Very cool historical find: Pamphlet on the birth of the White Army (Part II)

Homecoming

Many months ago I posted Part I of a very interesting historical document: One of the earliest propaganda pamphlets produced by the anti-communist White Army during the Russian Civil War for foreign audiences. Titled The Volunteer Army of Alexeiv and Denikin, the pamphlet provides a brief but fairly thorough history of the Volunteer Army, the largest and most successful formation of the (eventually defeated) Whites.

I think the Russian Civil War is really interesting. The successes and failures of the Whites in their struggle offer lots of useful lessons for Americans today. There are many parallels between the situation Russians faced beginning in 1917 and the predicament we find ourselves in. I wish more people would take the time to read (or listen, Substack offers text-to-speech that’s pretty good) about this subject in depth.

I’ve written a short series on the history of the Russian Revolution to help frame your thinking when you read more specific material, like this pamphlet. This series was written in a way that anyone could understand it without any background information at all. Please read this, I promise you’ll learn something important.

Part 1: The February and October Revolutions
Part 2: Post-Revolution Russian politics/The aftermath of the October Revolution
Part 3: National and ethnic divisions within the Russian Empire/The Ice March
Part 4: Ukraine, Finland, and the Revolt of the Czechoslovak Legion/Regicide
Part 5: Disaster for Lenin/Enter Wrangel

I’ve transcribed other primary source documents concerning the Russian Civil War that are very revealing. Check them out here:

Two intelligence reports from the American Expeditionary Force in Siberia, 1919
Forever relevant: General Wrangel's final letter to General Denikin

If you’re too lazy to scroll up, you can find Part I of this pamphlet here. The document that follows is very good but it probably won’t make much sense if you haven’t read Part I. I also provide some background on the author, Prince P. M. Volkonsky (very interesting in his own right).

Finally, please become a paid subscriber right now to support my work. It’s only $5 and every paid sub really makes a big difference in my life. Paid subscribers also get access to all the podcast episodes on this Substack (which are, frankly, great).

Without further ado, here is Part II of The Volunteer Army of Alexeiv and Denikin.

---

III.

THE RETURN TO THE DON.

Ekaterinodar had not been taken. The Reds were jubilant, the local Soviet papers were in raptures: "Kornilov's bands are finally defeated the whole Army is destroyed, the counter-revolutionary hydra exists no longer in the South."

These rejoicings, however, were unwarranted. True, the goal of the campaign—the capture of Ekaterinodar—had not been reached, but the army had done its work, and the storm of the town, though unsuccessful, dealt a fatal blow to Bolshevism. The Bolsheviks themselves confessed that the defence of the town had cost them 14,000 men, while deserters who overtook the retreating army, certified that even on March 30 the Soviet authorities were preparing for evacuation.

This campaign showed everyone quite clearly the impotence of the Red hordes before a handful of disciplined fighters. The Volunteer Army of 3,000 men had boldly marched against 200,000. The losses of the Bolsheviks were always ten times those of the Volunteers.

In the course of this campaign, i.e., in the course of fifty days, the army had been in forty engagements; the fame of its victories preceded the Volunteers as they returned to the Don, and strengthened men's faith in the success of its work of salvation. On its way the local population almost everywhere welcomed the army, and helped it as far as they were able. The intoxication of the revolution was already passing away, while the delights of the Bolshevist regime had cost the Kuban population dear. During the advance on Ekaterinodar the stanitsas¹ had given the Army some scores of unreliable recruits (the Circassians and the suburban stanitsas were exceptions), but on the way back trustworthy fighters joined its ranks in hundreds.

The further the Volunteers marched the more they were welcomed, and the more willingly men joined them. But the first steps of the retreat from Ekaterinodar were trying. The Bolsheviks, as always, carried on operations exclusively along the railway lines; therefore, the first task of the officers in command was to lead the army with its train ten versts in length, and its 1,200 wounded, out of the network of the railway system.

Southwards, towards the Caucasian mountains, there was no road; the way was barred by the enemy; the passages over the Kuban river were destroyed. Only northwards was retreat possible. So it was decided to go to the government of Stavropol, on the north-east borders of the Kuban territory, where there was an exit, free of railways, into the Kalmuck and Astrakhan steppes. But before reaching them the railway had to be crossed in three places. It was necessary, therefore, to deceive the enemy by night marches, as his armoured trains were scouting in all directions in search of the abhorred "Cadets" and "Kornilov's men."

