General Headquarters made feverish preparations to check the triumphant progress of the revolution at the front. The leaders of the compromising parties, which had been defeated in Petrograd, flocked to Moghilev.
On November 4, Verkhovsky, ex-Minister for War in the Provisional Government, and Chernov, Feit and Shokherman, members of the Central Committee of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, arrived at General Headquarters. They were followed somewhat later by Gotz, Skobelev and others. By that time “General Headquarters was teaming with all sorts of former and future would-be . . . statesmen.” Members of different army committees, representatives of different organisations, and all sorts of other “people with plans” arrived in a steady stream.[1]
In Moghilev, too, were the representatives of foreign missions, for the Allied diplomats were dictating their terms to General Headquarters. The former had refused to recognise the Soviet Government and had entered into direct relations with Dukhonin, thus emphasising that they regarded General Headquarters as the only organ of government.
In conjunction with the counter-revolutionary generals, the All-Army Committee and the leaders of the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks who had arrived at General Headquarters resolved to set up in opposition to the Council of People’s Commissars a new government which was to be under the wing of General Headquarters.
On the night of November 7, a telegram signed by the All-Army Committee was sent from General Headquarters to the various army organisations of the front ordering “the army on active service, represented by its Front and Army Committees, to take the initiative in forming a government,” and to nominate candidates for the post of Prime Minister.[2] The telegram went on to state that “on its part, the All-Army Committee nominates for this post Victor Mikhailovich Chernov, the leader of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party.”[3]
In the evening of November 8, Chernov addressed a meeting of the Moghilev Soviet in the role of prospective Prime Minister. Moghilev was preparing to become a second Versailles.
Without the support of the army, however, the idea of fighting the Soviet Government was hopeless; the masses of the soldiers were unwilling to fight for alien interests. They were willing to go on fighting the Germans if this was in the people’s interests. They were willing to fight staunchly for the Soviet regime. But they were most reluctant to continue the war in the interests of the capitalists. The counter-revolutionaries decided to play on the ardent desire of the soldiers to end the war which was inimical to the people’s interests, and General Headquarters made an attempt to seize the initiative in concluding peace with Germany. It goes without saying that this was not prompted by any desire to meet the wishes of the people. Their purpose was to win the support of the soldiers by promising them an early peace and then to use them to overthrow the Soviet Government.
The watchword of the counter-revolutionary campaign at the front was the same as that which had failed in Petrograd, viz., the setting up of a “homogeneous Socialist government,” which, it was claimed, was the only kind of government that would be capable of securing an immediate peace.
Demands for the speedy conclusion of an armistice, and for the formation of a “Socialist government” as an essential condition for this, came pouring into General Headquarters from Army Committees of different armies on the South-Western and Rumanian Fronts.
Thus, the “Committee for the Salvation,” of the Special Army of the South-Western Front demanded an immediate armistice and the formation of a “Socialist government.” The All-Army Committee made the demagogic statement that the only obstacle to peace was Lenin’s government. Only yesterday these men just as emphatically demanded the continuation of the war in conjunction with the Entente. The whole purpose of this campaign was clear, viz., to take the wind out of the Bolsheviks’ sails. Moreover, Dukhonin himself would not have been averse to opening negotiations for an armistice had the political circumstances been different.
“Bearing in mind the complexity of our present political life,” he said, “I, perhaps, would have undertaken the burden and responsibility at that moment and would have proceeded to carry out the task of bringing peace to Russia by means of an agreement with the Allies and the enemy countries, but in the position I was in it was impossible for me even to think of such a task.”[4]
With soldier-like candour Dukhonin expressed what the hardened politicians were trying to conceal by florid phrases such as that peace negotiations could be opened in the name of any government except the Bolshevik government.
It was “impossible even to think of such a task,” but the generals, too, had no scruples about stealing the Bolsheviks’ peace slogan.
