Ten Days That Shook the World

ct

r Nu

of the Pulko

917. 38 minute

e counter-revolutionary forces, who retreated from their positions in disorde

koye Selo and the station Alexandrovskaya. The Colpinno detachm

Tsarskoye Selo, to fortify its approach

fortifying its southern side, and t

ngthen the positions occupied by them, ar

of Colpinno and Krasnoye Selo, and also with the Staff

gn

ces acting against the Counter-

t-Colonel

without artillery, without a plan. What had fused that disorganised mass of undisciplined Red Guards, and soldiers without officers, into an

eissembourg. Massed against the Soviet forces were yunkers, Cossacks, land-owners, nobility, Black Hundreds-the Tsar come again, Okhrana and Sib

certified free from counter-revolutionary taint. Colonel Muraviov, ex-patriot, was in command-an efficient man, but to be carefully watched. At Colpinno, at Obukhovo, at Pulkovo and Krasnoye Selo were formed provision

ered about their little fires, waiting…. So it was beginning! They made toward the battle; and the worker hordes pouring out along the straight roads quickened their pace…. Thus upon all the points of attack automatically converge

rdes of the people, gathering in the darkness around the battle, rose like a tide and poured over the enemy…. Before midnight of Monday the Cossacks broke and were fleeing, leaving their artillery behind them, and the army of the proletar

F WORKERS' AND S

In the name of the Revolutionary Government I order all regiments to take the offensive against the enemies of the revolutionary democracy, and to take

he Revoluti

AVI

m the pr

forced their officers to line up and swear allegiance to the new Government. At Nizhni Novgorod the Soviet was in contro

ing the City Duma building, the Prefecture and the Hotel Metropole. The cobblestones of the Tverskaya and Nikitskaya had been torn up for trenches and barricades. A hail of machine-gun fire swept the quarters of the great banks and commercial houses. There were no light

cried the ordinary ci

tle villages, civil war burst into flame. From thousands of factories, peasant communes, regiments and a

oops invites the Provisional Government and the members of the Council of the Republic to come, if

ge, and declared that all attempts to interfere with the Bolshevik forces, and all armed resistance to its orders, would be severely repressed. At the same time

or the health!" Inside, the long, gloomy halls and bleak rooms seemed deserted. No one moved in all the enormous pile. A deep, uneasy sound came to my ears, and looking around, I noticed that everywhere on the floor, along the walls, men were sleeping. Rou

many glasses holding dregs of tea. Beside them lay a copy of the Military Revolutionary Committee's last bulletin, upside down, scrawled with painful hand-writing. It was a memorial writte

i Vin

Mas

tolb

skres

Leo

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aida

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Army on November 15th, 1916. O

il Be

Voskr

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agles, sleep wit

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Under the ear

closed your rank

flatly denied signing the proclamation of the Committee for Salvation, as had Avksentiev; and the Committee for Salvation itself had repudiated the Appe

ernov at their head, were at Gatchina, trying to

. "More than sixty delegates have arrived from the Front, with assurances of support by all the armies except the troops on the Rumanian fro

ertificate approving

ff headquarters by co

o transmit the first d

olution, over the Gove

nsla

T

y Revol

mm

W. &

ember

.

TIF

e present to t

st press JOHN REED,

s been examined by the

is no objection to its

all cooperate in ever

desti

mander in C

ff, VLAD. BO

e frightened by the Revolutionary Tribunals; they demand, in a sort of panic, that we dissolve them before going any further. … We have accepted the proposition of the Vikzhel to form a homogeneous Socialist Ministry, and they're working on that now. You see, it all

zky what statement he had to make to the world, Trotzky replied: "At this moment the

d a meeting and declared a formal strike. Smolny had demanded some thirty-five millions of rubles from the State Bank, and the cashier had locked the vaults, only paying out money to the representatives of the Provisional

haos in which affairs had been left by the striking clerks. In all the offices of the huge place perspiring volunteer workers, soldiers and sa

pealed to the Peasants, ordering them not to recognise the Land Decree passed by the Congress of the Soviets, because it would cause confusion and civil wa

y talk of "destroying the Bolsheviki"-and very little about excluding them from the Government, except from the Populist Socialists and the Peasants' Soviets. Even the Central Army Committee at the Stavka, the mo