On the night of March 31 the army started from Ekaterinodar, bearing with it the bodies of its heroes—Kornilov and Niezhintseff. On April 1 it reached Nemetskaya Kolonka, where it fought a stubborn battle, and after driving the enemy off went on its way, it having decided to attempt the first crossing of the railway at Medvedinskaya. In a lonely spot in the steppe, away from the main road, they buried Kornilov and Niezhintsev, and levelled their graves with the earth, to save their bodies from the sacrilegious mockery of the Bolsheviks. The following night they reached Medvedinskaya. By a sudden attack some of the staff of this little station were killed, and others were arrested, and then the army train began to cross the line. 

At that moment the telephone-bell rang. General Markov went up to the apparatus. The next station enquired: 

"Are there any signs of Kornilov's men? According to information received they should be near."

Markov replied:

"No one to be seen, all is quiet." "All the same, in case of eventualities we have sent you an armoured train," said the Bolshevik.

General Markov ordered a gun to be wheeled on to the track (there were only a dozen shells left); sharpshooters took their places on the embankment on both sides of the line; the movement of the army-train was stopped, all lights were put out, except the station lamps, and then the troops settled down to await their visitors. Lights were seen in the darkness, and the puffing of a locomotive with the rumble of a slowly travelling train reached their ears. General Markov, nagaika² in hand, stepped out to meet the train at the crossing and by shouting:

"Pull up! You will run down the wagon, comrade! made the driver stop the engine." 

Then Markov quickly stepped aside; a report rang out, and a shell exploded among the wheels of the engine. The driver attempted to back it, but it was severely damaged, and would not move. A second shell, fired point-blank, overturned the armoured car. The Bolsheviks, who were peacefully slumbering in the carriages, and had been awakened by the firing, opened a desultory fire with machine-guns. But their assailants were out of the line of fire, close up to the carriages, and greeted them with a shower of bombs. A panic ensued amongst those in the train, and the uninjured Bolsheviks fled in disorder, leaving all their munitions to the victors. 

"Carts to the train!" ordered Markov, and cases of cartridges, shells and rifles were transferred from the goods van; a gun also fell into the hands of the Volunteers. In the bright light of the blazing cars the long baggage-train and the little army safely crossed the first of the dangerous railway lines.

The inhabitants of the Medvedinskaya stanitsa greeted the army in a friendly manner, and supplied it with everything it could, while at the next stanitsa, Diakonovskaya, which was occupied the next day without resistance, the first reinforcement of the army by means of conscription was made.

With the staff of the army travelled the Kuban Government and the members of the Rada. They called a general meeting of the stanitsa, at which they explained the purpose of the campaign to the Cossacks, called on them to fight the Bolsheviks, and announced the necessity of conscription. This method of filling the ranks of the army corresponded with the wishes of the people more than any other, as the Cossacks were afraid to volunteer, fearing the vengeance of the Bolsheviks on their families. The proposals of the Government were greeted with delight. Thus began the gradual reinforcement of the army by soldiers drawn from the local population.

A day later, on April 4, the army reached the Zhuravskaya stanitsa, near the railway, and General Erdeli's cavalry occupied the station Viselki by a sudden night attack, and in the morning the crossing of the line was unopposed. The last wagon of the baggage-train and the rear-guard had left it far behind when the smoke of an engine appeared on the horizon, and shortly afterwards the explosions of shrapnel shells were heard in the rear.

There remained but one more railway—the TikhoretskKavkazskaya. They reached it on April 7, having evaded the watchfulness of the Bolsheviks by a clever manœuvre, and at night the long baggage-train crossed the line near a signal-box.

The signalman, with a revolver at his head, kept replying to the enquiries from the neighbouring stations: "All is well; there are no signs of the Cadets."

The army had now emerged from the railway system, and on April 9 it entered the Ilyinskaya stanitsa, where it enjoyed a three days' rest.

On April 12 they occupied the Uspenskaya stanitsa on the borders of the Stavropol Government and the Don territory.

While the army halted here a small contingent made a raid on the Razshetovskaya stanitsa, returning with ammunition and machine-guns captured from the Bolsheviks. Here, too, the mobilisation passed off brilliantly. The army was visibly increasing as it advanced. Moreover, many of the Bolshevik prisoners begged to be taken into its ranks. They were tried and proved to be useful material.

At Uspenskaya the first news was received of the changes which had taken place in the Don territory. For two whole months the Army had been cut off from the outer world, and knew nothing of what was happening in Russia or in the world in general. On April 13 a body of Don Cossacks arrived, being a delegation from fourteen of the southern stanitsas. They had heard of the approach of Kornilov's men, and hastened to beg them to assist the Cossacks against the Bolsheviks.

