CHAPTER XIII

THE BEGINNING OF THE REVOLUTION

As can easily be imagined, the reverses which followed each other from the very beginning of the war, were deeply reflected in the country, and gave but too good an opportunity to all the adversaries of the Government to try to discredit it in public opinion. After the assassination of M. Plehve the anarchists grew bolder, and, encouraged by success, went on with their murderous designs. Moscow, which formerly was the centre of conservatism, had become, by a strange freak of destiny, the bulwark of revolution. The spirit of the town had always been independent, and adverse to the Central Government established in St. Petersburg; but, on the other hand, it had always remained faithful to its Tsars.

After Khodinka things altered, and distrust of the Sovereign, as well as dislike for his Ministers and advisers, replaced the former devotion for the person of the monarch. The Grand Duke Sergius was intensely disliked, in spite of the great popularity of his wife. He was made the scapegoat of the mistakes committed by others, and people often accused him of things he had been unable to prevent as well as of those of which he personally disapproved. His entourage, too, were in part responsible for the hatred which the population of Moscow professed for his person. They were for the most part composed of people absolutely devoid of political sense, who were too weak even to flatter, but who thought themselves strong, because they advocated the use of the stick or of the lash as the remedy for all kind of possible evils.

The Grand Duke himself, whose intelligence was moderate, whose education had been conducted on the principle of strict obedience to the orders of the head of his House, and who had the great defect of believing that he possessed principles, whereas he had only passions, did not realise the gravity of the crisis which his country was going through. He imagined that by hanging a few people, and exiling a good many, he would be able to subdue the revolutionary tendencies which he was forced to recognise were little by little taking hold, not only of the lower orders, but also of the higher classes of Society in Moscow.

He was courageous by nature, more so than his nephew and brother-in-law, the Emperor, and he disdained the threats which he heard every day levelled at his person. However, at the end of the year 1904, these threats assumed such proportions that it was deemed advisable for the Grand Duke and his wife to remove from the palace of the Governor-General, where they resided, to the Kremlin, and the Grand Duchess, alarmed by all she heard, and having been told that her presence at his side would preserve her husband from any attempt to murder him, made a point of accompanying him wherever he went. However, one morning she was prevented from doing so, and as if to prove that she had been his guardian angel, it was on that very morning that Sergius Alexandrovitch was killed.

A cross is now erected on the spot where he was blown to pieces, and reminds the world of this dastardly crime. It is useless to repeat its harrowing details, or to relate how his mangled remains were picked up during three whole days (one of his fingers was found on the roof of the Arsenal). The people who first reached the spot where the catastrophe had occurred cannot to this day speak without a shudder of what they saw. A stretcher was brought hurriedly, no one knows from where, and upon it were deposited what remains it had been possible to pick up; and whilst this was being done one saw a woman, bareheaded, with a blue cloak thrown upon her shoulders, hurry up to the spot where the catastrophe had taken place and throw herself upon her knees beside the stretcher. It was the Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna, who, hearing the noise of the explosion, had rushed to see what had happened.

Bravely she followed the soldiers, who slowly brought back the remains of the Grand Duke to the Kremlin, and her composure in that trying moment of her life was the admiration of all who saw it. She found the courage to dispatch at once a telegram to the Emperor, in which she begged him, among other things, to allow her husband to be buried in Moscow, the town he loved so well, as she expressed herself; and she further begged Nicholas II. not to endanger his own person by coming to the funeral, and to grant her permission to spend the rest of her life beside the murdered Grand Duke’s grave.

Her message relieved Nicholas II. from a great anxiety and difficulty. He knew very well that his duty would have required him to be present at his uncle’s obsequies, but he did not care to do so at all, and thus expose himself to the possibility of a like fate. The request of the Grand Duchess gave him the opportunity for which he longed, and so he dispatched his other uncle, the Grand Duke Alexis, to Moscow, to represent him at the funeral, and he replied to his aunt and sister-in-law that he would follow her wishes in everything, and that she had only to order what she wanted.

Elizabeth Feodorovna then did one thing which was bitterly criticised afterwards, and not without reason. She insisted upon going to the prison where her husband’s murderer was confined, to hold conversation with him. It was said that she wanted to assure him of her forgiveness; but, as some people remarked, taking into account that she could not save him from the gallows, her step in visiting him seemed entirely out of place.

There was in all her actions at that sad time an exaggeration which did her more harm than good, and which destroyed many sympathies. However, Moscow loved her, and perhaps felt grateful to her for her willingness to remain in the town where her married life had been wrecked. When, later on, she developed considerable activity, not only in the domain of charity, but also in politics, she still kept the affection of the inhabitants of the old capital--so much so that it is at least certain that if ever another revolution breaks out in Moscow, the Grand Duchess will be respected by everybody, equally with the nuns of the community of Martha and Mary, which she has founded for the relief of the poor and sick inhabitants of the city.

