Father Georgi Gapon (original) (raw)
Sections
- Father Georgi Gapon
- Assembly of Russian Workers
- Bloody Sunday
- The 1905 Revolution
- The Death of Father Gapon
- Primary Sources
- Student Activities
- References
Georgi Gapon, the son of a peasant, was born in the village of Beliki, near Poltava in Russia on 17th February (O.S. 5th February) 1870. His father was a Cossack and his mother came from peasant stock.
Gapon later stressed that he came from a plebeian background. His biographer, Walter Sablinsky, claims that sources differ on this point: "One of his former teachers described the family as prosperous, and Soviet historians characterize his background as that of a wealthy peasant or kulak." (1)
At school one of his teachers, Ivan Mikhailovich Tregubov, introduced him to the ideas of Leo Tolstoy. He described him as "a serious boy, intelligent and pensive, although a lively one. He was always one of his top students, noted for his diligence and high degree of curiously." According to Lionel Kochan, Tregubov had a long-term impact on Gapon. (2)
Gapon entered the Theological Academy of St Petersburg and "combined his studies with missionary work amongst the poor and Chaplaincy duties at a St Petersburg deportation centre for convicts." Gapon became a religious teacher at the St. Olga children's orphanage. However, he eventually lost his faith in God and developed a strong desire to become a doctor as he thought in that role he would be more use to the poor. After failing to take his final exam the Theological Academy commented that he had "no particular desire to pursue a religious calling". (3)
In 1893 Gapon took a job as a zemstvo statistician, supplementing his income with money earned working as a private tutor. During this period he met the daughter of a local merchant in a house in which he was giving private lessons. The family objected to a proposed marriage due to Gapon's economic circumstances and he therefore made an appeal to Bishop Ilarion of Poltava, about his situation. The bishop interceded with the family and was granted permission to marry and re-entered the priesthood.
Father Georgi Gapon
Gapon married in 1896 and he was assigned to a lucrative post in a church in Poltava. His services were well attended and his fast growing reputation for genuine concern for the poor drew people away from other churches. During these years Gapon enjoyed a happily married life, with his wife giving birth to two children. Unfortunately she died after a brief illness in 1898.
If you find this article useful, please feel free to share on websites like Reddit. Please visit our support page. You can follow John Simkin on Twitter, Google+ & Facebook or subscribe to our monthly newsletter.
In 1902 Gapon became a priest in St. Petersburg where he showed considerable concern for the welfare of the poor. He soon developed a large following, "a handsome, bearded man, with a rich baritone voice, had oratorical gifts to a spell-binding degree". (4) The workers in St Petersburg had plenty to complain about. It was a time of great suffering for those on low incomes. About 40 per cent of houses had no running water or sewage. The Russian industrial employee worked on average an 11 hour day (10 hours on Saturday). Conditions in the factories were extremely harsh and little concern was shown for the workers' health and safety. Attempts by workers to form trade unions were resisted by the factory owners. In 1902 the army was called out 365 times to deal with unrest among workers. (5)
Vyacheslav Plehve, the Minister of the Interior, rejected all calls for reform. Lionel Kochan pointed out that "Plehve was the very embodiment of the government's policy of repression, contempt for public opinion, anti-semitism and bureaucratic tyranny" and it was no great surprise when Evno Azef, head of the Terrorist Brigade of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, ordered his assassination. (6)
On 28th July, 1904, Plehve was killed by a bomb thrown by Egor Sazonov on 28th July, 1904. Emile J. Dillon, who was working for the Daily Telegraph, witnessed the assassination: "Two men on bicycles glided past, followed by a closed carriage, which I recognized as that of the all-powerful minister (Vyacheslav Plehve). Suddenly the ground before me quivered, a tremendous sound as of thunder deafened me, the windows of the houses on both sides of the broad streets rattled, and the glass of the panes was hurled on to the stone pavements. A dead horse, a pool of blood, fragments of a carriage, and a hole in the ground were parts of my rapid impressions. My driver was on his knees devoutly praying and saying that the end of the world had come.... Plehve's end was received with semi-public rejoicings. I met nobody who regretted his assassination or condemned the authors." (7)
Plehve was replaced by Pyotr Sviatopolk-Mirsky, as Minister of the Interior. He held liberal views and hoped to use his power to create a more democratic system of government. Sviatopolk-Mirsky believed that Russia should grant the same rights enjoyed in more advanced countries in Europe. He recommended that the government strive to create a "stable and conservative element" among the workers by improving factory conditions and encouraging workers to buy their own homes. "It is common knowledge that nothing reinforces social order, providing it with stability, strength, and ability to withstand alien influences, better than small private owners, whose interests would suffer adversely from all disruptions of normal working conditions." (8)
Assembly of Russian Workers
In February, 1904, Sviatopolk-Mirsky's agents approached Father Gapon and encouraged him to use his popular following to "direct their grievances into the path of economic reform and away from political discontent". (9) Gapon agreed and on 11th April 1904 he formed the Assembly of Russian Workers of St Petersburg. Its aims were to affirm "national consciousness" amongst the workers, develop "sensible views" regarding their rights and foster amongst the members of the union "activity facilitating the legal improvements of the workers' conditions of work and living". (10)
