The reports of Kerensky's advance on Petrograd, at the head of some
forces or other, soon became more persistent and assumed more definite
outlines. We were informed from Tsarskoye-Selo that Cossack echelons
were not far from there, while an appeal, signed by Kerensky and General
Krassnov, was being circulated in Petrograd calling upon the whole
garrison to join the government's forces, which were expected any hour
to enter the capital. The cadet insurrection of October 29th was
undoubtedly connected with Kerensky's undertaking, only that it broke
out too soon, owing to determined action on our part. The Tsarskoye-Selo
garrison was ordered to demand of the approaching Cossack regiments
recognition of the Soviet government. In case of refusal, the Cossacks
were to be disarmed. But that garrison proved to be ill-fitted for
military operations. It had no artillery and no leaders, its officers
being unfriendly toward the Soviet government. The Cossacks took
possession of the radio-telegraph station at Tsarskoye-Selo, the most
powerful one in the country, and marched on. The garrisons of Peterhof,
Krasnoye-Selo and Gatchina displayed neither initiative nor resolution.

After the almost bloodless victory at Petrograd, the soldiers
confidently assumed that matters would take a similar course in the
future. All that was necessary, they thought, was to send an agitator to
the Cossacks, who would lay down their arms the moment the object of the
proletarian revolution was explained to them. Korniloff's
counter-revolutionary uprising was put down by means of speeches and
fraternization. By agitation and well-planned seizure of certain
institutions--without a fight--the Kerensky government was overthrown.
The same methods were now being employed by the leaders of the
Tsarskoye-Selo, Krasnoye-Selo and the Gatchina Soviets with General
Krassnov's Cossacks. But this time they did not work. Though without