In March 1917 Tsar Nicholas II abdicated ending centuries of autocratic royal rule in Russia. The revolution started with demonstrations in the capital Petrograd (St. Petersburg) against the First World War and shortages of food. Troops joined the protestors in the streets, A Provisional Government was set up to replace Tsarist rule but it had to share power with a new Council of Workers and Soldiers Deputies, called the Petrograd Soviet. Hear eyewitness accounts of the revolution from the BBC radio archive. Photo: 12th March 1917: Barricades across a street in St Petersburg, as a red flag floats above the cannons, during the Russian Revolution. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)