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The commissar of the Peter and paul▓s fortress

In the year when Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb student killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, in Sarajevo, Georgiy Blagonravov was nineteen. Could the son of an employee from a small country town Yegorievsk imagine what would happen to him three years after the war was declared?

In March 1917 Georgiy Blagonravov warrant officer of alternative infantry regiment No 180 enrolled to the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, or RSDLP, (also known as the Russian Social-Democratic Workers▓ Party), and was elected the head of the soviet (workers▓ local council) in the town of Yegorievsk. In June 1917, he became the delegate of the First National Congress of Soviets. Alongside thirty-five important Bolshevik leaders including Lenin, Stalin, Krylenko, Nogin, Shaumyan he was elected in the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (VTsIK in Russian).

S.I. Lukin. ╚We've Made It!╩. Moscow. 1967 [zoom (36k)]

Among the associate members of VTsIK were such prominent communist party members were Bubnov, Volodarsky, Dzerzhinsky, Kollontai, Nevsky, Podvoisky and others. During those restless days, Blagonravov lived in Kamenev▓s apartment on 9th Rozhdestvenskaya Street in St. Peteresburg where the Bolshevik headquarters was located. After the forces loyal to the Provisional government fired the demonstration organized by the Bolsheviks on July 4 1917, Blagonravov had to leave to Yegorievsk, as many of his comrades-in-arms were arrested (Trotsky, Kamenev, Dybenko, Ilyin).

On October 5, 1917 the Yegorievsk▓s soviet elected Blagonravov a deputy to the regional Bolshevik party conference; on October 8 together with Bukharin, Osinsky and Olminsky he became candidate to the Russian Constituent Assembly, which was established in Russia in the wake of the October Revolution of 1917, which overthrew the Russian Provisional Government.

However, that idea failed to be realized. The country was slipping down to the brink of catastrophe. Millions of enraged armed men demanded crucial changes immediately.

Russia was ripe for revolution. After the February Revolution, there were two main political forces in Russia ≈ the Provisional Government and the Petrograd Soviet.

On March 2, the Soviet received the eight-point program of the Provisional Committee and appointed an oversight committee and issued a decidedly conditional statement of support. Worse, the Soviet undermined the Provisional Government by issuing its own orders, beginning with the (in)famous seven-article Order No. 1 to the military on March 1 ≈ attacking and reducing the authority of military officers and the Provisional Government, putting anti-Government socialist Soviets throughout the military structure. The Soviet was not opposed to the war ≈ internal divisions produced a public ambivalence ≈ but was deeply worried about counter╛revolutionary moves from the military and was determined to have garrison troops firmly on its side.

On October 24, the members of the Central Committee of the Petrograd Soviet (Kamenev, Trotsky, Uritsky and others) on a special meeting in the former Smolny Institute (the Bolshevik headquarters at that moment) decided to establish an emergency headquarters in the St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress right in the center of Petrograd. The Petrograd Soviet, of Workers▓ and Soldiers▓ Deputies, was the council set up in Petrograd in March 1917 as the representative body of the city▓s workers.

The St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress is the original citadel of St. Petersburg, designed by Domenico Trezzini and founded in 1703. The fortress contains a number of buildings including the Peter and Paul Cathedral, where all Russian tsars from Peter I to Alexander III are interred. The fortress was established by Peter the Great on May 16 on a small island, Zayachii ostrov, on the Neva River. Built during the Northern War, the fort was never actually needed. The fort was completed with six bastions in earth and timber within a year, it was rebuilt with stone from 1706 to 1740.

Postcard. Leningrad. 1956. Circulation 300,000 [zoom (35k)]

From around 1720 the fort served as a base for the city garrison and also as a prison for high ranking or political prisoners. The Trubetskoy bastion, built in the 1870s, became the main prison block. The Cathedral was built from 1712 to 1733, and has a 123.2 m bell-tower and a gilded angel-topped cupola.

All of the members of the Central Committee were given special passes to enter the Fortress. After the order of Podvoisky and Antonov-Ovseenko, Lashevich and Blagonravov were responsible for placing the garrison of the fortress in operational readiness and for providing communication with the main headquarters in Smolny. Trotsky, a practiced orator persuaded the garrison▓s soldiers to change sides. About midnight Blagonravov arrived to Smolny to propose that Bolshevik forces launched an attack on the Winter Palace ≈ the residence of the Provisional Government. The Russian Provisional Government was formed in Petrograd after the deterioration of the Russian Empire and the tsar▓s abdication. The Government was headed by Alexander Kerensky.

However, when he entered the session room, Podvoisky, Tchudnovsky and Antonov-Ovseenko ≈ members of the Petrograd Military and Revolutionary Committee (a special body founded on October 12 by the Petrograd Soviet of Workers▓ and Soldiers▓ Deputies to protect it from the forces of the Provisional government) were discussing the plan of attack. St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress became the main foothold of the rebellion. Alas, there were only machine╛guns and rifles and no cannons in the Fortress. Still, the former warrant officer managed to find two rusty cannons and took them to the outer walls of the Fortress right opposite the Winter Palace. Antonov-Ovseenko, the head of the Petrograd Military and Revolutionary Committee and Blagonravov the Commissar of St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress ordered to deliver an ultimatum to the Provisional Government.

