The Donbas-Don operation was a

military campaign A military campaign is large-scale long-duration significant military strategy plan incorporating a series of interrelated military operations or battles forming a distinct part of a larger conflict often called a war. The term derives from th ...

of the

Russian Civil War The Russian Civil War () was a multi-party civil war in the former Russian Empire sparked by the 1917 overthrowing of the Russian Provisional Government in the October Revolution, as many factions vied to determine Russia's political future. I ...

that lasted from January to February 1918, by forces of the Southern Revolutionary Front under the command of

Vladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko Vladimir Alexandrovich Antonov-Ovseenko (; ; 9 March 1883 – 10 February 1938), real surname Ovseenko, party aliases 'Bayonet' () and 'Nikita' (), literary pseudonym A. Galsky (), was a prominent Bolshevik leader, Soviet statesman, mili ...

, against the Cossack troops of

Alexey Kaledin Alexey Maksimovich Kaledin (; 24 October 1861 – 11 February 1918) was a Don Cossack Cavalry General who commanded the 12th Cavalry Division and Russian Eight Army during World War I. He also led the Don Cossack White movement in the opening ...

and Volunteer detachments on the territory of the

Donbas The Donbas (, ; ) or Donbass ( ) is a historical, cultural, and economic region in eastern Ukraine. The majority of the Donbas is occupied by Russia as a result of the Russo-Ukrainian War. The word ''Donbas'' is a portmanteau formed fr ...

and the

Don Cossack Don Cossacks (, ) or Donians (, ), are Cossacks who settled along the middle and lower Don. Historically, they lived within the former Don Cossack Host (, ), which was either an independent or an autonomous democratic republic in present-da ...

region. It was the decisive operation in the complete conquest of Russia by the Bolsheviks following the

October Revolution The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two r ...

Background

In November 1917,

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

Mensheviks The Mensheviks ('the Minority') were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with Vladimir Lenin's Bolshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903. Mensheviks held more moderate and reformist ...

and

Socialist Revolutionaries The Socialist Revolutionary Party (SR; ,, ) was a major socialist political party in the late Russian Empire, during both phases of the Russian Revolution, and in early Soviet Russia. The party members were known as Esers (). The SRs were agr ...

created a joint revolutionary-military committee in

Rostov-on-Don Rostov-on-Don is a port city and the administrative centre of Rostov Oblast and the Southern Federal District of Russia. It lies in the southeastern part of the East European Plain on the Don River, from the Sea of Azov, directly north of t ...

. At the call of the Bolsheviks, 2,000 sailors from the

Black Sea Fleet The Black Sea Fleet () is the Naval fleet, fleet of the Russian Navy in the Black Sea, the Sea of Azov and the Mediterranean Sea. The Black Sea Fleet, along with other Russian ground and air forces on the Crimea, Crimean Peninsula, are subordin ...

, based in

Sevastopol Sevastopol ( ), sometimes written Sebastopol, is the largest city in Crimea and a major port on the Black Sea. Due to its strategic location and the navigability of the city's harbours, Sevastopol has been an important port and naval base th ...

, joined the

Red Guards The Red Guards () were a mass, student-led, paramilitary social movement mobilized by Chairman Mao Zedong in 1966 until their abolition in 1968, during the first phase of the Cultural Revolution, which he had instituted.Teiwes According to a ...

. On 9 December 1917, the committee initiated an uprising in the city; the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, who did not agree with this decision, subsequently left the committee. The uprising was a success and the Bolsheviks took control of Rostov. Six days later, counter-revolutionary Cossack troops under the command of Alexei Kaledin attacked Rostov, defeating a numerically stronger, but less organized and commanded Red Guard. The sailors in particular turned out to be of little value. After losing a clash with the Cossacks, the sailors shot one of their commanders at the station, accusing him of treason, before they returned to

Crimea Crimea ( ) is a peninsula in Eastern Europe, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, almost entirely surrounded by the Black Sea and the smaller Sea of Azov. The Isthmus of Perekop connects the peninsula to Kherson Oblast in mainland Ukrain ...

