Where did Kolchak pass? Admiral Kolchak: the story of the fall

GOLDEN TALES OF SIBERIA

KOLCHAK'S GOLD

Rumors about the great gold of Admiral Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak have long been spreading throughout Siberia. The Siberian taiga holds many secrets and countless treasures.
Beyond the hills and valleys, beyond the Sayan Mountains, this story of golden treasures happened. People are still arguing about this riddle, but the truth is only born in disputes...
First, we need to remember the man who is the most important person in our history. In the old days, the military people called him at full rank: “Your Excellency, Supreme Commander-in-Chief of Siberia.” Admiral Kolchak did not hold this position for long, only fourteen months.
He was originally from Izhora Finns. His father assembled ship cannons for the Tsarist Navy at a military factory. His love for maritime affairs came from his father, and little by little he became a glorious admiral.
Before the revolution, he served as an admiral on the warm Black Sea, was a famous naval commander, a brave officer, sympathetic to the simple sailor brethren. When the revolution broke out, the sailors hated many of the officers on the ships, but Kolchak’s good reputation survived and the revolutionary sailors left him in his former post. He firmly held the title of commander of the Black Sea Fleet. Even the sailor battle councils, quick to kill, trusted his nobility.
It was the eighteenth year. Our eternal adversaries, the mustachioed Janissaries, heard about the turmoil and devastation in Russia and began to disturb Russia’s maritime borders. The Turks rejoiced at the difficult revolutionary times and dreamed of conquering the great Black Sea. But it was not there!
Admiral Kolchak raised the sailor councils and decided to incriminate the warlike neighbor. Formidable battleships, ships, and military cruisers set off on a campaign to the Turkish shores. The smoke of the Russian ships covered the sun and the admiral said to the subdued Turks: “Let the revolution not disturb the Turks, this is an internal matter of the people. And for Turkey, the borders of Russia are firmly locked!”
The sea border became clean and calm again. Admiral Kolchak tried to respect Russia’s interests at sea, because in his youth he participated in the defense of the Far Eastern Port Arthur and received awards.
The Provisional Government came to power and recalled all major military officials to the capital. The time was difficult, complex, and it was impossible to understand the intricacies of power.
The government instructed Admiral Kolchak to become the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Siberian White Corps. Having received the appointment, Kolchak left for Omsk.
The white generals who fought against the republic recognized the new commander, sent him dispatches in which they recognized his appointment and reported on military operations. The Provisional Government was soon overthrown, but managed to award Kolchak with the golden Cross of St. George "For the liberation of the Urals."
The Soviet government was pushing back the whites on all fronts. Then the white ministers collected Russia's gold reserves and decided to give part of it for military needs.
The white ministers had to divide the gold reserves of the state, allocating part for military needs. They then assigned responsibility for a whole third of the treasure to Admiral Kolchak. Gold is the heaviest of all known metals, but outwardly it appears small. On precise scales it draws out more than even lead and it has no expiration date: it does not rust, does not deteriorate forever. It will only wear off a little if you wear a gold ring for a long time.
They secured the agreement with government papers, recorded them in treasury books, and issued gold bars to Admiral Alexander Vasilyevich. They loaded gold of the highest standard, long yellow bricks into strong oak boxes. The boxes themselves are carefully made of thick oak wood, and fastened at the corners with strong iron. On the oblong brick ingots themselves, a clear sovereign inscription is cast: “Gold of the Russian Empire.”
They loaded and placed the boxes into the railway carriages of the Golden Train and sent them to the Krasnoyarsk Territory. In Krasnoyarsk, they loaded gold onto carts and moved into the interior of the Siberian country. The most valuable cargo was surrounded by a military guard of the most loyal Cossacks.
Kolchak planned to use gold money to organize a great campaign from Siberia to Moscow in order to return the previous state structure to Russia. There would be enough gold for all military affairs, and perhaps there would be more left. But it was not fate. Apparently the Lord himself did not want to harass the Russian people in a fratricidal war, a civil war, and did not allow it to continue.
Having fought several major battles and suffered defeat, Admiral Kolchak’s troops retreated along the Kan River. Rumors were already spreading everywhere that a golden train was coming, carrying countless treasures. There were different kinds of people in Siberia, there were a lot of convicts, dashing men, desperate ones. Some fought for Soviet power, while others sought booty on the sly. The Chinese troops were especially rampant, mercilessly killing everyone, indiscriminately, sparing neither the Reds nor the Whites. The Chinese were especially willing to carry out executions of tsarist officers, appropriating the property of those executed, they also guarded Smolny, for a fee, of course...
Then the military decided to hide Russia’s gold reserves, to hide them so that bad people wouldn’t get them,
Admiral Alexander Vasilyevich thought through the mystery of hiding gold. He was a man of great intelligence, who, due to the hard times, was not understood by either the whites or the reds.
A secret lived with him, the Siberian riddle of the century. The gold bars were divided into three parts.
The first gold luggage was sent on a secret expedition to the East, to Japan. to foreign banks. But the Russian admiral could not stand the Japanese, after the battles with them in Port Arthur, and if not for the circumstances, he would never have done it. He refused treatment in Japan many times, although battle wounds were taking a toll on his health.
The second part of Russia's gold was sent by train to the city of Irkutsk.

The third part was hidden in our area. Why was Admiral Kolchak heading here? Because then the spiritual mentors of the ancient faith settled in the taiga thickets, in the Bogunai monastery. With them, priests and spiritual fathers, according to the custom of Russian sailors, the admiral held council in the last days of his life. According to eyewitnesses, he visited the elders on Bogunai on Christmas Day, January 7th, and died in February of the same year.
The admiral’s fateful conversation with the elders was shrouded in utter secrecy, but what is known for sure is that he could not doubt their advice and acted as they predicted, namely, he stopped military operations and stopped shedding the blood of his own people.

In the taiga monastery of Bogunai, hiding under the guise of a simple priest, a member of the Holy Synod of the Russian Church, Metropolitan Philaret, their holiness by title. With him were the bishops: Nicodemus, Sergius and Nicholas. These elders hid their proper names, not having the strength to fight the new government due to old age and infirmity.
Zita Yanovna Brams says: “My family lived in the Nizhnyaya Lebedevka farm, on the banks of the Kan. My parents, immigrants from the Baltic city of Kaunas, my father, Jan Yanovich, and my mother, went to Verkhnyaya Lebedevka to visit relatives for a wedding. Under the supervision of their older sisters, their small children were at home, playing with dolls on the stove. And outside there was a strong frost, it was Christmas Day, the seventh. Early in the morning there was a loud knock on the frozen kitchen window. At that time it was a big event, because there was only one family living on the farm, ours. They ran out white-haired children on the wooden porch, and froze in surprise.

