Alexander Fyodorovich Kerensky ( – 11 June 1970) was a Russian politician, lawyer and revolutionary who led the Russian Provisional Government and the short-lived Russian Republic for three months from late July to early November 1917 (N.S.).
After the February Revolution of 1917, he joined the newly formed provisional government, first as Minister of Justice, then as Minister of War, and after July as the government's second Minister-Chairman. He was the leader of the social-democratic Trudovik faction of the Socialist Revolutionary Party. Kerensky was also a vice-chairman of the Petrograd Soviet, a position that held a sizable amount of power. Kerensky became the prime minister of the Provisional Government, and his tenure was consumed with World War I. Despite mass opposition to the war, Kerensky chose to continue Russia's participation. His government cracked down on anti-war sentiment and dissent in 1917, which made his administration even more unpopular.
Kerensky remained in power until the October Revolution. This revolution saw the Bolsheviks create a government led by them in a coalition with the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, to replace Kerensky's government. Kerensky fled Russia and lived the remainder of his life in exile, mostly in Paris and New York City. He also worked for the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, California.
He died in New York on 11 June 1970, at the age of 89. Both the local Russian and Serbian Orthodox churches refused his body due to his Freemasonry, and because they saw him as largely responsible for the Bolshevik seizure of power. Eventually, his body was flown to London and buried in the non-sectarian Putney Vale Cemetery.
Biography
Early life and activism Alexander Kerensky was born in Simbirsk (now Ulyanovsk) on the Volga river on 4 May 1881 and was the eldest son in the family. His father, Fyodor Mikhailovich Kerensky, was a teacher and director of the local gymnasium, and was later promoted to be an inspector of public schools. His paternal grandfather Mikhail Ivanovich served as a priest in the village of Kerenka in the Gorodishchensky district of the Penza Governorate from 1830. The surname Kerensky comes from the name of this village. His maternal grandfather was head of the Topographical Bureau of the Kazan Military District. His mother, Nadezhda Aleksandrovna (née Adler), was the granddaughter of a former serf who had managed to purchase his freedom before serfdom was abolished in 1861. He subsequently embarked upon a mercantile career, in which he prospered. This allowed him to move his business to Moscow, where he continued his success and became a wealthy Moscow merchant.Encyclopedia of Cyril and Method
Members of the Kerensky and Ulyanov families were friends; Kerensky's father was the teacher of Vladimir Ulyanov (Lenin), and had even secured him acceptance into the University of Kazan. In 1889, when Kerensky was eight, the family moved to Tashkent, where his father had been appointed the superintendent of public schools. Kerensky graduated with honours in 1899. The same year he entered St. Petersburg University, where he studied history and philology. The next year he switched to law. He earned his law degree in 1904 and married Olga Lvovna Baranovskaya, the daughter of a Russian general, the same year.A Doomed Democracy Bernard Butcher, Stanford Magazine, January/February 2001 Kerensky joined the Narodnik movement and worked as a legal counsel to victims of the Revolution of 1905. At the end of 1904, he was jailed on suspicion of belonging to a militant group. Afterwards, he gained a reputation for his work as a defence lawyer in a number of political trials of revolutionaries.Political Figures of Russia, 1917, Biographical Dictionary, Large Russian Encyclopedia, 1993, p. 143.
In 1912, Kerensky became widely known when he visited the goldfields at the Lena River and published material about the Lena massacre.The Lena Goldfields Massacre and the Crisis of the Late Tsarist State by Michael Melancon In the same year, Kerensky was elected to the Fourth Duma as a member of the Trudoviks, a socialist, non-Marxist labour party founded by Alexis Aladin that was associated with the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, and joined a Freemason society uniting the anti-monarchy forces that strived for democratic renewal of Russia. In fact, the Socialist Revolutionary Party bought Kerensky a house, as he otherwise would not be eligible for election to the Duma, according to the Russian property laws.
During the 4th Session of the Fourth Duma in spring 1915, Kerensky appealed to Mikhail Rodzianko with a request from the Council of elders to inform the tsar that to succeed in the war he must: change his domestic policy, proclaim a General Amnesty for political prisoners, restore the Constitution of Finland, declare autonomy of Poland, provide national minorities autonomy in the field of culture, abolish restrictions against Jews, end religious intolerance, stop the harassment of legal trade union organizations.Transcript
In August, he became a significant member of the Progressive Bloc, which included several socialist parties, Mensheviks, and Liberals – but not Bolsheviks.TV-documentary "Russian Revolution seen from Russia" aired at Danish DR K 11.June.2018
Kerensky was an active member of the irregular Freemasonic lodge the Grand Orient of Russia's Peoples, which derived from the Grand Orient of France. Kerensky was Secretary-General of the Grand Orient of Russia's Peoples and stood down following his ascent to the government in July 1917. He was succeeded by a Menshevik, Alexander Halpern.