They said that it was rumoured that Novotcherkassk was now freed, and that there was a new and lawful Government there. Denikin sent messengers to the stanitsas to verify this report. 

In three days' time the messengers returned, and confirmed the rumour. This was good news; the revolt was spreading, one stanitsa after another was rising against the Bolsheviks the Reds were flying and throwing down their arms.

At a council of war it was decided to proceed to the Don territory to help the Cossacks and to march towards the Metchetinskaya stanitsa. The Kuban Government gave up the idea of marching on the Don; there was quite enough to do at home on the Kuban territory.

On April 15 the army started on its journey. It had to pass through several Bolshevist settlements in the Stavropol Government. The appearance of the Volunteers in the settlement of Gorkaya Balka was so unexpected that they were supposed to be Bolsheviks, and the mistress of the house in which the staff took up its quarters boasted that she had lately betrayed three officers who had sought shelter with her.

No papers were yet obtainable, but news was to be had at the tobacconist's—Rostov and Taganrog were said to be occupied by the Germans. This rumour, however, met with no credence.

On April 20 the army entered the Don territory, and had to give the Cossacks immediate assistance. Egorlitskaya, Metchetinskaya, and other stanitsas had just been occupied by the Bolsheviks. The Volunteers drove them out, and the Cossacks were able to celebrate Easter at home, with their families and their liberators.

The army reached Metchetinskaya on April 25. Here, for the first time for many weeks, they found newspapers, and learned news of their country, and became aware of the dreadful truth. Russia completely disrupted, the disgrace of the Brest treaty, the triumph of Germany, the opening of frontiers, the German occupation of the Ukraine, the Crimea, the coasts of the Black Sea and of the Sea of Azov, the invasion of the Don territory by the Germans, and, lastly, the ascendancy of the German orientation, which, under the hypnotic influence of the victorious German arms, was extending its influence widely and deeply throughout Russia. But at the most critical moment of the international situation, when Germany had already begun her victorious advance in the West, and the whole of the East, with some rare exceptions, believed that she would triumph in the end; in the days of great trial of faith and honour the Russian people, as typified by the Volunteer Army, remained loyal to their engagements.

A complete revolution had taken place on the Don. The southern cities, Taganrog, Rostov, and others, the whole coast of the Sea of Azov and the adjoining railway lines, were firmly occupied by the Germans. The Circle for the Liberation of the Don elected General Krasnov as Hetman, and on April 22, before Easter, Novotcherkassk was finally cleared of the Bolsheviks. One stanitsa after another joined the movement, and Krasnov with the now sobered and suffering Cossacks, but with the support of the arms of Germany, bought at a high price by concessions of an economic nature, began gradually and systematically to clear the territory of the bandit hordes. He invited Alexeiev and Denikin to work with him, but this was impossible. Though the aim was the same, the means were different.

At a council of war held at Metchetinskaya it was decided not to go to the Don, but to leave the army where it was, keep the Bolsheviks at bay in case of attack, and prepare for a second march on the Kuban. Denikin, with his staff, remained at Metchetinskaya, while Alexeiev moved to Novotcherkassk to work at the formation of new units, and to accumulate the supplies required by the army for its new campaign.

IV.

THE SECOND MARCH ON THE KUBAN.

1.

The whole of May was passed in preparations for the campaign, filling up the ranks of the existing units and forming new ones. General Alexeiev worked in Novotcherkassk, having agents in Petrograd, Moscow, Kiev, and other cities .

Communication could only be carried on secretly by means of special messengers; there was always great danger of the messengers being arrested or shot.

The Petrograd and Moscow organisations worked under the watchful eyes of the Soviet Special Commissions, and it would be premature to say much about them at present. It may, however, be remarked that they succeeded in evacuating from Petrograd all the cadets of the Pavlovsky, Michailovsky and Konstantinovsky schools and a portion of those of the Nicolaievsky cavalry school. Moscow was the main source of monetary supplies, and connection was kept up with politicians and public organisations in that city.

At the head of the Kiev agency, which covered the whole of the South-West, stood V. V. Shulgin, member of the State Duma, and General A. Dragomirov. Their task, too, was no easy one. Under the rule first of the Ukraine Rada, next of the Bolsheviks, and finally of the Germans, they had to mask their work and live in hiding themselves. Shulgin, who had twice been under arrest, was obliged to live away from his home until at last, in August, he fled, along with Dragomirov, to the army.

All those who wished to proceed to the Don found obstacles in their way; obstacles which increased as the successes achieved by the army became known.

Renegades from the Volunteer Army began to form other armies, such as the Astrakhan, Southern, Northern, Saratov and National armies; everywhere staffs, nuclei of officers and political representatives, etc., were gathered.

