Belarusian Smolensk Region

The Spread of Revolutionary Ideas Among Students and Teachers in the Smolensk Province in the 1860s-1880s

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E.V. Zavyalova*

“I, the undersigned, promise and swear by Almighty God before His Holy Gospel that I want and must serve faithfully and sincerely to His Imperial Majesty… Emperor Nicholas Pavlovich, the Autocrat of All Russia… and in everything obey, not sparing my life to the last drop of blood… and thus conduct myself as a loyal servant to His Imperial Majesty…” [1].

This is a fragment of the oath taken by future teachers of Tsarist Russia before assuming a position in an educational institution. Each swore to “serve faithfully” “in their capacity” and knowledge to the “Autocrat of All Russia,” agreeing to the conditions set by the authorities. It was the year 1839…

The next document is of a completely different nature and from a later time:

“To the Defenders of the Holstein-Tatar Dynasty

To the Preobrazhentsy:

In the times of Elizabeth

The nobleman by heart and mind

Shuvalov established universities

In our native land.

Now it is not the same, the scoundrel-Shuvalov,

The fool Ignatiev’s henchman,

Goes with a crowd of Generals

To storm the University.

And on the sons of Mind and Word

Lead the serf’s sons

Under the command of Tolstoy

Preobrazhensky bayonets!” [2].

This poem was discovered in the notes of the Smolensk nobleman Alexander Vasilyevich Pensky, who served in 1861 as a “staff captain of the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment” and became a participant in the suppression of student unrest in Petersburg.

A little over 20 years passed, and as we can see, the views of Russian society towards power and the monarch changed sharply – bold statements against the authorities began to be heard more and more frequently.

The 1860s were one of the turning points in the history of Russia. It was a time not only of radical reforms in its life but also of the emergence of mass student unrest, which flared up and subsided throughout the second half of the century. Primarily, these protests were caused by students’ struggles for their rights and freedoms; however, increasingly radical judgments about the country’s future began to be voiced in the student environment.

The dynamics of this phenomenon are evident: among those prosecuted for “political crimes” in the 1860s, students and gymnasium pupils accounted for 60%, in the 1870s – 52%, and by March 1, 1881 – 88% [3]. What was it that drew young people to radical ideas?

The ruling circles of the country sought to find an answer to this question. Thus, analyzing the political situation at the time of the abolition of serfdom, the Third Section noted: “…until 1861, there was no dangerous revolutionary movement for the Government… but since 1861, revolutionary ideas found fertile ground: from this time, a whole class of people of a very dangerous nature suddenly emerged in our Russia,” who not only embraced radical ideas but also offered themselves as “exact executors of any teachings aimed at overthrowing the existing social and state order.”

The basis of this “dangerous class,” the gendarmes considered, was the student youth [4]. According to the Third Section, after the defeat in the Crimean War (1853–1856), there emerged in society a “general conviction” that this catastrophe was inevitable due to the existing system of governance in Russia, and under the influence of this opinion, a “ruthless criticism of everything old” began. It was heard everywhere, and “everything bore the stamp of denial of the old, everywhere it was heard that the old principles of social and state life, the former ideals and beliefs were unsuitable for new life.” Everyone condemned everything old, but no one proposed anything new in return.

An “antagonism between parents and children and a complete disregard of the latter for any authority” arose. The authority of parental power was destroyed, which led to a disrespect for the authority of state power and former ideals, beliefs, which reflected in nihilism. The younger generation heard from all sides about the “ignorance and abuses of the old bureaucracy” and that the latter constantly hindered the tsar from carrying out reforms, and therefore, in this atmosphere and with such moods, “it was easy to accept any political teachings… predominantly of a negative direction” [4, pp. 4-6].

A somewhat different reason for the fascination of young people with radical ideas was named by the curator of the Kazan educational district in his report dated March 20, 1863, to the Minister of Education A.V. Golovnin. He believed that the spread of radical ideas and the “harmful” influence on the minds of gymnasium and school students were the fault of students expelled from educational institutions and sent to different cities [5].