Military men in gold shoulder straps appeared before us. Some are wearing simple sheepskin coats, tall fur hats, tied with leather belts. Many have long sabers in sheaths and guns, frosted over from the cold... They asked permission from the older sisters to stay in order to warm up and cook camp food in our stove, and also to leave the wounded in our house, those who cannot go.”
The military sisters let them in and sent their younger brother Robert to the Verkhnyaya Lebedevka farm to pick up his parents.
An important officer talked with Zita Yanovna’s father and told how the Kolchakites ended up on a small farm.
A golden convoy of twelve carts approached the mouth of the Barga, the place where it flows into the Kan, when melt water appeared above the frozen ice, on top of the Kan ice. An impossible circumstance for horses. The horse's feet got wet, they began to refuse to walk, and soon they stood up completely. Time was needed to heal the horses, but there was none; the convoy was overtaken by a dashing pursuit. While the captain was talking with his parents, who had come from relatives, the soldiers were busy at the hot stove. The Kolchakites had their own food, various canned goods, even frozen bread in wicker boxes. The gentlemen officers took off their sheepskin coats and overcoats and warmed themselves by the hot stove.
The most important, tall military man, elderly in a beautiful uniform, awards sparkling with gold and bright stones. The Russian guest in a rich uniform spoke for a long time to the owners of the farm about his plight, about his comrades who died, about difficult times, about the fact that they could not agree on peace with the new government, even about sick horses. “Help us with horses, and take the sick, maybe they’ll get better!” the military man asked.
The father gave simple draft horses to the golden train of Admiral Kolchak. In addition, the chief officer asked to lead him along the taiga paths to the monastery on Bogunai. Three military men got on hunting skis and followed their father to Bogunai, to the monastery to visit the elders from distant lands who ended up here due to misfortune..
Whether the elders talked for a long time or briefly with the military, it is known for sure that the elders did not approve of further bloodshed, only by the evening of January 8th did everyone return to the farm. The brave admiral knew those elders from St. Petersburg; there, before the military expedition to Port Arthur, they illuminated warships and served a prayer service in honor of the Russian army. What did the holy hermits predict for the formidable hero? One can guess from his deeds. The admiral withdrew from the war, dismissed his brave companions to all four sides, and hid the fate of the golden train in a great secret.
On a frosty night, Kolchak’s men shifted oak boxes with royal coats of arms onto new sleigh carts by the light of lit torches. Four good Cossacks could barely carry each box. These boxes were carefully covered with cloth blankets and straw from prying eyes.
Soon the Kolchakites left along with the main leader, leaving five wounded in the upper room of the Lithuanian house, who also turned out to be frostbitten. Their parents treated them, a doctor was called, but the further fate of the soldiers is unknown.
“Shortly after the departure of the Kolchak convoy, peasants from the village of Ilyinka appeared, those who often took barley beer from my father on holidays. They came into the house when the parents were away on business, and the younger children were alone.
Three healthy men began to remove the outer clothing from the wounded Kolchak soldiers. The jackets they wore were beautiful, probably expensive. The wounded's sheepskin coats and fur boots lay not far from their beds, on a wooden bench. The wounded did not allow themselves to be undressed, especially the old military man who did not want to give his boots to the Ilyinsk residents resisted. The defiant tried to get up, but could not and suddenly began to cry, but his tears did not pity the robbers." Zita Yanovna recalled.
Zita Yanovna remembers how, together with her father, they went to the shore of the Kan in the bitter frost, to see Kolchak’s horses left on the shore. The horses lay in different places, not far from each other, whinnying pitifully and looking with purple eyes, unable to rise, covered with frost and snow.
The father, as the owner, began to carry food every single day to the noble animals, who were helplessly awaiting their own death. Heated by a caring farmer. Yan Yanovich diligently carried spring water in a large cauldron on a sled to the river bank. He watered down the lying horses, fed them crushed potatoes, oats, and green clover hay. With a birch tree he swept away the snow from them, covering them with felt for the night.
One day, early in the morning, all three, with fabulously beautiful horses, met their farmer, standing on their own feet. The joy of the savior was no less than the joy of the saved. Now we could examine them. It turned out that the army people left behind two stallions of a good breed and a real treasure, a red mare. The tall mare was amazingly beautiful. There is a white shirt front on the chest. There is a white star on the forehead, and on thin, chiseled legs there are white socks. The purebred beauty became the decoration of the Lithuanian courtyard. She danced under the reins, gracefully moving her chiseled legs in white socks. It was impossible to stop looking at her shiny coat, silky mane and white shirtfront.
The time came and the mare gave birth to an equally beautiful, zealous foal. It must be said that when Jan Yanovich Brams took the young pacer to the Caen Fair, he sold the young horse with great fame, earning a lot of money. He bought us girls colorful fabrics, silk scarves, and boots. Happiness for the girls!
But what is the fate of Admiral Kolchak? After a conversation with the holy elders on Bogunai, he decided to step away from military affairs. He disbanded his Cossacks, covering the fate of the golden train with a great mystery. We saw him in Kansk. Then I traveled by rail to the city of Irkutsk. Here the information is contradictory. Some documents claim that the admiral was captured, others that he himself came to the Council of People's Deputies, wanting to stay in Russia, even after the trial. He hoped for a truce with the new government.
Alexander Vasilyevich was arrested and placed in prison in the city of Irkutsk. In the common cell with him were Russian officers, even one member of the State Duma. The admiral’s wife, who followed him to the war, Anna Timireva, who spent her entire life in prisons, also languished in a cell in the Irkutsk prison. They released her after forty years, only a weak old woman. Her whole crime was loyalty to the admiral no matter what.
Suddenly, a rumor spread that a detachment of Cossacks was approaching the city, having learned about the capture of their admiral, the Commander-in-Chief of the White Army in Siberia. Then the question of the admiral’s execution tightened in an ominous loop. They did not convene the court. It was decided to betray the class enemy into the hands of criminal lawless people. Unknown people, taking advantage of the panic, opened the doors of all prison cells. Even in prison, the admiral wore military uniform, gold epaulettes, expensive orders with diamonds, and gold wedding rings. The weight of the admiral's gold shoulder straps was a kilogram of pure gold. Therefore, the criminals happily agreed to deal with the Russian admiral; they were driven by the usual thirst for profit. Some fought for Soviet power, while others simply profited from the turmoil and confusion.
They took us to the Angara River, to an ice hole, tearing off our golden crosses and orders.
"You can say your last wish!" the criminals shouted in his face.
"It's not for you to hear my desire!" The admiral answered with dignity.
“Give him a blindfold before he dies,” ordered the organizer of the execution.
" No need." Kolchak objected. They demanded a story from him about the gold of the Russian Empire. They beat me. The naval officer's diamond awards, earned in battle, were torn off. “You are random people, robbers, and the gold belongs to Russia,” Alexander Vasilyevich wheezed, bleeding profusely. Tied up, they pushed him into an icy hole in the river, apparently water baptism was written in the sailor’s family. The Angara River carried the admiral's body to the shore, buried him on Siberian soil far from the Baltic Sea, on the shores of which a naval officer grew up, misunderstood by his people, misunderstood by the new government, who did not want the death of the Russian state, for which he fought on the sea borders.

With him died the secret of the golden train, the gold intended for the improvement of the army. Probably at that time it should not have been spent; perhaps the Lord did not deign to waste the precious metal. Maybe the Russian army will need gold in another, even more difficult time, then the admiral’s treasure will be discovered. Gold will be found for a good deed, but hidden from a bad one. Remember, fellow countrymen, gold metal is mobile, it chooses an honest person, and if the wicked take him by force, then gold takes away their life. The gold reserves of Admiral Kolchak await in our Siberian land worthy successors.

