State power has passed into the hands of the organ of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies-the Revolutionary Military Committee, which heads the Petrograd proletariat and the garrison.
"The cause for which the people have fought, namely, theimmediate offer of a democratic peace, the abolition of landed proprietorship, workers' control over production, and the establishment of Soviet power-this cause has been secured."Long live the revolution of workers, soldiers and peasants!" Although it was obvious that the revolution was victorious, all the morning of the 25th the Revolutionary Military Committee continued working feverishly, occupying one government build-ing after another, organising their defence, etc.At 2.30 p.m. the meeting of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies opened. With thunderous applause the Soviet greeted the news that the Provisional Government no longer existed, that some ministers had been, and the others would be, arrested, that the pre-Parliament had been dissolved and that the railway stations, post office, telegraph office and the State Bank had been occupied. The storming of the Winter Palace was continuing. The palace had not yet been captured but its fate was already sealed, and the soldiers were displaying unusual heroism; the revolution had been bloodless.Lenin's appearance at the meeting of the Soviet was greeted with an ovation. When he spoke, he did not use any high-flown words about the victory that had been gained. That was typical of Ilyich. He spoke of other things, of the tasks confronting Soviet power that had to be tackled immediately.He said that a new page in the history of Russia had been opened. The Soviet Government would carry on its work without the participation of the bourgeoisie. A decree would be issued on the abolition of the private ownership of land. Real workers' control of production would be established. The struggle for socialism would develop apace. The old state machinery would be smashed, a new power, the power of Soviet organisations, would be established. We had the strength of the mass organisation which could conquer all. The immediate task was to conclude peace. For this purpose capital must be defeated. The world proletariat, already showing signs of revolutionary ferment, would help us conclude peace....On November 8 (October 26) the congress session opened at 9 p.m. I was present at that session and remember how Ilyich made his speech on the reasons for the Decree on Land, how calmly he spoke. The audience listened with rapt attention. While he was reading the Decree on Land I noticed the expression on the face of one of the delegates sitting near me. He was a man of the peasant type, well on in years. His face seemed to become transparent, as though it were made of wax, so great was his excitement, and his eyes shone.The death penalty, introduced at the front by Kerensky, was abolished, the decrees on peace, land and workers' control were adopted and the Bolshevik list for the Council of People's Commissars was approved: Vladimir Ulyanov (Lenin) - Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars; A. I. Rykov- People's Commissar for Internal Affairs; V. P. Milyutin- Agriculture; A. G. Shiyapnikov - Labour; Army and Navy Affairs - a committee consisting of V. A. Ovseyenko (Antonov), N. V. Krylenko and P. Y. Dybenko; V. P. Nogin - Commerce and Industry; A. V. Lunacharsky - Education; I. I. Skvortsov (Stepanov) - Finance; L. D. Bronstein (Trotsky) - Foreign Affairs; G. I. Oppokov (Lomov) - Justice; I. A. Teodorovich - Food Supplies; N. P. Avilov (Glebov) - Posts and Telegraphs; J. V. Jugashvili (Stalin) - Chairman for Affairs of the Nationalities. The post of Commissar for the Railways was left vacant.Comrade Eino Rahja recalls that he was sitting in a corner and listening when the list of the first People's Commissars was being discussed by the Bolshevik group of delegates. When someone of those proposed as People's Commissars began to refuse, saying that he had no experience at that sort of work, Vladimir Ilyich burst out laughing: "And do you think for a moment any of us have that sort of experience?" Nobody had any experience, of course. But Vladimir Ilyich saw in his mind's eye a People's Commissar, a new type of minister, the organiser and leader of one or another branch of state activity, who was closely connected with the masses.All the time Vladimir Ilyich gave a great amount of thought to new forms of administration. He was thinking of how to organise state machinery which would be free of red tape, which would be able to rely on the masses and organise them to help it in its work, and which would in the course of its work produce a new type of civil servant. In the decision of the Second Congress of Soviets on the formation of Workers' and Peasants' Government this is expressed in the following words: "The management