Another version of the increase in student unrest and the spread of anti-government views was expressed by a member of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Main Administration for Press Affairs F.P. Yelenyev, who noted that “the poor and subordinate position of the youth of the lower classes naturally arouses in them a passionate sympathy for the teaching of the overthrow of everything that stands above the masses.”

In addition, “constant incitement” was carried out in universities by professional revolutionaries. As a result, Yelenyev came to the original conclusion: scholarships in universities bring more harm than good, for “they artificially attract masses of people from all classes and nationalities to universities, spending their university years in idleness, gatherings, and stuffing their heads with distorted teachings” [5, p. 118].

The viewpoint of Mikhail Lemke, presented in his book “Essays on the Liberation Movement of the 1860s,” is noteworthy. It cites a “Note on the Petersburg University Disorders” (the author is unknown), where the main reason for the spread of radical ideas among student youth is named as the cruelty with which the authorities punished young people for participating in student “disorders.”

These were merely disturbances, but the authorities sought political motives in them, without publicizing their conclusions. “And this,” the author emphasized, “made young people think that their offenses were approved, that they were sympathized with,” which, in turn, led them to “actual political and state crimes” [6].

Modern researchers of opposition movements of the post-reform era, studying the process of spreading radical ideas, focus their attention on “raznochintsy,” who were the children of merchants, petty bourgeois, priests, impoverished nobles, and literate peasants [7].

It seems that the aforementioned reasons for the students’ dissatisfaction with their situation and state policy collectively explain the intensification of the spread of radical ideas among them quite logically. What were these ideas?

In the 1860s, after the publication of I.S. Turgenev’s novel “Fathers and Sons,” “nihilists” in society began to be called those who wanted to change the existing state structure in the country, who criticized existing traditions, norms of morality and religion, and did not recognize former authorities. These same ideas were expressed in the works of N.G. Chernyshevsky and D.I. Pisarev. The authorities, however, used the term “nihilist” as a derogatory characterization of all those fascinated by radical ideas in the 1860s-1870s, primarily students of raznochintsy. Individuals suspected of “nihilism” were under special surveillance by the political police, their movements, connections, and places of residence were monitored.

For example, on May 18, 1877, the Moscow chief of police secretly informed the Smolensk governor that “residing in Moscow under the covert surveillance of the police, Candidate of the St. Petersburg University Dmitry Vasilyevich Averkiyev” had left for Smolensk. Local authorities were instructed to continue surveillance of Averkiyev, with the reason given: in 1865 he was punished as an adherent of the teaching of “nihilism” [8].

Nihilistic teachings were quite popular among the youth. An illustration of this conclusion is a case preserved in the archival fund of the Department of Police, which shows that on December 8, 1881, the mentioned department addressed the Smolensk gendarmerie with a directive to collect information about a 6th-grade student of the Smolensk Real School N.V. Volkov and his acquaintance I. Neklepaev, as both were suspected of harmful “politically oriented thoughts.” The correspondence of the young men began to be covertly monitored, and it soon became clear that Volkov was so imbued with socialist ideas that in his letters he expressed “the conviction of the necessity of destroying existing social relations through revolution, the preparation for which should constitute the goal of life” [9].

Radical ideas were sometimes embraced by teachers as well. In the town of Dorogobuzh, a teacher of the Yalta Zemstvo School, Alexey Gursky, was sent under police supervision for propagating “harmful views” and “bad morals” [10].

And these were not isolated examples [11, 12]. Thus, in the “Reports of Persons Under Police Surveillance” for 1872 in the Smolensk province, three more individuals involved in the “Nechayev affair” were listed: a former student of Moscow University, a nobleman, a native of the Smolensk province A. Nikolaev, “personal honorary citizen” S. Prokofyev from Gzhatsk district, and “merchant’s son” N. Shestakov from Belsky district. All were placed under “strict secret police surveillance” [13].

In 1872, the “Smolensk Provincial Gendarmerie Administration,” according to the directive of the III Section, was obliged to “secretly collect” information about the landowner of Belsky district Ivan Lykoshkin and his three daughters living in St. Petersburg. One of them – the youngest, thirteen-year-old Sofia, lived in St. Petersburg in the same house as “the sister of the state criminal” S. Nechayev – Anna Nechayeva. Local gendarmes gathered information and reported to the capital that nothing reprehensible had been observed regarding the sisters and their father. However, when one of the sisters planned to go to Switzerland for further education and requested to be issued an international passport, she was denied [14].