By the end of 1904 the Assembly had cells in most of the larger factories, including a particularly strong contingent at the Putilov works. The overall membership has been variously estimated between 2,000 and 8,000. Whatever the true figure, the strength of the Assembly and of its sympathizers exceeded by far that of the political parties. For example, in St Petersburg at this time, the local Menshevik and Bolshevik groups could muster no more than 300 members each. (11)
Adam B. Ulam, the author of The Bolsheviks(1998) was highly critical of the leader of the Assembly of Russian Revolution: "Gapon had certain peasant cunning, but was politically illiterate, and his personal tastes were rather inappropriate for either a revolutionary or a priest: he was unusually fond of gambling and drinking. Yet he became an object of a spirited competition among various branches of the radical movement." (12) Another revolutionary figure, Victor Serge, saw him in a much more positive light. "Gapon is a remarkable character. He seems to have believed sincerely in the possibility of reconciling the true interests of the workers with the authorities' good intentions". (13)
According to Cathy Porter: "Despite its opposition to equal pay for women, the Union attracted some three hundred women members, who had to fight a great deal of prejudice from the men to join." Vera Karelina was an early member and led its women's section: "I remember what I had to put up with when there was the question of women joining... There wasn't a single mention of the woman worker, as if she was non-existent, like some sort of appendage, despite the fact that the workers in several factories were exclusively women." Karelina was also a Bolshevik but complained "how little our party concerned itself with the fate of working women, and how inadequate was its interest in their liberation.'' (14)
Father Gapon
Adam B. Ulam claimed that the Assembly of Russian Workers of St Petersburg was firmly under the control of the Minister of the Interior: "Father Gapon... had, with the encouragement and subsidies of the police, organized a workers' union, thus continuing the work of Zubatov. The union had scrupulously excluded Socialists and Jews. For a while the police could congratulate themselves on their enterprise." (15) David Shub, a Menshevik, agreed, claiming that the organization had been set up to "wean the workers away from radicalism". (16)
Alexandra Kollontai, an important Bolshevik leader, did join the union with little difficulty. She was also a feminist and felt the Bolsheviks had not done enough to support the demands of women members. Kollontai believed that any organization that allowed factory women was preferable to the Bolsheviks' almost total silence about them, and "how little our party concerned itself with the fate of working women, and how inadequate was its interest in their liberation." (17)
1904 was a bad year for Russian workers. Prices of essential goods rose so quickly that real wages declined by 20 per cent. When four members of the Assembly of Russian Workers were dismissed at the Putilov Iron Works in December, Gapon tried to intercede for the men who lost their jobs. This included talks with the factory owners and the governor-general of St Petersburg. When this failed, Gapon called for his members in the Putilov Iron Works to come out on strike. (18)
Father Gapon demanded: (i) An 8-hour day and freedom to organize trade unions. (ii) Improved working conditions, free medical aid, higher wages for women workers. (iii) Elections to be held for a constituent assembly by universal, equal and secret suffrage. (iv) Freedom of speech, press, association and religion. (v) An end to the war with Japan. By the 3rd January 1905, all 13,000 workers at Putilov were on strike, the department of police reported to the Minister of the Interior. "Soon the only occupants of the factory were two agents of the secret police". (19)
The strike spread to other factories. By the 8th January over 110,000 workers in St. Petersburg were on strike. Father Gapon wrote that: "St Petersburg seethed with excitement. All the factories, mills and workshops gradually stopped working, till at last not one chimney remained smoking in the great industrial district... Thousands of men and women gathered incessantly before the premises of the branches of the Workmen's Association." (20)
Tsar Nicholas II became concerned about these events and wrote in his diary: "Since yesterday all the factories and workshops in St. Petersburg have been on strike. Troops have been brought in from the surroundings to strengthen the garrison. The workers have conducted themselves calmly hitherto. Their number is estimated at 120,000. At the head of the workers' union some priest - socialist Gapon. Mirsky (the Minister of the Interior) came in the evening with a report of the measures taken." (21)
Gapon drew up a petition that he intended to present a message to Nicholas II: "We workers, our children, our wives and our old, helpless parents have come, Lord, to seek truth and protection from you. We are impoverished and oppressed, unbearable work is imposed on us, we are despised and not recognized as human beings. We are treated as slaves, who must bear their fate and be silent. We have suffered terrible things, but we are pressed ever deeper into the abyss of poverty, ignorance and lack of rights." (22)
The petition contained a series of political and economic demands that "would overcome the ignorance and legal oppression of the Russian people". This included demands for universal and compulsory education, freedom of the press, association and conscience, the liberation of political prisoners, separation of church and state, replacement of indirect taxation by a progressive income tax, equality before the law, the abolition of redemption payments, cheap credit and the transfer of the land to the people. (23)
Bloody Sunday
