The Peasant/worker in Russia

[Alixz]

I have always found traditional Russian lacquer work to be too ornate for my taste.

The Byzantine style of decoration was so heavy and so very colorful.

In a way, I guess I sympathize with Alix for bringing in her "simple" English chintzs.

Seeing the color pictures is wonderful though and brings a different level to our understanding of the work done.

[AGRBear]

I have looked and looked for FA's story about  how Russia would have been affected if t Nicholas II  had changed to a different kind of sock so all his life as a Tsar he wore sock he didn't like.

Most young people do not understand that the simple change of a Tsar's socks would have created a shock wave from the Tsar on down to the peasant making the Tsar's socks.  And,  so,  to the Tsar it as not worth the havoc which would have changed thousands of lives  just because  he would have liked to have worn different socks.

Maybe FA can recall the story and repeat it here.

AGRBear

[AGRBear]

It took me a while to find the posts about the socks.  It can be found under Nicholas II,  Negitive attriutes of Nicholas II as Tsar  pg 9:

It is so very easy for us in this day and age to say Nicholas II should have done this or should have done that.

How simple would it have been for Nicholas II have created change?

There is an example of how Nicholas II would have liked to have changed the kind of socks he wore:

To just give one small perspective on what Nicholas faced on a daily basis. He hated his socks...they were chosen for him, and the choice was based on what his father had worn. However, to even change the kind of socks he wore would have entailed the total disruption of a dozen of the house staff, not to mention shame on the soon to be former supplier, and the stiff competition between the 'new' suppliers, all desperately wanting the Imperial warrant. The total disruption of dozens and dozens of people, over socks, was just not worth it to Nicholas, so he just kept having the socks he hated, rather than upset so many people, merely over his socks. Imagine how he approached the firmly entrenched bureaucracy....
FA

I don't know what kind of socks Nicholas II wore, but, let's just say for the sake of this example the socks were made of wool.

The simple order of  changing the "royal socks" meant that Nicholas II would have caused:
1. telling his staff that he didn't like the socks would have sent shock ways from the staff to the supplier and the word would have reached everyone in the know that the Emperor no longer wanted these partcular socks and this would have sent caused disruption from the Tsar all the way down to the person who grew the wool on the country side.....
2.  the public would assume that there must be something wrong with the supplier, the manufacturer and all those involved down to the man who owned the sheep and every person along that chain would be viewed differently....  This may mean that everyone would withdraw their orders as had the Tsar.....  What was once a thriving business fell into ruins....
3.  the process of finding a new supply of socks would have been a different occurance and perhaps would affect two industries if the Tsar wanted cottom socks instead of wool....
4.  the process of ordering new cotton socks would have sent the same kind of wave over Russia and changes would have occured....
5.  this change would also include the fact that the Tsar only wore his socks once and these socks then were given to others... I'm not sure who rated in this staff to recieve socks or if they were given to a particular group who depended upon these socks...

The Tsar's feet were far more important than any of us would even begin to realize today in our modern world.

If it was this difficult to change the Tsar's socks, one can just imagine the difficulty in changing his brand of tea or something even more important like a point of law.

I think the old saying remains true:  Do not be so critical untill you've walked in the other person's shoes for awhile.

AGRBear

I can't find FA's original post since the changed of the forum has eliminated links to some of the old posts.

Anyway,  when you have time,  take a look at that thread and the posts which surrounded the sock post.  That prticular thread holds a lot of interesting thoughts.

AGRBear

[TampaBay]

AGR Bear,

I understand all you have said in your last post and you make very good points.

However, if Nicholas wanted cotton socks all he needed to do was ask one of his globe trotting banished realitives to pick him up 100 pairs in Paris or London and present the cooton or silk socks to him as a gift.  I think if Alexandra had wanted a different type of stocking she would have done whatever it took to overcome the court inerta and procure the different type of stocking she wanted.


TampaBay

[AGRBear]

Sure,  he could have gotten different socks quite easily, however, the moment he did,  all concern would have noticed and the industry would have suffered immediately.

I don't know who supplied the socks for the Tsar,  but the person in charge of selling them to the Tsar's  and the person who purchsed the socks  would have "lost face", probably both would have lost their jobs / position and so would have the hundreds under the seller....  And,  the factory probably would have suffered financial losses or even closed.  Does that appear rather drastic?  To us here in the modern world,  we can't believe this as even a posibility let alone a probable in those times.  But, those living in those times understood.  Today,  we call it the "trickle down effect" but in those days it wasn't a trickle it was a huge rouge wave that swept away everyone in it's path.

Of course,  someone new arrived with the new imperial socks and filled the void with his people, his factory and his family.

The Tsar got his new socks but at a great cost to others.

It wasn't in Nicholas II's character to think of just himself and his hurting feet,  he thought about and understood the consequences to others.

AGRBear

[AGRBear]

1890s
>>It was not until the closing decades of the nineteethy century that Russia entered the industrial age.  Only then, under the impact of favorable goverment politices, did traditional Russian soceity begin to undergo a rapid transfromation.  Vast rual areas were soon converted into factory villages, and urban centers expanded to absorb new factories, shops, and residential districts.  But most significant of all, a new and greatly enlgarge workign population was formed as tens of thousands of peasants migrated from country side, forwaking their plows for jobs in cities and town."<<

p. 1 in THE RUSSIAN WORKER, LIFE AND LABOR UNDER THE TSARIST REGIME by Victoria E. Bonnell.