. In Rostov and

Novocherkassk Novocherkassk () is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, city in Rostov Oblast, Russia, located near the confluence of the Tuzlov and Aksay Rivers, the latter a distributary of the Don (river), Don River. Novocherkassk is best known as the ...

, the former Imperial Russian generals

Lavr Kornilov Lavr Georgiyevich Kornilov (, ; – 13 April 1918) was a Russian military intelligence officer, explorer, and general in the Imperial Russian Army during World War I. He served as Supreme Commander of the Russian Army and as the military leade ...

and

Mikhail Alekseyev Mikhail Vasilyevich Alekseyev () ( – ) was an Imperial Russian Army general during World War I and the Russian Civil War. Between 1915 and 1917 he served as Tsar Nicholas II's Chief of Staff of the Stavka, and after the February Revolut ...

initiated the creation of the counter-revolutionary

Volunteer Army The Volunteer Army (; ), abbreviated to (), also known as the Southern White Army was a White Army active in South Russia during the Russian Civil War from 1917 to 1920. The Volunteer Army fought against Bolsheviks and the Makhnovists on the ...

. The

Council of People's Commissars The Council of People's Commissars (CPC) (), commonly known as the ''Sovnarkom'' (), were the highest executive (government), executive authorities of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), the Soviet Union (USSR), and the Sovi ...

, headed by

Vladimir Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...

, considered the mobilization over the

Don Don, don or DON and variants may refer to: Places *Don (river), a river in European Russia *Don River (disambiguation), several other rivers with the name * Don, Benin, a town in Benin * Don, Dang, a village and hill station in Dang district, Gu ...

to be the greatest threat to their government, due to the number of Cossacks who could join the counter-revolutionary troops, and also because the Volunteer Army and the Cossacks posed a direct threat to the Donbas, which had been sympathetic to the

. Finally, control over Rostov and Novocherkassk would give the Red Guards a rail link to the

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region spanning Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is situated between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, comprising parts of Southern Russia, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. The Caucasus Mountains, i ...

. It was decided to transfer troops from

central Russia Central Russia is, broadly, the various areas in European Russia. Historically, the area of Central Russia varied based on the purpose for which it is being used. It may, for example, refer to European Russia (except the North Caucasus and ...

to this region, led by

Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko Vladimir Alexandrovich Antonov-Ovseenko (; ; 9 March 1883 – 10 February 1938), real surname Ovseenko, party aliases 'Bayonet' () and 'Nikita' (), literary pseudonym A. Galsky (), was a prominent Bolshevik leader, Soviet statesman, mili ...

, one of the commanders of the Bolshevik coup in

Petrograd Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...

. His hastily organized force consisted, in addition to units led from the north, of workers' units from Donbas. At the end of December 1917, the army of Antonov-Ovseenko, together with local Bolshevik troops, captured Kharkiv. On 24-25 December 1917, an All-Ukrainian Congress of Councils was held in the city, during which they proclaimed the creation of the

Ukrainian People's Republic of Soviets The Ukrainian People's Republic of Soviets (; ) was a short-lived (1917–1918) Soviet republic of the Russian SFSR that was created by the declaration of the Kharkiv All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets "About the self-determination of Ukraine" ...

. Part of Antonov-Ovseenko's troops was directed to support it in an armed struggle against the forces loyal to the

Central Council of Ukraine The Central Rada of Ukraine, also called the Central Council (), was the All-Ukrainian council that united deputies of soldiers, workers, and peasants deputies as well as few members of political, public, cultural and professional organizations o ...

, while the others continued the fight against Kaledin.

Plan

In the fight against Kaledin and Kornilov, Antonov-Ovseenko intended to cooperate with the Red Cossacks, led by and , as well as with Mikhail Petrov's red troops going south from

Voronezh Voronezh ( ; , ) is a city and the administrative centre of Voronezh Oblast in southwestern Russia straddling the Voronezh River, located from where it flows into the Don River. The city sits on the Southeastern Railway, which connects wes ...