These officers were given equipment allowances and pay at a higher rate than that which the scanty funds of the Volunteer Army permitted, but all had to sign a pledge that they would not exchange into the Volunteer Army. As none of these armies. ever went beyond the primary stage of formation, they could not, of course, be fighting units and a real force (with the exception of a few small guerilla units). But this did not matter; it was important for the Germans to carry out their plan of confusion and derision, and they carried it out brilliantly. The truth about the doings of the Volunteer Army was concealed, lies and slander about it were circulated, thousands of officers were enticed away from it, and one section of the population was hounded on against the other It is interesting for us to note that all these efforts of the Germans proved that they were well informed themselves, that they realised the strength of the Volunteer Army, and knew what a healthy national spirit, inimical to them, was developing under its banner.

In spite of all these obstacles, the Bolshevist barriers and threats, the German cordons and devices, the men of Russia came thronging from all quarters in response to the call of Alexeiev and the wizardry of the posthumous fame of Kornilov. Alexeiev worked harder than ever, beginning at five o'clock in the morning and finishing at eleven o'clock at night.

His staff, under General Elsner, had its quarters in Novotcherkassk at the Central Hotel, and there every morning numbers of newly arrived Volunteers appeared. These consisted of generals, officers, cadets and schoolboys. Every day from one to two hundred were registered. The whole day long newly formed units passed through the streets of Novotcherkassk singing songs as they marched. They did not remain long in the town, but as soon as they had finished their course of instruction they were sent on to the army, at the Metchetinskaya stanitsa, to their respective contingents.

Towards the end of May, Colonel Drozdovsky arrived at Metchetinskaya with 2,000 officers, eight guns with their ammunition, and two armoured cars. This contingent had made its way from the Rumanian front, having marched two thousand versts, and experienced a series of trials and had numerous tussles with bands of the Reds.

The formation of the Astrakhan army was begun at Rostov, and continued at the Velikokniazheskaya stanitsa. Officers proceeding to join this army had to remain some time in Novotcherkassk. There they learned the truth about the Volunteers, which had been concealed from them in Kiev, and many joined the Volunteer Army.

"No one can leave the Ukraine who does not volunteer for the Astrakhan army," they said. "All we need is to assemble and arm ourselves; after that we shall find our way." A whole echelon of two hundred men passed over into the ranks of the Volunteer Army.

By the beginning of June the numbers of the army had reached 12,000, and in the course of its victorious march south the Kuban stanitsas reinforced it with their Cossacks. The Bolshevist units which surrendered consisted almost wholly of local inhabitants who had been conscripted by the Reds; these begged to be taken into the army, and fought splendidly. After the action at Belaya-Gleena (on June 25) about 5,000 such "Bolsheviks" surrendered, of whom half were received into the Volunteer ranks.

Thus by October the army had gradually increased to about 100,000 men, occupying a front of 250-300 versts.³ The growth of the army and its ever-increasing success could not but disturb the German military authorities, who were watching it from Rostov. Owing to the insistence of the Germans, officers were forbidden to leave the Ukraine for the Don territory. This order remained a dead letter, as the officers avoided the main railway stations, where the Germans were watching for them. At the beginning of July an order was issued forbidding Volunteer officers to remain longer than three days in Rostov or Novotcherkassk, so Alexeiev migrated from Novotcherkassk to the Tikhoretskaya stanitsa, which had just been occupied by his army.

All the agents of the army in the Crimea and the Ukraine were forbidden by the Germans to carry on their work. The recalcitrant or suspected were deported without explanation to some place unknown. But all these measures were fruitless; the army continued its work.

Whenever the German military authorities attempted to enter into direct communication with the staff of the army, Alexeiev and Denikin gave the same unvarying answer:

"The strategic situation does not allow us either to absent ourselves for the purpose of negotiation or to receive anyone at the General Headquarters of the Army."

The enemy was strong. After the occupation of the Ukraine, Odessa, Sevastopol and the Crimea by the Germans all the rabble which had fled from these places gathered in the Kuban territory. The Bolshevist navy was concentrated at Novorossiisk with all its guns and ammunition. The "pride" of the revolution—the sailors and the Letts—settled down as masters at Ekaterinodar, Eisk, Armavir, Stavropol, and other towns; they were joined by several thousand Chinese, who had run from their work on the Black Sea railway, and decided to defend "their native Kuban," as they explained when taken prisoners. How many Bolsheviks there were it is difficult to say, probably not less than 250,000, as they forced the local Cossacks into their ranks, showing no mercy to the recalcitrant.

