Don Cossacks in the Civil War. Cossacks in the Civil War

The reasons why the Cossacks of all Cossack regions for the most part rejected the destructive ideas of Bolshevism and entered into an open struggle against them, and in completely unequal conditions, are still not entirely clear and constitute a mystery for many historians. After all, in everyday life, the Cossacks were the same farmers as 75% of the Russian population, bore the same state burdens, if not more, and were under the same administrative control of the state. With the beginning of the revolution that came after the abdication of the sovereign, the Cossacks within the regions and in the front-line units experienced various psychological stages. During the February rebellion in Petrograd, the Cossacks took a neutral position and remained outside spectators of the unfolding events. The Cossacks saw that in the presence of significant armed forces in Petrograd the government not only does not use them, but also strictly prohibits their use against the rebels. During the previous rebellion in 1905-1906, Cossack troops were the main armed force, who restored order in the country, as a result, in public opinion they earned the contemptuous title of “whips” and “royal satraps and guardsmen.” Therefore, in the rebellion that arose in the Russian capital, the Cossacks were inert and left the government to decide the issue of restoring order with the help of other troops. After the abdication of the sovereign and the entry into control of the country by the Provisional Government, the Cossacks considered the continuity of power legitimate and were ready to support the new government. But gradually this attitude changed, and, observing the complete inactivity of the authorities and even the encouragement of unbridled revolutionary excesses, the Cossacks began to gradually move away from the destructive power, and the instructions of the Council of Cossack Troops, operating in Petrograd under the chairmanship of the ataman of the Orenburg army Dutov, became authoritative for them.

Inside the Cossack regions, the Cossacks also did not become intoxicated with revolutionary freedoms and, having made some local changes, continued to live as before, without causing any economic, much less social, upheaval. At the front, in military units, the Cossacks accepted the order for the army, which completely changed the foundations of military formations, with bewilderment and, under the new conditions, continued to maintain order and discipline in the units, most often electing their former commanders and superiors. There were no refusals to execute orders and there was no settling of personal scores with the command staff. But the tension gradually increased. The population of the Cossack regions and Cossack units at the front were subjected to active revolutionary propaganda, which involuntarily had to affect their psychology and forced them to listen carefully to the calls and demands of the revolutionary leaders. In the area of ​​the Don Army, one of the important revolutionary acts was the removal of the appointed ataman Count Grabbe, his replacement with an elected ataman of Cossack origin, General Kaledin, and the restoration of the convening of public representatives to the Military Circle, according to the custom that had existed since ancient times, until the reign of Emperor Peter I. After which their lives continued walking without much shock. The issue of relations with the non-Cossack population, which, psychologically, followed the same revolutionary paths as the population of the rest of Russia, became acute. At the front, powerful propaganda was carried out among the Cossack military units, accusing Ataman Kaledin of being counter-revolutionary and having a certain success among the Cossacks. The seizure of power by the Bolsheviks in Petrograd was accompanied by a decree addressed to the Cossacks, in which only geographical names were changed, and it was promised that the Cossacks would be freed from the yoke of generals and the burden of military service and equality would be established in everything democratic freedoms. The Cossacks had nothing against this.

Rice. 1 Region of the Don Army

The Bolsheviks came to power under anti-war slogans and soon began to fulfill their promises. In November 1917, the Council of People's Commissars invited all warring countries to begin peace negotiations, but the Entente countries refused. Then Ulyanov sent a delegation to German-occupied Brest-Litovsk for separate peace negotiations with delegates from Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria. Germany's ultimatum demands shocked the delegates and caused hesitation even among the Bolsheviks, who were not particularly patriotic, but Ulyanov accepted these conditions. The “obscene Peace of Brest-Litovsk” was concluded, according to which Russia lost about 1 million km² of territory, pledged to demobilize the army and navy, transfer ships and infrastructure of the Black Sea Fleet to Germany, pay an indemnity of 6 billion marks, recognize the independence of Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland. The Germans had a free hand to continue the war in the west. At the beginning of March, the German army along the entire front began to advance to occupy the territories given up by the Bolsheviks under the peace treaty. Moreover, Germany, in addition to the agreement, announced to Ulyanov that Ukraine should be considered a province of Germany, to which Ulyanov also agreed. There is a fact in this case that is not widely known. Russia's diplomatic defeat in Brest-Litovsk was caused not only by the corruption, inconsistency and adventurism of the Petrograd negotiators. The “joker” played a key role here. A new partner suddenly appeared in the group of contracting parties - the Ukrainian Central Rada, which, despite all the precariousness of its position, behind the back of the delegation from Petrograd, on February 9 (January 27), 1918, signed a separate peace treaty with Germany in Brest-Litovsk. The next day, the Soviet delegation interrupted the negotiations with the slogan “we will stop the war, but we will not sign peace.” In response, on February 18, German troops launched an offensive along the entire front line. At the same time, the German-Austrian side tightened the peace terms. In view of the complete inability of the Sovietized old army and the beginnings of the Red Army to resist even the limited advance of German troops and the need for a respite to strengthen the Bolshevik regime, on March 3, Russia also signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. After this, the “independent” Ukraine was occupied by the Germans and, as unnecessary, they threw Petliura “from the throne”, placing the puppet Hetman Skoropadsky on him. Thus, shortly before falling into oblivion, the Second Reich, under the leadership of Kaiser Wilhelm II, captured Ukraine and Crimea.

After the Bolsheviks concluded the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, part of the territory of the Russian Empire turned into zones of occupation of the Central countries. Austro-German troops occupied Finland, the Baltic states, Belarus, Ukraine and eliminated the Soviets there. The Allies vigilantly monitored what was happening in Russia and also tried to ensure their interests connecting them with the former Russia. In addition, there were up to two million prisoners in Russia who could, with the consent of the Bolsheviks, be sent to their countries, and for the Entente powers it was important to prevent the return of prisoners of war to Germany and Austria-Hungary. Ports in the north of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk, and in the Far East Vladivostok served as a means of communication between Russia and its allies. Large warehouses of property and military equipment, delivered by foreigners on orders from the Russian government, were concentrated in these ports. The accumulated cargo amounted to over a million tons, worth up to 2 and a half billion rubles. Cargoes were shamelessly stolen, including by local revolutionary committees. To ensure the safety of cargo, these ports were gradually occupied by the Allies. Since orders imported from England, France and Italy were sent through northern ports, they were occupied by 12,000 British and 11,000 Allied units. Imports from the USA and Japan went through Vladivostok. On July 6, 1918, the Entente declared Vladivostok an international zone, and the city was occupied by Japanese units of 57,000 and other allied units of 13,000 people. But they did not begin to overthrow the Bolshevik government. Only on July 29, the Bolshevik power in Vladivostok was overthrown by the White Czechs under the leadership of the Russian general M. K. Diterichs.

In domestic politics, the Bolsheviks issued decrees that destroyed all social structures: banks, national industry, private property, land ownership, and under the guise of nationalization, simple robbery was often carried out without any state leadership. The inevitable devastation began in the country, for which the Bolsheviks blamed the bourgeoisie and “rotten intellectuals,” and these classes were subjected to the most severe terror, bordering on destruction. It is still completely impossible to understand how this all-destroying force came to power in Russia, given that power was seized in a country that had a thousand-year-old culture. After all, with the same measures, international destructive forces hoped to produce an internal explosion in worried France, transferring up to 10 million francs to French banks for this purpose. But France, by the beginning of the twentieth century, had already exhausted its limit on revolutions and was tired of them. Unfortunately for the businessmen of the revolution, there were forces in the country that were able to unravel the insidious and far-reaching plans of the leaders of the proletariat and resist them. This was written about in more detail in Military Review in the article “How America Saved Western Europe from the specter of world revolution."