of individual branches of state activity is entrusted to commissions whose members shall ensure the fulfilment of the programme announced by the Congress, and shall work in close contact with mass organisations of men and women workers, sailors, soldiers, peasants and office employees. Governmental authority is vested in a collegium of the chairmen of those commissions, i.e., the Council of People's Commissars."3I remember the talks I had with Ilyich on this subject in those weeks when he lived at Fofanova's. At that time I was working very enthusiastically in the Vyborg District and was eagerly studying the revolutionary creative urge of the masses, the way in which life was being radically reorganised. When I met Ilyich I would tell him of life in the district. I remember I once told him about a very original session of a People's Court at which I had been present. Such court sessions had been held during the revolution of 1905, for example, in Sormovo. Comrade Chugurin, a worker whom I knew from the days of the Party School at Longjumeau, near Paris, and with whom I was working in the Vyborg District municipality, came from Sormovo. He suggested that we begin to organise these courts in the Vyborg District. The first session was held in the House of the People. The room was packed with people, some stood on benches and others on the window-sills. I do not now remember all the details; they were not criminal cases but mostly domestic problems. Two suspicious characters who had attempted to arrest Chugurin were on trial. A tall, swarthy care-taker was "tried" for beating his adolescent son, making him work and refusing to allow him to study. Many of the working men and women present spoke up sharply against the "accused", who at first began wiping the perspiration from his brow, then the tears rolled down his cheeks as he promised not to ill-treat his son again. It was not a court of justice but one of public control over the behaviour of citizens, it was proletarian ethics in the making. Vladimir Ilyich was very interested in this "trial" and asked for all the details.Most of my talks with him, however, were about new forms of cultural work. I was in charge of the Department of Public Education. In summer the children's schools were closed and I was engaged mostly in political educational activities. The five years' experience I had gained at the Sunday evening school in the Nevskaya Zastava District in the 90's was of great help to me. Times had changed, of course, and it was now possible to carry on the work on broader lines.Every week we held a conference with representatives of something like forty factories and discussed together what had to be done and how various activities were to be conducted. And, of course, everything we decided upon was immediately carried out. We decided, for example, to put an end to illiteracy, and each of the factory representatives made lists of all illiterates at his own factory, found premises for schools, brought pressure to bear on the factory management and raised funds. A superintendent from amongst the workers was appointed to each school for illiterates, and he saw to it that everything necessary was provided - blackboards, chalk, ABC books; others were appointed to ensure that instruction was given correctly and to hear what the workers had to say about the schools. We gave instructions to the superintendents and heard their reports. We held meetings of representatives of the soldiers' wives, discussed with them the state of affairs in the children's homes, organised their control of the homes, instructed them and explained the situation. We used to call meetings of the librarians of the district and, together with them and the workers, discussed what form of work should be conducted in the libraries. The workers showed great initiative and quite a large body of helpers was grouped around the Department of Public Education. Ilyich said then that the work of our state apparatus and our future ministers should be organised in the same way: there should be commissions of working men and women who knew the living and working conditions of the people, and what was troubling them most at any given moment. Vladimir Ilyich thought I had the knack of drawing people into the work of state administration and often spoke to me on the subject; he often scolded what he called "accursed" bureaucracy. When it became necessary later on to give greater responsibility to the People's Commissars and department heads who frequently delegated responsibility to committees and commissions, the question of one-man manage-ment arose. Ilyich made me a member of the Commission of the Council of People's Commissars appointed to examine this ques-tion and told me to make sure that the initiative and activity of the commissions were in no way suppressed by one-man management, that the ties with the masses were not weakened;

