Stolypin land management in Kaluga governorate during the World War I (July 1914 – June 1917)

Panasuk Viktor Vyacheslavovich PhD in History Docentm, the department of History, Kaluga State University named after K. E. Tsiolkovsky г. Калуга, ул. Аллейная д. 12 victor77777@mail.ru

Introduction

The relevance of the study is justified by the fact that the Stolypin land transformations of the beginning of the XX century have attracted the close attention of many generations of researchers for more than a century. The Russian historiography of this problem has hundreds of publications devoted to the study of this topic both at the national and regional levels. At the present stage of historiography, interest in this topic has sharply increased, alternative assessments and approaches have appeared, new sources have been introduced into scientific circulation ^{[4, 42, 46]}. However, despite the fact that many issues have received detailed coverage, the analysis of Stolypin land transformations in the Kaluga province during such a difficult, extreme period as the First World War is still a fragmentary, little-studied issue ^{[2, 45]}. It follows from this that the current historiographical situation presupposes the formulation of a new range of research tasks and the disclosure of previously little-studied aspects of this problem.

The purpose of this work is to analyze the Stolypin land management in the Kaluga province during the First World War and its transformation after February 1917. The main objectives of the study include identifying the dynamics of the formation of individual farms, analyzing the conditions and nature of land management work, as well as the role of the Provisional Government in relation to Stolypin land management. The source base of the study consisted of various documents and materials that can be divided into several groups. Firstly, the office documentation of the fund 575 – "Kaluga Provincial Land Management Commission", identified in the State Archive of the Kaluga region. It contains valuable information about the number of farms and cuts in individual counties and in the province as a whole, texts of departmental circulars, etc. Secondly, reference and statistical publications, where data on the progress of land management works in the studied region and on a national scale are presented. And, thirdly, the materials of the central and local press (for example, the Kaluga Courier and the Voice of Kaluga), on the pages of which the reaction of the public to the events and processes related to the Stolypin land management is traced.

The main part

At the end of July 1914 The Russian Empire, following its allied obligations to the Entente countries, entered the First World War. The new international political conflict, which has taken on a protracted, exhausting character for all its participants, has had a very direct impact on all aspects of life. The land transformations of P. A. Stolypin, the purpose of which was to create a prosperous stratum of peasants in the village, which had lasted for almost ten years by this time, in new historical conditions entered the final stage of development.

When the news of the beginning of the war came, boundary work in the Kaluga province was in full swing. According to the plan adopted by the provincial land management commission in April 1914, this year in the region it was supposed to carry out work on individual land management for 3330 householders on an area of over 31090 des. ^{[37, p. 8]} It is worth noting that this plan set more ambitious tasks for local land managers compared to the pre-war 1913, when it was 2700 farms and cuts were formed – a record number of local farms in the pre-war years of the Stolypin reform ^{[44, p. 46]}.

Meanwhile, at the beginning of August 1914, when the scale of the tragedy that had occurred was not yet fully known, the first pessimistic forecasts regarding the further development of local land management appeared in the Kaluga Courier newspaper ^{[18, p. 3]}. The general mobilization announced in Russia affected a large group of people involved in land management – from peasants to employees of the Main Department of Land Management and Agriculture (hereinafter – GUZiZ). So, according to official data, in the second half of 1914, 40 surveyor ranks were called up from the Kaluga province to the ranks of the army: 6 permanent members and 1 secretary of the county land management commissions, as well as 33 surveying technicians. The authorities managed to partially solve the personnel problem that arose. Technical personnel – boundary technicians were invited to fill vacant positions of members of county land management commissions ^{[44, p. 46]}. For example, in December 1914, the position of an indispensable member of the Kaluga County Land Management Commission was occupied by its senior surveyor Briving ^{[26, p. 3]}. Meanwhile, such a practice of filling positions resulted in an increase in the shortage of technical personnel in the region. This problem was acute in Medynsky uyezd. If in the pre-war 1913 up to 20 people worked here, then in November 1914 only 5 boundary technicians. By the end of autumn of this year, the situation in the region had become so depressing that, according to the local press, "no one from Kaluga wanted to voluntarily go to preparatory work by the spring of 1915. There were a lot of land management cases – about 100. There was a serious question: who would perform them and how – it was unknown" ^{[25, p. 4]}. Moreover, in one of the reports for 1914, GUZiZ recognized that among the land management commissions of central Russia, one of the most difficult situations with personnel has developed in the Kaluga province ^{[28, p. 194]}. The conditions of wartime, in which Stolypin land management was now developing, dictated the need to revise all previously planned land management plans "in accordance with the available composition of surveyors and land management ranks remaining outside the draft, as well as the degree of importance and urgency of individual works" ^{[37, p. 6]}. This practice of carrying out land management works became the leading one throughout the entire war period. 