The Grand Duke Sergius Alexandrovitch was murdered in January of 1905, and the year which began with this catastrophe was to see many more bloody days before it came to an end. About the same time that the fifth son of the Emperor Alexander II. met with the same fate as his father, Port Arthur fell into the hands of the Japanese, and this loss of the fortress on which the attention of the whole of Russia had been concentrated for long months, put the crowning touch to the general indignation of the public against the Government. In St. Petersburg, especially, where factories abound, and where the workmen felt bitterly the economical crisis, which, as a consequence of the war, was ruining the country, the agitation assumed quite gigantic proportions. It was felt that a revolt, if not a revolution, was imminent, and that something had to be done to arrest its progress. The misfortune was that no one seemed to know what was to be done.

At that time Count Witte was Minister of the Interior. Unscrupulous as ever, clever as usual, he thought that the first step to be taken would be to ascertain what really were the intentions of the leaders of the anarchist movement, which lately had assumed considerable proportions among the working classes.

The leaders of this movement had hitherto escaped the vigilance of the police, and could not be discovered. On the other hand, it was evident that unless the Government discovered the intentions of these leaders, fight was impossible and no measures could be taken to check the evil. It was then that he bethought himself of resorting to the old method of _agents provocateurs_, through the help of whom he hoped to get at last to the bottom of the vast conspiracy, the existence of which no one denied.

Whilst he was looking around him for a man willing to take upon himself such a part, one of his old friends in Odessa indicated to him a parish priest, called Gapon, who, he told him, wielded a considerable influence among the working classes of St. Petersburg, and who might be useful to him in that respect. After some hesitation Count Witte decided to see the priest in question, and one dark winter evening Gapon was introduced into the presence of the Minister.

The two men understood each other at once. Few people, indeed, possess the clear insight into human nature that has been granted to Count Witte. As soon as he saw Gapon he judged that he was false by nature, desirous of enjoying the luxuries of life, in the attainment of which he would have no scruples. He was aware that Gapon had the advantage of knowing how to talk to the masses, how to inspire them with confidence in his person and with belief in his expressed principles. Gapon, on the other hand, was delighted to find in Count Witte the opportunity to win for himself the means whereby, at a later date, he could lead an easy, pleasant, indolent life, with all the pleasures that money can afford.

The Government, headed by Witte, felt that some pretext had to be found for measures of repression, which nothing justified so long as the revolutionary agitation was simply increasing. They hesitated to resort to measures of violence, which might be difficult to justify in the eyes of Europe. The Emperor, too, was constantly urging his Ministers to put an end to the discussions which he felt, rather than knew, were going on everywhere in St. Petersburg and in Moscow. Witte himself felt that if things were allowed to go on as they were the moment might easily arrive when the agitation would reach the troops, already exasperated at the disasters of the war, and throw them also on the side of the enemies of the Government.

At this moment Gapon proposed to persuade the workmen of the different factories around St. Petersburg to present a petition to the Emperor. This petition would furnish the pretext to actively crush the smouldering rebellion.

The news that this petition was about to be presented circulated everywhere for days before the workmen made up their minds to go with it to the Winter Palace. It is said that the police took care to spread a report, in the hope of producing a general panic, that the masses were about to rise, and to attack the Sovereign in his Palace; and following the precedent of the Parisians during the October days which saw the beginning of the end of the old French monarchy, to compel him to accede to their wishes. What the masses wanted no one knew, and the wildest rumours were afloat. Some said that the nation wanted peace to be concluded at once, no matter under what conditions; others that it would beg for permission to raise a popular militia to fight the Japanese; whilst people eager to appear well informed assured their friends that what the workmen wanted was the abdication of the Emperor and the establishment of a Republic. Rumours without end filled the town, and everybody belonging to the upper classes of Society trembled with panic, and scarcely dared to come out of their houses. This universal anxiety was carefully nursed by the agents of the Government in order to justify the measures it meant to take to restore an order that had not yet been disturbed.

The Empress Dowager, on the other hand, was the only person who kept cool, and who would not give way to the terror that seemed to have taken hold of everyone. She refused to leave the capital, and showed herself publicly as if nothing was the matter. It was only when the Emperor sent her a positive command to retire that she consented to leave the Anitchkov Palace and went to her own castle of Gatschina.

