On 13 March [O.S. 1 March] 1881, Alexander II, the Emperor of Russia, was assassinated in Saint Petersburg, Russia, while returning to the Winter Palace from Mikhailovsky Manège in a closed carriage. The assassination was planned by the Executive Committee of Narodnaya Volya ("People's Will"), chiefly by Andrei Zhelyabov. Of the four assassins coordinated by Sophia Perovskaya, two actually committed the deed. One assassin, Nikolai Rysakov, threw a bomb which damaged the carriage, prompting the Tsar to disembark. At this point a second assassin, Ignacy Hryniewiecki, threw a bomb that fatally wounded Alexander II.
Alexander II had previously survived several attempts on his life, including the attempts by Dmitry Karakozov and Alexander Soloviev, the attempt to dynamite the imperial train in Aleksandrovsk (Zaporizhzhia), and the bombing of the Winter Palace in February 1880. The assassination is popularly considered to be the most successful action by the Russian nihilist movement of the 19th century. One of those linked to the assassination was Jewish; the assassination set off a wave of antisemitism and pogroms throughout the Russian Empire.
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