And in the Kolchak white movement. History lessons: leaders of the White movement
Kolchak Alexander Vasilyevich is a prominent military leader and statesman of Russia, polar explorer. During the Civil War, he entered the historical chronicles as the leader of the White movement. The assessment of Kolchak’s personality is one of the most controversial and tragic pages in Russian history of the 20th century.
ObzorfotoAlexander Kolchak was born on November 16, 1874 in the village of Aleksandrovskoye in the suburbs of St. Petersburg, into a family of hereditary nobles. The Kolchakov family gained fame in the military field, serving the Russian Empire for many centuries. His father was a hero of the defense of Sevastopol during the Crimean campaign.
Education
Until the age of 11, he was educated at home. In 1885-88. Alexander studied at the 6th gymnasium in St. Petersburg, where he graduated from three classes. Then he entered the Naval Cadet Corps, where he showed excellent success in all subjects. As the best student in scientific knowledge and behavior, he was enrolled in the class of midshipmen and appointed sergeant major. He graduated from the Cadet Corps in 1894 with the rank of midshipman.
Carier start
From 1895 to 1899, Kolchak served in the Baltic and Pacific fleets and circumnavigated the world three times. He was engaged in independent research of the Pacific Ocean, most of all interested in its northern territories. In 1900, the capable young lieutenant was transferred to the Academy of Sciences. At this time, the first scientific works began to appear, in particular, an article was published about his observations of sea currents. But the goal of the young officer is not only theoretical, but also practical research - he dreams of going on one of the polar expeditions.
Blogger Interested in his publications, the famous Arctic explorer Baron E.V. Toll invites Kolchak to take part in the search for the legendary “Sannikov Land”. Having gone in search of the missing Toll, he takes a whaleboat from the schooner "Zarya", and then makes a risky journey on dog sleds and finds the remains of the lost expedition. During this dangerous campaign, Kolchak caught a severe cold and miraculously survived severe pneumonia.
Russo-Japanese War
In March 1904, immediately after the start of the war, having not fully recovered from his illness, Kolchak achieved a referral to besieged Port Arthur. The destroyer "Angry", under his command, took part in the installation of barrage mines dangerously close to the Japanese raid. Thanks to these hostilities, several enemy ships were blown up.
Letanosti In the last months of the siege, he commanded coastal artillery, which inflicted significant damage on the enemy. During the fighting he was wounded, and after the capture of the fortress he was captured. In recognition of his fighting spirit, the command of the Japanese army left Kolchak with weapons and released him from captivity. For his heroism he was awarded:
- St. George's weapon;
- Orders of St. Anne and St. Stanislav.
The struggle to recreate the fleet
After treatment in the hospital, Kolchak receives six months' leave. Sincerely experiencing the virtually complete loss of his native fleet in the war with Japan, he is actively involved in the work of reviving it.
Gossip In June 1906, Kolchak headed a commission at the Naval General Staff to determine the reasons that led to the defeat at Tsushima. As a military expert, he often spoke at State Duma hearings with justification for allocating the necessary funding.
His project, dedicated to the realities of the Russian fleet, became the theoretical basis for all Russian military shipbuilding in the pre-war period. As part of its implementation, Kolchak in 1906-1908. personally supervises the construction of four battleships and two icebreakers.
For his invaluable contribution to the study of the Russian North, Lieutenant Kolchak was elected a member of the Russian Geographical Society. The nickname “Kolchak the Polar” stuck to him.
At the same time, Kolchak continues his efforts to systematize materials from past expeditions. The work he published in 1909 on the ice cover of the Kara and Siberian seas is recognized as a new stage in the development of polar oceanography in the study of ice cover.
World War I
The Kaiser's command was preparing for the blitzkrieg of St. Petersburg. Heinrich of Prussia, the commander of the German fleet, expected to sail through the Gulf of Finland to the capital in the first days of the war and subject it to hurricane fire from powerful guns.
Having destroyed important objects, he intended to land troops, capture St. Petersburg and put an end to Russia's military claims. The implementation of Napoleonic projects was prevented by the strategic experience and brilliant actions of Russian naval officers.
Gossip Given the significant superiority in the number of German ships, mine warfare tactics were recognized as the initial strategy to combat the enemy. The Kolchak division already during the first days of war laid 6 thousand mines in the waters of the Gulf of Finland. Skillfully placed mines became a reliable shield for the defense of the capital and thwarted the plans of the German fleet to capture Russia.
Subsequently, Kolchak persistently defended plans to switch to more aggressive actions. Already at the end of 1914, a daring operation was undertaken to mine the Danzig Bay directly off the enemy’s coast. As a result of this operation, 35 enemy warships were blown up. The successful actions of the naval commander determined his subsequent promotion.
Sanmati In September 1915, he was appointed commander of the Mine Division. At the beginning of October, he undertook a bold maneuver to land troops on the shore of the Gulf of Riga to help the armies of the Northern Front. The operation was carried out so successfully that the enemy did not even realize that the Russians were present.
In June 1916, A.V. Kolchak was promoted by the Sovereign to the rank of Commander-in-Chief of the Black Sea Fleet. In the photo, the talented naval commander is captured in full dress uniform with all the military regalia.
Revolutionary time
After the February Revolution, Kolchak was faithful to the emperor to the end. Hearing the offer of the revolutionary sailors to surrender their weapons, he threw his award saber overboard, arguing for his action with the words: “Even the Japanese did not take away my weapons, I will not give them to you either!”
Arriving in Petrograd, Kolchak blamed the ministers of the Provisional Government for the collapse of his own army and country. After which the dangerous admiral was actually sent into political exile at the head of the allied military mission to America.
In December 1917, he asked the British government to enlist in military service. However, certain circles are already betting on Kolchak as an authoritative leader capable of rallying the liberation struggle against Bolshevism.
The Volunteer Army operated in the South of Russia, and there were many disparate governments in Siberia and the East. Having united in September 1918, they created a Directory, the inconsistency of which inspired distrust in the wider officer and business circles. They needed a “strong hand” and, having carried out a white coup, invited Kolchak to accept the title of Supreme Ruler of Russia.
Goals of the Kolchak government
Kolchak's policy was to restore the foundations of the Russian Empire. His decrees banned all extremist parties. The Siberian government wanted to achieve reconciliation of all population groups and parties, without the participation of left and right radicals. An economic reform was prepared, involving the creation of an industrial base in Siberia.
The greatest victories of Kolchak’s army were achieved in the spring of 1919, when it occupied the territory of the Urals. However, after the successes, a series of failures began, caused by a number of miscalculations:
- Kolchak’s incompetence in the problems of government;
- refusal to resolve the agrarian question;
- partisan and Socialist Revolutionary resistance;
- political disagreements with allies.
In November 1919, Kolchak was forced to leave Omsk; in January 1920 he gave his powers to Denikin. As a result of the betrayal of the allied Czech Corps, it was handed over to the Bolshevik Revolutionary Committee, which seized power in Irkutsk.
Death of Admiral Kolchak
The fate of the legendary personality ended tragically. Some historians cite the cause of death as a personal secret order, fearing his release by Kappel’s troops rushing to the rescue. A.V. Kolchak was shot on February 7, 1920 in Irkutsk.