Epilogue

Folk stories are stubbornly denied by historians, but our task is to convey to the reader the whole truth of the people's word, people's memory. Repeatedly confirmed by old-timers, this information will complement the picture of Kolchak’s time in Siberia. During the Civil War, a detachment of the Supreme Ruler of Siberia, Admiral Kolchak, passed through the Oryol land. The detachment moved on sled carts. Eyewitnesses remembered that the last carts carried dead Cossacks and officers for weapons, provisions and the wounded. Because even in difficult times, in the Siberian remnant of the old Russian army, traditions were sacredly observed - burying people in a Christian manner after the funeral service and farewell. The Kolchakites, whom the Reds scolded as bandits, even in difficult times did not lose their human face and Christian conscience. The priest was summoned from Zaozernaya and the dead Cossacks were buried with honors near Orlovka.
The Kolchakites passed through several villages and remembered them in many of them. In Orlovka, the head of the detachment, Admiral Kolchak, in full dress uniform, walked around the courtyards, opened the gates himself and asked the peasants for horses for his convoy.
According to the stories of old-timers, in Orlovka a young beautiful girl from the local peasants left for Kolchak’s detachment. She undertook to care for the wounded people from the detachment who were being transported with the convoy.
When Kolchak’s convoy was already leaving the village of Orlovka, a grandmother named Ledeneva, later the mother of Regina Ledeneva, was sitting on a bench near the last hut. One of the soldiers of a convoy walking past ran up to her and asked to exchange his new leather boots for her old grandfather’s hemmed felt boots.
Ledeneva agreed because she considered the exchange beneficial. The soldier walked further in her felt boots, throwing his new leather boots on her bench. Perhaps this military man came to Siberia from the West, where there is no such frost.
The grandmother also saw the entire convoy herself and claims that it consisted of seventy horse-drawn carts.
And there was a rumor about her that she fell in love with one of the officers, if not the admiral himself. Unfortunately, nothing is known about the further fate of the brave girl, except that she never returned home and may have died along with the detachment.
They left a seriously wounded young officer in the village of Vysotino. The owners took care of him and called a priest from Zaozerny for the last rites. The officer was buried in the village cemetery. In memory of the untimely death of the officer, the owners kept his award silver saber for a long time.
Not far from the village of Vysotino, in the forest, trenches and traces of the battle were preserved, according to the stories of the residents of what happened there between Kolchak’s troops and partisans. For a long time it was still possible to find rusty cartridges, bayonets, and rifles there. For some time, local residents kept three machine guns and a small-caliber gun on wheels - a cannon from Kolchak’s army.
In the village of Ilyinka, local residents saw Admiral Kolchak in a uniform and cap walking ahead of the convoy and loudly telling the residents of the courtyards that he had little left and so that his gold would not be lost, he was now distributing it to all people. Kolchak personally threw handfuls of gold coins over the fence into the courtyards of local residents.
In lower Lebedevka, an Estonian family named Brams saw a detachment of whites. The elders went that day to a wedding in Verkhnyaya Lebedevka, and the children were left at home alone. The Cossacks knocked on the door and asked to let them in to rest and call their parents. The older sister followed her father and mother on skis, and the younger sister saw the oldest officer wearing a rich uniform with gold shoulder straps and diamond awards and orders. According to her, it was Admiral Kolchak himself. The Cossacks brought their food and prepared lunch. Leaving the wounded and frostbitten with the Brems family, Kolchak went further along the frozen river.
And a few days later, bad people from Ilyinka, where many convicts took root, came to the Brems. Taking advantage of their defenselessness, they took off their shoes and robbed the wounded. Then the Reds came and took all the sick with them. Most likely the Kolchakites were shot.
In the village of Gmiryanka, a ceremonial chair was made for the arrival of the Supreme Ruler. This furniture was made by local skilled wood craftsmen. The chair was decorated with legs curved in a metropolitan manner on wooden balls - symbols of power. It was very comfortable to sit in, despite its hard appearance. According to the recollections of old-timers, before an important event, the chair was taken out of the house into the yard and placed on a beautiful expensive carpet. From this place Kolchak held his highest court in all cases. In the house where senior officers stayed, elegant, expensive guitars made in ancient times have been preserved. One guitar there is especially richly decorated with mother-of-pearl. But it is known that the admiral himself loved to sing and composed poems and songs. There is even a legend among Chita old-timers that Kolchak himself composed the song “Shine, Shine, My Star,” and it was this that he sang while going to be shot. And the Chita people claim that Kolchak was shot there.
The Kolchak banner was white and green, as a symbol of the colors of snow and taiga.
A ribbon with these flowers was on the cross for the Siberian Campaign. The admiral did not award his own with royal decorations, considering the civil war fratricidal.

Mostly, white people in our villages still have a respectful opinion. But the time was wartime and cruel. For some reason, mostly in the families of partisans they remember the punitive reprisals of the Kolchakites. The partisans called the whites bandits. But according to the law, the power of the Provisional Government in Siberia was represented by Kolchak and his subordinate Cossacks. Maybe the stories about most of the atrocities were propaganda ploys? It was after rumors of atrocities that people took the side of the partisans and went into the forest. Detachments of Chinese who crossed the border also appeared in our area. The Chinese spontaneously settled in Siberia and brought their families. Chinese gangs engaged in brutal robbery and tortured local residents to rob them of their gold reserves.
After the First World War, foreign prisoners of war were brought to Siberia. There were Italians, Austrians, Germans and Czechs. In our district they lived at Rybnoye station in a free settlement. It was with the appearance of the prisoners that in 1914 the first attack in the entire history of our region took place on a guarded postal carriage with gold from local mines. During the turmoil of the civil war, they formed detachments and called themselves Kolchakites. But they had nothing to do with the legitimate government of Kolchak, and took out their grievances for the shameful captivity on the local population. When carrying out raids and robberies, the White Czechs called themselves Kolchakites, perhaps wanting to take revenge for their captivity and defeat to the Russian military commander. Detachments of White Czechs formed at Rybnoye station
If Kolchak immediately took drastic measures against the partisans and their families, keeping people's life in tradition, then the Reds were harmless at first, and only after taking power they began repression. But if Kolchak’s superficial terror removed only the tip of the revolutionary wave, then the waves of red terror touched entire layers of Siberian society. The composition of the local population and class composition changed beyond recognition after many years of extermination.
So who turned out to be worse over time? The St. Petersburg aristocrat Kolchak, who flogged men and burned the houses of partisans, who shot only at his enemies, or the whole machine of red repressions of 19, 22, 37, erasing the dynasties of peasants and the centuries-old social structure?
The significance of Admiral Kolchak’s Siberian campaign was revealed in people’s understanding only later, when it became clear that Kolchak’s campaign was the only real chance to turn the tide of history and save the traditions of folk life in Siberia. Hopes to keep the huge region away from the revolution did not come true. A fundamental change became inevitable. The traditions of the people were outlawed.

Reviews

A peculiar but interesting interpretation of those events.
I would like to correct the author a little:

“Kolchak planned to use gold money to organize a great campaign from Siberia to Moscow in order to return the previous state structure of Russia. There would have been enough gold for all military affairs, perhaps there would have been some left over. But fate did not work out. Apparently the Lord himself did not want to harass the Russian people into the fratricidal war, the civil war, was not allowed to continue."

It was not the Lord who did not want the civil war to continue. It continued for a long time in European Russia, right up to 1922. Destroying almost the entire peasantry and intelligentsia.

The people themselves then renounced God, became apostates, and destroyed and burned churches with their own hands. That is why God abandoned people. And the admiral ended his earthly life with martyrdom. Like a saint.

But much is now known about the gold reserves of Tsarist Russia. Recently a documentary was shown with filming at the bottom of Lake Baikal. Parts of train cars were discovered at a depth of about 1.5 km, but it is not yet possible to lift the train from such a depth.

And I completely agree with you that until people come to God and fulfill his Commandments, this gold reserve of Russia will not be available to humanity.

Thank you, although I don’t agree with everything, it was nice to read about the great Russian son, Admiral Kolchak. Unfortunately, Russia lost many educated, intelligent and fair sons and daughters who faithfully served their Fatherland during that civil war! But this was her gene pool! With + and respect, TATYANA

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“Kolchak’s Gold,” which ended up in Siberia during the Civil War and may have disappeared here, has haunted specialists and treasure hunters for almost a century. Traces of precious caches are sought in forests, at the bottom of the deepest lake, in foreign banks - there are many versions. But none of them have brought me closer to wealth yet...

For Novosibirsk residents, November 20 is a kind of significant date. On this day in 1919, 40 wagons of “Kolchak’s gold” passed through Novonikolaevsk towards Lake Baikal. “The trains stayed here for several days and moved further to the East,” said Vladislav Kokoulin, Doctor of Historical Sciences, NSU Professor, specialist in the history of the Civil War.

490 tons of gold

By 1914, the gold reserves of the Russian Empire were the largest in the world and amounted to 1 billion 100 million rubles. To preserve state treasures during the First World War, half of the entire gold reserve was evacuated in 1915 from Petrograd to Kazan. After the October Revolution, the Bolsheviks tried to take the money out, but they only managed to take 100 boxes - in August 1918, Kazan was captured by the Whites and their Czechoslovak allies.

