D. A. Safonov

COSSACKS IN THE CIVIL WAR: BETWEEN RED AND WHITE

(Almanac “White Guard”, No. 8. Cossacks of Russia in the White Movement. M., “Posev”, 2005, pp. 8-10).

The fall of the Provisional Government and the establishment of Bolshevik power did not initially evoke a serious response among the Cossacks. Some villages refused on principle to participate in what was happening - as was stated in the order to delegates to the Small Military Circle from a number of villages of the Orenburg Cossack Army, “until the matter of the civil war is clarified, remain neutral.”1 However, remain neutral, do not interfere in the civil war that has begun in the country The Cossacks still failed to fight the war. Tens of thousands of armed, military-trained people represented a force that was impossible not to take into account (in the fall of 1917, the army had 162 cavalry Cossack regiments, 171 separate hundreds and 24 foot battalions). The intense confrontation between the Reds and the Whites eventually reached the Cossack regions. First of all, this happened in the South and the Urals.

Both opposing sides actively tried to win the Cossacks over to them (or at least not to let them go to the enemy). There was active campaigning in word and deed. Whites emphasized preserving liberties, Cossack traditions, and identity. The Reds - on the common goals of the socialist revolution for all working people, the comradely feelings of the Cossack front-line soldiers towards the soldiers. V.F. Mamonov drew attention to the similarity of elements of religious consciousness in the agitation of the Reds and Whites, as well as the methods of propaganda work.2 In general, neither one nor the other was sincere. Everyone was primarily interested in the combat potential of the Cossack troops.

In principle, the Cossacks definitely did not support anyone. There is no general data regarding how actively the Cossacks joined one or another camp. The Ural army rose almost completely, fielding 18 regiments (up to 10 thousand sabers) by November 1918. The Orenburg Cossack army fielded nine regiments - by the fall of 1918 there were 10,904 Cossacks in service. At the same time, in the fall of 1918, in the ranks of the Whites there were approximately 50 thousand Don and 35.5 thousand Kuban Cossacks.3 By February 1919, there were 7-8 thousand Cossacks in the Red Army, united in 9 regiments. The report of the Cossack department of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, compiled at the end of 1919, concluded that the Red Cossacks made up 20% of the total number, and from 70 to 80% of the Cossacks, for various reasons, were on the side of the whites.4

The neutrality of the Cossacks did not suit anyone. The Cossacks were doomed to participate in a fratricidal war. The warring parties demanded a choice from the Cossacks: and in a word (“So know, whoever is not with us is against us. We need to finally agree: either go with us or take rifles and fight against us” (Chairman of the Orenburg Military Revolutionary Committee S. Zwilling on 1st Provincial Congress of Soviets on March 12, 1918)5 and in deed, trying to force the Cossacks to join the fight.

In conditions when the Cossacks were biding their time, the communists had a real chance to win them over to their side, but stereotypes of ideas about the Cossacks, political intolerance, and mistakes in policy ultimately led to a crisis. The crisis was brewing gradually, step by step. This is clearly seen in the events in the Orenburg region. In the first three days after the Red Guard entered Orenburg, several dozen villages declared recognition of Soviet power. The distribution of food detachments to the nearest villages gave rise to the emergence of partisan self-defense units. On March 3, 1918, the Military Revolutionary Committee threatened that if “any village assists counter-revolutionary partisan detachments with shelter, shelter, food, etc., then such a village will be destroyed mercilessly by artillery fire.”6 From March 23, according to eyewitnesses, in the city a real “hunt for the Cossacks” began.7 Mass murders were committed solely for belonging to the Cossack class - these were mainly disabled, elderly, sick people. As a countermeasure - the destruction of several food detachments in the Cossack villages.

The next stage is the raid of partisan detachments on Orenburg on the night of April 3-4. The partisans held a number of streets for several hours, then retreated. Hatred and suspicion, fear arose again - as a result, reprisals against the Cossacks without trial began again, lynchings in the Cossack Forstadt lasted three days. Raids began in nearby villages, arrests of priests of Cossack parishes, executions of “hostile elements,” indemnities and requisitions. 19 villages were destroyed by artillery fire. The villages panicked. Protocols from villages about the desire to begin peace negotiations poured in. In the minutes of the general meeting of the village of Kamenno-Ozernaya there was a revealing remark - “we are between two fires.”8

However, the communist authorities responded with another ultimatum, threatening “merciless red terror” - “Guilty villages” will be “indiscriminately swept away from the face of the earth, guilty and innocent.”9 Even at the end of May, the provincial executive committee and the Military Revolutionary Committee adopted resolutions demanding an end to the ongoing lynchings and destruction of the villages . Such actions pushed the Cossacks away from the councils and pushed those who were wavering. Self-defense units became the basis of the Komuch army.

A similar situation took place on the Don: in the village of Veshenskaya at the end of 1918 there was an uprising against the whites. On the night of March 11, 1919, the uprising broke out again, this time due to dissatisfaction with the policies of the Bolsheviks.

Despite seemingly completely different goals, both sides acted using almost the same methods. At the beginning of 1918, Orenburg was under the control of the Reds for several months, then Ataman A.I. entered the city. Dutov. The orders he established were surprisingly similar to the orders imposed by the communist authorities. Contemporaries noticed this almost immediately - an article with the characteristic title “Bolshevism Inside Out” appeared in the Menshevik newspaper “Narodnoye Delo.”10 Political opponents were immediately expelled from local authorities, censorship was introduced, and indemnities were imposed. Arrests took place along class lines: the Reds arrested Cossacks and the bourgeoisie, the Whites arrested workers and for “active participation in a gang calling themselves Bolsheviks.”

It is symptomatic that the Cossacks who tried to conduct a dialogue with the authorities suffered equally from both - almost immediately after the occupation of Orenburg by the Reds, a Cossack newspaper that was in opposition to Ataman Dutov was closed, and Cossacks who advocated dialogue with the Soviets were arrested. The executive committee of the Council of Cossack Deputies was dissolved. Later, these same people were repressed by Dutov. Evidence of weakness can be seen in the willingness with which the parties attributed their failures to the successes of the other side. The Bolsheviks increasingly became a kind of “bogeyman” with which the atamans intimidated the Cossacks in their own interests. The fact that the partisans who raided Orenburg on April 4, 1918, had white armbands was interpreted by the communists as a sign of the White Guard.

Both sides hid their weakness in violence, quite demonstratively shifting the blame of individuals onto the entire village. The Dutovites carried out reprisals against villages that did not submit to mobilization. The troops of V.K. did the same. Blucher.11 Executions became a mass phenomenon. During the two months of the famous directive, at least 260 Cossacks were shot on the Don. At that time, there were white governments in the territories of the Ural and Orenburg troops - in Orenburg alone in January 1919, 250 Cossacks were shot for evading service in the White Army.

Whether the Reds and Whites wanted it or not, the punitive measures of one side inevitably pushed the Cossacks to the side of their opponents. General I.G. Akulinin wrote: “The inept and cruel policy of the Bolsheviks, their undisguised hatred of the Cossacks, desecration of Cossack shrines, and especially bloody massacres, requisitions and indemnities and robberies in the villages - all this opened the eyes of the Cossacks to the essence of Soviet power and forced them to take up arms. ".12 However, he kept silent about the fact that the whites acted in a similar way - and this also “opened the eyes of the Cossacks.” Territories that had been under one government and had a hard time there, more strongly desired another in the hope of the best.

What did the Cossacks do when they found themselves between Bolshevism on the left and right? It turned out to be impossible to simply sit on the sidelines - the fronts passed through military territories. Desertion can be considered a passive form of counteraction. Another way was to evade mobilization - the number of refusals was constantly increasing, attempts to evade by refusing the Cossack rank became common. A special order was issued in the Orenburg army, according to which “the Cossacks expelled from the Orenburg army were transferred to a prisoner of war camp without any investigation or trial.”13 From the end of 1918, refusals to conduct military operations and mass defections to the side of the Red Army became frequent occurrences.

Cossack partisan self-defense units, which began to be created in villages for defense against any external threat, became a special form of counteraction. The simplified bipolar scheme of the balance of power in the Civil War, which dominated Russian literature for decades, inevitably assigned the Cossack partisans to one of the camps. The Orenburg partisans, who opposed the requisitions of the red detachments, began to be perceived as white; Cossack detachments (including F.K. Mironov), who met the whites on the way to the Volga in the summer of 1918, became red. However, everything was much more complicated.

It seems to us that it would not be entirely correct to say that by ultimately taking either side, the Cossacks thereby unambiguously became red or white. The traditionally accepted explanations in Soviet literature for the unconditional transition of the “laboring Cossacks” to the side of the Reds as a result of the propaganda activities of the communists and “kulaks” to the side of the Whites extremely simplify the complex picture. Cossacks fight as much for someone as against someone. The removal of hostile forces from one's territory almost immediately entailed a decline in military activity. As the white armies left military territories, the outflow of Cossacks from them increased. In our opinion, mass defections to the Red side are not the result of an ideological choice, but simply a return home. Those who left Russia and emigrated were, first of all, those for whom there was no way back. The rest tried to adapt to the new conditions.

1. Civil war in the Orenburg region (1917-1919). Documents and materials. Orenburg, 1958. P. 32.
2. History of the Cossacks of Asian Russia. T.3. XX century. Ekaterinburg, 1995. pp. 71-72.

3. History of the Cossacks of the Urals. Ed. V.F. Mamonova. Orenburg-Chelyabinsk, 1992. P. 209; Mashin M.D. Orenburg and Ural Cossacks during the Civil War. Saratov, 1984. P. 38; Futoryansky L.I. Cossacks during the civil war. //Cossacks in the October Revolution and Civil War. Cherkessk, 1984. P. 54.

4. GA RF. F. 1235. Op. 82. D. 4. l. 98.

5. For the power of the Soviets. Sat. playback Chkalov, 1957. P. 145.

6. Voinov V. Ataman Dutov and the tragedy of the Orenburg Cossacks // Rifey. Ural local history collection. Chelyabinsk, 1990. P. 75.

7. Work morning. No. 41. 1918. 18(05).07.

9. News of the Orenburg Executive Committee of the Council of Cossacks, Workers and Peasants' Deputies. No. 49. 1918, 11.04 (29.03).

10. People's cause. No. 7. 1918. 17.07.

11. Mashin M.D. Decree. Op. P. 58; Civil war in the Orenburg region. P. 137.

12. Akulinin I.G. Orenburg Cossack army in the fight against the Bolsheviks. 1917-1920. Shanghai, 1937. P. 168.

13. Orenburg Cossack Messenger. 1918. 24.08.

The civil war in Siberia had its own characteristics. Siberia's territorial space was several times larger than the territory of European Russia. The peculiarity of the Siberian population was that it did not know serfdom, there were no large landowners' lands that constrained the peasants' possessions, and there was no land question. In Siberia, administrative and economic exploitation of the population was much weaker because the centers of administrative influence spread only along the Siberian railway line. Therefore, such influence almost did not extend to the internal life of the provinces located at a distance from the railway line, and the people only needed order and the opportunity for a quiet existence. Under such patriarchal conditions, revolutionary propaganda could only succeed in Siberia by force, which could not but cause resistance. And it inevitably arose. In June, Cossacks, volunteers and detachments of Czechoslovaks cleared the entire Siberian railway route from Chelyabinsk to Irkutsk of Bolsheviks. After this, an irreconcilable struggle began between the parties, as a result of which the advantage was established in the power structure formed in Omsk, which relied on an armed force of about 40,000, of which half were from the Ural, Siberian and Orenburg Cossacks. Anti-Bolshevik rebel detachments in Siberia fought under a white and green flag, since “according to the resolution of the Emergency Siberian Regional Congress, the colors of the flag of autonomous Siberia were established as white and green - as a symbol of the snows and forests of Siberia.”

Rice. 1 Flag of Siberia

It should be said that during the Russian Troubles of the twentieth century, not only Siberia declared autonomy, there was an endless parade of sovereignties. The same was true for the Cossacks. During the collapse of the Russian Empire and the Civil War, several Cossack state entities were proclaimed:
Kuban People's Republic
All-Great Don Army
Terek Cossack Republic
Ural Cossack Republic
Orenburg Cossack Circle
Siberian-Semirechensk Cossack Republic
Transbaikal Cossack Republic.

Of course, all these centrifugal chimeras arose, first of all, from the impotence of the central government, which happened again in the early 90s. In addition to the national-geographical divide, the Bolsheviks managed to organize an internal split: the previously united Cossacks were divided into “red” and “white”. Some of the Cossacks, primarily young people and front-line soldiers, were deceived by the promises and promises of the Bolsheviks, and left to fight for the Soviets.

Rice. 2 Red Cossacks

In the Southern Urals, the Red Guards, under the leadership of the Bolshevik worker V.K. Blucher, and the Red Orenburg Cossacks of the brothers Nikolai and Ivan Kashirin fought surrounded and retreated in battle from Vekhneuralsk to Beloretsk, and from there, repelling the attacks of the White Cossacks, they began a great campaign along the Ural Mountains near Kungur, to join the 3rd Red Army. Having fought along the rear of the whites for more than 1000 kilometers, the red fighters and Cossacks in the Askino area united with the red units. From them, the 30th Infantry Division was formed, the commander of which was appointed Blucher, and the former Cossack squadrons Kashirins were appointed deputy and brigade commander. All three receive the newly established Order of the Red Banner, with Blucher receiving it at No. 1. During this period, about 12 thousand Orenburg Cossacks fought on the side of Ataman Dutov, and up to 4 thousand Cossacks fought for Soviet power. The Bolsheviks created Cossack regiments, often on the basis of old regiments of the tsarist army. So, on the Don, the majority of the Cossacks of the 1st, 15th and 32nd Don Regiments went to the Red Army. In battles, the Red Cossacks emerged as the best fighting units of the Bolsheviks. In June, the Don Red partisans were consolidated into the 1st Socialist Cavalry Regiment (about 1000 sabers) led by Dumenko and his deputy Budyonny. In August, this regiment, replenished with cavalry from the Martyno-Orlovsky detachment, turned into the 1st Don Soviet Cavalry Brigade, led by the same commanders. Dumenko and Budyonny were the initiators of the creation of large cavalry formations in the Red Army. Since the summer of 1918, they persistently convinced the Soviet leadership of the need to create mounted divisions and corps. Their views were shared by K.E. Voroshilov, I.V. Stalin, A.I. Egorov and other leaders of the 10th Army. By order of the commander of the 10th Army K.E. Voroshilov No. 62 of November 28, 1918, Dumenko’s cavalry brigade was reorganized into the Consolidated Cavalry Division. The commander of the 32nd Cossack regiment, military foreman Mironov, also unconditionally sided with the new government. The Cossacks elected him military commissar of the Ust-Medveditsky district revolutionary committee. In the spring of 1918, to fight the Whites, Mironov organized several Cossack partisan detachments, which were then united into the 23rd Division of the Red Army. Mironov was appointed division commander. In September 1918 - February 1919, he successfully and famously crushed the white cavalry near Tambov and Voronezh, for which he was awarded the highest award of the Soviet Republic - the Order of the Red Banner No. 3. However, most of the Cossacks fought for the whites. The Bolshevik leadership saw that it was the Cossacks who made up the majority of the manpower of the white armies. This was especially typical for the south of Russia, where two-thirds of all Russian Cossacks were concentrated in the Don and Kuban. The civil war in the Cossack regions was fought with the most brutal methods; the extermination of prisoners and hostages was often practiced.

