Revolution: The grandson who believes it's time to rewrite history

Millions of Russians will today honour the Bolsheviks who led the October Revolution 80 years ago. Spare a thought, though, for the man they threw out. Kerensky's British grandson believes history is guilty of a terrible misjudgement.

Moscow - As Russia's Communists unfurl their red banners and sally forth on to the icy streets to celebrate the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, one man will be at home in Britain, working on plans for a mission to resurrect the reputation of a politician they once ousted and still scorn - his grandfather, Alexander.

No matter that Stephen Kerensky, a writer and antiques dealer from Warwickshire, must overcome decades of relentless Soviet propaganda. No matter that his views also run counter to those of some of the West's leading historians.

He believes that his grandfather is one of the "most vilified politicians of any era", the whipping boy of both the West and Russia in their rush to conceal errors that led to collectivisation, famine, Stalin's terror and the KGB. So he has decided to change history's mind. Family, after all, is family.

The story of Alexander Kerensky is one of those great "what ifs". Had his coalition government struggled on, would Lenin have ever taken charge? Would Stalin have terrorised and slaughtered millions? Or could Russia have become one of the world's democracies, a citadel of free speech and human rights?

A democratic lawyer, Kerensky became head of Russia's Provisional Government in the summer of 1917, four months after the monarchy finally buckled under the weight of Nicholas II's bovine conviction that he had a divine right to rule as an autocrat. After his abdication, Kerensky was one of several who persuaded the tsar's younger brother, the Grand Duke Mikhail, that there would be civil war if the monarchy tried to stagger on.

A brilliant orator and - at least, at first - a vastly popular figure, he remained in office until the Bolsheviks finally seized power, 80 years ago today, when they peppered the Winter Palace in St Petersburg with machine-gun fire, breezed in and arrested his ministers.

Kerensky, then only 36, escaped earlier in a car flying the Stars and Stripes - an exploit in which Soviet propagandists subsequently revelled, emphasising the damning detail that he fled dressed in women's clothing. That allegation, says Stephen Kerensky, is one slur among many: "One of the main Soviet slanders against him is that he was living like a tsar in the Winter Palace, holding orgies and being driven around in the Tsar's Rolls. That was actually Lenin's hobby, not Kerensky's."

Later this month Mr Kerensky, 48, who lives in Rugby, will press his case in person when he travels to St Petersburg for the publication of the first instalment of the memoirs of his grandmother, Olga, who settled in Britain after the revolution. It will be printed by a magazine, Zvezda (Star), which has taken up the cause with relish.

"We believe Kerensky was a remarkable man, says the editor-in-chief, Yakov Gordin. "His role was distorted later and caricatured for political reasons by the Soviets. Our task is to restore the true image of this important politician."

They have a formidable task on their hands; Kerensky, who eventually lived in the US, spent much of his life writing books about his version of events. His son Gleb - Stephen's father - also took up the cudgels, and for decades bombarded the Times with letters seeking to clear his father's name. And yet Kerensky's dismal reputation has lived on.

Especially in Russia. At 94, Alexander Alexeyev is deaf and very doddery, but he remembers the former prime minister well enough. He was 13 during the October Revolution, and now - his fragile chest weighed down by Soviet medals says: "There is nothing positive to say about Kerensky. He expressed the interests of the bourgeoisie, that's all."

Leading historians have been even less charitable, casting Kerensky in the role of a theatrical, self-indulgent figure who emerged as an early hero - a cult figure, even, among the democratic intelligentsia - of the revolution, but frittered his support away through indecision and vanity.

Richard Pipes, author of a highly authoritative history of the revolution, wrote that he was "all impulse and emotion" and was "incapable of coping" with his responsibilities. Another, Orlando Figes, author of the award- winning A People's Tragedy, has accused him of being a man of "Bonapartist ambitions", undone by "weakness of will" who went on to a life in exile penning "mendacious" memoirs. Towards the end of his rule, says Dr Figes, he was an isolated figure, who had "no idea of the extent of his own unpopularity".

Stephen Kerensky appears undaunted by these weighty opponents. He personally knew his grandfather who died in New York in 1970; he found him "amazingly charismatic". He points to his record as a lawyer who defended Bolsheviks during the tsarist era.

"Lenin, by contrast, is probably the most contradictory character in history. His terrifying rage and an equally terrifying belief in the rightness of every thought that ever crossed his mind created a holocaust that lasted for 50 years."

Britain ranks high on the list of those whom he believes have undermined Kerensky's proper historical legacy. In particular, he blames the British, who were desperate to keep Russia in the war, for supporting the right wing, dictatorially-inclined Russian commander-in- chief, General Lavr Kornilov - whom Kerensky fatally bounced into open revolt by accusing him of plotting a military coup. "By failing to support Kerensky, the British contributed to his fall, and therefore bear some responsibility for Lenin, Stalin and the holocaust that followed," said Mr Kerensky.

Life is full of lost causes, and Stephen Kerensky is probably fighting one of them. His family is entwined in one of history's most momentous episodes. Yet changing the text is astonishingly hard. "I can't write a book because I have no great credibility as a historian, and I can't read or write Russian. I would be torn apart."

But he believes he will win in the end: "I am quite convinced that this issue is going to dramatically change. Historians cannot sustain their position. It just doesn't stand up."

He can, at least, take comfort in one small detail. Hot news: as Russians take to the streets today, Kerensky's ratings are on the up. In 1991, 20 per cent of Russians saw him as a bad apple, according to a survey by the All-Russia Centre for Public Opinion Studies. That figure has now dropped by a third. Okay, so they also feel better about Nicholas II and Stalin; but it's a start.