Enormous stores of ammunition, armoured trains and motor-cars and all the railways fell into the hands of the Bolsheviks.

Deserters stated that there were about forty German instructors attached to the Bolshevist staffs; two German officers were found among the slain after the first engagement at Armavir. With shame it was learned that there were Russian officers of the General Staff among the Bolsheviks; one of them was taken prisoner at the capture of the Tikhoretskaya stanitsa, tried by court-martial and shot.

The task which lay before the army was to dispose of this group of Bolsheviks, break through to the Black Sea and the Caspian, safeguard its rear and ensure its supplies, so that it might afterwards turn northwards toward Tsaritsin. This task was expected to be fulfilled by September, but the enemy proved to be more stubborn and a better fighter than was supposed, and operations dragged on until November.

2.

At the beginning of June, when the army numbered about 12,500 men, an attack was made southwards along the railway lines, which were no longer avoided as they had been in the trying days of the first campaign; on the contrary, the railroads were an attraction, they had to be taken possession of. In the course of the first month the following junctions were captured: Torgovaya, Kavkazskaya and Tikhoretskaya, and the town of Stavropol. Driven from these points, the Bolsheviks lost the initiative, the movements of their troops were hampered, and large military stores passed into the hands of the Volunteers. The occupation of Tikhoretskaya was of especial importance. The position had been considered "impregnable," and its fall was the cause of much mortification to the staff of the Red army at Ekaterinodar. Enormous military spoils fell to the Volunteers—whole trains, a number of railway cars, and a variety of supplies; clothing for the whole army, a thousand poods⁴ of wool, sacks to the value of several million roubles, etc., etc.

The joy at the capture of the Torgovaya stanitsa was damped by the death of General Markov, the hero of the first Kuban campaign.

Thanks to its junction with the Kuban forces, to the influx of new Volunteers, and the mobilisation which was carried on in the stanitsas, by the middle of July the army had become a force of 30,000 men, and consisted of three divisions of infantry and three of cavalry; there were twenty batteries as well as several armoured trains and motor-cars.

On August 2 Ekaterinodar was taken after a three days' battle. The capture of this town signalised a great change in the position of the army. For five months the capital of the Kuban had been in the power of the Bolsheviks; the inhabitants were groaning under their despotism. The Bolsheviks spread rumours among the population about their imaginary victories, and the rout of the Kornilov men and the Cossacks; the citizens grew tired of waiting for their liberators, and ceased to believe in the possibility of their liberation-they hardly believed in victory even when the first cavalry detachments of the Volunteers broke into the town. The Bolsheviks had begun evacuating the town three days earlier, removing their supplies, their heavy artillery and their plunder. The Bolsheviks departed, but threatened to return again soon.

It was only when, on the following day (August 3), General Denikin and Hetman Filimonov with the members of the Government entered the town that all doubts vanished. They were received with enthusiasm, and flowers were showered on them. Behind them, one after another, the regiments of the Volunteer army came into the town. Some remained in it, others at once marched on farther to their positions.

On August 5 General Alexeiev rode into the town. The troops were drawn up in the Cathedral Square and the neighbouring streets. Alexeiev rode down their ranks, thanking them for their services; he was followed by his escort, before which waved the national tricolour. The troops and the citizens greeted him with indescribable enthusiasm. The review came to an end, and in the Cathedral Square the local bishop held a service of thanksgiving and of prayer for the souls of the glorious Volunteers and Kuban Cossacks who had laid down their lives for the liberation of their native land. When the Cossack choir began the Memoriam æternam, the bishop's mitre, shining in the sunlight, bent slowly to the earth, and with him the whole of the Christian warriors and the people flooding the square prostrated themselves.

After the service was over, Alexeiev took the salute during the march past of the troops. Those fine men were not distinguished by brilliancy of uniform or arms, or even by any special military bearing; all of them, in their worn, motley garb, were equally covered with grey dust, but every one of them—commanders, officers and privates—was fired with that conscious military spirit which is born and lives only in the surroundings of war.

Alexeiev, Denikin, and the whole of their staff settled down in Ekaterinodar, and the work of the staff was now carried on amidst calm and normal surroundings.

The burial of Kornilov was appointed for August 8. It was proposed to transfer his remains from the place of their temporary interment at Nemetskaya Kolonka to the vault in the Cathedral of Ekaterinodar. Large numbers of people had come to the city for the funeral, deputations from Novotcherkassk, Rostov, and other places, as well as relatives and admirers. But when the Volunteers reached the spot where Kornilov and Niezhintseff had been buried five months earlier they found only their empty, desecrated graves. Whose traitorous hand pointed out these graves to the Bolsheviks is yet a secret. The disappearance of Kornilov's remains seemed to cast a yet brighter halo round the memory of this national hero; the farmhouse where he was killed became a place of pilgrimage and a spot for prayer. A chapel is now being built there.