Rice. 3 Execution of captured Cossacks and hostages

Due to the small number of Red Cossacks, it seemed that all Cossacks were fighting with the rest of the non-Cossack population. By the end of 1918, it became obvious that in almost every army, approximately 80% of the combat-ready Cossacks were fighting the Bolsheviks and about 20% were fighting on the side of the Reds. On the fields of the outbreak of the civil war, the white Cossacks of Shkuro fought with the red Cossacks of Budyonny, the red Cossacks of Mironov fought with the white Cossacks of Mamantov, the white Cossacks of Dutov fought with the red Cossacks of Kashirin, and so on... A bloody whirlwind swept over the Cossack lands. The grief-stricken Cossack women said: “Divided into whites and reds and let’s chop each other down to the delight of the Jewish commissars.” This was only to the advantage of the Bolsheviks and the forces behind them. Such is the great Cossack tragedy. And she had her reasons. When the 3rd Extraordinary Circle of the Orenburg Cossack Army took place in Orenburg in September 1918, where the first results of the fight against the Soviets were summed up, Ataman of the 1st District K.A. Kargin, with brilliant simplicity and very accurately described the main sources and causes of Bolshevism among the Cossacks. “The Bolsheviks in Russia and in the army were a result of the fact that we have many poor people. And neither disciplinary regulations nor executions will eliminate the discord as long as we have poverty. Eliminate this poverty, give it the opportunity to live like a human being - and all these Bolshevisms and other “isms” will disappear.” However, it was already too late to philosophize and drastic punitive measures were planned at the Circle against supporters of the Bolsheviks, Cossacks, nonresidents and their families. It must be said that they were not much different from the punitive actions of the Reds. The gap among the Cossacks deepened. In addition to the Ural, Orenburg and Siberian Cossacks, Kolchak’s army included the Transbaikal and Ussuri Cossack troops, which found themselves under the patronage and support of the Japanese. Initially, the formation of the armed forces to fight against the Bolsheviks was based on the principle of voluntariness, but in August the mobilization of youth aged 19-20 was announced, and as a result, Kolchak’s army began to number up to 200,000 people. By August 1918, forces numbering up to 120,000 people were deployed on the Western Front of Siberia alone. Units of the troops were distributed into three armies: the Siberian under the command of Gaida, who broke with the Czechs and was promoted to general by Admiral Kolchak, the Western under the command of the glorious Cossack general Khanzhin and the Southern under the command of the ataman of the Orenburg army, General Dutov. The Ural Cossacks, having driven back the Reds, fought from Astrakhan to Novonikolaevsk, occupying a front stretching 500-600 versts. Against these troops, the Reds had from 80 to 100,000 people on the Eastern Front. However, having strengthened the troops by forced mobilization, the Reds went on the offensive and occupied Kazan on September 9, Simbirsk on the 12th, and Samara on October 10. By the Christmas holidays, Ufa was taken by the Reds, the Siberian armies began to retreat to the east and occupy the passes of the Ural Mountains, where the armies were supposed to be replenished, put themselves in order and prepare for the spring offensive. At the end of 1918, Dutov's Southern Army, formed mainly from Cossacks of the Orenburg Cossack Army, also suffered heavy losses, and left Orenburg in January 1919.

In the south, in the summer of 1918, 25 ages were mobilized into the Don Army and there were 27,000 infantry, 30,000 cavalry, 175 guns, 610 machine guns, 20 aircraft, 4 armored trains in service, not counting the young standing army. By August the reorganization of the army was completed. The foot regiments had 2-3 battalions, 1000 bayonets and 8 machine guns in each battalion, the horse regiments were six hundred strong with 8 machine guns. The regiments were organized into brigades and divisions, divisions into corps, which were placed on 3 fronts: northern against Voronezh, eastern against Tsaritsyn and southeastern near the village of Velikoknyazheskaya. The special beauty and pride of the Don was the standing army of Cossacks of 19-20 years of age. It consisted of: 1st Don Cossack Division - 5 thousand swords, 1st Plastun Brigade - 8 thousand bayonets, 1st Rifle Brigade - 8 thousand bayonets, 1st Engineer Battalion - 1 thousand bayonets, technical troops - armored trains , airplanes, armored squads, etc. In total, up to 30 thousand excellent fighters. A river flotilla of 8 ships was created. After bloody battles on July 27, the Don units went beyond the army in the north and occupied the city of Boguchar, Voronezh province. The Don Army was free from the Red Guard, but the Cossacks categorically refused to go further. With great difficulty, the ataman managed to carry out the Circle’s resolution on crossing the borders of the Don Army, which was expressed in the order. But it was a dead letter. The Cossacks said: “We will go if the Russians also go.” But the Russian Volunteer Army was firmly stuck in the Kuban and could not go north. Denikin refused the ataman. He declared that he must remain in the Kuban until he liberated the entire North Caucasus from the Bolsheviks.

Rice. 4 Cossack regions of southern Russia

Under these conditions, the ataman looked carefully at Ukraine. As long as there was order in Ukraine, as long as there was friendship and alliance with the hetman, he was calm. The western border did not require a single soldier from the chieftain. There was a proper trade exchange with Ukraine. But there was no firm confidence that the hetman would survive. The hetman did not have an army; the Germans prevented him from creating one. There was a good division of Sich riflemen, several officer battalions, and a very smart hussar regiment. But these were ceremonial troops. There were a bunch of generals and officers who were appointed commanders of corps, divisions and regiments. They put on the original Ukrainian zhupans, issued the forelocks, hung crooked sabers, occupied the barracks, issued regulations with covers in Ukrainian and content in Russian, but there were no soldiers in the army. All order was ensured by German garrisons. Their menacing “Halt” silenced all the political mongrels. However, the hetman understood that it was impossible to forever rely on German troops and sought a defensive alliance with the Don, Kuban, Crimea and the peoples of the Caucasus against the Bolsheviks. The Germans supported him in this. On October 20, the hetman and the ataman held negotiations at the Skorokhodovo station and sent a letter to the command of the Volunteer Army, outlining their proposals. But the outstretched hand was rejected. So, the goals of Ukraine, the Don and the Volunteer Army had significant differences. The leaders of Ukraine and the Don considered the main goal to be the fight against the Bolsheviks, and the determination of the structure of Russia was postponed until victory. Denikin adhered to a completely different point of view. He believed that he was on the same path only with those who denied any autonomy and unconditionally shared the idea of ​​a united and indivisible Russia. In the conditions of the Russian Troubles, this was his enormous epistemological, ideological, organizational and political mistake, which determined the sad fate of the white movement.

The chieftain was faced with the fact of harsh reality. The Cossacks refused to go beyond the Donskoy army. And they were right. Voronezh, Saratov and other peasants not only did not fight the Bolsheviks, but also went against the Cossacks. The Cossacks, not without difficulty, were able to cope with their Don workers, peasants and non-residents, but they could not defeat all of central Russia and they understood this perfectly well. The ataman had the only means to force the Cossacks to march on Moscow. It was necessary to give them a break from the privations of combat and then force them to join the Russian people's army advancing on Moscow. He asked for volunteers twice and was refused twice. Then he began to create a new Russian southern army with funds from Ukraine and the Don. But Denikin prevented this matter in every possible way, calling it a German idea. However, the ataman needed this army due to the extreme fatigue of the Don army and the decisive refusal of the Cossacks to march to Russia. In Ukraine there were personnel for this army. After the aggravation of relations between the Volunteer Army and the Germans and Skoropadsky, the Germans began to prevent the movement of volunteers to the Kuban and quite a lot of people accumulated in Ukraine who were ready to fight the Bolsheviks, but did not have such an opportunity. From the very beginning, the Kiev union “Our Motherland” became the main supplier of personnel for the southern army. The monarchical orientation of this organization sharply narrowed the social base of the army, since monarchical ideas were very unpopular among the people. Thanks to socialist propaganda, the word tsar was still a bugbear for many people. With the name of the tsar, the peasants inextricably linked the idea of ​​​​the harsh collection of taxes, the sale of the last little cow for debts to the state, the dominance of landowners and capitalists, gold-chasing officers and the officer’s stick. In addition, they were afraid of the return of the landowners and punishment for the ruin of their estates. Ordinary Cossacks did not want restoration, because the concept of monarchy was associated with universal, long-term, forced military service, the obligation to equip themselves at their own expense and maintain combat horses that were not needed on the farm. Cossack officers associated tsarism with ideas about ruinous “benefits.” The Cossacks liked their new independent system, they were pleased that they themselves were discussing issues of power, land and mineral resources. The king and the monarchy were opposed to the concept of freedom. It is difficult to say what the intelligentsia wanted and what it feared, because it itself never knows. She is like that Baba Yaga who is “always against.” In addition, General Ivanov, also a monarchist, a very distinguished man, but already sick and elderly, took command of the southern army. As a result, little came of this venture.

And the Soviet government, suffering defeats everywhere, began in July 1918 to properly organize the Red Army. With the help of officers brought into it, scattered Soviet detachments were brought together into military formations. Military specialists were placed in command posts in regiments, brigades, divisions and corps. The Bolsheviks managed to create a split not only among the Cossacks, but also among the officers. It was divided into approximately three equal parts: for the whites, for the reds, and for no one. Here is another great tragedy.

Rice. 5 Mother's tragedy. One son is for the whites, and the other is for the reds

The Don Army had to fight against a militarily organized enemy. By August, more than 70,000 soldiers, 230 guns and 450 machine guns were concentrated against the Don Army. The enemy's numerical superiority in forces created a difficult situation for the Don. This situation was aggravated by political turmoil. On August 15, after the liberation of the entire territory of the Don from the Bolsheviks, a Great Military Circle was convened in Novocherkassk from the entire population of the Don. This was no longer the former “gray” Circle of Don’s salvation. The intelligentsia and semi-intelligentsia, public teachers, lawyers, clerks, clerks, and solicitors entered it, managed to capture the minds of the Cossacks, and the Circle was divided into districts, villages, and parties. At the Circle, from the very first meetings, opposition to Ataman Krasnov opened up, which had roots in the Volunteer Army. Ataman was accused of his friendly relations with the Germans, his desire for firm independent power and independence. And indeed, the ataman contrasted Cossack chauvinism with Bolshevism, Cossack nationalism with internationalism, and Don independence with Russian imperialism. Very few people then understood the significance of Don separatism as a transitional phenomenon. Denikin did not understand this either. Everything on the Don irritated him: the anthem, the flag, the coat of arms, the ataman, the Circle, discipline, satiety, order, Don patriotism. He considered all this a manifestation of separatism and fought against the Don and Kuban with all methods. As a result, he chopped off the branch on which he was sitting. As soon as the civil war ceased to be national and popular, it became a class war and could not be successful for the whites due to the large number of the poorer class. First the peasants, and then the Cossacks, fell away from the Volunteer Army and the white movement and it died. They talk about the Cossacks betraying Denikin, but this is not true, quite the opposite. If Denikin had not betrayed the Cossacks, if he had not cruelly offended their young national feeling, they would not have left him. In addition, the decision made by the ataman and the Military Circle to continue the war outside the Don intensified anti-war propaganda on the part of the Reds, and ideas began to spread among the Cossack units that the ataman and the government were pushing the Cossacks to conquests that were alien to them outside the Don, the possession of which the Bolsheviks were not encroaching on. . The Cossacks wanted to believe that the Bolsheviks really would not touch the Don territory and that it was possible to come to an agreement with them. The Cossacks reasoned reasonably: “We have liberated our lands from the Reds, let Russian soldiers and peasants lead the further fight against them, and we can only help them.” In addition, for summer field work on the Don, workers were required, and because of this, the older ages had to be released and sent home, which greatly affected the size and combat effectiveness of the army. The bearded Cossacks firmly united and disciplined hundreds with their authority. But despite the machinations of the opposition, folk wisdom and national egoism prevailed on the Circle over the cunning attacks of political parties. The chieftain's policy was approved, and he himself was re-elected on September 12. Ataman firmly understood that Russia itself must be saved. He did not trust the Germans, much less the Allies. He knew that foreigners go to Russia not for Russia, but to snatch as much as possible from it. He also understood that Germany and France, for opposite reasons, needed a strong and powerful Russia, and England a weak, fragmented, federal one. He believed in Germany and France, he did not believe in England at all.

By the end of summer, the fighting on the border of the Don region centered around Tsaritsyn, which was also not part of the Don region. The defense there was led by the future Soviet leader I.V. Stalin, whose organizational abilities are now doubted only by the most ignorant and stubborn. Lulling the Cossacks to sleep with propaganda about the futility of their struggle outside the borders of the Don, the Bolsheviks concentrated large forces on this front. However, the first Red offensive was repulsed, and they retreated to Kamyshin and the lower Volga. While the Volunteer Army fought during the summer to clear the Kuban region from the army of paramedic Sorokin, the Don Army ensured its activities on all fronts against the Reds from Tsaritsyn to Taganrog. During the summer of 1918, the Don Army suffered heavy losses, up to 40% of the Cossacks and up to 70% of the officers. The quantitative superiority of the Reds and the vast front space did not allow the Cossack regiments to leave the front and go to the rear to rest. The Cossacks were in constant combat tension. Not only the people were tired, but the horse train was also exhausted. Difficult conditions and lack of proper hygiene began to cause infectious diseases, and typhus appeared among the troops. In addition, units of the Reds under the command of Zhloba, defeated in battles north of Stavropol, went towards Tsaritsyn. The appearance from the Caucasus of Sorokin's army, which had not been killed by volunteers, posed a threat from the flank and rear of the Don Army, which was waging a stubborn struggle against the garrison of 50,000 people occupying Tsaritsyn. With the onset of cold weather and general fatigue, the Don units began to retreat from Tsaritsyn.

But how were things in Kuban? The lack of weapons and fighters of the Volunteer Army was made up for with enthusiasm and daring. Across the open field, under hurricane fire, officer companies, striking the imagination of the enemy, moved in orderly chains and drove the Red troops ten times larger in number.

Rice. 6 Attack of the officer company

Successful battles, accompanied by the capture of a large number of prisoners, raised the spirits in the Kuban villages, and the Cossacks began to take up arms en masse. The Volunteer Army, which suffered heavy losses, was replenished with a large number of Kuban Cossacks, volunteers arriving from all over Russia and people from the partial mobilization of the population. The need for unified command of all forces fighting against the Bolsheviks was recognized by the entire command staff. In addition, it was necessary for the leaders of the White movement to take into account the all-Russian situation that had developed in the revolutionary process. Unfortunately, none of the leaders of the Good Army, who claimed the role of leaders on an all-Russian scale, possessed flexibility and dialectical philosophy. The dialectic of the Bolsheviks, who, in order to retain power, gave the Germans more than a third of the territory and population of European Russia, of course, could not serve as an example, but Denikin’s claims to the role of an immaculate and unyielding guardian of “one and indivisible Russia” in the conditions of the Troubles could only be ridiculous. In the conditions of a multifactorial and merciless struggle of “everyone against everyone,” he did not have the necessary flexibility and dialectics. Ataman Krasnov’s refusal to subordinate the administration of the Don region to Denikin was understood by him not only as the ataman’s personal vanity, but also as the independence of the Cossacks hidden in this. All parts of the Russian Empire that sought to restore order on their own were considered by Denikin to be enemies of the white movement. The local authorities of Kuban also did not recognize Denikin, and punitive detachments began to be sent against them from the first days of the struggle. Military efforts were scattered, significant forces were diverted from the main goal. The main sections of the population, objectively supporting the whites, not only did not join the struggle, but became his opponents. The front required a large number of male population, but it was also necessary to take into account the demands of internal work, and often the Cossacks who were at the front were released from units for certain periods of time. The Kuban government exempted some ages from mobilization, and General Denikin saw in this “dangerous preconditions and a manifestation of sovereignty.” The army was fed by the Kuban population. The Kuban government paid all the costs of supplying the Volunteer Army, which could not complain about the food supply. At the same time, according to the laws of war, the Volunteer Army appropriated to itself the right to all property seized from the Bolsheviks, cargo going to Red units, the right to requisition, and more. Other means of replenishing the treasury of the Good Army were indemnities imposed on villages that showed hostile actions towards it. To account for and distribute this property, General Denikin organized a commission of public figures from the military-industrial committee. The activities of this commission proceeded in such a way that a significant part of the cargo was spoiled, some was stolen, and there was abuse among the members of the commission that the commission was composed of mostly unprepared, useless, even harmful and ignorant people. The immutable law of any army is that everything beautiful, brave, heroic, noble goes to the front, and everything cowardly, shying away from battle, everything thirsting not for heroism and glory, but for profit and outward splendor, all speculators gather in the rear. People who have never seen a hundred-ruble ticket before are handling millions of rubles, they are dizzy from this money, they sell “loot” here, they have their heroes here. The front is ragged, barefoot, naked and hungry, and here people are sitting in cleverly sewn Circassian caps, colored caps, jackets and riding breeches. Here they drink wine, jingle gold and politick.