One of the main reasons that allowed the Bolsheviks to carry out a coup d'etat and then quite quickly seize power in many regions and cities of the Russian Empire was the support of numerous reserve and training battalions stationed throughout Russia that did not want to go to the front. It was Lenin’s promise of an immediate end to the war with Germany that predetermined the transition of the Russian army, which had decayed during the “Kerenschina,” to the side of the Bolsheviks, which ensured their victory. In most regions of the country, the establishment of Bolshevik power took place quickly and peacefully: from 84 provincial and other major cities Only in fifteen years was Soviet power established as a result of armed struggle. Having adopted the “Decree on Peace” on the second day of their stay in power, the Bolsheviks ensured the “triumphant march of Soviet power” across Russia from October 1917 to February 1918.

The relations between the Cossacks and the Bolshevik rulers were determined by the decrees of the Union of Cossack Troops and the Soviet government. On November 22, 1917, the Union of Cossack Troops presented a resolution in which it notified the Soviet government that:
- The Cossacks do not seek anything for themselves and do not demand anything for themselves outside the boundaries of their regions. But, guided by the democratic principles of self-determination of nationalities, it will not tolerate on its territories any power other than the people’s, formed by the free agreement of local nationalities without any external or outside influence.
- Sending punitive detachments against the Cossack regions, in particular against the Don, will bring civil war to the outskirts, where energetic work is underway to establish public order. This will cause a disruption in transport, will be an obstacle to the delivery of goods, coal, oil and steel to the cities of Russia and will worsen the food supply, leading to disorder in the breadbasket of Russia.
- The Cossacks oppose any introduction of foreign troops into the Cossack regions without the consent of the military and regional Cossack governments.
In response to the peace declaration of the Union of Cossack Troops, the Bolsheviks issued a decree to open military operations against the south, which read:
- Relying on the Black Sea Fleet, arm and organize the Red Guard to occupy the Donetsk coal region.
- From the north, from the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief, move combined detachments to the south to the starting points: Gomel, Bryansk, Kharkov, Voronezh.
- The most active units should move from the Zhmerinka area to the east to occupy Donbass.

This decree created the germ of the fratricidal civil war of Soviet power against the Cossack regions. To survive, the Bolsheviks urgently needed Caucasian oil, Donetsk coal and bread from the southern outskirts. The outbreak of massive famine pushed Soviet Russia towards the rich south. The Don and Kuban governments did not have well-organized and sufficient forces at their disposal to protect the regions. The units returning from the front did not want to fight, they tried to disperse to the villages, and the young Cossack front-line soldiers entered into an open fight with the old men. In many villages this struggle became fierce, reprisals on both sides were brutal. But there were many Cossacks who came from the front, they were well armed and vociferous, had combat experience, and in most villages victory remained with the front-line youth, heavily infected with Bolshevism. It soon became clear that even in the Cossack regions, strong units could be created only on the basis of volunteerism. To maintain order in the Don and Kuban, their governments used detachments consisting of volunteers: students, cadets, cadets and youth. Many Cossack officers volunteered to form such volunteer (the Cossacks call them partisan) units, but this matter was poorly organized at the headquarters. Permission to form such detachments was given to almost everyone who asked. Many adventurers appeared, even robbers, who simply robbed the population for profit. However, the main threat to the Cossack regions turned out to be regiments returning from the front, since many of those who returned were infected with Bolshevism. The formation of volunteer Red Cossack units also began immediately after the Bolsheviks came to power. At the end of November 1917, at a meeting of representatives of the Cossack units of the Petrograd Military District, it was decided to create revolutionary detachments from the Cossacks of the 5th Cossack division, 1st, 4th and 14th Don regiments and send them to the Don, Kuban and Terek to defeat the counter-revolution and establish Soviet authorities. In January 1918, a congress of front-line Cossacks gathered in the village of Kamenskaya with the participation of delegates from 46 Cossack regiments. The Congress recognized Soviet power and created the Don Military Revolutionary Committee, which declared war on the ataman of the Don Army, General A.M. Kaledin, who opposed the Bolsheviks. Among the command staff of the Don Cossacks, two staff officers, military foreman Golubov and Mironov, were supporters of Bolshevik ideas, and Golubov’s closest collaborator was the sub-sergeant Podtyolkov. In January 1918, the 32nd Don Cossack Regiment returned to the Don from the Romanian Front. Having elected military sergeant F.K. as his commander. Mironov, the regiment supported the establishment of Soviet power, and decided not to go home until the counter-revolution led by Ataman Kaledin was defeated. But the most tragic role on the Don was played by Golubov, who in February occupied Novocherkassk with two regiments of Cossacks he propagated, dispersed the meeting of the Military Circle, arrested General Nazarov, who took office after the death of General Kaledin, and shot him. After a short time, this “hero” of the revolution was shot by the Cossacks right at the rally, and Podtyolkov, who had large sums of money with him, was captured by the Cossacks and, according to their verdict, hanged. Mironov's fate was also tragic. He managed to attract with him a significant number of Cossacks, with whom he fought on the side of the Reds, but, not being satisfied with their orders, he decided to go over with the Cossacks to the side of the fighting Don. Mironov was arrested by the Reds, sent to Moscow, where he was shot. But that will come later. In the meantime, there was great turmoil on the Don. If the Cossack population still hesitated, and only in some villages did the prudent voice of the old people gain the upper hand, then the non-Cossack population entirely sided with the Bolsheviks. The nonresident population in the Cossack regions always envied the Cossacks, who owned a large amount of land. Taking the side of the Bolsheviks, nonresidents hoped to take part in the division of the officers' and landowners' Cossack lands.

Other armed forces in the south were detachments of the emerging Volunteer Army, located in Rostov. On November 2, 1917, General Alekseev arrived on the Don, got in touch with Ataman Kaledin and asked him for permission to form volunteer detachments on the Don. General Alekseev’s goal was to take advantage of the southeastern base of the armed forces to gather the remaining steadfast officers, cadets, and old soldiers and organize them into the army necessary to restore order in Russia. Despite the complete lack of funds, Alekseev eagerly got down to business. On Barochnaya Street, the premises of one of the infirmaries were turned into an officers' dormitory, which became the cradle of volunteerism. Soon the first donation was received, 400 rubles. This is all that Russian society allocated to its defenders in November. But people simply walked to the Don, without any idea of ​​what awaited them, groping, in the darkness, across the solid Bolshevik sea. They went to where the centuries-old traditions of the Cossack freemen and the names of the leaders whom popular rumor associated with the Don served as a bright beacon. They came exhausted, hungry, ragged, but not discouraged. On December 6 (19), disguised as a peasant, with a false passport, General Kornilov arrived by rail in the Don. He wanted to go further to the Volga, and from there to Siberia. He considered it more correct for General Alekseev to remain in the south of Russia, and he would be given the opportunity to work in Siberia. He argued that in this case they would not interfere with each other and he would be able to organize a big business in Siberia. He was eager for space. But representatives of the “National Center” who arrived in Novocherkassk from Moscow insisted that Kornilov remain in the south of Russia and work together with Kaledin and Alekseev. An agreement was concluded between them, according to which General Alekseev took charge of all financial and political issues, General Kornilov took over the organization and command of the Volunteer Army, General Kaledin continued the formation of the Don Army and the management of the affairs of the Don Army. Kornilov had little faith in the success of work in the south of Russia, where he would have to create a white cause in the territories of the Cossack troops and depend on the military atamans. He said this: “I know Siberia, I believe in Siberia, things can be done there on a broad scale. Here Alekseev alone can easily handle the matter.” Kornilov was eager to go to Siberia with all his soul and heart, he wanted to be released and was not particularly interested in the work of forming the Volunteer Army. Kornilov’s fears that he would have friction and misunderstandings with Alekseev were justified from the first days of their work together. The forced stay of Kornilov in the south of Russia was a big political mistake of the “National Center”. But they believed that if Kornilov left, then many volunteers would follow him and the business started in Novocherkassk could fall apart. The formation of the Good Army progressed slowly, with an average of 75-80 volunteers signing up per day. There were few soldiers; mostly officers, cadets, students, cadets and high school students signed up. there was not enough in the Don warehouses; it had to be taken away from soldiers traveling home, in military echelons passing through Rostov and Novocherkassk, or bought through buyers in the same echelons. Lack of funds made work extremely difficult. The formation of the Don units progressed even worse. Generals Alekseev and Kornilov understood that the Cossacks did not want to go to restore order in Russia, but they were confident that the Cossacks would defend their lands. However, the situation in the Cossack regions of the southeast turned out to be much more difficult. The regiments returning from the front were completely neutral in the events taking place, and even showed a tendency towards Bolshevism, declaring that the Bolsheviks had not done anything bad to them.