The month following the fall of Ekaterinodar witnessed the successive occupation of Armavir, Maikop, Novorossiisk, with the Black Sea coast and Eisk, with the Kuban coast of the Sea of Azov. Everywhere the Bolsheviks suffered enormous losses, everywhere they fled in disorder, generally directing their course eastwards. By the middle of September the army numbered over 60,000 men, and occupied a front of 250 versts. By the occupation of Novorossiisk the Volunteer Army opened a road for Russia to the sea, and so got in touch with the Allies, from whom Real Russia had been so long cut off by Germany, the Ukraine, and Bolshevik Russia.

On September 25 the army suffered an irreparable loss by the death of General Alexeiev. The trying conditions of the campaign, combined with the effects of overwork, broke down his health, and he passed away after a short but painful illness.

He was not fated to live to hear the joyful news of the beginning of the Allies ' triumph, of which, indeed, he never had any doubt (Bulgaria collapsed on September 26), but he died with the full consciousness of having done his duty towards his beloved native land. He had regenerated the Russian army, created a nucleus for a future Russia, and saved the honour of his native land.

One of Alexeiev's last orders was to forbid the crews of German vessels to land in ports occupied by the Volunteer army, such as, for instance: Novorossiisk, Anapa, Eisk, and others. Under Bolshevik rule they had been complete masters there; now they had to submit to a new master.

After Alexeiev's death the supreme command of the army passed to General Denikin, while questions of a political nature and those concerning civil administration were referred to a "Special Council attached to the Commander-in-Chief," which had been formed at Ekaterinodar during Alexeiev's life-time, under the presidency of General A. M. Dragomirov.

This Council became a centre round which men of political experience and representatives of public organisations grouped themselves. Some of them had long ago attached themselves to the army, had given their money for its formation, and shared the fatigues of its campaigns. Others joined it afterwards, when the staff had taken up its quarters at Ekaterinodar.

Among them were the former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sazonov, and his assistant Neratov. It is interesting to note that Sazonov, who had left Yalta in the middle of September, was detained by the German authorities at Kertch, and could not leave for a whole month. The Council attained to especial importance when, after the breakdown of Germany, the way to the army became free to all. The Volunteer Army, with its military, civil and public organisation, naturally became the centre of the State.

After the occupation of Novorossiisk, the coasts of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, Armavir, Maikop, and all the railways of the Kuban territory, the fate of the nest of Bolsheviks was sealed. The Bolsheviks, had only the Vladikavkaz railway left at their disposal, their only path of retreat was to the northeast, towards Astrakhan, across the steppes, where there was no railroad. The approaching autumn rains were bound to ruin the country roads, and the amount of loot was very great. Tens of thousands of carts with refugees and their families retreated with the Bolsheviks. There was no room in the trains, and so along the railway long lines of carts crept in several parallel files. Some of them were proceeding to Mineralniya Vody (Mineral Waters), some to the terminus at Holy Cross, whence it was said a railway to Astrakhan was being built. Some again were making their way into the steppes or lumbered up the stations along the Vladikavkaz railway, waiting for something to turn up.

The situation of the Bolsheviks was hopeless, and their final defeat seemed near. But this very hopelessness made them fight more stubbornly, and the struggle was long drawn out. The commissaries, the sailors, the Letts, the Chinese—all these miscreants knew well that they would have no mercy shown them, and so fought desperately and made their troops fight, too, cheering them with false reports that Ekaterinodar was retaken, and that a "Soviet" army of a million men was coming from the north to help them, while another was coming from Tsaritsin, which had already defeated the Cossacks of the Don, etc.

The orders of the Commander-in-Chief Sorokin bristled with such lies, so that, as was stated in one of these reports, the fighters should not bolt with eyes bulging out of their sockets. All this "news" was supported by the partial successes which attended the arms of the Bolsheviks. Armavir changed hands twice, the Nevinnomisskaya stanitsa several times. When a large force had to be concentrated to drive the Reds out of Armavir and take final possession of it, a section of the Bolsheviks made a dash at Stavropol, captured it on October 13, and settled down there for a short time. September and October were passed in constant severe fighting; but the heroic spirit of the Volunteers did not sink, in spite of the fatigue entailed by daily engagements.