The problem of the shortage of surveyors continued to be acute in subsequent years. The local authorities were concerned about this difficult situation, trying to resolve it by taking a number of actions for this. Firstly, in the spring of 1915, 10 graduates of the Moscow Konstantinovsky Land Survey Institute were invited to the position of assistant surveyors of the county land management commissions ^{[47, p. 2]}. Secondly, at the end of August 1915, during the Great Retreat of the Russian Army on the Eastern Front, the personnel of the evacuated Grodno provincial, Bialystok and Belsky district land management commissions entered the temporary subordination of the Kaluga Provincial Land Management Commission. Employees of other county land management commissions of the north-western province came under the control of departmental county commissions of the Kaluga province ^{[1, p. 3]}.   

Another difficult problem caused by the military actions was the decision of the central authorities in early August 1914 to reduce to 50% of all types of estimated allocations in the field of land management (loans, allowances, etc.) for the second half of this year. At the same time, all petitions received by the land management commissions after August 1 of this year were no longer considered ^[34]. This forced and unpopular measure led to the curtailment of operations to provide systematic material assistance to farmers and bran workers. So, in 1914 in Kaluga province it was supposed to carry out a wide range of hydraulic engineering measures (watering, wells, ditches) on a total area of 1245 des. ^{[37, p. 20]}. However, already at the end of July 1914, the Kaluga-Tula Department of Agriculture and State Property notified the provincial land management Commission of the need to postpone the planned work, except for cases of special urgency and urgency. In the course of correspondence with local land management commissions, it turned out that this category of cases included work on the construction of wells only for farmers of Meshchovsky, Tarussky and Maloyaroslavetsky counties. In other localities, work was postponed ^{[5, l. 1, 5, 7, 8, 10, 12, 14]}. Let's give another example of the Kaluga District, which was one of the centers of farm settlement in the region in the pre-war years. So, if in 1913 28 householders were granted loans for the transfer of residential and outbuildings totaling 5,010 rubles, an average of 179 rubles per 1 yard, then in 1914 – already 11 householders totaling 1,116 rubles, an average of 101 rubles per 1 yard ^{[16, p. 41]}. The volume of assistance to farmers of the Kaluga province has also decreased in the construction of fire-resistant buildings belonging to the competence of the Department of Rural Construction of GUZiZ. If in 1913 79 loans totaling 7524 rubles were issued to peasants for these purposes, then in 1914 – 59 loans in the amount of 2737 rubles. The size of the loan also decreased: on average from 95 rubles in 1913 to 46 rubles in 1914 ^{[33, p. 32; 44, p. 48]}

As a result, by the beginning of September 1914 in the Kaluga province, a month after the outbreak of the war, 15% of householders were terminated cases on the formation of precinct farms on an area equal to this indicator. In addition, due to the military mobilization of householders, local land managers postponed a number of planned works for the next year ^{[37, p. 6]}. However, despite these objective difficulties that fell to the lot of all those who were involved in the government course of land management, in 1914, 2,469 individual farms were formed in the Kaluga province, which amounted to 91% of households in relation to the pre-war 1913. Analyzing these results, we can assume that the first year of hostilities did not lead to a sharp drop in the pace of individual land management ^{[44, p. 46]}.

Along with the execution of land management works, the war also led to a reduction in the amount of preparatory work necessary for this. The local press drew attention to this problem. So, in December 1914 The Kaluga Courier reported that in the pre-war years, land surveying specialists took an active part in the winter period in collecting information on the ground in order to study the petitions of peasants who intended to switch to individual farms, since GUZiZ regularly paid travel per diem to specialists. However, in the conditions of the war, the allocation of funds for these purposes was stopped, so specialists "reluctantly go on such business trips," the newspaper stated ^{[19, p. 2]}. The ranks of the land management department bitterly admitted that "it is impossible to conduct preparatory work directly in winter, – you will not gather peasants for gatherings, and many are not in the villages, in view of their call to war. Many simply do not want to gather for gatherings ..." ^{[15, p. 3]}.

