Revolutionary. Frame by frame. Rem Word
Martov moved to Germany
Photography is the home of Pavel Rumyantsev, a railway worker who sympathizes with the revolutionaries. This one, presumably, a fairly well-off worker, does not participate in the meetings. Meetings are held under the guise of celebrating the birthday of his wife Rumyantsev, Olga. The establishment of the RSDLP is already celebrated with a festive dinner – with libations, toasts and songs. The manifesto of the new party says: “Both the movement and the socialist direction, the Russian Social-Democratic Party continues the work and traditions of the entire preceding revolutionary movement in Russia; setting the most important of the immediate tasks of the party in its whole – the conquest of political freedom, social democracy goes to the goal, clearly outlined by the glorious leaders of the old “People’s Will”. But the means and ways that social democracy chooses are different. Their choice is determined by the fact that it consciously wants to be and remains a class movement of organized working masses. She is firmly convinced that “the emancipation of the working class can only be his own business,” and will consistently align all his actions with this basic principle of international social democracy. Long live the Russian, long live the international social democracy! “Comrades, to tune in to the wave of time – the Internationale (listen). I ask everyone to stand up. … Another couple of glasses and, suppose, the host of the house, Pavel Rumyantsev, timidly approaches the festive table. “Tell me, honestly, for whom are you doing all this? Do you really love us, the workers? Can I sit next to you?”
Lev Davidovich Trotsky (Bronstein), the future world-famous revolutionary, Lenin’s ally, the founder of the Red Army. Birth – 1879, November 7, the village of Yanovka, Kherson Province. Information about any profession Bronstein, practical, working activities, no. At the end of school education (Nikolaev), Trotsky, outside of any work experience, declares himself a friend of the proletariat, a professional revolutionary. Now, when Ulyanov-Lenin speaks at the First Congress of the RSDLP, he is 19 years old. Leib Bronstein is busy reviving the South Russian Workers’ Union. Soon he will be sent to Siberia for four years. The royal link is not a gulag. Soon enough, Trotsky escapes, not protected by guards and rows of barbed wire. In Europe – Vienna, London, articles written by Bronstein during his wanderings around Siberia have already gained popularity. Revolutionary becomes one of the editors of the newspaper Iskra
Jacob Sverdlov (Eshua Solomon Movshevich). Persistently scribbling on the violin, communicating among themselves in the spirit of the Torah, regularly, and attending the synagogue on their own, the Jewish boys have an advantage over the boys of all other religious denominations of Russia in organizing their own destiny. In this photo, our hero is 29 years old. By the time of the first congress of the RSDLP, Jacob is 23 years old. The first task from the party is the leadership of the Urals and, note, the Ekaterininburg committees of the RSDLP (b). The largest Motovilikha cannon factory in the country is enveloped in a fiery revolutionary spirit. One of his employees, Gabriel Myasnikov, will later become the murderer of the last de jure Russian emperor, Mikhail Romanov.
Upon exclusion from the seminary, I. Dzhugashvili receives a certificate that he has completed four classes and can work as a teacher in elementary public schools. For some time, Joseph has been working as a tutor, and even an “observer-calculator” at the Tiflis Physical Observatory. Actually, this is the entire experience of practical, generally useful work of the future leader. Even at the seminary, Dzhugashvili led the propaganda of Marxism in the workers’ circles, from a certain moment he began to receive money for it. Since 1901, now Koba (nickname – after the name of a romantic Georgian robber) goes to the illegal position. The first undertakings of the revolutionary – the publication of the newspaper “Struggle” and the organization of a large-scale strike of oil workers in Baku (1904), can be considered productive. Since 1903, the time of the Second Congress of the RSDLP, Stalin is a recognized revolutionary, now a “Bolshevik”, and spends most of his time abroad. Foreign voyages alternate with links – by the standards of the Stalinist GULAG “childish,” a few months a year, with the ability to run whenever they like. In 1906, Dzhugashvili was apprehended by a tragedy – the death of his wife, Catherine (Svanidze), from typhus, 8 months after the marriage. The personality of a revolutionary undergoes irreversible changes to excessive rigidity and asceticism. The son, Jacob, later nicknamed Stalin’s “Teen Wolf”, was raised by his mother’s sister until 1921. In March 1917, under a general amnesty from the organizers of the February Revolution, Stalin arrives in St. Petersburg
At the beginning of the twentieth-century turbulent exhaust gas, 95% of Russian and more than 50% of global oil production falls on Baku. The tycoons registered in Russia – Nobili, Rothschilds, Mantashevs (Russians of Armenian descent), make huge profits. Sometimes they donate to theaters and museums, but the “simple man” is outside the scope of their understanding. Meanwhile, the salary of a worker does not reach the ruble a day, he has to work and live in terrible conditions. The photograph depicts something resembling the landscape of Mordor – a forest of oil rigs and swamps of earthen tanks filled with oil. The wells are poisoned. For drinking you have to collect rainwater. Unpaid overtime work, 12—15 hour working day, endless fines, dwelling-barracks with rooms for 80 people. Such a tremendously low level of life, on the one hand, devalues life, on the other hand, makes possible the solidarity of representatives of thirty nationalities, ensures readiness for struggle. … Cossacks called by the authorities dispersed a 40,000-strong mob, killed 8 and wounded 40 workers. Workers, in turn, are detrimental to businesses. In the end, the first collective agreement is drawn up in Russia. A 9-hour working day is established, wages are raised to one ruble. Such a thing as a four-day paid vacation is realized as something fantastic before. The tsar’s reaction is interesting, according to one of the government documents: “… the pliability shown by the oil owners… drew the attention of his imperial majesty the sovereign emperor, since this compliance may have extremely adverse consequences on other factory and factory districts”
N-Japanese war of 1904—1905 becomes the catalyst for many subsequent revolutionary events. The initial psychological reason for the confrontation with the ambitious Eastern Power is as follows. During a trip to Japan, Nicholas II receives saber blows from a samurai, who believes that excessive honor is given to a foreign emperor. The attacker dies three months after the sentence is pronounced (life imprisonment), but the monarch harbors a fierce grudge against all Japanese. The external reason is the unrestrained advance of the Russian troops in Korea, the construction of military fortifications, contrary to the treaties with Japan. In addition, the intention of the samurai to saddle the 450 millionth China and lay the foundation of the world superpower with unclear objectives, causes the desire to somehow stop them. Before that, in the First Japanese-Chinese War, as well, for control over Korea, the Japanese gain experience in waging war at sea with armored ships. In the autumn of 1894, a battle will take place at the mouth of the Yalu River (north-west coast of Korea), with approximately equal forces (12 and 18 pennants, respectively). Japan has 4 ships seriously damaged, 100 people killed. China loses 5 sunk cruisers, and 650 sailors. The Qing Empire wins the battle – drives the Japanese squadron away from the transport ships. However, fearing new demoralizing losses, the government of the Celestial Empire forbids the fleet to go to sea. In early 1895, the battle for Weihaiwei (now the administrative district of the PRC) will take place. The Japanese attack the surrounded Chinese fleet (27 pennants, two battleships of Italian construction), destroy it completely, together with 2000 sailors, losing 200 fighters and 2 destroyers. A serious shortcoming of the Chinese fleets is the lack of high-explosive fragmentation projectiles. Available armor-piercing pigs inflict minimal