The Years of Revolution

Alexandra Kollontai

From 'The Autobiography of a Sexually Emancipated Communist Woman'
So overwhelming was the rush of subsequent events that to this very day I really do not know what I should describe and emphasize: what have I accomplished, desired, achieved? Was there altogether an individual will at that time? Was it not only the omnipotent storm of the Revolution, the command of the active, awakened masses that determined our will and action? Was there altogether a single human being who would not have bowed to the general will? There were only masses of people, bound together in a bipartite will, which operated either for or against the Revolution, for or against ending the war, and which sided for or against the power of the Soviets. Looking back one perceives only a massive operation, struggle, and action. In reality there were no heroes or leaders. It was the people, the working people, in soldiers' uniform or in civilian attire, who controlled the situation and who recorded its will indelibly in the history of the country and mankind. It was a sultry summer, a crucial summer of the revolutionary flood-tide in 1917! At first the social storm raged only in the countryside, the peasants set fire to the "nests of gentle folk." In the cities the struggle that raged was between the advocates of a republican-bourgeois Russia and the socialist aspirations of the Bolsheviks ...

As I have previously stated, I belonged to the Bolsheviks. Thus immediately, from the first days onwards, I found an absolute enormous pile of work waiting for me. Once more the issue was to wage a struggle against the war, against coalescence with the liberal bourgeoisie, and for the power of the workers' councils, the Soviets. The natural consequence of this stand was that the bourgeois newspapers branded me as a "mad female Bolshevik." But this bothered me not at all. My field of activity was immense, and my followers, factory workers and women-soldiers, numbered thousands.[101] At this time I was very popular, especially[102] as an orator,[103] and, at the same time, hated and viciously attacked by the bourgeois press. Thus it was a stroke of luck~ that I was[104] so weighed down with current work that I found hardly any time to read the attacks and slanders against me. The hate directed against me, allegedly because I had been in the pay of the German Kaiser for the purpose of weakening the Russian front, grew[105] to monstrous proportions.

One of the most burning questions of the day was the high cost of living and the growing scarcity of vital necessities. Thus the women of the poverty-stricken strata had an indescribably hard time of it. Precisely this situation prepared the terrain in the Party for "work with women" so that very soon we were able to accomplish useful work. [106] Already in May of 1917 a weekly called "The Women Workers" made its debut. I authored an appeal to women against the high cost of living and the war.[107] The first mass meeting, packed with thousands of people,[108] that took place in Russia under the Provisional Government, was organized by us, by the Bolsheviks. Kerensky and his ministers made no secret of their hatred of me, the "instigator of the spirit of disorganization" in the Army. One particular article of mine in "Pravda" in which I interceded for German prisoners of war unleashed a veritable storm of[109] indignation on the part of patriotic-minded circles. When in April Lenin delivered his famous programmatic speech within the frame of the Soviets, I was the only one of his Party comrades who took the poor to support his theses. What hatred this particular act kindled against me![110] Often I had to jump off tramcars before people recognized me, since I had become a topical theme of the day and often bore personal witness to the most incredible abuse and lies directed against me. I should like to cite a small example which can show how the enemy worked with might and main to defame me. At that time the newspapers hostile to me were already writing about the "Kollontai party dresses" which particularly then was laughable because my trunk had been lost en route to Russia, so I always wore the one and the same dress. There was even a little street ballad that commented on Lenin and me in verse.[111] There was also nothing extraordinary in the fact that, threatened as I was by irritated mobs, I was always protected from the worst only by the courageous intercession of my friends and Party comrades. Nevertheless I myself personally experienced little[112] of the hatred around me and, of course, there was also a great number of enthusiastic friends: the workers, the sailors, the soldiers who were utterly devoted to me.[113] Moreover, the number of our followers[114] grew from day to day. Already in April, I was a member of the Soviet executive which, in reality, was the guiding political body of the moment, to which I belonged as the only woman and over a long period. In May of 1917 I took part in the strike of women laundry workers who set forth the demand that all laundries be "municipalized." The struggle lasted six weeks. Nevertheless the principal demand of the women laundry workers remained unmet by the Kerensky regime.