Over 150,000 people signed the document and on 22nd January, 1905, Gapon led a large procession of workers to the Winter Palace in order to present the petition. The loyal character of the demonstration was stressed by the many church icons and portraits of the Tsar carried by the demonstrators. Alexandra Kollontai was on the march and her biographer, Cathy Porter, has described what took place: "She described the hot sun on the snow that Sunday morning, as she joined hundreds of thousands of workers, dressed in their Sunday best and accompanied by elderly relatives and children. They moved off in respectful silence towards the Winter Palace, and stood in the snow for two hours, holding their banners, icons and portraits of the Tsar, waiting for him to appear." (24)
Harold Williams, a journalist working for the Manchester Guardian, also watched the Gapon led procession taking place: "I shall never forget that Sunday in January 1905 when, from the outskirts of the city, from the factory regions beyond the Moscow Gate, from the Narva side, from up the river, the workmen came in thousands crowding into the centre to seek from the tsar redress for obscurely felt grievances; how they surged over the snow, a black thronging mass." (25)
The soldiers machine-gunned them down and the Cossacks charged them. (26) Alexandra Kollontai observed the "trusting expectant faces, the fateful signal of the troops stationed around the Palace, the pools of blood on the snow, the bellowing of the gendarmes, the dead, the wounded, the children shot." She added that what the Tsar did not realise was that "on that day he had killed something even greater, he had killed superstition, and the workers' faith that they could ever achieve justice from him. From then on everything was different and new." (27) It is not known the actual numbers killed but a public commission of lawyers after the event estimated that approximately 150 people lost their lives and around 200 were wounded. (28)
Gapon later described what happened in his book The Story of My Life (1905): "The procession moved in a compact mass. In front of me were my two bodyguards and a yellow fellow with dark eyes from whose face his hard labouring life had not wiped away the light of youthful gaiety. On the flanks of the crowd ran the children. Some of the women insisted on walking in the first rows, in order, as they said, to protect me with their bodies, and force had to be used to remove them. Suddenly the company of Cossacks galloped rapidly towards us with drawn swords. So, then, it was to be a massacre after all! There was no time for consideration, for making plans, or giving orders. A cry of alarm arose as the Cossacks came down upon us. Our front ranks broke before them, opening to right and left, and down the lane the soldiers drove their horses, striking on both sides. I saw the swords lifted and falling, the men, women and children dropping to the earth like logs of wood, while moans, curses and shouts filled the air." (29)
Wojciech Kossak, Bloody Sunday (May, 1905)
Alexandra Kollontai observed the "trusting expectant faces, the fateful signal of the troops stationed around the Palace, the pools of blood on the snow, the bellowing of the gendarmes, the dead, the wounded, the children shot." She added that what the Tsar did not realise was that "on that day he had killed something even greater, he had killed superstition, and the workers' faith that they could ever achieve justice from him. From then on everything was different and new." (30) It is not known the actual numbers killed but a public commission of lawyers after the event estimated that approximately 150 people lost their lives and around 200 were wounded. (31)
Father Gapon escaped uninjured from the scene and sought refuge at the home of Maxim Gorky: "Gapon by some miracle remained alive, he is in my house asleep. He now says there is no Tsar anymore, no church, no God. This is a man who has great influence upon the workers of the Putilov works. He has the following of close to 10,000 men who believe in him as a saint. He will lead the workers on the true path." (32)
The 1905 Revolution
The killing of the demonstrators became known as Bloody Sunday and it has been argued that this event signalled the start of the 1905 Revolution. That night the Tsar wrote in his diary: "A painful day. There have been serious disorders in St. Petersburg because workmen wanted to come up to the Winter Palace. Troops had to open fire in several places in the city; there were many killed and wounded. God, how painful and sad." (32)
The massacre of an unarmed crowd undermined the standing of the autocracy in Russia. The United States consul in Odessa reported: "All classes condemn the authorities and more particularly the Tsar. The present ruler has lost absolutely the affection of the Russian people, and whatever the future may have in store for the dynasty, the present tsar will never again be safe in the midst of his people." (33)
The day after the massacre all the workers at the capital's electricity stations came out on strike. This was followed by general strikes taking place in Moscow, Vilno, Kovno, Riga, Revel and Kiev. Other strikes broke out all over the country. Pyotr Sviatopolk-Mirsky resigned his post as Minister of the Interior, and on 19th January, 1905, Tsar Nicholas II summoned a group of workers to the Winter Palace and instructed them to elect delegates to his new Shidlovsky Commission, which promised to deal with some of their grievances. (34)
Lenin, who had been highly suspicious of Father Gapon, admitted that the formation of Assembly of Russian Workers of St Petersburg and the occurrence of Bloody Sunday, had made an important contribution to the development of a radical political consciousness: "The revolutionary education of the proletariat made more progress in one day than it could have made in months and years of drab, humdrum, wretched existence." (35)
Henry Nevinson, of The Daily Chronicle commented that Gapon was "the man who struck the first blow at the heart of tyranny and made the old monster sprawl." When he heard the news of Bloody Sunday Leon Trotsky decided to return to Russia. He realised that Father Gapon had shown the way forward: "Now no one can deny that the general strike is the most important means of fighting. The twenty-second of January was the first political strike, even if he was disguised under a priest's cloak. One need only add that revolution in Russia may place a democratic workers' government in power." (36)
