GREATWAR-L Archives

From: Iain Kerr <>
Subject: Re: [WW1] Archangel, Russia
Date: Thu, 01 Nov 2001 07:09:30 +0000
In-Reply-To: <000c01c16257$0fb547e0$0200a8c0@Vivianne>

At 04:57 PM 31/10/01 -0500, Vivienne Shishakly wrote:
>Hello All,
>
>If anyone has any suggestions on how to find information re
>Archangel in Russia. My grandfather, Sgt. Francis Jenkin HOPKINS, was
>in the Army Service Corp during the Grit. War 1914-1918. His boat was
>torpedoed and he was lost in Russia. He was eventually invalided home to
>a hospital in Sheffield, England.
>
>Thanks for your attention,
>
>Vivienne (nee Hopkins)

Vivienne,

British and Allied Forces in Russia 1918 - 1919

The British military involvement of 1918-1920 in several parts of European
Russia was the outcome of the Russian Revolution of Nov 1917. The activity
was closely connected both with events in Asia (particularly in Persia and
in Siberia) and with the general course of the War in the West. The
continued German and Turkish threats to India by way of Persia and
Afghanistan, and the crisis of 1918 in France caused by the withdrawal of
Russia from the Entente, formed the background to the North Russian
Expedition and the Allied intervention in South Russia, which are
summarised below.

In the spring of 1918, the main Russian Government was neutral towards
Germany and Austria. Russia however was surrounded by various hostile
regional Governments on the fringes of the former Russian Empire. Its
western front was open, and German troops had been transferred in very
large numbers to France. Finland, independent since Dec 1917, was torn by
the struggle between "White" and "Red" factions, and strong German forces
entered the country and secured, in May 1918, the ascendency of the "White
Russian" Government.

All these facts suggested British and Allied intervention. This took the
form of landings in the North of Russia around Murmansk and Military and
Naval Missions with armaments and stores in the South and in the
Vladivostok area in the East. The Northern expedition lasted from 1918 to
1919, and was a separate military operation. The intervention in the South
was linked with the advance of detachments from the Allied armies in Greece
and Mesopotamia, and it lasted from 1919 to 1920.

Operations in North Russia

By mid 1918, the North Russian ports, through which the Allies had assisted
Russia with supplies and munitions, were now open to German
occupation. The Black Sea, the Caucasus and the Caspian Sea were as yet
beyond the reach of Allied forces, and the Russian half of the barrier
between the Central Powers and India had failed. A small British-French-US
expeditionary force under British command was sent to North Russia to
retrieve Allied munitions that had been supplied to the Czarist Army.

In Apr 1918, a force of 150 Royal Marines landed at Murmansk, off which a
British battleship had been stationed for some time. By the end of May,
500 British marines and sailors, 300 French soldiers, 1,400 Serbian
soldiers and 500 Finnish "Red Guards" (the Finnish Legion) were holding the
Kola Peninsula and Kandalaksha. The danger was considered to be in
Finland, and the Murmansk force, gradually strengthened, occupied the line
of the Murmansk railway as far South as Soroka by the end of Jun
1918. These operations were begun with the consent of the main Russian
Government.

On 1-2 Aug 1918, another Allied force occupied Archangel. In Aug and Sep
the force advanced westward to Onega and South and South-East, along the
Vologda railway and the Dvina, to Yemtsa and beyond Bereznik
(Semenovka). Behind these two forces were the friendly local Soviets, but
already both had become engaged in hostilities with the Russian Bolshevik
troops. On 18 Sep Admiral Kolchak announced the formation of an
anti-Bolshevik Government and "assumed power" over all the Russias, basing
himself on Siberia and the South. By Oct 1918, nearly 20,000 British,
French, American, Italian, Polish and Russian troops were on the Archangel
front, and nearly 15,000 British, French, Italian, Serbian and Russian
troops on the Murmansk front.

The Canadian government sent Canadian troops to Russia in help Britain and
other anti-Soviet forces in the Russian Civil War in 1918. A Canadian force
of 4,000 was sent to Archangel and Murmansk, where they fought in civil war
actions. All Canadian troops were withdrawn from Russia in Jun 1919.