1915 was the second year of new tests for local land managers. In March-April of this year, the departmental commissions received a number of appeals from the householders of Zhizdrinsky, Kaluga, Maloyaroslavetsky and Peremyshl counties, in which they declared their refusal to carry out land management works or asked to postpone them until the autumn or even until the end of the war. The peasants motivated their actions by the fact that it was extremely important for them to wait for the return of male family members to their homes, who in their letters urged them to wait for access to individual plots ^{[29, p. 3]}.

On the eve of the new field season, on March 13, 1915, the commissioner of the Central District GUZiZ G. P. Gnedich visited Kaluga with a brief working visit, the purpose of which was to discuss pressing problems of the development of land management in the field in wartime conditions. Having familiarized himself with the affairs of the indispensable members of the county land management commissions, a high-ranking official stated that "it is better to finish the land management work already begun earlier, without seizing new ones, unless the peasants themselves insist on the production of new works." ^{[41, p. 2]}. A month later, in mid-April 1915, it was approved the new plan of land management works in Kaluga province for the current year. The document included 228 cases on the formation of 3257 individual possessions on an area of 28745 des., involving 72 people for these purposes. Compared with the previous year, the new plan assumed a reduction in all these indicators ^{[37, p. 15; 36, p. 17]}. The document was developed taking into account the explanations of G. P. Gnedich, as well as the GUZiZ circular dated April 6 of this year, according to which land management work on the ground was possible only if the peasants themselves wished, without any inducement of them to allotments and opening by land managers ^{[6, l. 75]}.

On the eve of the departure of the surveyors for field work, April 29, 1915 The Chief Administrator of Land Management and Agriculture A.V. Krivoshein issued a new circular addressed to the land management commissions of the country. The document established a temporary suspension of land management work until the end of the war in cases where there was no full agreement among the householders on the allocation. The circular specifically stipulated that we are not talking at all about the denial of the right of peasants to land management. The political authorities actually made concessions to the communists, because they feared a significant increase in social tension in the village environment in the conditions of an ongoing military conflict ^{[7, l. 87-88]}. The publication of this circular found a response in the local press. So, in May 1915, an article entitled "New trends in land Management" was published in the Kaluga Courier, in which a pessimistic assessment of its further development was expressed: "... now work can be carried out only if all householders agree, which, in most cases, is impossible" ^{[27, p. 1]}.

The protracted military conflict continued to have a negative impact on the pace of land management. In 1915, in comparison with the previous year, the number of petitions of householders of the Kaluga province for sole land management decreased from 3,918 to 2,178, i.e. almost 2 times ^{[31, p. 62; 32, p. 64]}. By mid-July of this year, work on individual and group land management was postponed for 20% of peasant households, covering an area of 15% of the planned area. In general, these indicators were 22 and 29% in the country ^{[36, p. 10, 22, 23]}. In total, in 1915, 2,486 farms and cuts were formed on peasant lands in the Kaluga province. Moreover, compared to the previous year, the number of precinct farms increased by 17 yards.

This result was influenced by the following circumstances. Firstly, individual households (71 and 2 courtyards, respectively) were formed due to group land management works, such as, for example, the destruction of the lane, the delimitation of lands. It follows from this that group land management, the main purpose of which was to eliminate the shortcomings of communal land ownership, could be a precursor for a sole proprietor. Such a norm was contained in the law "Regulations on Land Management" of May 29, 1911. Secondly, due to the execution in kind of a large number of works planned in the pre-war years. Thus, the number of single-handedly arranged farms in 1915 exceeded (by 308 yards) the number of petitions submitted ^{[32, pp. 62-63]}. In general, according to a contemporary, "in 1915, in the Kaluga province, despite the wartime, land management was an average step. ... In some counties there were partial openings, single allotments of land from the community and land divisions by villages. ... There was nothing inflated, invented, and most importantly, there was no imposition of land management. Everything went on as usual" ^{[21, p. 2]}.

On the eve of the new field season, in January 1916, the Minister of Agriculture A. N. Naumov (replaced by A.V. Krivoshein in November 1915) sent a circular to the land management commissions of the country, in which recommendations were indicated when drawing up a new plan of land management works for the current year. Firstly, the head of the Ministry insisted that preparatory work in the winter period should be carried out only when there are appropriate petitions for the opening of rural societies. Secondly, taking into account the new appeals of recruits and militia warriors, the indispensable members of the county commissions and land surveyors had to find out in the winter period on the ground the question - whether the householders intend to carry out land management work or require them to be postponed. Thirdly, surveyors who had exemption from compulsory military service had to be involved in the execution of the most complex land management works, first of all ^{[23, p. 74]}.     

