Mikhail Artemyevich Muravyov

Mikhail Artemyevich Muravyov (russian: Михаи́л Арте́мьевич Муравьёв) ( – July 11, 1918) was a Russian officer who changed sides during the time of the Civil War.

He was born in a village of Burdukovo, near Vetluga Kostroma Governorate to a peasant family. In 1898 he entered the army, serving in the Russo-Japanese War and World War I, in which he was a lieutenant colonel on the Southwestern Front.

After the February Revolution he organized volunteer units to continue the war, but he became disaffected with the Provisional Government and joined the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries. During the October Revolution he defended Petrograd against the forces of Alexander Kerensky.

In January 1918 he led Red Guard units against the Central Rada of Ukraine and after the Battle of Kruty his forces took Kyiv, where they carried out mass terror against the officers of the imperial army and pro-Ukrainian elements. Then his forces fought for the Odessa Soviet Republic against the Romanians and Austro-Hungarians, and in spring 1918 against the Don Cossack forces of General Kaledin.

However, after he had been named commander of the Eastern Front, fighting the Czechoslovak Legion, he heard of the Left SR uprising against the Bolsheviks in early July and rebelled, sailing down the Volga with a thousand men, hoping to take Simbirsk (). He was captured by the Bolsheviks, resisted arrest, and was shot while trying to draw a gun.

Biography

Early years

Mikhail Muravyov was born into a peasant family. He studied at the Kostroma seminary. In 1898 he enlisted as a volunteer in the army, in 1901 he graduated from the two-year Kazan infantry cadet school, after which he was distributed to the city of Roslavl of the Smolensk province. In the same year he distinguished himself in training exercises by capturing Aleksey Kuropatkin, the mock enemy commander.

Russo-Japanese War

In 1904, he commanded a company of the 122nd Tambov Regiment in the Russo-Japanese War. In February 1905, he was seriously wounded in the head.

He spent about five years abroad, primarily in France, where he attended the Paris Military Academy. In 1907, Muravyov fell under the influence of revolutionary ideas and joined Boris Savinkov's Socialist Revolutionary group.

On January 1, 1909 he served in the 1st Nevsky Infantry Regiment in the Caucasus. For seven years he served as a teacher at the Kazan Military School and married the daughter of the commander of the reserve Skopinsky infantry regiment.

World War I

At the beginning of World War I, after receiving a number of serious wounds at the front, he was transferred by a tactics teacher to the ensign school in Odessa.

February revolution

During the February Revolution, Muravyov was on the Southwestern Front. In March, he tried to oust the Governor of Odessa Ebelov for being "insufficiently revolutionary and a cadet."

In May, at the First Congress of the Southwestern Front (Kamianets-Podilskyi), he took the initiative to create volunteer strike units. In Petrograd, he headed the "Organizing Bureau of the All-Russian Central Committee for the Recruitment of Volunteers into Shock Units" (he was also the chairman of the "Central Executive Committee for the formation of the revolutionary army from volunteer rear services to continue the war with Germany" ), and led the formation of volunteer shock battalions. In this field, Muravyov managed to form up to one hundred "death battalions" and several women's battalions. He was spotted by Alexander Kerensky, who appointed him chief of security of the Provisional Government, and promoted him to lieutenant colonel.

After the defeat of the Kornilov coup, he severed further relations with the Russian Provisional Government and joined the Left Socialist Revolutionaries, who actively criticized Kerensky.

October Revolution

After the October Revolution, he offered his services to the Soviet government. Two days after the uprising in Petrograd, Muravyov met with Yakov Sverdlov and Lenin, after which he was authorized to organize a fight against marauders who plundered the Petrograd wine shops.

On October 27, he became a member of the Revolutionary Military Committee and was elected the chief of defense of Petrograd. He was then appointed commander-in-chief of the troops of the Petrograd Military District, and then appointed commander of the troops operating against the forces of Kerensky-Krasnov. But on November 8 he announced his resignation from these positions, in connection with the withdrawal of the Left Socialist Revolutionaries from government posts.

In Ukraine and on the Romanian front

On December 6, 1917, the Council of People's Commissars formed the Southern Front to combat counter-revolution and Vladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko was appointed to be its commander in chief. Muravyov was appointed Antonov-Ovseenko's chief of staff. Together with the commander of the troops of the Moscow military district, Nikolay Muralov, he formed Moscow Red Guard detachments to send against the troops of Alexey Kaledin One of the inventors of the "echelon war" tactics. After the Southern Front entered Kharkiv proclaimed Soviet power in Ukraine, Antonov-Ovseenko transferred the command of the troops operating in Ukraine to Muravyov, and he himself led the fight against the Don Cossack troops.

On January 4, 1918, the Soviet government of Ukraine officially declared war on the Central Council of Ukraine. General management of the operation was assigned to Muravyov. On January 6, Muravyov’s troops entered Poltava. During the occupation of Poltava, Muravyov ordered the execution of 98 cadets and officers.

Four days after the troops of the Central Council suppressed the January uprising in Kyiv, Muravyov’s troops entered the city, where a regime of Red Terror was established. During the storming of the city, a massive shelling was carried out, as a result of which the Grushevsky apartment building was destroyed. Before the assault itself, on February 4, Muravyov ordered his troops: "to mercilessly destroy all officers, cadets, Haidamakas, monarchists and enemies of the revolution in Kiev".

Muravyov himself imposed an indemnity of five million rubles on the Kievan "bourgeoisie" for the maintenance of Soviet troops. According to the Ukrainian Red Cross, in the first days after the establishment of Muravyov’s power in Kiev, up to five thousand people were killed, of which up to three thousand were officers. It was one of the largest, if not the largest, massacres of Russian officers in the entire Civil War.

On January 27, Muravyov sent a report to Antonov-Ovseenko and Lenin on the capture of Kiev:

Victor A. Savchenko accompanied this statement by Muravyov with the following remark:

Muravyov was a staunch opponent of " Ukrainization" and his troops carried out mass repressions against the Ukrainian intelligentsia, officers, and the bourgeoisie, to the point that it even became dangerous to speak Ukrainian in the streets. The People's Secretariat of Ukraine, which had moved to Kyiv from Kharkiv

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