“The trophies cannot be counted, Russia’s gold reserves of 650 million have been captured,” Colonel Kappel reported in a telegram.

It was this gold that came to be called “Kolchak’s gold,” after Admiral Alexander Kolchak, proclaimed Supreme Ruler of Russia in November 1918. The Whites took possession of 650 million rubles, which amounted to approximately 490 tons of pure gold, mostly in bullion and coins, as well as a small number of gold stripes and circles. The gold reserves, along with the Russian one, included coins from 14 countries. Most of them were German marks.

Path through Siberia

The gold stayed in Omsk, the capital of White Guard Russia, for about a year. In 1919, under pressure from the Red Army, the Whites fled to the East, and with them the gold reserves traveled along the Trans-Siberian Railway. The train consisted of 40 carriages, with accompanying personnel in another 12 carriages.

“Eight military echelons were sent from Omsk to the east. One of them housed a gold reserve, approximately 30 thousand pounds of gold. There were more than 1 thousand people on the trains, including Kolchak’s personal convoy,” the newspaper “New Russian Life” reported.

The movement of the train was not easy. At dawn on November 14, at the Kirzinsky crossing between Omsk and Tatarsk, a train with security crashed into the tail of the train with gold. “A powerful blow smashed nine trains with gold, a fire broke out in the colliding trains, and then the ammunition kept by the guards began to explode. Several carriages derailed. The collision injured 147 people, 15 of them were killed, eight were burned,” eyewitnesses say in their memoirs.

Another emergency occurred near Novonikolaevsk. The carriages became detached from the locomotive, rolled downhill and almost ended up in the Ob River. The gold was saved by soldiers who managed to install special brakes under the wheels. But, according to Kokoulin, this is nothing more than a legend.

Trains with gold arrived at the Nizhneudinsk station, here representatives of the Entente forced Admiral Kolchak to renounce the rights of the Supreme Ruler and give up the gold reserves to the Czechoslovak formations. Kolchak was handed over to the Socialist Revolutionaries, who handed him over to the Bolshevik authorities, who shot the admiral. The Czech corps returned 409 million rubles to the Soviets in exchange for a promise to release them from the country.

In June 1921, the People's Commissariat of Finance of the RSFSR compiled a certificate stating that during the reign of Admiral Kolchak, Russia's gold reserves decreased by 235.6 million rubles, or 182 tons. Bricks and stones were discovered in some of the boxes that once held gold bars.

Czechoslovakian trace

According to one version, it was the Czechoslovak corps that stole the missing millions. For example, the former Deputy Minister of Finance in the Kolchak government, Novitsky, accused the Czechs of stealing 63 million rubles. The head of the Czech Foreign Ministry directly wrote to the command of the legion: “If it is still in your power, try to take it (gold reserves) to a safe place, for example to the Czech Republic.”

As evidence, they usually cite the fact that immediately after the return of the corps to their homeland, the largest Legiabank, which was founded by Czech legionnaires, but most experts consider this version to be unfounded.

Military spending

“Admirals of the admiral, including among modern historians, claim that the admiral was very sensitive to the gold reserves and even intended to transfer it to the disposal of the Constituent Assembly. However, this is not so - part of the gold was already sold to English, French and Japanese banks in 1919 in exchange for the supply of weapons and uniforms, part was transferred to Chita, where it ended up at the disposal of Ataman Grigory Semyonov,” says Kokoulin.

For example, part of the stock was used to order banknotes in the United States. The financiers of the White movement sought to stabilize monetary circulation, for which reliable banknotes were needed. But the bills produced by the American Banknote Company had to be burned to avoid paying for storage. So, literally, the money was wasted.

Mountains and taiga

Of the 28 wagons loaded with precious metals in Omsk, only 18 with gold and three with silver reached Irkutsk, so they are looking for gold almost along the entire Trans-Siberian Railway - from Omsk to Khabarovsk.

The most famous story is the disappearance of 13 boxes with 500 kilograms of gold in front of the Tyret station. Several security guards were accused of theft and were arrested. But many treasure hunters are confident that part of the loot was either buried near the station or buried in one of the abandoned salt mines nearby.

The Maryina Griva lock in the Ob-Yenisei Canal attracts the attention of gold miners because five hundred White Guards were buried nearby. Precious ingots were allegedly found in the Sikhote-Alin mountains.

Another place under discussion is a cache on the Belaya River in front of Irkutsk, in the Kholmushinsky caves. Allegedly, this is the place where part of the gold was transported, and two esauls, according to some accounts, shot the soldiers who participated in the abduction. One of the local residents said that, as a schoolboy, in the 50s he was able to crawl into a cave, where he saw decayed bodies and some boxes, but out of fear he did not approach them.

Bottom of Baikal

According to treasure hunters, part of the gold reserve could get to the bottom of Lake Baikal in two ways. Some argue that there was a train crash on the Circum-Baikal Railway, perhaps deliberately set up so that the gold would not go to the Reds, or that the White Czech train was blown up by partisans.

Archaeologist Alexey Tivanenko reported in 2013 that he managed to find Kolchak’s gold after exploring the bottom of Lake Baikal on bathyscaphes. The researchers saw at the bottom a cemetery of wagons and four ingots lying between stones and sleepers, but were unable to pick them up.

According to another version, Kolchak removed some of the valuables from the train and sent them to Transbaikalia by sleigh along with Black Sea sailors devoted to the movement. The caravan decided to travel along Lake Baikal to avoid encounters with the Red Army, but froze to death when temperatures dropped to -60 degrees. During the spring thaw, bodies and bags of gold drowned. This assumption is considered one of the most untenable, since at the beginning of January there is still no ice in the southern part of the lake.

Instead of gold

“So, most likely, there are no treasures with Kolchak’s gold in Siberia. However, you can still look for something in Siberia, in particular in Novosibirsk and in villages along the Trans-Siberian Railway in the vicinity of Novosibirsk,” summarizes Kokoulin.

Evidence and memories have been preserved that some refugees who traveled east along with the retreating Kolchak army had family jewelry that had not only artistic, but also historical value. They gave away their jewelry in exchange for bread and milk at stations and in villages adjacent to the highway.

“It is quite possible to find some part of these treasures, which may still be kept by the descendants of those enterprising peasants - sellers of bread and milk,” the historian believes.

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.

Alexander 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.

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.

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 rebuild 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.

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 expose 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.

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.

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 the 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.

1. Alexander Kolchak was baptized in Trinity Church, which is known today as Kulich and Easter.
2. 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.
3. 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.
4. The maps that Kolchak compiled were used by Soviet sailors until the end of the 1950s.
5. Before his death, Kolchak did not accept the offer to blindfold him. He gave his cigarette case to the Cheka officer in charge of the execution.

By the beginning of the First World War, the Russian Empire had the largest gold reserves in the world, much of which disappeared after the revolution.

What's missing?

According to various sources, in the admiral's treasury Alexander Kolchak there were from 500 to 650 tons of gold. In addition, among the treasures that the commander received are 30,000 poods or 480 tons of silver, church utensils and other historical values. The approximate value of gold alone in 2000s prices is about $60 billion.

Colossal treasures of the White Guards under the command of a colonel Vladimir Kappel captured in Kazan, where before that, away from the revolutionary capitals, the Bolsheviks managed to transport valuables. The gold was sent by train to Omsk, where by November 1918 the new Russian government had assembled. Admiral Kolchak was declared the “supreme ruler” of the country.

The valuables were placed in the Omsk State Bank, and their audit was carried out only after 6 months. By this time, 505 tons remained in the “gold reserves”. It is likely that some of the funds have already been spent.

How did it disappear?

According to archival documents, a total of eight trainloads of gold left Omsk for the Far East; the first departed in March 1919. Seven of them reached Vladivostok. The fate of the last, eighth train seems the most mysterious; millions of gold rubles and dozens of boxes with bullion from it disappeared without a trace.