On September 4 Nevinnomisskaya was taken. Two battalions of the Kornilov Regiment, with two guns, attacked the 30,000 Bolsheviks entrenched there with eight guns. The officers went against the enemy trenches with their rifles slung at their backs. The attack was so unexpected that the Bolsheviks and their staff ran away. Sorokin himself was there dining to the music of a band; he barely managed to escape, but the band was captured. The spoil left by the Bolsheviks was great.

In the beginning of October a series of severe engagements took place at Armavir, where ten days were spent in driving out the Bolsheviks. They were driven out at last, but at the price of heavy losses. The First Officers ' Regiment lost 50 percent. of its men, and the newly-formed combined Guards 31st Regiment, 80 percent; the colonel, the second in command, and twenty officers were killed and thirty officers wounded. 

On October 6 the Cathedral square in Ekaterinodar witnessed a scene which was sad but majestic in its modesty and simplicity. Twenty-one funerals took place at once. The rough wooden coffins, made of unplanned boards hastily put together, and the plain crosses of pine branches tied together, and the attendant burial parties could scarcely be accommodated in me the Cathedral. Denikin with his staff and a great crowd of citizens gathered to pray for the souls of the fallen. The coffins were brought forth and one was placed on a gun-carriage, three on hearses, the rest on ordinary carts. The mournful procession slowly drew out. It was accompanied by the solemn, beloved, long forgotten strains of "How Glorious is our Lord in Zion," the weeping of a few relatives and friends, and the blessings of the crowd as they piously crossed themselves.

Scarcely a day passed in Ekaterinodar without the citizens accompanying the remains of several of their beloved Volunteer protectors along the path from the Cathedral to the cemetery.

After the capture of Armavir, by a whole series of brilliant actions of the cavalry units on the right flank of the army between the Caucasian hills and the railway, all the bands of the Bolsheviks with their military trains were driven beyond the railway on to the right bank of the Kuban. At this time the army had united with Colonel Shkura's contingent, which was acting from the Mineral Waters side. The whole railway line, as far as the Nevinnomisskaya stanitsa, was in the hands of the Volunteers, and the Bolsheviks were fleeing towards Stavropol. About 35,000 of them had gathered there with an enormous train of 30,000 wagons.

By the end of October Denikin succeeded in surrounding the town. He called on the Bolsheviks to surrender, promising to spare all but their leaders and the criminals amongst them. 25,000 of them were ready to surrender, but 10,000 sailors of the "Taman" contingent refused to do so, and threatened to shoot down the rest with machine-guns. General Denikin, who superintended the operations at Stavropol in person, gave orders to begin the bombardment and assault on October 31.

On November 1 he left the field of battle for a few hours and went to Ekaterinodar to attend a special meeting of the Rada. In a heartfelt speech, instinct with fire, he recalled all that the Volunteer Army and the Russian officers, "those great martyrs," had done for the Kuban; by the first day of November the last stanitsa of the territory had been freed from the Bolsheviks. He was unable to finish his speech; he received a telegram which he read out to the meeting on the spot. It reported that the first cavalry division of the Volunteer Army has broken into Stavropol.

The ovations in honour of the army were without end: Denikin was greeted as the liberator of the Kuban, as a national hero, while he called on all to create a united Russian army and to continue the fight along one front for the honour and existence of Russia and lead her, as he put it, "...as our own beloved, worn with sickness, to the Court of Justice of the nations, that she might say, if even with low and weakened voice, what it was that the Russian people wished and called for."

Stavropol was taken; the Bolsheviks rushed in one mass north-eastward. Their losses were immense; what was left of them was pursued by the cavalry; their days were numbered. There were two more small Bolshevist groups left, one at the Mineral Waters, the other at Holy Cross. It would not be difficult to deal with them.

In any case it may be said confidently that by November the second Kuban campaign had attained its ends; the nest of Bolshevism in the South of Russia had been destroyed, the Kuban territory and the Stavropol and Black Sea Governments liberated.

As I come to the end of this sketch of the army, I find it difficult to suppress a feeling of regret that I have been able to say so little about the exploits of the army, to bring forward so few of the individual names of heroes. I am forced against my will to confine myself to descriptions of a general nature.

It is not easy to speak of individuals when the army, which had lived as a family, united by daily warfare during nine months, had developed a special breed of fighters of a peculiarly heroic character. To mention all by name would be impossible; to name some only would be an injustice to the others.

General Denikin asked one officer who had taken part in forty-seven actions, "How many cartridges have you used all this time?" "Seven," replied the officer modestly. This answer means but little to the civilian, but he who has been in battle knows how calm a man must be, with what contempt for death he must be inspired, to stand against an attack in silence, without a cry, without firing a shot.

Their contempt for death simply bordered on recklessness.