Trotsky believed that Bloody Sunday made the revolution much more likely. One revolutionary noted that the killing of peaceful protestors had changed the political views of many peasants: "Now tens of thousands of revolutionary pamphlets were swallowed up without remainder; nine-tenths were not only read but read until they fell apart. The newspaper which was recently considered by the broad popular masses, and particularly by the peasantry, as a landlord's affair, and when it came accidentally into their hands was used in the best of cases to roll cigarettes in, was now carefully, even lovingly, straightened and smoothed out, and given to the literate." (37)
After the massacre Gapon left Russia and went to live in Geneva. Bloody Sunday made Father Gapon a national figure overnight and he enjoyed greater popularity "than any Russian revolutionary had previously commanded". (38) One of the first people he met was George Plekhanov, the leader of the Mensheviks. (39)
Plekhanov introduced Gapon to Pavel Axelrod, Vera Zasulich, Lev Deich and Fedor Dan. Gapon told them that he fully shared the views of this revolutionary group and this information was published in the Menshevik's newspaper, Vorwärts. Deich later recalled that they made efforts to give him an education in Marxism. They explained that the course of history was determined by objective historical laws, not by individual actions. Gapon also went to live with Axelrod. (40)
Victor Adler sent Leon Trotsky a telegram after receiving a message from Pavel Axelrod. "I have just received a telegram from Axelrod saying that Gapon has arrived abroad and announced himself as a revolutionary. It's a pity. If he had disappeared altogether there would have remained a beautiful legend, whereas as an emigre he will be a comical figure. You know, such men are better as historical martyrs than as comrades in a party." (41)
The leaders of the Socialist Revolutionary Party (SRP) became upset by this development and used his friend, Pinchas Rutenberg, to try and get him to change his mind. Rutenberg received instructions "to make every effort to win him over". This included persuading him to live with SRP supporter, Leonid E. Shishko. "By inclination and temperament, Gapon was more at home with the Socialist Revolutionaries, who emphasized the force of individual action and revolutionary voluntarism." (42)
Father Gapon saw himself as the leader of the coming revolution and believed that his first task was to unify the revolutionary parties. However, he preferred the SRP approach to politics. He told Lev Deich: "Theories are not important to them, only that the person possesses courage and be devoted to the people's cause. They do not demand anything from me, do not criticize my actions. On the contrary, they always praise me." (43)
Victor Chernov was not convinced that Gapon really supported the SRP: "A party man, no matter what party, Gapon never was, nor was he capable of being one... Even if Gapon genuinely intended to follow a certain line of behavior, he could not do so. He would violate this promise, as he violated every promise he made to himself. At the first opportunity he would find it more tactically advantageous to act in a different manner. If you want, he was a complete and absolute anarchist, incapable of being a regular party member. Every organization he could conceive was only a superstructure of his unlimited authority. He alone had to be in the center of everything, know everything, hold in his hands the strings of the organization and manipulate the people tied to them in whatever manner he saw fit." (44)
Father Gapon also had meetings with the anarchist, Peter Kropotkin. He also had conversations with Lenin and other Bolsheviks in Geneva. (45) Nadezhda Krupskaya reported: "In Geneva Gapon began to visit us frequently. He talked a lot. Vladimir Il'ich listened attentively, trying to discern in his accounts the features of the approaching revolution". Lenin's conversations with Gapon helped persuade him to alter the Bolshevik agrarian policy. (46)
Gapon's common law wife joined him in exile and in May, 1905, they visited London. He was offered a considerable sum from a publisher to write his autobiography, The Story of My Life (1905). While in the England he was asked to write an appeal against anti-Semitism. He readily agreed and wrote a pamphlet against Jewish pogroms, and refused to accept a share of the royalties offered him. (47)
On 27th June, 1905, sailors on the Potemkin battleship, protested against the serving of rotten meat infested with maggots. The captain ordered that the ringleaders to be shot. The firing-squad refused to carry out the order and joined with the rest of the crew in throwing the officers overboard. The mutineers killed seven of the Potemkin's eighteen officers, including Captain Evgeny Golikov. They organized a ship's committee of 25 sailors, led by Afanasi Matushenko, to run the battleship. (48)
A delegation of the mutinous sailors arrived in Geneva with a message addressed directly to Father Gapon. He took the cause of the sailors to heart and spent all his time collecting money and purchasing supplies for them. He and their leader, Afanasi Matushenko, became inseparable. "Both were of peasant origin and products of the mass upheaval of 1905 - both were out of place among the party intelligentsia of Geneva." (49)
The Potemkin Mutiny spread to other units in the army and navy. Industrial workers all over Russia withdrew their labour and in October, 1905, the railwaymen went on strike which paralyzed the whole Russian railway network. This developed into a general strike. Leon Trotsky later recalled: "After 10th October 1905, the strike, now with political slogans, spread from Moscow throughout the country. No such general strike had ever been seen anywhere before. In many towns there were clashes with the troops." (50)