The political police sought to track any manifestation of discontent with the existing regime in Russian society. In this regard, teachers who taught both privately and in Sunday schools raised concerns. Thus, on November 19, 1863, a secret directive from the gendarmerie was sent to the Smolensk civil governor Borozdne, proposing to establish “the most secret surveillance” over a former student of St. Petersburg University, the son of a petty bourgeois from Petrozavodsk, Syvorotkin. The young man had left the capital for Dorogobuzh district in early November 1863 and had taken a position as a private tutor in the estate of General Chebyshev [15].

The political police were alarmed by the possibility of the spread of populist ideas in Sunday schools. Thus, on June 28, 1862, the head of the Moscow educational district ordered the director of schools in the Smolensk province to deliver “a complete list of persons who have recently been administrators and teachers in all Sunday schools.” A week prior, it was reported that “the surveillance established over Sunday schools and public reading rooms proved insufficient.”

Frightened by this fact, the authorities decided to “review the rules for establishing Sunday schools” and “until the transformation of the aforementioned schools on new grounds, close all existing ones…” [16].

Nevertheless, as some researchers believe, in the 1860s, only a tendency towards direct contacts between revolutionaries and the people began to emerge, while the mass movement of populists became prominent in the 1870s, after the famous call of M. Bakunin to “go to the people” [17].

“Going to the people” began in the spring of 1874. At the same time, there were two viewpoints: if “we do not move towards rapprochement with the people, then everything done until now will turn into capital, the application of which is unlikely to ever be demanded” [17, p. 57].

On the other hand, propaganda among peasants, the “Flying Method,” involved the propagandist moving from village to village, never lingering long anywhere. The goal was to incite a peasant movement while conducting propaganda for socialism [18].

Thus, in Vyazma on September 27, 1874, a student from Tula Gymnasium, Pyotr Kompasov, was detained. He was found with revolutionary books and a notebook with addresses. At the end of December of the same year, in the village of Khotin in Dukhovshchinsky district, a former student of the agricultural academy Nikolai Leontovich was arrested. In his belongings, specially printed books for work among the people and works by Chernyshevsky were discovered [19].

However, as time showed, this method was less effective, and the populists decided on a more effective method from their point of view – “settled” propaganda [18, p. 108]. Now, living permanently in rural areas, a populist became “one of their own” among the peasantry, which was supposed to enhance their influence.

Let us provide a similar case. On September 16, 1874, the manager of the Orlov-Vitebsk railway reported to the Smolensk governor about the following request from the Roslavl district police chief, who asked to monitor the contacts of a student from the St. Petersburg Practical Technological Institute, Ivan Alexeev, who had arrived in Roslavl. The young man resided in the Roslavl railway school. The gendarmes decided to check everything “covertly,” carefully assigning “the head of the Roslavl workshops” G. Fedorov to this “work.” However, he refused the assigned duty, citing extreme busyness. The student was then decided to be interrogated about the purpose of his arrival at the railway and what he intended to do. Sensing trouble, Alexeev disappeared, and his search yielded nothing [20].

It turns out that the authorities correctly identified the source of danger but could not suppress it promptly. Another example has been preserved in the archives of the State Archive of the Smolensk Region. On February 19, 1877, the Gzhatsk district police chief informed the Smolensk governor that “in the village of Rogozino, Semenovskaya volost, settled a former teacher of the Tomsk Theological School Pavel Ivanovich Pokrovsky.” As it turned out, he belonged to those individuals under “covert police surveillance.” The reason for settling was explained as “the necessity in village life for the improvement of his disrupted health, as well as the desire to use the money he had for farming.”

Pokrovsky’s subsequent actions raised the authorities’ suspicions. He rented land, paying an amount that sparked “popular gossip.” According to the tenant, the young man paid three times more than the cost without bargaining. Subsequently, Pokrovsky paid more than required, quite often “without any visible purpose, treated peasants to vodka,” had no servants in the house, and finally, almost every week traveled to Moscow, returning each time with heavy luggage. But the most suspicious thing was that some young people constantly visited him and stayed for some time.