There are infirmaries with doctors, nurses and nurses. There is love and jealousy here. This was the case in all armies, and this was also the case in the white armies. Along with ideological people, selfish people joined the white movement. These selfish people settled firmly in the rear and flooded Ekaterinodar, Rostov and Novocherkassk. Their behavior hurt the sight and hearing of the army and the population. In addition, it was not clear to General Denikin why the Kuban government, liberating the region, replaced the rulers with the same people who were under the Bolsheviks, renaming them from commissars to atamans. He did not understand that the business qualities of each Cossack were determined in the conditions of Cossack democracy by the Cossacks themselves. However, not being able to restore order himself in the regions liberated from Bolshevik rule, General Denikin remained irreconcilable with the local Cossack order and with local national organizations that lived by their own customs in pre-revolutionary times. They were classified as hostile “independents,” and punitive measures were taken against them. All these reasons could not help attract the population to the side of the white army. At the same time, General Denikin, both during the Civil War and in emigration, thought a lot, but to no avail, about the completely inexplicable (from his point of view) epidemic spread of Bolshevism. Moreover, the Kuban army, territorially and by origin, was divided into an army of Black Sea Cossacks, resettled by order of Empress Catherine II after the destruction of the Dnieper army, and the Lineians, whose population consisted of settlers from the Don region and from the communities of the Volga Cossacks.

These two units, constituting one army, were different in character. Both parts contained their historical past. The Black Sea people were the heirs of the army of the Dnieper Cossacks and Zaporozhye, whose ancestors, due to their many times demonstrated political instability, were destroyed as an army. Moreover, the Russian authorities only completed the destruction of the Dnieper Army, and it was started by Poland, under the rule of whose kings the Dnieper Cossacks were for a long time. This unstable orientation of the Little Russians has brought many tragedies in the past; it is enough to recall the inglorious fate and death of their last talented hetman Mazepa. This violent past and other features of the Little Russian character imposed strong specifics on the behavior of the Kuban people in the civil war. The Kuban Rada split into two currents: Ukrainian and independent. The leaders of the Rada Bych and Ryabovol proposed merging with Ukraine, the independentists stood for the establishment of a federation in which Kuban would be completely independent. Both of them dreamed and sought to free themselves from Denikin’s tutelage. He, in turn, considered them all traitors. The moderate part of the Rada, front-line soldiers and Ataman Filimonov stuck to the volunteers. They wanted to free themselves from the Bolsheviks with the help of volunteers. But Ataman Filimonov had little authority among the Cossacks; they had other heroes: Pokrovsky, Shkuro, Ulagai, Pavlyuchenko. The Kuban people liked them very much, but their behavior was difficult to predict. The behavior of numerous Caucasian nationalities was even more unpredictable, which determined the great specificity of the civil war in the Caucasus. Frankly speaking, with all their zigzags and twists, the Reds used all this specificity much better than Denikin.

Many white hopes were associated with the name of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich Romanov. Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich lived all this time in Crimea, without openly participating in political events. He was greatly depressed by the thought that by sending his telegram to the sovereign with a request for abdication, he contributed to the death of the monarchy and the destruction of Russia. The Grand Duke wanted to make amends for this and take part in military work. However, in response to General Alekseev’s lengthy letter, the Grand Duke responded with only one phrase: “Be at peace”... and General Alekseev died on September 25. The high command and the civilian part of the administration of the liberated territories were completely united in the hands of General Denikin.

Heavy continuous fighting exhausted both sides fighting in the Kuban. The Reds also had a struggle among the high command. The commander of the 11th Army, former paramedic Sorokin, was removed, and command passed to the Revolutionary Military Council. Finding no support in the army, Sorokin fled from Pyatigorsk in the direction of Stavropol. On October 17, he was caught, put in prison, where he was killed without any trial. After the murder of Sorkin, as a result of internal squabbles among the Red leaders and from impotent rage at the stubborn resistance of the Cossacks, also wanting to intimidate the population, a demonstrative execution of 106 hostages was carried out in Mineralnye Vody. Among those executed were General Radko-Dmitriev, a Bulgarian in Russian service, and General Ruzsky, who so persistently persuaded the last Russian Emperor to abdicate the throne. After the verdict, General Ruzsky was asked the question: “Do you now recognize the great Russian revolution?” He replied: “I see only one great robbery.” It is worth adding to this that the beginning of the robbery was laid by him at the headquarters of the Northern Front, where violence was carried out against the will of the emperor, who was forced to abdicate the throne. As for the bulk of the former officers located in the North Caucasus, they turned out to be absolutely inert to the events taking place, showing no desire to serve either the whites or the reds, which decided their fate. Almost all of them were destroyed “just in case” by the Reds.

In the Caucasus, the class struggle was heavily implicated in the national question. Among the numerous peoples who inhabited it, Georgia had the greatest political importance, and in an economic sense, Caucasian oil. Politically and territorially, Georgia found itself primarily under pressure from Turkey. Soviet power, but to the Brest-Litovsk Peace, ceded Kars, Ardahan and Batum to Turkey, which Georgia could not recognize. Türkiye recognized the independence of Georgia, but presented territorial demands even more severe than the demands of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty. Georgia refused to carry them out, the Turks went on the offensive and occupied Kars, heading towards Tiflis. Not recognizing Soviet power, Georgia sought to ensure the country's independence with armed force and began the formation of an army. But Georgia was governed by politicians who took an active part after the revolution as part of the Petrograd Council of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies. These same individuals now ingloriously tried to build the Georgian army on the same principles that at one time led the Russian army to disintegration. In the spring of 1918, the struggle for Caucasian oil began. The German command removed a cavalry brigade and several battalions from the Bulgarian front and transported them to Batum and Poti, which was leased by Germany for 60 years. However, the Turks were the first to appear in Baku and the fanaticism of Turkish Mohammedanism, the ideas and propaganda of the Reds, the power and money of the British and Germans clashed there. In Transcaucasia, since ancient times there was irreconcilable hostility between Armenians and Azerbaijanis (then they were called Turk-Tatars). After the Soviets established power, centuries-old hostilities were intensified by religion and politics. Two camps were created: the Soviet-Armenian proletariat and the Turkish-Tatars. Back in March 1918, one of the Soviet-Armenian regiments, returning from Persia, seized power in Baku and massacred entire neighborhoods of the Turk-Tatars, killing up to 10,000 people. For several months, power in the city remained in the hands of the Red Armenians. At the beginning of September, a Turkish corps under the command of Mursal Pasha arrived in Baku, dispersed the Baku commune and occupied the city. With the arrival of the Turks, the massacre of the Armenian population began. The Muslims were triumphant.

Germany, after the Brest-Litovsk Treaty, strengthened itself on the shores of the Azov and Black Seas, to the ports of which part of their fleet was introduced. In the coastal cities of the Black Sea, German sailors, who sympathetically followed the unequal struggle of the Good Army with the Bolsheviks, offered their help to the army headquarters, which was contemptuously rejected by Denikin. Georgia, separated from Russia by a mountain range, had a connection with the northern part of the Caucasus through a narrow strip of coast that made up the Black Sea province. Having annexed the Sukhumi district to its territory, Georgia deployed an armed detachment under the command of General Mazniev to Tuapse by September. This was a fatal decision when the yeast of the national interests of the newly emerged states with all their severity and intractability was poured into the Civil War. The Georgians sent a detachment of 3,000 people with 18 guns against the Volunteer Army towards Tuapse. On the coast, the Georgians began to build fortifications with a front to the north, and a small German landing force landed in Sochi and Adler. General Denikin began to reproach the representatives of Georgia for the difficult and humiliating situation of the Russian population on the territory of Georgia, the theft of Russian state property, the invasion and occupation by the Georgians, together with the Germans, of the Black Sea province. To which Georgia replied: “The volunteer army is a private organization... Under the current situation, the Sochi district should become part of Georgia...”. In this dispute between the leaders of the Dobrarmia and Georgia, the government of Kuban was entirely on the side of Georgia. The Kuban people had friendly relations with Georgia. It soon became clear that the Sochi district was occupied by Georgia with the consent of Kuban and that there were no misunderstandings between Kuban and Georgia.

Such turbulent events that developed in Transcaucasia did not leave any room there for the problems of the Russian Empire and its last stronghold, the Volunteer Army. Therefore, General Denikin finally turned his gaze to the East, where the government of Admiral Kolchak was formed. An embassy was sent to him, and then Denikin recognized Admiral Kolchak as the Supreme Ruler of national Russia.

Meanwhile, the defense of the Don continued on the front from Tsaritsyn to Taganrog. All summer and autumn, the Don Army, without any outside help, fought heavy and constant battles on the main directions from Voronezh and Tsaritsyn. Instead of the Red Guard gangs, the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (RKKA), which had just been created through the efforts of military experts, was already fighting against the people's Don Army. By the end of 1918, the Red Army already had 299 regular regiments, including 97 regiments on the eastern front against Kolchak, 38 regiments on the northern front against the Finns and Germans, 65 regiments on the western front against the Polish-Lithuanian troops, 99 regiments on the southern front, of which there were 44 regiments on the Don front, 5 regiments on the Astrakhan front, 28 regiments on the Kursk-Bryansk front, and 22 regiments against Denikin and Kuban. The army was commanded by the Revolutionary Military Council, headed by Bronstein (Trotsky), and the Defense Council, headed by Ulyanov (Lenin), stood at the head of all military efforts of the country. The headquarters of the Southern Front in Kozlov received in October the task of wiping out the Don Cossacks from the face of the earth and occupying Rostov and Novocherkassk at all costs. The front was commanded by General Sytin. The front consisted of Sorokin's 11th Army, headquarters in Nevinnomyssk, operating against volunteers and Kuban, Antonov's 12th Army, headquarters in Astrakhan, Voroshilov's 10th Army, headquarters in Tsaritsyn, General Egorov's 9th Army, headquarters in Balashov, 8th Army of General Chernavin, headquarters in Voronezh. Sorokin, Antonov and Voroshilov were remnants of the previous electoral system, and Sorokin’s fate had already been decided, a replacement was being sought for Voroshilov, and all the other commanders were former staff officers and generals of the imperial army. Thus, the situation on the Don front was developing in a very formidable manner. The ataman and the army commanders, Generals Denisov and Ivanov, were aware that the times when one Cossack was enough for ten Red Guards were over and understood that the period of “handicraft” operations was over. The Don army was preparing to fight back. The offensive was stopped, the troops retreated from the Voronezh province and consolidated on a fortified strip along the border of the Don Army. Relying on the left flank on Ukraine, occupied by the Germans, and on the right on the inaccessible Trans-Volga region, the ataman hoped to hold the defense until spring, during which time he had strengthened and strengthened his army. But man proposes, but God disposes.

In November, extremely unfavorable events of a general political nature occurred for Don. The Allies defeated the Central Powers, Kaiser Wilhelm abdicated the throne, and a revolution and disintegration of the army began in Germany. German troops began to leave Russia. German soldiers did not obey their commanders; they were already ruled by their Soviets of Soldiers' Deputies. Just recently, stern German soldiers stopped crowds of workers and soldiers in Ukraine with the formidable “Halt,” but now they obediently allowed themselves to be disarmed by Ukrainian peasants. And then Ostap suffered. Ukraine began to boil, seethed with uprisings, each volost had its own “fathers” and the civil war rolled wildly across the country. Hetmanism, Gaidama, Petliurism, Makhnovism... All this was heavily implicated in Ukrainian nationalism and separatism. Many works have been written about this period and dozens of films have been made, including incredibly popular ones. If you remember “Wedding in Malinovka” or “Little Red Devils”, you can vividly imagine... the future of Ukraine.

And then Petlyura, uniting with Vinnichenko, raised a revolt of the Sich Riflemen. There was no one to suppress the rebellion. The hetman did not have his own army. The German Council of Deputies concluded a truce with Petliura, who drove up the trains and German soldiers loaded into them, abandoning their positions and weapons, and set off for their homeland. Under these conditions, the French command on the Black Sea promised the hetman 3-4 divisions. But in Versailles, on the Thames and the Potomac they looked at it completely differently. Big politicians saw a united Russia as a threat to Persia, India, the Middle and Far East. They wanted to see Russia destroyed, fragmented and burning over a slow fire. In Soviet Russia they followed the events with fear and trembling. Objectively, the victory of the Allies was the defeat of Bolshevism. Both the commissars and the Red Army soldiers understood this. Just as the Don people said that they could not fight against all of Russia, so the Red Army soldiers understood that they could not fight against the whole world. But there was no need to fight. Versailles did not want to save Russia, did not want to share the fruits of victory with it, so they postponed assistance. There was another reason. Although the British and French said that Bolshevism is a disease of defeated armies, but they are the victors and their armies are not touched by this terrible disease. But that was not the case. Their soldiers no longer wanted to fight with anyone, their armies were already corroded by the same terrible gangrene of war fatigue as the others. And when the allies did not come to Ukraine, the Bolsheviks began to hope for victory. Hastily formed squads of officers and cadets were left to defend Ukraine and the hetman. The Hetman's troops were defeated, the Ukrainian Council of Ministers surrendered Kyiv to the Petliurists, bargaining for themselves and the officer squads the right to evacuation to the Don and Kuban. The hetman escaped.

Petlyura’s return to power was colorfully described in the novel “Days of the Turbins” by Mikhail Bulgakov: chaos, murder, violence against Russian officers and simply against Russians in Kyiv. And then the stubborn struggle against Russia, not only against the red one, but also against the white one. The Petliurites carried out terrible terror, massacres and genocide of Russians in the occupied territories. The Soviet command, having learned about this, moved Antonov’s army to Ukraine, which easily defeated the Petliura gangs and occupied Kharkov, and then Kyiv. Petlyura fled to Kamenets-Podolsk. In Ukraine, after the Germans left, huge reserves of military equipment remained, which went to the Reds. This gave them the opportunity to form the Ninth Army from the Ukrainian side and send it against the Don from the west. With the departure of German units from the borders of the Don and Ukraine, the situation of the Don became complicated in two respects: the army was deprived of replenishment with weapons and military supplies, and a new, western front stretching 600 miles was added. Ample opportunities opened up for the command of the Red Army to take advantage of the prevailing conditions, and they decided to first defeat the Don Army and then destroy the Kuban and Volunteer armies. All the attention of the ataman of the Don army was now turned to the western borders. But there was faith that the allies would come and help out. The intelligentsia was lovingly, enthusiastically disposed towards the allies and was looking forward to them. Thanks to the wide spread of Anglo-French education and literature, the British and French, despite the remoteness of these countries, were closer to the Russian educated heart than the Germans. And even more so the Russians, because this social layer is traditionally and firmly convinced that in our Fatherland there cannot be prophets by definition. The common people, including the Cossacks, had other priorities in this regard. The Germans enjoyed sympathy and were liked by ordinary Cossacks as a serious and hardworking people; ordinary people looked at the Frenchman as a frivolous creature with some contempt, and at the Englishman with great distrust. The Russian people were firmly convinced that during the period of Russian successes, “the Englishwoman always does shit.” It soon became clear that the Cossacks’ faith in their allies turned out to be an illusion and a chimera.

