250 THE ZEMSTVOS DURING THE WAR
the other hand, remained under the exclusive control of the govern-
ment committee. Interminable negotiations once more began, to be
ended by the outbreak of the Revolution.
The problems of the leather industry thus remained unsolved even
in the third year of the War. Some zemstvos, however (Vyatka,
Ekaterinoslav, Ryazan, Samara, and Taurida) started as early as
the latter half of 1916 to collect hides under the provisions of the
decree of July 7.2
Factories and Workshops.
It will be clear from the preceding pages that market conditions
compelled the Zemstvo Union from the very outset to organize the
buying and manufacture of whatever articles it required for the
purpose of its work. Thus came into existence numerous workshops
where articles of clothing and underwear were made. A large num-
ber of temporary workshops were established for the manufacture of
suspension cots, stretchers, mattresses, furniture, and other articles
needed by the hospitals. These workshops had only a minor portion
of the work done on the premises, leaving most of it to outworkers.
This was the case of the tent factory, among others, opened in Mos-
cow in October, 1915. Beginning with ten workers, it very quickly
expanded, for it received large orders not only from the zemstvo in-
stitutions, but also from the military authorities. At the close of
1916, 850 persons were already employed at this factory, in addi-
tion to about 3,000 outworkers engaged on its orders. Besides the
tents, portable hutments were manufactured, and in the third year
of the War this plant was producing thirty different types of tents,
such as tents for the staff, for operating rooms, for dressing rooms,
for officers’ quarters, ete. It also manufactured twenty different
types of hutments to be used for living quarters, disinfection rooms,
laundries, bathhouses, operating rooms, garages, repair shops, din-
ing rooms, etc. It produced, moreover, sail-cloth articles, such as
* Among the numerous articles dealing with the leather industry which
appeared in Iszvestia (Bulletin) the following may be mentioned: Nos. 12-
18, pp. 67-71; No. 20, pp. 44-45; No. 24, pp. 50-67; No. 27, pp. 47-50; No.
34, pp. 61-85; Nos. 37-38, pp. 54-58, 61-68; No. 48, pp. 21-24; No. 49, pp.
97-38; No. 50, pp. 11-15; Nos. 52-58, pp. 171-174; Nos. 58-60, pp. 5-10.
See also Zagorsky, State Control of Industry in Russia during the War
(Yale University Press, 1928) in this series of Economic and Social His-
tory of the World War.