In the 21st century, the negative assessment of Kolchak’s personality has been revised. His name is immortalized on memorial plaques, monuments, and feature films.
Personal life
Kolchak's wife, Sofya Omirova, is a hereditary noblewoman. Due to the protracted expedition, she waited for her fiancé for several years. Their wedding took place in March 1904 in the Irkutsk church.
Three children were born in the marriage:
- The first daughter, born in 1905, died in infancy.
- Son Rostislav, born March 9, 1910.
- Daughter Margarita, born in 1912, died at the age of two.
In 1919, Sofya Omirova, with the help of British allies, emigrated with her son to Constanta, and subsequently to Paris. She died in 1956 and was buried in the cemetery of Russian Parisians.
Son Rostislav, an employee of the Algerian Bank, participated in battles with the Germans on the side of the French army. Died in 1965. Kolchak's grandson - Alexander, born in 1933, lives in Paris.
The last years of his life, Kolchak's actual wife became his last love. She met the admiral in 1915 in Helsingfors, where she arrived with her husband, a naval officer. After the divorce in 1918, she followed the admiral. She was arrested along with Kolchak, and after his execution she spent almost 30 years in various exiles and prisons. She was rehabilitated and died in 1975 in Moscow.
- Alexander Kolchak was baptized in Trinity Church, which is known today as Kulich and Easter.
- During one of his polar campaigns, Kolchak named the island in honor of his bride, who was waiting for him in the capital. Cape Sophia retains the name given to him to this day.
- A.V. Kolchak became the fourth polar navigator in history to receive the highest award of the geographical society - the Konstantinov Medal. Before him, the great F. Nansen, N. Nordenskiöld, N. Jurgens received this honor.
- The maps that Kolchak compiled were used by Soviet sailors until the end of the 1950s.
- Before his death, Kolchak did not accept the offer to blindfold him. He gave his cigarette case to the Cheka officer in command of the execution.
Supreme Ruler of Russia Kolchak...
For decades, this phrase was perceived, on the one hand, by the participants of the “white cause” who were defeated in the civil war with deep respect, or at least with understanding; on the other hand, the Bolsheviks, the Reds, and many Soviet people who were brought up on the Marxist-Leninist principles of class intolerance with hatred or sharp hostility. So. Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak was born on November 4, 1874. at the Obukhov Steel Plant in the family of a nobleman - a naval artillery officer. He began his education at the 6th St. Petersburg Classical Gymnasium, and from 1888. studied in the naval cadet corps, was second in the class of 1894, although he could have been first, but refused in favor of his comrade. And September 15, 1894 he was awarded the rank of midshipman, and in December 1898. he was promoted to lieutenant, but due to his departure to serve at the Imperial Academy, he remained in this rank until 1906. Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak was known to the scientific community for his research work in the field of oceanology, hydrology and cartography of the Arctic Ocean. And also thanks to his brave expedition in search of Baron Toll. But he was not destined to remain a researcher for long, as the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905 broke out and he was forced to petition for his transfer to the Pacific Fleet. It should be noted that this fact testifies to Kolchak’s enormous patriotism, since shortly before this, on March 5, 1904. he married Sofia Fedorovna Omirova. A participant in the Russian-Japanese War, he commanded a destroyer and artillery batteries in Port Arthur. He was wounded and captured. Upon his return from Japan, he conducted scientific research, was one of the initiators of the restoration and reorganization of the Russian Navy, an expert in the State Duma, and predicted the world war, the war between Russia and Germany. In 1908-1910 supervised the preparation and initial stage of a new polar expedition, which had the task of building the Northern Sea Route, the design and construction of new type icebreakers "Vaigach" and "Taimyr". Having been recalled by the Naval General Staff, he was the head of its operational department for the Baltic Fleet, implementing the shipbuilding program and preparing the fleet for war. Since 1912 in the Baltic Fleet, he commands destroyers. On the eve of the declaration of war and at its beginning, he directs the mining of the Gulf of Finland, his own, and then German ports. Since the fall of 1915, commander of the mine division and all naval forces of the Gulf of Riga. Rear Admiral (March), Vice Admiral (June 1916). Since June 1916, commander of the Black Sea Fleet. During the February Revolution, he swore an oath to the Provisional Government. With the growing influence of the Bolsheviks, Kolchak gave up command of the Black Sea Fleet. He was popular in military and political circles and was named among candidates for dictator. In July 1917, at the head of the naval mission, he went to the USA, where he stayed until the October Revolution in Russia. He did not accept the power of the Bolsheviks. Representative of the white movement abroad. With the consent of the British authorities, they decided to use Kolchak in preparing military formations in the Far East to fight the Bolshevik rule and the German occupiers. For this purpose, in April 1918, he was introduced to the board of the Chinese Eastern Railway and operated in Manchuria and Japan. Since September in Vladivostok, he decided to make his way to the south of Russia to fight the Soviets. Upon arrival on October 13 in Omsk, where the All-Russian Provisional Government was located, he agreed to the proposal to take the post of Minister of War and Navy. In October 1918, he arrived in Omsk with the English General A. Knox and on November 4 was appointed Minister of War and Naval Affairs of the Siberian Government. And already on November 18, 1918, with the support of White Guard officers and interventionists, he carried out a coup and established a military dictatorship, accepting the title of “Supreme Ruler of the Russian State” and the rank of Supreme Commander-in-Chief (until January 4, 1920). In the very first days of his reign, he developed vigorous activity to calm society in relation to the coup. And it should be noted that he was able to overcome the resistance only by December 1918. But he made a fatal mistake by practically rejecting all socialist parties, after which he had to fight with them. With Kolchak coming to power, the white forces were consolidated throughout the eastern region. He was recognized by everyone except the Cossack atamans Semenov and Kalmykov. Kolchak also came into contact with the government of the Great Don Cossack Army, and on June 17, along with Denikin joining Kolchak, he became the Supreme Ruler of all White Russia. At the same time, he appointed Denikin as his deputy. Kolchak's main goal was to destroy the Bolsheviks. But it should be noted that during his government there was a significant improvement in the economic area and the tax system. Banks were also reorganized. The Kolchak government, which claimed to be an all-Russian government and was later recognized as such, was carried away by state building, forming the staff of ministries and other institutions without any measure. The state structure was formed as an all-Russian one, to serve the entire country. Its staff turned out to be overly inflated. Moreover, numerous institutions were filled by unskilled people. The bulky apparatus became ineffective. A policy was pursued in relation to peasants that took into account their interests, opening up the prospect of a private farming path of development. At the beginning of 1919 The troops were reorganized. The largest army formations - the Siberian and Western armies - were commanded respectively by a major general, and after the capture of Perm - by Lieutenant General R. Gaida and Lieutenant General M.V. Khanzhin. Khanzhin was operationally subordinate to the Southern Army Group of Major General G.A. Belov, which was adjacent to the left flank of his formation. The first of the armies constituted the right, middle wing of the front, the second acted in the center. To the south there was a separate Orenburg army under the command of Lieutenant