Rasputin In response to bitter resentments held against the imperial favourite Grigori Rasputin in the midst of Russia's failing effort in World War I, Kerensky, at the opening of the Duma on 2 November 1916, called the imperial ministers "hired assassins" and "cowards", and alleged that they were "guided by the contemptible Grishka Rasputin!"The Russian Provisional Government, 1917: Documents, Volume 1, p. 16 by Robert Paul Browder, Aleksandr Fyodorovich Kerensky Grand Duke Nicholas Mikhailovich, Prince Georgy Lvov, and General Mikhail Alekseyev attempted to persuade the Tsar to send away the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, Rasputin's steadfast patron, either to the Livadia Palace in Yalta or to Britain.A. Kerensky (1965) Russia and History's turning point, p. 150. Lvov, Zinaida Yusupova (the mother of Felix Yusupov), Alexandra's sister Elisabeth, Grand Duchess Victoria and the empress's mother-in-law Maria Feodorovna also tried to influence and pressure the imperial couple to remove Rasputin from his position of influence within the imperial household, but without success.The Russian Provisional Government, 1917: Documents, Volume 1, p. 18 by Robert Paul Browder, Aleksandr Fyodorovich Kerensky According to Kerensky, Rasputin had terrorised the empress by threatening to return to his native village.A. Kerensky (1965) Russia and History's turning point, p. 163.
Members of the nobility murdered Rasputin in December 1916, and he was buried near the imperial residence in Tsarskoye Selo. Shortly after the February Revolution of 1917, Kerensky ordered soldiers to re-bury the corpse at an unmarked spot in the countryside. However, the truck broke down or was forced to stop because of the snow on Lesnoe Road outside of St. Petersburg. It is likely the corpse was incinerated (between 3 and 7 in the morning) in the cauldrons of the nearby boiler shopRasputin G. E. (1869–1916) . A.G. Kalmykov in the Saint Petersburg encyclopaedia.Nelipa, pp. 454–455, 457–459.Moe, p. 627. of the Saint Petersburg State Polytechnical University, including the coffin, without leaving a single trace.
Russian Provisional Government of 1917
When the February Revolution broke out in 1917, Kerensky – together with Pavel Milyukov – was one of its most prominent leaders. As one of the Duma's most well-known speakers against the monarchy and as a lawyer and defender of many revolutionaries, Kerensky became a member of the Provisional Committee of the State Duma and was elected vice-chairman of the newly formed Petrograd Soviet. These two bodies, the Duma and the Petrograd Soviet - or, rather, their respective executive committees - soon became each other's antagonists on most matters except regarding the end of the tsar's autocracy.
The Petrograd Soviet grew to include 3000 to 4000 members, and their meetings could drown into a blur of lengthy speeches. At the meeting of to the executive committee of the Petrograd Soviet, or Ispolkom, formed a self-appointed committee, with three members from each of the parties eventually represented in the Soviet. Kerensky became one of the members representing the Socialist Revolutionary Party (the SRs).Richard Pipes (1995). "The Russian Revolution", pp. 104–06 Swedish
On , without any consultation with the government, the Ispolkom of the Soviet issued the infamous Order No. 1, intended only for the 160,000-strong Petrograd garrison, but soon interpreted as applicable to all soldiers at the front. The order stipulated that all military units should form committees like the Petrograd Soviet. This led to confusion and "stripping of officers' authority"; further, "Order No. 3" stipulated that the military was subordinate to Ispolkom in the political hierarchy. The ideas came from a group of socialists and aimed to limit the officers' power to military affairs. The socialist intellectuals believed the officers to be the most likely counterrevolutionary elements. Kerensky's role in these orders is unclear, but he participated in the decisions. But just as before the revolution, where he had defended many who disliked the tsar, he now saved the lives of many of the tsar's civil servants about to be lynched by mobs.Pipes, p. 110
Additionally, the Duma formed an executive committee which eventually became the Russian Provisional Government. As there was little trust between Ispolkom and this government (and as he was about to accept the office of Attorney General in the Provisional Government), Kerensky gave a most passionate speech, not just to the Ispolkom, but to the entire Petrograd Soviet. He then swore, as minister, never to violate democratic values, and ended his speech with the words "I cannot live without the people. In the moment you begin to doubt me, then kill me." The huge majority (workers and soldiers) gave him great applause, and Kerensky now became the first and the only one who participated in both the Provisional Government and the Ispolkom. As a link between Ispolkom and the Provisional Government, Kerensky stood to benefit from this position.
After the first government crisis over Milyukov's secret note re-committing Russia to its original war-aims on 2–4 May, Kerensky became the Minister of War and the dominant figure in the newly formed socialist-liberal coalition government. On 10 May (Julian calendar), Kerensky started for the front and visited one division after another, urging the men to do their duty. His speeches were impressive and convincing for the moment, but had little lasting effect. Under Allied pressure to continue the war, he launched what became known as the Kerensky Offensive against the Austro-Hungarian/German South Army on .Preclík, Vratislav. Masaryk a legie (Masaryk and legions), váz. kniha, 219 pages, first issue vydalo nakladatelství Paris Karviná, Žižkova 2379 (734 01 Karvina, Czech Republic) ve spolupráci s Masarykovým demokratickým hnutím (Masaryk Democratic Movement, Prague), 2019, , pp. 36–39, 41–42, 111–12, 124–25, 128, 129, 132, 140–48, 184–99. At first successful, the offensive soon met strong resistance and the Central Powers riposted with a strong counter-attack. The Russian army retreated and suffered heavy losses, and it became clear from many incidents of desertion, sabotage, and mutiny that the army was no longer willing to attack.