Tsar Nicholas II became increasingly concerned about the situation and entered into talks with Sergi Witte, his Chief Minister. As he pointed out: "Through all these horrible days, I constantly met Witte. We very often met in the early morning to part only in the evening when night fell. There were only two ways open; to find an energetic soldier and crush the rebellion by sheer force. That would mean rivers of blood, and in the end we would be where had started. The other way out would be to give to the people their civil rights, freedom of speech and press, also to have laws conformed by a State Duma - that of course would be a constitution. Witte defends this very energetically." (51)
Grand Duke Nikolai Romanov, the second cousin of the Tsar, was an important figure in the military. He was highly critical of the way the Tsar dealt with these incidents and favoured the kind of reforms favoured by Sergi Witte: "The government (if there is one) continues to remain in complete inactivity... a stupid spectator to the tide which little by little is engulfing the country." (52)
On 22nd October, 1905, Sergi Witte sent a message to the Tsar: "The present movement for freedom is not of new birth. Its roots are imbedded in centuries of Russian history. Freedom must become the slogan of the government. No other possibility for the salvation of the state exists. The march of historical progress cannot be halted. The idea of civil liberty will triumph if not through reform then by the path of revolution. The government must be ready to proceed along constitutional lines. The government must sincerely and openly strive for the well-being of the state and not endeavour to protect this or that type of government. There is no alternative. The government must either place itself at the head of the movement which has gripped the country or it must relinquish it to the elementary forces to tear it to pieces." (53)
Later that month, Trotsky and other Mensheviks established the St. Petersburg Soviet. On 26th October the first meeting of the Soviet took place in the Technological Institute. It was attended by only forty delegates as most factories in the city had time to elect the representatives. It published a statement that claimed: "In the next few days decisive events will take place in Russia, which will determine for many years the fate of the working class in Russia. We must be fully prepared to cope with these events united through our common Soviet." (54)
Over the next few weeks over 50 of these soviets were formed all over Russia and these events became known as the 1905 Revolution. Witte continued to advise the Tsar to make concessions. The Grand Duke Nikolai Romanov agreed and urged the Tsar to bring in reforms. The Tsar refused and instead ordered him to assume the role of a military dictator. The Grand Duke drew his pistol and threatened to shoot himself on the spot if the Tsar did not endorse Witte's plan. (55)
On 30th October, the Tsar reluctantly agreed to publish details of the proposed reforms that became known as the October Manifesto. This granted freedom of conscience, speech, meeting and association. He also promised that in future people would not be imprisoned without trial. Finally it announced that no law would become operative without the approval of the State Duma. It has been pointed out that "Witte sold the new policy with all the forcefulness at his command". He also appealed to the owners of the newspapers in Russia to "help me to calm opinions". (56)
These proposals were rejected by the St. Petersburg Soviet: "We are given a constitution, but absolutism remains... The struggling revolutionary proletariat cannot lay down its weapons until the political rights of the Russian people are established on a firm foundation, until a democratic republic is established, the best road for the further progress to Socialism." (57)
The Death of Father Gapon
On hearing about the publication of the October Manifesto, Gapon returned to Russia and attempted to gain permission to reopen the Assembly of Russian Workers of St Petersburg. However, Sergi Witte refused to meet him. Instead he sent him a message threatening to arrest him if he did not leave the country. He was willing to offer a deal that involved Gapon to come out openly in support of Witte and condemn all further insurrectionary activity against the regime. In return, he was given a promise that after the crisis was over, Gapon would be allowed back into Russia and he could continue with his trade union activities. (58)
The Tsar decided to take action against the revolutionaries. Trotsky later explained that: "On the evening of 3rd December the St Petersburg Soviet was surrounded by troops. All the exists and entrances were closed." Leon Trotsky and the other leaders of the Soviet were arrested. Trotsky was exiled to Siberia and deprived of all civil rights. Trotsky explained that he had learnt an important political lesson, "the strike of the workers had for the first time brought Tsarism to its knees." (59)
Georgi Gapon kept his side of the bargain. Whenever possible he gave press interviews praising Sergi Witte and calling for moderation. Gapon's biographer, Walter Sablinsky, has pointed out: "This, of course, earned him vehement denunciations from the revolutionaries... Suddenly the revolutionary hero had become an ardent defender of the tsarist government." Anger increased when it became clear that Witte was determined to pacify the country by force and all the revolutionary leaders were arrested. (60)
Gapon's reputation took another blow when it was reported by the New York Tribune on 24th December 1905 that he had been seen in a casino in Monte Carlo. The following day the newspaper printed a photograph of the workers on the barricades in Moscow with a photograph of Gapon at the casino with Grand Duke Cyril Vladimirovich under the caption: "Grand Duke Cyril faces Father Gapon in Monte Carlo at the same roulette table". (61) Gapon justified his decision by saying that to be on the Riviera and not visit a casino was like being in Rome and not seeing the Pope. (62)