Denikin had an ambivalent attitude towards Don. While Germany was doing well, and supplies were coming to the Good Army from Ukraine through the Don, Denikin’s attitude towards Ataman Krasnov was cold, but restrained. But as soon as news of the Allied victory became known, everything changed. General Denikin began to take revenge on the ataman for his independence and show that everything was now in his hands. On November 13, in Yekaterinodar, Denikin convened a meeting of representatives of the Good Army, Don and Kuban, at which he demanded that 3 main issues be resolved. About unified power (dictatorship of General Denikin), unified command and unified representation before the allies. The meeting did not come to an agreement, and relations worsened even more, and with the arrival of the allies, a cruel intrigue began against the ataman and the Donskoy army. Ataman Krasnov has long been presented by Denikin’s agents among the Allies as a figure of “German orientation.” All the chieftain's attempts to change this characteristic were unsuccessful. In addition, when meeting foreigners, Krasnov always ordered the old Russian anthem to be played. At the same time, he said: “I have two possibilities. Either play “God Save the Tsar” in such cases, without attaching importance to the words, or a funeral march. I deeply believe in Russia, that’s why I can’t play a funeral march. I'm playing the Russian anthem." For this, Ataman was also considered a monarchist abroad. As a result, Don received no help from the allies. But the ataman had no time to fend off intrigues. The military situation changed dramatically, and the Donskoy army was threatened with death. Attaching particular importance to the territory of the Don, by November the Soviet government concentrated four armies of 125,000 soldiers with 468 guns and 1,337 machine guns against the Don Army. The rear of the Red armies were reliably covered by railway lines, which ensured the transfer of troops and maneuvering, and the Red units increased in number. The winter turned out to be early and cold. With the onset of cold weather, diseases developed and typhus began. The 60 thousand-strong Don Army began to melt and freeze numerically, and there was nowhere to take reinforcements. The manpower resources on the Don were completely exhausted, the Cossacks were mobilized from 18 to 52 years old, and even older ones acted as volunteers. It was clear that with the defeat of the Don Army, the Volunteer Army would also cease to exist. But the Don Cossacks held the front, which allowed General Denikin, taking advantage of the difficult situation on the Don, to conduct a behind-the-scenes struggle against Ataman Krasnov through members of the Military Circle. At the same time, the Bolsheviks resorted to their tried and tested method - the most tempting promises, behind which there was nothing but unheard of treachery. But these promises sounded very attractive and humane. The Bolsheviks promised the Cossacks peace and complete inviolability of the borders of the Don Army if the latter laid down their arms and went home.

They pointed out that the Allies would not help them; on the contrary, they were helping the Bolsheviks. The fight against enemy forces 2-3 times superior depressed the morale of the Cossacks, and the Reds’ promise to establish peaceful relations in some parts began to find supporters. Individual units began to leave the front, exposing it, and finally, the regiments of the Upper Don District decided to enter into negotiations with the Reds and stopped resistance. The truce was concluded on the basis of self-determination and friendship of peoples. Many Cossacks went home. Through gaps in the front, the Reds penetrated into the deep rear of the defending units and, without any pressure, the Cossacks of the Khopyorsky district rolled back. The Don Army, leaving the northern districts, retreated to the line of the Seversky Donets, surrendering village after village to the red Mironov Cossacks. The ataman did not have a single free Cossack; everything was sent to defend the western front. A threat arose over Novocherkassk. Only volunteers or allies could save the situation.

By the time the front of the Don Army collapsed, the regions of Kuban and the North Caucasus had already been liberated from the Reds. By November 1918, the armed forces in Kuban consisted of 35 thousand Kuban residents and 7 thousand volunteers. These forces were free, but General Denikin was in no hurry to provide assistance to the exhausted Don Cossacks. The situation and the allies required unified command. But not only the Cossacks, but also the Cossack officers and generals did not want to obey the tsarist generals. This conflict had to be resolved somehow. Under pressure from the allies, General Denikin invited the ataman and the Don government to gather for a meeting in order to clarify the relationship between the Don and the command of the Don Army. On December 26, 1918, Don commanders Denisov, Polyakov, Smagin, Ponomarev on the one hand and generals Denikin, Dragomirov, Romanovsky and Shcherbachev on the other gathered for a meeting in Torgovaya. The meeting was opened by a speech by General Denikin. Beginning by outlining the broad prospects of the fight against the Bolsheviks, he urged those present to forget personal grievances and insults. The issue of unified command for the entire command staff was a vital necessity, and it was clear to everyone that all armed forces, incomparably smaller in comparison with enemy units, must be united under one common leadership and directed towards one goal: the destruction of the center of Bolshevism and the occupation of Moscow. The negotiations were very difficult and constantly reached a dead end. There were too many differences between the command of the Volunteer Army and the Cossacks, in the field of politics, tactics and strategy. But still, with great difficulty and great concessions, Denikin managed to subjugate the Don Army.

During these difficult days, the chieftain accepted the Allied military mission led by General Pul. They inspected the troops in positions and in reserve, factories, workshops, and stud farms. The more Pul saw, the more he realized that immediate help was needed. But in London there was a completely different opinion. After his report, Poole was removed from leadership of the mission in the Caucasus and replaced by General Briggs, who did nothing without command from London. But there were no orders to help the Cossacks. England needed a Russia weakened, exhausted and plunged into permanent turmoil. The French mission, instead of helping, presented the ataman and the Don government with an ultimatum, in which it demanded the complete subordination of the ataman and the Don government to the French command on the Black Sea and full compensation for all losses of French citizens (read coal miners) in the Donbass. Under these conditions, persecution against the ataman and the Donskoy army continued in Yekaterinodar. General Denikin maintained contacts and conducted constant negotiations with the Chairman of the Circle, Kharlamov, and other figures from the opposition to the Ataman. However, understanding the seriousness of the situation of the Don Army, Denikin sent Mai-Maevsky’s division to the Mariupol area and 2 more Kuban divisions were echeloned and awaited the order to march. But there was no order; Denikin was waiting for the Circle’s decision regarding Ataman Krasnov.

The Great Military Circle met on February 1st. This was no longer the same circle as it was on August 15 in the days of victories. The faces were the same, but the expression was not the same. Then all the front-line soldiers had shoulder straps, orders and medals. Now all the Cossacks and junior officers were without shoulder straps. The circle, represented by its gray part, democratized and played like the Bolsheviks. On February 2, Krug expressed no confidence in the commander and chief of staff of the Don Army, Generals Denisov and Polyakov. In response, Ataman Krasnov was offended for his comrades-in-arms and resigned from his position as Ataman. The circle did not accept her at first. But behind the scenes, the dominant opinion was that without the resignation of the ataman, there would be no help from the allies and Denikin. After this, the Circle accepted the resignation. In his place, General Bogaevsky was elected ataman. On February 3, General Denikin visited the Circle, where he was greeted with thunderous applause. Now the Volunteer, Don, Kuban, Terek armies and the Black Sea Fleet were united under his command under the name of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia (AFSR).

The truce between the Severodonon Cossacks and the Bolsheviks lasted, but not for long. Just a few days after the truce, the Reds appeared in the villages and began to carry out savage massacres among the Cossacks. They began to take away grain, steal livestock, kill disobedient people and commit violence. In response, an uprising began on February 26, sweeping the villages of Kazanskaya, Migulinskaya, Veshenskaya and Elanskaya. The defeat of Germany, the elimination of Ataman Krasnov, the creation of the AFSR and the uprising of the Cossacks began a new stage in the fight against the Bolsheviks in the south of Russia. But that's a completely different story.

Materials used:
Gordeev A.A. - History of the Cossacks
Mamonov V.F. and others - History of the Cossacks of the Urals. Orenburg-Chelyabinsk 1992
Shibanov N.S. - Orenburg Cossacks of the 20th century
Ryzhkova N.V. - Don Cossacks in the wars of the early twentieth century - 2008
Brusilov A.A. My memories. Voenizdat. M.1983
Krasnov P.N. The Great Don Army. "Patriot" M.1990
Lukomsky A.S. The birth of the Volunteer Army.M.1926
Denikin A.I. How the fight against the Bolsheviks began in the south of Russia. M. 1926

In December 1918, at a meeting of party activists in Kursk, L.D. Trotsky, Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic and People's Commissar for Naval Affairs, analyzing the results of the year of the civil war, instructed: “It should be clear to each of you that the old ruling classes received their art, their skill in governing as a legacy from their grandfathers and great-grandfathers. What can we do to counter this? How can we compensate for our inexperience? Remember, comrades, only by terror. Consistent and merciless terror! History will never forgive us for our compliance and softness. If so far we have destroyed hundreds and thousands, now the time has come to create an organization whose apparatus, if necessary, can destroy tens of thousands. We don’t have time, we don’t have the opportunity to look for our real, active enemies. We are forced to take the path of destruction."

In confirmation and development of these words, on January 29, 1919, Ya. M. Sverdlov, on behalf of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), sent a circular letter, known as the “directive on de-Cossackization to all responsible comrades working in the Cossack regions.” The directive read:

“The latest events on various fronts and Cossack regions, our advances deeper into Cossack settlements and disintegration among the Cossack troops forces us to give instructions to party workers about the nature of their work in these areas. It is necessary, taking into account the experience of the Civil War with the Cossacks, to recognize the only correct thing to be the most merciless fight against all the top of the Cossacks, through their total extermination.

1. Carry out mass terror against the rich Cossacks, exterminating them without exception; carry out merciless terror against all Cossacks who took any direct or indirect part in the fight against Soviet power. It is necessary to take all those measures towards the average Cossacks that provide a guarantee against any attempts on their part to make new protests against Soviet power.

2. Confiscate bread and force all surplus to be poured into specified points, this applies to both bread and all agricultural products.

3. Take all measures to assist the migrating newcomer poor, organizing resettlement where possible.

4. Equalize nonresident newcomers with the Cossacks in land and all other respects.

5. carry out complete disarmament, shoot everyone who is found to have a weapon after the surrender date.

6. Issue weapons only to reliable elements from out of town.

7. Armed detachments should be left in the Cossack villages until complete order is established.

8. All commissioners appointed to certain Cossack settlements are invited to show maximum firmness and steadily implement these instructions.

The Central Committee decides to carry through the relevant Soviet institutions the commitment of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture to urgently develop actual measures for the mass resettlement of the poor to Cossack lands. Central Committee of the RCP (b)".

There is an opinion that the authorship of the directive on storytelling belongs to only one person - Ya. M. Sverdlov, and neither the Central Committee of the RCP (b) nor the Council of People's Commissars took any part in the adoption of this document. However, analyzing the entire course of the Bolshevik party’s seizure of power in the period 1917-1918, it becomes obvious that there is a pattern of raising violence and lawlessness to the rank of state policy. The desire for limitless dictatorship provoked a cynical justification for the inevitability of terror.

Under these conditions, the terror unleashed against the Cossacks in the occupied villages acquired such proportions that, on March 16, 1919, the Plenum of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) was forced to recognize the January directive as erroneous. But the flywheel of the extermination machine was launched, and it was no longer possible to stop it.

The beginning of state genocide on the part of the Bolsheviks and distrust of yesterday’s neighbors - the mountaineers, fear of them, pushed part of the Cossacks again onto the path of struggle against Soviet power, but now as part of General Denikin’s Volunteer Army.

The overt genocide of the Cossacks that began led the Don to disaster, but in the North Caucasus it ended in complete defeat for the Bolsheviks. The 150,000-strong XI Army, which Fedko led after Sorokin’s death, was cumbersomely deploying for the decisive blow. It was covered from the flank by the XII Army occupying the area from Vladikavkaz to Grozny. From these two armies the Caspian-Caucasian Front was created. Things were uneasy in the rear of the Reds. Stavropol peasants were increasingly inclined to whites after the invasion of food detachments. The mountaineers turned away from the Bolsheviks, even those who supported them during the period of general anarchy. Thus, the Chechens, Kabardians and Ossetians had their own civil war: some wanted to go with the Reds, others with the Whites, and still others wanted to build an Islamic state. The Kalmyks openly hated the Bolsheviks after the outrages committed against them. After the bloody suppression of the Bicherakhov uprising, the Terek Cossacks hid.

On January 4, 1919, the Volunteer Army dealt a crushing blow to the XI Red Army in the area of ​​the village of Nevinnomyssk and, having broken through the front, began to pursue the enemy in two directions - to the Holy Cross and to Mineralnye Vody. The gigantic XI Army began to fall apart. Ordzhonikidze insisted on withdrawing to Vladikavkaz. Most commanders were against it, believing that an army pressed against the mountains would fall into a trap. Already on January 19, Pyatigorsk was captured by the Whites, and on January 20, the Georgievsk group of the Reds was defeated.

To repel the white troops and to direct all military operations in the region, by decision of the Caucasian Regional Committee of the RCP (b), at the end of December 1918, the Defense Council of the North Caucasus was created, headed by G. K. Ordzhonikidze. At the direction of the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR, weapons and ammunition were sent to the North Caucasus to help the XI Army.

But, despite all the measures taken, parts of the Red Army were unable to withstand the onslaught of the Volunteer Army. The Extraordinary Commissar of the South of Russia G.K. Ordzhonikidze, in a telegram addressed to V.I. Lenin dated January 24, 1919, reported on the state of affairs: “There is no XI Army. She completely decomposed. The enemy occupies cities and villages almost without resistance. At night the question was to leave the entire Terek region and go to Astrakhan.”

On January 25, 1919, during the general offensive of the Volunteer Army in the North Caucasus, the Kabardian Cavalry Brigade, consisting of two regiments under the command of Captain Zaurbek Dautokov-Serebryakov, occupied Nalchik and Baksan in battle. And on January 26, A.G. Shkuro’s detachments occupied the Kotlyarevskaya and Prokhladnaya railway stations. At the same time, the White Guard Circassian division and two Cossack Plastun battalions, turning to the right from the village of Novoossetinskaya, reached the Terek near the Kabardian village of Abaevo and, connecting at the Kotlyarevskaya station with Shkuro’s detachments, moved along the railway line to Vladikavkaz. By the beginning of February, the white units of generals Shkuro, Pokrovsky and Ulagai blocked the administrative center of the Terek region, the city of Vladikavkaz, on three sides. On February 10, 1919, Vladikavkaz was captured. Denikin's command forced the XI Red Army to retreat across the hungry steppes to Astrakhan. The remnants of the XII Red Army crumbled. Extraordinary Commissioner of the South of Russia G.K. Ordzhonikidze with a small detachment fled to Ingushetia, some units under the command of N. Gikalo went to Dagestan, and the bulk, already representing chaotic crowds of refugees, poured into Georgia through winter passes, freezing in the mountains, dying from avalanches and snowfalls, exterminated by yesterday's allies - the mountaineers. The Georgian government, fearing typhus, refused to let them in. The Reds tried to storm their way out of the Daryal Gorge but were met with machine gun fire. Many died. The remnants surrendered to the Georgians and were interned as prisoners of war.

By the time the Volunteer Army occupied the North Caucasus, of the independent Terek units that survived the defeat of the uprising, only a detachment of Terek Cossacks in Petrovsk, led by the commander of the Terek Territory troops, Major General I.N. Kosnikov, remained. It included the Grebensky and Gorsko-Mozdoksky cavalry regiments, a horse hundred of Kopay Cossacks, the 1st Mozdok and 2nd Grebensky Plastun battalions, a hundred foot Kopay Cossacks, the 1st and 2nd artillery divisions. By February 14, 1919, the detachment numbered 2,088 people.

