Editing Russian Revolution of 1905 (section)

== Start of the revolution ==
[[File:The Russian Revolution, 1905 Q81561.jpg|thumb|Artistic impression of [[Bloody Sunday (1905)|Bloody Sunday]] in St. Petersburg]]
In December 1904, a strike occurred at the [[Kirov Plant|Putilov plant]] (a railway and artillery supplier) in St. Petersburg. Sympathy strikes in other parts of the city raised the number of strikers to 150,000 workers in 382 factories.<ref name="Salisbury, Harrison E. 1981 125">{{cite book |title=Black Night White Snow |author=Salisbury, Harrison E. |publisher=Da Capo Press |year=1981 |isbn=978-0-306-80154-9 |page=117}}</ref> By {{OldStyleDate|21 January|1905|8 January}}, the city had no electricity and newspaper distribution was halted. All public areas were declared closed.

Controversial Orthodox priest [[Georgy Gapon]], who headed a police-sponsored workers' association, led a huge workers' procession to the [[Winter Palace]] to deliver a petition<ref>This petition asked for "an eight-hour day, a minimum daily wage of one ruble (fifty cents), a repudiation of bungling bureaucrats, and a democratically elected Constituend Assembly to introduce representative government into the empire."  R.R. Palmer, ''A History of the Modern World'', second edition, Alfred A. Knopf (New York) 1960, p. 715</ref> to the [[Nicholas II of Russia|Tsar]] on Sunday, {{OldStyleDate|22 January|1905|9 January}}. The troops guarding the Palace were ordered to tell the demonstrators not to pass a certain point, according to [[Sergei Witte]], and at some point, troops opened fire on the demonstrators, causing between 200 (according to Witte) and 1,000 deaths. The event became known as [[Bloody Sunday (1905)|Bloody Sunday]], and is considered by many scholars as the start of the active phase of the revolution.

The events in St. Petersburg provoked public indignation and a series of massive strikes that spread quickly throughout the industrial centers of the Russian Empire. Polish socialists—both the [[Polish Socialist Party|PPS]] and the [[Social Democracy of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania|SDKPiL]]—called for a general strike. By the end of January 1905, over 400,000 workers in [[Congress Poland|Russian Poland]] were on strike (see [[Revolution in the Kingdom of Poland (1905–1907)]]). Half of European Russia's industrial workers went on strike in 1905, and 93.2% in Poland.<ref name="Blobaum">Robert Blobaum, ''Feliks Dzierzynski and the SDKPiL: A Study of the Origins of Polish Communism'', p. 123</ref> There were also strikes in Finland and the [[Baltic states|Baltic]] coast. In [[Riga]], 130 protesters were killed on {{OldStyleDate|26 January|1905|13 January}}, and in [[Warsaw]] a few days later over 100 strikers were shot on the streets. By February, there were strikes in the [[Caucasus]], and by April, in the [[Ural Mountains|Urals]] and beyond. In March, all higher academic institutions were forcibly closed for the remainder of the year, adding radical students to the striking workers. A strike by railway workers on {{OldStyleDate|21 October|1905|8 October}} quickly developed into a general strike in Saint Petersburg and Moscow. This prompted the setting up of the short-lived [[Saint Petersburg Soviet]] of Workers' Delegates, an admixture of [[Bolsheviks]] and [[Mensheviks]] headed by Khrustalev-Nossar and despite the [[Iskra]] split would see the likes of [[Julius Martov]] and [[Georgi Plekhanov]] spar with [[Lenin]]. [[Leon Trotsky]], who felt a strong connection to the Bolsheviki, had not given up a compromise but spearheaded strike action in over 200 factories.<ref>Voline (2004). ''Unknown Revolution'', Chapter 2: [http://www.ditext.com/voline/89.html The Birth of the "Soviets"]</ref> By {{OldStyleDate|26 October|1905|13 October}}, over 2 million workers were on strike and there were almost no active railways in all of Russia. Growing inter-ethnic confrontation throughout the [[Caucasus]] resulted in [[Armenian–Tatar massacres of 1905–1906|Armenian–Tatar massacres]], heavily damaging the cities and the Baku [[oilfield]]s.{{cn|date=November 2024}}