In addition, inside the Cossack regions there was a difficult struggle against the non-resident population, and in the Kuban and Terek also against the highlanders. The military atamans had the opportunity to use well-trained teams of young Cossacks who were preparing to be sent to the front, and organize the conscription of successive ages of youth. General Kaledin could have had support in this from the elderly and front-line soldiers, who said: “We have served our duty, now we must call on others.” The formation of Cossack youth from conscription age could have given up to 2-3 divisions, which in those days was enough to maintain order on the Don, but this was not done. At the end of December, representatives of the British and French military missions arrived in Novocherkassk. They asked what had been done, what was planned to be done, after which they stated that they could help, but for now only with money, in the amount of 100 million rubles, in tranches of 10 million per month. The first payment was expected in January, but was never received, and then the situation completely changed. The initial funds for the formation of the Good Army consisted of donations, but they were scanty, mainly due to the unimaginable greed and stinginess of the Russian bourgeoisie and other propertied classes under the given circumstances. It should be said that the stinginess and stinginess of the Russian bourgeoisie is simply legendary. Back in 1909, during a discussion in the State Duma on the issue of the kulaks, P.A. Stolypin spoke prophetic words. He said: “... there is no more greedy and unscrupulous kulak and bourgeois than in Russia. It is no coincidence that in the Russian language the phrases “world-eater kulak and world-eater bourgeois” are used. If they do not change the type of their social behavior, great shocks await us...” He looked as if into water. They did not change social behavior. Almost all the organizers of the white movement point to the low usefulness of their appeals for material assistance to the property classes. However, by mid-January, a small (about 5 thousand people) but very combative and morally strong Volunteer Army had emerged. The Council of People's Commissars demanded the extradition or dispersal of volunteers. Kaledin and Krug answered: “There is no extradition from the Don!” The Bolsheviks, in order to eliminate the counter-revolutionaries, began to pull units loyal to them from the Western and Caucasian fronts to the Don region. They began to threaten the Don from Donbass, Voronezh, Torgovaya and Tikhoretskaya. In addition, the Bolsheviks tightened control on the railways and the influx of volunteers decreased sharply. At the end of January, the Bolsheviks occupied Bataysk and Taganrog, and on January 29, cavalry units moved from Donbass to Novocherkassk. The Don found himself defenseless against the Reds. Ataman Kaledin was confused, did not want bloodshed and decided to transfer his powers to the City Duma and democratic organizations, and then committed life with a shot in the heart. This was a sad but logical result of his activities. The First Don Circle gave pernach to the elected chieftain, but did not give him power.

The region was headed by a Military Government of 14 elders elected from each district. Their meetings had the character of a provincial duma and did not leave any trace in the history of the Don. On November 20, the government addressed the population with a very liberal declaration, convening a congress of the Cossack and peasant population on December 29 to organize the life of the Don region. At the beginning of January, a coalition government was created on a parity basis, 7 seats were given to the Cossacks, 7 to non-residents. The inclusion of demagogues-intellectuals and revolutionary democrats into the government finally led to the paralysis of power. Ataman Kaledin was ruined by his trust in the Don peasants and non-residents, his famous “parity”. He failed to glue the disparate pieces of the population of the Don region together. Under him, the Don split into two camps, Cossacks and Don peasants, along with non-resident workers and artisans. The latter, with few exceptions, were with the Bolsheviks. The Don peasantry, which made up 48% of the region's population, carried away by the broad promises of the Bolsheviks, was not satisfied with the measures of the Don government: the introduction of zemstvos in peasant districts, the attraction of peasants to participate in stanitsa self-government, their widespread admission into the Cossack class and the allocation of three million dessiatines of landowners' land. Under the influence of the incoming socialist element, the Don peasantry demanded a general division of all Cossack land. The numerically smallest working environment (10-11%) was concentrated in the most important centers, was the most restless and did not hide its sympathy for Soviet power. The revolutionary-democratic intelligentsia had not outlived its former psychology and, with amazing blindness, continued its destructive policy, which led to the death of democracy on a nationwide scale. The bloc of Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries reigned in all peasant and non-resident congresses, all kinds of dumas, councils, trade unions and inter-party meetings. There was not a single meeting where resolutions of no confidence in the ataman, the government and the Circle were not passed, or protests against their taking measures against anarchy, criminality and banditry.

They preached neutrality and reconciliation with that force that openly declared: “He who is not with us is against us.” In cities, workers' settlements and peasant settlements, the uprisings against the Cossacks did not subside. Attempts to place units of workers and peasants into Cossack regiments ended in disaster. They betrayed the Cossacks, went to the Bolsheviks and took Cossack officers with them to torture and death. The war took on the character of a class struggle. The Cossacks defended their Cossack rights from the Don workers and peasants. With the death of Ataman Kaledin and the occupation of Novocherkassk by the Bolsheviks, the period of the Great War and the transition to civil war ends in the south.

Rice. 2 Ataman Kaledin

On February 12, Bolshevik troops occupied Novocherkassk and military foreman Golubov, in “gratitude” for the fact that General Nazarov once saved him from prison, shot the new chieftain. Having lost all hope of holding Rostov, on the night of February 9 (22), the Good Army of 2,500 soldiers left the city for Aksai, and then moved to Kuban. After the establishment of Bolshevik power in Novocherkassk, terror began. Cossack units were prudently scattered throughout the city in small groups; domination in the city was in the hands of nonresidents and Bolsheviks. On suspicion of connections with the Good Army, officers were mercilessly executed. The robberies and robberies of the Bolsheviks made the Cossacks wary, even the Cossacks of the Golubovo regiments took a wait-and-see attitude. In the villages where nonresident and Don peasants seized power, the executive committees began dividing the Cossack lands. These outrages soon caused uprisings of the Cossacks in the villages adjacent to Novocherkassk. The leader of the Reds on the Don, Podtyolkov, and the head of the punitive detachment, Antonov, fled to Rostov, then were caught and executed. The occupation of Novocherkassk by the White Cossacks in April coincided with the occupation of Rostov by the Germans, and the return of the Volunteer Army to the Don region. But out of 252 villages of the Donskoy army, only 10 were liberated from the Bolsheviks. The Germans firmly occupied Rostov and Taganrog and the entire western part of the Donetsk district. The outposts of the Bavarian cavalry stood 12 versts from Novocherkassk. Under these conditions, Don was faced with four main tasks:
- immediately convene a new Circle, in which only delegates from the liberated villages could take part
- establish relations with the German authorities, find out their intentions and come to an agreement with them
- recreate the Don Army
- establish relationships with the Volunteer Army.

