DEKABRISTS

Also called DECEMBRISTS, first modern Russian revolutionaries who led an unsuccesful uprising on Dec. 26 (Dec. 14, old style) 1825 and through their martyrdom provided a source of inspiration to succeeding generations of Russian revolutionaries.

Member on the upper classes, most Dekabrists were former military officers who had participated in the Russian occupation of France after the Napoelonic Wars, had been Freemasons and were members of the secret revolutionary societies in Russia -the Union of Salvation (1816), the Union of Welfare (1818), the Northern Society (1821) and the Southern Society (1821).

The Northern Society, taking advantage of the brief but confusing interregnum following the death of Alexander I, staged an uprising, convincing some of the troops in St. Petersburg to refuse to take a loyalty oath to Nicholas I and to demand instead the accession of his brother Constantine.

The rebellion was poorly organized and easily suppressed; Col. Prince Sergey Trubetskoy who was to be the provisional dictator fled immediately.

Another insurrection by the Chernigov regiment in the south was also quicly defeated. An extensive investigation in which Nicholas personally participated ensued; it resulted in the trial of 121 Dekabrists, the execution of 5 (Pavel Pestel, Sergey Muravyov-Apostol, Pyotr Kakhovsky, Mikhail Bestuzhev-Ryumin and Kondraty Ryleyev), the imprisonment of 31 and the banishment of the rest to Siberia.