Kerensky Alexander Fedorovich (born April 22 (May 4) 1881 - death June 11, 1970) is a Russian politician and statesman, minister, leader of the February Revolution of 1917 in Russia, dictator of revolutionary Russia in July - October 1917.
Alexander Fedorovich Kerensky - short biography (review of the article)
Alexander Fedorovich Kerensky - lawyer, member of the Supreme Council of Masons of Russia, elected chairman of the Trudovik faction in the State Duma. Member of the Provisional Committee of the State Duma, Deputy Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Petrosovet. 1917, March - joins the Socialist Revolutionary Party. The Minister of Justice in the Provisional Government, in the 1st and 2nd coalition governments, the Minister of War and the Navy, while remaining the Minister of Justice. From July 8 to October 25, 1917, the minister-chairman of the Provisional Government, from August 30, simultaneously the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. Since July 1918 - life in exile. 1970, June 11 - died in exile in America.
And now in more detail …
Childhood, adolescence. Training
Alexander Kerensky was born in Simbirsk on April 22, 1881 into a noble family. Father is the director of the male gymnasium, which the Ulyanov brothers graduated from. As a child, Sasha fell ill with bone tuberculosis and for some time the family lived in Tashkent (his father served as the chief inspector of schools in the Turkestan region - according to the "table of ranks" his rank corresponded to the rank of major general and gave the right to hereditary nobility). After graduating from the gymnasium, Alexander entered the history and philology, and then the law faculty of St. Petersburg University, in 1904 he received a law degree, became an assistant to the attorney at law in the capital district, he was admitted to the bar of St. Petersburg.
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Political formation
In political processes, he draws closer to the Socialist-Revolutionary Party. During the 1905 revolution, he sympathized with the terror and even wanted to join the Combat Organization of the Social Revolutionaries, but Azev refused to accept him. Kerensky was arrested for his "Socialist-Revolutionary activities", officially for possession of leaflets, and for four months he spent in prison, six months in exile in Tashkent. After exile, Kerensky in St. Petersburg became known as a brilliant lawyer, defender in political trials. He provides free legal aid in the People's House, works as a legal adviser among workers, and is a member of the committee for assisting the victims of Bloody Sunday.
1906, October - Kerensky is glorified throughout Russia, after the won trial in the case of the peasants who plundered the estate of the Baltic baron.
1912 - Kerensky was elected a deputy of the IV State Duma on the list of the Labor Party, and since 1915 - he became the chairman of the Duma faction of the Labor Party. He heads the Duma commission to investigate the execution of workers in the Lena gold mines, initiates protest actions of lawyers against the "Beilis case", for which he was sentenced to 8 months in prison.
At the same time, Alexander Kerensky joined the Great East Masonic lodge, soon became the General Secretary of its Supreme Council, the leader of Russian Freemasonry and the curator of Masonic lodges in Ukraine.
During the First World War, Kerensky acts as a "defender" - a supporter of the war against the German bloc in order to protect the "revolutionary fatherland."
1916, summer - Kerensky prepares the overthrow of the monarchy of Nicholas II. From the Duma rostrum, he said: "All world history says that the revolution was the method and the only means of saving the state." The Empress demands that the tsar hang Kerensky.
Alexander Kerensky. Revel, Estonia. April 9, 1917.
Revolution - February 1917
On February 14 (27), 1917, during the February Revolution, Kerensky was elected to the Provisional Committee of the State Duma and deputy chairman of the executive committee of the Petrograd Soviet. In early March 1917, Aleksandr Fedorovich Kerensky, as a representative of the "socialists" (he had just joined the Socialist-Revolutionary Party), held the post of Minister of Justice of the Provisional Government. He is considered a skillful politician - a symbol of the unity of revolutionary parties (Cadets, Octobrists, Socialist-Revolutionaries, Mensheviks, Soviet structures). He signs a decree on the release of all prisoners for political and religious reasons, an order to abolish the death penalty.
Youngest Minister
At 33, Kerensky becomes the youngest and most popular minister in Russia. 1917, May 5 - after another crisis in the Provisional Government, Kerensky holds the post of Minister of War and Naval, while retaining the portfolio of the Minister of Justice. He seeks to restore the fighting efficiency of the army at the front, to carry out an offensive in the southwestern direction, to rally the nation under the slogan "Everything for the defense of the revolution!" He travels to the front-line units and speaks to the soldiers for days, using his oratorical gift, inspires the army to "defend the revolutionary fatherland." At the First All-Russian Congress of Soviets, Kerensky was elected a member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets.
When armed uprisings of the Bolsheviks and anarchists were taking place in Petrograd in July 1917, Kerensky was able to suppress them by sending the most dangerous instigators to prison. The Bolsheviks went underground, and it seemed that they would not soon be able to restore their authority among the masses. But Alexander Fyodorovich's mistake was his unwillingness to immediately arrest Lenin.
Kerensky and Kornilov in Tsarskoe Selo - arrest of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (March 1917).
Head of the Provisional Government
1917, July 8 - Kerensky is the head of the Provisional Government and at the same time the minister of war and naval. Moderate revolutionaries (Cadets and Right SRs) hoped that he could become a revolutionary dictator and be able to curb anarchy in the state. He also lacks determination …
The authority of the prime minister in July-August 1917 was shaken by an unsuccessful offensive on the Southwestern Front, the collapse of the army and galloping inflation.
The promises that were made to the people were never fulfilled, Alexander Fedorovich postponed important government decisions until the opening of the Constituent Assembly in November 1917. However, the ongoing war and economic crisis put the country on the brink of starvation. Kerensky postpones until the convocation of the Constituent Assembly the solution of the problems of concluding a peace, redistribution of land and property, workers' control, national autonomies … meanwhile, Lenin had already promised the proletarians "everything and immediately." When it was necessary to take decisive measures, he sought compromises and "did not take off his white gloves." Kerensky turned out to be a weak politician and a lousy dictator.
