Oil on canvas. The Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia. Read Note.
27 February 1917 - The so-called February Revolution of 1917 in Russia culminated on the 27th of February.
On the morning of the 27th, an armed group of revolutionaries led a raid on an armory, captured its stock of rifles and mounted an attack on the prisons, setting free the revolutionaries and criminals being held there. They then went on to launch attacks on the police stations. The Petrograd Garrison supported the revolutionaries. Nicholas II was forced to abdicate and a Provisional Government took over.
Real power in Russia after the February Revolution, however, lay with the socialist leaders of the Petrograd (later All-Russian) Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, who were elected by popular mandate (unlike the ministers of the Provisional Government).