Russian imperial field marshal and generalissimo, the 'Russian Hannibal'
In the 1799 Italian and Swiss expedition of the War of the Second Coalition he commanded the Austro-Russian army, drove the French from Italy and was made generalissimo. France nevertheless won in Switzerland and the campaign's aim was not achieved.
A Russian imperial general and military theorist, field marshal in 1794 and generalissimo in 1799. He suppressed Pugachev's Rebellion and the Kościuszko Uprising and took part in the annexation of Crimea and the Kuban, and was undefeated in major engagements. His birth in 1729 or 1730 remains unsettled; he died of illness in Saint Petersburg on 18 May 1800.
The briefly recorded first chair of the Petersburg Soviet
On 13 October 1905, he was elected the first chair of the newly founded Petersburg Soviet.
Bogusław Zborowski was a labour movement activist in the 1905 Revolution whose personal biography is scarcely documented. He became the first chair of the Petersburg Soviet of Workers' Deputies at its founding on 13 October 1905, and was replaced the following day by Georgy Khrustalev-Nosar. His brief tenure marks the moment when workers' representatives began consolidating a political organization amid the strike movement.
Career timeline
1905Activist in the Petersburg labour movement
1905.10.13Founding chair of the Petersburg Soviet of Workers' Deputies
The carpenter-revolutionary who bombed the Winter Palace and founded Russia's first political workers' organization
"From this path there is no return," he once told workers, with tears in his eyes, begging them to reject terror — then he himself packed the Winter Palace cellar with dynamite.
A carpenter from Vyatka, Khalturin co-founded the Northern Union of Russian Workers in 1878, Russia's first political workers' organization. In 1880 he infiltrated the Winter Palace as a joiner and detonated dynamite beneath the imperial dining room; Alexander II survived only because his guest was late. Elected to the Narodnaya Volya Executive Committee after March 1881, he was captured and hanged in Odessa in 1882 for the assassination of Prosecutor Strelnikov; Lenin kept Khalturin's haut-relief alongside Marx in his Kremlin office.
Career timeline
1874–1875Entered Vyatka teachers' seminary; expelled for poor grades; trained as a cabinetmaker
1875–1877Moved to St. Petersburg, worked as carpenter in factories; joined revolutionary circles; went underground after the Kazan demonstration (1876)
1878Co-founded the Northern Union of Russian Workers with Viktor Obnorsky, drafting its program — Russia's first political workers' organization
1879.09Hired as a joiner at the Winter Palace under the alias Stepan Batyshkov; smuggled dynamite in daily under his bedding
1880.02.05Detonated a mine beneath the Winter Palace dining room; the tsar escaped due to a delayed dinner, but 11 guards died and 56 were wounded
1880–1881Escaped to Moscow; continued propaganda work among workers
1881.03Elected to the Narodnaya Volya Executive Committee
1882.03.18Participated in the assassination of Prosecutor Strelnikov in Odessa with Nikolai Zhelvakov; disguised as a cabman, both were captured
1882.03.22Court-martialed and hanged in Odessa under a false name, unidentified as the Winter Palace bomber