General N.A. Savelyev, who was soon replaced by Lieutenant General V.S. Tolstoy. The entire front had a length of up to 1400 km. Kolchak’s formations were opposed by six red armies numbered 1st to 5th and Turkestan. They were respectively commanded by G.D. Gai, V.I. Shorin, S.A. Mezheninov, M.V. Frunze, J.K. Blumberg (soon replaced by M.N. Tukhachevsky) and G.V. Zinoviev. The front commander was S.S. Kamenev. The chairman of the Revolutionary Military Union, L.D. Trotsky, often went to the front. By the spring of 1919 the number of Kolchak’s troops was up to 400 thousand people. In addition to them, in Siberia and the Far East there were up to 35 thousand Czechoslovaks, 80 thousand Japanese, more than 6 thousand British and Canadians, more than 8 thousand Americans and more than one thousand French. But they were all stationed in the rear and did not take active part in the hostilities. At the beginning of March 1919 Kolchak's troops, ahead of the Reds, went on the offensive and began to quickly advance towards the Volga, approaching it at Kazan and Samara at a distance of up to 80, and at Spassk - up to 35 kilometers. However, by the end of April the offensive potential was exhausted. It seemed that the White front was not seriously threatened. The Red counter-offensive against the Western army, launched at the end of April, encountered stubborn resistance. But then, on May 1, the unexpected happened. The Ukrainian kuren (regiment) named after T.G. Shevchenko, who had just arrived at the front south of the Sarai-Gir station of the Samara-Zlatoust railway, started an uprising. In Chelyabinsk, where this unit was formed, the soldiers of the regiment were propagandized by communists and anarchists. The carefully prepared uprising, with strict adherence to secrecy, turned out to be successful. It was possible to involve soldiers from four more regiments and a Jaeger battalion. Several thousand soldiers with weapons, artillery and convoys went over to the side of the Reds, the shock group of their front. Thousands of soldiers and officers fled to the rear. All this had a destructive effect on neighboring parts and connections. The 11th and 12th White divisions were defeated. A huge gap appeared in the white battle formation, into which cavalry and infantry rushed. The situation at the front was also aggravated by constant intrigues between the commanders. The end of October - the beginning of November, when the White forces retreated to Tobolsk and only desperate efforts managed to stop the Reds, this was the beginning of a catastrophe for both the troops and the entire White affair of Admiral Kolchak. The enemy approached Omsk and On November 10, the government was evacuated, but Kolchak himself hesitated to leave. Moreover, he decided to retreat with the troops and waited for their approach, believing that the presence of a military leader with the active army would benefit it. He left Omsk on November 12 on four echelons, together with the “Golden Echelon”, carrying gold reserves and an armored train. On December 21, an uprising broke out in Cheremkhovo, on the way to Irkutsk, and 3 days later in the outskirts of the city itself - Glazkov. January 3, 1920 . The Council of Ministers sends a telegram to Kolchak demanding that he renounce power and hand it over to Denikin, which Kolchak did, issuing it on January 4, 1920. his last decree. On January 18, a decree was issued to arrest Kolchak, and after the arrest, numerous interrogations began. On February 7, Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak and V.N. Pepelyaev were shot, and their bodies were thrown into the Angara. This is how Admiral Kolchak went on his last voyage. Who, when and how decided the issue of Kolchak’s murder is not known for certain, but for decades the prevailing opinion was that this issue was resolved without trial or investigation by the Irkutsk Revolutionary Committee. Sometimes there is mention of coordinating an “act of retaliation” with the Revolutionary Military Council of the 5th Army. But there is one interesting telegram: “Cipher Sklyansky: Send Smirnov (RVS 5) a code: Do not spread any news about Kolchak, do not print absolutely anything, and after we occupy Irkutsk, send a strictly official telegram explaining that the local authorities before our arrival acted this way and that under the influence of Kappel’s threat and the danger of White Guard conspiracies in Irkutsk- Are you going to do it extremely reliably? Where is Tukhachevsky? How are things on the Cavalry Front? In Crimea?"
(written in the hand of Comrade Lenin)
January 1920
(From the archive of Comrade Sklyansky)
The following were used in preparing the report:
- Plotnikov I.F. “Alexander Vasilievich Kolchak. Life and activity". Rostov n/d.: publishing house "Phoenix", 1998.
- Internet Resources
In the post-Soviet period in Russia, a reassessment of the events and results of the Civil War began. The attitude towards the leaders of the White movement began to change to the exact opposite - now films are being made about them, in which they appear as fearless knights without fear or reproach.
At the same time, many know very little about the fate of the most famous leaders of the White Army. Not all of them managed to maintain honor and dignity after defeat in the Civil War. Some were destined for an inglorious end and indelible shame.
Alexander Kolchak
On November 5, 1918, Admiral Kolchak was appointed Minister of War and Navy of the so-called Ufa Directory, one of the anti-Bolshevik governments created during the Civil War.
On November 18, 1918, a coup took place, as a result of which the Directory was abolished, and Kolchak himself was given the title of Supreme Ruler of Russia.
From the autumn of 1918 to the summer of 1919, Kolchak managed to successfully conduct military operations against the Bolsheviks. At the same time, in the territory controlled by his troops, methods of terror were practiced against political opponents.
A series of military failures in the second half of 1919 led to the loss of all previously captured territories. Kolchak’s repressive methods provoked a wave of uprisings in the rear of the White Army, and often at the head of these uprisings were not the Bolsheviks, but the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks.
Kolchak planned to get to Irkutsk, where he was going to continue his resistance, but on December 27, 1919, power in the city passed to the Political Center, which included the Bolsheviks, Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries.
On January 4, 1920, Kolchak signed his last decree - on the transfer of supreme power to General Denikin. Under the guarantee of representatives of the Entente, who promised to take Kolchak to a safe place, the former Supreme Ruler arrived in Irkutsk on January 15.
Here he was handed over to the Political Center and placed in a local prison. On January 21, interrogations of Kolchak began by the Extraordinary Commission of Inquiry. After the final transfer of power in Irkutsk to the Bolsheviks, the admiral’s fate was sealed.
On the night of February 6-7, 1920, 45-year-old Kolchak was shot by decision of the Irkutsk Military Revolutionary Committee of the Bolsheviks.
General Staff Lieutenant General V.O. Kappel. Winter 1919 Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Vladimir Kappel
General Kappel gained fame thanks to the popular film “Chapaev” in the USSR, which depicted the so-called “psychic attack” - when chains of Kappel’s men moved towards the enemy without firing a single shot.
The “psychic attack” had rather mundane reasons - parts of the White Guards were seriously suffering from a shortage of ammunition, and such tactics were a forced decision.
In June 1918, General Kappel organized a detachment of volunteers, which was subsequently deployed into the Separate Rifle Brigade of the People's Army of Komuch. The Committee of Members of the All-Russian Constituent Assembly (Komuch) became the first anti-Bolshevik government of Russia, and Kappel’s unit became one of the most reliable in his army.
An interesting fact is that the symbol of Komuch was the red banner, and the “Internationale” was used as the anthem. So the general, who became one of the symbols of the White movement, began the Civil War under the red banner.
After the anti-Bolshevik forces in eastern Russia were united under the general control of Admiral Kolchak, General Kappel led the 1st Volga Corps, later called “Kappel Corps”.
