Like any other year, 1917 officially ended on December 31. In a more profound way, however, the year came to an end during the nighttime hours of October 25-26 (November 7-8 New Style). That is when the Bolshevik Military Revolutionary Committee raised a rebellion, grabbed power by arresting the Provisional Government, and cynically used the Second Congress of Soviets to give this brazen takeover a veneer of democracy: formally, they placed power in the hands of the congress, which they by then essentially controlled, along with their temporary comrades, the SRs or Socialist Revolutionaries, with whom they would break a few months later. The Mensheviks and other leftist members of the Congress could do little but voice their objections.
And that was that.
Some rejoiced, others were indignant, while still others hastily packed their bags to flee the country, or made their way to the Don region to join the anti-Bolshevik military effort. Few truly appreciated the impact the events of that night would have on the rest of their lives.
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On November 5 (18) the church exercised a freedom that had been taken away from it by Peter the Great and elected V.V. Belavin as Patriarch Tikhon.
Nikolai Krylenko (1885-1938), a mere ensign before the revolution, was essentially placed in charge of the military as soon as the Bolsheviks took over.
Notably, Dukhonin was the last commander-in-chief of the Russian Imperial Army and, after Kerensky fled Petrograd, the de facto supreme commander of an army that was disintegrating.
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