# Georgy Gapon
**Georgy Gapon** (Георгий Аполлонович Гапон; 5 (17) February 1870, Bilyky, Poltava governorate – 28 March (10 April) 1906, Ozerki near St Petersburg) was a priest of the [Russian Orthodox Church](https://www.edgepedia.org/russian-orthodox-church), labor organizer, and police informant who led the workers' procession to the [Winter Palace](https://www.edgepedia.org/winter-palace) on 9 January 1905 (22 January New Style) that ended in the massacre known as [Bloody Sunday](https://www.edgepedia.org/bloody-sunday-1905) and opened the Revolution of 1905. The National Library of Russia authority record describes him as a priest, political figure, trade-union leader, orator and preacher, and one of the main figures of Bloody Sunday[1](https://webservices.nlr.ru/semweb/?method=afnlr&query=NLR10%3A%3ARU%5CNLR%5CAUTH%5C770244046). The Library of Congress authority record characterizes him as a priest and agent of the Okhrana (Tsarist Russia's secret police, which Gapon secretly served) who instigated strikes and petitions to Tsar Nicholas II, tried to infiltrate the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, was exposed, and was hanged[2](https://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/no89005363.html).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Born / died | 5 (17) February 1870, village of Bilyky (Belyaki), Kobelyaky uyezd, Poltava governorate; 28 March (10 April) 1906, Ozerki near St Petersburg[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) • [4](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml) |
| Education | Poltava seminary (1893); St Petersburg Theological Academy (1898–1903), with a dissertation on the parish in the Greek and Russian Orthodox churches[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) |
| The Assembly | Founded 1904 on the base of a police-sponsored mutual-aid society; about 20,000 members and eleven branches by the end of 1904[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) • [5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich) |
| Bloody Sunday | 9 (22) January 1905: prohibited procession to the Winter Palace with a petition to Nicholas II; soldiers fired in several locations[4](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml) • [5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich) |
| Casualties | Estimates range from more than 130 casualties to about 1,000 killed and 3,000–4,000 wounded; about 200 killed and 800 wounded per Beliana[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich) • [3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) • [6](https://beliana.sav.sk/heslo/gapon-georgij-apollonovic) |
| Okhrana connection | Received money from a secret fund of the Police Department; after returning to Russia in autumn 1905 was tasked to infiltrate the SR Combat Organization[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) • [4](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml) |
| Death | Killed by hanging on 28 March 1906 at a dacha at Ozerki rented by the SR engineer P. M. Rutenberg[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru) |
## Early life and clerical career
Gapon came from a peasant background in the Poltava region. His own memoir describes his parents as simple peasants from the village of Belyaki, Poltava governorate[8](https://www.hrono.ru/libris/lib_g/gapon02.php). An annotating source, the Tolstoyan I. M. Tregubov in a letter of 1 February 1905, calls him the son of a well-to-do peasant of the town of Beliki in Kobelyaky uyezd, and a police department record lists his father Apollon Fyodorovich as a Cossack and his mother as a peasant[8](https://www.hrono.ru/libris/lib_g/gapon02.php).
He finished the Poltava seminary in 1893 and studied at the St Petersburg Theological Academy from 1898 to 1903[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf). As a student he was involved in missionary work among the homeless in St Petersburg[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich), and from 1900 to 1902 he served in children's shelters[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru). In 1902 he was suspended by the Synod for "moral sinfulness"[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf). In 1903 he completed a theological dissertation on the contemporary state of the parish in the Greek and Russian Orthodox churches, and from early 1904 he served as priest of the St Petersburg transit prison[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) • [7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru).
## The Assembly of Russian Factory and Mill Workers
**A police-sponsored beginning.** In autumn 1902 Gapon met Sergei V. Zubatov, head of the Special Section of the [Police Department](https://www.edgepedia.org/police-department), who drew him into the legal Society for Mutual Aid of Workers in Mechanical Production[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru). The BSE describes the connection as one with the head of the Moscow Okhrana and says Gapon created St Petersburg organizations on the Zubatov model, a phenomenon contemporaries called "gaponovshchina"[4](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml).
When Zubatov was dismissed in the summer of 1903 and given twenty-four hours to leave the city, Gapon inherited the police-created organization[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich). In 1904 the Assembly of Russian Factory and Mill Workers ([Собрание русских фабрично-заводских рабочих](https://www.edgepedia.org/assembly-of-russian-factory-workers)) was created on its base; the Saint Petersburg Encyclopedia calls it one of the first legal mass organizations of workers in Russia[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru) • [9](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2803931699?lc=en). Its meetings opened with prayers and the national anthem, with portraits of the tsars on the walls[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich).
By December 1904 the Assembly had about 20,000 members and eleven branches[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) • [5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich). At the same time, according to the Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine, Gapon was an Okhrana agent receiving money from a secret fund of the Police Department to depoliticize the workers[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf). Control, however, was slipping: by the end of 1904 a workers' "staff" around Gapon had effectively taken the Assembly out of police control, meeting at his flat on Tserkovnaya Street[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru).
After four members were dismissed from the Putilov Works, Gapon called a strike that began on 16 January 1905, and by 17 January the entire working force of the capital had joined[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich).
## Bloody Sunday, 9 (22) January 1905
On Gapon's initiative the petition to [Nicholas II](https://www.edgepedia.org/nicholas-ii) was drafted and the workers' march to the tsar was organized[4](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml). The petition was titled "Most Humble and Loyal Address to be presented to the Tsar at 2 P.M. on the Winter Palace Square"[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich). The procession was prohibited, but it went ahead on 9 January Old Style; soldiers opened fire in several locations[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich). The Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine states that Gapon had warned the police of the march in advance[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf).