When the retreat of Kolchak’s troops from Omsk began, the gold was loaded into 40 wagons and sent east along the Trans-Siberian Railway. 12 escort cars followed him. In the area of ​​Nizhneudinsk station, the train was stopped by the White Czechs, who controlled those territories. They, with the consent of the Entente countries, forced the supreme ruler of Russia to abdicate his post and transfer the existing values ​​to the Czechoslovak Corps. The Czechs, in exchange for security guarantees, gave 311 tons of gold and an admiral to the Socialist Revolutionaries. And those, in turn, to the Bolsheviks. Kolchak was shot, and the “gold reserves” were returned to the state, having lost over 180 tons.

Where to look?

According to one version, Kolchak ordered to hide some of the valuables before his arrest. Potential places to search for treasure were the Maryina Griva lock in the Ob-Yenisei Canal (this navigable water canal between the Ob and Yenisei basins was used from the end of the 19th century to the mid-20th century) and caves in the Sikhote-Alin mountains in the Khabarovsk Territory.

Some seekers believe that some of the gold could have been sunk in the Irtysh or Baikal. There are legends that near the Taiga station on the 3565th kilometer of the Trans-Siberian Railway in 1919, locals saw a convoy with 26 boxes of gold.

The version that seems more plausible is that during the short time he was in office, the supreme ruler spent a significant part of the gold of the Russian Empire, and the other part was sent abroad. That is, there is practically nothing left of the gold reserves. There is information that Kolchak spent about 250 million gold rubles on purchasing weapons and obtaining loans from foreign banks. In addition, the Kolchak government ordered the printing of its own banknotes in the United States, which it paid for but never received.

Members of the Russian naval mission to the USA led by Alexander Kolchak
(sitting center) with American naval officers in New York

Gold was exported through Vladivostok to Sweden, Norway, Japan, Britain and the USA. There it was placed in banks as collateral for obtaining loans. Part of the ingots was transferred to the United States government for the supply of Remington rifles and Colt machine guns.

There is an opinion that the money remaining in foreign banks was spent on resettling the army Wrangel in the Balkans and assistance to emigrants until the 1950s.

It is known that part of the valuables from one of the echelons was captured by the ataman’s troops Grigory Semenov. He used about 30 tons of gold for the needs of his army. Perhaps some of the valuables were taken by the White Czechs while retreating. After the Czechoslovak Corps returned home, the largest Legiabank was formed by the legionnaires.

The surviving “Kolchak’s gold” was returned to Kazan. With these funds, the restoration of the country's economy and industry began after the Civil War, including the construction of the first “communist construction projects.” Only the last “gold” train, returned from Irkutsk, “lost weight” by more than four million gold rubles or, in equivalent, by almost three and a half tons of precious metal. His fate still worries treasure hunters to this day.

From me:

Mannerheim in Leningrad, for his participation in the BLOCKADE, was immortalized with a plaque. A monument to Kolchak was erected where he destroyed the most people. And after the rehabilitation of Vlasov, will they take up the rehabilitation of Hitler?

Blind Leaders of the Blind Documentary:

How and why A.V. Kolchak came to Russia - British officer from December 1917

Not everyone knows about this. It is not customary to talk about this now for the same reason that in references to the legendary A.A. Brusilov will never be told that he became a red general. Sometimes in disputes about Kolchak they ask to show a document with a contract. I don't have one. He's not needed. Kolchak himself told everything, everything was recorded on paper. Everything is confirmed by his telegrams to his mistress Timireva.

A very important question is what brought the British officer to Russia. Especially in light of the fact that some senators and zealots of Kolchak’s memory are in favor of erecting monuments to him :

“There should be places of worship, monuments to the heroes of the Russian Army who laid down their lives and well-being in the name of Russia, the Tsar and the Fatherland. A monument to Alexander Kolchak should appear in Omsk!”— © Senator Mizulina.

We will show that:

a) Kolchak actually entered the service of the British crown;

b) Kolchak ended up in Russia on the orders of his new superiors. (At the same time, he himself did not want to go to Russia. Maybe he even hoped to avoid the visit.)

* * *

From the minutes of meetings of the Extraordinary Investigative Commission.

“...Having considered this question, I came to the conclusion that there was only one thing left for me - to continue the war, as a representative of the former Russian government, which made a certain commitment to the allies. I occupied an official position, enjoyed its trust, it waged this war, and I obliged to continue this war. Then I went to the British envoy in Tokyo, Sir Green, and told him my point of view on the situation, saying that I did not recognize this government (remember these words -arctus) and I consider it my duty, as one of the representatives of the former government, to fulfill the promise to the allies; that the obligations that were assumed by Russia in relation to the allies are also my obligations, as a representative of the Russian command, and that therefore I consider it necessary to fulfill these obligations to the end and wish to participate in the war, even if Russia made peace under the Bolsheviks. Therefore, I turned to him with a request to inform the English government that I was asking to be accepted into the English army on any conditions. I do not set any conditions, but only ask that you give me the opportunity to actively fight.

Sir Green listened to me and said:

“I completely understand you, I understand your position; I will inform my government about this and ask you to wait for a response from the British government.”

However, he had the opportunity to remain serving in the Russian Navy, there are many examples of naval senior officers, and the investigator draws attention to this:

Alekseevsky. At the time when you made such a difficult decision to enter the service of another state, even an allied or former allied state, you must have had the thought that there is a whole group of officers who quite consciously remain in the service of the new government in the Navy, and that among them there are well-known large figures ... large officers in the Navy who deliberately went for it, such as, for example Altvater* . How did you feel about them?

Kolchak. Altvater’s behavior surprised me, because if the question had previously been raised about what Altvater’s political beliefs were, then I would have said that he was rather a monarchist. ... And I was even more surprised by his repainting in this form. In general, before it was difficult to say what political beliefs an officer had, since such a question simply did not exist before the war. If one of the officers had asked then:

“Which party do you belong to?” - then he would probably answer: “I don’t belong to any party and I’m not involved in politics.” (and now let us remember the words noted above about the non-recognition of the Bolshevik government, and read carefully the following -arctus )

Each of us believed that the government could be anything, but that Russia could exist under any form of government. In your case, a monarchist means a person who believes that only this form of government can exist. I think we had few such people, and Altvater most likely belonged to this type of people. For me personally, there was not even such a question as whether Russia could exist under a different type of government. Of course I thought it could exist.

Alekseevsky. Then among the military, if not expressed, there was still an idea that Russia could exist under any government. However, when the new government was created, did it already seem to you that the country could not exist under this type of government?

<…>

Two weeks later a response came from the British War Ministry. I was first informed that the British government was willing to accept my offer to join the army and asked me where I would prefer to serve. I replied that when I approached them with a request to accept me into service in the English army, I did not set any conditions and offered to use me in whatever way they found possible. As for why I expressed a desire to join the army and not the Navy, I knew the English Navy well, I knew that the English Navy, of course, did not need our help.

<…>

A.V. Kolchak - A. Timireva :

... Finally, very late, the answer came that the British government was inviting me to go to Bombay and report to the headquarters of the Indian army, where I would receive instructions about my appointment to the Mesopotamian front.

For me this, although I did not ask for it, was quite acceptable, since it was near the Black Sea, where the actions against the Turks took place and where I fought at sea. Therefore, I willingly accepted the offer and asked Sir Charles Green to give me the opportunity to travel by boat to Bombay.

A.V. Kolchak - A. Timireva :

“Singapore, March 16. (1918) Met by order of the British government return immediately to China for work in Manchuria and Siberia. It found a way to use me there in the form of the allies and Russia, it is preferable to Mesopotamia.”

...In the end, on the 20th of January, after much waiting, I managed to leave by boat from Yokohama to Shanghai, where I arrived at the end of January. In Shanghai I went to see our Consul General Gross and the English Consul, to whom I presented a paper defining my position and asked for his assistance in getting me on board the ship and taking me to Bombay to the headquarters of the Mesopotamian army. An appropriate order was made on his part, but he had to wait a long time for the ship. ...

