In fact, the revolution did not free people from legal serfdom in Russia.
Serfdom as a legal institution was abolished in the 1850's in Russia, by
Czar Alexander III. Now, while conditions for most former serfs did not
change much between them and the October revolution, it is also true that
conditions for those former serfs did not change much after the revolution
either. It is, for example, debatable whether Stalin treated the rural
agricultural laborers better than they had been in the time of Alexander
II.
JLP