At the end of June, I was sent by my Party to Stockholm as a delegate to an international consultation which was interrupted when news reached us of the July uprising against the Provisional Government and of the extremely harsh measures that the[115] government was taking against the Bolsheviks. Many of our leading Party comrades had already been arrested, others, including Lenin, had managed to escape and go into hiding. The Bolsheviks were accused of high treason and branded as spies of the German Kaiser. The uprising was brought to a standstill and the coalition regime retaliated against all those who had manifested sympathy for the Bolsheviks. I immediately decided to return to Russia, although my friends and Party comrades[116] considered this to be a risky undertaking. They wanted me to go to Sweden and await the course of events. Well-intentioned as these counsels were, and correct as they also appeared to me later,[117] I nevertheless could not heed them. I simply had to go back. Otherwise it would appear to me as an act of cowardice to take advantage of the privilege, that had become mine, of remaining wholly immune from the persecutions of the Provisional Government, when a great number of my political friends were sitting in jail. Later I realized that, perhaps, I might have been able to be move useful to our cause from Sweden, but I was under the compulsion of the moment.[118] By order of the Kerensky regime I was arrested on the border of Torneo and subjected to the most boorish treatment as a spy ... But the arrest itself proceeded quite theatrically: during the inspection of my passport I was requested to step into the commandant's office. I understood what that meant. A number of soldiers were standing in an enormous room, pressed close against each other. Two young officers were also present, one of them being the charming young man who had received me so amiably[119] four months previously. A veritable[120] silence prevailed in the room. The facial expression of the first officer, Prince B., betrayed a great nervousness. Composed, I waited to see what would happen next. "You are under arrest," explained Prince B. "So. Has the counter-revolution triumphed Do we again have a monarchy?" "No," was the gruff reply. "You are under arrest by order of the Provisional Government." "I have been expecting it. Please, let my suitcase be brought in, I don't want it to be lost." "But, of course. Lieutenant, the suitcase!" I saw how the officers heaved a sigh of relief, and how the soldiers left the room with displeasure writ large on their faces. Later I learned that my arrest had occasioned a protest among the soldiers who insisted upon witnessing the arrest. The officers, however, had feared that I might make a speech to the soldiers. "In that case we would have been lost," one of them told me afterwards.

I was forced to wait for the course of the investigation, like the other Bolsheviks, in a Petrograd prison, in strict isolation. The more incredibly the regime conducted itself towards the Bolsheviks, the more their influence grew.[121] The march of the White general Kornilov on Petrograd strengthened the most radical elements of the Revolution. The people demanded that the jailed Bolsheviks be freed. Kerensky, however, refused to free me and it was only by an order of the Soviet that I was released from jail upon payment of bail. But already on the next day, Kerensky's decree that I be placed under house arrest hung over me. Nevertheless I was given my full freedom of movement one month before the decisive struggle, the October Revolution in 1917. Again my work piled up. Now the groundwork was to be set for a systematic women-workers movement. The first conference of women workers was to be called. It also took place and it coincided with the overthrow of the Provisional Government and the establishment of the Soviet Republic.

At that time I was a member of the highest Party body, the Central Committee, and I voted for the policy of armed uprising.[122] I was also a member of different Party representations in decisive Congresses and State institutions (the preliminary Parliament, the democratic Congress, etc.). Then came the great days of the October Revolution. Smolny became historic. The sleepless nights, the permanent sessions. And, finally, the stirring declarations. "The Soviets take power!" "The Soviets address an appeal to the peoples of the world to put an end to the war." "The land is socialized and belongs to the peasants!"

Russian Revolution in Dates

1905 Jan Bloody Sunday - Tsarist troops open fire on a peaceful demonstration of workers in St Petersburg.
1905 October General Strike sweeps Russia which ends when the Tsar promises a constitution.

1905 December In response to the suppression of the St Petersburg Soviet the Moscow Soviet organises a disastrous insurrection that the government suppresses after five days

1906 The promised parliament, the Duma, is dissolved when it produces an anti government majority even though elected on a narrow franchise.

1911-1914 A new wave of workers unrest ends with the outbreak of the First World War

1917 Feb After several days of demonstrations in Petrograd (formally St Petersburg) the government orders troops to open fire. The next day these troops mutiny. The Tsar abdicates when he hears that Moscow too has joined the Revolution. An agreement is reached between the Petrograd Soviet and the Provisional Government headed by Lvov.

1917 March 12th Abolition of the death Penalty

1917 April 18th Milyukov note. Milyukov tells allies that war aims unchanged.

1917 April 20 - 21 The April Days. Opposition to the Foreign Minister Milyukov boils over due to his refusal to renounce annexations.

1917 May Milyukov resigns. Members of the Mensheviks and the Socialist Revolutionaries join the government.

1917 June 3 First All-Russia Congress of Workers and Soldiers Soviets opens.

1917 June 18 Offensive launched by Russia against Austria Hungary.

1917 July The July Days. (3rd and 4th) Workers and soldiers in Petrograd demand the Soviet takes power. Sporadic fighting results and the Soviet restores order with troops brought back from the front. Trotsky arrested. Lenin goes into hiding. A new provisional government is set up with Kerensky at it's head (8th).

