What happened in the 1917 Russian Revolution?

At the beginning of the First World War in 1914, Russia was a monarchy, which meant it was ruled over by a Tsar called Nicholas II.

For a long time before the war, the Russian people were growing angry with the power the Tsar held over them and how little the imperial family seemed to care about their poverty.

In the fifty years before the war, Tsars had been attacked by their own people in an effort to force change in society.

Some of the most active political groups calling for change were those that followed the ideology of socialism. 

Socialists, which included communist groups, argued that Russia should not be controlled by a monarchy and, instead, should be controlled by the Russian people themselves.

These groups encouraged the peasants to stage an armed take-over of the country to get rid of the Tsar altogether.

In its place, they wanted to set up a government that focused on the needs of the peasants and the regular workers in society. 

However, despite the encouragement by communist political groups, the Russian population did not rise up and overthrow the Tsar, as most people still felt a loyalty to the imperial family. 

That was until the First World War began. Russia had not fared well in the conflict and there was growing resentment at home.

The Russian army continued to suffer defeats, and, by 1917, they had suffered over 1.7 million military deaths in World War I, with millions more wounded or captured.

At home, peasants were starving due to restrictions placed on food. As a result, the popularity of communist political groups increased as they called for Russia to leave the war.

The Tsar, however, refused to let Russia quit from the conflict, no matter how much his people were starving or suffering.

This finally led some people within Russian society to call for the overthrow of the Tsar.

The revolution finally occurred in 1917. However, it was a revolution that occurred in stages over the course of the year.

It can be a complex topic to study, but this article will try and keep things simple, by explaining the three broad stages that took Russia from a monarchy to a communist country. 

The first stage of the Russian Revolution occurred in February 1917, and it was the event that finally removed the Tsar and the imperial family from power.

This stage began on February 23rd, when women workers in the city of Petrograd walked away from their factory jobs to march onto the streets in protest about the ongoing food shortages.

This day was important for them to protest upon, because it was International Women's Day.

Around 90,000 women marched in this protest, calling for more food, the removal of the Tsar and an end to the war. 

On the very next day, over 150,000 men and women protested again. Then, for the third day in a row, the city of Petrograd was again filled with protestors as more people walked off their jobs.

Even the military units that were sent in by the Tsar to control the protests quit their own jobs and joined the crowds.

Tsar Nicholas II knew that the protests were occurring, but he was not in Petrograd at the time, so he did not respond to the calls for change.

However, by March 1st, the protests and anger were becoming a national security threat and the Tsar finally admitted that it was time to step down.

On March the 2nd, Tsar Nicholas II signed the official abdication forms, which meant that he was no longer in power.

He and his family no longer controlled Russia, and power was handed over to the Russian people. 

The second stage of the Russian Revolution covers the months between March to October 1917.

During this time, Russia tried to create a government that could effectively replace the Tsar.

However, what people quickly found was that running a country was a far more difficult thing to do than they first realised, and different versions of governments were quickly created and disbanded.

Once the Tsar had stepped down, it wasn't immediately clear who now made the decisions about what should happen in Russia.

Two main political groups became the most influential. The first group was composed of former members of the government body known as the duma and was made up of people from the wealthy middle class of Russian society, rather than by the peasants or workers.

The second group was a collection of people who claimed to represent the workers of the city of Petrograd and was known as the 'Petrograd Soviet'. 

It was a council of workers' and soldiers' deputies, who represented the political interests of workers and soldiers.

It was the duma that created the first government to replace the Tsar, and it was known as the Provisional Government.

It was considered to be a 'provisional' government, as its main job was to ensure that an election would be held later in the year for the people to vote for a permanent government.

However, instead of planning for an election, the Provisional Government essentially decided that they were the permanent government instead. 

During the first few weeks in power, the Provisional Government did implement some changes to Russian society, but refused to end Russia's involvement in World War One.

This meant that very little changed for the Russian peasants and workers. There were still food shortages, people were still being recruited for the army and Russia was still losing battles in the war.

