In February 1917 hundreds of thousands of people crowded the streets of Petrograd. They were demanding abolition of monarchy and completion of war known as World War I. The starting point of these developments is considered to have happened at Putilovsky plant strikes on 16 February and the bread riots on 23 February. The revolt began from Vyborgskaya storona and Petrogradskaya storona, which are the parts of the city across the Neva river to the North from the centre. The revolt transformed into street demonstrations of workers around the city and clashes with troops that later on joined the rebellion. The sound of shooting was everywhere, in the air and at people, the crowd smashed showcases, the demonstrations filled the streets. In a week, on 2 March, the Emperor Nicolas II abdicated the throne for himself and for Tsarevich Alexey in favor of Grand Duke Mikhail Aleksandrovich, who postponed the question of the leadership of the State in his turn until the meeting with Constitutional Assembly.

These people talk about these events in their memoirs:

Globachev K.I., ex-chief of the Petrograd police;

Milyukov P. N., leader of the Constitutional democratic party, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Provisional Government in 1917;

Nabokov V. D., one of the leaders of the Constitutional Democratic party;

Olitskaya E. L., leader of the Socialist Revolutionary party of the post-revolutionary period;

Zhevakhov N. D., acting Chief Procurator of the Holy Synod in February, 1917;

Paleolog J. M., the Ambassador of France in Russia;

Gippius Z. N., poet and playwright;

Blok A. A., poet and publicist;

Zoshchenko M. M., writer;

Prokofiev S. S., composer;

Raskolnikov F. F., student of the separate Midshipman classes;

Voitinsky V. S., revolutionary;

Unknown schoolboy in his diary;

Great days of the Russian Revolution, published by printing house Bureau of the Russian Press in Petrograd in 1917.