Source # 1 - Video about Czar Nicholas and Russia before the Revolution - click here
Source # 2 - Video about February Revolution in Russia - click here
Biography - Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin was born in Russia in 1870 to a well educated family, his father worked for the government inspecting schools. As a child, Lenin was a gifted student. Lenin’s interest in revolutionary politics was formed when his older brother was arrested and executed by secret police for being part of a revolutionary group that planning to execute the Russian czar or emperor of Russia. After this, Lenin began to work in political groups that were opposed to the rule of the czar. The secret police ordered Lenin to live in a rural village to keep him from working with other revolutionaries. With little to do in the village, Lenin read Karl’s Marx’s books and, in 1889, Lenin declared that he was a Marxist communist.
In 1892, Lenin was allowed to move to small city in central Russia where he worked as a lawyer trying to protect the rights of poor peasants. Seeing how badly the government treated the peasants made Lenin want to work to overthrow the czar. A few years later, he moved to the St. Petersburg, the Russian capital city, and joined up with revolutionary groups. However, he was only in St. Petersburg for a little while when he was arrested by the secret police and exiled for three years to Siberia. After returning from Siberia, Lenin was forced into exile outside of Russia for his continuing revolutionary activities. Lenin would spend the next twenty years mostly living in exile in Europe working with other Russian revolutionaries. In 1912, he was recognizes as the leader of the Bolsheviks, one of the most radical groups of Russian revolutionaries.
Lenin was living outside of Russia when World War One began. He believed that the war could result in the revolution he had been working for his whole life. In the spring of 1917, the Russian people, exhausted from the war, overthrew the czar. Still living outside of Russia, Lenin was unable to participate in this revolution. Lenin was able to return to Russia with help from the Germans, who wanted to create chaos in Russia to force it to drop out of the war. After returning to Russia, Lenin opposed the new Russian government and began to organize the Bolsheviks to overthrow it and make Russia a communist country. Within a few months of Lenin’s return, the Bolsheviks overthrew the government in the October Revolution. After overthrowing the government, Lenin and Bolsheviks fought a three year civil war for control of Russia. It was during the civil war that Lenin ordered the ruthless policies of War Communism and the Red Terror. In 1918, Lenin was nearly killed in an assassination attempt.
By 1921, Lenin and Bolsheviks had won the civil war. The Russia they ruled had been devastated by both World War One and the civil war – it was deeply impoverished and was suffering a terrible famine. This forced Lenin to delay his plans to turn Russia into a communist society because he believed it was first necessary to rebuild the country. Lenin ordered the New Economic Policy which allowed farmers and businesses to sell their goods in markets and keep the profits so as to help the country recover. The next year, Lenin suffered two strokes and his health began to fail. In the last year of his life he spoke of his regret that the Soviet Union had become so dictatorial and that he did not think that Joseph Stalin would be a good ruler. However, by this point he was too weak to have much effect on events in the Soviet Union. In January 1924, Lenin died and after a power struggle Stalin became the leader of the Soviet Union. Stalin ordered that Lenin’s body be preserved and put on permanent public display in Red Square at the center of Moscow. His body is still on display in Moscow, long after the collapse of the Soviet Union and communism.
Source # 3 - Video about the October Revolution in Russia - click here
Source # 4 - Soviet Poster that reads "Comrade Lenin Cleans the Earth of Filth"
Source # 5 - Soviet Poster that reads "Death of Capitalism or Death Under Capitalism"
Source # 6 - Soviet Poster that reads "Are you Enlisted"
Source # 7 - Map of Russia during the Revolution and Civil War
Source # 8 - Soviet Poster in support of the Red Army
Source # 9 - Soviet Poster that reads, "Soviet Union Under Siege - All to the Defense!"
Source # 10 - Video about the way Lenin and the Bolsheviks used Terror to win the Russian Civil War - click here
Source # 11 - Video about the early Soviet Union under Lenin - click here
Source # 12 - Soviet Poster that reads "We Destroyed Our Enemies with Weapons. We will now Earn Our Bread with Work, Comrades"