One of the first units of the Terets to join the Volunteer Army was the Terek officer regiment, formed on November 1, 1918 from the officer detachment of Colonel B. N. Litvinov, who arrived in the army after the defeat of the Terek uprising (disbanded in March 1919), as well as detachments of colonels V. K. Agoeva, Z. Dautokova-Serebryakova and G. A. Kibirov.

On November 8, 1918, the 1st Terek Cossack Regiment was formed as part of the Volunteer Army (later merged into the 1st Terek Cossack Division). The widespread formation of Terek units began with the establishment of the Volunteer Army in the North Caucasus. The basis of the Terek formations in the Civil War were the 1, 2, 3 and 4th Terek Cossack divisions and the 1, 2, 3 and 4th Terek Plastun brigades, as well as the Terek Cossack horse-artillery divisions and separate batteries, which were part of both the Troops Terek-Dagestan Territory, as well as the Volunteer and Caucasian Volunteer Armies. Beginning in February 1919, Terek formations were already conducting independent military operations against the Red Army. This was especially significant for the white forces in the south, in connection with the transfer of the Caucasian Volunteer Army to the Northern Front.

The Terek Plastun separate brigade was formed as part of the Volunteer Army on December 9, 1918 from the newly formed 1st and 2nd Terek Plastun battalions and the Terek Cossack artillery division, which included the 1st Terek Cossack and 2nd Terek Plastun batteries.

With the end of the North Caucasus Operation of the Volunteer Army, the Armed Forces in the South of Russia established control over most of the territory of the North Caucasus. On January 10, 1919, A.I. Denikin appointed the commander of the III Army Corps, General V.P. Lyakhov, as commander-in-chief and commander of the troops of the created Terek-Dagestan Territory. The newly appointed commander, in order to recreate the Terek Cossack army, was ordered to assemble a Cossack Circle to select a Chieftain. The Terek Great Military Circle began its work on February 22, 1919. More than twenty issues were put on the agenda, but in the first row in terms of importance was the issue of adopting a new Constitution for the region, which was then adopted on February 27. The day after the adoption of the Constitution, elections for a military chieftain took place. He became Major General G. A. Vdovenko, a Cossack from the State village. The Big Circle showed support for the Volunteer Army and elected the Small Circle (Commission of Legislative Provisions). At the same time, the Military Circle decided to temporarily locate military authorities and the residence of the military chieftain in the city of Pyatigorsk.

The territories liberated from Soviet power returned to the mainstream of peaceful life. The former Terek region itself was transformed into the Terek-Dagestan region with its center in Pyatigorsk. The Cossacks evicted from the Sunzha villages in 1918 were returned back.

The British tried to limit the advance of the White Guards by retaining the oil fields of Grozny and Dagestan for small “sovereign” entities, such as the government of the Central Caspian Sea and the Mountain-Dagestan government. The British detachments, even having landed in Petrovsk, began moving towards Grozny. Ahead of the British, the White Guard units entered Grozny on February 8 and moved further, occupying the Caspian coast to Derbent.

In the mountains, which the White Guard troops approached, confusion reigned. Each nation had its own government, or even several. Thus, the Chechens formed two national governments, which fought bloody wars among themselves for several weeks. The dead were counted in the hundreds. Almost every valley had its own money, often homemade, and the generally accepted “convertible” currency was rifle cartridges. Georgia, Azerbaijan, and even Great Britain tried to act as guarantors of “mountain autonomies”. But the Commander-in-Chief of the Volunteer Army A.I. Denikin (whom Soviet propaganda loved to portray as a puppet of the Entente) decisively demanded the abolition of all these “autonomies.” By installing governors in the national regions from white officers of these nationalities. So, for example, on January 19, 1919, the commander-in-chief of the Terek-Dagestan region, Lieutenant General V.P. Lyakhov, issued an order according to which a colonel, later major general, Tembot Zhankhotovich Bekovich-Cherkassky was appointed ruler of Kabarda. His assistants were Captain Zaurbek Dautokov-Serebryakov for the military department, and Colonel Sultanbek Kasaevich Klishbiev for civil administration.

Relying on the support of the local nobility, General Denikin convened mountain congresses in Kabarda, Ossetia, Ingushetia, Chechnya and Dagestan in March 1919. These congresses elected Rulers and Councils under them, who had extensive judicial and administrative powers. Sharia law was preserved in criminal and family matters.

At the beginning of 1919, in the Terek-Dagestan region, a system of self-government of the region of two centers was formed: Cossack and volunteer (both were located in Pyatigorsk). As A.I. Denikin later noted, the unresolved nature of a number of issues dating back to pre-revolutionary times, lack of agreement in relationships, and the influence of the Kuban independents on the Tertsy could not but give rise to friction between these two authorities. Only thanks to the awareness of the mortal danger in the event of a rupture, the absence of independent tendencies among the masses of the Terek Cossacks, and personal relationships between representatives of both branches of government, the state mechanism in the North Caucasus worked throughout 1919 without significant interruptions. Until the end of white power, the region continued to be in double subordination: the representative of the volunteer government (General Lyakhov was replaced by cavalry general I. G. Erdeli on April 16 (29), 1919) was guided by the “Basic Provisions” on the Terek-Dagestan region, the drafting of which was completed by the Special meeting in May 1919; the military ataman ruled on the basis of the Terek Constitution.

Political disagreements and misunderstandings between representatives of the two authorities, as a rule, ended in the adoption of a compromise decision. Friction between the two centers of power throughout 1919 was created mainly by a small but influential part of the radical independent Terek intelligentsia in the government and the Circle. The most obvious illustration is the position of the Terek faction of the Supreme Cossack Circle, which gathered in Yekaterinodar on January 5 (18), 1920 as the supreme authority of the Don, Kuban and Terek. The Terek faction maintained a loyal attitude towards the government of the South of Russia, based on the position that separatism was unacceptable for the army and the fate of the mountain issue. The resolution to sever relations with Denikin was adopted by the Supreme Circle of the Don, Kuban and Terek with a small number of votes from the Terek faction, most of which went home.

In the territory liberated from the Bolsheviks, transport was improved, paralyzed enterprises were opened, and trade revived. In May 1919, the South-Eastern Russian Church Council was held in Stavropol. The Council was attended by bishops, clergy and laity selected from the Stavropol, Don, Kuban, Vladikavkaz and Sukhumi-Black Sea dioceses, as well as members of the All-Russian Local Council who found themselves in the south of the country. At the Council, issues of the spiritual and social structure of this vast territory were discussed, and the Supreme Provisional Church Administration was formed. Its chairman was Archbishop of Don Mitrofan (Simashkevich), members were Archbishop of Tauride Dimitri (Abashidze), Bishop of Taganrog Arseny (Smolenets), Protopresbyter G. I. Schavelsky, Professor A. P. Rozhdestvensky, Count V. Musin-Pushkin and Professor P. Verkhovsky.

Thus, with the arrival of white troops in the Terek region, the Cossack military government was restored, headed by ataman Major General G. A. Vdovenko. The “South-Eastern Union of Cossack Troops, Highlanders of the Caucasus and Free Peoples of the Steppes” continued its work, the basis of which was the idea of ​​a federal beginning of the Don, Kuban, Terek, the North Caucasus region, as well as the Astrakhan, Ural and Orenburg troops. The political goal of the Union was to join it as an independent state association to the future Russian Federation.

A.I. Denikin, in turn, advocated for “preserving the unity of the Russian state, subject to the granting of autonomy to individual nationalities and original formations (Cossacks), as well as broad decentralization of all government administration... The basis for the decentralization of government was the division of the occupied territory into regions.”

Recognizing the fundamental right of autonomy for the Cossack troops, Denikin made a reservation in relation to the Terek army, which “due to the extreme stripes and the need to reconcile the interests of the Cossacks and highlanders” was supposed to enter the North Caucasus region on the basis of autonomy. It was planned to include representatives of the Cossacks and mountain peoples in the new structures of regional power. Mountain peoples were given broad self-government within ethnic boundaries, with an elected administration, non-interference from the state in matters of religion and public education, but without funding for these programs from the state budget.

Unlike the Don and Kuban, on the Terek the “connection with all-Russian statehood” has not weakened. On June 21, 1919, Gerasim Andreevich Vdovenko, elected military ataman, opened the next Great Circle of the Terek Cossack Army in the Park Theater in the city of Essentuki. The Commander-in-Chief of the Volunteer Army A.I. Denikin was also present at the circle. The program of the Terek government stated that “only a decisive victory over Bolshevism and the revival of Russia will create the possibility of restoring the power and native troops, bloodless and weakened by the civil struggle.”

In view of the ongoing war, the Terets were interested in increasing their numbers by involving their neighboring allies in the anti-Bolshevik struggle. Thus, the Karanogai people were included in the Terek Army, and at the Great Circle the Cossacks expressed their agreement in principle to the Ossetians and Kabardians joining the Army “on equal rights.” The situation was more complicated with the nonresident population. Encouraging the entry of individual representatives of indigenous peasants into the Cossack class, the Terets were very prejudiced towards the demand of non-residents to resolve the land issue, to introduce them into the work of the Circle, as well as into central and local government bodies.

In the Terek region liberated from the Bolsheviks, complete mobilization took place. In addition to the Cossack regiments, units formed from highlanders were also sent to the front. Wanting to confirm loyalty to Denikin, even yesterday’s enemies of the Terets - the Chechens and Ingush - responded to the call of the Commander-in-Chief of the Volunteer Army and replenished the White Guard ranks with their volunteers.

Already in May 1919, in addition to the Kuban combat units, the Circassian Cavalry Division and the Karachay Cavalry Brigade operated on the Tsaritsyn Front. The 2nd Terek Cossack Division, 1st Terek Plastun Brigade, Kabardian Cavalry Division, Ingush Cavalry Brigade, Dagestan Cavalry Brigade and Ossetian Cavalry Regiment, who arrived from the Terek and Dagestan, were also transferred here. In Ukraine, the 1st Terek Cossack Division and the Chechen Cavalry Division were deployed against Makhno.

The situation in the North Caucasus remained extremely difficult. In June, Ingushetia launched an uprising, but a week later it was suppressed. Kabarda and Ossetia were disturbed by the Balkars and “Kermenists” (representatives of the Ossetian revolutionary democratic organization) with their forays. In the mountainous part of Dagestan, Ali-Khadzhi raised an uprising, and in August this “baton” was taken up by the Chechen sheikh Uzun-Khadzhi, who settled in Vedeno. All nationalist and religious protests in the North Caucasus were not only supported, but also provoked by anti-Russian circles in Turkey and Georgia. The constant military danger forced Denikin to keep up to 15 thousand fighters in this region under the command of General I. G. Erdeli, including two Terek divisions - the 3rd and 4th, and another Plastun brigade that belonged to the North Caucasus group.

Meanwhile, the situation at the front was even more deplorable. Thus, by December 1919, General Denikin’s Volunteer Army, under pressure from three times superior enemy forces, had lost 50% of its personnel. As of December 1, there were 42,733 wounded people alone in military medical institutions in the south of Russia. A large-scale retreat of the Armed Forces of Southern Russia began. On November 19, units of the Red Army broke into Kursk, on December 10, Kharkov was abandoned, on December 28, Tsaritsyn, and already on January 9, 1920, Soviet troops entered Rostov-on-Don.

On January 8, 1920, the Terek Cossacks suffered irreparable losses - units of Budyonny’s First Cavalry Army almost completely destroyed the Terek Plastun brigade. At the same time, the commander of the cavalry corps, General K.K. Mamontov, despite the order to attack the enemy, withdrew his corps through Aksai to the left bank of the Don.

In January 1920, the Armed Forces of the South of Russia numbered 81,506 people, of which: Volunteer units - 30,802, Don Army - 37,762, Kuban Army - 8,317, Terek Army - 3,115, Astrakhan Army - 468, Mountain units - 1042. These forces were clearly not enough to restrain the advance of the Reds, but the separatist games of the Cossack leaders continued at this critical moment for all anti-Bolshevik forces.

On January 18, 1920, the Cossack Supreme Circle met in Yekaterinodar, which began to create an independent union state and declared itself the supreme authority over the affairs of the Don, Kuban and Terek. Some of the Don delegates and almost all of the Terets called for the continuation of the struggle in unity with the main command. Most of the Kuban, part of the Don and several Terets demanded a complete break with Denikin. Some of the Kuban and Donets were inclined to stop fighting.

According to A.I. Denikin, “only the Tertsy - the ataman, the government and the Circle faction - almost in full force represented a united front.” The Kuban people were reproached for abandoning the front by the Kuban units, and proposals were made to separate the eastern departments (“lineists”) from this army and annex them to the Terek. Terek ataman G. A. Vdovenko spoke with the following words: “The Terets have one current. We have “United and indivisible Russia” written in golden letters.

At the end of January 1920, a compromise provision was developed and accepted by all parties:

1. South Russian power is established on the basis of an agreement between the main command of the Armed Forces in the South of Russia and the Supreme Circle of the Don, Kuban and Terek, until the convening of the All-Russian Constituent Assembly.

2. Lieutenant General A.I. Denikin is recognized as the first head of the South Russian government...

3. The law on the succession of power of the head of state is developed by the Legislative Chamber on a general basis.

4. Legislative power in the South of Russia is exercised by the Legislative Chamber.

5. The functions of the executive branch, in addition to the head of the South Russian government, are determined by the Council of Ministers...

6. The Chairman of the Council of Ministers is appointed by the person heading the South Russian government.

7. The person heading the South Russian government has the right to dissolve the Legislative Chamber and the right of relative “veto”...

In agreement with the three factions of the Supreme Circle, a cabinet of ministers was formed, but “the emergence of a new government did not bring any change in the course of events.”

The military and political crisis of the White South was growing. Government reform no longer saved the situation - the front collapsed. On February 29, 1920, units of the Red Army captured Stavropol, on March 17, Ekaterinodar and the village of Nevinnomysskaya fell, on March 22 - Vladikavkaz, on March 23 - Kizlyar, on March 24 - Grozny, on March 27 - Novorossiysk, on March 30 - Port Petrovsk and on April 7 - Tuapse. . Soviet power was restored almost throughout the entire territory of the North Caucasus, which was confirmed by the decree of March 25, 1920.

Part of the army of the Armed Forces of Southern Russia (about 30 thousand people) was evacuated from Novorossiysk to Crimea. The Terek Cossacks who left Vladikavkaz (altogether about 12 thousand people along with refugees) went along the Georgian Military Road to Georgia, where they were interned in camps near Poti, in a swampy, malarial area. The demoralized Cossack units, squeezed on the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus, mostly surrendered to the red units.

On April 4, 1920, A.I. Denikin gave the order to appoint Lieutenant General Baron P.N. Wrangel as his successor to the post of Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia.

After the evacuation of the Armed Forces of Southern Russia to Crimea, from the remnants of the Terek and Astrakhan Cossack units in April 1920, the Separate Terek-Astrakhan Cossack Brigade was formed, which from April 28, as the Terek-Astrakhan Brigade, was part of the 3rd Cavalry Division of the Consolidated Corps. On July 7, after reorganization, the brigade again became separate. In the summer of 1920, she was part of the Special Forces Group that participated in the Kuban landing. From September 4, the brigade operated separately as part of the Russian Army and included the 1st Terek, 1st and 2nd Astrakhan regiments and the Terek-Astrakhan Cossack horse artillery division and the Separate Terek reserve Cossack hundred.

The attitude of the Cossacks towards Baron Wrangel was ambivalent. On the one hand, he contributed to the dispersal of the Kuban Regional Rada in 1919, on the other hand, his toughness and commitment to order impressed the Cossacks. The Cossacks’ attitude towards him was not spoiled by the fact that Wrangel put the Don general Sidorin on trial for the fact that he telegraphed the military ataman Bogaevsky about his decision “to withdraw the Don army from the Crimea and the subordination in which it is now located.”