Victor Chernov, Evno Azef, and Pinchas Rutenberg held a meeting to discuss the fate of Gapon. Azef, the head of the organization, that carried out political assassinations for the Socialist Revolutionary Party, argued that Gapon should be "done away with like a viper". Chernov rejected this idea and pointed out that he was still revered by ordinary workers, and that if he was murdered the SRP would be accused of killing him over political differences. (63)
Azef disagreed with this view and gave orders to Rutenberg to kill Gapon. On 26th March 1906, Gapon arrived to meet Rutenberg in a rented cottage in Ozerki, a little town north of St. Petersburg. Rutenberg and three other members of the SRP murdered Gapon. "Gapon's hands were tied, and he was hanged from a coat hook on the wall. Since the hook was not high enough, the executioners sat on his shoulders, pushing him down until he was strangled." (64) The cottage was locked, and it was over a month before the body was discovered. (65)
The death of Father Gapon
Primary Sources
(1) Adam B. Ulam, The Bolsheviks(1998)
To Geneva came Father Gapon, the Orthodox priest who had led the masses in their march to the Winter Palace. There could be no doubt about Gapon's background. He had, with the encouragement and subsidies of the police, organized a workers' union, thus continuing the work of Zubatov. The union had scrupulously excluded Socialists and Jews. For a while the police could congratulate themselves on their enterprise. Capon seemed to be a born leader inculcating in the growing mass of his followers loyalty to the Tsar and faith and obedience to the Holy Orthodox Church. What finally led this obedient tool of the authorities to lead the strike and the procession that triggered off the revolution is still uncertain. His head was obviously turned by his success, his sympathies clearly aroused by the misery of his men. There is every likelihood that, like many who found themselves at once in the revolutionary movement and within the world of the police, he became mentally deranged. The march was to be peaceful, he told the workers; they were going to lay at the feet of the Tsar a humble supplication to relieve the misery of his people and to grant them freedom. Yet he also talked wildly about a revolution if the Tsar was to scorn their pleas. Some argue that Capon had the fantastic vision of the Emperor summoning him to his side to be his minister and to rule Russia. After the catastrophe Gapon hid and then fled the country, leaving behind a manifesto cursing Nicholas II as the hangman of his people and urging a revolution.
(2) Cathy Porter, Alexandra Kollontai: A Biography (1980)
The strike began on 3 January, and within three days had spread to the Neva shipyards and to the city's bakeries. It was then that the decision was taken, heavily guided by the hand of Gapon, for workers to march to the Winter Palace to beg the Tsar for a constitution. Neither Bolsheviks nor Mensheviks doubted that such a demonstration would take Russia a step closer to a revolution for which its inexperienced and vulnerable proletariat were completely unprepared. The prospect was too terrifying to contemplate, and the party tried helplessly to intervene against Gapon, who they saw as a dangerous provocateur and probably mad. For Kollontai however, and all the other Bolsheviks who marched with the workers that day to the Winter Palace, their alarm was irrelevant. "However tragically this first show of workers' strength ended, it was an inevitable first lesson for them on the road to revolution."
She described the hot sun on the snow that Sunday morning, as she joined hundreds of thousands of workers, dressed in their Sunday best and accompanied by elderly relatives and children. They moved off in respectful silence towards the Winter Palace, and stood in the snow for two hours, holding their banners, icons and portraits of the Tsar, waiting for him to appear. A shot was fired, and they stamped their feet. Another, and they laughed that they must be blanks. A third, and suddenly the blood was pouring and women and children were lying dead in the snow. And still the people standing next to her kept assuring her it must be a mistake, and that the Tsar would not shoot his unarmed subjects. But by then the gendarmes were galloping into the crowd and the slaughter had started.
Something like a thousand workers were killed in the city that day, their blood spilt on the Schlusselburg Highway, the Troitsky Bridge, the Nevsky Prospect, and in Alexandrov Park. By the evening barricades had gone up on the Vasilev Island, and some of the bolder demonstrators raided the Schaff arms factory for guns. But few were able to defend themselves.
(3) Father Georgi Gapon, letter to Nicholas II (21st January, 1905)
The people believe in thee. They have made up their minds to gather at the Winter Palace tomorrow at 2 p.m. to lay their needs before thee. Do not fear anything. Stand tomorrow before the party and accept our humblest petition. I, the representative of the workingmen, and my comrades, guarantee the inviolability of thy person.
(4) Nicholas II, diary entry (21st January, 1917)
Since yesterday all the factories and workshops in St. Petersburg have been on strike. Troops have been brought in from the surroundings to strengthen the garrison. The workers have conducted themselves calmly hitherto. Their number is estimated at 120,000. At the head of the workers' union some priest - socialist Gapon. Mirsky came in the evening with a report of the measures taken.
(5) Extract from the petition that Father Georgi Gapon hoped to present to Nicholas II on 22nd January, 1905.
We workers, our children, our wives and our old, helpless parents have come, Lord, to seek truth and protection from you. We are impoverished and oppressed, unbearable work is imposed on us, we are despised and not recognized as human beings. We are treated as slaves, who must bear their fate and be silent. We have suffered terrible things, but we are pressed ever deeper into the abyss of poverty, ignorance and lack of rights.
(6) The demands made by Father George Gapon and the Assembly of Factory Workers.