When meeting with the first “whites” in Shanghai who came for weapons, Kolchak refuses help, citing his new status and the obligations associated with it:

Then, back in Shanghai, I met for the first time with one of the representatives of the Semyonovsky armed detachment. It was the Cossack centurion Zhevchenko, who was traveling through Beijing, visited our envoy, then went to Shanghai and Japan asking for weapons for Semenov’s detachment. At the hotel where I was staying, he met me and said that in the exclusion zone there had been an uprising against Soviet power, that Semenov was at the head of the rebels, that he had formed a detachment of 2,000 people, and that they had no weapons and uniforms, - and so he was sent to Cathay and Japan to ask for the opportunity and means to purchase weapons for the detachments.

He asked me how I felt about this. I replied that no matter how I feel, at the moment I am bound by certain obligations and cannot change my decision. He said that it would be very important if I came to Semyonov to talk, since it was necessary for me to be involved in this matter. I said:

“I completely sympathize, but I made a commitment, received an invitation from the English government and am going to the Mesopotamian front.”

From my point of view, I considered it indifferent whether I would work with Semenov or in Mesopotamia - I would fulfill my duty towards my homeland.

How did Kolchak end up in Russia? What kind of wind blew it?

I left Shanghai by boat to Singapore. In Singapore, the commander of the troops, General Ridout, came to me to greet me and gave me a telegram urgently sent to Singapore from the director of the Intelligence Department of the military general staff in England.

This telegram read as follows: the British government accepted my proposal, nevertheless, due to the changed situation on the Mesopotamian front (later I found out what the situation was, but before I could not have foreseen this), he considers in view of the requests addressed to him by our envoy Prince. Kudashev, useful for the general allied cause, so that I return to Russia, that I am recommended to go to the Far East to begin my activities there, and from their point of view this is more profitable than my stay on the Mesopotamian front, especially since the situation there had completely changed.

Let us pay attention to one more piece of evidence that shows what Kolchak was seeking:

« I ask to be accepted into the English army on any terms." it's done.

I'm already more than half way done. This put me in an extremely difficult situation, primarily financially - after all, we traveled all the time and lived on our own money, without receiving a penny from the English government, so our funds were running out and we could not afford such excursions. I then sent another telegram asking: is this an order or just advice that I may not carry out? To this, an urgent telegram was received with a rather vague answer: the British government insists that it is better for me to go to the Far East, and recommends that I go to Beijing at the disposal of our envoy, Prince. Kudasheva. Then I saw that their issue had been resolved. After waiting for the first steamer, I left for Shanghai, and from Shanghai by rail to Beijing. This was in March or April 1918.

<…>

That is, Kolchak obeyed the order, and did not go to Russia at the call of his soul.

As for material difficulties - well, really, it’s a logical question; only strong romantics and enthusiasts can work without a salary.

* Vasily Mikhailovich Altfater - rear admiral of the Russian Imperial Navy, first commander of the RKKF RSFSR

About Kolchak and Kolchakites

As part of the propaganda of the “white” movement and the distortion of history, many artistic works. One of these works is the film “Admiral”.

White officer, admiral, patriot, hero... Such a handsome Khabensky Kolchak cannot be bad. Can't be wrong. That means the Bolsheviks are wrong.— This is exactly the chain of reasoning that the authors of this book offer us. artistic film.

But this is all untrue!

The truth is that the historical Kolchak bears very little resemblance to the artistic one.

1918 In November, Kolchak, with the blessing of the British and French, declared himself dictator of Siberia. The admiral is an irritable little man, about whom one of his colleagues wrote:

“a sick child... definitely neurasthenic... always under the influence of others,” settled in Omsk and began to call himself “the supreme ruler of Russia.”

The former tsarist minister Sazonov, who called Kolchak “the Russian Washington,” immediately became his official representative in France. In London and Paris he was lavished with praise. Sir Samuel Hoare again declared publicly that Kolchak was a “gentleman.” Winston Churchill claimed that Kolchak was "honest", "incorruptible", "smart" and a "patriot". The New York Times saw him as a "strong and honest man" backed by a "stable and more or less representative government."

Kolchak with foreign allies

The Allies, and especially the British, generously supplied Kolchak with ammunition, weapons and money.

“We sent to Siberia,” the commander of the British troops in Siberia, General Knox, proudly reported, “hundreds of thousands of rifles, hundreds of millions of cartridges, hundreds of thousands of sets of uniforms and machine gun belts, etc. Every bullet fired by Russian soldiers at the Bolsheviks during this year , was made in England, by English workers, from English raw materials and delivered to Vladivostok in English holds.”

In Russia at that time they sang a song:

English uniform,
French shoulder straps,
Japanese tobacco,
Ruler of Omsk!

The commander of the American Expeditionary Forces in Siberia, General Greves, who can hardly be suspected of sympathy for the Bolsheviks, did not share the Allies’ enthusiasm for Admiral Kolchak. Every day his intelligence officers supplied him with new information about the reign of terror that Kolchak had established. There were 100 thousand soldiers in the admiral's army, and new thousands of people were recruited into it under the threat of execution. Prisons and concentration camps were filled to capacity. Hundreds of Russians who dared to disobey the new dictator hung from trees and telegraph poles along the Siberian Railway. Many rested in mass graves, which they were ordered to dig before Kolchak’s executioners destroyed them with machine gun fire. Murders and robberies became an everyday occurrence.

One of Kolchak’s assistants, a former tsarist officer named Rozanov, issued the following order:

1. When occupying villages previously occupied by bandits (Soviet partisans), demand the surrender of the leaders of the movement, and where leaders cannot be found, but there is enough evidence of their presence, shoot every tenth resident.
2. If, when troops pass through the city, the population does not inform the troops about the presence of the enemy, collect monetary indemnity without any mercy.
3. Villages whose population offers armed resistance to our troops are to be burned, and all adult men are to be shot; property, houses, carts, etc. confiscate for the needs of the army.

In telling General Greves about the officer who issued this order, General Knox said:

“Well done, this Rozanov, by God!”

Bodies of workers and peasants shot by Kolchak's men

Along with Kolchak’s troops, the country was ravaged by gangs of bandits who received financial support from Japan. Their main leaders were Ataman Grigory Semenov and Kalmykov.

Colonel Morrow, who commanded American troops in the Transbaikal sector, reported that in one in the village occupied by the Semyonovtsy, all men, women and children were villainously killed. Some were shot “like hares” when they tried to escape from their homes. Others were burned alive.

“Soldiers of Semenov and Kalmykov,- says General Grevs, - taking advantage of the patronage of the Japanese troops, they scoured the country like wild animals, robbing and killing civilians... Anyone who asked questions about these brutal murders was answered that those killed were Bolsheviks, and, apparently, this explanation satisfied everyone.”

General Grevs did not hide the disgust that the atrocities of the anti-Soviet troops in Siberia aroused in him, which earned him a hostile attitude from the White Guard, British, French and Japanese command.

The American Ambassador to Japan Morris, during his stay in Siberia, informed General Greves that he had received a telegram from the State Department about the need to provide support to Kolchak in connection with American policy in Siberia.

“You see, general,- said Morris, - you will have to support Kolchak.”

Greves replied that the War Department had not given him any instructions regarding support for Kolchak.

“It’s not the military that’s in charge, it’s the State Department,” Morris said.

“The State Department doesn’t know about me,” Grevs answered.

Kolchak's agents began persecuting Grevs in order to undermine his prestige and achieve his recall from Siberia. Rumors and fiction began to spread that Grevs had “become a Bolshevik” and that his troops were helping the “communists.” This propaganda was also anti-Semitic in nature. Here's a typical example:

“American soldiers are infected with Bolshevism. For the most part, these are Jews from New York's East Side who are constantly starting riots.

