Temporary committees of public security in the northern district cities of Tobolsk province in the spring and summer of 1917

The article examines changes in the system of governing bodies at the local level in the northern cities of the Tobolsk province (Berezov and Surgut) in the spring and summer of 1917, examines the issues of creating temporary public safety committees (hereinafter – CPS), their tasks and staffing, gives an assessment of their activities, reveals the personalities of participants in public life in this period. It was established that after the February Revolution of 1917, CPS were formed in the district centers of the Tobolsk North, which had their own specifics: the spontaneity of elections, the absence of political parties and election campaigning, and the non-partisanship of committee members. Due to the small social base, the same persons “rotated” in the composition of the established governing bodies at the local level. The key areas of work of the CPS: the closure of district police departments, the removal of police officers, the dismissal of gendarme non-commissioned officers, peasant chiefs and other officials associated with the tsarist regime, participation in the preparation of new elections of city councils, explaining current events to the population, solving the problems of developing the local economy. The novelty of the study consists in an integrated approach to assessing the organization and activities of the CPS in the northern cities of the region, in focusing on the key participants in the events described. For the first time, information about the personal composition of the new local authorities, extracted from archival funds, was presented. The article is intended for a wide range of readers interested in the history of the development of the Tobolsk North.