(1) An 8-hour day and freedom to organize trade unions.
(2) Improved working conditions, free medical aid, higher wages for women workers.
(3) Elections to be held for a constituent assembly by universal, equal and secret suffrage.
(4) Freedom of speech, press, association and religion.
(5) An end to the war with Japan.
(7) Father George Gapon, The Story of My Life (1905)
The procession moved in a compact mass. In front of me were my two bodyguards and a yellow fellow with dark eyes from whose face his hard labouring life had not wiped away the light of youthful gaiety. On the flanks of the crowd ran the children. Some of the women insisted on walking in the first rows, in order, as they said, to protect me with their bodies, and force had to be used to remove them.
Suddenly the company of Cossacks galloped rapidly towards us with drawn swords. So, then, it was to be a massacre after all! There was no time for consideration, for making plans, or giving orders. A cry of alarm arose as the Cossacks came down upon us. Our front ranks broke before them, opening to right and left, and down the lane the soldiers drove their horses, striking on both sides. I saw the swords lifted and falling, the men, women and children dropping to the earth like logs of wood, while moans, curses and shouts filled the air.
Again we started forward, with solemn resolution and rising rage in our hearts. The Cossacks turned their horses and began to cut their way through the crowd from the rear. They passed through the whole column and galloped back towards the Narva Gate, where - the infantry having opened their ranks and let them through - they again formed lines.
We were not more than thirty yards from the soldiers, being separated from them only by the bridge over the Tarakanovskii Canal, which here masks the border of the city, when suddenly, without any warning and without a moment's delay, was heard the dry crack of many rifle-shots. Vasiliev, with whom I was walking hand in hand, suddenly left hold of my arm and sank upon the snow. One of the workmen who carried the banners fell also. Immediately one of the two police officers shouted out "What are you doing? How dare you fire upon the portrait of the Tsar?"
An old man named Lavrentiev, who was carrying the Tsar's portrait, had been one of the first victims. Another old man caught the portrait as it fell from his hands and carried it till he too was killed by the next volley. With his last gasp the old man said "I may die, but I will see the Tsar".
Both the blacksmiths who had guarded me were killed, as well as all these who were carrying the ikons and banners; and all these emblems now lay scattered on the snow. The soldiers were actually shooting into the courtyards at the adjoining houses, where the crowd tried to find refuge and, as I learned afterwards, bullets even struck persons inside, through the windows.
At last the firing ceased. I stood up with a few others who remained uninjured and looked down at the bodies that lay prostrate around me. Horror crept into my heart. The thought flashed through my mind, And this is the work of our Little Father, the Tsar". Perhaps the anger saved me, for now I knew in very truth that a new chapter was opened in the book of history of our people.
(8) Bernard Pares, The Fall of the Russian Monarchy (2001)
Gapon's organization was based on a representation of one person for every thousand workers. He planned a peaceful demonstration in the form of a march to the Winter Palace, carrying church banners and singing religious and national songs. Owing to the idiocy of the military authorities, the crowd was met with rifle fire both at the outskirts of the city and the palace square. The actual victims, as certified by a public commission of lawyers of the Opposition, was approximately 150 killed and 200 wounded; and as all who had taken a leading part in the procession were then expelled from the capital, the news was circulated all over the Empire.
(9) Nicholas II, diary entry (22nd January, 1917)
A painful day. There have been serious disorders in St. Petersburg because workmen wanted to come up to the Winter Palace. Troops had to open fire in several places in the city; there were many killed and wounded. God, how painful and sad.
(10) Maxim Gorky was one of those who took part in the march to the Winter Palace. That night Gapon took refuge in Gorky's house.
Gapon by some miracle remained alive, he is in my house asleep. He now says there is no Tsar anymore, no church, no God. This is a man who has great influence upon the workers of the Putilov works. He has the following of close to 10,000 men who believe in him as a saint. He will lead the workers on the true path.
(11) Victor Serge, Year One of the Russian Revolution (1930)
Gapon is a remarkable character. He seems to have believed sincerely in the possibility of reconciling the true interests of the workers with the authorities' good intentions. At any rate it was he who organized the movement to petition the Tsar which ended with the massacre of 22 January, 1905.
The petition of the workers of St. Petersburg on Nicholas II, drafted by Gapon and endorsed by tens of thousands of proletarians, was both a lugubrious entreaty and a daring set of demands. It asked for an eight-hour day, recognition of workers' rights and a Constitution (including the responsibility of ministers to the people, separation of Church and State, and democratic liberties). From all quarters of the capital the petitioners, carrying icons and singing hymns, set off marching through the snow, late on a January morning, to see their "little father, the Tsar".
At every cross-road armed ambushes were waiting for them. The soldiers machine-gunned them down and the Cossacks charged them. "Treat them like rebels" had been the Emperor's command. The outcome of the day was several hundred dead and as many wounded. This stupid and criminal repression detonated the first Russian revolution.