On April 28, a general meeting of the Don government and delegates from the villages and military units that took part in the expulsion of Soviet troops from the Don region took place. The composition of this Circle could not have any claim to resolving issues for the entire Army, which is why it limited its work to issues of organizing the struggle for the liberation of the Don. The meeting decided to declare itself the Don Rescue Circle. There were 130 people in it. Even on the democratic Don, this was the most popular assembly. The circle was called gray because there were no intelligentsia on it. At this time, the cowardly intelligentsia sat in cellars and basements, trembling for their lives or being mean to the commissars, signing up for service in the Soviets or trying to get a job in innocent institutions for education, food and finance. She had no time for elections this time Time of Troubles, when both voters and deputies risked their heads. The circle was elected without party struggle, there was no time for that. The circle was chosen and elected to it exclusively by Cossacks who passionately wanted to save their native Don and were ready to give their lives for this. And these weren't empty words, because after the elections, having sent their delegates, the electors themselves dismantled their weapons and went to save the Don. This Circle did not have a political face and had one goal - to save the Don from the Bolsheviks, at any cost and at any cost. He was truly popular, meek, wise and businesslike. And this gray, from overcoat and coat cloth, that is, truly democratic, the Don saved the people's mind. Already by the time the full military circle was convened on August 15, 1918, the Don land was cleared of the Bolsheviks.

The second urgent task for the Don was to resolve relations with the Germans who occupied Ukraine and the western part of the lands of the Don Army. Ukraine also laid claim to the German-occupied Don lands: Donbass, Taganrog and Rostov. Attitudes towards the Germans and Ukraine were the most hot issue, and on April 29, the Circle decided to send a plenipotentiary embassy to the Germans in Kyiv in order to find out the reasons for their appearance on the territory of the Don. The negotiations took place in calm conditions. The Germans stated that they were not going to occupy the region and promised to clear the occupied villages, which they soon did. On the same day, the Circle decided to organize a real army, not from partisans, volunteers or vigilantes, but obeying laws and discipline. What Ataman Kaledin with his government and the Circle, consisting of talkative intellectuals, had been stomping around for almost a year, the gray Circle for saving the Don decided at two meetings. The Don Army was still only a project, and the command of the Volunteer Army already wanted to crush it under itself. But Krug answered clearly and specifically: “The supreme command of all military forces, without exception, operating on the territory of the Don Army must belong to the military ataman...”. This answer did not satisfy Denikin; he wanted to have large reinforcements of people and material in the person of the Don Cossacks, and not to have a “allied” army nearby. The circle worked intensively, meetings were held in the morning and evening. He was in a hurry to restore order and was not afraid of reproaches for his desire to return to the old regime. On May 1, the Circle decided: “Unlike the Bolshevik gangs, which do not wear any external insignia, all units participating in the defense of the Don must immediately take on their military appearance and wear shoulder straps and other insignia.” On May 3, as a result of a closed vote, Major General P.N. was elected military chieftain by 107 votes (13 against, 10 abstained). Krasnov. General Krasnov did not accept this election before the Circle adopted the laws that he considered necessary to introduce into the Donskoy army in order to be able to fulfill the tasks assigned to him by the Circle. Krasnov said at the Circle: “Creativity has never been the lot of the team. Raphael's Madonna was created by Raphael, and not by a committee of artists... You are the owners of the Don land, I am your manager. It's all about trust. If you trust me, you accept the laws I propose; if you do not accept them, it means that you do not trust me, you are afraid that I will use the power given to you to the detriment of the army. Then we have nothing to talk about. I cannot lead the army without your complete trust.” When asked by one of the members of the Circle whether he could suggest changing or altering anything in the laws proposed by the ataman, Krasnov replied: “You can. Articles 48,49,50. You can propose any flag except red, any coat of arms except the Jewish one five-pointed star, any anthem except the international...". The very next day the Circle reviewed all the laws proposed by the ataman and adopted them. The circle restored the ancient pre-Petrine title “The Great Don Army”. The laws were an almost complete copy of the basic laws of the Russian Empire, with the difference that the rights and prerogatives of the emperor passed to... the ataman. And there was no time for sentimentality.

Before the eyes of the Don Rescue Circle stood the bloody ghosts of Ataman Kaledin, who had shot himself, and Ataman Nazarov, who had been shot. The Don lay in rubble, it was not only destroyed, but polluted by the Bolsheviks, and the German horses drank the water of the Quiet Don, a river sacred to the Cossacks. The work of the previous Circles led to this, with the decisions of which Kaledin and Nazarov fought, but could not win because they had no power. But these laws created many enemies for the chieftain. As soon as the Bolsheviks were expelled, the intelligentsia, hiding in cellars and basements, came out and started a liberal howl. These laws did not satisfy Denikin either, who saw in them a desire for independence. On May 5, the Circle dispersed, and the ataman was left alone to rule the army. That same evening, his adjutant Yesaul Kulgavov went to Kyiv with handwritten letters to Hetman Skoropadsky and Emperor Wilhelm. The result of the letter was that on May 8, a German delegation came to the ataman, with a statement that the Germans did not pursue any aggressive goals in relation to the Don and would leave Rostov and Taganrog as soon as they saw that complete order had been restored in the Don region. On May 9, Krasnov met with the Kuban ataman Filimonov and the Georgian delegation, and on May 15 in the village of Manychskaya with Alekseev and Denikin. The meeting revealed deep differences between the Don Ataman and the command of the Don Army in both tactics and strategy in the fight against the Bolsheviks. The goal of the rebel Cossacks was to liberate the land of the Don Army from the Bolsheviks. They had no further intentions of waging war outside their territory.

Rice. 3 Ataman Krasnov P.N.

By the time of the occupation of Novocherkassk and the election of the ataman by the Circle for the Salvation of the Don, all armed forces consisted of six infantry and two cavalry regiments of varying numbers. The junior officers were from the villages and were good, but there was a shortage of hundred and regimental commanders. Having experienced many insults and humiliations during the revolution, many senior commanders at first had distrust of the Cossack movement. The Cossacks were dressed in their semi-military dress, but boots were missing. Up to 30% were dressed in poles and bast shoes. Most wore shoulder straps, and everyone wore white stripes on their caps and hats to distinguish them from the Red Guard. The discipline was fraternal, the officers ate from the same pot with the Cossacks, because they were most often relatives. The headquarters were small; for economic purposes there were several regiments public figures from the villages that resolved all rear issues. The battle was fleeting. No trenches or fortifications were built. There were few entrenching tools, and natural laziness prevented the Cossacks from digging in. The tactics were simple. At dawn they began to attack in liquid chains. At this time, an outflanking column was moving along an intricate route towards the enemy’s flank and rear. If the enemy was ten times stronger, it was considered normal for an offensive. As soon as a bypass column appeared, the Reds began to retreat and then the Cossack cavalry rushed at them with a wild, soul-chilling whoop, knocked them over and took them prisoner. Sometimes the battle began with a feigned retreat of twenty versts (this is an old Cossack venter). The Reds rushed to pursue, and at this time the encircling columns closed behind them and the enemy found themselves in a fire pocket. With such tactics, Colonel Guselshchikov with regiments of 2-3 thousand people smashed and captured entire Red Guard divisions of 10-15 thousand people with convoys and artillery. Cossack custom required that officers go in front, so their losses were very high. For example, the division commander, General Mamantov, was wounded three times and still in chains. In the attack, the Cossacks were merciless, and they were also merciless towards the captured Red Guards. They were especially harsh towards captured Cossacks, who were considered traitors to the Don. Here the father used to sentence his son to death and did not want to say goodbye to him. It also happened the other way around. At this time, echelons of Red troops were still moving across the Don territory, fleeing to the east. But in June the railway line was cleared of the Reds, and in July, after the Bolsheviks were expelled from the Khopyorsky district, the entire territory of the Don was liberated from the Reds by the Cossacks themselves.