nsky's "humanitarian sentiments," published

nited around it, I have halted all military action against the rebels. A delegate of the Committee

nt a telegram

est energetically against the use of political terrorism in the civil war, especially when it is carried on between different factions of the revoluti

page 227

ontaining rhymes and jokes about the defeated bourgeoisie and the "moderate"

o elect a Provisional People's Council, composed of about four hundred members-seventy-five representing Smolny, seventy-five the old Tsay-ee-kah, and the rest split up amo

ith him? Certainly! He was a volunteer, a University student, and as we rolled down the street shouted over his shoulder to me phr

k stairway to a low room lit by one window. At a long wooden table were seated some twenty soldiers, eatin

n, a huge loaf of black bread, and of course the inevitable tea-pots. At once every one began asking me questions about America: Was it true that people in a free country sold their votes for money? If so, how did they get what they wanted? How about this "Tammany"? Was it true that in a free country a little group of people could control a whole city,

apitalist class? Then the capitalist class must control the legislatures and the courts. How then can the

" said Baklanov, suddenly. "And I-and I-" The whole

I come in?" asked the Colonel. "Prosim! Prosim!" they answered heartily. He entered, smiling, a tall, distinguished figure in a goat-ski

re to-day," he answered. "Yes, comrade, we shall be very glad to hav

l the Battalion absolutely, except in action, when the Colonel is delegated by us to command. In action his orders must be obeyed, but he i

ee great bundles of newspapers for the front. Straight down the Liteiny we rattled, and along the Zagorodny Prospekt. Next to me sat a youth wit

ically. "My family is a very ancient and nobl

" I began,

ind, because they know I do not believe in opposing the will of the majority…. I have refused to take any ac

e others cried at him gaily,

s. Women with spades, some with rifles and bandoleers, others wearing the Red Cross on their arm-bands-the bowed, toil-worn women of the slums. Squads of soldiers marching out of step, with an affectionate jeer for the Red Guards; sailors, grim-looking; children with bundles of food for their fathers and mothers; all these, coming and going, trudged through the whitened mud that covered the cobbles of the highway inches

and gilded and coloured bulbs and pinnacles; to the left, tall chimneys, some pouring out black smoke; and beyond, a lowering sky over Finland. On e

nother. A row of houses facing the cross-roads was marked with bullets, and the earth was trampled into mud half a mile around. The fighting had been furious here…. In the near distance riderless Cossack horse

over, and the imperial city disgorging its thousands along all the roads. Far over to the left lay the little hill of Kranoye Selo, the parade-ground of the Imperial Guards' summer camp, and the Imperial Dair

. She was in an automobile, with Zalkind and another man. There was a truce, and they started for the front trenches. They were talking and laughing, when all of a s

t room a samovar had been set up, and fifty or more workers, soldiers, sailors and officers stood around, drinking tea and talking at the top of their voices. In one corner two clumsy-handed workingmen were trying to make a multigraphing machine go. At the centre table, the huge Dybenko bent over a m

attention. In his breast was a hole; through his clothes fresh blood came welling up with every heart-beat. His eyes were closed and his young, bearded

u go up to the Commandant's headquarters and take charge? Wait; I will write

om some Red Guards were rummaging curiously around, while my old friend, the Colonel, stood by the window biting his moustache. He greeted me

in such a war as this, no matter how much we may instinctively dislike the dicta

taking over the offi

nel nervously, "are t

ed. "Money? Money? Ah, you mean the chest. There it is," said the Colonel, "just as I fou

d knowingly. "Very c

axe. Here is an American comrade. Let him smash th

e. The wooden

said the Red Guard

stolen the money and

," he said. "It was the Kornilovi

Red Guard. "He is Ker

him, then we will, a

in Peter-Paul, where h

led assent. With a pi

was le

houted to me to come along. Red Guards issued from headquarters, each of them staggering under an arm-load of small, corrugated-iron bombs, filled with grubit-which, they say, is ten tim

side. The cannon leaped from one wheel to the other, and the grubit bombs went rolli

workers ready to throw over the capitalists? What is the situation in the Mooney case now? Will they extradite Berkman to San Francisco?" and other,

