Alert and suspicious, the working-class of the city constituted itself a vast spy system, through the servants prying into bourgeois households, and reporting all information to the Military Revolutionary Committee, which struck with an iron hand, unceasing. In this way was discovered the Monarchist plot led by former Duma-member Purishkevitch and a group of nobles and officers, who had planned an officers’ uprising, and had written a letter inviting Kaledin to Petrograd. (See App. XI, Sect. 9)…. In this way was unearthed the conspiracy of the Petrograd Cadets, who were sending money and recruits to Kaledin….
Neratov, frightened at the outburst of popular fury provoked by his flight, returned and surrendered the Secret Treaties to Trotzky, who began their publication in Pravda, scandalising the world….
[Graphic, page 279: Proclamation]
Bolshevik order. A proclamation of the Committee to Fight against Pogroms, attached to the Petrograd Soviet. For translation see App. XI, Sect. 11.
The restrictions on the Press were increased by a decree (See App. XI, Sect. 10) making advertisements a monopoly of the official Government newspaper. At this all the other papers suspended publication as a protest, or disobeyed the law and were closed…. Only three weeks later did they finally submit.
Still the strike of the Ministries went on, still the sabotage of the old officials, the stoppage of normal economic life. Behind Smolny was only the will of the vast, unorganised popular masses; and with them the Council of People’s Commissars dealt, directing revolutionary mass-action against its enemies. In eloquent proclamations, (See App. XI, Sect. 12) couched in simple words and spread over Russia, Lenin explained the Revolution, urged the people to take the power into their own hands, by force to break down the resistance of the propertied classes, by force to take over the institutions of Government. Revolutionary order. Revolutionary discipline! Strict accounting and control! No strikes! No loafing!
[Graphic, page 281: Appeal to work hard]
Appeal of the Petrograd Soviet, the Petrograd Council of Professional Unions, and the Petrograd Council of Factory Shop Committees, to the Workers of Petrograd, urging them to work hard and not to strike. For translation see App. XI, Sect. 13.
On the 20th of November the Military Revolutionary Committee issued a warning:
The rich classes oppose the power of the Soviets—the Government of workers, soldiers and peasants. Their sympathisers halt the work of the employees of the Government and the Duma, incite strikes in the banks, try to interrupt communication by the railways, the post and the telegraph….