1917 July 12th Death Penalty reintroduced for the front.

1917 Aug The Kornilov putsch. An attempt by General Kornilov to establish a right wing dictatorship is a disastrous flop. Chernov the leader of the Socialist Revolutionaries resigns from the government denouncing Kerensky for complicity in the plot.

1917 Sept The Bolsheviks win control of the Petrograd Soviet.
In the countryside peasant seizure of land from the gentry continues and reaches the level of near insurrection in Tambov.

1917 Oct The Bolsheviks overthrow the Provisional government on the eve of the meeting of 2nd All-Russia Congress of Soviets.

1917 26/27 Oct Soviet proclamations on land and peace. Death Penalty abolished.

1917 30 Oct Kerensky repulsed outside Petrograd

1917 2 Nov Bolsheviks gain Moscow

1917 7th Nov Ukraine proclaimed independent by the Central Rada.

1917 Nov 12-14 Elections to the Constituent Assembly. Socialist Revolutionaries the largest party.

1917 12 Dec Left-SRs join Sovnarkom

1917 Dec (early) Congress of Socialist Revolutionaries results in victory for the left under Chernov. Likewise Menshevik Congress gives victory to Martov's Menshevik internationalists.

1918 Jan 5th The Constituent Assembly in which the Bolsheviks are a minority meets for one day before being suppressed. Earlier that day a demonstration is fired on by Bolshevik units and several demonstrators are killed

1918 10-18 Jan 3rd Soviet Congress

1918 Jan 28th Trotsky denounces the German Peace Terms as unacceptable and walks out of the peace negotiations at Brest- Litovsk.

1918 Feb 1/14 Russia adopts Western (Gregorian) calendar.

1918 Feb 18th The Germans invade Russia which is all but defenceless as virtually the entire army has deserted.

1918 March The Bolsheviks accept the dictated peace of Brest-Litovsk. The Left SRs denounce the peace and leave the government.

1918 April 12th Moscow headquarters of the anarchists surrounded and attacked by Bolshevik troops

1918 May 9th Bolshevik troops open fire on workers protesting at food shortages in the town of Kolpino

1918 May (late) The Czechoslovak legion mutinies against the Bolshevik government. Using the railways they are able to sweep away Bolshevik control from vast areas of Russia. The Socialist Revolutionaries support the rising.

1918 July Fifth Soviet Congress. The left SRs assassinate the German ambassador and are in turn crushed by the Bolsheviks.

1918 16 July Gorky’s Novaia Zhizn , the last opposition paper, banned.

1918 23rd Aug 3 ministers of the Siberian Government are arrested by supporter of Mikhailov, the finance Minister, when they arrive in Omsk. They are told to resign their posts. Two agree. The third, Novoselov, refuses and is hacked to death.

1918 22nd Sept Siberian Oblast Duma dismisses Mikhailov and is itself dispersed by Mikhailov

1918 18th November Kolchak, stages a coup against the Directory, the multi party government in Siberia, and establishes a counterrevolutionary despotism.

1918 Dec Perm falls to Kolchak's Whites

1919 Jan Mensheviks legalised and allowed to publish Vsegda Vpered in Moscow. Era of relative freedom begins in Bolshevik controlled Russia

1919 25 Feb The Cheka closes down Vsegda Vpered. This marks a return to despotic rule by Bolsheviks.

1919 White Armies attack the Bolsheviks from all directions but the Red Army is finally victorious.

1920 25 Apr Poland invades Russia.

1920 19th Aug Start of peasant insurrection in Tambov

1920 14 Nov. Last White army under Wrangel evacuates the Crimea

1921 Peasant unrest sweeps Russia. These risings are suppressed but the New Economic Policy is proclaimed that gives the peasants the right to sell their grain surpluses

1921 1-17 Mar The old Bolshevik stronghold of Kronstadt rises demanding free election to the Soviets but is suppressed.

1921 May Tambov insurrection suppressed

1924 Lenin dies. Trotsky is defeated by a triumvirate of Stalin, Kamenev and Zinoviev. Though Stalin stays in the background it is he who is the real power as the other two will shortly discover.