But Blagonravov and Co encountered unexpected difficulties: there were no signal lamp in the Fortress; artillerists refused to fire from non╛operational canons. The ultimatum expired and Lenin demanded immediate storm of the Winter Palace. Antonov╛Ovseenko demanded to take prompt actions from Blagonravov.

Finally, artillerists from the Baltic sea range arrived to the Fortress. Following the ultimatum from the Petrograd Soviet to the Provisional Government ministers in the Winter Palace, after the blank salvo of the Cruiser ╚Aurora╩ at 21.00, the guns of the Fortress fired thirty or so shells at the Winter Palace. Only two actually hit, inflicting minor damage, and the defenders refused to surrender ≈ at that time. The Winter Palace was guarded by Cossacks, cadets (military students), and a Women▓s Battalion. At 02.10 on the morning of October 26 the Winter Palace was taken by forces under Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko. By 4 a.m., Antonov-Ovseenko took the arrested ministers of the Provisional Government to the St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress. Blagonravov chambered them in the vaults of the Trubetskoi bastion.

Later official accounts of the revolution from the Soviet Union would depict the events in October as being far more dramatic than they actually had been. Official films made much later showed a huge storming of the Winter Palace and fierce fighting, but in reality the Bolshevik insurgents faced little or no opposition and were practically able to just walk into the building and take it over. The insurrection was timed and organized to hand state power to the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers▓ and Soldiers▓ Deputies which began on October 25th.

On October 26, Kerensky▓s forces captured Gatchina, one of the suburbs of Petrograd. St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress became a weapon ammunition supply point.

G.K. Savitsky. First Days after the Revolution. Moscow. 1958 [zoom (49k)]

On October 29 at 3 p.m. near Troitsky Bridge (not far from Matilda Kshesinskaya▓s mansion), a patrol seized two men in an automobile. One of them ≈ A. Bruderer, a prominent representative of the Socialist Revolutionary party ≈ had a written order to start rebellion against the Bolsheviks issued by Polkovnikov, the commander of forces of the so-called ╚Salvation of the Motherland and Revolution Committee╩.

Blagonravov rushed to Smolny. Podvoisky, one of the leaders of the Petrograd▓s Military and Revolutionary Committee immediately directed measures against the rebels. Thus, the first revolt against the Bolsheviks was put down due to the Commissar of St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress Blagonravov.

However, the situation in the city remained unstable. Numerous riots and bashings began. Gang of armored and drunken bandits killed people and plundered stores and wine shops. Rumors began to ooze out about the heavy wine stocks in the vaults of the captured Winter Palace. The guards of the vaults were unable to cope with crowds trying to enter the Palace.

On November 14, the Military and Revolutionary Committee decided to replace the guards by reliable Baltic seamen and to seal the wine vaults. Blagonravov was appointed the commandant of the Winter Palace (after Tchudnovsky). On November 26 the wine stocks were destroyed: wine and spirit flowed by fire hoses into the Neva River. According to the Commandant of Smolny Malkov, many people drank that flows mixed with mud and water right from the streets. Others filled bottles and buckets.

The revolution cast into anarchy and disorder. On November 21, the Military and Revolutionary Committee founded the special Commission to fight the counter-revolution. The Commission consisted of Blagonravov, Skripnik, Flerovsky, Galkin, Trifonov. Later, on December 3, Blagonravov took the post Special Commissar of Petrograd. He had to destroy wine stock, disarm and arrest criminal and counter-revolutionary gangs. At that time, there were over 700 wine stocks in Petrograd. Sixty-nine raids on wine stores were made on December 4. The Petrograd▓s Soviet declared a state of emergency in the city. Blagonravov was at the center of the events. Soon the situation improved.

By the end of the year, Rumanian forces occupied the province Bessarabia. After Lenin▓s order on December 31 Blagonravov arrested the Rumanian ambassador Diamandi. Later in the evening an assassination attempt on Lenin was committed. Terror caused retaliatory terror.

From November 1918 and up to July 1919 Blagonravov worked at the Transport Department of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission. Then he was a board member of the Petrograd Extraordinary Commission and, for some time, the Head of the Petrograd Extraordinary Commission. In 1921, he occupied the post of the Transport Department of All-Russian Extraordinary Commission. On April 15, 1921 Felix Dzerzhinsky was appointed the People▓s Commissar of Means of Communication. Notably, Blagonravov highly respected Dzerzhinsky and even copied his way of dressing and behavior pattern.

In September 1932, Georgiy Blagonravov became the Deputy People▓s Commissar of Transportation (the Head of the Commissariat was A. Andreev). Andreev and Blagonravov knew each other since October 1917, when the latter was the Commissar of St. Peter and Paul▓s Fortress.

However, in 1935 Andreev was replaced by Kaganovich, while Yakov Livshits superseded Blagonravov as the Deputy Commissar of Transportation. Blagonravov became the head of the Road Department instead of L. Serebryakov.

Soon the Great Purge began. On January 30, 1936 Pyatakov, Serebryakov, Livshits (thirteen men in total, about half of them were staff members of the Commissariat of Transportation) were sentenced to death. It was the initiative of Lazar Kaganovich. Later the former People▓s Commissars Nevsky, Rudzutak, Kobozev, deputy commissars Levchenko, Toropchenov were repressed as well.

Most likely, Blagonravov felt the nearness of arrest too. He was accused in preparation of acts of terror on railroads and assassination attempt on Kaganovich and Ezhov. According to documents, he was shot on February 9, 1938.