English Colonel John Ward, a member of parliament who served as a political adviser to Kolchak, publicly stated that when visiting the headquarters of the American Expeditionary Forces, he discovered that “out of sixty liaison officers and translators, more than fifty were Russian Jews.”

The same kind of rumors were spread by some of Grevs's compatriots.

"American Consul in Vladivostok,– recalls Grevs, – day after day, without any comment, he telegraphed to the State Department slanderous, false, obscene articles about American troops that appeared in Vladivostok newspapers. These articles, as well as slander against American troops that were distributed in the United States, were based on accusations of Bolshevism. The actions of the American soldiers did not give rise to such an accusation... but it was repeated by Kolchak’s supporters (including Consul General Harris) in relation to everyone who did not support Kolchak.”

At the very height of the slanderous campaign, a messenger from General Ivanov-Rynov, who commanded Kolchak’s units in Eastern Siberia, appeared at the headquarters of General Grevs. He informed Grevs that if he undertakes to give Kolchak’s army 20 thousand dollars a month, General Ivanov-Rynov will make sure that the agitation against Grevs and his troops stops.

This Ivanov-Rynov, even among Kolchak’s generals, stood out as a monster and a sadist. In Eastern Siberia, his soldiers exterminated the entire male population in villages where, according to their suspicions, the “Bolsheviks” were hiding. Women were raped and beaten with ramrods. They killed indiscriminately - old people, women, children.

Victims of Kolchak in Novosibirsk, 1919

Excavation of the grave in which victims of the Kolchak repressions of March 1919 were buried, Tomsk, 1920.

Tomsk residents carry the bodies of spread out participants in the anti-Kolchak uprising

Funeral of a Red Guard soldier brutally murdered by Kolchak's troops

Novosobornaya Square on the day of the reburial of the Kolchak victims on January 22, 1920.

One young American officer sent to investigate the atrocities of Ivanov-Rynov was so shocked that, having finished his report to Grevs, he exclaimed:

“For God’s sake, general, don’t send me on such errands again! Just a little more and I would have torn off my uniform and started saving these unfortunates.”

When Ivanov-Rynov faced the threat of popular indignation, the English commissioner Sir Charles Elliot hastened to Greves to express his concern for the fate of the Kolchak general.

– As for me, - General Grevs answered him fiercely, - Let them bring this Ivanov-Rynov here and hang him on that telephone pole in front of my headquarters - not a single American will lift a finger to save him!

Ask yourself why, during the Civil War, the Red Army was able to defeat the well-armed and Western-sponsored White Army and troops of 14!! states that invaded Soviet Russia during the intervention?

But because the MAJORITY of the Russian people, seeing the cruelty, baseness and corruption of such “Kolchaks”, supported the Red Army. source

Kolchak. He's such a sweetheart...

Such a touching series was filmed with public money about one of the main executioners of the Russian people during the civil war of the last century that it just brings tears to your eyes. And just as touchingly, heartfeltly they tell us about this guardian for the Russian land. And memorial trips and prayer services are held on trips through Baikal. Well, just grace descends on the soul.

But for some reason, residents of the territories of Russia, where Kolchak and his comrades were heroes, have a different opinion. They remember how entire villages of Kolchak’s people threw people who were still alive into mines, and not only that.

By the way, why is it that the Tsar’s father is honored on an equal basis with priests and white officers? Weren't they the ones who blackmailed the king from the throne? Didn’t they plunge our country into bloodshed, betraying their people, their king? Wasn’t it the priests who joyfully restored the patriarchy immediately after their betrayal of the sovereign? Was it not the landowners and generals who wanted power without the control of the emperor? Didn’t they begin to organize a civil war after the successful February coup, organized by them? Weren't they the ones who hanged Russian peasants and shot them all over the country? It was only Wrangel, horrified by the death of the Russian people, who left Crimea himself; all the others preferred to slaughter the Russian peasant until they themselves were calmed down forever.

Yes, and remembering the Polovtsian princes with the last names Gzak and Konchak, cited in the Tale of Igor’s Regiment, the conclusion involuntarily arises that Kolchak is related to them. Maybe that’s why we shouldn’t be surprised by the following?

By the way, there is no point in judging the dead, neither white nor red. But mistakes cannot be repeated. Only the living can make mistakes. Therefore, the lessons of history need to be known by heart.

In the spring of 1919, the first campaign of the Entente countries and the United States of America against the Soviet Republic began. The campaign was combined: it was carried out by the combined forces of internal counter-revolution and interventionists. The imperialists did not rely on their own troops - their soldiers did not want to fight against the workers and toiling peasants of Soviet Russia. Therefore, they relied on the unification of all the forces of internal counter-revolution, recognizing the main ruler of all affairs in Russia, Tsarist Admiral A.V. Kolchak.

American, English and French millionaires took on the bulk of Kolchak's supplies of weapons, ammunition, and uniforms. In the first half of 1919 alone, the United States sent Kolchak more than 250 thousand rifles and millions of cartridges. In total, in 1919, Kolchak received from the USA, England, France and Japan 700 thousand rifles, 3650 machine guns, 530 guns, 30 aircraft, 2 million pairs of boots, thousands of sets of uniforms, equipment and linen.

With the help of his foreign masters, by the spring of 1919, Kolchak managed to arm, clothe and shoe an army of almost 400,000.

Kolchak’s offensive was supported by Denikin’s army from the North Caucasus and the south, intending to unite with Kolchak’s army in the Saratov region in order to jointly move towards Moscow.

The White Poles were advancing from the west together with Petliura and White Guard troops. In the north and Turkestan, mixed detachments of Anglo-American and French interventionists and the army of the White Guard General Miller operated. Yudenich was advancing from the north-west, supported by the White Finns and the English fleet. Thus, all the forces of counter-revolution and interventionists went on the offensive. Soviet Russia again found itself surrounded by advancing enemy hordes. Several fronts were created in the country. The main one was the Eastern Front. Here the fate of the Soviet Union was decided.

On March 4, 1919, Kolchak launched an offensive against the Red Army along the entire Eastern Front over 2 thousand kilometers. He fielded 145 thousand bayonets and sabers. The backbone of his army was the Siberian kulaks, the urban bourgeoisie and the wealthy Cossacks. There were about 150 thousand intervention troops in Kolchak’s rear. They guarded the railways and helped deal with the population.

The Entente kept Kolchak's army under its direct control. Military missions of the Entente powers were constantly located at the headquarters of the White Guards. French General Janin was appointed commander-in-chief of all intervention forces operating in Eastern Russia and Siberia. The English General Knox was in charge of supplying Kolchak’s army and forming new units for it.

The interventionists helped Kolchak develop an operational plan of attack and determined the main direction of the attack.

In the Perm-Glazov sector, Kolchak’s strongest Siberian Army operated under the command of General Gaida. The same army was supposed to develop an offensive in the direction of Vyatka, Sarapul and connect with the interventionist troops operating in the North.

victims of Kolchak and Kolchak’s thugs

victims of the Kolchak atrocities in Siberia. 1919

peasant hanged by Kolchak's men

From everywhere, from the territory of Udmurtia liberated from the enemy, information was received about the atrocities and tyranny of the White Guards. For example, at the Peskovsky plant, 45 Soviet workers, poor peasant workers, were tortured to death. They were subjected to the most cruel torture: their ears, noses, lips were cut out, their bodies were pierced in many places with bayonets (doc. Nos. 33, 36).

Women, old people and children were subjected to violence, flogging and torture. Property, livestock, and harness were confiscated. The horses that the Soviet government gave to the poor to support their farms were taken away by the Kolchakites and given to their former owners (Doc. No. 47).

The young teacher of the village of Zura, Pyotr Smirnov, was brutally hacked to pieces with a White Guard saber because he walked towards a White Guard in good clothes (Doc. No. 56).

In the village of Syam-Mozhga, Kolchak’s men dealt with a 70-year-old old woman because she sympathized with Soviet power (Doc. No. 66).