The danger from Finland disappeared in Dec 1918, with the withdrawal of the
German troops and the establishment of a friendly coalition
government. But the hope of junction with the Czech Legion in the Urals
was disappointed. Some of the Allies had believed that this joint force
could link up with the Czech Legion in the Urals, thereby contributing to a
unified White Russian counter-revolution and overthrow of the Bolshevik
regime. However wiser heads prevailed. The Czech Legion had emerged from
the late Russian armies; two Czechoslovak divisions, 100,000 strong and
formed of ex-Austro-Hungarian prisoners of the Russians. The Czechs
eventually fought their way east along the Trans-Siberian railway until
they were rescued by an American-led expedition. The Czechs and Allies
were evacuated from Vladivostok in Apr 1920.

In the north, the winter was spent in repelling determined Bolshevik
attacks on the Archangel force and in advancing the forward positions of
the Murmansk force beyond Segeja. With the early spring of 1919, news
arrived of considerable successes won by Admiral Kolchak in the East and by
General Denikin, the "White Russian" commander in the South. But in Mar
and Apr the Allied governments decided on an early evacuation of North
Russia. War against the Bolshevik Government had not been one of their
objects.

The two North Russian forces were to be strengthened, disengaged through
local offensives, and withdrawn. Friendly governments were to be helped to
establish themselves, if possible, on a firm military basis. The Siberian
army of Admiral Kolchak might perhaps be linked, before the Allied soldiers
left, with the troops of the Archangel Soviet. General Lord Rawlinson was
sent to co-ordinate the operations. Only the first of these aims was
realised. The Murmansk force reached Lake Onega by 18 May and fought small
actions on or near the lake through the summer. The force captured Lijma
between 14 and 16 Sep, and within another month it had successfully
evacuated from Murmansk.

The Archangel force, fighting on a wider front and more severely attacked,
won the Battle of Troitsa on 10 Aug, and evacuated Archangel without
further difficulty on 27 Sep. The friendly Governments held out for some
months, but the Bolsheviks entered Archangel on 20 Feb 1920. On the
Finnish border, fighting between Soviet forces and Finnish troops or
Karelian insurgents continued at intervals until the end of 1921.
British Battle Honours

The British awarded five battle honours to eleven infantry regiments for
the actions in the north and east, but nothing in the south. In the north:
"Murmansk 1918-19", "Archangel 1918-19", "Troitsa". In the east:
"Dukhovskaya" and "Siberia 1918-19".

Units Employed in Russia

The following infantry battalions are known to have served in Russia in
1918-1919:

2/10th (Cyclist) Battalion, The Royal Scots (Territorial Force) as infantry
- Archangel;

45th and 46th (Service) Battalions, The Royal Fusiliers (City of London
Regiment) - Archangel;

17th (Service) Battalion (1st City), The King's (Liverpool) Regiment -
Archangel;

6th (Service) Battalion Alexandra, Princess of Wales's Own (Yorkshire
Regiment) - Archangel;

Unknown Battalion, The East Surrey Regiment - Murmansk;

11th (Service) Battalion (1st South Down), The Royal Sussex Regiment -
Murmansk;

1/9th (Cyclist) Battalion, The Hampshire Regiment as infantry- Siberia;

Unknown Battalion, The Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry -
Archangel;

25th (Garrison) Battalion, The Duke of Cambridge's Own (Middlesex Regiment)
- Siberia [and other elements in Murmansk?];

2/7th Battalion, The Durham Light Infantry (Territorial Infantry) - Archangel;

Unknown Battalion, The Highland Light Infantry - Murmansk and Archangel.

A small detachment of the Tank Corps, some 49 other ranks plus officers,
served in Russia between Apr and Dec 1919.

The following Royal Artillery units served in North Russia from 1918-20:

6th Brigade, RFA (formed of 420th Battery and 434th Battery) at Maselga and
Medvejya Gora;

435th (Howitzer) Battery at Retchenga and Maselga;

1203rd Battery at Murmansk); and

421 (Howitzer) Battery attached to the 6th Brigade, RFA at Archangel.



Yours aye,

Iain Kerr in Windsor, Berkshire, United Kingdom
Web Page at: http://home.clara.net/iainkerr/index.htm
RootsWeb Sponsor and Listowner for the WORLDWAR2 Mailing List.

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