On November 10 the representatives of the Allied missions handed Dukhonin an official protest “against the violation, in any way, of the terms of the treaty of September 5, 1914,” by which Russia solemnly undertook not to cease hostilities separately and not to conclude a separate peace. Behind the scenes, however, the Allied ambassadors advised their governments to permit Russia to open negotiations with Germany. This, of course, was done not with the object of supporting the effort for peace initiated by the Bolsheviks but of “taking the wind out of their sails.” For example, Sir George Buchanan, the British Ambassador, telegraphed to his government in London as follows:
“In my opinion, the only safe course left to us is to give Russia back her word and to tell her people that, realising how worn out they are by the war and the disorganisation inseparable from a great revolution, we leave it to them to decide whether they will purchase peace on Germany’s terms or fight on with the Allies. . . .
“I am not advocating any transaction with the Bolshevik government. On the contrary, I believe that the adoption of the course which I have suggested will take the wind out of their sails, as they will no longer be able to reproach the Allies with driving Russian soldiers to the slaughter for their imperialistic aims.”[5]
Later, General Headquarters received a telegram, signed by the Italian Attaché, stating that, in principle, the Allies would not object if Russia, having collapsed under the burden of the war, concluded a separate peace with Germany.
Thus, the representatives of the Entente backed General Headquarters in the hope of being able in this way to overthrow the Soviet Government. But the compromisers who had flocked to General Headquarters could not agree among themselves. The All-Army Committee was in almost constant session, but could not reach a final decision on the question of forming an “all-Socialist” government and of offering armed resistance to the Bolsheviks.
At last, the All-Army Committee was obliged to state that the attempt immediately to form a government at General Headquarters had failed.
It resolved: 1) Not to recognise the authority of the Council of People’s Commissars; 2) That a government should be formed of representatives of all Socialist parties, from the Populist Socialists to the Bolsheviks; 3) That the neutrality of General Headquarters be protected by armed force, and that no Bolshevik troops be permitted to enter.
The Committee did not confine itself to issuing a declaration but informed the All-Russian Executive Committee of the Railwaymen’s Union by direct wire that “in order to avoid a collision which would be fatal to the cause of the revolution [the Committee] nominates for the post of Supreme Commander-in-Chief a person who enjoys the confidence of both sides.” The Railwaymen’s Executive approved of this proposal and promised to submit it for discussion to the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets.
Incidentally, as soon as the representatives of the Entente became convinced that the compromisers and General Headquarters were incapable of setting up a government they disavowed the Italian Attaché’s telegram, declaring it to have been a forgery.
The first task that confronted the Soviet Government was to frustrate the counter-revolutionary designs of General Headquarters and of their advisers. Already on October 27 the Soviet Government had offered peace to the belligerent powers, but twelve days elapsed and no answer was received, whereupon, the People’s Commissariat for Foreign Affairs, on November 8, handed the ambassadors of the Allied powers a note proposing that an immediate armistice should be concluded on all fronts and that peace negotiations should be opened. At the same time, General Dukhonin, Supreme Commander-in-Chief, was ordered:
“Immediately on the receipt of this to propose to the military authorities of the enemy armies the immediate cessation of hostilities with a view to opening peace negotiations.”[6]
General Dukhonin sent no answer. Thereupon, Lenin, together with Stalin, at about 4 a.m. on November 9, got in touch with General Headquarters by direct wire, summoned Dukhonin, and categorically ordered him to proceed to open negotiations for an armistice. Dukhonin refused to do so. It became obvious that the tsarist generals—General Headquarters and the Army Staffs subordinate to it—were preparing to combat the proletarian revolution. The civil war at the front was entering a new phase.
Lenin and Stalin dismissed Dukhonin from the post of Commander-in-Chief, and on the morning of November 9 they issued an appeal to the soldiers at the front by radio, calling upon them to frustrate the counter-revolutionary designs of General Headquarters.
“Soldiers!” said Lenin. “The cause of peace is in your hands! Do not allow the counter-revolutionary generals to frustrate the great cause of peace, surround them by a guard in order to avert acts of summary justice unworthy of a revolutionary army and to prevent these generals from evading the trial that awaits them. Maintain the strictest revolutionary and military order.