I thought I'd dig into this more since it was these new workers whom Father Gapon touched religiously and polticialy in 1905,  so,  I thought we should look into who these workers were and how their lives changed and  why they marched upon the palace that eventful day known as Bloody Sunday.

p. 1- page 2: 

>>More than one million men and women --most of them peasants-- entered the industrial labor force between 1887 and 1900, bringing the total number of factory and mine workers at the turn of the century to 2.4 million.<<

This number doesn't include how this new expansion of industrial workers affected others who found new jobs in new and flourishing services such as transportation, construction, day laborers and let us not forget these people left jobs which needed to be filled....

>> ...all of these categories combined, there were 6.4 million hired workers in the Russian Empire in 1897..."

This is known because there was made a national census.

I have read through various census of the various villages my ancestors lived,  and,  they present to us the names of those living in a household,  the ages of those living [head of the house to the youngest children listed as "infant", and occupation of those employed, as well as the house number.

Bonnell has hordes of footnotes to prove her stats and information.

>>The Russian working class consisted of herogenous elements employed in many different occupations and industries.  'Together these diverse gorups were destined to play a crucial role in the country's future, and by 1900 they wre already showing signs of volatility and a propensity for collective action that could not be ignored.<<

AGRBear

AGRBear

[Binky]

You are making me confused agrbear.  You said you are looking at all these stats and census figures but you just told zvadeza that too much stats make you miss the truth.  Then some other poster on another thread said that Russia government policies in 1890s were chahnged to be against labor but you say the policies were favorable.  Its nice to know the name of all those people living in your ancestors households.  I would like to know the same from my family but it confuses me what that means about anything.

[ChristineM]

I really did not mean to drive this thread so far off topic with my reference to Nicholas' daily mail deliveries - if it was anything like the UK, up until very recently we got three mail deliveries every day except Sundays.   Since he was such an early riser, he probably got his first delivery long  before 10.00a.m.   By that time he had walked round the Park and was breaking fast with his wife.

Perhaps it would be better to get back to discussing the peasants before they revolt.

tsaria

[Louis_Charles]

Postcards? Did the peasants send the Tsar postcards? They were cheaper, but of course they couldn't hold bombs.

[ChristineM]

The Tsar allegedly used long white envelopes with an orange thread strategically attached.   Envelopes were sealed in such a way that all that was required was a tug of the said orange thread which, in turn, would then neatly slice the envelope open.

I'm not so sure about postcards.   They must have become rather boring many of them featuring photographs of either himself, his wife or his children.   

Another thought - what about the postage stamps.   I wonder if either the Tsar - or the Queen for that matter - licked the reverse of their own heads?   Perhaps they preferred to use one of those old little sponge things and thus avoided the nasty taste of glue.

tsaria

[Belochka]

Another thought - what about the postage stamps.   I wonder if either the Tsar - or the Queen for that matter - licked the reverse of their own heads?   Perhaps they preferred to use one of those old little sponge things and thus avoided the nasty taste of glue.

tsaria

Baron Vladimir Borisovich Fredericks was responsible for transmitting and forwarding correspondence to his majesty. His office would have had the honor of appending the stamps where appropriate.

Only the Terentenary series had images of NII (there were two to select from: the 7 kopek and for larger items - the 5 ruble). The remainder of the postage stamps after 1908 (in the main) depicted the double-headed eagle.

Nikolai had offical document writers, and where appropriate only signed any document at the bottom.

Nikolai however always sealed his own envelopes with hot wax which contained his official decisions to ensure that strict secrecy of their contents be preserved. (I have one of those sealed specimens that remains attached to the back of one envelope sent from T. S. to St. P.).

Margarita

[Belochka]

Postcards? Did the peasants send the Tsar postcards? They were cheaper, but of course they couldn't hold bombs.

One certainly did not want to place an unnecessary burden over to the postal authorities.

 

[Binky]

It was a real honor to lick the tsar's stamps like Belochka says.  I read one time that King Louis 14th in France used to let people tell him jokes while he was using the bathroom on a special chair in his bedroom.  That was a big honor too and people fought to do it.  But not in front of the king.

[ChristineM]

Oh Binky, as I'm sure you know, some kings went even further than that.   The collection of HMs' effluent was regarded as a great, and highly sought after, privilege.   Interesting - queens seem to have been much more grounded.

How fortunate to possess such an envelope, Belochka.   The closest I can claim is having looked into the eyes of a wonderful old man who looked into the eyes of his Emperor.   (And who also saw Rasputin in Tsarskoe Selo on a number of occasions.)   His eyes were, almost violently, blue too.   To have shaken the hand of a man who knew Kerensky - ? degrees of separation.   And to have a collection of kopeks - dating from late 19th and early 20th century - kindly gifted by Father (now Bishop) Markel.   These were discovered during the restoration of the Feodorovsky Sobor.

Kopeks - sacrifice of peasants - rather soldiers - the sons of peasants, but peasants nonetheless.   Probably young lives sacrificed in the slaughter of WW1.   They mean a great deal to me. 

'Peasant' in Russian terms was rather a catch-all word.    There were three types of 'peasant'.

1)  Kulaks
2)  Seredniaks
3)  Bednyaks
     (Batraks were hired farm hands)

tsaria

[Binky]

Wow Belochka.  I can't hardly believe you have that envelope containing a real decision by Nicholas.  It's too bad it was never opened because maybe there was something important inside and something went wrong because they never heard whtat the tsar told them to do.

tsaria I looked up what you meant about effluent.  Ewwww But it is very interesting they did that.