Our Year 11 history students visited St Petersburg for two nights on a trip to enrich their learning about the Russia and USSR 1894-1941 topic. It is a trip our historians and the history department have eagerly awaited, and the excursions in St Petersburg have assisted them in their understanding of the significant events, their causes and consequences and the changes that took place in Russia in the early part of the 20th century.
The excursions included: a visit to Kronshtadt, where Leon Trotsky ordered a revolt crushed in 1921 which threatened Bolshevik control; a boat trip on the Neva river to the gulf of Finland and past the Aurora cruiser, which not only took part in the Russo-Japanese War, but which also fired a single shot signalling the attack on the Winter Palace by the Bolshevik's in October 1917; the Rumantsyev mansion, which currently has exhibitions on life in the 1920s and 1930s under communist rule, and the impact of the Siege of Leningrad which lasted for 872 days; a visit to the Peter and Paul fortress, where notable inmates included Trotsky, Maxim Gorky and members of Narodnaya Volya (the People's Will), the revolutionary group responsible for the assassination of Alexander II in 1881. Lastly, a rooftop tour on Nevsky Prospect with a tour guide who detailed the history of St Petersburg from Tsarist times to the changes brought about by the communists, renaming the city Leningrad, and then earning its title 'hero city' for its courage in the depths of the siege.
In the history department we are always looking for interesting places to visit, and we will continue to provide curriculum enrichment opportunities for our students across Moscow and Russia as a whole.
