Primary Documents - Manifesto of Russian Council of Workmen and Soldiers, 25 July 1917
Reproduced below is the
text of a manifesto issued by the influential Russian Council of Workmen and
Soldiers dated 25 July 1917.
Following two earlier manifestos dated 15 May and 23 July - each appealing for civil and military support for the Provisional Government established in the wake of Tsar Nicholas II's abdication, this third manifesto struck a desperate note.
It warned of a fresh German attack overseen by German Chief of Staff Paul von Hindenburg; it threatened the Provisional Government's very existence. The manifesto concluded by stating that "the greatest revolution in the world can not and shall not perish".
Click here to read an address by War Justice Alexander Guchkov dated 10 May 1917 and here for another by Justice Minister Alexander Kerenski four days later pleading the same cause.
Manifesto of 25 July 1917 by Council of Workmen and Soldiers
Lack of discipline and open treachery at the front are facilitating Field-Marshal von Hindenburg's new offensive.
The serious defeats inflicted on our army are opening the way to the enemy for increasing the general panic and preparing the soil in which the poisonous seeds of counter-revolution may come into full bloom. Already an attack is being organized by the strong bourgeoisie; already the jackals and hyenas of the old regime are howling.
We turn to you, our representatives, with a passionate appeal for aid. Support the revolutionary authority; try to secure the full submission of workingmen, soldiers, and peasants to all the decisions of democracy's majority.
Inspire them; awaken enthusiasm in them. Exert your entire will, your entire energy. Rally round our All-Russian centres and we will show the country and the world that the nation which created the greatest revolution in the world can not and shall not perish.
Source: Source Records of the Great War, Vol. V, ed. Charles F. Horne, National Alumni 1923
A sandbag was a sack filled with earth from which defences were built.
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