A new sport was invented. An officer would step out of the trenches, alone, without his rifle, and walk coolly towards the enemy trenches. The Bolsheviks would look on in silence, waiting to see what would come next; the officer, without hurrying, would approach their trenches, whip out his revolver, empty it into the stupefied Bolsheviks and calmly return to his comrades. Then only would they begin firing at him.

The spirit of the troops was high and worked miracles. What are we to say of those cadets, those schoolboys who could scarcely carry their heavy rifles, yet in moments of danger would rescue their weary elder comrades by a dashing charge?

The officers, those experienced fighters, could only wonder whence they gathered their strength. It was these children who were the personification of the terrors of the "counterrevolution" to the Bolsheviks. It was in their honour that the Bolsheviks gave the common name of "cadets" to the hated Volunteer army. Nearly all these youths perished.

Of the Volunteers who left Rostov with Kornilov in February, not 10 percent remained alive by November.

Altogether 30,000 of the Volunteers laid down their lives. Military history and the history of Russia will long discuss the singular campaigns, in which battles were fought, not according to the rules of military art, but frequently in direct opposition to them. Almost daily fighting in the course of a whole year gradually brought to the front such leaders as Denikin, Erdeli, Drozdovsky, Niezhintsev, Kutepov, Markov, and others. Their names will pass into history. I say nothing of Alexeiev and Kornilov—their names have gained immortality already.

I must say a few words also with regard to the unfounded reproaches from which the army has suffered at the initiative of the Germans.

What they all amount to is an accusation against the army of setting forth no definite programme, marching under no distinctive banner, refraining from any declaration of its political faith, and so forth.

Let its supreme leader, General Denikin, answer for me in the words which he addressed on August 26 in Stavropol to the representatives of the city and of its public organisations assembled to greet him:

Together with an attitude towards it which is frequently enthusiastic, the army has more than once met with complete misunderstanding and abuse. The reasons for this are many. The Volunteer Army has set itself the task of re-creating a united sovereign Russia. Hence the murmurs of the centrifugal forces in the land and of local diseased ambition.

The Volunteer Army cannot, even temporarily, bow the knee to the foreigner, and still less hamper in any way the free course of the Russian ship of State. Hence come murmuring and threats from without.

Advancing on its path of thorns, the Volunteer Army seeks the support of all the loyal elements of the nation. It cannot become the tool of any political party or public organisation. If it did it would not be the army of the Russian State. ' Hence the dissatisfaction of the intolerant and the political struggle over the army. But though there are definite traditions in the army, it will never become the oppressor of the thought and conscience of others. It says plainly and honestly: Be Conservatives or Socialists as you like, but love your tormented motherland and help us to save it.

In just the same way, while turning all its forces against the corrupters of the soul of the people and the dissipators of their wealth, the Volunteer Army knows nothing of class and social war. Amidst the painful circumstances in which we live, when nothing but tatters are left of Russia, it is not the time to undertake the solution of social problems. Nor may the parts of Russia undertake the reconstruction of its life, each according to its own ideas.

Therefore those officers of the Volunteer Army whom fate has entrusted with the heavy burden of its direction will in no case forcibly change the fundamental constitution of Russia. Their task is only to create surroundings in which it will again be possible to live and breathe in an atmosphere of toleration until the legislative institutions of Russia, representing the reason and the conscience of the Russian people, direct its life along a new channel towards light and truth.

The day will come when the cup of Russia's long-suffering will overflow, when the tocsin will toll all over Russia, clanging indignantly and calling to battle ,' and then all the armies—the Volunteer Army and the Cossack forces, the armies of the South and of Siberia, and the front of the Constituent Assembly—will all join forces.

The rivers, great and small, will all unite in one Russian sea, which, stormy and powerful, will wash away all that scum—home and foreign—which has now settled on the wounded, tortured body of our native land.

November, 1918.

1. Administrative subdivision of a Cossack Host, usually a collection of villages. Stanitsas provided representatives to the Rada (a Host’s parliment) and were one of the few truly democratic institutions allowed by the Russian government before the Revolutions of 1917.

2. A nagaika is a short braided leather whip with a rounded end (sometimes barbed). Although originally intended to drive horses, Cossacks, who were often deployed by the Czarist regime as internal police, frequently used it to disperse illegal public demonstrations.

3. A verst is a traditional Russian measure of distance equivalent to about about 0.66 miles or 1.1 kilometers.

4. A pood is a traditional Russian unit of weight equivalent to 36.11 pounds or 16.38 kilograms. Its use in commerce was officially abolished by the Bolsheviks in 1924.