The Decembrists and Their Effects
... the union followed in 1821 when Alexander established a secret, political police; however, the secret protest movement soon revived. In due course, it grew into a widespread conspiracy network which essentially had two centers: the Northern Society located in St. Petersburg under the direction of Prince Trubitskoi, Nikita Muraviev, Obolenskii, and Ryleev; and the Southern Society located in the Second Army with Pestel and Sergei Muraviev-Apostol as leaders (Curtiss 10). It was not far down the road that the society decided to take revolutionary measures to gain their aims. In the autumn of 1825, political instability characterized by questionable succession, lack of police power at the time, as well as past palace revolutions gave the Decembrists the opportunity to strike. When Alexander died suddenly and without an heir in the fall of 1825, confusion over the succession lasted several weeks. Alexander’s youngest brother Nicholas was highly unpopular at the time; however, Constantine had previously secretly refused the throne in favor of Nicholas unbeknown to the Decembrists, Nicholas, or the rest of the country (Liders 14). Contributing to the Decembrists’ idea of an armed gentry coup was also of the fact that palace revolutions, by this time, had evolved to have an atmosphere of semilegality about them. Following the examples of all Russian sovereigns, form Catherine I to Alexander I, the Decembrists attempted to turn these old methods of succession to the purpose of humanitarian reform (Malia 2). In addition, it was relatively simple to organize and carry out a rebellion like the one planned by the Decembrists due to the lack of an organized police force. The ministry of police that was established in 1811 was disbanded eight years later and “in the second half of the eighteenth century there existed a rural and an urban constabulary”, however, there was “no special body responsible for ferreting out political opposition.” (Pipes 290) The Decembrists chose this brief period of political turmoil and little opposition as the best time to introduce the idea of a constitutional government. Despite the movement’s defined ideas and radicalism, several unexpected problems set the uprising off on the wrong foot and premeditated failure. One of the most immediate difficulties with the revolt, unknown to the Decembrists, was that Nicholas was warned of the upcoming uprising by his informers and took several precautionary measures, such as making the Senate pledge allegiance to him early in the morning before the revolt had begun (Curtiss 13). Other dilemmas included difficulty getting the military out in defiance of the government because some of the commanders loyal to the tsar were able to confine the men to barracks. Also, the would-be leader of the revolt, Prince Trubitskoi, cowardly failed to show up that fateful morning, leaving the revolt in the hands of inexperienced leaders (Mazour 176). The revolt took place on December 14 and although they did not have enough soldiers to fully justify their cause, the Decembrists were so intent on seeing their wishes carried out, that ultimately the movement had to be crushed by artillery force. On December 13, 1825, about three thousand soldiers were persuaded by the leaders of the upcoming revolt to assemble in the Senate Square at St. Petersburg the following morning (Walsh 184). Many failed to show, however, and even when “to the soldiers of the Moskovski Regiment were added themselves some Grenadiers and the Division of Marine Guards,” there “stood mustered on the Place of the Senate and exposed to all the damp frigidity of a St. Petersburg breeze in winter, block of fully 2,000 men.” (Kluchevsky 168) The new emperor, while gathering to himself all of the troops that had remained faithful, did not wish to use force and therefore sent Miloradovich to parley with the rebels. However, the Governor-Federal of the capital did not have any success and as he turned to leave, he was mortally shot from behind. Several more people, including a priest, were sent to conference with the leaders of the revolt but to no avail. At last, “fearing his troops might defect to the rebels after dark,” Nicholas gave the command and cannons were brought to the spot, loaded with blank, and fired (Daniloff).The men scattered when live shell was used. This was followed by the arrests of about a hundred people that had been involved in the revolt. After the revolt was put down, the arrested were questioned and then presented before the Supreme Court which decided on their degree of guilt and dealt with them accordingly. Five of the total 121 people arrested were sentenced to be drawn and quartered, 31 were sentenced to decapitation, along with eighty five others exiled to Siberia for hard labor for life by the Supreme Criminal Commission Nicholas had appointed just days before (Miliukov 230). However, it is now known that the judges deliberately exaggerated the penalties so that Nich...