Kappel remained faithful to Kolchak to the end. After the arrest of the latter, the general, who by that time had received command of the entire collapsing Eastern Front, made a desperate attempt to save Kolchak.
In severe frost conditions, Kappel led his troops to Irkutsk. Moving along the bed of the Kan River, the general fell into a wormwood. Kappel received frostbite, which developed into gangrene. After the amputation of his foot, he continued to lead the troops.
On January 21, 1920, Kappel transferred command of the troops to General Wojciechowski. Severe pneumonia was added to the gangrene. The already dying Kappel insisted on continuing the march to Irkutsk.
36-year-old Vladimir Kappel died on January 26, 1920 at the Utai crossing, near the Tulun station near the city of Nizhneudinsk. His troops were defeated by the Reds on the outskirts of Irkutsk.
Lavr Kornilov in 1917. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Lavr Kornilov
After the failure of his speech, Kornilov was arrested, and the general and his associates spent the period from September 1 to November 1917 under arrest in Mogilev and Bykhov.
The October Revolution in Petrograd led to the fact that opponents of the Bolsheviks decided to release the previously arrested generals.
Once free, Kornilov went to the Don, where he began creating a Volunteer Army for the war with the Bolsheviks. In fact, Kornilov became not only one of the organizers of the White movement, but one of those who unleashed the Civil War in Russia.
Kornilov acted with extremely harsh methods. Participants in the so-called First Kuban “Ice” Campaign recalled: “All the Bolsheviks captured by us with weapons in their hands were shot on the spot: alone, in dozens, hundreds. It was a war of extermination.
The Kornilovites used intimidation tactics against the civilian population: in Lavr Kornilov’s appeal, residents were warned that any “hostile action” towards volunteers and Cossack detachments operating with them would be punishable by executions and burning of villages.
Kornilov’s participation in the Civil War was short-lived - on March 31, 1918, the 47-year-old general was killed during the storming of Yekaterinodar.
General Nikolai Nikolaevich Yudenich. 1910s Photo from the photo album of Alexander Pogost. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Nikolai Yudenich
General Yudenich, who successfully operated in the Caucasian theater of military operations during the First World War, returned to Petrograd in the summer of 1917. He remained in the city after the October Revolution, going illegal.
Only at the beginning of 1919 did he go to Helsingfors (now Helsinki), where at the end of 1918 the “Russian Committee” was organized - another anti-Bolshevik government.
Yudenich was proclaimed the head of the White movement in North-West Russia with dictatorial powers.
By the summer of 1919, Yudenich, having received funding and confirmation of her powers from Kolchak, created the so-called North-Western Army, which was tasked with capturing Petrograd.
In the fall of 1919, the Northwestern Army launched a campaign against Petrograd. By mid-October, Yudenich's troops reached the Pulkovo Heights, where they were stopped by the reserves of the Red Army.
The White front was broken through and a rapid retreat began. The fate of Yudenich's army was tragic - the units pressed to the border with Estonia were forced to cross into the territory of this state, where they were interned and placed in camps. Thousands of military and civilians died in these camps.
Yudenich himself, having announced the dissolution of the army, went to London through Stockholm and Copenhagen. Then the general moved to France, where he settled.
Unlike many of his associates, Yudenich withdrew from political life in exile.
Living in Nice, he headed the Society of Devotees of Russian History.
Denikin in Paris, 1938. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Anton Denikin
General Anton Denikin, who was one of General Kornilov's comrades in the coup attempt in the summer of 1917, was among those who were arrested and then released after the Bolsheviks came to power.
Together with Kornilov, he went to the Don, where he became one of the founders of the Volunteer Army.
By the time of Kornilov’s death during the storming of Yekaterinodar, Denikin was his deputy and took command of the Volunteer Army.
In January 1919, during the reorganization of the White forces, Denikin became the commander of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia - recognized by the Western allies as “number two” in the White movement after General Kolchak.
Denikin's greatest successes occurred in the summer of 1919. After a series of victories in July, he signed the “Moscow Directive” - a plan to take the Russian capital.
Having captured large territories of southern and central Russia, as well as Ukraine, Denikin’s troops approached Tula in October 1919. The Bolsheviks were seriously considering plans to abandon Moscow.
However, the defeat in the Oryol-Kromsky battle, where Budyonny’s cavalry loudly declared itself, led to an equally rapid retreat of the Whites.
In January 1920, Denikin received from Kolchak the rights of the Supreme Ruler of Russia. At the same time, things were going catastrophically at the front. The offensive, launched in February 1920, ended in failure; the Whites were thrown back to the Crimea.
The allies and generals demanded that Denikin transfer power to a successor, for whom he was chosen Peter Wrangel.
On April 4, 1920, Denikin transferred all powers to Wrangel, and on the same day he left Russia forever on an English destroyer.
In exile, Denikin withdrew from active politics and took up literature. He wrote books on the history of the Russian army in pre-revolutionary times, as well as on the history of the Civil War.
In the 1930s, Denikin, unlike many other leaders of the white emigration, advocated the need to support the Red Army against any foreign aggressor, followed by the awakening of the Russian spirit in the ranks of this army, which, according to the general’s plan, should overthrow Bolshevism in Russia.
The Second World War found Denikin on French territory. After Germany's attack on the USSR, he received offers of cooperation from the Nazis several times, but invariably refused. The general called former like-minded people who entered into an alliance with Hitler “obscurantists” and “Hitler admirers.”
After the end of the war, Denikin left for the United States, fearing that he might be extradited to the Soviet Union. However, the USSR government, knowing about Denikin’s position during the war, did not put forward any demands for his extradition to the allies.
Anton Denikin died on August 7, 1947 in the USA at the age of 74. In October 2005, on the initiative Russian President Vladimir Putin the remains of Denikin and his wife were reburied in the Donskoy Monastery in Moscow.
Peter Wrangel. Photo: Public Domain
Peter Wrangel
Baron Pyotr Wrangel, known as the “Black Baron” because of his wearing a black Cossack Circassian cap with gazyrs, became the last leader of the White movement in Russia during the Civil War.
At the end of 1917, Wrangel, who left, lived in Yalta, where he was arrested by the Bolsheviks. Soon the baron was released, since the Bolsheviks did not find any crime in his actions. After the occupation of Crimea by the German army, Wrangel left for Kyiv, where he collaborated with the government of Hetman Skoropadsky. Only after this did the baron decide to join the Volunteer Army, which he joined in August 1918.
Successfully commanding the white cavalry, Wrangel became one of the most influential military leaders, and came into conflict with Denikin, not agreeing with him on plans for further actions.
The conflict ended with Wrangel being removed from command and dismissed, after which he left for Constantinople. But in the spring of 1920, the allies, dissatisfied with the course of hostilities, achieved the resignation of Denikin and his replacement with Wrangel.
The baron's plans were extensive. He was going to create an “alternative Russia” in Crimea, which was supposed to win the competitive struggle against the Bolsheviks. But neither militarily nor economically these projects were viable. In November 1920, together with the remnants of the defeated White Army, Wrangel left Russia.
