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Summary Revision Notes: OCR A Level History, Russia, Chapter 3 - From War to Revolution 1914-17 $6.47
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Summary Revision Notes: OCR A Level History, Russia, Chapter 3 - From War to Revolution 1914-17
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  • Course
  • AS Unit F962 - European and World History Period Studies
  • Institution
  • OCR

These revision notes provide a detailed summary of the third chapter of Michael Lynch's 'Access to History, Russia ' - the OCR recommended textbook for this paper. I used these revision notes to achieve a grade A in my history A Level.

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Document information

  • June 27, 2024
  • 7
  • 2021/2022
  • Summary

Subjects

  • history
  • a level
  • ocr
  • russia
  • ww1

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  • A/AS Level
  • OCR
  • history
  • AS Unit F962 - European and World History Period Studies
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From War to Revolution
What was the Effect of War on Russia?
Initial Support and Bolshevik Setbacks
 Whatever the tsar’s previous uncertainties might have been, once war was declared,
he became wholly committed to it.
 At a special session of the Duma, the tsar announced that Russia was at war with
Germany.
 This announcement was met with cheers and applause from all deputies apart from
the 5 Bolshevik representatives.
 In fact, when war was declared, many socialists abandoned their policies and
supported the war effort instead.
 Everyone, that is, except for the Bolsheviks, who were vilified, called traitors and
German agents, and were forced to flee Russia for opposing the war.

Inflation
 At the outbreak of war, Russia's currency was on the gold standard, and it had the
largest gold reserves of any European country.
 The war changed all of this, as government spending went from 4 million to 30
million roubles per year.
 This led to heavy taxation and borrowing, and the currency was taken off of the gold
standard.
 This meant that more and more money could be printed.
 In the short term, this meant that wages could be paid, and commerce could
continue.
 In the long term, however, it made money practically worthless, resulting in severe
inflation in 1916.
 Between 1914 and 1916, average earnings doubled while the price of food and fuel
quadrupled.

Food and Transport
 Initially, many farmers benefited from the war, as demand and industrial
production/output increased and so they made large profits.
 However, this changed in 1916 for several different reasons:
o inflation made trading unprofitable, so farmers began to hoard their stocks
(i.e., stop selling).
o the military requisitioned horses and fertiliser, so it was difficult to sustain
agricultural output.
o the army had first claimed to most food products.
o they also had priority in the use of roads and railways, meeting the food
supplies to civilian areas were difficult to maintain.

,  Famine became a constant reality for much of Russia, especially in Petrograd, due to
the number of arriving refugees and its remoteness to food producing areas.
 It was the disruption of the transport system rather than the decline in food
production that was the major cause of Russia's wartime shortages.
 Although the railway had been improved dramatically, it was not able to bear the
pressures put on it by the war.
 Signalling systems broke down and broke and blocked lines, and steam trains
stranded by engine failure and lack of coal became commonplace.
 For example, in the port of Archangel, there was so great a build-up of supplies that
they sank into the ground and the under the weight of new supplies.
 Sometimes, the food rotted and had to be thrown away.
 As a result, food couldn’t be distributed effectively.
 By 1916, Petrograd and Moscow only received 1/3 of their food and fuel
requirements.

Living Conditions
 Unsurprisingly, the disruption to supply lines made living and working conditions
increasingly poor.
 Inflation also played a part in this.
 The cost of living increased as well.
 A report from an okrhrana agent stated that ‘even if we estimate the rise in earnings
at 100%, the prices of products have risen by 300%’.

Pre-war 1916
Average income of an 2-3 roubles 5-6 roubles
electrician
Monthly rent of a shared 2-3 roubles 8-12 roubles
room


Prohibition
 At the beginning of the war, the tsar introduced a ban on the production and sale of
alcohol, in an attempt to remove any distraction from the war effort.
 This backfired, and there were two main consequences:
o The government directed nearly 1/3 of its revenue from taxes on alcohol
sales, and so lost money.
o It increased resentment for this are, particularly amongst the peasants and
workers, and caused social unrest.
 Once the effect of prohibition was realised, prohibition was repealed in 1916.
 But by then the damage was done and it was too late for recovery.

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