oldiers ran out into the road before us,

nybody! We're Red Guards!" And we thundered imperiously on, while Vladimir Nicolaievit

w a squad of sailors march

he front,

d, "it was about half a kilometer down the road. But the damn thing isn't

have been about a mile further that Vladimir Nicolaievi

ong here the side of the road was heavily wooded. Very much excited now, we crept along, speaking in whispers, until the truck was nearly opp

cannon and slewed it around until it a

a pale wan colour in the low, sickly autumn sun. Not a thing moved, except

thin, and paused. Beyond, in a little clearing, three

greeted, while behind him one cannon, twenty rifles and a truck-load

hooting going o

ing relieved, "Why we were just sh

pty day. At the first cross-roads two soldiers ran out in f

s, com

r. "We are Red Guards. We don't need

nary discipline. Suppose some counterrevolutionaries came along in a tr

mine, which had been issued by the Revolutionary Staff at Smolny. The sentries declared that I must go with them. The Red Guards objected strenuously, but the sailor who had spok

he road, all the company waving farewell. The soldiers consulted in low tones for a moment, and then l

e from the chimney of a datchya, a rambling wooden house a quarter of a mile up the si

re is the seal of the

mit

dly at my pass, t

thers," said one, sullenly.

can surely read." They hesitated. "No," said one. The other looked me over. "Wh

larm, babbling, "I don't know anything about them! I don't know anything about them!" One of my guards held o

ass, John Reed, is a

Democracy, an in

d. In the fast-deepening twilight we trudged along the muddy road. Occasionally we met squads of soldiers, who stopped and

at the entrance asked eager questions. A spy? A provocator? We mounted a winding stair and emerged into a great, bare room with a huge stove in the centre, and ro

ve, slowly and then with a rush, thundering, with faces full of hate. "Comrades! Comrades!" yelled one of my guards. "Commit

eyes. Then he smiled and handed me the pass. "Comrades, this is an American comrade. I am Chairman of the Committee, and I

nner. You shall go to the Officers' Club, wh

ristocratic-looking youth, with the shoulder straps of a Lieutenant,

library opened from the hall. We entered the dining-room, at a long table in the centre of which sat about twenty officers in full uniform, wearing their gold- and silver-handled swords, the ribbons and crosses of Imperial decorations. All

olsheviki?" I

, but I caught one or two gla

evik. Captain Kherlov there is a Cadet. I myself am a Socialist Revolutionary of the right wing…. I should say that most of the offi

the Colonel spread them out on the t

l marks, "were our positions this morning.

ers, we occupied the position along this r

Chairman of the Regimental Committee, with another soldier.

ur sector. I do not think it is necessary to take up advanced positions. Gentlem

re to advance with all speed, and prepare to engage the Cossacks north of Gatchina i

Rapidly tracing lines with a blue pencil, he gave his orders, while a sergeant made shorthand notes. The sergeant then withdrew, and ten minutes

t in his pocket. Then he signed the other, stamped it with a ro

the Rev

ng press of trucks, armoured cars, cannon before the door, and the shouting, the laughter of unwonted victory. Half a dozen Red Guards forced their way through, a pri

arried the big revolver. An automobile stood with racing engine at the kerb. Alon

old the Cossacks nobody knows, but the fact is that General Krasnov and his staff and sever

print here the depos

e morning of

clock (A. M.), I was summoned by the Supreme Command

e. Your Cossacks declare categorically that the

talk of it, and I know that

icers say the

s the officers who are

do? I ought to

ble man, you will go i

ou will present your

e, and enter into nego

nal Gove

I will do t

guard and ask that a

o you know whether it is

know who D

is my

ou play for high stakes you mu

ll leave

calmly and openly, so that every one

must give me a guard

Go

ed him to pick out ten Cossacks to accompany the Supreme Commander. Half an hour later

arched for, supposing that he could not hav

form of a sailor," and by that act lost whatever p

as crowded with the proletarian army going home, and new reserves pouring out to take their places. Immense trucks like ours, columns of artillery, wagons, loomed up in the night

capital, immeasurably more splendid by night than by

one hand, while with the other he swept the

face all alight. "All