A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution, 1891-1924

Because of the preoccupation of many historians with the organized labour movement — and their seduction by the Soviet myth of the armed workers on the barricades — the role of this everyday criminal violence in the revolutionary crowd has been either ignored or, even more misleadingly, confused with the violence of industrial war. Yet the closer one looks at the crowds on the streets, the harder it becomes to distinguish clearly between organized forms of protest — the marching workers with banners and songs — and criminal acts of looting and violence. The one could easily — and often did — break down into the other. It was not just a question of 'hooligans' or criminals joining in labour protests or taking advantage of the chaos they created to vandalize, assault and loot. Such acts seem to have been an integral element of labour militancy, a means of asserting the power of the plebeian crowd and of despoiling and destroying symbols of wealth and privilege. What the frightened middle classes termed 'hooliganism' — mob attacks on the well-to-do and on figures of authority, looting and vandalism, drunken brawling and rioting — could just as easily be categorized as 'revolutionary acts'. And in part that is what they were: the revolutionary violence of 1905—17 was expressed in just these sorts of act. It was driven by the same feelings of hatred for the rich and all

figures of authority, by the same desire of the poor and the powerless to assert themselves and claim the streets as their own. From the perspective of the propertied there was very little to distinguish between the 'rough' and 'rude' behaviour of the 'hooligans' — their cocky way of dressing, their drunkenness and vulgar language, their 'insolence' and licence' — and the behaviour of the revolutionary crowd.⁵¹ Even the most organized labour protests could, on the slightest provocation, break down into violence and looting. It was to become a major problem for all the revolutionary parties, the Bolsheviks in particular, who tried to use the violence of the crowd for their own political ends. Such violence was a double-edged sword and could lead to anarchy rather than controlled revolutionary force. This was the lesson the Bolsheviks would learn during the July and October Days in 1917 — outbursts of violence which were far removed from the Soviet image of heroic proletarian power.

If, however, there was some genuine inspiration for the Soviet myth of the factory worker, gun in hand, fighting for the revolution on the barricades, then that was the general strike of 1905. For it was the classic example of a spontaneous yet disciplined uprising of the working class. It began on 20 September with a walk-out by the Moscow printers — the most educated group of workers — for better pay and conditions. The strikers made contact with the students and held a mass street demonstration, which was attacked by the police. The workers threw stones at the police, smashed shop windows, overturned benches and knocked down trees to make barricades. By the start of October the printers of St Petersburg and several other cities had come out in solidarity with their comrades: middle-class homes went without their newspapers for several weeks. Then the railway workers came out on strike. The Union of Railway Employees and Workers was affiliated to the Union of Unions, which had been discussing the idea of a general political strike to further its campaign for political reform since the summer. By 10 October virtually the entire railway network had come to a halt. Millions of other workers — factory, shop and transport workers, bank and office employees, hospital staff, students, lecturers, even the actors of the Imperial Theatre in St Petersburg — came out in support of what had become in effect a national strike against the autocracy. The cities were brought to a standstill. All transport stopped. The lights went out at night. Telegraphs and telephones ceased to work. Shops were closed and their windows boarded up. Food became scarce. Robberies and looting exploded out of control. The gentry and the bourgeoisie took fright at the breakdown of law and order. When the Moscow water system began to malfunction there was panic; rumours spread that the strikers had deliberately contaminated the water. Workers, students and professionals joined together in demonstrations against the authorities. Many ended in the hasty building of barricades and in violent clashes with the police and Cossacks. The political demands of the demonstrators were

remarkably uniform — the convocation of a constituent assembly elected by universal suffrage — which was a sign of the co-ordinating role played by the Union of Unions as well as the increased discipline and organization of the workers themselves.⁵²