The winds of change are blowing through the Russian Empire after the February Revolution toppled the old order – the former Tsar is now under arrest. Stay up to date with the latest news from the 1917 Russia.
Once the Autocrat of All Russia, now just Colonel Romanov, the former Tsar, Nicholas II, finally returned to his imperial residence of Tsarskoye Selo, where he and his family were placed under house arrest on March 22.
The Provisional Government originally planned to let the Romanovs flee to the UK, but the Petrograd Soviet – a far more radical revolutionary force – insisted that they be placed under arrest.
The power in the country is de facto being shared between the Provisional Government and the increasingly powerful Petrograd Soviet of Workers and Soldiers Deputies. The Soviet controls the troops, railways, post and telegraphs.
As an alternative source of power, it attacks the rival Provisional Government as bourgeois and contradicts it.
Meanwhile the Provisional Government is receiving recognition from major world powers.
And the Russian people are still in a state of euphoria over their newly-obtained freedom. The new authorities proclaim freedom of speech and ban censorship.
In another progressive move, the Provisional Government abolishes capital punishment.
On April 1, some 40,000 women march in downtown Petrograd (St. Petersburg) to demand voter equality. Russia will soon become one the first countries in Europe to give women the right to vote.
READ MORE: Russian women’s march that made history (VIDEO, PHOTOS)
The spirit of the revolution can be felt all over the vast empire.
On March 29, the Provisional Government recognizes the independence of Poland, which was part of the Russian Empire for more than a century.
Meanwhile, Marxist theorist Leon Trotsky departs the US to return to Russia to ride the wave of the revolution.
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