The situation with the Kuban Cossacks was more complicated. Military ataman Bukretov was opposed to the evacuation of Cossack units squeezed on the Black Sea coast to Crimea. Wrangel was not immediately able to send the ataman to the Caucasus to organize the evacuation, and the remnants of those who did not surrender to the Reds (about 17 thousand people) were only able to board ships on May 4. Bukretov transferred the ataman power to the chairman of the Kuban government, Ivanis, and together with the “independent” deputies of the Rada, taking with them part of the military treasury, he fled to Georgia. The Kuban Rada, which gathered in Feodosia, recognized Bukretov and Ivanis as traitors, and elected military general Ulagai as military chieftain, but he refused power.

The small Terek group led by Ataman Vdovenko was traditionally hostile to separatist movements and, therefore, had nothing in common with the ambitious Cossack leaders.

The lack of unity in the political Cossack camp and Wrangel’s uncompromising attitude towards “independence” allowed the commander-in-chief of the Russian army to conclude an agreement with the military atamans that he considered necessary for the state structure of Russia. Gathering together Bogaevsky, Ivanis, Vdovenko and Lyakhov, Wrangel gave them 24 hours to think, and thus, “On July 22, a solemn signing of an agreement took place ... with the atamans and governments of the Don, Kuban, Terek and Astrakhan ... in development of the agreement of 2 (15 ) April this year...

1. The state formations of Don, Kuban, Terek and Astrakhan are ensured complete independence in their internal structure and management.

2. The chairmen of the governments of state entities of Don, Kuban, Terek and Astrakhan or their replacement members of their governments participate in the Council of Heads of Departments under the Government and the Commander-in-Chief, with the right to a decisive vote on all issues.

3. The Commander-in-Chief is assigned full power over all armed forces of state entities... both in operational terms and on fundamental issues of army organization.

4. All necessary for supply... food and other means are provided... according to a special allocation.

5. Management of railways and main telegraph lines is vested in the authority of the Commander-in-Chief.

6. Agreement and negotiations with foreign governments, both in the field of political and commercial policy, are carried out by the Ruler and Commander-in-Chief. If these negotiations concern the interests of one of the state entities..., the Ruler and Commander-in-Chief first enters into an agreement with the subject ataman.

7. A common customs line and a single indirect taxation are established...

8. A unified monetary system is established on the territory of the contracting parties...

9. Upon the liberation of the territory of state entities... this agreement must be submitted for approval by large military Circles and regional Councils, but will take effect immediately upon its signing.

10. This agreement is established until the complete end of the Civil War.”

The unsuccessful landing of the Kuban landing party led by General Ulaym in the Kuban in August 1920, and the stalled September offensive on the Kakhovka bridgehead forced Baron Wrangel to withdraw within the Crimean Peninsula and begin preparations for defense and evacuation.

By the beginning of the offensive on November 7, 1920, the Red Army numbered 133 thousand bayonets and sabers; the Russian Army had 37 thousand bayonets and sabers. The superior forces of the Soviet troops broke the defense, and already on November 12, Baron Wrangel issued an order to abandon Crimea. Organized by the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Army, the evacuation was completed on November 16, 1920 and made it possible to save about 150 thousand military and civilians, of which about 30 thousand Cossacks.

The territory of Russia was abandoned by the remnants of the last provisional national government and the last legitimate governments of the Cossack troops of the Russian Empire, including Terek.

After the evacuation of the Russian army from Crimea to Chataldzha, the Terek-Astrakhan regiment was formed as part of the Don Corps. After the transformation of the army into the Russian All-Military Union (ROVS), the regiment until the 1930s was a cadre unit. So by the fall of 1925, the regiment numbered 427 people, including 211 officers.

Policy of the Donburo of the RCP(b) towards the Cossacks during the Civil War

The situation in Soviet Russia during the civil war largely depended on the situation on the outskirts, including on the Don, where the largest detachment of the “most organized and therefore most significant” force of the non-proletarian masses of Russia - the Cossacks - was concentrated.

The origins of the Cossack policy of the Bolsheviks date back to 1917, when V.I. Lenin warned about the possibility of forming a “Russian Vendée” on the Don. Although the Cossacks generally adhered to a position of neutrality during the revolution in October 1917, some of its groups already took part in the fight against Soviet power. V.I. Lenin considered the Cossacks to be a privileged peasantry, capable of acting as a reactionary mass if their privileges were infringed. But this does not mean that the Cossacks were considered by Lenin as a single mass. Lenin noted that it was fragmented by differences in the size of land ownership, in payments, in the conditions of medieval use of land for service.

The appeal of the Rostov Council of Workers' Deputies said: Again we remember 1905, when the black reaction rode out on the Cossacks. Again the Cossacks are sent against the people, again they want to make the word “Cossack” the most hated for the worker and peasant... Again the Don Cossacks gain the shameful glory of people’s executioners, again it becomes a shame for the revolutionary Cossacks to bear the Cossack title... So throw it off, brother villagers , take over the power of the Kaledins and Bogaevskys and join your brothers, soldiers, peasants and workers.

The civil war, as a sharp aggravation of class contradictions in specific historical conditions, could hardly be prevented then. General Kaledin, Ataman of the Don Army, rose up to fight the revolution at noon on October 25, i.e. even before the opening of the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies and its adoption of historical decrees that shook the whole of Russia. Following him, the overthrown Prime Minister of the Provisional Government Kerensky, the Cossack General Krasnov, and the atamans of the Cossack troops of the Kuban, Orenburg, Terek Central Rada of Ukraine rebelled against Soviet power. General Alekseev in Novocherkassk launched the formation of a volunteer army. Thus, a powerful center of counter-revolution arose in the south of the country. The Soviet government sent armed forces led by Antonov-Ovseyenko to defeat him.

All eyewitnesses and contemporaries viewed these battles as a civil war. In particular, this is how they were then qualified by the head of the Soviet government created by the revolution, V.I. Lenin. Already on October 29, 1917, he explained that “the political situation has now been reduced to a military one,” and at the beginning of November he pointed out: “An insignificant handful has started a civil war.” On November 28, he signed a document with the expressive title “Decree on the arrest of the leaders of the civil war against the revolution.” The Soviets were entrusted with the responsibility of special supervision over the Cadet Party due to its connection with ardent counter-revolutionaries. The resolution of December 3 stated: under the leadership of the Cadets, a fierce civil war began “against the very foundations of the workers’ and peasants’ revolution.”

• On February 2, 1918, “Free Don” reported that in Novonikolevskaya the peasants decided to destroy the Cossack class and take away the land from the Cossacks. The peasants are waiting for the Bolsheviks as their saviors, who will bring freedom to the peasants and, more importantly, land. On this basis, relations between them and the Cossacks are worsening every day, and, apparently, heroic measures will be required to prevent civil massacre on the Quiet Don.
• The year 1918 was a turning point in the development of a number of social, economic and political processes that were intertwined in Russia into a rather intricate knot. The collapse of the empire continued and this process reached its lowest point. In the country as a whole, the state of the economy was catastrophic, and although the 1918 harvest was above average, famine was raging in many cities.

From the end of February to the end of March 1918, a kind of split occurred on the Don between the politically active wealthy Cossacks and the Don service elite. Active supporters of the anti-Bolshevik struggle created the “Detachment of Free Don Cossacks” and the Foot Partisan Cossack Regiment in order to retain the necessary officer and partisan personnel by the time the Don Cossacks awakened. The idea of ​​uniting and opposing the Soviets to all anti-Bolshevik forces in the detachment was absent. The detachments acted separately for purely opportunistic reasons.

In February 1918, the Military Revolutionary Committee, actually headed by S.I. Syrtsov, pursued an agreement with the working Cossacks. As a result of this policy - the creation of the Don Soviet Republic. The Cossack Committee under the All-Russian Central Executive Committee sent more than 100 agitators from the “Defense of the Rights of Labor Cossacks” detachment to the Don. Their task is to organize Councils of Cossack Deputies in the Don Region. By April, about 120 of them had been created in cities, villages and farmsteads. However, the acceptance of Soviet power was far from unconditional.

The first recorded armed clash with Soviet power was on March 21, 1918 - the Cossacks of the village of Lugansk repelled 34 arrested officers. On March 31, a rebellion broke out in the Suvorovskaya village of the 2nd Don District, and on April 2 - in the Yegorlykskaya village. With the onset of spring, contradictions in rural areas intensified. The bulk of the Cossacks, as usual, hesitated at first. When peasants tried to divide the land without waiting for the land issue to be resolved through legislation, the Cossacks even appealed to the regional Soviet authorities. In the north of the region, the Cossacks reacted painfully even to the seizure of landowners' lands by peasants. Further developments of events put the majority of the Cossacks in direct opposition to Soviet power.

“In some places, a violent seizure of land begins ...”, “The non-resident peasantry began to cultivate ... military reserve land and surplus land in the yurts of rich southern villages,” Peasants who rented land from the Cossacks “stopped paying rent.” The authorities, instead of smoothing out the contradictions, set a course to fight the “kulak elements of the Cossacks.”

Due to the fact that nonresident peasants stopped paying rent and began to use the land for free, part of the Cossack poor, who rented out the land, also recoiled to the side of the anti-Bolshevik forces. The refusal of out-of-towners to pay rent deprived her of a significant part of her income.

The growing struggle exacerbated the contradictions within the Cossacks, and in April 1918, the Bolshevik Cossack V.S. Kovalev, characterizing the relationship between the Cossack poor and the elite, stated: “When Soviet troops went to fight Kaledin, this gap was not noticeable, but now she showed up."

Thus, by May 1918, a mass anti-Bolshevik movement was emerging in one of the regions of southern Russia - on the Don. The reasons for the mass uprising and mass resistance were various. All those changes in the social, political and agrarian structure that took place in Central Russia were not acceptable to the Don Cossacks, who preferred armed struggle. The Cossacks are rising up to fight initially defensively, from a military point of view this doomed them to defeat. The logic of the rebels was as follows: “The Bolsheviks are destroying the Cossacks, the intelligentsia, like the communists, are trying to abolish us, but the Russian people don’t even think about us. Let’s go recklessly - we’ll either die or we’ll live: everyone has decided to destroy us, we’ll try to fight back.”

In June 1918, the split and class struggle in the Russian countryside reached its peak. On the Don, an outbreak of class struggle led to the transition of the Cossacks, incl. and the poor, in the southern districts on the side of the whites, in the northern, more homogeneous districts in terms of class and estate, the Cossacks were inclined to neutrality, but were subject to mobilization. This turn of events slowed down the political divisions within the classes.”

“The peasantry on the Don, more unanimously than anywhere else in Russia, was entirely on the side of the Soviets.” The lower Cossack villages (Bessergenevskaya, Melekhovskaya, Semikarakorskaya, Nagaevskaya, etc.) passed sentences on the eviction of nonresidents. There were exceptions: in May August 1918, 417 non-residents who participated in the fight against the Bolsheviks were accepted into the Cossacks, 1,400 sentences expelled Cossacks from the class for acts directly opposite, and 300 sentences were passed on eviction from the region. And yet the war acquired class overtones.

Despite all their fighting qualities, the Cossack rebels, as in the times of the peasant wars, having liberated their village, did not want to go further, and “it was not possible to raise them to vigorously pursue the enemy. The rebels wanted to fight the Bolsheviks, but had nothing against the Soviets.” As contemporaries believed, “when rebelling, the Cossacks thought least of all about the structure of their state. While rebelling, they did not forget for a minute that peace could be made as soon as the Soviet government agreed not to disturb their life in the village.”

Completely in the spirit of the times were the words of the Chairman of the Moscow Council P. Smidovich, spoken in September 1918 from the rostrum of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee: “This war is not being waged to lead to an agreement or to subjugate, this is a war of destruction. There can be no other civil war.” Terror as a state policy became a logical natural step in such a struggle.

In the fall of 1918, the Cossack forces were split: 18% of combat-ready Cossacks ended up in the ranks of the Red Army, 82% in the Don Army. Among those who went to the Bolsheviks, the presence of the poor was clearly visible. The forces of the Don Army were strained. In the October battles, 40% of the Cossacks and 80% of the officers dropped out of its ranks.

Having confirmed in practice in the spring and summer of 1918 that they were incompatible with them, the Soviets, led by the RCP(b), in the fall of 1918 set a course for their complete defeat: “The government on the Don was already being played when tendencies to flirt with Cossack federalist desires were revealed . Over the course of a year, the civil war on the Don managed to quite sharply delimit and separate revolutionary elements from counter-revolutionary ones. And strong Soviet power must rely only on economically true revolutionary elements, and the dark counter-revolutionary elements must be suppressed by Soviet power with its strength, its power, enlightened with its agitation and proletarianized with its economic policy.”

The Donburo took a course of ignoring the specific features of the Cossacks. In particular, the elimination of the “Cossack-police” division of the region into districts began; part of the territory was transferred to neighboring provinces. Syrtsov wrote that these steps mark the beginning of the abolition of the old form under the cover of which the “Russian Vendée” lived. In the educated regions, revolutionary committees, tribunals and military commissariats were created, which were supposed to ensure the effectiveness of the new policy.

At the beginning of January 1919, the Red Army launched a general offensive against the Cossack Don, which was then experiencing a stage of agony, and at the end of the same month the notorious circular letter from the Organizing Bureau of the Bolshevik Central Committee was sent to the localities. A merciless bloody ax fell on the heads of the Cossacks...”

The January (1919) anti-Cossack actions served as an expression of the general policy of Bolshevism towards the Cossacks. And its very foundations received ideological and theoretical development long before 1919. The foundation was formed by the works of Lenin, his associates and the resolutions of Bolshevik congresses and conferences. The existing, far from flawless ideas about the Cossacks as opponents of bourgeois reforms received absolutization in them and eventually molded into indisputable dogmas about the Cossacks as the backbone of the Vendean forces of Russia. Guided by the latter, the Bolsheviks, having seized power and following the formal logic of things, led - and could not help but lead - the line to eradicate the Cossacks. And after they faced the furious Soviet destiny and the attacks of the Cossacks on them, this line acquired bitterness and wild hatred.

Don fought and the government took unpopular measures. On October 5, 1918, an order was issued: “The entire amount of bread, food and feed, from the current harvest of 1918, past years and the future harvest of 1919, minus the reserve necessary for food and household needs of the owner, is received (from the time the grain was taken to accounting) at the disposal of the All-Great Don Army and can be alienated only through the food authorities.”

The Cossacks were asked to hand over the harvest themselves at a price of 10 rubles per pood until May 15, 1919. The villages were dissatisfied with this resolution. The last straw was the offensive of Soviet troops against Krasnov on the Southern Front, which began on January 4, 1919, and the beginning of the collapse of the Don Army.

In August 1918, People's Commissar of the Don Soviet Republic for Military Affairs E.A. Trifonov pointed out mass transitions from camp to camp. With the onset of counter-revolutionary forces, the Don government lost authority and territory. The Cossack department of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee tried to organize the Cossacks who took the side of Soviet power. On September 3, 1918, the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR issued a decree on the creation of the “Marching Circle of the Don Army” of the revolutionary Cossack government. “To convene the Marching Circle of the Soviet Don Army - a military government vested with full power on the Don... The Marching Circle... includes representatives of the Don Soviet regiments, as well as farms and villages freed from officer and landowner power.

But at that time, Soviet power on the Don did not last long. After the liquidation of the Council of People's Commissars of the Don Republic in the fall of 1918, the Central Committee of the RCP (b) appointed several members of the Don Bureau of the RCP (b) to lead illegal party work in the territory occupied by the enemy. The death of the Don Republic as a result of the intervention of German troops and the uprising of the Lower Don Cossacks in the spring of 1918, as well as the execution of the Podtelkov expedition, significantly influenced the attitude of the leaders of the Don Bolsheviks towards the Cossacks. As a result, the Circular of the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) dated January 24, 1919, containing points about mass terror in relation to the counter-revolutionary Cossacks.