In other Cossack regions the situation was no easier than on the Don. The situation was especially difficult among the Caucasian tribes, where the Russian population was scattered. The North Caucasus was raging. The fall of the central government caused a shock more serious here than anywhere else. Reconciled by the tsarist power, but not having outlived the centuries-old strife and not having forgotten old grievances, the mixed-tribal population became agitated. The Russian element that united it, about 40% of the population consisted of two equal groups, Terek Cossacks and non-residents. But these groups were separated by social conditions, were settling their land scores and could not counter the Bolshevik threat with unity and strength. While Ataman Karaulov was alive, several Terek regiments and some ghost of power remained. On December 13, at the Prokhladnaya station, a crowd of Bolshevik soldiers, on the orders of the Vladikavkaz Soviet of Deputies, unhooked the ataman’s carriage, drove it to a distant dead end and opened fire on the carriage. Karaulov was killed. In fact, on the Terek, power passed to local councils and bands of soldiers of the Caucasian Front, who flowed in a continuous stream from the Transcaucasus and, not being able to penetrate further into their native places, due to the complete blockage of the Caucasian highways, settled like locusts across the Terek-Dagestan region. They terrorized the population, planted new councils or hired themselves into the service of existing ones, bringing fear, blood and destruction everywhere. This flow served as the most powerful conductor of Bolshevism, which swept the nonresident Russian population (due to the thirst for land), touched the Cossack intelligentsia (due to the thirst for power) and greatly confused the Terek Cossacks (due to the fear of “going against the people”). As for the mountaineers, they were extremely conservative in their way of life, which very little reflected social and land inequality. True to their customs and traditions, they were governed by their national councils and were alien to the ideas of Bolshevism. But the mountaineers quickly and willingly accepted the practical aspects of central anarchy and intensified violence and robbery. By disarming the passing troop trains, they had a lot of weapons and ammunition. On the basis of the Caucasian Native Corps, they formed national military formations.

Rice. 4 Cossack regions of Russia

After the death of Ataman Karaulov, an overwhelming struggle with the Bolshevik detachments that filled the region and the aggravation of controversial issues with neighbors - Kabardians, Chechens, Ossetians, Ingush - the Terek Army was turned into a republic, part of the RSFSR. Quantitatively, Terek Cossacks in the Terek region made up 20% of the population, nonresidents - 20%, Ossetians - 17%, Chechens - 16%, Kabardians - 12% and Ingush - 4%. The most active among other peoples were the smallest - the Ingush, who fielded a strong and well-armed detachment. They robbed everyone and kept Vladikavkaz in constant fear, which they captured and plundered in January. When Soviet power was established in Dagestan, as well as on the Terek, on March 9, 1918, the Council of People's Commissars set its first goal to break the Terek Cossacks, destroying their special advantages. Armed expeditions of mountaineers were sent to the villages, robberies, violence and murders were carried out, lands were taken away and handed over to the Ingush and Chechens. In this difficult situation, the Terek Cossacks lost heart. While the mountain peoples created their armed forces through improvisation, the natural Cossack army, which had 12 well-organized regiments, disintegrated, dispersed and disarmed at the request of the Bolsheviks. However, the excesses of the Reds led to the uprising beginning on June 18, 1918 Terek Cossacks under the leadership of Bicherakhov. The Cossacks defeat the Red troops and blockade their remnants in Grozny and Kizlyar. On July 20, in Mozdok, the Cossacks were convened for a congress, at which they decided on an armed uprising against Soviet power. The Terets established contact with the command of the Volunteer Army, the Terek Cossacks created a combat detachment of up to 12,000 people with 40 guns and resolutely took the path of fighting the Bolsheviks.

The Orenburg Army under the command of Ataman Dutov, the first to declare independence from the power of the Soviets, was the first to be invaded by detachments of workers and red soldiers, who began robbery and repression. Veteran of the fight against the Soviets, Orenburg Cossack General I.G. Akulinin recalled: “The stupid and cruel policy of the Bolsheviks, their undisguised hatred of the Cossacks, the desecration of Cossack shrines and, especially, bloody reprisals, requisitions, indemnities and robbery in the villages - all this opened our eyes to the essence Soviet power and forced him to take up arms. The Bolsheviks could not lure the Cossacks with anything. The Cossacks had land, and they regained their freedom in the form of the broadest self-government in the first days of the February Revolution.” A turning point gradually occurred in the mood of the ordinary and front-line Cossacks; they increasingly began to speak out against the violence and tyranny of the new government. If in January 1918, Ataman Dutov, under pressure from Soviet troops, left Orenburg, and he had barely three hundred active fighters left, then on the night of April 4, sleeping Orenburg was raided by more than 1,000 Cossacks, and on July 3, power was restored in Orenburg passed into the hands of the ataman.

Fig.5 Ataman Dutov

In the area of ​​the Ural Cossacks, the resistance was more successful, despite the small number of the Troops. Uralsk was not occupied by the Bolsheviks. Ural Cossacks from the beginning of the birth of Bolshevism, they did not accept its ideology and back in March they easily dispersed the local Bolshevik revolutionary committees. The main reasons were that among the Urals there were no non-residents, there was a lot of land, and the Cossacks were Old Believers who more strictly guarded their religious and moral principles. The Cossack regions of Asian Russia generally occupied special position. All of them were small in composition, most of them were historically formed in special conditions by state measures, for the purposes of state necessity, and their historical existence was determined by insignificant periods. Despite the fact that these troops did not have firmly established Cossack traditions, foundations and skills for forms of statehood, all of them turned out to be hostile to the approaching Bolshevism. In mid-April 1918, the troops of Ataman Semyonov, about 1000 bayonets and sabers, went on the offensive from Manchuria to Transbaikalia, against 5.5 thousand for the Reds. At the same time, the uprising of the Transbaikal Cossacks began. By May, Semenov’s troops approached Chita, but were unable to take it immediately. The battles between Semyonov’s Cossacks and the red detachments, consisting mainly of former political prisoners and captured Hungarians, in Transbaikalia took place with varying degrees of success. However, at the end of July, the Cossacks defeated the Red troops and took Chita on August 28. Soon the Amur Cossacks drove the Bolsheviks out of their capital Blagoveshchensk, and the Ussuri Cossacks took Khabarovsk. Thus, under the command of their atamans: Transbaikal - Semenov, Ussuri - Kalmykov, Semirechensky - Annenkov, Ural - Tolstov, Siberian - Ivanov, Orenburg - Dutov, Astrakhan - Prince Tundutov, they entered into a decisive battle. In the fight against the Bolsheviks, the Cossack regions fought exclusively for their lands and law and order, and their actions, according to historians, were in the nature of a guerrilla war.

