Revolutionaries Kill Tsar Alexander II with Bombs

On March 13, 1881 (1 March in the Old Style calendar then used in Russia), Tsar Alexander II of Russia was traveling back to the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg after reviewing military maneuvers at the Mikhailovsky Manege. His closed, two-seater carriage was escorted by mounted Cossacks and police officers following in sleighs. The emperor had already survived multiple attempts against his life, including shootings, an explosion along an imperial rail route, and an earlier bombing inside the Winter Palace. A revolutionary organization known as Narodnaya Volya, or the People's Will, had resolved in August 1879 to execute the monarch, aiming to ignite a general political uprising across the Russian Empire.

The plot had been prepared over several months by an executive committee whose primary coordinator was Andrei Zhelyabov. Conspirators had studied the tsar's regular travel routes through the capital. Along Malaya Sadovaya Street, members rented a cheese shop, using the premises to dig a tunnel toward the middle of the roadway and pack it with dynamite. Handheld explosive projectiles were designed by Nikolai Kibalchich. However, Zhelyabov was captured by tsarist police two days before the scheduled assault, prompting his partner, Sophia Perovskaya, to direct the remaining operatives.