“Let the regiments at the front immediately elect plenipotentiaries to start formal negotiations for an armistice with the enemy.
“The Council of People’s Commissars empowers you to do so.
“Keep us informed in every possible way of every step in the negotiations. The Council of People’s Commissars is alone empowered to sign the final treaty of armistice.
“Soldiers! The cause of peace is in your hands! Vigilance, restraint and energy, and the cause of peace will triumph!”[7]
Thus, the opposition of the generals was countered by an appeal to the masses for revolutionary action. These were the only correct tactics to adopt in the complicated situation created by the counter-revolutionary struggle against the Soviet Government. Lenin emphasised that the Council of People’s Commissars called upon the entire mass of the soldiers to take up the struggle for peace. Their function was to prevent the counter-revolutionary generals from frustrating the effort for peace. The generals were to be watched with revolutionary vigilance.
“The soldiers were warned to guard the counter-revolutionary generals,” said Lenin. “. . . If advantage is taken of the moment when the soldiers open negotiations for an armistice to commit treachery, if an attack is made during the fraternisation, it will be the duty of the soldiers to shoot the traitors without any formalities.”[8]
At the same time Lenin pointed out that peace was impossible as long as a man like Dukhonin was at the head of the army.
“When we opened negotiations with Dukhonin,” he said, “we knew that we were going to negotiate with an enemy, and when one has to deal with an enemy one must not postpone action.”[9]
Lenin’s appeal to the army to take the cause of peace into its own hands strengthened the influence of the Soviet Government at the front and won it numerous new supporters. Even on the more conservative fronts, like the South-Western and Rumanian, the masses of the soldiers began to take a more vigorous part in the revolutionary struggle for peace.
Simultaneously, measures were taken to destroy the hotbed of counter-revolution at General Headquarters. On Lenin’s orders a mixed detachment consisting of two echelons of the Lithuanian Regiment and a company of sailors from the Baltic Fleet were sent from Petrograd to occupy General Headquarters. Detachments for the purpose of occupying General Headquarters were also formed at the front and Ter-Arutyunyants was commissioned to go from Petrograd to the Western Front for this purpose. On November 10, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief appointed by the Council of People’s Commissars left Petrograd on a special train for the front. In the evening of November 11 he arrived in Pskov, and by telephone summoned General Cheremisov, Commander-in-Chief of the Northern Front. This summons was confirmed in writing. Cheremisov sent an evasive reply. He did not wish publicly to recognise the new Supreme Commander-in-Chief, but was not averse to entering into relations with him. Cheremisov was dismissed from his post of Commander-in-Chief of the Northern Front, but was ordered to continue acting in that capacity until his successor was appointed. However, on November 13, he left Pskov for Petrograd, where he was detained.
On November 12, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief arrived in Dvinsk, the headquarters of the Fifth Army. General Boldyrev, the Commander-in-Chief of the Fifth Army, like Cheremisov, failed to answer the summons to appear before the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. He called up General Headquarters and informed Dukhonin of this. Dukhonin answered:
“I think you have acted quite correctly. . . . May the Lord protect you.”[10]
Boldyrev assured General Headquarters that he would firmly pursue his line to the very end, but this end unexpectedly came very soon. That same day he was dismissed and arrested, and General Antipov was appointed in his place.
