Tomsk Province socialists-revolutionaries in the documents and materials of the Siberian bodies of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission during 1920-1921

The article first presents the activity of the right social revolutionaries in Tomsk Province after the restoration of the Soviet power in Siberia during 1919-1921. The position of the provincial body of the Socialist Revolutionary Party before and after its transition to the illegal status is described on the basis of the documents and materials included in the disposal of the Siberian All-Russian Extraordinary Commission authorities. The publication illustrates the main activities of the right social revolutionaries during 19201921, as well as the forms and methods of their work among various social groups. An effort was undertaken to assess the influence of right socialist revolutionaries on the social and political life of the province. Comparing the reports of different departments of the Cheka bodies, private information letters of the Russian Communist Party of the Bolsheviks organizations and some Socialist Revolutionary Party documents allow reconstructing the picture of the right social revolutionaries during their underground activities in Tomsk Province. The analysis of these sources, including comparative, structural and logical methods of research, allowed receiving new information regarding the organizational structure, the composition parameters of the revolutionary organizations in that period. The study of the materials shows that the Bolshevik authorities did not initially volunteer to cooperate with the socialist opposition and initiated a number of measures restricting and then suppressing activities of the social revolutionary rights on the territory of Tomsk Province. The author provides information showing that the local bodies of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission had sufficiently detailed information about the illegal activities of socialist revolutionaries, with the exception of intra-party information. Conspiracy of Socialists-Revolutionaries significantly complicated the work of the Cheka bodies, forcing chekists and their confidential colleagues to provide unverified and sometimes false information, exaggerating the scale of work and the real influence of the right social revolutionaries. Regular information of the party structures of the Russian Communist Party of the Bolsheviks, of the local All-Russian Extraordinary Commission does not confirm the widely organized social revolutionaries among the population. The author concludes that illegal activities of the Socialists-Revolutionaries in Tomsk Province during 1920-1921 were primarily episodic in nature and did not represent special danger for the dominant Bolshevik regime. The activities of the right socialists-revolutionaries activated noticeably with the beginning of the new economic policy, prompting the Soviet party authorities and the local structures of the Cheka bodies to implement punitive measures that effectively paralyzed the activities of the few right social revolutionary organizations on the territory of Tomsk Province.

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