17 Petersburg Places

Petersburg Places

- Elena Bobrova

Vosstaniya Square (Uprising Square)

The February Revolution began on February 23, 1917 (March 8, new style), after demonstrations by women and workers angry about bread shortages (and encouraged by warmer than usual weather) began gathering and marching in the streets of St. Petersburg. The crowds of protesters grew daily to as many as 200,000.  Among the soldiers ordered to fire on them was a training detachment of the Volynsky Regiment. The killing of unarmed protesters by their detachment on February 26 greatly upset its members, and that night some of the noncommissioned officers resolved that they would no longer follow orders to shoot civilians. The next day, having received the support of their soldiers, they shot their commanding officer, raided weapons supplies, and went over to the side of the demonstrators. A few days later, on March 3, the tsar abdicated. In 1918 Znamenskaya Square was renamed Ploshchad Vosstaniya – Uprising Square – because the Volynsky Regiment was quartered nearby. In 1941, the square’s Znamenskaya Church was demolished and one of the city’s first metro stations was built where it stood. The metro station is adorned with bas-reliefs depicting iconic revolutionary scenes. You can even spot Joseph Stalin in one, which is rather unusual. Most of the dictator’s images, ubiquitous during his rule, were removed from public places during de-Stalinization in the 1960s.

Tauride Palace