On the night of November 11, representatives of the Military Revolutionary Committee, accompanied by a large armed detachment, appeared at the Headquarters of the Western Front in Minsk and called upon General Baluyev, the Commander-in-Chief, to obey the instructions of the Soviet Government to open negotiations for an armistice. Baluyev refused. He was thereupon informed that he was dismissed and that Colonel Kamenshchikov, a Bolshevik, had been appointed in his place. Baluyev was obliged to hand over his command. On hearing of this, Dukhonin at once telegraphed Baluyev, stating that he had done wrong in handing over his command in this way, but it was already too late. General Headquarters tried to transfer the command of the Western Front to General M. N. Yaroshevsky, Chief of Supply for the front. Dukhonin sent him a telegram stating:
“In view of General Baluyev’s indisposition, I order you to take over command of the Western Front.”[11]
General Yaroshevsky, however, dared not obey Dukhonin’s order. General B. S. Malyavin proved to be more enterprising. Claiming to act in conformity with clause 112 of the Army Field Regulations, he proclaimed himself acting Commander-in-Chief of the Western Front, but his activities in this capacity went no further than signing the order of his self-appointment. By order of the new Commander-in-Chief of the Front, Malyavin was arrested.
The resistance of the generals on the fronts, and that of General Headquarters, was not completely broken, however. On the day following the dismissal of Generals Boldyrev and Baluyev, Dukhonin, in a conversation over the direct wire with General Shcherbachev, Commander-in-Chief of the Rumanian Front, stated:
“General Headquarters continues to adhere to the view expressed in my telegram to you on November 9. I shall continue to fight the usurpers until a governmental authority recognised by the whole country is established.”[12]
Dukhonin’s openly mutinous statements prompted the Soviet Government to issue an order proclaiming him an enemy of the people. Dukhonin’s orders were to be neither transmitted nor obeyed. All persons who supported him were liable to prosecution. The officers who were honest and loyal to their country obeyed the lawful Soviet Government. A typical example of such an officer was General N. A. Danilov, Commander-in-Chief of the Second Army.
On November 14, the Commissar of the Military Revolutionary Committee arrived at the headquarters of the Third Army in Polotsk, and at a meeting of the Army Committee discussed the question of occupying General Headquarters. The Army Committee decided immediately to form a detachment for this purpose to be chosen from the 35th Corps which had been most conspicuously revolutionary during the October days. Reliable military men were sent to reconnoitre the position in Moghilev. They were instructed to ascertain the condition of the enemy’s forces, and to endeavour to win over as many of the men as possible and form at least a small detachment which, at the necessary moment, would take armed action inside the premises of General Headquarters. The detachment of the 35th Corps of the Third Army was to advance on Moghilev from the North via Orsha, and was to assist the mixed detachment which was marching on Orsha from Petrograd. A second detachment for the occupation of General Headquarters was formed in Minsk and consisted of the 1st Minsk Soviet Revolutionary Regiment, the 60th Siberian Rifle Regiment, the armoured train under the command of Prolygin, two armoured cars, a company of infantry and sappers. This detachment marched on Moghilev from the South, via Zhlobin.
On learning of these preparations, General Headquarters hastily called for Cossacks and shock battalions from the South-Western Front; but the Cossacks were no longer the standby they had been before. They had become permeated with Bolshevik ideas. The 4th Siberian Cossack Regiment which arrived at General Headquarters began to waver. The shock battalions, however, were firmer.
On November 17, General Headquarters learned that the Petrograd mixed detachment was approaching Moghilev. “The sailors are coming!”—was the cry that rang through General Headquarters. On the night of November 17, a meeting of the All-Army Committee was held to discuss the formation of a “central authority.” Representatives were present from the Caucasian, Rumanian and the South-Western Fronts. There were no representatives from the Western and Northern Fronts. These had not even replied to the All-Army Committee’s invitation. Among those present were Dukhonin, Stankevich—the Supreme Commissar of the Provisional Government—the staff officers and representatives of the shock battalions, which had arrived to protect General Headquarters.