And when the November revolution broke out in Germany, the Cossacks became a real threat. “Tear the thorn out of the heart” - this was the unanimous decision. At the beginning of January 1919, units of the Southern Front of the Red Army launched a counteroffensive to put an end to the rebellious Cossack Don. Its organizers neglected the fact that by that time the Cossacks, especially the front-line soldiers, had already begun to lean towards Soviet power. Although political agencies called on soldiers and commanders to be tolerant and prevent violence, for many of them the principle of “blood for blood” and “an eye for an eye” became the defining principle. The villages and farms, which had been quiet, turned into a boiling cauldron.

In such an extremely aggravated and cruel situation, on January 24, 1919, the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) adopted a Circular Letter, which spurred violence and served as a target for decossackization:

“Carry out mass terror against the rich Cossacks, exterminating them without exception; carry out merciless mass terror against all Cossacks who took any direct or indirect part in the fight against Soviet power. It is necessary to apply to the average Cossacks all those measures that provide a guarantee against any attempts on their part to make new protests against Soviet power.

• 1. Confiscate bread and force all surplus to be poured into specified points, this applies to both bread and all agricultural products.
• 2. Take all measures to assist the migrating newcomer poor, organizing resettlement where possible.
• 3. Equalize newcomers, non-residents with the Cossacks in land and in all other respects.
• 4. Carry out complete disarmament, shoot everyone who is found with a weapon after the surrender date.
• 5. Issue weapons only to reliable elements from out of town.
• 6. Armed detachments should be left in the Cossack villages until complete order is established.
• 7. All commissioners appointed to certain Cossack settlements are invited to show maximum firmness and steadily implement these instructions.”

Since January 1919, the practice of decossackization in the Bolshevik style began: everything came down to military-political methods. And this policy was not at all limited to some one-time act. She is the course, the line. Their theoretical beginning goes back to the end of the 19th century, and their implementation dates back to the entire period of the undivided rule of the RCP (b) - CPSU (b) - CPSU.

On March 16, 1919, the Central Committee of the RCP (b) suspended the circular letter, which met the requirements of the policy of alliance with the middle peasantry, which the party congress was to adopt. But at the same time, Lenin and other senior leaders agreed with the provision on organizing the eviction of the Cossacks and the resettlement of people from starving areas.

The Donburo greeted with bewilderment the decision to suspend the January decision and on April 8 adopted a resolution emphasizing that “the very existence of the Cossacks, with their way of life, privileges and remnants, and most importantly, the ability to conduct armed struggle, poses a threat to Soviet power. The Donburo proposed to eliminate the Cossacks as a special economic and ethnographic group by dispersing them and resettling them beyond the Don.”

1919 -1920 - the peak of the relationship between the Soviet government and the Cossacks. The Cossacks suffered huge losses. Some died on the battlefield, others - from Czech bullets, others - tens of thousands - thrown out of the country, lost their homeland. Decoration in the Bolshevik way changed its forms and methods, but it never stopped. It demanded the total destruction of the counter-revolutionary leaders of the Cossacks; the eviction outside the Don of its unstable part, which included all the middle peasants - the bulk of the villages and farmsteads; resettlement of poor peasants from the North-Western industrial center to the Don. The indiscriminate approach to the implementation of these inhumane orders resulted in rampant crimes, which meant genuine genocide.

A cruel and unjustified political line that gave rise to grave consequences, including the echo that has reached our days, causing justifiable anger, however, a biased interpretation. The circular letter, often mistakenly called a directive, was overgrown with tales and fables. But accuracy is an essential feature of truthful reporting of history. The implementation of the cruel circular on the ground resulted in repressions that fell not only on the real culprits, but also on defenseless old men and women. Many Cossacks became victims of lawlessness, although there is no exact information about their number. .

The Cossacks, whose amplitude of fluctuations in the direction of Soviet power had previously been quite large, now turned in their mass by 180 degrees. Total repressions served as an anti-Soviet catalyst. On the night of March 12, 1919, in the villages of the Kazan village, the Cossacks killed the small Red Guard garrisons and local communists. A few days later, the flames engulfed all the districts of the Upper Don, which went down in history as Veshensky. It blew up the rear of the Southern Front of the Red Army. The offensive of its units on Novocherkassk and Rostov floundered. The attempt to suppress the uprising was unsuccessful, since it practically boiled down to exclusively military efforts.

The Center's policy towards the Cossacks in 1919 was not consistent. On March 16, the Plenum of the Central Committee of the RCP(b) specifically discussed the issue of them. G.Ya. Sokolnikov condemned the Circular Letter and criticized the activities of the Donburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) (9, p. 14). However, the outlined course was not developed and implemented. The problems of resettlement of new settlers to the Don took center stage, which added fuel to the fire and created a field of increased political tension. F.K. Mironov sent his protests to Moscow. The RVS of the Southern Front, although reluctantly, somewhat softened its position regarding the Cossacks. V.I. Lenin was in a hurry to end the uprising. (9, p.14). However, the military command was in no hurry to do this. Trotsky created an expeditionary force, which went on the offensive only on May 28. But by June 5, White Guard troops broke through to Veshenskaya and joined forces with the rebels. Soon Denikin announced a campaign against Moscow. He assigned the decisive role to the Cossacks. The civil war is spreading and becoming fiercer. It dragged on for several more months. De-Cossackization turned out to be such a high price.

On August 13, 1919, a joint meeting of the Politburo and the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) discussed the appeal to the Cossacks, presented by Lenin. The government stated that it “is not going to de-Cossack anyone by force... does not go against the Cossack way of life, leaving the working Cossacks their villages and farms, their lands, the right to wear whatever uniform they want (for example, stripes).” But the Cossacks’ patience ran out. And on August 24, Mironov’s corps voluntarily set out from Saransk to the front. On August 28, Grazhdanupr, the body of decossackization, was abolished and a temporary Don Executive Committee was created, headed by Medvedev. In Balashov, under the leadership of Trotsky, the meeting brought to the “foreground” and outlined “broad political work in the Cossacks.” After this, Trotsky developed “Theses on Work on the Don.”

At the moment when Denikin broke through to Tula, Trotsky left the question to the Party Central Committee about changing the policy towards the Don Cossacks and about Mironov: “We are giving the Don, Kuban complete “autonomy”, our troops are clearing the Don. The Cossacks are completely breaking with Denikin. Appropriate guarantees must be created. Mironov and his comrades could act as a mediator, who would have to go deep into the Don.” On October 23, the Politburo decided: “To release Mironov from any punishment,” and his appointment to the position should be agreed upon with Trotsky. On October 26, it was decided to publish Mironov’s appeal to the Don Cossacks. Trotsky proposed appointing him to a command post, but the Politburo, disagreeing with him, sent Mironov to work only in the Don Executive Committee for now.

The truth about de-Cossackization without its falsification and without the political game around it is one of the most difficult pages in the history of the Cossacks, although it had many of them. And not only in Soviet times, but also in ancient times.

The triumphal march of Soviet power in many regions of the country took place in a climate of civil war. This is so obvious that it leaves no doubt. Another thing is that there was a fundamental difference between the civil war of the end of 1917 and the middle of 1918. It was in both its forms and scale. In turn, this directly depended on the intensity and strength of the imperialist intervention in Soviet Russia.

The above provides full grounds for the following conclusion: the civil war in Russia in general and in its individual regions with a special composition of the population, where the forces of the all-Russian counter-revolution were relocated, began from the first days of the revolution. Moreover, this revolution itself unfolded in the context of a peasant war that flared up in September 1917 against the landowners. The overthrown classes resorted to violence against the rebellious people. And the latter had no choice but to respond to force with force. As a result, the revolution was accompanied by severe armed clashes.

At the same time, the severity of the civil war had a decisive influence on the choice of paths and forms of socio-economic transformations and the first steps of Soviet power. And for this reason, too, she often took unjustifiably cruel measures, which ultimately boomeranged against her, because this repelled the masses, especially the Cossacks, from her. Already in the spring of 1918, when the dispossessed peasantry began to equalize the redistribution of land, the Cossacks turned away from the revolution. In May they destroyed F. Podtelkov's expedition to the Don.

“Cossack uprising on the Don in March-June 1919. was one of the most serious threats to the Soviet government and had a great influence on the course of the civil war." The study of materials from the archives of Rostov-on-Don and Moscow made it possible to reveal contradictions in the policies of the Bolshevik Party at all levels.

The Plenum of the RCP(b) of March 16, 1919 canceled Sverdlov’s January directive, just on the day of his “untimely” death, but the Donburo did not take this into account and on April 8, 1919, promulgated another directive: “The urgent task is complete, rapid and the decisive destruction of the Cossacks as a special economic group, the destruction of its economic foundations, the physical destruction of the Cossack bureaucracy and officers, in general all the top of the Cossacks, the dispersal and neutralization of the ordinary Cossacks and their formal liquidation.”

The head of the Donburo Syrtsov telegraphed the pre-revolutionary committee of the village of Veshenskaya: “For every killed Red Army soldier and member of the revolutionary committee, shoot a hundred Cossacks.”

After the fall of the Don Soviet Republic in September 1918, the Don Bureau was created to direct underground communist work in Rostov, Taganrog and other places behind white lines. When the Red Army advanced to the South, the Donburo became the main factor in governing the Don region. Members of the bureau were appointed by Moscow and operated from Kursk, Millerovo - rear areas that remained under Soviet control. Local officials carried out large-scale confiscations of private property. The RVS of the Southern Front insisted on executions and shootings and called for the creation of tribunals in each regiment. Repression carried out by army tribunals and the Donburo forced the territory to rise up against the communists, and this led to the loss of the entire upper Don region.

The first signs of a departure from brutal military confrontation and extreme methods of resolving contradictions between the Cossacks and Soviet power appeared towards the end of 1919 and were consolidated in 1920, when the civil war in southern Russia brought victory to the Bolsheviks. The White movement, in which the Cossacks played a prominent role, was defeated. Bolshevism came into its own on the Don.

Assessing the activities of the Donburo of the RCP (b) from the autumn of 1918 to the autumn of 1919, it should be recognized that despite the well-known positive contribution of the Donburo to the defeat of the counter-revolution and the establishment of Soviet power on the Don, a number of major miscalculations and failures were made in its Cossack policy. “Subsequently, all members of the Donburo reconsidered their views and actions. S.I. Syrtsov recognized the work experience of the Citizenship Department as unsatisfactory and tried to limit the administrative activities of political departments on the Don in the spring of 1920. At the first regional party conference, he spoke out against S.F. Vasilchenko, who called for crushing the Cossacks with “fire and sword.” Five years later, based on Syrtsov’s report, at the April (1925) plenum of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), a resolution was adopted “On work among the Cossacks,” which outlined a course for the widespread involvement of the Cossacks in Soviet construction and the removal of all restrictions on their life activities.

Don Bolshevik Cossacks civil war

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Introduction

Simultaneously with the completion of the “gathering of lands” by Moscow and the formation of an imperial state on the territory of the Northern Black Sea region, a military-political community emerged, later called the Don Army. Thus began the historical path of the Don Cossacks. Who were the first Cossacks? Legal historian M. Vladimirsky-Budanov defined the new society as follows: “On the Don, since ancient times (even during the existence of the Grand Duchy of Ryazan), people from the state, mostly dissatisfied with the new state system, founded free Cossack communities, fighting the Tatars at their own peril and risk , and finally in the lower reaches of the Don they united into one big land...”

For a long time, Russian historiography cultivated the position that the basis of the Don Cossacks were peasants and serfs who fled from serfdom, most of all dissatisfied with the state system of Moscow Rus'.

Despite the severity of universal military service, the Cossacks, especially the southern ones, enjoyed a certain prosperity, which almost completely excluded the material incentive that raised the working class and peasantry of Russia against the central government.

The Cossacks are one of the few parts of the St. Petersburg garrison that were loyal to the policies of the Provisional Government. They were the most hoped for in revolutionary days. But the Cossacks were wary of the actions of the Provisional Government.

After the October Revolution, the Cossacks, as a military service class, were represented by 12 Cossack troops: Don, Kuban, Terek, Astrakhan, Ural, Orenburg, Semirechensk, Siberian, Transbaikal, Amur, Ussuri. In total, the Cossack population of Russia at that time amounted to about 4.5 million people. There were about 300 thousand Cossacks in combat formation. It was these people who had to take part in the fratricidal Civil War, during which they mostly took the side of the White movement. According to various sources, in the ranks of the Red Army there were from 10 to 20% of Cossacks, and in the ranks of the White Army - from 80 to 90%. All this led to the fact that, having acted as an alternative force to the power of the Bolsheviks, the Cossacks aroused a negative attitude towards themselves not only from the government, but also from the bulk of the population.

1. Don Cossacks in the fight against the Bolsheviks 1917-1921.

1.1 Temporary truce between the Don and the Bolsheviks (December 1917 - March 1918)

The construction of socialism in Russia was described in the book “State and Revolution” - V.I. Lenin 1917. According to Lenin’s plan - socialism - “the state is a machine” - private property, private trade and all aspects of personal freedom were denied, labor was imposed on everyone conscription, all producers had to hand over their products to the state, which in turn carries out centralized distribution. At the top of this entire pyramid stands the “working class party.”

It was impossible to begin construction of such a system in November 1917. The only real force that supported the Bolsheviks were the morally corrupted crowds of soldiers deserting from the front and the Kronstadt sailors, well trained to rob. The inability of the new government to create order in the country, to provide food and clothing, was replaced by the need to give the people an enemy. And if there is an internal enemy, then you have to fight him. During the war, what is the demand for cold, hunger, disease, etc. The Cossack atamans were the first to be declared traitors: Kaledin, Dutov, Filimonov, although they did not swear allegiance to the new government and did not serve for a day.

On July 2, 1917, the Great Military Circle elected Lieutenant General of the Tsarist Army Kaledin to the post of Don Ataman - after his repeated refusals. The Cossacks continued to fight at the front, and Bolshevik propaganda penetrated deeper and deeper into their ranks, and while the spare parts waiting on the Don continued to firmly maintain a position hostile to the Bolsheviks, the front-line Cossacks began to waver.

1.2 Uprising on the Don, the overthrow of Soviet power and the cleansing of the Don territories from communists (March - November 1918)

The first attempt at interaction between the Don Cossacks and the Bolsheviks began with the intention of the All-Great Don Army (VVD) to reconcile with Soviet power.

On December 5, Ataman Kaledin declared martial law on the Don - a democrat in spirit, Kaledin emphasizes that this is aimed solely at establishing order and security in the Don region. Kaledin demands caution in dealing with non-residents and miners of the Donetsk region.

At the end of January 1918, the Military Revolutionary Committee (MRC) was formed in the village of Kamenskaya, headed by the Don Cossack Podtelkov.

The front-line Cossacks, returning from the Great War, preferred to sleep in their kurens, plow the land and maintain neutrality with the Kamensky Military Revolutionary Committee. And the VVD was besieged from all sides, from all strategic directions, the Red Guards were marching on Novocherkassk. And only the Volunteer Army (in the process of formation) and the detachment of Yesaul Chernetsov (400 Don partisans) prevented the invasion.

In the end, with the combined blows of the Red Guards and Cossack regiments who went over to the side of the Bolsheviks, Chernetsov was defeated and personally hacked to death by the chairman of the Don Revkom, Podtelkov. Realizing that the VVD region could not be defended, the Volunteer Army left Novocherkassk and went to Kuban. On January 29, Ataman Kaledin convened a meeting where he announced that he had one company left to defend Novocherkassk. Most members of the government said that it was impossible to hold the capital of the VVD; a company of fighters remained to defend Novocherkassk. That same evening, A.M. Kaledin shot himself.