The shooting near the Winter Palace became known as Bloody Sunday and began the Revolution of 1905[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich).
## Exile, return, and the Okhrana question
After 9 January Gapon emigrated to Switzerland. There he organized, through the International Socialist Bureau, an April 1905 conference of Russian revolutionary parties and took part in purchasing weapons for revolutionaries[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru). The Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine adds that abroad he negotiated with Lenin on a coalition revolutionary committee and joined the SR party, from which he was expelled for "political illiteracy"[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf).
After the [October Manifesto](https://www.edgepedia.org/october-manifesto) of 17 October 1905 he returned to St Petersburg and renewed contacts both with the former Assembly leadership and with the police[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru). The BSE states that the Okhrana tasked him with infiltrating the [SR Combat Organization](https://www.edgepedia.org/combat-organization-of-the-socialist-revolutionary-party) and that he was exposed[4](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml). The Library of Congress authority record, citing the third edition of the BSE, likewise identifies him as an agent of the Okhrana who tried to infiltrate the Socialist-Revolutionary Party and was exposed[2](https://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/no89005363.html).
## Death in 1906
Gapon was killed on 28 March 1906 at a dacha at Ozerki station near St Petersburg, at the crossing of Olga and Varvara streets, rented by the SR party member and engineer P. M. Rutenberg; he was buried at Uspenskoye cemetery near the Finland Railway line[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru).
The sources disagree on who ordered the killing. Encyclopedia.com states that he was killed by a terrorist squad acting on the orders of the double agent [Evno Azef](https://www.edgepedia.org/evno-azef), and that the perpetrators concocted a story of a workers' trial and execution to explain the murder[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich). The Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine says the killing was by decision of the SR party Central Committee, and describes the method as hanging[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf). The BSE says he was tried by a group of workers and hanged[4](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml).
## By the numbers
The quantities attached to Gapon's career vary widely across sources, and the differences are themselves informative.
- **Assembly membership**: about 20,000 members and eleven branches by December 1904[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf) • [5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich).
- **Marchers on 9 January 1905**: Beliana gives approximately 200,000 participants[6](https://beliana.sav.sk/heslo/gapon-georgij-apollonovic); the other retrieved sources give no figure.
- **Casualties**: Encyclopedia.com reports more than 130 casualties[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich); Beliana reports about 200 killed and about 800 wounded[6](https://beliana.sav.sk/heslo/gapon-georgij-apollonovic); the Norwegian Store norske leksikon reports over 200 killed[10](https://snl.no/Georgij_Gapon); the Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine reports about 1,000 killed and 3,000–4,000 wounded[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf). The figures range from more than 130 casualties to about 1,000 killed[5](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich) • [3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf).
## Memoirs and historiography
Gapon's memoir, *The Story of My Life*, was published in 1906 and presents his own account of his peasant origins and the events leading to Bloody Sunday[11](https://www.marxists.org/archive/gapon/1906-story-of-my-life.pdf). A Russian edition, *История моей жизни*, was first published in Leningrad in 1925 and reissued in Moscow in 1990[3](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf).
Later literature includes Rutenberg's *Убийство Гапона: Записки* (Moscow, 1990), by the man at whose dacha Gapon died, and I. N. Ksenofontov's *Георгий Гапон: вымысел и правда* (Moscow, 1996)[7](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru). Western scholarship has treated Gapon at monograph length: a study of the 1905 revolution devotes a chapter to Father Georgii Gapon and a separate chapter to the Assembly, situating both within the ministry of Sviatopolk-Mirskii and the origins of the revolution[12](https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/9781400856756.34/html).
## References
1. [РНБ: формат авторитетной записи, Гапон Георгий Аполлонович, National Library of Russia](https://webservices.nlr.ru/semweb/?method=afnlr&query=NLR10%3A%3ARU%5CNLR%5CAUTH%5C770244046)
2. [Gapon, Georgiĭ Apollonovich, 1870–1906, Library of Congress authority record](https://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/no89005363.html)
3. [Гапон Георгій Аполлонович, Енциклопедія Сучасної України](https://esu.com.ua/pdf/file/28644.pdf)
4. [Гапон Георгий Аполлонович, БСЭ](http://alcala.ru/bse/izbrannoe/slovar-G/G10703.shtml)
5. [Gapon, Georgy Apollonovich, Encyclopedia.com](https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/gapon-georgy-apollonovich)
6. [Gapon, Georgij Apollonovič, Encyclopaedia Beliana](https://beliana.sav.sk/heslo/gapon-georgij-apollonovic)
7. [ГАПОН Георгий Аполлонович, Энциклопедия Санкт-Петербурга](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2804023193?lc=ru)
8. [Гапон Георгий, История моей жизни, комментарий, hrono.ru](https://www.hrono.ru/libris/lib_g/gapon02.php)
9. [Assembly of Russian Factory and Plant Workers of St. Petersburg, Saint Petersburg encyclopaedia](https://www.encspb.ru/object/2803931699?lc=en)
10. [Georgij Gapon, Store norske leksikon](https://snl.no/Georgij_Gapon)
11. [The Story of My Life, by Father George Gapon (1906)](https://www.marxists.org/archive/gapon/1906-story-of-my-life.pdf)
12. [Chapter II. Father Georgii Gapon, scholarly monograph, De Gruyter](https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/9781400856756.34/html)
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