Nicholas II. completely misunderstood when told about the intention of the workmen to seek to see himself in person, and to lay before him their wrongs and their wants. When he was informed that all the efforts to disperse the masses about to march towards the Winter Palace had failed, he conceived the idea that the Revolution had come, and had only one thought: to fly from danger; and in the dead of the night a train was hurriedly made ready, and he escaped to Tsarskoe Selo, with the Empress and his children, without taking even the time to gather together any of his papers, Alexandra Feodorovna, indeed, leaving everything behind her, even to her clothes and linen.

It is certain that had anyone been found to tell the Emperor to decide to face the crowd he would have subdued them, only by his appearance before them. The Russian peasant has still in his heart a respect for the person of the Tsar, and until the present reign he has considered him like a father to whom one could always apply in case of need. Indeed, on that January day, when the workmen and populace of the capital marched towards the Winter Palace, not one man among this multitude but thought he would be able to tell his Sovereign that he was ready to give his life for him and for his dynasty. Not one of them had any thought of rebellion, and if that thought came later on it was after the pavement of the square in front of the Winter Palace had been dyed red.

In the darkness of the night, before leaving his capital, Nicholas II. called to him his uncles, the Grand Dukes Vladimir and Nicholas, the two energetic men of the family, and asked them what they thought ought to be done. Vladimir Alexandrovitch was for calling the troops to repulse the turbulent masses. A person who was present at this council of war then asked: “But if they are not turbulent, then what must one do?” The Tsar threw a terrible glance towards the unlucky speaker and, so it is said, replied: “If they are not turbulent, then one must treat them as if they were so.” The two Grand Dukes bowed their heads in silence, and at that moment the Empress ran into the room crying that the mutineers were coming, and that they must go at once. She was holding her son in her arms, and crying violently. Her husband threw a cloak over her shoulders, and hurried, together with her, to the door, where their carriage was waiting to take them to the station, saying to his uncles as he went: “Don’t spare them; kill as many as is necessary.”

Whilst the Tsar of All the Russias was thus escaping from his capital with his family, the workmen who were causing this panic had also spent a sleepless night. By the representations of Gapon they had been induced to direct their steps towards the Palace. He had explained to them that the best person before whom they could lay their grievances was the Emperor, their “little father,” who loved his people, and who would surely listen to them, and do all that he could for them. They had started on that road which for so many was to be the road of death, singing the National Anthem, and with a large picture of the Tsar, which they were carrying before them as a shield. Not a single obstacle met them on the march; no police were there to prevent their advance. It seemed as if it was agreed to let them pass, and, encouraged by the facilities they found everywhere, they believed more than ever in the assurances given to them by Gapon, who was marching at their head, that they would be received by the Emperor. When the procession reached the square before the Winter Palace, they suddenly found it to be occupied by two regiments of Cossacks.

It is said that an officer who had followed the procession managed to enter the Palace, where the Grand Duke Vladimir was holding his council of war, and tried to persuade him that the best thing to do would be to tell the multitude that the Emperor was not in town, and induce the people to disperse. The Grand Duke would not hear of it. “Punished they must be,” he said, and thereupon gave the order to fire.

Meanwhile the workmen, not knowing what was going on, began shouting their desire to see the Tsar, their “little father.” No reply was given to these appeals, no word of warning was spoken, and suddenly, before these masses had been able to realise what was happening, the troops took to their rifles, and laid low as many of the now frightened creatures as they could.

It is useless to describe the panic that followed. After a few moments, when the smoke had dissipated, the square was found to be covered with dead bodies and wounded men, women, and children. The soldiers fired again and again, and when the crowds, struck with terror, fled in every direction, they were followed by mounted Cossacks, who pursued them all along the Nevski Prospekt, killing whom they could, either with their rifles or with their whips; and when all seemed to be over, a cannon was fired, sweeping the whole length of the long avenue, and laying low all who had succeeded in escaping the first charge of the cavalry.

Gapon had escaped. As the first volley was heard he managed to disappear, hidden from friends and foes, by the care of the police for whom he had worked so well. He escaped to Paris, where he tried to pass as a martyr of the cause which he had betrayed. When he returned to Russia, as everybody now knows, he was murdered; not by the order of the Revolutionary Executive Committee, but by agents of the Government. It was too dangerous to allow such a compromising accomplice to live.

On the evening of the day that had seen such bloody scenes enacted within the walls of St. Petersburg, the Grand Duke Vladimir went to Tsarskoe Selo, to report to his nephew the events that had taken place. Nicholas II. listened in silence to the details given to him by his uncle. When the latter had finished he is reported to have asked: “Are you sure that you have killed enough people?”