In the village of N. Multan, Malmyzh district, the corpse of the young communist Vlasov was buried in the square in front of the people's house in 1918. Kolchak’s men herded the working peasants to the square, forced them to dig up the corpse and publicly mocked him: they beat him on the head with a log, crushed his chest, and finally, putting a noose around his neck, tied him to the front of the tarantass and in this form dragged him along the village street for a long time (Doc. No. 66 ).

In workers' settlements and cities, in the huts of the poor peasants of Udmurtia, a terrible groan arose from the atrocities and execution of Kolchak's men. For example, during the two months of the bandits’ stay in Votkinsk, 800 corpses were discovered in Ustinov Log alone, not counting those isolated victims in private apartments that were taken to an unknown location. The Kolchakites robbed and ruined the national economy of Udmurtia. From the Sarapul district it was reported that “after Kolchak, there was literally nothing left anywhere... After Kolchak’s robberies in the district, the availability of horses decreased by 47 percent and cows by 85 percent... In the Malmyzh district, in the Vikharevo volost alone, Kolchak’s men took 1,100 horses and 500 cows from the peasants , 2000 carts, 1300 sets of harness, thousands of pounds of grain and dozens of farms were completely plundered.”

“After the capture of Yalutorovsk by the Whites (June 18, 1918), the previous authorities were restored there. A brutal persecution of everyone who collaborated with the Soviets began. Arrests and executions became a widespread phenomenon. The Whites killed Demushkin, a member of the Soviet of Deputies, and shot ten former prisoners of war (Czechs and Hungarians) who refused to serve them. According to the memoirs of Fyodor Plotnikov, a participant in the Civil War and a prisoner of Kolchak’s dungeons from April to July 1919, a table with chains and various torture devices was installed in the basement of the prison. The tortured people were taken outside the Jewish cemetery (now the territory of a sanatorium orphanage), where they were shot. All this happened since June 1918. In May 1919, the Eastern Front of the Red Army went on the offensive. On August 7, 1919, Tyumen was liberated. Sensing the approach of the Reds, Kolchak’s men committed brutal reprisals against their prisoners. One day in August 1919, two large groups of prisoners were taken out of the prison. One group - 96 people - was shot in a birch forest (now the territory of a furniture factory), another, 197 people, were hacked to death with sabers across the Tobol River near Lake Ginger...".

From a certificate from the deputy director of the Yalutorovsky museum complex N.M. Shestakova:

“I consider myself obliged to say that my grandfather Yakov Alekseevich Ushakov, a front-line soldier of the First World War, Knight of St. George, was also hacked to death by Kolchak’s sabers beyond Tobol. My grandmother was left with three young sons. My father was only 6 years old at that time... And how many women throughout Russia did Kolchak’s men make widows, and children orphans, how many old people were left without filial care?”

Therefore, the logical result (please note that there was no torture, no bullying, just execution):

“We entered Kolchak’s cell and found him dressed - in a fur coat and hat,” writes I.N. Bursak. “It seemed like he was expecting something.” Chudnovsky read him the resolution of the Revolutionary Committee. Kolchak exclaimed:

- How! Without trial?

Chudnovsky replied:

- Yes, Admiral, just like you and your henchmen shot thousands of our comrades.

Having gone up to the second floor, we entered Pepelyaev’s cell. This one was also dressed. When Chudnovsky read him the resolution of the revolutionary committee, Pepelyaev fell to his knees and, lying at his feet, begged not to be shot. He assured that, together with his brother, General Pepelyaev, he had long decided to rebel against Kolchak and go over to the side of the Red Army. I ordered him to stand up and said: “You can’t die with dignity...

They went down to Kolchak’s cell again, took him and went to the office. The formalities are completed.

By 4 o'clock in the morning we arrived on the bank of the Ushakovka River, a tributary of the Angara. Kolchak behaved calmly all the time, and Pepelyaev - this huge carcass - seemed to be in a fever.

Full moon, bright frosty night. Kolchak and Pepelyaev stand on the hillock. Kolchak refuses my offer to blindfold him. The platoon is formed, rifles at the ready. Chudnovsky whispers to me:

- It's time.

I give the command:

- Platoon, attack the enemies of the revolution!

Both fall. We put the corpses on the sleigh, bring them to the river and lower them into the hole. So the “supreme ruler of all Rus'” Admiral Kolchak leaves for his last voyage...”

(“The Defeat of Kolchak”, military publishing house of the USSR Ministry of Defense, M., 1969, pp. 279-280, circulation 50,000 copies).

In the Yekaterinburg province, one of the 12 provinces under Kolchak’s control, at least 25 thousand people were shot under Kolchak, and about 10% of the two million population were flogged. They flogged both men, women and children.

M. G. Alexandrov, commissar of the Red Guard detachment in Tomsk. He was arrested by the Kolchakites and imprisoned in Tomsk prison. In mid-June 1919, he recalled, 11 workers were taken from their cell at night. Nobody was sleeping.

“The silence was broken by faint groans coming from the prison yard, prayers and curses were heard... but after a while everything died down. In the morning, the criminals told us that the Cossacks hacked the prisoners with sabers and bayonets in the back exercise yard, and then loaded the carts and took them away somewhere.”

Aleksandrov reported that he was then sent to the Aleksandrovsky Central Station near Irkutsk, and out of more than a thousand prisoners there, the Red Army soldiers released only 368 people in January 1920. In 1921–1923 Alexandrov worked in the district Cheka of the Tomsk region. RGASPI, f. 71, op. 15, d. 71, l. 83-102.

American General W. Graves recalled:

“The soldiers of Semenov and Kalmykov, being under the protection of Japanese troops, flooded the country like wild animals, killing and robbing the people, while the Japanese, if they wished, could have stopped these killings at any time. If at that time they asked what all these brutal murders were about, they usually received the answer that those killed were Bolsheviks, and this explanation, obviously, satisfied everyone. Events in Eastern Siberia were usually presented in the darkest colors and human life there was not worth a penny.

Horrible murders were committed in Eastern Siberia, but they were not carried out by the Bolsheviks, as was usually thought. I will not be mistaken if I say that in Eastern Siberia for every person killed by the Bolsheviks, there were a hundred people killed by anti-Bolshevik elements."

Graves doubted whether it was possible to point out any country in the world during the last fifty years where murder could be committed with such ease and with the least fear of responsibility as in Siberia during the reign of Admiral Kolchak. Concluding his memoirs, Graves noted that the interventionists and White Guards were doomed to defeat, since “the number of Bolsheviks in Siberia by the time of Kolchak had increased many times in comparison with their number at the time of our arrival.”

There is a plaque for Mannerheim in St. Petersburg, now there will be one for Kolchak... Next is Hitler?

The opening of the memorial plaque to Admiral Alexander Kolchak, who led the White movement in the Civil War, will take place on September 24... The memorial plaque will be installed on the bay window of the building where Kolchak lived... The text of the inscription is approved:

“The outstanding Russian officer, scientist and researcher Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak lived in this house from 1906 to 1912.”

I will not argue about his outstanding scientific achievements. But I read in the memoirs of General Denikin that Kolchak demanded (under pressure from Mackinder) that Denikin enter into an agreement with Petliura (giving him Ukraine) in order to defeat the Bolsheviks. For Denikin, his homeland turned out to be more important.

Kolchak was recruited by British intelligence while he was a captain of the 1st rank and commander of a mine division in the Baltic Fleet. This happened at the turn of 1915-1916. This was already a betrayal of the Tsar and the Fatherland, to which he swore allegiance and kissed the cross!

Have you ever wondered why the Entente fleets calmly entered the Russian sector of the Baltic Sea in 1918?! After all, he was mined! Moreover, in the confusion of two revolutions in 1917, no one removed the minefields. Yes, because Kolchak’s ticket to joining the British intelligence service was to hand over all the information about the location of minefields and obstacles in the Russian sector of the Baltic Sea! After all, it was he who carried out this mining and had all the maps of minefields and obstacles in his hands!