The “Black Baron” counted on the continuation of the armed struggle. In 1924, he created the Russian All-Military Union (ROVS), which united the majority of participants in the White movement in exile. Numbering tens of thousands of members, the EMRO was a serious force.
Wrangel failed to implement his plans to continue the Civil War - on April 25, 1928, in Brussels, he died suddenly from tuberculosis.
Ataman of the VVD, cavalry general P.N. Krasnov. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Peter Krasnov
After the October Revolution, Pyotr Krasnov, who was the commander of the 3rd Cavalry Corps, on the orders of Alexander Kerensky, moved troops from Petrograd. On the approaches to the capital, the corps was stopped, and Krasnov himself was arrested. But then the Bolsheviks not only released Krasnov, but also left him at the head of the corps.
After the demobilization of the corps, he left for the Don, where he continued the anti-Bolshevik struggle, agreeing to lead the Cossack uprising after they captured and held Novocherkassk. On May 16, 1918, Krasnov was elected ataman of the Don Cossacks. Having entered into cooperation with the Germans, Krasnov proclaimed the All-Great Don Army as an independent state.
However, after the final defeat of Germany in the First World War, Krasnov had to urgently change his political line. Krasnov agreed to the annexation of the Don Army to the Volunteer Army, and recognized the supremacy of Denikin.
Denikin, however, remained distrustful of Krasnov, and forced him to resign in February 1919. After this, Krasnov went to Yudenich, and after the latter’s defeat he went into exile.
In exile, Krasnov collaborated with the EMRO and was one of the founders of the Brotherhood of Russian Truth, an organization engaged in underground work in Soviet Russia.
On June 22, 1941, Pyotr Krasnov made an appeal that said: “I ask you to tell all the Cossacks that this war is not against Russia, but against the communists, Jews and their minions trading in Russian blood. May God help German weapons and Hitler! Let them do what the Russians and Emperor Alexander I did for Prussia in 1813.”
In 1943, Krasnov became head of the Main Directorate of Cossack Troops of the Imperial Ministry of the Eastern Occupied Territories of Germany.
In May 1945, Krasnov, along with other collaborators, was captured by the British and extradited to the Soviet Union.
The military collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR sentenced Pyotr Krasnov to death. Together with his accomplices, the 77-year-old Hitler henchman was hanged in Lefortovo prison on January 16, 1947.
Photo by A. G. Shkuro, taken by the USSR MGB after the arrest. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Andrey Shkuro
At birth, General Shkuro had a less euphonious surname - Shkura.
Shkuro earned notoriety, oddly enough, during the First World War, when he commanded the Kuban cavalry detachment. His raids were sometimes not coordinated with the command, and the soldiers were seen in unseemly acts. Here is what Baron Wrangel recalled about that period: “Colonel Shkuro’s detachment, led by its chief, operating in the area of the XVIII Corps, which included my Ussuri division, mostly hung out in the rear, drank and robbed, until, finally, at the insistence Corps commander Krymov, was not recalled from the corps area.”
During the Civil War, Shkuro began with a partisan detachment in the Kislovodsk region, which grew into a large unit that joined Denikin’s army in the summer of 1918.
Shkuro’s habits have not changed: successfully operating in raids, his so-called “Wolf Hundred” also became famous for total robberies and unmotivated reprisals, in comparison with which the exploits of the Makhnovists and Petliurists pale.
Shkuro's decline began in October 1919, when his cavalry was defeated by Budyonny. Mass desertion began, which is why only a few hundred people remained under Shkuro’s command.
After Wrangel came to power, Shkuro was dismissed from the army, and already in May 1920 he found himself in exile.
Abroad, Shkuro did odd jobs, was a rider in a circus, and an extra in silent films.
After the German attack on the USSR, Shkuro, together with Krasnov, advocated cooperation with Hitler. In 1944, by special decree of Himmler, Shkuro was appointed head of the Cossack Troops Reserve at the General Staff of the SS Troops, enlisted in the service as SS Gruppenführer and Lieutenant General of the SS Troops with the right to wear a German general's uniform and receive pay for this rank.
Shkuro was involved in preparing reserves for the Cossack corps, which carried out punitive actions against Yugoslav partisans.
In May 1945, Shkuro, along with other Cossack collaborators, was arrested by the British and handed over to the Soviet Union.
Being involved in the same case with Pyotr Krasnov, the 60-year-old veteran of raids and robberies shared his fate - Andrei Shkuro was hanged in Lefortovo prison on January 16, 1947.
Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak (November 4 (16), 1874, St. Petersburg province - February 7, 1920, Irkutsk) - Russian politician, vice admiral of the Russian Imperial Fleet (1916) and admiral of the Siberian Flotilla (1918). Polar explorer and oceanographer, participant in expeditions of 1900-1903 (awarded by the Imperial Russian Geographical Society with the Great Constantine Medal). Participant in the Russian-Japanese, World War I and Civil Wars. Leader and leader of the White movement in Siberia. A number of leaders of the White movement and Entente states recognized him as the Supreme Ruler of Russia (although he had no real power over the entire territory of the country).
The first widely known representative of the Kolchak family was the Turkish military leader of Crimean Tatar origin Ilias Kolchak Pasha, commandant of the Khotyn fortress, captured by Field Marshal H. A. Minikh. After the end of the war, Kolchak Pasha settled in Poland, and in 1794 his descendants moved to Russia.
One of the representatives of this family was Vasily Ivanovich Kolchak (1837-1913), a naval artillery officer, major general in the Admiralty. V.I. Kolchak received his first officer rank after being seriously wounded during the defense of Sevastopol during the Crimean War of 1853-1856: he was one of the seven surviving defenders of the Stone Tower on Malakhov Kurgan, whom the French found among the corpses after the assault. After the war, he graduated from the Mining Institute in St. Petersburg and, until his retirement, served as a receptionist for the Maritime Ministry at the Obukhov plant, having a reputation as a straightforward and extremely scrupulous person.
The future admiral received his primary education at home, and then studied at the 6th St. Petersburg Classical Gymnasium.
On August 6, 1894, Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak was assigned to the 1st rank cruiser "Rurik" as an assistant watch commander and on November 15, 1894 he was promoted to the rank of midshipman. On this cruiser he departed for the Far East. At the end of 1896, Kolchak was assigned to the 2nd rank cruiser "Cruiser" as a watch commander. On this ship he went on campaigns in the Pacific Ocean for several years, and in 1899 he returned to Kronstadt. On December 6, 1898, he was promoted to lieutenant. During the campaigns, Kolchak not only fulfilled his official duties, but also actively engaged in self-education. He also became interested in oceanography and hydrology. In 1899, he published the article “Observations on surface temperatures and specific gravities of sea water, made on the cruisers Rurik and Cruiser from May 1897 to March 1898.”
Upon arrival in Kronstadt, Kolchak went to see Vice Admiral S.O. Makarov, who was preparing to sail on the icebreaker Ermak to the Arctic Ocean. Kolchak asked to be accepted into the expedition, but was refused “due to official circumstances.” After this, for some time being part of the personnel of the ship "Prince Pozharsky", Kolchak in September 1899 transferred to the squadron battleship "Petropavlovsk" and went to the Far East on it. However, while staying in the Greek port of Piraeus, he received an invitation from the Academy of Sciences from Baron E.V. Toll to take part in the mentioned expedition. From Greece through Odessa in January 1900, Kolchak arrived in St. Petersburg. The head of the expedition invited Alexander Vasilievich to lead the hydrological work, and in addition to be the second magnetologist. Throughout the winter and spring of 1900, Kolchak prepared for the expedition.
