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History of the Moscow City authorities >> Heads of the Moscow City administration from 1917 to 1990 >> Pyotr Germogenovich SMIDOVICH - Chairman of the Presidium of the Moscow Soviet of Workers' and Red Armymen's Deputies (March – October 1918)

Pyotr Germogenovich

SMIDOVICH

1874–1935

Chairman of the Presidium of the Moscow Soviet of Workers'
and Red Armymen's Deputies

March – October 1918

Descended from the nobility of the Mogilev gubernia. Second cousin of the well-known author, W Veresayev. In 1895 he was excluded from Moscow University for his participation in a student movement. He received his degree at the Higher Electrotechnical School in Paris. A member of the RSDLP from 1898 and from 1903 a Bolshevik. Repeatedly suffered repressions from the tsarist authorities.

On 1 March 1917he became a member of the Executive Committee and Presidium of the Moscow Soviet of Workers' Deputies. In March 1918 the Third Regional Congress of Soviets declared the Regional Soviet of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies as the highest organ of power in Moscow and the Moscow gubernia in between the Congresses of Soviets. In Moscow itself the city organ of power, the Presidium, was left intact, although subordinated to the Regional Soviet. The latter was in charge of political, civil and economic affairs. The Soldiers' Soviet, which had previously existed in the form of a soldiers' section, was abolished. PG. Smidovich was re-elected chairman of the new Presidium of the City Council. After Moscow was declared capital of the Russian Federation on 16 March 1918 and the Council of People's Commissars of Moscow and the Moscow Region was dissolved in June 1918 the role of the Executive Committee and Presidium of the Moscow Soviet in running all aspects of city life rose sharply.

PG. Smidovich consistently followed the line of his precursor with regard to the nationalisation of industrial and trade enterprises and the resettlement of workers in "bourgeois" apartments, the improvement of food supplies, and also initiated the creation of the system of public catering. As chairman of the Presidium of the Moscow Soviet he took an active part in the suppression of demonstrations by leftwing Socialist Revolutionaries in July 1918. In 1919-1920 he headed the Moscow Gubernia National Economic Council and was in charge of the Moscow Department of People's Education.

In the years that followed he held administrative posts in the apparatus of the All-Russia National Economic Council, All-Russia Central Executive Committee and the Central Executive Committee of the USSR.

Buried in the Kremlin wall on Red Square.