The facts were more than eloquent: a populist had settled in the village. The police decided to observe Pokrovsky and the individuals visiting him, but “the necessary” information was not revealed even after a “surprise search.” As a result, surveillance was established. Soon, the Gzhatsk district police chief reported that in December 1877, Pokrovsky had disappeared from the village of Rogozino. The search for the young man across the districts of the province yielded nothing, but in May 1879, he was found in the Mozhaysk district of Moscow province [21].

However, soon the mass “going to the people” dwindled. There are many reasons: the absence of a unified center of movement; the spontaneity of the actions of participants; quite effective work by the authorities in capturing propagandists and suppressing their activities. But most importantly, it was the ignorance of young people regarding the realities of peasant life. The ideas of the populists were incomprehensible to the peasants, alien, plus the age-old belief in a good “father-tsar.” “Going to the people” became “the first collision of two utopias: revolutionary-populist and conservative-populist, fundamentally differing from each other” [17, p. 58].

However, it was not only on this that the activity of spreading populist ideas among students in the Smolensk province ended. As historian D.I. Budayev pointed out, there were several circles in Smolensk (in 1883–1884, in 1885, and 1889) organized by students of gymnasiums, theological seminaries, and real schools that propagated populist views [19, pp. 171-183].

Thus, the facts presented indicate that in the Smolensk province among the student youth and teachers of schools and gymnasiums, the same radical ideas were popular as among the student bodies and teachers in other provinces of the Russian Empire, including in the capital’s educational institutions. These ideas actively permeated all layers of educated society. Primarily, these ideas captivated individuals from the nobility, petty bourgeoisie, merchants, peasants, and clergy.

The typical “hero” of this period becomes the young intelligentsia – a raznochinets who received higher education.

  1. GASO (State Archive of the Smolensk Region). F. 45. Op. 1. Unit file 307. pp. 2-2 ob.

  2. GASO. F. 107. Op. 1. Unit file 4. pp. 1.

  3. Panagin F.G. The Teaching Staff in the Revolutionary Movement in Russia (XIX – Early XX Centuries). Moscow, 1986. p. 78.

  4. GARF. F. 109. Op. 1 a. Unit file 1042 a. pp. 1-3 ob.

  5. Tkachenko P.S. Student Youth in the Revolutionary Movement of the 1860s-70s.

Moscow, 1978. pp. 116-117.

  1. Lemke M. Essays on the Liberation Movement of the 1860s. St. Petersburg, 1908. p. 478.

  2. Power and Social Movement in Russia of the Imperial Period / ed. M.D. Karpachev. Voronezh, 2005. pp. 39-40.

  3. GASO. F. 1. Op. 5. Unit file 232. pp. 1,1 ob.

  4. GARF. F. 102. Op. 77. Unit file 1408. pp. 2-3, 5-7.

  5. GASO. F. 1. Op. 5. Unit file 116. pp. 66.

  6. GARF. F. 109. Op. 1 a. Unit file 329. pp. 1.

  7. GASO. F. 1. Op. 5. Unit file 162. pp. 1-2; Unit file 191. pp. 1-39.

  8. GASO. F. 1. Op. 5. Unit file 281. pp. 41, 42 193, 194.

  9. GARF. F. 109. Op. 1. Unit file 594. pp. 2-9.

  10. GASO. F. 1. Op. 4. Unit file 715. pp. 1-3.

  11. GASO. F. 45. Op. 1. Unit file 2027. pp. 4, 9, 14.

  12. Zverev V.V. Populists in the History of Russia. Moscow, 2003. p. 55.

  13. Korzhavin V.K. Populism of the 1870s. Kaliningrad, 2007. p. 106.

  14. Budayev D.I. Monuments of Revolutionary Heroism. Moscow, 1981. p. 169.

  15. GASO. F. 1. Op. 5. Unit file 196. pp. 1-5.

  16. GASO. F. 1. Op. 5. Unit file 230. pp. 1-3, 14-16, 17.

*The article is published with the author’s consent.