On July 21, 1901, the expedition on the schooner “Zarya” moved across the Baltic, North and Norwegian seas to the shores of the Taimyr Peninsula, where they would spend their first winter. In October 1900, Kolchak took part in Toll’s trip to the Gafner fjord, and in April-May 1901 the two of them traveled around Taimyr. Throughout the expedition, the future admiral conducted active scientific work. In 1901, E.V. Toll immortalized the name of A.V. Kolchak, naming the island and cape discovered by the expedition after him.
In the spring of 1902, Toll decided to head on foot north of the New Siberian Islands together with magnetologist F. G. Seberg and two mushers. The remaining members of the expedition, due to a lack of food supplies, had to go from Bennett Island to the south, to the mainland, and then return to St. Petersburg. Kolchak and his companions went to the mouth of the Lena and arrived in the capital through Yakutsk and Irkutsk.
Upon arrival in St. Petersburg, Alexander Vasilyevich reported to the Academy about the work done, and also reported on the enterprise of Baron Toll, from whom no news had been received either by that time or later. In January 1903, it was decided to organize an expedition, the purpose of which was to clarify the fate of Toll’s expedition. The expedition took place from May 5 to December 7, 1903. It consisted of 17 people on 12 sledges pulled by 160 dogs. The journey to Bennett Island took three months and was extremely difficult. On August 4, 1903, having reached Bennett Island, the expedition discovered traces of Toll and his companions: expedition documents, collections, geodetic instruments and a diary were found. It turned out that Toll arrived on the island in the summer of 1902, and headed south, having a supply of provisions for only 2-3 weeks. It became clear that Toll's expedition was lost.
Sofya Fedorovna Kolchak (1876 - 1956) - wife of Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak. Sofya Fedorovna was born in 1876 in Kamenets-Podolsk, Podolsk province of the Russian Empire (now the Khmelnitsky region of Ukraine). By agreement with Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak, they were supposed to get married after his first expedition. In honor of Sophia (then bride) a small island in the Litke archipelago and a cape on Bennett Island were named. The wait lasted for several years. They got married on March 5, 1904 in the church of the Znamensky Monastery in Irkutsk.
Sofya Fedorovna gave birth to three children from Kolchak. The first girl (c. 1905) did not live even a month. The second was son Rostislav (03/09/1910 - 06/28/1965). The last daughter, Margarita (1912-1914), caught a cold while fleeing from the Germans from Libau and died.
During the Civil War, Sofya Fedorovna waited for her husband to the last in Sevastopol. From there she managed to emigrate in 1919: her British allies, who respected her husband, provided her with money and took her on Her Majesty’s ship from Sevastopol to Constanta. Then she moved to Bucharest and went to Paris. Rostislav was brought there too.
Despite the difficult financial situation, Sofya Fedorovna managed to give her son a good education. Rostislav Aleksandrovich Kolchak graduated from the Higher School of Diplomatic and Commercial Sciences in Paris and served in an Algerian bank. He married Ekaterina Razvozova, the daughter of Admiral A.V. Razvozov, who was killed by the Bolsheviks in Petrograd.
Sofya Fedorovna survived the German occupation of Paris, the captivity of her son, an officer in the French army. Sofya Fedorovna died in the Lynjumo hospital in Italy in 1956. She was buried in the main cemetery of the Russian diaspora - Saint-Genevieve des Bois.
In December 1903, 29-year-old Lieutenant Kolchak, exhausted from the polar expedition, set off on his way back to St. Petersburg, where he was going to marry his bride Sofia Omirova. Not far from Irkutsk, he was caught by the news of the beginning of the Russo-Japanese War. He summoned his father and bride by telegram to Siberia and immediately after the wedding he left for Port Arthur.
Commander of the Pacific Squadron, Admiral S.O. Makarov invited him to serve on the battleship Petropavlovsk, which was the flagship of the squadron from January to April 1904. Kolchak refused and asked to be assigned to the fast cruiser Askold, which soon saved his life. A few days later, the Petropavlovsk hit a mine and quickly sank, taking to the bottom more than 600 sailors and officers, including Makarov himself and the famous battle painter V.V. Vereshchagin. Soon after this, Kolchak achieved a transfer to the destroyer "Angry", and by the end of the siege of Port Arthur he had to command a battery on the land front, since severe rheumatism - a consequence of two polar expeditions - forced him to abandon the warship. This was followed by injury, the surrender of Port Arthur and Japanese captivity, in which Kolchak spent 4 months. Upon his return, he was awarded the St. George weapon - the golden saber “For Bravery.”
Freed from captivity, Kolchak received the rank of captain of the second rank. The main task of the group of naval officers and admirals, which included Kolchak, was to develop plans for the further development of the Russian navy.
First of all, the Naval General Staff was created, which took over the direct combat training of the fleet. Then a shipbuilding program was drawn up. To obtain additional funding, officers and admirals actively lobbied their program in the Duma. The construction of new ships progressed slowly - 6 (out of 8) battleships, about 10 cruisers and several dozen destroyers and submarines entered service only in 1915-1916, at the height of the First World War, and some of the ships laid down at that time were already being completed in the 1930s.
Taking into account the significant numerical superiority of the potential enemy, the Naval General Staff developed a new plan for the defense of St. Petersburg and the Gulf of Finland - in the event of a threat of attack, all ships of the Baltic Fleet, upon an agreed signal, were to go to sea and place 8 lines of minefields at the mouth of the Gulf of Finland, covered by coastal batteries.
Captain Kolchak took part in the design of special icebreaking ships "Taimyr" and "Vaigach", launched in 1909. In the spring of 1910, these ships arrived in Vladivostok, then went on a cartographic expedition to the Bering Strait and Cape Dezhnev, returning back to the autumn Vladivostok. Kolchak commanded the icebreaker Vaygach on this expedition. In 1909, Kolchak published a monograph summarizing his glaciological research in the Arctic - “Ice of the Kara and Siberian Seas” (Notes of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. Ser. 8. Physics and Mathematics Department. St. Petersburg, 1909. Vol. 26, No. 1.).
In 1912, Kolchak transferred to serve in the Baltic Fleet as a flag captain for the operational part of the fleet headquarters.
To protect the capital from a possible attack by the German fleet, the Mine Division, on the personal order of Essen, set up minefields in the waters of the Gulf of Finland on the night of July 18, 1914, without waiting for permission from the Minister of the Navy and Nicholas II.
In the fall of 1914, with the personal participation of Kolchak, an operation to blockade German naval bases with mines was developed. In 1914-1915 destroyers and cruisers, including those under the command of Kolchak, laid mines at Kiel, Danzig (Gdansk), Pillau (modern Baltiysk), Vindava and even at the island of Bornholm. As a result, 4 German cruisers were blown up in these minefields (2 of them sank - Friedrich Karl and Bremen (according to other sources, the E-9 submarine was sunk), 8 destroyers and 11 transports.