The flight of Kerensky from Gatchina in 1917. (Artist G. Shegal).
General Kornilov's mutiny
1917, July 19 - Kerensky appoints General Kornilov Lavr Georgievich Supreme Commander-in-Chief. At that time, part of the moderate revolutionary elite and officers were rushing with a plan to introduce troops to Petrograd, resume the death penalty in the army and establish a revolutionary dictatorship to prevent a Bolshevik coup. However, Kornilov, who was entrusted with the role of "savior of the revolution", seeks to establish one-man power and does not take Kerensky into account.
If by mid-August 1917 Kerensky and Kornilov were thinking of establishing a two-umvirate of dictators in the state, then at the end of the month, in circles close to Kornilov, they began to talk about the need to arrest Kerensky. Having learned this, the Head of Government dismissed Kornilov from office, but the general did not obey the order and raised a mutiny, sending his troops loyal to Petrograd. But the general's soldiers refused to fight the "people", the mutiny was suppressed, and its organizers, Kornilov and Denikin Anton Ivanovich, were arrested.
The suppression of the rebellion cost dearly to Alexander Kerensky himself. During the mutiny, in search of allies, the head of the Provisional Government actually legalized the Bolshevik Party and its "assault detachments" - the workers' Red Guard. As a result, in September - October 1917, the Bolsheviks seized the leadership in the Soviets, armed themselves and began to prepare for an uprising.
Kerensky is abandoned by officers, part of the bourgeoisie and moderate revolutionaries.
1917, September - Kerensky Alexander Fedorovich also becomes the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, creates new authorities - the Directory and the Pre-Parliament, proclaims Russia a republic. At that time, he believed that he was still able to suppress all attempts at an armed uprising of the Bolsheviks, but at the same time he did not dare to take personal responsibility and unleash terror against the "left".
Kerensky - The year is 1938.
October 1917
1917, October 24 - Kerensky demands from the Republican Pre-Parliament to fully support the government's punitive actions against the Bolsheviks who rebelled in the capital. However, the Pre-Parliament also shirks responsibility. In fact, the Bolsheviks were no longer opposed by the state punitive mechanism.
1917, October 25 - during the capture of the capital by the rebels, Alexander Fedorovich miraculously managed to leave St. Petersburg for the headquarters of the Northern Front. He asks for help against the Bolsheviks. However, Kerensky did not manage to find serious support in the troops. At the time of the uprising of the Bolsheviks, the Provisional Government finds itself without its leader, without the support of the population and without reliable troops, which helped the Bolsheviks very easily seize power in the capital.
Kerensky was able to raise only the Cossacks of General Krasnov. With several thousand Cossacks, Kerensky made a desperate attempt to break through to Petersburg with the intention of turning the tide of the revolution. But Kerensky-Krasnov's campaign against St. Petersburg fails. A few days after the start of the offensive on St. Petersburg, Krasnov's Cossacks changed their oath, they wanted to arrest Kerensky and hand him over to the Bolsheviks. Kerensky, changes into a sailor's uniform (and not in a nurse's dress, as Soviet propagandists wrote about it), and flees from imminent reprisals through the underground passage of the palace in Gatchina. For a month he hides in the villages of the Novgorod province, and in December 1917 he tries to negotiate with the ataman Kaledin on the Don.
Kerensky was elected a deputy of the Constituent Assembly, but the leadership of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party dissuaded him from speaking at the opening of the Constituent Assembly, so as not to be in danger of arrest. In February - April 1917, Kerensky lived in Finland, still hoping to return to big politics.
Alexander Fedorovich Kerensky in America. 1969 year.
Emigration
May 1918 - he illegally sneaks into Soviet Moscow and establishes contact with the underground Union for the Renaissance of Russia. 1918, July - Kerensky leaves his homeland for good, leaves for England through Murmansk. In 1918-1919. On behalf of the Union for the Renaissance of Russia, he negotiated with representatives of the Entente about the possibility of a joint struggle against the Bolsheviks. In Paris, Kerensky is the leader of the Non-Party Democratic Association. In 1921-1922. he takes part in a meeting of the members of the Constituent Assembly of the Emigration Forces (elected as a member of the executive committee), in the work of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party Congress. But Kerensky by that time had already lost all his political capital and his popularity, and Western leaders do not see in him a person who is capable of curbing the Bolsheviks and rallying the nation.
1922-1940 - Alexander Fedorovich Kerensky lives in Berlin and Paris, he is a member of the Russian Public Committee, editor of the newspaper "Days" and the magazine "New Russia", opposes fascism and Stalinism. 1940, summer - he leaves for America, is a member of the American group of Russian Social Revolutionaries-emigrants. During World War II, Kerensky campaigned for aid to the Soviet Union, collaborated with Western democrats. 1949 - he, one of the organizers of the League of Struggle for People's Freedom, in 1951 entered the Council for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia.
1950-1960s Alexander Fedorovich works in the archives of Stanford University and the Hoover Institute for War, Revolution and Peace. 1965 - his memoirs "Russia at a Historical Turn" are published. Many of the émigrés accuse the leader of the February Revolution of facilitating the collapse of the monarchy and the collapse of “great Russia”, of “surrendering” Russia to the Bolsheviks. Lenin called him "the hero of the left phrase", Trotsky - "the temporary worker of the historical moment." Before his death, Alexander Fedorovich said: “I have ruined Russia! But, God knows, I wanted her freedom! " In recent years, he lived in poverty, lost his eyesight, and found himself in complete isolation. The former Head of the Provisional Government died in New York on June 11, 1970.