The Spartacist Uprising

• The Spartacists were a threat from the left where from 5 – 12 January 1919, 50,000 members of the post-World War One Communist Party, known as the Spartacists, rebelled in Berlin, led by Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht.
• The government was saved when, through the army, it armed bands of ex-soldiers, known as the Freikorps, who defeated the Spartacist rebels.
• In the aftermath of the Spartacist uprising, communist workers' councils seized power all over Germany, and a Communist People's Government took power in Bavaria.
• Liebknecht and Luxemburg were killed by the Freikorps after being arrested on the 15th.
• By May 1919 the Freikorps had crushed all of the Spartacist uprisings.