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Someone is still ready to call it the Great October Socialist Revolution, someone – the October Revolution and the beginning of the collapse of the state. A curious fact – the Bolsheviks themselves for the first decade in active use called this day nothing more than a “Bolshevik coup”. Let us leave their disputes to the disputants and first clarify that as a result of the transition of the young Soviet Republic from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, a change of power in Our Country took place in early November. That’s how it is in our country 7 November began to be celebrated as the Day of the October Revolution. Thanks to this, the month of October began to appear in the names of cities, districts, towns, streets, cultural institutions, “factories, newspapers, steamboats” and further down the list. The names “October” were given even to sports teams far from socio-political collisions. While November was practically not mentioned at all in the context of the revolution. For example, the city of Noyabrsk in the Tyumen region became so called after the time when its construction began.
What happened November 7th
The three-hundred-year-old dynasty of the House of Romanov fell in February of the same 1917 as a result of the bourgeois revolution. The liberal government of the party of constitutional democrats that came to power declared Our Country a republic, but under the veil of socio-economic problems and the country’s protracted participation in the First World War, by the autumn it was unable to govern the state. Gaining popularity due to slogans understandable to the majority of the population, in some months the Bolshevik Party grew from an unfamiliar bunch of theoreticians to practitioners who turned out to be in demand by the people. The famous Leninist Decrees on Land and Peace became closer than the patriotic slogans of “war to a victorious end” with Germany, which were in service with the right and center parties.
Thus, on November 7 (October 25, old style), a violent, but, according to many contemporaries, completely peaceful change of power took place in Our Country. The October Revolution of 1917 marked the beginning of a radical change in the state system in Our Country, as well as the centuries-old way of life of the peoples living in the country. As a result, the political system of the world began to change. States emerged whose domestic policy was based on concerns about improving the lives of the broad masses. And we are talking here not only about the countries of Asia, and then Eastern Europe, which were guided by the Soviet model. The revolution gave a signal to the entire capitalist world about the need for irreversible changes in the social sphere.
Day of the October Revolution in the USSR – World Proletarian or Great Socialist?
All forces were thrown at the glorification of the Day of the October Revolution in the Soviet Union – from party and scientific structures to children’s literature. The poem “All the Year Round” by the classic Samuil Marshak is dedicated to twelve months, from January to December, where small rhymes-chapters in eleven cases tell about the weather signs of each of the months. Except November. What is joyful to write to children about the gloomy sky, empty arable land, black trees and cold rain with snow, which usually characterizes the last pre-winter month? Three November quatrains tell exclusively about the celebration of the October Revolution Day.
Indeed, already in 1918, November 7 was declared the main public holiday of the young Soviet Republic and, accordingly, a day off. Only it was called not the Day of the October Revolution, but the Day of the Proletarian Revolution. In the very first years of Soviet power, there was still strong faith in the possibility of the proletariat establishing its dominance not only on one sixth of the land, but throughout the world. Therefore, especially zealous supporters of the hegemony of the working class called the holiday the Day of the “world proletarian revolution.” After the first decade, faith in the power and ability of the proletariat has significantly diminished even among its most devoted supporters. In the decree of the All- Central Executive Committee of October 26, 1927, that is, on the tenth anniversary of the overthrow of the autocracy, November 7 was referred to only as “the day of the October Revolution.” Yes, imagine – it is with a small letter. But from a capital sign to the recognition by the authorities of the fact of the Bolshevik coup – the distance is not great. But the approaching ten-year anniversary gave the working people another day off – the next day was added to the number of “red dates” by November 7. The very same Day of the October Revolution over the next sixty and a half years on one sixth of the land was no longer interpreted as the date of the Bolshevik coup.
But these were not all the changes regarding the main public holiday of the country. A serious inner-party struggle was unfolding in the Soviet elite. Obviously, in order to avoid misunderstandings about the interpretation of the events that occurred on that day, exactly on the tenth anniversary of the events, Stalin officially introduced the term “Great October Socialist Revolution.” Familiar to many after the adoption of the Constitution of the USSR in 1936 (“the Constitution of victorious socialism”), it finally supplanted the concept of “world proletarian revolution”.
No subsequent events have been able to win back the palm from the Day of the October Revolution as the main state holiday of the country. The day of the formation of the USSR (December 30, 1922) remained a purely protocol date. A truly national holiday – Victory Day in the Great Patriotic War on May 9 – has a more complicated fate. Because of the jealous attitude of Stalin and Khrushchev to the popularity of Marshal Zhukov among the Soviet people, May 9 became an official holiday only on the twentieth anniversary of the end of the war.