Rice. 6 White Cossacks

A huge role throughout the Siberian railway track The troops of the Czechoslovak legions, formed by the Russian government from Czech and Slovak prisoners of war, numbering up to 45,000 people, played. By the beginning of the revolution, the Czech corps stood in the rear of the Southwestern Front in Ukraine. In the eyes of the Austro-Germans, legionnaires, like former prisoners of war, were traitors. When the Germans attacked Ukraine in March 1918, the Czechs offered strong resistance to them, but most Czechs did not see their place in Soviet Russia and wanted to return to the European front. According to the agreement with the Bolsheviks, Czech trains were sent towards Siberia to board ships in Vladivostok and send them to Europe. In addition to the Czechoslovaks, there were many captured Hungarians in Russia, who mostly sympathized with the Reds. The Czechoslovakians had a centuries-old and fierce hostility and enmity with the Hungarians (how can one not recall the immortal works of J. Hasek in this regard). Due to fear of attacks on the way by the Hungarian Red units, the Czechs resolutely refused to obey the Bolshevik order to surrender all weapons, which is why it was decided to disperse the Czech legions. They were divided into four groups with a distance between groups of echelons of 1000 kilometers, so that the echelons with Czechs stretched throughout Siberia from the Volga to Transbaikalia. The Czech legions played a colossal role in the Russian civil war, since after their rebellion the fight against the Soviets sharply intensified.

Rice. 7 Czech Legion on the way along the Trans-Siberian Railway

Despite the agreements, there were considerable misunderstandings in the relations between the Czechs, Hungarians and local revolutionary committees. As a result, on May 25, 1918, 4.5 thousand Czechs rebelled in Mariinsk, and on May 26, the Hungarians provoked an uprising of 8.8 thousand Czechs in Chelyabinsk. Then, with the support of Czechoslovak troops, the Bolshevik government was overthrown on May 26 in Novonikolaevsk, May 29 in Penza, May 30 in Syzran, May 31 in Tomsk and Kurgan, June 7 in Omsk, June 8 in Samara and June 18 in Krasnoyarsk. The formation of Russian combat units began in the liberated areas. On July 5, Russian and Czechoslovak troops occupy Ufa, and on July 25 they take Yekaterinburg. At the end of 1918, the Czechoslovak legionnaires themselves began a gradual retreat to the Far East. But, having participated in battles in Kolchak’s army, they would finally finish their retreat and leave Vladivostok for France only at the beginning of 1920. In such conditions, the Russian White movement began in the Volga region and Siberia, not counting the independent actions of the Ural and Orenburg Cossack troops, which began the fight against the Bolsheviks immediately after they came to power. On June 8, the Committee of the Constituent Assembly (Komuch) was created in Samara, liberated from the Reds. He declared himself a temporary revolutionary government, which was supposed to spread over the entire territory of Russia and transfer control of the country to a legally elected Constituent Assembly. The rising population of the Volga region began a successful struggle against the Bolsheviks, but in the liberated places control ended up in the hands of the fleeing fragments of the Provisional Government. These heirs and participants in destructive activities, having formed a government, carried out the same destructive work. At the same time, Komuch created his own armed forces - the People's Army. On June 9, Lieutenant Colonel Kappel began commanding a detachment of 350 people in Samara. In mid-June, the replenished detachment took Syzran, Stavropol Volzhsky (now Togliatti), and also inflicted a heavy defeat on the Reds near Melekes. On July 21, Kappel takes Simbirsk, defeating the superior forces of the Soviet commander Guy defending the city. As a result, by the beginning of August 1918, the territory of the Constituent Assembly extended from west to east for 750 versts from Syzran to Zlatoust, from north to south for 500 versts from Simbirsk to Volsk. On August 7, Kappel’s troops, having previously defeated the red river flotilla that came out to meet them at the mouth of the Kama, take Kazan. There they seize part of the gold reserves of the Russian Empire (650 million gold rubles in coins, 100 million rubles in credit notes, gold bars, platinum and other valuables), as well as huge warehouses with weapons, ammunition, medicines, and ammunition. This gave the Samara government a solid financial and material base. With the capture of Kazan into the anti-Bolshevik camp in in full force The Academy of the General Staff, located in the city, headed by General A.I. Andogsky, is transferred.

Rice. 8 Hero of Komuch Lieutenant Colonel Kappel V.O.

A government of industrialists was formed in Yekaterinburg, a Siberian government was formed in Omsk, and the government of Ataman Semyonov, who led the Transbaikal Army, was formed in Chita. The Allies dominated in Vladivostok. Then General Horvath arrived from Harbin, and as many as three authorities were formed: from the proteges of the Allies, General Horvath and from the railway board. Such fragmentation of the anti-Bolshevik front in the east required unification, and a meeting was convened in Ufa to select a single authoritative state power. The situation in the units of the anti-Bolshevik forces was unfavorable. The Czechs did not want to fight in Russia and demanded that they be sent to the European fronts against the Germans. There was no trust in the Siberian government and members of the Komuch among the troops and the people. In addition, the representative of England, General Knox, stated that until a firm government was created, the delivery of supplies from the British would be stopped. Under these conditions, Admiral Kolchak joined the government and in the fall he carried out a coup and was proclaimed head of government and supreme commander with the transfer of full power to him.

In the south of Russia events developed as follows. After the Reds occupied Novocherkassk in early 1918, the Volunteer Army retreated to Kuban. During the campaign to Ekaterinodar, the army, having endured all the difficulties of the winter campaign, later nicknamed the “ice campaign,” fought continuously. After the death of General Kornilov, who was killed near Yekaterinodar on March 31 (April 13), the army again made its way with a large number of prisoners to the territory of the Don, where by that time the Cossacks, who had rebelled against the Bolsheviks, had begun to clear their territory. Only by May the army found itself in conditions that allowed it to rest and replenish itself for the further fight against the Bolsheviks. Although the attitude of the Volunteer Army command towards the German army was irreconcilable, it, having no weapons, tearfully begged Ataman Krasnov to send the Volunteer Army weapons, shells and cartridges that it received from the German army. Ataman Krasnov, in his colorful expression, receiving military equipment from the hostile Germans, washed them in the clean waters of the Don and transferred part of the Volunteer Army. Kuban was still occupied by the Bolsheviks. In Kuban, the break with the center, which occurred on the Don due to the collapse of the Provisional Government, occurred earlier and more acutely. Back on October 5, with a strong protest from the Provisional Government, the regional Cossack Rada adopted a resolution to separate the region into an independent Kuban Republic. At the same time, the right to elect members of the self-government body was granted only to the Cossack, mountain population and old-time peasants, that is, almost half of the region’s population was deprived of voting rights. A military ataman, Colonel Filimonov, was placed at the head of the socialist government. The discord between the Cossack and nonresident populations took on increasingly acute forms. Not only the nonresident population, but also the front-line Cossacks stood up against the Rada and the government. Bolshevism came to this mass. The Kuban units returning from the front did not go to war against the government, did not want to fight the Bolsheviks and did not follow the orders of their elected authorities. An attempt, following the example of Don, to create a government based on “parity” ended in the same way, paralysis of power. Everywhere, in every village and village, the Red Guard from outside the city gathered, and they were joined by a part of the Cossack front-line soldiers, who were poorly subordinate to the center, but followed exactly its policy. These undisciplined, but well-armed and violent gangs began to impose Soviet power, redistribute land, confiscate grain surpluses and socialize, and simply rob wealthy Cossacks and behead the Cossacks - persecute officers, non-Bolshevik intelligentsia, priests, and authoritative old men. And above all, to disarmament. It is worthy of surprise with what complete non-resistance the Cossack villages, regiments and batteries gave up their rifles, machine guns, and guns. When the villages of the Yeisk department rebelled at the end of April, it was a completely unarmed militia. The Cossacks had no more than 10 rifles per hundred; the rest were armed with what they could. Some attached daggers or scythes to long sticks, others took pitchforks, others took spears, and others simply shovels and axes. Punitive detachments with... Cossack weapons came out against defenseless villages. By the beginning of April, all non-resident villages and 85 out of 87 villages were Bolshevik. But the Bolshevism of the villages was purely external. Often only the names changed: the ataman became a commissar, the village assembly became a council, the village board became an iskom.