At the same time, an attempt to intercept a German convoy transporting ore from Sweden, in which Kolchak was directly involved, ended in failure.
In July 1916, by order of the Russian Emperor Nicholas II, Alexander Vasilyevich was promoted to vice admiral and appointed commander of the Black Sea Fleet.
After the February Revolution of 1917, Kolchak was the first in the Black Sea Fleet to swear allegiance to the Provisional Government. In the spring of 1917, Headquarters began preparing an amphibious operation to capture Constantinople, but due to the disintegration of the army and navy, this idea had to be abandoned.
In June 1917, the Sevastopol Council decided to disarm officers suspected of counter-revolution, including taking away Kolchak’s St. George’s weapon - the golden saber awarded to him for Port Arthur. The admiral chose to throw the blade overboard. Three weeks later, divers lifted it from the bottom and handed it to Kolchak, engraving on the blade the inscription: “To the Knight of Honor Admiral Kolchak from the Union of Army and Navy Officers.” At this time, Kolchak, along with the General Staff infantry general L.G. Kornilov, was considered as a potential candidate for military dictator. It was for this reason that in August A.F. Kerensky summoned the admiral to Petrograd, where he forced him to resign, after which, at the invitation of the command of the American fleet, he went to the United States to advise American specialists on the experience of Russian sailors using mine weapons in the Baltic and Black Seas in the First World War.
In San Francisco, Kolchak was offered to stay in the United States, promising him a chair in mine engineering at the best naval college and a rich life in a cottage on the ocean. Kolchak refused and went back to Russia.
Arriving in Japan, Kolchak learned about the October Revolution, the liquidation of the Headquarters of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief and the negotiations begun by the Bolsheviks with the Germans. After this, the admiral left for Tokyo. There he handed the British ambassador a request for admission into the English army “at least as privates.” The ambassador, after consultations with London, handed Kolchak a direction to the Mesopotamian front. On the way there, in Singapore, he was overtaken by a telegram from the Russian envoy to China, Kudashev, inviting him to Manchuria to form Russian military units. Kolchak went to Beijing, after which he began organizing Russian armed forces to protect the Chinese Eastern Railway.
However, due to disagreements with Ataman Semyonov and the manager of the CER, General Horvat, Admiral Kolchak left Manchuria and went to Russia, intending to join General Denikin’s Volunteer Army. He left behind a wife and son in Sevastopol.
On October 13, 1918, he arrived in Omsk, where at that time a political crisis erupted. On November 4, 1918, Kolchak, as a popular figure among officers, was invited to the post of Minister of War and Navy in the Council of Ministers of the so-called “Directory” - the united anti-Bolshevik government located in Omsk, where the majority were Socialist Revolutionaries. On the night of November 18, 1918, a coup took place in Omsk - Cossack officers arrested four Socialist Revolutionary leaders of the Directory, led by its chairman N.D. Avksentiev. In the current situation, the Council of Ministers - the executive body of the Directory - announced the assumption of full supreme power and then decided to hand it over to one person, giving him the title of Supreme Ruler of the Russian State. Kolchak was elected to this post by secret ballot of members of the Council of Ministers. The admiral announced his consent to the election and with his first order to the army announced that he would assume the title of Supreme Commander-in-Chief.
Addressing the population, Kolchak declared: “Having accepted the cross of this government in the extremely difficult conditions of the civil war and the complete breakdown of state life, I declare that I will not follow either the path of reaction or the disastrous path of party membership.” Next, the Supreme Ruler proclaimed the goals and objectives of the new government. The first, most pressing task was to strengthen and increase the combat capability of the army. The second, inextricably linked with the first, is “victory over Bolshevism.” The third task, the solution of which was recognized as possible only under the condition of victory, was proclaimed “the revival and resurrection of a dying state.” All the activities of the new government were declared aimed at ensuring that “the temporary supreme power of the Supreme Ruler and Supreme Commander-in-Chief could transfer the fate of the state into the hands of the people, allowing them to organize public administration according to their will.”
Kolchak hoped that under the banner of the fight against the Reds he would be able to unite the most diverse political forces and create a new state power. At first, the situation at the fronts was favorable to these plans. In December 1918, the Siberian Army occupied Perm, which had important strategic importance and significant reserves of military equipment.
In March 1919, Kolchak’s troops launched an attack on Samara and Kazan, in April they occupied the entire Urals and approached the Volga. However, due to Kolchak’s incompetence in organizing and managing the ground army (as well as his assistants), the militarily favorable situation soon gave way to a catastrophic one. The dispersion and stretching of forces, the lack of logistics support and the general lack of coordination of actions led to the fact that the Red Army was able to first stop Kolchak’s troops and then launch a counteroffensive. The result was a more than six-month retreat of Kolchak’s armies to the east, which ended with the fall of the Omsk regime.
It must be said that Kolchak himself was well aware of the fact of a desperate personnel shortage, which ultimately led to the tragedy of his army in 1919. In particular, in a conversation with General Inostrantsev, Kolchak openly stated this sad circumstance: “You will soon see for yourself how poor we are in people, why we have to endure, even in high positions, not excluding the posts of ministers, people who are far from corresponding to the places they occupy , but this is because there is no one to replace them..."
The same opinions prevailed in the active army. For example, General Shchepikhin said: “It’s incomprehensible to the mind, it’s like surprise how long-suffering our passion-bearer, an ordinary officer and soldier, is. What kind of experiments were not carried out with him, what kind of tricks our “strategic boys” did not throw out with his passive participation,” - Kostya (Sakharov ) and Mitka (Lebedev) - and the cup of patience is still not overflowing..."
In May, the retreat of Kolchak’s troops began, and by August they were forced to leave Ufa, Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk.
After the defeat in the fall of 1918, Bolshevik detachments fled to the taiga, settled there, mainly north of Krasnoyarsk and in the Minusinsk region, and, replenished with deserters, began to attack the communications of the White Army. In the spring of 1919, they were surrounded and partly destroyed, partly driven even deeper into the taiga, and partly fled to China.
The peasantry of Siberia, as well as throughout Russia, who did not want to fight in either the Red or White armies, avoiding mobilization, fled to the forests, organizing “green” gangs. This picture was also observed in the rear of Kolchak’s army. But until September - October 1919, these detachments were small in number and did not pose a particular problem for the authorities.
But when the front collapsed in the fall of 1919, the collapse of the army and mass desertion began. Deserters began en masse to join the newly activated Bolshevik detachments, causing their numbers to grow to tens of thousands of people. This is where the Soviet legend came from about a 150,000-strong partisan army, supposedly operating in the rear of Kolchak’s army, although in reality such an army did not exist.
In 1914-1917, about a third of Russia's gold reserves were sent for temporary storage to England and Canada, and about half were exported to Kazan. Part of the gold reserves of the Russian Empire, stored in Kazan (more than 500 tons), was captured on August 7, 1918 by the troops of the People's Army under the command of the General Staff of Colonel V. O. Kappel and sent to Samara, where the KOMUCH government was established. From Samara, gold was transported to Ufa for some time, and at the end of November 1918, the gold reserves of the Russian Empire were moved to Omsk and came into the possession of the Kolchak government. The gold was deposited in a local branch of the State Bank. In May 1919, it was established that in total there was gold worth 650 million rubles (505 tons) in Omsk.