Instead of solving the problems that caused the revolution, the Provisional Government was making the same problems worse. 

So, throughout 1917, 'soviets,' or workers' councils, began to form across Russia, which challenged the Provisional Government’s authority and calling for greater control by workers and peasants over their own lives

One of the most important people in Russian history was a man called Vladimir Ilyich Lenin.

He was the leader of a political group known as the Bolsheviks, which promoted communist ideals.

While Lenin was born in Russia, he had been living in exile elsewhere in Europe when the February Revolution occurred.

He believed that the Provisional Government had not done enough to help the Russian people, and he travelled back to Russia on a train to raise enthusiasm for a more radical government.

He was transported through Germany in a sealed train. By doing this, Germany hoped that Lenin's return would create further instability in Russia, which would help them in the war.

Lenin arrived in the city of Petrograd on April 3, 1917. Crowds of workers and soldiers were there to meet him, waving red flags.

The colour red would become associated with the third stage of the Russian Revolution. 

Lenin gave a speech to his supporters, in which he called for the end of the Provisional Government because it had not given the Russian people 'peace, land, or bread'.

By this, he meant that they hadn't ended the war (peace), redistributed land to peasants (land), or solved food shortages (bread).

As the Russian people grew more discontented with the Provisional Government, the popularity of Lenin's Bolshevik party began to grow.

Also, Lenin's call for another revolution, a more violent one, grew in popularity.

Then, during an event known as the 'July Days', there were a series of protests in Petrograd, erupted in July 1917 as workers and soldiers demanded the Provisional Government surrender its power to the soviets.

It became an event that revealed deep divisions between the government and the radical left.

The third and final stage of the Russian Revolution occurred in October 1917, and it was when the communist Bolsheviks took control of Russia.

On the 10th of October, the Bolshevik party held a secret meeting where Lenin drew up plans for his followers to stage an armed revolution and seize control of the country.

Once agreed upon, the Bolshevik leadership began planning. Then, in the early morning of October 25, the Bolshevik revolution began. 

Soldiers who supported the Bolsheviks quickly took control of the telegraph systems, power stations, roads, post offices, railways, and even the banks in the city of Petrograd.

These were the most important pieces of infrastructure that governments and militaries needed to function.

By taking these first, not only could the Bolsheviks claim to be the government, but they also stopped anyone else fighting back against their control.

By midday, the Bolsheviks controlled Petrograd. The only place left to fall to them was the former home of the Tsar, called the Winter Palace, where the members of the Provisional Government were. 

It would not be until the next day that troops entered the palace and finally removed the last of the politicians.

The final stage of the revolution was not as bloody as many had feared. Ultimately, it was a quick overthrow, and the Bolsheviks took control of Russia.

Once in power, Lenin began a more radical change to Russian society. In December 1917, the Bolshevik government formed the Cheka, a secret police force tasked with quelling opposition.

This began a period of intense political repression known as the 'Red Terror'.

Very soon after the October Revolution, the new Bolshevik government signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on March 3, 1918, which officially ended Russia's participation in the war.

However, to achieve this, Russia had to surrender a significant amount of land to Germany, including Ukraine, Finland, and the Baltic states.

This meant that there was less farmland to grow crops for the starving Russian people. As a result, very few of the problems were solved.

Then, in June 1918, Russia went to war with itself, in what is known as a 'civil war'. 

One army formed which was called 'The Whites', which wanted the Bolsheviks out of power.

The Whites were a coalition of anti-Bolshevik forces with varying goals, including monarchists, republicans, and others. 

The other army that fought against them was known as 'The Reds', which was the army of the Bolshevik government.

Afraid that the Whites wanted to return the Tsar to Power, the Reds killed Nicholas II and his entire family on July 16-17, 1918.

The Russian Civil War lasted for over three years and resulted in an estimated 7 to 12 million deaths, including combatants and civilians, many of whom perished from famine and disease.

Ultimately, the Reds won, and the Bolsheviks would create the Soviet Union, which would last until 1991.