“You cannot deny us justice, as we are all suffocating from nightmarish lynchings": “Kornilovschina” on the battleship ‘Petropavlovsk’ according to personal letters of August-September 1917 from the Russian State Archive of Military and Naval Forces colle

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doi 10.28995/2073-0101-2025-2-452–468

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Bazhanov, Denis A. (2025). “You cannot deny us justice, as we are all suffocating from nightmarish lynchings": “Kornilovschina” on the battleship ‘Petropavlovsk’ according to personal letters of August-September 1917 from the Russian State Archive of Military and Naval Forces collection, Herald of an Archivist, № 2, pp. 452–468, doi 10.28995/2073-0101-2025-2-452–468

Bazhanov, Denis A., A. I. Herzen Russian State Pedagogical University, St. Petersburg, Russia

“You cannot deny us justice, as we are all suffocating from nightmarish lynchings": “Kornilovschina” on the battleship ‘Petropavlovsk’ according to personal letters of August-September 1917 from the Russian State Archive of Military and Naval Forces collection

Abstract

The publication of documents from the Russian State Archive of the Navy is based on the application of an anthropological approach for the comparative analysis of the participants' perception of the events of the February Revolution in Russia in 1917 and the time of L. G. Kornilov's speech, as well as on the source method for identifying the peculiarities of information recording in a particular historical source. The relevance of the plot is connected with such a circumstance as the psychological connection of the outgrowth of the revolutionary process into the civil war. In the days of the fall of the monarchy, Russian officers became hostages of the former socio-political organization of the professional community. On the basis of the surviving documents the author undertakes a reconstruction of the moods and reactions of the officers' community, as well as their relatives to the processes that took place in the days of Kornilov's speech on the ships of the Baltic Fleet. For the first time the “letter to the authorities” of A. D. Romanova, the sister of one of the villainously murdered naval officers, with annexes of independent scientific value from the funds of the Russian State Archive of the Navy in St. Petersburg is introduced into scientific circulation. The presented materials allow us to evaluate the outburst of the wildest radicalism of the crews of the Baltic Fleet warships, which reflected the tension of the political situation, which in many respects repeated the situation of the February-March days of 1917. The reason for the lynchings was the demand to collect from the officers a kind of “political reliability receipts” with a sharp condemnation of L. G. Kornilov's actions and refusal to obey his orders, as well as agreement to comply with the orders of the so-called revolutionary authorities. Attempts by some officers to refuse to demonstrate loyalty to the revolutionary authorities, explained by their unwillingness to participate in the political struggle, were perceived as counter-revolutionary. At the same time, the sending of “letters to the authorities” to “respected public figures”, including, presumably, M. V. Rodzianko, indicated uncertainty about the desire and ability of the head of the Provisional Government to obtain justice for the lynch mobs. This was indirectly confirmed by the inaction in this direction after the February-March events. An important feature of the published letter of the sister of the dead naval officer was the undisguised hatred of the murderers. In many respects it was explained by personal kinship, but it also reflected the readiness to pursue the goals set by the most radical means. This indicated a growing irreconcilability in various groups of society, which meant psychological readiness for civil war in Russia.

Keywords

Revolutionary events of 1917 in Russia, World War I in 1914-1918, Baltic Fleet, Central Committee of the Baltic Fleet (TsentroBalt, CCBF), Finnish Revolutionary Committee, lynchings, loyalty to the revolutionary authorities, “letters to the authorities”, L. G. Kornilov, A. F. Kerensky, M. V. Rodzianko.

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About authors

Bazhanov Denis A., PhD in History, associate professor, Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia, department of Russian History (XIX-XXI centuries), assistant professor, Saint Petersburg, Russia, +7-812-312-44-92, +7-921-630-51-65, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

ORCID 0000-0001-6658-7498

The article was received in the editorial office on 5.08.2024, recommended for publication on 20.03.2025