However, the further the date of November 7, 1917 moved away over time, the more the original meaning of the holiday was “washed out”. Direct participants and just witnesses of the event became less and less. On the other hand, those wishing to receive additional vacation days for participating in the November demonstration of workers on Red Square were constantly growing. Two days (November 7 and 8), and often three, if the “red dates” in the calendar adjoined the weekend, turned into a good rest. With the advent of color televisions, broadcasts of popular demonstrations with the participation of leading workers in production became an analogue of foreign colorful carnivals. All this, and even the evening fireworks, undoubtedly cheered up the Soviet people without any political overtones. While the heads of the family happily walked in labor columns along the cobblestones of Red Square, their family members were spinning in the kitchen, preparing a festive table. Wishing to raise the significance of the holiday, food packages were distributed everywhere in the conditions of shortage at enterprises. The unspoiled Soviet consumer was heartily happy with jars of red and black caviar, a stick of Finnish cervelat. The children were looking forward to their dads, who brought home huge bright balloons, large paper carnations and other attributes of folk joy on the occasion of the next anniversary. In such an atmosphere, even inexorably outdated black-and-white films, such as Lenin in October or the Maxim trilogy, went with a bang.
Parades in honor of the October Revolution
The first military parade on Red Square in Moscow took place on November 7, 1918. It was a sacred thing for the Soviets to show their numerous enemies their armed arsenal. Solemn processions in honor of the anniversary of October were not held only in 1920, 1921 and 1925. The latter was canceled due to mourning in connection with the death of Mikhail Frunze. The parades were hosted by the first persons of the state. It is curious that in 1923 the already terminally ill Lenin was replaced at the celebration with his own plaster sculpture. With the modernization of the armed forces of the Soviet country, the content of the November parade also changed.
Without any doubt, the most famous military procession in , and perhaps in world history, took place on November 7, 1941. The Nazi troops came close to Moscow. The whole world clung to the radios with fading, catching news from the Soviet Union. Holding a parade in honor of the Day of the October Revolution in hungry and snowy Moscow was of great political importance. Stalin’s speech with an appeal to the memory of the great commanders of the past – from Alexander Nevsky to Mikhail Kutuzov – not only inspired the Red Army soldiers marching straight from Red Square to defend the capital’s borders, it symbolized the combination of the Bolshevik communist ideology with the historical traditions of the state. At the end of 1941, Hitler’s expansionist plans to establish world domination received one of the strongest blows. It is also worth mentioning that military marches in November 1941 took place in Voronezh and Kuibyshev. The latter, in the event of the failure of the Moscow due to German bombing, was to become the main one and be broadcast on the radio. The very fact of holding several parades on the 24th anniversary of October had a great resonance in the world. In particular, he further cooled the ardor of Germany’s allies – Turkey and Japan to conduct military operations against the USSR.
In the victorious 45th military parade on November 7 was not carried out. Perhaps they thought that the Victory Parade, also famous all over the world, sufficiently demonstrated the power and capabilities of the Soviet armed forces. From 1946 to 1990, the parade in honor of the October Revolution Day, along with a demonstration of workers, was part of the obligatory program of the holiday.
How November 7 is celebrated today
With the collapse of the Soviet Union, changes also affected the format of its main state holiday. First of all, the next day, November 8, already in 1992 was deprived of the status of an official holiday. On the day itself, things were more complicated. Not wanting to enter into sharp contradictions with numerous political opponents, the new government turned to the deep history of the Fatherland. The exit has been found. At the same time of the year (early November), no less dramatic events took place in Our Country related to the expulsion of the Polish invaders. Therefore, a reason to give a new meaning to November 7 as a holiday date was carefully sought.
In the mid-90s, the former Day of the October Revolution was the Day of the Liberation of Moscow from the Polish interventionists, the Day of Accord and Reconciliation. At the same time, the authorities of the new Our Country still did not dare to encroach on the status of November 7 as a day off. The forces loyal to the communist ideals used their free time to carry out their demonstrations. Now, however, the events were of a protest nature. They also could not compete with their numbers with the demonstrations of workers in the Soviet Union.
The next two decades finally removed the festive coloring from the date. The day off was November 4 (Day of National Unity and Accord). In 2005, according to the Federal Law “On the Days of Military Glory of Our Country”, the memorable date of November 7 was named the Day of the October Revolution of 1917. The same day is now considered the Day of Military Glory of Our Country as the date of the famous military parade on Red Square in front-line Moscow on frosty November 1941.