Instead of discussing the question of the “governmental authority” the meeting was obliged to deal with less ambitious matters. All those present were excited by the news of the approach of the Soviet detachment. After a lengthy discussion it was at last decided by a small majority, a large number abstaining, that: 1) As far as possible General Headquarters be retained in present hands; 2) Measures be taken immediately to transfer General Headquarters to Kiev; 3) Negotiations be opened with the Council of People’s Commissars with a view to avoiding a conflict; 4) The (committee’s) arguments be backed by the threat of armed force; 5) Armed force not to be resorted to under any circumstances; 6) The Supreme Commander-in-Chief be appointed with the consent of the All-Army Committee and the All-Russian Executive Committee; 7) The question of peace and armistice be withdrawn from the competence of General Headquarters. But these decisions were of no practical value whatever. Colonel Greim, who was present at the meeting stated that if General Headquarters remained inactive, the doom of the entire army was sealed. He proposed that everybody, “should remain at his post at all costs and continue his work.”[13] “The mood prevailing among the staff officers was that of flight,” said General M. D. Bonch-Bruyevich, who was at General Headquarters.[14] The behaviour of the staff officers was fully in keeping with this.
But another danger threatened General Headquarters. The Moghilev Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, which up to now had been an obedient tool of the compromisers, began to veer round. Influenced by events, the units stationed in Moghilev became permeated with revolutionary sentiments. The agitation conducted by the Bolsheviks who had arrived to reconnoitre the position, such as those from Polotsk, for example, was the final touch. A new Soviet was elected, and at last, at a meeting of the Executive Committee of the Moghilev Soviet held on November 18, the Bolsheviks completely triumphed over the compromisers. While the meeting of the Central Army Committee was in progress at General Headquarters and threatening resolutions were being adopted, the Executive Committee of the Moghilev Soviet elected a Military Revolutionary Committee, which included representatives of the Military Revolutionary Committee of the Western Front and of the different armies.
At about 5 a.m. on November 19, Dukhonin telephoned Stankevich, the Supreme Commissar of the Provisional Government, urgently requesting him to come and see him at once. “Very important news has been received,” he said. When Stankevich arrived he found the higher officers of the General Staff gathered in Dukhonin’s room. The “news” which had been received was that units which only very recently had been regarded as “reliable,” now refused to protect General Headquarters.
At this crucial juncture, Stankevich, formerly a lieutenant of a sappers’ unit, very shrewd, “a real Jesuit” as General Bonch-Bruyevich described him, advised Dukhonin to flee and told him that he had an automobile in readiness for the purpose. Dukhonin accepted the advice. Leaving General Headquarters alone, he went to the place where Stankevich was to have been waiting for him in his car. When he got there, Stankevich had not yet arrived. Dukhonin thought better of it and returned to General Headquarters. “The automobile, which arrived soon after, carried only Stankevich from Moghilev,” relates Bonch-Bruyevich.[15]
When all possibility of offering armed resistance had vanished, General Headquarters decided to remove to another place; some proposed Kiev, others Jassy, the headquarters of the Rumanian Front, but this plan could not be carried out. A crowd of excited soldiers appeared outside the premises and declared that they would allow nobody to leave.
An operations conference of the General Staff was then called and it was decided to order the All-Army Committee to dissolve and all its members, as well as all those present at the conference, to disperse; but it was impossible for them to disperse as General Headquarters no longer possessed any means of transportation. It had even become difficult to leave the premises. Dukhonin told his entourage that “his own orderly was watching him.”
On November 19 the Moghilev Military Revolutionary Committee issued the following proclamation:
“Acting on the order of the Government of People’s Commissars appointed by the will of the October Revolution, the Moghilev Military Revolutionary Committee, consisting of representatives of the Executive Committee of the Moghilev Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies and of representatives of the Military Revolutionary Committee of the Western Front and of its armies, proclaims itself the supreme authority in the town of Moghilev and its environs, and assumes control over the activities of General Headquarters.”[16]
Dukhonin, dismissed from his post, was placed under domiciliary arrest. The Central Army Committee was proclaimed dissolved and its members also placed under domiciliary arrest.
Revolutionary troops were approaching General Headquarters from the north and south. From the north the trains carrying the Petrograd detachment were approaching Orsha, and in the south the detachment formed in Minsk was approaching Zhlobin. General S. I. Odintsov was dispatched on a locomotive from Orsha to Moghilev to ascertain what the position was at General Headquarters. The conviction prevailed that the latter would offer resistance. On arriving in Moghilev and investigating the situation General Odintsov, at 5:10 p.m. on November 19, reported by wire that General Headquarters was not in a position to offer any resistance whatever.