. After taking control of Rostov-on-Don and Novocherkassk, he expected to march further south to join the troops of the 39th Infantry Division of the Russian Army, who had shown strong sympathies for the Bolsheviks prior to the revolution. On 8 January 1918, Antonov-Ovseenko divided his forces into two groups: the first, headed by

Rudolf Sivers Rudolf Ferdinandovich Sivers (; 1892–1918) was a Russian revolutionary and military leader. Sivers was born in Saint Petersburg on 23 November 1892. A veteran of World War I, after the February Revolution he joined Bolsheviks, Bolshevik party ...

, numbering 10,000 soldiers, was to attack

Taganrog Taganrog (, ) is a port city in Rostov Oblast, Russia, on the north shore of Taganrog Bay in the Sea of Azov, several kilometers west of the mouth of the Don (river), Don River. It is in the Black Sea region. Population: Located at the site of a ...

, and then Rostov, the second, under the command of

Yuriy Sablin Yuriy Vladimirovich Sablin (Russian: Юрий Владимирович Саблин; 24 November 1897 – 1937) was a Russian military leader and Socialist Revolutionary. Yuriy was born in Yuryev, Governorate of Livonia, into a family of a b ...

, was entrusted with the task of joining Petrov's troops.

Battle

The Reds had an enormous numerical advantage over the Don, but they fought without enthusiasm or discipline. More than once, individual units on their own entered into local truces with the enemy forces and withdrew from the fight. This was the case with the soldiers of the 39th Division, who formed a truce on their own with the 8th Cossack Division. Sablin's group managed to connect with Petrov's troops, but on 31 January, they suffered a defeat at Licha in a battle against Vasily Chernetsov's Cossacks. Shortly thereafter, however, Chernetsov's unit broke the previously agreed local truce and was smashed on 3 February by Fyodor Podtiolkov's unit. This victory opened the way to Novocherkassk for Yuri Sablin's group. On 25 January, Sivers' group was defeated at Matvieyovy Kurgan by

Alexander Kutepov Alexander Pavlovich Kutepov (; 28 September 1882 – 26 January 1930) was a Russian military officer in the Imperial Russian Army and later an anti-communist officer in the Volunteer Army during the Russian Civil War. From 1928 to 1930, he cha ...

's less numerous but more disciplined unit, in the first serious clashes with the Whites. Two days later, however, the Whites had to withdraw some of their forces to Taganrog, where a workers' uprising had broken out. On 2 February, the Bolsheviks took over the city, and a day later Sivers' troops began their march towards it, arriving on 8 February. Not wanting to completely destroy the newly created anti-Bolshevik forces, Kornilov and Alekseyev decided to leave Rostov and Novocherkassk. Kaledin refused to leave the Don and committed suicide on 12 May. White forces left Rostov in an orderly manner on the night of 21-22 February, starting the

Ice March The Ice March (Russian: Ледяной поход), also called the First Kuban Campaign (Russian: Первый кубанский поход), a withdrawal (military), military withdrawal lasting from February to May 1918, was one of the defi ...

towards

Yekaterinodar Krasnodar, formerly Yekaterinodar (until 1920), is the largest city and the administrative centre of Krasnodar Krai, Russia. The city stands on the Kuban River in southern Russia, with a population of 1,154,885 residents, and up to 1.263 millio ...

. On 23 February, Sivers captured Rostov. The Cossack troops from Novocherkassk did not manage to do the same, because on 25 February, the city was taken over by the reconstructed local revolutionary-military committee. Only 1,500 Cossacks, led by , fled the city chaotically and began their own Steppe March towards the Sal. Sablin's troops immediately entered the city in their wake. and ''krug'' President Voloshinov were arrested and executed six days later.

References

Sources

* * * * *

Background

Plan

Battle

References

Sources

Further reading