Petersburg Industrial War 1896

Categories / Social Life
PETERSBURG INDUSTRIAL WAR 1896, the name given by Lenin to the Petersburg textile-workers' strike prepared by the Petersburg League of the Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class. It was incited by the refusal of factory-owners to pay for the so-called Tsar's Days (15-17 May 1896), during the coronation of Emperor Nicholas II, when work was ordered not to be carried out. Workers of the Russian Cotton Factory (now the Spinning Factory Vereteno, 225 Obvodny Canal Embankment; memorial plaque installed) were the first to start the strike on 23 of May; soon workers from 18 other factories joined them (about 16,000 people). The strike lasted over 3 weeks, and was headed by members of the League of the Struggle and its workers (S.I. Radchenko, N.K. Krupskaya, M.A. Silvin, A.S. Shapovalov, N.Y. Ivanov, and F.G. Galaktionov). The workers' demands were established at mass meetings, and were by the League formalized in pamphlets (13 pamphlets were published through the middle of June). Workers strove for shortening the workday from 13 hours to 10.5 hours, fixing the work day from 07:00 to 19:00, ending work at 14:00 on Saturdays, and also for strict fixing and enforcement of the terms of what constituted the beginning and end of work. In attempting to suppress the strike, the government arrested over 1,000 workers and many socialist-democrats. The scope of the demonstration caused the government to reduce the working day through legislation to 11.5 hours.

Z. P. Solovyeva. Galaktionov F.G.
Ivanov N.Ya.
Krupskaya Nadezhda Konstantinovna
Lenin (real name Ulyanov) Vladimir Ilyich
Nicholas II, Emperor
Radchenko Stepan Ivanovich
Shapovalov Alexander Sidorovich
Silvin Mikhail Alexandrovich
Obvodny Canal Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city, house 225
Union of Struggle for Liberation of the Working Class, St. Petersburg
Vereteno Spinning Factory