(12) Adam B. Ulam, The Bolsheviks(1998)
It was this man who now appeared in the West dressed in the aura of a people's leader and mortal foe of the autocracy. George Capon was lionized and fussed over by the Socialist and progressive circles in Germany and France, besieged by pleas for articles, memoirs, and the like. The Russians had every reason to know better: Gapon had certain peasant cunning, but was politically illiterate, and his personal tastes were rather inappropriate for either a revolutionary or a priest: he was unusually fond of gambling and drinking. Yet he became an object of a spirited competition among various branches of the radical movement. At first this priceless asset was seized by the Socialist Revolutionaries. Their agent Rutenberg, with him ever since the St. Petersburg days, was charged with protecting him from the wiles of the Social Democrats and others. But Capon now envisaged himself as the leader of the whole revolutionary movement, and would grant audiences, and preside over conferences.
Lenin was not backward in this sordid competition to capture and use the man who was mentally unhinged and had all the mannerisms of a con man. The reason was obvious: Capon had obviously a special gift to capture popular imagination and to lead the masses. He had spoken to, inspired, and led thousands of workers. Lenin had once addressed fifteen Russian workers, he recalled ruefully in 1904. In the wake of the Bloody Sunday he wondered whether the "little father" was despite his shady past a genuine Christian Socialist, a representative of the young and more progressive clergy (Gapon was Lenin's age). Soon he became more affirmative: "Facts have decided in favor of Capon." And in a tribute to Capon's movement, he asks, and this has an eloquence of its own: "Can the Social Democrats seize this spontaneous movement?"
But it proved to be impossible to ensnare Capon. He started by playing the role of the leader of all the revolutionary parties. When that proved impractical he announced his conversion to Social Democracy and held a series of conferences with Lenin. To his credit, Plekhanov viewed the whole plot with distaste and skepticism. When the "little father" announced his conversion and repaired to Plekhanov, the still acknowledged pope of the Russian Marxists, the latter told him not to speak nonsense but to read some books and find out what Marxism was about. Some days later he met Gapon on the street. Asked how his education was progressing the "little father" announced his return to the Socialist Revolutionaries; there, he explained, one did not have to read dull books; the Socialist Revolutionaries instructed him in such interesting occupations as shooting, riding, making bombs, and the like. Plekhanov, for once living up to his reputation as a wit, informed Gapon that the perfidious Socialist Revolutionaries were withholding from him their greatest secret. Like most of his kind Gapon was inordinately suspicious and he begged to be let in on the secret. Why, how to fly in a balloon, said Plekhanov with a straight face. The "little father" glared and there was no more question of his accession to the Social Democrats. The circumstances of Gapon's death do not reflect credit on the revolutionary movement. He soon returned to Russia, but it proved impossible for him to resume his previous role. He entered into negotiations with the police. Informed about this by his guardian angel Rutenberg, the Central Committee of the Socialist Revolutionaries passed a sentence of death on the man who had deceived their hopes.
Even by the strict revolutionary code there was scant justification for this decision: Gapon had not as yet betrayed any revolutionaries and a public warning rather than an execution was in order. Rutenberg, who had grown fond of this strange man, had to arrange the assassination of his friend. After the deed the Central Committee compounded its unsavory role by issuing a public denial of its complicity in the murder. All in all, the Social Democrats could congratulate themselves on their failure to win Capon to their cause.
(13) Victor Chernov, Dela Naroda (3rd May, 1906)
A party man, no matter what party, Gapon never was, nor was he capable of being one... Even if Gapon genuinely intended to follow a certain line of behavior, he could not do so. He would violate this promise, as he violated every promise he made to himself. At the first opportunity he would find it more tactically advantageous to act in a different manner. If you want, he was a complete and absolute anarchist, incapable of being a regular party member. Every organization he could conceive was only a superstructure of his unlimited authority. He alone had to be in the center of everything, know everything, hold in his hands the strings of the organization and manipulate the people tied to them in whatever manner he saw fit.
Student Activities
Russian Revolution Simmulation
Bloody Sunday (Answer Commentary)
1905 Russian Revolution (Answer Commentary)
Russia and the First World War (Answer Commentary)
The Life and Death of Rasputin (Answer Commentary)
The Coal Industry: 1600-1925 (Answer Commentary)
Women in the Coalmines (Answer Commentary)
Child Labour in the Collieries (Answer Commentary)
Child Labour Simulation (Teacher Notes)
The Chartists (Answer Commentary)
Women and the Chartist Movement (Answer Commentary)
Road Transport and the Industrial Revolution (Answer Commentary)
Canal Mania (Answer Commentary)
Early Development of the Railways (Answer Commentary)
Health Problems in Industrial Towns (Answer Commentary)
Public Health Reform in the 19th century (Answer Commentary)
Richard Arkwright and the Factory System (Answer Commentary)
Robert Owen and New Lanark (Answer Commentary)
James Watt and Steam Power (Answer Commentary)
The Domestic System (Answer Commentary)
The Luddites: 1775-1825 (Answer Commentary)
The Plight of the Handloom Weavers (Answer Commentary)
1832 Reform Act and the House of Lords (Answer Commentary)
Benjamin Disraeli and the 1867 Reform Act (Answer Commentary)
William Gladstone and the 1884 Reform Act (Answer Commentary)