The third year of the war demonstrated a further reduction in the number of petitions of the Kaluga province householders for individual land management – by almost 400 applications. Petitions for the transition to individual plots were received from peasants of all 11 counties of the region. Especially here we will highlight the Meshchovsky district, in which a record number – 600 householders filed applications for the opening of villages on farms and cuts, which amounted to 1/3 of the total number of petitions for individual land management. The situation was exactly the opposite in a number of other counties – Zhizdrinsky, Kozelsky, Mosalsky, Peremyshlsky and Tarussky, where peasants stopped submitting such applications. It should be noted that this group included the large southern districts – Zhizdrinsky and Kozelsky, as well as Mosalsky Uyezd in the western part of the province, which for many pre-war years was one of the leaders in the number of individual farms formed. The reduction of peasant petitions for expansion to almost zero directly testified that, as a result of military mobilizations, the village lost many male householders. At the same time, the execution of works in kind on the transition of villages to farms and cuts continued and covered all the counties of the Kaluga province ^{[11, l. 9, 12, 13, 15,18, 20-22, 25, 27, 30]}.

Medynsky uyezd became the leader in the number of formed precinct farms in 1916 – 340 yards on an area of 1843 des. ^{[12, l. 20]} As an example, we will give the opening of the village of Hopilovo, numbering 50 yards, on 19 farmsteads and 31 cut-off plots on a total area of 491 des. At the same time, the entire allotment land went into the open, which was a rare case in the region ^{[22, p. 2]}. In comparison with 1915, the number of established precinct farms in the Kaluga province has decreased by almost 2 times, and the area allocated for them by more than 2.5 times, which in absolute figures amounted to 1,299 farms and cuts on an area of 7,733 des. ^{[11, l. 9, 12, 13, 15,18, 20-22, 25, 27, 30]} Land management commissions are again faced with a shortage of specialists. Within a year, half of their employees were called up for military service. For example, by mid-October 1916, in 3 departmental county commissions, the position of an indispensable member, who was one of the heads of land management in the field, turned out to be vacant ^{[20, p. 2]}. Despite a significant reduction in the staffing of land management commissions, this year they managed to conduct a survey and complete preparatory work for 1917 for 1,649 householders on the area of 12119 des., which accounted for 92% of the total number of peasants who declared sole land management ^{[11, l. 9, 12, 13, 15,18, 20-22, 25, 27, 30]}. In particular, in Tarussky Uyezd, 1 case was being prepared for the opening of a rural society consisting of 95 householders and 5 cases for the allocation of 6 householders ^{[9, L. 61, 65]}. The result of the intense activity of land surveyors in 1916 was the conduct of large-scale preparatory work for the peasants of Medynsky and Meshchovsky counties, to whom almost half of the entire area of such work in the region was allocated ^{[13, L. 20, 21]}.

The main way of organizing individual farms in the Kaluga province during the First World War was the expansion of rural societies. The share of such households in 1915 was 87%, in 1916 – 82% of the total number of individual farms ^{[32, p. 65; 11, l. 9, 12, 13, 15,18, 20-22, 25, 27, 30]}. Despite the decrease in the specific weight of such yards, it should be noted that in the balance of types of individual land management since 1912, the expansion of rural societies significantly prevailed over allotments ^{[35, p. 163]}. According to the modern researcher M. A. Davydov, a similar situation was very typical for many other regions of the country ^{[4, p. 127]}.   

In the practice of land surveying, there were widely known cases when, during the opening of rural societies, individual householders were allocated land for common use (pasture, hayfields, forest plots, etc.), this norm, which took into account the various economic interests of householders, was provided for by the law "Regulations on Land Management" of 1911. This right was used by many Kaluga peasants. So, if by January 1, 1914, the area of land allocated for general use to individual householders was 1,120 des., then two years later, by January 1, 1916, it had already reached 8,440 des. ^{[30, p. 9; 32, p. 31]} By this time only in one Maloyaroslavets county when the expansion 8 rural societies with 610 households, 3320 des were in common use by households, which accounted for 49% of the amount of land allocated to sole ownership in this area ^{[10, l. 107]}.

When organizing allotments in kind, local land managers also faced new cases in their practice. If in the pre-war years, when carrying out this type of land management work, all the allotment land was allocated to the sole ownership of householders, then in the period under study there were cases of a different nature. So, in 1916, in the Peremyshl district, when organizing a group allocation for cuts, 5 householders on a total area of 57 des. 6 des were allocated for general use. ^{[8, l. 15]} It is obvious that the long war served as an impetus for such changes in individual land management, since in a situation where many peasants were mobilized, the common use of land was the necessary compromise that took into account the interest of all parties to the land management process.