Where executive committees were captured by non-residents, their decisions were sabotaged, re-elected every week. There was a stubborn, but passive, without inspiration or enthusiasm, struggle between the age-old way of Cossack democracy and life with the new government. There was a desire to preserve Cossack democracy, but there was no courage. All this, in addition, was heavily implicated in the pro-Ukrainian separatism of some Cossacks who had Dnieper roots. The pro-Ukrainian figure Luka Bych, who headed the Rada, declared: “Helping the Volunteer Army means preparing for the reabsorption of Kuban by Russia.” Under these conditions, Ataman Shkuro assembled the first partisan detachment, located in the Stavropol area, where the Council was meeting, intensified the struggle and presented the Council with an ultimatum. The uprising of the Kuban Cossacks quickly gained strength. In June, the 8,000-strong Volunteer Army began its second campaign against Kuban, which had completely rebelled against the Bolsheviks. This time White was lucky. General Denikin successively defeated Kalnin’s 30,000-strong army near Belaya Glina and Tikhoretskaya, then in a fierce battle near Yekaterinodar, Sorokin’s 30,000-strong army. On July 21, the Whites occupied Stavropol, and on August 17, Ekaterinodar. Blocked on the Taman Peninsula, a 30,000-strong group of Reds under the command of Kovtyukh, the so-called “Taman Army,” along the Black Sea coast fought its way across the Kuban River, where the remnants of the defeated armies of Kalnin and Sorokin fled. By the end of August, the territory of the Kuban army is completely cleared of the Bolsheviks, and the strength of the White Army reaches 40 thousand bayonets and sabers. However, having entered the territory of Kuban, Denikin issued a decree addressed to the Kuban ataman and the government, demanding:
- full tension on the part of Kuban for its speedy liberation from the Bolsheviks
- all priority units of the Kuban military forces should henceforth be part of the Volunteer Army to carry out national tasks
- in the future, no separatism should be shown on the part of the liberated Kuban Cossacks.

Such gross interference by the command of the Volunteer Army in the internal affairs of the Kuban Cossacks had a negative impact. General Denikin led an army that had no defined territory, no people under his control, and, even worse, no political ideology. The commander of the Don Army, General Denisov, even called the volunteers “wandering musicians” in his hearts. General Denikin's ideas were oriented towards armed struggle. Not having sufficient means for this, General Denikin demanded the subordination of the Cossack regions of the Don and Kuban to him in order to fight. Don was in better conditions and was not at all bound by Denikin’s instructions. The German army was perceived on the Don as a real force that contributed to getting rid of Bolshevik domination and terror. The Don government entered into contact with the German command and established fruitful cooperation. Relations with the Germans resulted in a purely business form. The rate of the German mark was set at 75 kopecks of the Don currency, a price was made for a Russian rifle with 30 rounds of one pound of wheat or rye, and other supply agreements were concluded. From the German army through Kyiv in the first month and a half the Don Army received: 11,651 rifles, 88 machine guns, 46 guns, 109 thousand artillery shells, 11.5 million rifle cartridges, of which 35 thousand artillery shells and about 3 million rifle cartridges. At the same time, all the shame of peaceful relations with an irreconcilable enemy fell solely on Ataman Krasnov. As for the Supreme Command, according to the laws of the Don Army, it could only belong to the Military Ataman, and before his election - to the marching Ataman. This discrepancy led to the Don demanding the return of all the Don people from the Dorovol army. The relationship between the Don and the Good Army became not an alliance, but a relationship of fellow travelers.

In addition to tactics, there were also great differences within the white movement in strategy, policy and war goals. The goal of the Cossack masses was to liberate their land from the Bolshevik invasion, establish order in their region and provide the Russian people with the opportunity to arrange their destiny according to at will. Meanwhile, the forms of civil war and the organization of the armed forces returned the art of war to the era of the 19th century. The successes of the troops then depended solely on the qualities of the commander who directly controlled the troops. Good commanders of the 19th century did not scatter the main forces, but directed them towards one main goal: the capture of the enemy’s political center. With the capture of the center, the government of the country is paralyzed and the conduct of the war becomes more complicated. The Council of People's Commissars, sitting in Moscow, was in an exclusively difficult conditions, reminiscent of the position of Muscovite Rus' in the 14th-15th centuries, limited by the Oka and Volga rivers. Moscow was cut off from all types of supplies, and the goals of the Soviet rulers were reduced to obtaining basic food supplies and a piece of daily bread. In the pathetic calls of the leaders there were no longer any high motives emanating from the ideas of Marx; they sounded cynical, figurative and simple, as they once sounded in the speeches of the people's leader Pugachev: “Go, take everything and destroy everyone who stands in your way.” . People's Commissar of Military and Marine Bronstein (Trotsky), in his speech on June 9, 1918, indicated simple and clear goals: “Comrades! Among all the questions that trouble our hearts, there is one simple question - the question of our daily bread. All our thoughts, all our ideals are now dominated by one concern, one anxiety: how to survive tomorrow. Everyone involuntarily thinks about himself, about his family... My task is not at all to conduct only one campaign among you. We need to have a serious conversation about the country's food situation. According to our statistics, in 17, there was a surplus of grain in those places that produce and export grain, there were 882,000,000 poods. On the other hand, there are areas in the country where there is not enough of their own bread. If you calculate, it turns out that they are missing 322,000,000 poods. Therefore, in one part of the country there is a surplus of 882,000,000 pounds, and in the other, 322,000,000 pounds are not enough...

In the North Caucasus alone there is now a grain surplus of no less than 140,000,000 poods; in order to satisfy hunger, we need 15,000,000 poods per month for the whole country. Just think: 140,000,000 poods of surplus located only in the North Caucasus may be enough for ten months for the entire country. ...Let each of you now promise to provide immediate practical assistance so that we can organize a campaign for bread.” In fact, it was a direct call for robbery. Thanks to the complete lack of publicity, paralysis public life and the complete fragmentation of the country, the Bolsheviks promoted people to leadership positions for whom, under normal conditions, there was only one place - prison. In such conditions, the task of the white command in the fight against the Bolsheviks should have had the shortest goal of capturing Moscow, without being distracted by any other secondary tasks. And to accomplish this main task it was necessary to attract the broadest sections of the people, primarily peasants. In reality, it was the other way around. The volunteer army, instead of marching on Moscow, was firmly stuck in the North Caucasus; the white Ural-Siberian troops could not cross the Volga. All revolutionary changes beneficial to the peasants and people, economic and political, were not recognized by the whites. The first step of their civilian representatives in the liberated territory was a decree that canceled all orders issued by the Provisional Government and the Council of People's Commissars, including those relating to property relations. General Denikin, having absolutely no plan for establishing a new order capable of satisfying the population, consciously or unconsciously, wanted to return Rus' to its original pre-revolutionary position, and the peasants were obliged to pay for the seized lands to their former owners. After this, could the whites count on the peasants supporting their activities? Of course not. 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 peasants and non-residents, but to defeat the entire peasant central Russia they couldn’t and they understood it perfectly.

