When Kerensky
returns to the Winter Palace from the Pre-Parliament (the session of November 6
– October 24), he finds Commissar Stankevich there, back from headquarters at
the front. Stankevich was skeptical about whether an insurrection was actually
taking place – too quiet. Kerensky thought it was; he was waiting on the
resolution of the Pre-Parliament before taking certain steps against it.
Stankevich went to Mariinsky Palace to see how things stood there.
Kerensky did not
like the news Stankevich brought back at about 9:00 p.m. – particularly the resolution
demanding that the Pre-Parliament should run the fight against the insurrection
through its own committee of public safety. Kerensky summoned the
Pre-Parliament’s leaders to a cabinet meeting at the palace, at which he
threatened to resign – again. Avksentiev explained that the resolution was “purely
theoretical” and admitted that maybe the wording wasn‘t apt. The Menshevik Dan
wanted the government to proclaim it had proposed peace negotiations to the
Entente, and publish it on posters throughout the city.
A delegation of
Cossack officers came in next. They believed their three regiments of cavalry
would be willing and able not only to defend the government, but also to
destroy the Bolsheviks. Kerensky seems to have liked this pretty well, but said
he regretted he had not arrested Trotsky before then.
Of course none of
this was based on the realities of the situation. After the meetings broke up
at 2:00 a.m. (November 7 – October 25), Kerensky was left alone with his deputy
Konovalov. General Polkovnikov came in with a plan to capture Smolny, but he
could not specify what forces he intended to use. Maybe the commander in chief
could find them. Only then did Kerensky realize that all Polkovnikov’s reports
on the preparedness and loyalty of the garrison were not just mistaken, but
self-deluded.
Further proof
that the situation was more dangerous than imagined came from a commissar of
the city government: ships of the Baltic Fleet in the Neva, bridges taken,
Bolshevik movements “meeting nowhere the slightest resistance….” Now Kerensky
and his deputy knew they needed troops – lots of them, and fast.
They went to Polkovnikov’s
nearby headquarters and found it stuffed with officers hiding from troops they
could no longer command. Not much help. Kerensky telephoned his party’s
headquarters; maybe the Social Revolutionaries could arm the membership.
Miliukov observes that this was sure to alienate military elements aligned with
the right. But unlike the Bolsheviks, the Social Revolutionaries had made no
effort to arm the party rank and file.
Now it was time
to call in the Cossack regiments. But cavalry cannot operate without support,
the Cossacks said. They must have armored cars, machine guns, and especially
infantry to back them up. Kerensky promised these things, but they were things
he could not deliver. Only squadrons, not regiments, of Cossacks ever came to
the defense of the Winter Palace.
People in
headquarters and at the palace were beginning to sense an oncoming fiasco.
Kerensky summoned
a War Ministry official to headquarters. He was stopped, taken to the barracks
of the Pavlovsky Regiment, then permitted to go on his way. Commissar Stankevich
too was allowed to pass into headquarters during this time (later going on his mission
to the telephone exchange). That at least was something.
It was 5:00 a.m.
New conversations with the headquarters of the Northern Front brought new
promises and assurances. But troops were not arriving. Kerensky and Konovalov
returned to the palace to rest, only to find the phones had been cut off. And
there in the river, across the courtyard from the palace, revolutionary marines
stood guard on the Dvortsovy bridge.
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