On the night of November 19 events occurred in Moghilev in which General Headquarters were directly involved and which had far-reaching consequences in the subsequent stage of the revolution. Generals Kornilov, Denikin, Lukomsky, Romanovsky, Markov, Erdeli and the other leaders of the counter-revolutionary mutiny which had been suppressed in August, escaped from the prison where they had been held in the town of Bykhov, 20 kilometres from Moghilev. While in Bykhov Prison they were “guarded” by the Tekinsky Regiment and the Chevaliers of St. George. When the climax was approaching at General Headquarters Dukhonin advised the “prisoners” to take flight and gave the order for their release. General Denikin, the future leader of the counter-revolution in the South, gives the following account of this incident.
“On the morning of the 19th, Colonel Kusonsky of the General Staff appeared at the prison and reported to General Kornilov:
“‘. . . General Dukhonin has ordered me to inform you that all the prisoners are to leave Bykhov at once.’
“General Kornilov summoned the commandant, Lieutenant-Colonel Erhardt of the Tekinsky Regiment, and said to him:
“‘Release the generals at once. Have the Tekinsks ready to march by midnight. I will go with the regiment.’
“That night, (November 19), the commandant of the Bykhov Prison informed the guard of Chevaliers of St. George of the order he had received to release General Kornilov, who would go to the Don. . . . At midnight the guard was lined up, the General appeared, bade farewell to the men, thanked his ‘jailers’ for the excellent way they had performed their duty, and made them a present of 2,000 rubles. . . .
“At 1 a.m. the slumbering Bykhovites were roused by the clatter of hoofs. The Tekinsky Regiment, with General Kornilov at its head, marched to the bridge, and crossing the Dnieper, vanished into the gloom.”[17]
Denikin, Lukomsky and the other generals who had been held in custody in Bykhov changed into mufti and left for the Don by train.
That same night the representatives of the foreign missions, the members of the All-Army Committee and a number of the staff officers, including Quartermaster-General Dieterichs, Colonel Kusonsky, Chief of the Operations Department, Sergievsky, Chief of Communications, and nearly all the officers of the Operations Department, fled from Moghilev, leaving the army even without operational directions.
On the morning of November 20, the sailors’ detachment entered Moghilev. In their black greatcoats and fur hats, their rifles slung across their shoulders, they marched slowly through the deserted streets of the town. Dukhonin was under arrest in the Commander-in-Chief’s special train. A crowd of soldiers, excited by the news of the flight of Kornilov and the other counter-revolutionary generals, had gathered outside his car, demanding that he be surrendered to them. They were pacified only with difficulty by the assurance that the Soviet Government would put Dukhonin on trial for his crimes. But soon the soldiers again raised a commotion and pressed still closer around the car. In spite of all the entreaties and efforts of the guard to prevent it, Dukhonin was dragged out and killed.
The Tekinsky Regiment, under the command of General Kornilov, proceeded in a south-westerly direction. Fearing pursuit, Kornilov hastened to leave the Moghilev Region, and in order to cover up his tracks he led the regiment across country, moving mainly at night. General Denikin related that “the inhabitants of the villages on the route fled, or met the Tekinsks with horror.”[18]
Near Zhlobin, the detachment of revolutionary troops which was marching on Moghilev from the south encountered the resistance of the shock battalions which had left General Headquarters. On November 20, fighting broke out at siding No. 22, between Zhlobin and Krasny Bereg Station, and lasted several hours. At night the shock battalions fled. On November 21, the detachment entered Zhlobin. It went no further, as Moghilev was already occupied by the Petrograd detachment. When Kornilov’s flight was discovered the armoured train commanded by Prolygin and two battalions of the 266th Porechinsky Regiment, of the 35th Corps of the Third Army, which had been sent to reinforce the detachment, were sent in pursuit. On November 22 these units started out in the direction of Gomel.
