- July Days
The July Days refers to events in
1917 that took place inPetrograd ,Russia , betweenJuly 3 andJuly 7 (Julian calendar ) (July 16 -July 20 ,Gregorian calendar ), when soldiers and industrial workers in the city rioted against theRussian Provisional Government .Bolsheviks led the attack, but it failed and their leaderVladimir Lenin went into hiding, while other leaders were arrested. [ [http://college.hmco.com/history/west/mckay/western_society/7e/students/outlines/ch27.html "A History of Western Society"] . Chapter Outlines. "Chapter 27: The Great Break: War and Revolution", Seventh Edition.John P. McKay , University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign;Bennett D. Hill , Georgetown University; John Buckler, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign] ["In July 1917, a half-baked Bolshevik uprising against the Government failed. Trotsky went to prison but Lenin escaped to Finland." ("Key Themes of the Twentieth Century" by Philip Sauvain. p.54)] The outcome of the July Days represented a temporary decline in the growth of Bolshevik power and influence in the period before theOctober Revolution .Causes
Alexander Kerensky , then minister of war and navy, ordered a vast Russian offensive againstAustro-Hungarian forces on16 June . Despite initial successes, the Russians were defeated and the operation ended onJuly 2 , quickly to be followed by a combined counter-offensive by German andAustro-Hungarian forces on6 July .At the same time, divisions within the Provisional Government were proven when some of the members offered independence to the Ukranian leaders. This made the Bolsheviks start thinking of a rebellion against the weak Russian government.Anti-war feelings were rife among the populace at that time. These feelings intensified with the news of the failed offensive. Discontented workers started protests which soon spiraled into violent riots.
July 3
On July 3rd, machine gunners from the several-thousand-man First Machine Gun Regiment were dispatched to all the major
Petrograd factories and military units to appeal for insurrection. By mid-afternoon thousands of workers and soldiers took to the streets. Soldiers were in full battle dress and workers marched alongside their families carrying banners while insurgent motorcars and military trucks drove through the streets decorated with red flags. Demonstrations outside theMariinsky Palace , the headquarters for theProvisional Government and theTauride Palace , the headquarters of thePetrograd Soviet , included slogans for the transfer of power to theSoviets . A large part of the demonstration went out of their way to parade past theBolshevik headquarters at theKshesinskaia mansion .Random rifle and machine gun fire was scattered throughout the city. Workers and soldiers appealed to the guards at the
Peter and Paul Fortress and with their consent were able to take over the Fortress. A group of soldiers made an unsuccessful attempt to capture War MinisterAlexander Kerensky .In reaction to the street protests, the
Provisional Government and thePetrograd Soviet appealed to workers and soldiers to not go into the streets. This directive failed and in response the commander of the Petrograd Military District, General Petr Polovstev ordered units of the garrison to restore order. Units not active in the rebellion ignored the orders. Later in the evening General Polovstev issued a decree banning on further demonstrations. TheProvisional Government , the military and thePetrograd Soviet had lost all authority. The cabinet of theProvisional Government and theAll-Russian Executive Committees of thePetrograd Soviet met in emergency sessions throughout the night discussing how to deal with the situation. [. cite book
last = Rabinowitch
first = Alexander
authorlink = Alexander Rabinowitch
title = The Bolsheviks Come to Power: The Revolution of 1917 in Petrograd
publisher = Haymarket Books and Pluto Press
date = 2004
id = SBN 0745322689]Bolshevik involvement
The demands which the workers and soldiers took to the streets with in the July Days were influenced by the
Bolshevik Party . 'All Power to the Soviets' and other slogans put forth by theBolsheviks were taken up by the workers and soldiers on the streets. The demonstration was organized by theBolshevik Military Organization without authorization from the Central Committee after pressure from rank and file soldiers. During the afternoon of July 3 the Central Committee with the support ofKamenev ,Trotsky andZinoviev decided to take action to restrain the developing situation. Under the pressure of what seemed like a developing mass demonstration of workers and soldiers in the streets, the leadership of theBolshevik Military Organization , thePetersburg Committee and later on the Central Committee, reversed their decision, coming out in support of the street demonstrations. BothTrotsky andZinoviev persistently argued that the street protests remain peaceful. After this decision, theBolshevik Military Organization actively organized and supported the demonstration, mobilizing reinforcements from the front lines and dispatching armored cars to capture key posts including bridges and thePeter and Paul Fortress .No public record was ever made of the internal debates of the
Bolshevik Party around the July Days. There were some within theBolshevik Party who advocated an intensification of activity on July 4th. Most prominent among those were Nikolai Podvoisky and Vladimir Nevsky, leaders of theBolshevik Military Organization ,Volodarsky a member of thePetersburg Committee andMartin Latis of the Vyborg District Bolshevik Organization, who was highly critical of the Central Committee's decision to hold back the masses. Others in theBolshevik Party , includingV.I. Lenin were split on what to do. On July 5th at two or three o'clock in the morning, after the Provisional Government dispatched a number of loyal troops from the front to the streets of Petrograd and won the support of a number of previously neutral garrisons of troops, the Central Committee of theBolshevik Party decided to call off the street demonstrations.Consequences
Kerensky ordered the arrest of Lenin and the other leading Bolsheviks, accusing them of inciting revolt with German financial backing. Lenin successfully fled and went into hiding in
Finland , but many other Bolshevik leaders were arrested, includingTrotsky andLunacharskii who were apprehended on22 July . They remained in prison until Kerensky released them in response to theKornilov Affair .References
Further reading
*cite book
last = Trotsky
first = Leon
authorlink = Leon Trotsky
title = The History of the Russian Revolution
publisher = Pathfinder Press
date = 1980
id = ISBN 978-0873488297
*cite book
last = Cliff
first = Tony
authorlink = Tony Cliff
title = All Power to the Soviets: Lenin, 1914-1917
publisher = Haymarket Books
date = 2004
id = ISBN 978-1931859103
*cite book
last = Le Blanc
first = Paul
authorlink = Paul Le Blanc
title = Lenin and the Revolutionary Party
publisher = Humanity Books
date = 1993
id = ISBN 978-1573924276
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