Kazan Demonstration of 1876

the first political demonstration in Russia in which politically progressive workers took part. It occurred as a result of the growing strike movement in Russia and was held in St. Petersburg on December 6 on the square in front of the Kazan Cathedral. The demonstration was organized and carried out by members of the Land and Liberty populist organization and by members of workers’ circles linked with the populist group. Some 400 persons gathered on the square. G. V. Plekhanov gave an impassioned revolutionary speech, and a young worker, Ia. Potapov, raised a red flag. The demonstrators resisted the police, and 31 persons were arrested, of whom five were condemned to 10–15 years at hard labor, ten to exile in Siberia, and three workers, including Potapov, to confinement in a monastery for five years. The demonstration marked the first conscious participation of the Russian working class in the progressive social movement.