 The destructive, bloody First World War contributed to the aggravation of socio-economic and political contradictions in Russia, which led to the February Revolution of 1917. The fall of the monarchy not only radically changed the political system in the country, but also had a very direct impact on the future of Stolypin land management. The Provisional Government, declaring itself the new legitimate body of state power, recognized the agrarian issue as one of their main issues in its policy. Thus, in the decree of the Provisional Government of March 19, 1917, it was announced that the urgent preparation of a new land reform. To fulfill this task, a Land Committee was supposed to be formed under the Ministry of Agriculture ^{[38, p. 1]}. Meanwhile, on March 28, 1917, under the leadership of S. F. Trukhachev, an indispensable member of the Kaluga Provincial Land Management Commission, a meeting of surveyors of departmental commissions was held, where he expressed the general state of concern of the audience about the uncertainty of the issue regarding the upcoming field work. As a result, a decision was made according to which land surveyors were given the right to independently determine on the ground how much there is a sustained interest in land management among the population. Otherwise, it was proposed to send surveyors to assist in supplying the army with food both inside the province and outside it ^{[43, p. 2]}.

Further, on March 31, 1917, the Minister of Agriculture A. I. Shingarev sent a circular telegram to the new Kaluga provincial commissar D. N. Chelishchev, which contained a demand for the suspension of all types of land management work on communal, private-owned, bank lands, as well as to cancel the upcoming visits of surveyors to field work ^{[17, p. 3.]} On According to the plan of the Provisional Government, the main task of the Government formed on April 21, 1917. The Main Land Committee began to develop "urgent temporary measures until the resolution of the land issue by the Constituent Assembly" ^{[40, p. 1]}. According to the local press, the termination of land management works in the Kaluga province could not but cause in the surveying circles a sense of concern, confusion about their uncertain situation. Some of them openly stated that it was no longer necessary to engage in non-urgent, desk work on the production of documents certifying the ownership of householders to individual plots in the new conditions ^{[3, p. 3]}.

Some time later, the Main Land Committee expressed its critical attitude to Stolypin land management. At its meeting on May 31, 1917, it was proposed to abolish the provincial and county land management commissions, except for their office and the survey staff of employees ^{[14, L. 5]}. Further, on June 28, 1917. The Provisional Government adopted a fateful resolution with the characteristic title "On the suspension of certain laws on peasant land ownership and land use, regulations on land management, as well as on the abolition of land management commissions", which officially terminated the Stolypin course of agrarian policy in the country. The essence of this document was as follows. Firstly, the production of cases on certificates for farmsteads was suspended in accordance with the law of June 14, 1910, as well as cases on strengthening allotments according to the decree of November 9, 1906. Secondly, land management commissions were abolished, and all their cases (both completed and not completed) were transferred to the provincial and county land committees. Thirdly, individual and group land management work was suspended, and the entire composition of surveyors was now subordinated to the Main Land Committee ^{[39, p. 1]}.

This decision of the authorities has not been ignored by the press. So, on July 4, 1917, an article explaining the position of the state on this issue was published in the government newspaper "Rural Bulletin", whose subscribers were the volost boards of the country. According to this publication, the adoption of the resolution of June 28, 1917 was caused by the need to reduce social tension between various groups of the peasantry, as well as the desire to preserve the land reserve available to the householders until the resolution of the agrarian issue by the Constituent Assembly ^{[48, p. 1]}. Then, a few days later, a small a note with the eloquent title "Liquidation of land management", where the main provisions of the above-mentioned government document were outlined ^{[24, p. 3]} 

Conclusion

Summing up the last period of activity of Stolypin land management in Kaluga province, it should be noted the following. The First World War disrupted the progressive peaceful path of development of agrarian transformations in the local village. Numerous conscription of employees of departmental commissions and tens of thousands of householders, a sharp reduction in state funding for land management had a very negative impact on the dynamics of the Stolypin reform. Nevertheless, despite all the hardships and hardships, during the war there was a legislative framework for agrarian reforms, which testified to the preservation of their potential even after the end of hostilities. However, the February Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent actions of the Provisional Government led to the complete cessation of Stolypin land management. Consequently, the issue of the results of the reform does not have an unambiguous assessment, since the agrarian transformations in the Kaluga village have received an incomplete character.         

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