But a miracle happened: Don, shocked by the death of his beloved Ataman, stood up, chose a new Ataman - General Nazarov, and assigned him full civil and military power. After this, even the “bawlers” from the front-line soldiers fell silent. Unfortunately, the noble impulse turned out to be fleeting; no one doubted that Don’s days were numbered. On February 25, General Nazarov was shot, and Pokhodny Ataman of the VVD Popov managed to withdraw military valuables and a detachment of 1.5 thousand people from Novocherkassk.

The red units, having taken power on the Don, were ready to impose their worldview through violence and any means of coercion. Their hatred was caused by the entire traditional way of Cossack life - from private property to Cossack will in the matter of self-government. In response to the violence, the Cossack masses rebelled. The Cossack front-line soldiers - hoping that “we’ll drive the ataman away and live our own lives” - miscalculated. Golubov - who overthrew the government of the Military Circle - fled and was later identified and killed by the Cossacks.

On Easter night 1918, M.G. approached Novocherkassk with a detachment. Drozdovsky. Coming from the Romanian front, the detachment was heading to join the Volunteer Army of A.I. Denikin. While passing Gulyai-Polye, we learned about a certain N.I. Makhno, who robbed trains in the area and killed “bourgeois and cadets.” N.I. Makhno, having learned that staff officers and their families were traveling, decided to attack the trains, where he was met by machine guns and bayonets from special forces officers. N.I. himself Makhno barely escaped with his feet. M.G. Drozdovsky’s detachment helped the rebel Cossack villages recapture the capital of the VVD, Novocherkassk.

As soon as the villages of the Lower Don were cleared of Bolshevik detachments, the Don Rescue Circle was convened in Novocherkassk. Only the Cossacks participated in it, often not understanding political issues, as well as current issues. A new Military Ataman was nominated - P.N. Krasnov, as well as military foreman Denisov, who proved himself during the uprising. For the newborn Don State, natural allies were needed - Germany became them. The Germans were afraid of the Cossacks, and the VVD protected the German units from the invasion of Bolshevik troops.

Ataman P.N. Krasnov in the past served in the Guard, participated in two wars, the Russo-Japanese War and the Great War, was a good writer, and had military awards. The positions were located near the Cossack villages. The war was conducted according to Cossack rules, with cavalry rounds, luring the enemy into ambush with false retreats. In this Cossack war, the Gundorovsky regiment, commanded by Colonel Guselshchikov, and also General Mamontov, who was not a natural Cossack, but went through the entire Great War with the Cossacks of the VVD and was assigned to one of the Lower Don villages, stood out especially.

In one of the battles, the Chairman of the Don Revkom, Podtelkov, was caught by the White Cossacks. He and the secretary of the Don Revkom, Krivoshlykov, were hanged, and about 70 Cossacks accompanying them were shot. So merciless was the trial of the Cossack traitors. Soon an uprising began in the Upper Don districts.

Ataman P.N. Krasnov, unfortunately, was not a brilliant commander, but he was a talented administrator. Numbered divisions (participating in the Great War) began to be formed from assorted and differently armed village regiments. The Young Don Army began to form; it consisted of Cossacks who had not been to the front of the Great War and were not poisoned by the poison of Bolshevik propaganda. This was the Don Guard - the basis of the future personnel army. In addition, officer schools were opened in Novocherkassk, and a small fleet was established in the Sea of ​​Azov.

At the end of August 1918, the VVD army reached the peak of its strength. But, having gone beyond the borders of the VVD, the Cossacks’ desire to fight decreased significantly - the front-line soldiers began to speak: “We won’t let the Bolsheviks in, and let the Russians liberate themselves if they want.” Moreover, in October 1918, General Mamontov’s offensive against the city of Tsaritsyn (Volgograd) ended in failure. By the onset of winter, the Air Force had exhausted all its resources and began to run out of steam. In addition, Germany capitulated in November, and the VVD troops lost their regular supply of weapons, ammunition and uniforms.

The disaster began on the Don. The Don Army had one ally left - the White Volunteer Army, under the command of A.I. Denikin, but she was busy fighting with the Red Guard in Kuban and Stavropol. The most serious trouble happened on the northern border of the VVD, where, succumbing to Bolshevik propaganda, three Cossack regiments abandoned the front and went to their native villages to celebrate Christmas. The rebels were led by junior officer Fomin. The departure of three regiments exposed about 50 km of the front. 9 divisions of the 9th Red Army immediately entered the breakthrough. The catastrophe became global: the departing units scattered to their native villages and farmsteads, abandoning military property. Part of the Upper Don Cossacks, with arms in hand, went to F.K. Mironov (who regained his strength as a “Phoenix bird”). It was possible to stop the Red Army through several counterattacks from Mamontov’s cavalry corps, only at the turn of the river. Northern Donets. As a result of the retreat of the Don Army, Ataman of the VVD P.N. Krasnov convened the Military Circle and resigned, transferring his powers to A.P. Bogaevsky. In the operational rear, the VVD headquarters concentrated a group of the most combat-ready formations: the Gundorov regiment, part of the Young Army, part of Mamantov’s corps. The fight was not over - Don didn't give up.

1.3 New invasion of the Bolsheviks, betrayal of the Upper Don districts. Upper Don uprising

The Cossack regiments that had abandoned the front were urgently transferred to fight A.V. Kolchak. January 24, 1919 signed by V.I. Lenin and Ya.M. Sverdlov issued instructions that said: “Carry out mass terror against the rich Cossacks, exterminating them without exception, carry out merciless mass terror against all Cossacks who took any direct or indirect part in the fight against Soviet power”... At the same time, L D. Trotsky, the commander-in-chief of the Red Army and Navy, coined the expression: “to arrange Carthage,” which meant a scorched earth tactic on the territory of the VVD. Execution was due for all: for not surrendering edged weapons - checkers, daggers (which of the Cossacks did not have them?), for wearing a Cossack uniform, for not surrendering monetary indemnities, for wearing royal orders, for using the word “Cossack”, for wearing stripes - it is easier to list what for which they were not shot.

In the first half of March, the villages of Elanskaya and Kazanskaya rebelled. At the beginning, the Bolsheviks did not betray the significance of the uprising that had begun; you never know, they suppressed peasant uprisings of the same type, without any particular losses for themselves. But this uprising differed from others, primarily in Cossack discipline, and also in the fact that people who had imbibed the sense of military valor with their mother’s milk fought on the side of the rebels. The capital of the rebels was the village of Veshenskaya. At first, the rebels fought with cold steel, using Cossack methods of war and knowledge of the territory, and in rounds they cut down punitive security forces.

More and more elite-international communist units rushed to suppress the rebels. IN AND. Lenin writes: “I am afraid that you are mistaken... that there is no strength for ferocious and merciless reprisal..." At the end of the spring of 1919, the Bolshevik command formed a special expeditionary force to fight the Upper Don uprising

June 6, 1919 suddenly from the turn of the river. The reformed White Don Army went on the offensive in the Northern Donets. The punishers and security officers, finding themselves between two fires, began to retreat in panic. The Upper Don uprising remained like a thorn in the rear of the Reds. Everyone who wanted to leave the area of ​​the uprising was killed on the spot. Hostages were taken in the surrounding villages.

On June 6, the Red Army was surrounded. Mironov tried to mobilize in the Upper Don districts, but after everything that happened, the Cossacks did not even come to him. The Upper Don uprising symbolizes the attitude of true patriots of the Russian people towards the Boshevist-international regime. It was at this moment that the character of the Russian people, their self-sufficiency, emerged.

1.4 The second invasion of the Red Army troops on the Don, the performance of the Don Cossacks on the side of the Armed Forces of Southern Russia under the leadership of A.I. Denikin (April - October 1919)

The situation near Tsaritsyn and in the Don region was aggravated by the fact that Dagestan rebelled. Imam Uzum Haji declared Jihad against the infidels. Uzum Haji himself and all his forces did not pose any particular danger to the troops of General A.I. Denikin, but his rebel army distracted parts of the Terek Cossack army from the fight against the Bolsheviks.

In the rear of Denikin’s White Army, Makhno’s units became more active; in August 1919, the Terek Division of General Agoev, one of the most stable units in the corps of General A.G., was sent against them. Skinny. At one point, the “father” was pressed to the bank of the Dnieper, at the same time he began negotiations on switching to Petliura’s side. When necessary, Mr. Makhno, like Mr. Lenin, easily went over to the side of his enemies, and ideological disputes did not bother them at all.

An interesting situation arose in September-October 1919 in the south of Russia. Volunteer Corps A.P. Kutepov, having crushed about 80 Bolshevik divisions, approached Kursk. At this time, the corps of General A.G. approached Mamontov’s corps as reinforcement. Skinny. The battle with the 1st Cavalry Army in the Voronezh region lasted for 3 days. Despite the fact that the Reds suffered heavy losses, the units of Mamontov and Shkuro were forced to retreat under an overwhelming advantage, in addition, the 1st Cavalry Army was covered by numerous infantry.

Why did the White Guard lose???

· There were fewer of them. At a time when A.I. Denikin has about 60 thousand people, A.V. Kolchak has 150 thousand people, N.I. Yudenich 10 thousand people - the number of the Red Army reached 1.5 million people.

· The central position of the Soviet Union relative to the White Fronts, allowing for unlimited maneuver of forces.

· There were no politicians among the White Guards. None of the military commanders (including A.I. Denikin) considered it possible to make territorial and economic concessions that would infringe on the interests of Russia, unlike V.I. Lenin, who considered himself a person who had the right to divide the Russian Empire.

· The Whites lost the most important War - the propaganda War. Unlike the Bolsheviks, they used the power of propaganda very sparingly, for example, promising to give land and property to the landowners, they did not do this. Thus, acquiring enemies in the camp of the inert peasantry and landowners who seemed to stand for them.

In mid-October, the situation of the Don and Volunteer Army, advancing in the south of Russia, deteriorated significantly. The Red Army has increased quantitatively and, most importantly, qualitatively.

On October 12, 1919, Budyonny’s 1st Cavalry Army, reinforced by infantry divisions in the amount of 15-20 thousand bayonets and sabers, began an attack on the weakened corps of A.G. Shkuro and K.K. Mamontova. At that time, the number of Cossack formations was 3.5-4 thousand people, nevertheless, in the saber cuttings the Cossacks offered fierce resistance to the Budenovites. But the forces were too unequal. Advancing on the Cossack corps and pushing through their front, the Budenovites entered the flank of the Volunteer Army. The Don command, represented by General Sidorin, sought to more reliably cover the lands of the Don from the Bolshevik invasion.

1.5 Disaster 1919 - 1920 and the withdrawal of the Armed Forces of Southern Russia to Crimea (October 1919 - March 1920)

On December 5, 1919, Budyonny’s 1st Cavalry Army made a breakthrough, driving a deep wedge between the Don and Volunteer Army.

On January 9, 1920, Rostov was captured. By mid-January 1920, the red units operating against A.I. Denikin, were united into a common front under the command of Shorin.

By mid-January 1920, the thaw gave way to severe frosts. Through the joint efforts of the Don and Volunteer armies, the 1st cavalry and infantry units of the Reds were thrown back beyond the Don. And in the Kuban, decomposition continued, unaffected by the red occupation of the Kuban - it showed signs of Bolshevism and anarchy. On January 18, 1920, the Supreme Cossack Circle was assembled in Yekaterinodar - deputies from the Don, Kuban, Terek, and Astrakhan were gathered, and it began to create an “independent Cossack state” with the goal of clearing the Cossack land from the Bolsheviks.

On January 27, 1920, all Bolshevik forces went on the offensive against the Don and Volunteer armies of General. A.I. Denikin.

The real battle took place on Manych. Opposite Dumenko's cavalry stood the 2nd and 4th Don Corps of the Denikin Army.

February 8, 1920 A.I. Denikin issued a directive to launch a general offensive. A powerful force appeared in the White Guard, capable of resisting the red cavalry groups.

After the defeat of the Don Corps, General. Pavlov and the collapse of the Kuban army, the Don and Volunteer armies began to quickly retreat to the sea. In the Don Army, which showed itself excellently in the battles on the river. Manych, complete decomposition reigned. The Don commanders, having gathered their own “councils”, arbitrarily removed the general from office. Pavlov, accusing him of not being a Cossack. The Kuban army, which had almost completely disappeared, began to grow before our eyes as it retreated, but it grew not at the expense of the fighters, but at the expense of deserters, who believed that this was how they could escape from the Bolsheviks.

On March 16, Ekaterinodar was surrendered. On March 20, the White armies approached Novorossiysk. At the same time, A.I.’s last combat order was issued. Denikin. The Don Cossacks had no sense of resistance left, there was only a consciousness of dull and indifferent indifference, everything was mixed up, no connections between the headquarters and the troops were observed. Many surrendered, but individual feats also happened - in this way the Ataman regiment died heroically, entering the wheelhouse against 2 red divisions. The catastrophe was becoming inevitable. It was necessary to save the remnants of the armies. March 26, Gen. A.P. Kutepov reported that it was impossible to stay in Novorossiysk any longer. The following vessels were loaded onto the available ships: almost the entire Volunteer Corps, the remnants of the Kuban troops under the command of General. N.G. Babiev and several Don divisions. The last to leave the port of Novorossiysk was the destroyer "Captain Saken" with Gen. A.I. Denikin and his staff on board.

In total, about 30 thousand soldiers and Cossacks were taken from the city of Novorossiysk to the Crimean peninsula. After the evacuation to the Crimea Peninsula, Gen. A.I. Denikin resigned from the post of Commander-in-Chief of the South of Russia.

Conclusion

The main result of the Civil War for the Cossacks was the completion of the process of “decossackization.” It should be recognized that in the early 20s. The Cossack population has already merged with the rest of the agricultural population - merged in terms of its status, range of interests and tasks. Just as the decree of Peter I on the tax-paying population, at one time, eliminated in principle the differences between groups of the agricultural population by unifying their status and responsibilities, in the same way, the policy pursued by the communist authorities towards farmers brought together previously so different groups, equalizing everyone , as citizens of the “Soviet Republic”.

At the same time, the Cossacks suffered irreparable losses - the officers were knocked out almost entirely, and a significant part of the Cossack intelligentsia died. Many villages were destroyed. A significant number of Cossacks ended up in exile. Political suspicion towards the Cossacks remained for a long time. Involvement, at least indirectly, in the white Cossacks or the insurgent movement left a stigma for the rest of his life. In a number of areas, a large number of Cossacks were deprived of voting rights. Anything reminiscent of the Cossacks was banned. Until the beginning of the 30s. there was a methodical search for those “culpable” before the Soviet regime; accusing someone of involvement in the “Cossack counter-revolution” remained the most serious and inevitably entailed repression. Don Cossacks Bolshevik Denikin

I believe that, despite all the hesitations and contradictions with the authorities, the Cossacks of the Department of Internal Affairs remained faithful to their Motherland and the oath: “Faith, Tsar and Fatherland!”

Bibliography

1. Savelyev E.P. Average history of the Cossacks. Novocherkassk, 1916.

2. A.I. Denikin, “Essays on Russian Troubles”

3. M.A. Sholokhov, “Quiet Don”, collected works in 8 volumes.

4. Materials for the series “Peoples and Cultures”, issue 19: “Cossacks of Russia”, book 2, part 1 (published in “Izvestia of the Central Committee of the CPSU”, 1989, No. 6, p. 177)

5. V.I. Lenin, complete works, in 55 volumes.

6. V.V. Komin, "Nestor Makhno"

7. E.F. Losev, “The Life of Remarkable People: F.K. Mironov”

8. “Forgotten and unknown Russia: the White movement”, “Don army in the fight against the Bolsheviks”, a collection of memoirs of Don Cossack officers.

9. Vladimirsky-Budanov M.F. Review of the history of Russian law. Kyiv, 1900. P. 123.

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