Russia:
Reform and Reaction
The Russian Colossus
Largest Nation on Earth
The Russian nation is....
Saint Basil’s Cathedral, Moscow
Legend has it that St. Basil’s Cathedral’s beauty cost its architect his eyes. The Moscow monument was built between 1555 and 1561 by Ivan the Terrible to commemorate a victory over the Mongols.
Emancipation and the stirrings of Revolution
Conditions in Russia 1800's
Tsar Alexander II
His distress at the outcome of the Crimean War, which had demonstrated Russia’s backwardness, inspired him toward a great program of domestic reforms, the most important being the emancipation (1861) of the serfs. A period of repression after 1866 led to a resurgence of revolutionary terrorism and to Alexander’s own assassination.
Crimean War
During the years leading up to the Crimean War, France, Russia and Britain were all competing for influence in the Middle East, particularly with Turkey. Religious differences were certainly a catalyst in the Crimean War.
Serf
A member of the lowest feudal class, attached to the land owned by a lord and required to perform labor in return for certain legal or customary rights.
The drive to industrialize
Peter stolypin
Peter Stolypin was a remarkable man. All the evidence seems to point to a catastrophe within Russia at some point in the early C20th. Yet Peter Stolypin was the one man who is most associated with having the ability to save the Romanov's. His assassination in 1911 probably doomed the Romanov's to history.
"Bloody Sunday" 1905
Massacre in St. Petersburg, Russia, of peaceful demonstrators marking the beginning of the violent phase of the Russian Revolution of 1905. At the end of the 19th century, industrial workers in Russia had begun to organize; police agents, eager to prevent the Labour Movement from being dominated by revolutionary influences, formed legal labour unions and encouraged the workers to concentrate their energies on making economic gains and to disregard broader social and political problems.
Russian Industrialization
Alexander II drew up plans for a massive investment in railways - (put in place under Alexander III). The emancipation, he hoped, would lead to greater agricultural output, in order to finance the railways, and the beginnings of Russia's industrialisation. He also invested in new iron and steel works - for armaments, new textiles factories - for uniforms, and new manufacturing industries - for arms and ammunition.