On November 26, the seventh day after his flight, Kornilov approached the Gomel-Bryansk railway, in the vicinity of Unecha Station. From the village of Krasnovichi, where the regiment had its last bivouac, Kornilov made for the village of Pisarevka with the intention of crossing the railway east of Unecha Station. A peasant whom they met on the road offered to lead the regiment the safest way, but when this guide brought them to the outskirts of a wood nearby shots rang out, fired almost at point-blank range. It transpired that this peasant had deliberately led Kornilov into an ambush set for him by his pursuers.
The regiment retreated to Krasnovichi and then Kornilov changed his route with the intention of crossing the railway west of Unecha. But he barely reached the railway embankment near Peschaniki Station when an armoured train suddenly appeared round the sharp bend and opened fire upon the regiment with all its guns. Many were killed and wounded. Kornilov’s horse was shot under him. The regiment scattered. The leading squadron turned sharply and galloped off, followed by the main body. Subsequently it was surrounded and disarmed in the town of Pavlichi, near Klintsi. Kornilov managed to rally small remnants of the regiment after it was hurled back from the railway, but soon, changing into mufti, he deserted them and fled by railway to the south.
Thus, General Headquarters was dissolved, and with it was dissolved the main hotbed of counter-revolution at the front, where numerous plots had been hatched to crush the proletarian revolution. Ahead still lay the struggle against the counter-revolution on the other fronts—the South-Western, Rumanian and Caucasian—to which the remnants of the defeated enemy forces flocked; but this struggle was no longer formidable. On these fronts, too, the tide of popular anger against the age-long exploiters rose. The masses of the soldiers eagerly watched what was happening on the more revolutionary fronts and began to follow their example. The forces of the new government grew. The two most progressive and most powerful fronts—the North and the West—were entirely on its side.
[1] A. Dickhof-Derenthal, “Silhouettes of the October Revolution,” in Perezhitoye. In the Year of Revolution, Verf Publishers, Moscow, 1918, Book I, p. 54.
[2] “The Telegram of the All-Army Committee,” Golos Desyatoi Armii, No. 100, November 9, 1917.
[3] Ibid.
[4] “On the Eve of the Armistice,” Krasny Arkhiv, 1927, Vol. 4 (23), p. 205.
[5] Sir George Buchanan, My Mission to Russia and Other Diplomatic Memories, Boston, Little, Brown & Company, 1923, Vol. II, p. 225-26.
[6] “The Government’s Order to Mr. Dukhonin,” Izvestia of the Central Executive Committee and of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, No. 221, November 10, 1917.
[7] V. I. Lenin, “Radio Message to All,” Lenin and Stalin, 1917, Eng. ed., p. 655.
[8] V. I. Lenin, “Meeting of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of November 10, 1917,” Collected Works, Russ. ed., Vol. XXII, p. 76.
[9] Ibid.
[10] “Excerpts from Conversations on the Direct Wire,” Bulletin of the All-Army Committee, No. 17, November 13, 1917.
[11] V. V. Kamenshchikov, 1917 on the Western Front, Materials of the Secretariat of the Head Editorial Board of The History of the Civil War, Fund of Vol. II of “H.C.W.”
[12] “On the Eve of the Armistice,” Krasny Arkhiv, 1927, Vol. 4 (23), p. 230.
[13] “The Conference of the Members of General Headquarters,” Moghilevskaya Zhizn (Moghilev Life), No. 194, November 20, 1917.
[14] M. D. Bonch-Bruyevich, Reminiscences, Materials of the Secretariat of the Head Editorial Board of The History of the Civil War, Fund of Vol. II of “H.C.W.”
[15] Ibid.
[16] Materials of the Secretariat of the Head Editorial Board of The History of the Civil War, Fund of Vol. II of “H.C.W.”
[17] A. I. Denikin, Sketches of the Disturbances in Russia, Vol. II, Paris, 1922, p. 144.
[18] Ibid., p. 153.
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