Petrograd
receives news about the movement in its direction of General Kornilov’s forces.
Reportedly: at 12:30 p.m., General Krymov reached Luga, 87 miles from the
capital; at 2:30 p.m., trains loaded with Kornilov’s troops were passing
through Oredezh station; at 3:00 p.m., Luga’s garrison surrendered; at 6:00
p.m., troops were advancing past Narva and approaching Gatchina, 28 miles from
the capital.
The stock markets
actually went up!
Little did the
bourgeoisie know, this is what was really happening: Railroad workers were
tearing up the tracks on the insurrection’s line of march. They isolated
Moghiliev, Kornilov’s headquarters, from the rest of the railroad net. They put
the railroad bridges under guard. Rail dispatchers and engineers were sending
parts of Kornilov’s units one way, other parts another way, so that troops got
separated from commanders and staff, from their own weapons and supplies, and
from each other. Telegraph operators were not only holding up messages, but
retransmitting them to the Committee of Defense. Other workers dug trenches –
in hours instead of days.
And in Petrograd
itself, workers eager to join the Red Guard were arming themselves with 40,000
stand of rifles. The workers of the Putilov factory turned out 100 cannon for
defense of the city. The chauffeurs union provided transportation and delivered
messages for the Soviet’s Committee of Defense. Clerks of the metal workers
union prepared and distributed the necessary paperwork. The printers union
decided, favorably to the interests of the Soviet, what would go into print.
Counter-revolutionary elements were put under arrest.
Governor-general
Savinkov had little or nothing to do with the organization of the defense.
Significantly,
the Menshevik Dan, on behalf of the Petrograd Soviet, decreed that units of the
Petrograd garrison should not carry out any movements unless orders were
countersigned by the Committee of Defense. This was the same tactic the Soviet
had employed during the April Days. It effectively deprived Kerensky of command
over the city’s troops. Not only did he not control resistance to Kornilov on behalf of the Provisional Government,
he did not have forces to support his own ambitions as against both Kornilov and
the Provisional Government.
I might observe, without
revealing too much too soon, that this was all good practice for the October
Revolution.
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