As Russian and non-Russian history shows us, when required dramatic changes and solutions, we need not just people, but extraordinary personalities, who, unfortunately, were not available during the Russian timelessness. The country needed a government capable of not only issuing decrees, but also having the intelligence and authority to ensure that these decrees were carried out by the people, preferably voluntarily. Such power does not depend on state forms, but is based, as a rule, solely on the abilities and authority of the leader. Bonaparte, having established power, did not look for any forms, but managed to force him to obey his will. He forced both representatives of the royal nobility and people from the sans-culottes to serve France. There were no such consolidating personalities in the white and red movements, and this led to an incredible split and bitterness in the ensuing civil war. 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

Beginning with a spontaneous popular uprising, the revolutionary events of 1917 entailed large-scale changes in the usual way of life of all segments of the population. And the Cossacks were no exception. Before the emperor had time to abdicate the throne, he was replaced by a new provisional government. It was unbearable for the freedom-loving and willful Cossacks to accept this state of affairs. Therefore in certain moment the situation got out of the control of the central government: instead of bowing their heads obediently, the Cossacks began to fight.

Kuban Republic

The collapse of the Russian Empire was marked not only by civil war and riots. Against the backdrop of a harsh redistribution of power and bloody reprisals against dissenters, several autonomous Cossack republics were proclaimed - Kuban, Don, Terek, Amur, and Ural. They arose largely due to the impotence of the central government, which failed to quickly suppress the riots in remote regions.

One of the most durable Cossack republics turned out to be Kuban. Without having much influence on the outcome of events at the very beginning of the revolution, during the Civil War its participants noticeably increased their power. And they didn’t just increase it, but established their own constitution and issued many decrees. The laws of the seceding Cossacks were objectionable to the central government, but were unquestioningly carried out locally.

While inferior to others in numbers, the Kuban Republic, nevertheless, was a formidable military force. The Cossacks more than made up for the lack of men and weapons with daring. On the battlefield, they repeatedly managed to defeat officer companies that outnumbered them tens of times. Even under hurricane fire, the Kuban Cossacks moved in even and regular ranks, gradually pushing back the enemy and capturing a large number of prisoners. It is quite natural that this state of affairs raised the mood in the villages, and there were more and more people willing to take the side of the Kuban residents.

Don Republic

Like the Kuban Republic, the Don military government was formed shortly after the 1917 revolution. Blinded by the Bolsheviks' promises to end the war, the Don Cossacks initially maintained neutrality. This allowed the Red commissioners to occupy the Don with relative ease.

However, after the invaders began to harshly impose their orders and physically destroy all those resisting, the Cossacks came to their senses. Ataman A.M. Kaledin, who is at the head Don Army, quickly organized powerful resistance and knocked the Reds out of their occupied positions. Soon after these events, independence was declared and a draft Constitution was adopted.

Despite the rosy prospect, the Don Cossacks suffered the same fate as their Kuban neighbors. In many ways, the split occurred due to the fact that they were involved in the political games of the white movement. Although one should not diminish the influence on such developments of the fact that the Don Cossacks refused to fight for the good of Russia. Having significant military power, they wanted to fight exclusively for themselves: for their honor and independence.

The situation was aggravated by the pronounced isolation of the people, which sometimes reached extremes. The Don Cossacks not only considered representatives of other nationalities as strangers, they in every possible way avoided any contact with them. Mixed marriages, close communication and any other everyday issues were prohibited. Cossack communities lived as isolated as possible.

Terek Cossack Army

The most unique among the Cossacks of Russia was, perhaps, the Terek Cossack Army. And the point here is not the fate of its representatives - it was similar for all representatives of the pre-revolutionary Cossacks. Having managed to organize a republic and developed future plan actions, the Terek Cossacks were able to survive for only about two years, after which they, along with others, were abolished in 1920.

However, this did not prevent the Terek Cossacks from remaining the most colorful representatives of the class, and they invariably stood out due to their appearance and cultural customs. Living in close proximity to the Caucasian highlanders, the Tertsy entered into mixed marriages with them and accepted them into their army. This affected appearance Cossacks: dressed in Caucasian hats and burkas, with daggers at the ready, they were not at all like other cavalry troops.

It was the Terek Cossacks who became the first repressed ethnic group, which was forcibly evicted from their native villages. It didn’t even help that most of them fought for central power. Everyone suffered the same fate: to leave their native places alive or die, refusing to give up their homes to the Ingush, Chechens and other representatives of the newly formed North Caucasian republics.

Other Cossack troops

The revolution and the war that followed became a turning point in the lives of several million Russian Cossacks. Regardless of their region of residence and way of life, they had a common national identity and, for the most part, were not in solidarity with the new government. As a result, February 1917 had serious consequences for the Kuban, Don, Terek, Ural, Astrakhan and Orenburg Cossacks.

The abdication of Emperor Nicholas II from the throne brought confusion to the well-established centralized command of troops. The bulk of them were in a suspended and uncertain state for a long time, which did not benefit their awareness of themselves as a single community. The situation was aggravated by capitalist relations, which penetrated deeper and deeper into the Cossack environment, destroying it from the inside.

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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 a force alternative to the power of the Bolsheviks, the Cossacks caused negative attitude to itself 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.

July 2, 1917 The Great Military Circle elected Lieutenant General to the post of Don Ataman tsarist army Kaledin - 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 of 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 close to 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 Gundorov 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. The 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. Skin. 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. Skin. 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 you lose? White Guard???

· 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.

· White lost the most main War- propaganda. 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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The Kuban people, their Ukrainian-speaking part, go the furthest in their desire for independence. The delegation of the Kuban Rada is trying to achieve recognition by the League of Nations that Kuban is independent state.
However, the struggle dictates that the Cossack governments need to unite with the White Guard armies fighting for “One, Great and Indivisible Russia.” The Kuban and Tertsy people are fighting as part of the Volunteer Army of General A.I. Denikin. In January 1919, the Don Cossacks recognized Denikin’s supremacy. It is the Cossacks in the South of Russia who give mass strength to the “white” movement. The Bolsheviks call their Southern Front “Cossack”.
At the end of 1918, the power of Admiral A.V. was recognized. Kolchak Orenburg and Ural residents. After some bickering, Ataman Semenov recognizes Kolchak’s power. The Siberians were Kolchak’s reliable support.
Being recognized as the “Supreme Ruler of Russia”, A.V. Kolchak appointed Ataman Dutov as the Supreme Marching Ataman of all Cossack troops.
"Red" Cossacks. In the fight against Soviet power, the Cossacks were not united. Some of the Cossacks, mostly the poor, sided with the Bolsheviks. 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 Bolsheviks.

The Bolsheviks create Cossack regiments, often on the basis of old regiments of the tsarist army. Thus, 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. On the Don, the Red Cossack commanders F. Mironov and K. Bulatkin are extremely popular. In Kuban -I. Kochubey, Y. Balakhonov. The Red Orenburg Cossacks are commanded by the Kashirin brothers.
In the east of the country, many Transbaikal and Amur Cossacks are drawn into the partisan war against Kolchak and the Japanese.
The Soviet leadership is trying to further split the Cossacks. To guide the Red Cossacks and for propaganda purposes - to show that not all Cossacks are against Soviet power, a Cossack department is being created under the All-Russian Central Executive Committee.
As the Cossack military governments became more and more dependent on the “white” generals, the Cossacks, individually and in groups, went over to the side of the Bolsheviks. By the beginning of 1920, when Kolchak and Denikin were defeated, the transitions became widespread. Entire divisions of Cossacks are beginning to be created in the Red Army. Especially many Cossacks joined the Red Army when the White Guards evacuated to the Crimea and abandoned tens of thousands of Donetsk and Kuban residents on the Black Sea coast. Most of the abandoned Cossacks are enlisted in the Red Army and sent to the Polish front.