[[File:The Russian Revolution, 1905 Q81546.jpg|thumb|Artistic impression of the mutiny by the crew of the battleship [[Russian battleship Potemkin|''Potemkin'']] against the ship's officers on 14 June 1905]]
With the unsuccessful and bloody [[Russo-Japanese War]] (1904–1905) there was unrest in army reserve units. On 2 January 1905, [[Lüshunkou District|Port Arthur]] was lost; in February 1905, the Russian army was defeated at [[Battle of Mukden|Mukden]], losing almost 80,000 men. On 27–28 May 1905, the Russian [[Baltic Fleet]] was defeated at [[Battle of Tsushima|Tsushima]]. Witte was dispatched to make peace, negotiating the [[Treaty of Portsmouth]] (signed {{OldStyleDate|5 September|1905|23 August}}). In 1905, there were naval mutinies at [[Sevastopol]] (see [[Sevastopol Uprising]]), [[Vladivostok]], and [[Kronstadt]], peaking in June with the [[Russian battleship Potemkin#The mutiny|mutiny aboard the battleship ''Potemkin'']]. The mutineers eventually surrendered the battleship to Romanian authorities on 8 July in exchange for asylum, then the Romanians returned her to Imperial Russian authorities on the following day.<ref>Neal Bascomb, ''[[Red Mutiny: Eleven Fateful Days on the Battleship Potemkin]]'', pp. 286–299</ref> Some sources claim over 2,000 sailors died in the suppression.<ref>Bascomb, N (2007). ''Red Mutiny: Eleven Fateful Days on the Battleship Potemkin''. Boston: ''[[Houghton Mifflin]]''.</ref> The mutinies were disorganised and quickly crushed. Despite these mutinies, the armed forces were largely apolitical and remained mostly loyal, if dissatisfied—and were widely used by the government to control the 1905 unrest.{{cn|date=November 2024}}

[[File:The Russian Revolution, 1905 Q81553.jpg|thumb|A barricade erected by revolutionaries in Moscow during [[Moscow uprising of 1905]]]]
Nationalist groups had been angered by the [[Russification]] undertaken since [[Alexander II of Russia|Alexander II]]. The Poles, Finns, and the Baltic provinces all sought autonomy, and also freedom to use their national languages and promote their own culture.<ref name="Kevin O'Connor">[[Kevin O'Connor (historian)|Kevin O'Connor]], ''The History of the Baltic States'', Greenwood Press, {{ISBN|0-313-32355-0}}, [https://books.google.com/books?id=b3b5nU4bnw4C&dq=Russification+Poland-Lithuania&pg=RA1-PA58 Google Print, p. 58]</ref> [[Muslims|Muslim]] groups were also active, founding the [[Union of the Muslims of Russia]] in August 1905. Certain groups took the opportunity to settle differences with each other rather than the government. Some nationalists undertook [[Anti-jewish|anti-Jewish]] [[Pogroms in the Russian Empire|pogrom]]s, possibly with government aid, and in total over 3,000 Jews were killed.<ref name="taylor2003">Taylor, BD (2003). ''Politics and the Russian Army: Civil-Military Relations, 1689–2000''. [[Cambridge University Press]]. p. 69.</ref>

The number of prisoners throughout the Russian Empire, which had peaked at 116,376 in 1893, fell by over a third to a record low of 75,009 in January 1905, chiefly because of several mass amnesties granted by the Tsar;<ref name="wheat2002">Wheatcroft, SG (2002). ''Challenging Traditional Views of Russian History''. [[Palgrave Macmillan]]. ''The Pre-Revolutionary Period'', p. 34.</ref> the historian S G Wheatcroft has wondered what role these released criminals played in the 1905–06 social unrest.<ref name="wheat2002" />

=== Government response ===
On 12 January 1905, the Tsar appointed [[Dmitri Feodorovich Trepov]] as governor in St Petersburg and dismissed the Minister of the Interior, [[Pyotr Sviatopolk-Mirsky]], on {{OldStyleDate|18 February|1905|5 February}}. He appointed a government commission "to enquire without delay into the causes of discontent among the workers in the city of St Petersburg and its suburbs"<ref>{{cite book |last1=Allen |first1=Rowan |last2=Rose |first2=Denny |title=History of Europe |date=March 28, 2018 |publisher=ED-Tech Pres |location=UK |page=167 |isbn=9781839472787 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Q-PEDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA167 |access-date=25 May 2022}}</ref> in view of the strike movement. The commission was headed by Senator Nikolay Shidlovsky, a member of the [[State Council of Imperial Russia|State Council]], and included officials, chiefs of government factories, and private factory owners. It was also meant to have included workers' delegates elected according to a two-stage system. Elections of the workers delegates were, however, blocked by the socialists who wanted to divert the workers from the elections to the armed struggle. On {{OldStyleDate|5 March|1905|20 February}}, the commission was dissolved without having started work. Following the assassination of his uncle, the [[Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia|Grand Duke Sergei Aleksandrovich]], on {{OldStyleDate|17 February|1905|4 February}}, the Tsar made new concessions. On {{OldStyleDate|2 March|1905|18 February}} he published the ''[[Alexander Bulygin|Bulygin Rescript]]'', which promised the formation of a consultative assembly, [[religious tolerance]], [[freedom of speech]] (in the form of [[language rights]] for the Polish minority) and a reduction in the peasants' redemption payments. On {{OldStyleDate|24 and 25 May|1905|11 and 12 May}}, about 300 Zemstvo and municipal representatives held three meetings in Moscow, which passed a resolution, asking for popular representation at the national level. On {{OldStyleDate|6 June|1905|24 May}}, [[Nicholas II]] had received a Zemstvo deputation. Responding to speeches by Prince [[Sergei Nikolaevich Trubetskoy]] and Mr Fyodrov, the Tsar confirmed his promise to convene an assembly of people's representatives.{{cn|date=November 2024}}