Sormovo Demonstration of 1902

one of the first mass May Day political demonstrations in Russia, held near Nizhny Novgorod, in Sormovo (now a district of the city of Gorky). The demonstration was planned by Social Democrats under the leadership of the Nizhny Novgorod committee of the RSDLP, which in early 1902 distributed leaflets in Sormovo urging workers to leave work on May 1 and attend the demonstration. In February 1902 a meeting of 61 Social Democrats worked out measures to involve the masses in the Sormovo Demonstration and the plan for its execution.

On May 1, one-half of Sormovo’s workers went on strike. The demonstrators marched down Bol’shaia Street with red banners bearing such slogans as “Down With Autocracy!” and “Long Live Political Freedom!” and sang the “Varshavianka.” The police failed in their attempt to disperse the demonstration. When troops arrived, the demonstrators began singing “You Have Fallen a Victim,” while the worker P. A. Zalomov approached the soldiers with a red banner. The soldiers seized Zalomov and fell upon the workers, killing many of them. Numerous arrests were made.

The leaders of the Sormovo Demonstration and the workers who took part in it were tried from Oct. 28 to Oct. 31, 1902, in Nizhny Novgorod and Sormovo. At the trial, Zalomov delivered a brilliant speech against autocracy. Six persons were sentenced to permanent exile in Siberia. The trial drew much public attention. The newspaper Iskra published the speeches of the workers with a foreword by V. I. Lenin (see Poln. sobr. soch., 5th ed., vol. 7, p. 65).

The Sormovo Demonstration is depicted in M. Gorky’s novel The Mother.