Having at his disposal most of Russia's gold reserves, Kolchak did not allow his government to spend gold, even to stabilize the financial system and fight inflation (which was facilitated by the rampant issue of “kerenoks” and tsarist rubles by the Bolsheviks). Kolchak spent 68 million rubles on the purchase of weapons and uniforms for his army. Loans were obtained from foreign banks secured by 128 million rubles: proceeds from the placement were returned to Russia.
On October 31, 1919, the gold reserves, under heavy security, were loaded into 40 wagons, with accompanying personnel in another 12 wagons. The Trans-Siberian Railway, from Novo-Nikolaevsk (now Novosibirsk) to Irkutsk, was controlled by the Czechs, whose main task was their own evacuation from Russia. Only on December 27, 1919, the headquarters train and the train with gold arrived at the Nizhneudinsk station, where representatives of the Entente forced Admiral Kolchak to sign an order to renounce the rights of the Supreme Ruler of Russia and transfer the train with the gold reserve to the control of the Czechoslovak Corps. On January 15, 1920, the Czech command handed Kolchak over to the Socialist Revolutionary Political Center, which within a few days handed the admiral over to the Bolsheviks. On February 7, the Czechoslovaks handed over 409 million rubles in gold to the Bolsheviks in exchange for guarantees of the unhindered evacuation of the corps from Russia. In June 1921, the People's Commissariat of Finance of the RSFSR drew up a certificate from which it follows that during the reign of Admiral Kolchak, Russia's gold reserves decreased by 235.6 million rubles, or 182 tons. Another 35 million rubles from the gold reserves disappeared after it was transferred to the Bolsheviks, during transportation from Irkutsk to Kazan.
On January 4, 1920, in Nizhneudinsk, Admiral A.V. Kolchak signed his last Decree, in which he announced his intention to transfer the powers of the “Supreme All-Russian Power” to A.I. Denikin. Until the receipt of instructions from A.I. Denikin, “the entirety of military and civil power throughout the entire territory of the Russian Eastern Outskirts” was granted to Lieutenant General G.M. Semyonov.
On January 5, 1920, a coup took place in Irkutsk, the city was captured by the Socialist-Revolutionary-Menshevik Political Center. On January 15, A.V. Kolchak, who left Nizhneudinsk on a Czechoslovak train, in a carriage flying the flags of Great Britain, France, the USA, Japan and Czechoslovakia, arrived on the outskirts of Irkutsk. The Czechoslovak command, at the request of the Socialist Revolutionary Political Center, with the sanction of the French General Janin, handed over Kolchak to his representatives. On January 21, the Political Center transferred power in Irkutsk to the Bolshevik Revolutionary Committee. From January 21 to February 6, 1920, Kolchak was interrogated by the Extraordinary Commission of Inquiry.
On the night of February 6-7, 1920, Admiral A.V. Kolchak and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Russian Government V.N. Pepelyaev were shot by order of the Irkutsk Military Revolutionary Committee. The resolution of the Irkutsk Military Revolutionary Committee on the execution of the Supreme Ruler Admiral Kolchak and Chairman of the Council of Ministers Pepelyaev was signed by Shiryamov, the chairman of the committee and its members A. Svoskarev, M. Levenson and Otradny.
According to the official version, this was done out of fear that General Kappel’s units breaking through to Irkutsk had the goal of freeing Kolchak. According to the most common version, the execution took place on the banks of the Ushakovka River near the Znamensky Convent. According to legend, while sitting on the ice awaiting execution, the admiral sang the romance “Burn, burn, my star...”. There is a version that Kolchak himself commanded his execution. After the execution, the bodies of the dead were thrown into the hole.
Recently, previously unknown documents relating to the execution and subsequent burial of Admiral Kolchak were discovered in the Irkutsk region. Documents marked “secret” were found during work on the Irkutsk City Theater’s play “The Admiral’s Star,” based on the play by former state security officer Sergei Ostroumov. According to the documents found, in the spring of 1920, not far from the Innokentyevskaya station (on the bank of the Angara, 20 km below Irkutsk), local residents discovered a corpse in an admiral's uniform, carried by the current to the shore of the Angara. Representatives of the investigative authorities arrived and conducted an inquiry and identified the body of the executed Admiral Kolchak. Subsequently, investigators and local residents secretly buried the admiral according to Christian custom. Investigators compiled a map on which Kolchak’s grave was marked with a cross. Currently, all found documents are being examined.
Based on these documents, Irkutsk historian I.I. Kozlov established the expected location of Kolchak’s grave. According to other sources, Kolchak’s grave is located in the Irkutsk Znamensky Monastery.
I. A. Bunin, 1921, Paris, from a speech at a memorial service for A. V. Kolchak.
“The day will come when our children, mentally contemplating the shame and horror of our days, will forgive Russia a lot for the fact that not only Cain ruled in the darkness of these days, but Abel was also among her sons. The time will come when His name will be inscribed in golden letters for eternal glory and memory in the Chronicle of the Russian Land."
Kolchak Alexander Vasilyevich (1874-1920), Russian admiral (1916), one of the leaders of the White movement.
Born on November 16, 1874 in St. Petersburg in the family of an engineer, retired major general of naval artillery.
In 1894, Kolchak graduated from the Naval Cadet Corps; in 1900-1902 participated in the polar expedition of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences.
During the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905. commanded a destroyer, a minelayer, and then a battery in Port Arthur; was in captivity.
After the war, Kolchak and a group of naval officers prepared proposals for reform of the Russian navy. In 1914, he was appointed head of the operational department of the Baltic Fleet, and in July 1916 - commander of the Black Sea Fleet with the rank of rear admiral. On June 9, 1917, in response to the demand of the ship committee to hand over his personal weapons, Kolchak with the words “You didn’t hand it to me, you won’t take it!” threw a golden saber with the inscription “For bravery” into the sea. The next day he was recalled to Petrograd and sent to the United States as a mine specialist.
At the end of 1917, Kolchak arrived in the Far East. Heading to the Volunteer Army, he stayed in Omsk and on November 4, 1918, he was appointed Minister of Defense of the newly formed All-Russian Provisional Government.
On November 18, after the military coup in Omsk, the admiral, thanks to his enormous authority, was proclaimed “the supreme ruler of the Russian state.” In this capacity he was recognized by the governments of the Entente countries and the United States, but relations with the allies did not work out. Kolchak’s main goal was the armed struggle against the Bolsheviks, but he also had to curb the allies in their encroachments on Russia’s sovereign rights.
After the defeat of the Eastern White Army, the admiral transferred his powers to A.I. Denikin on January 4, 1920. The troops of the Czechoslovak Corps, commanded by the chief officer of the Allied forces in Siberia, the French General Janin, handed Kolchak over to the temporary Socialist-Revolutionary-Menshevik “Political Center” in Irkutsk in exchange for free passage to Vladivostok.
A little later, the admiral ended up in the hands of the Bolsheviks.
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