Historical Dictionary of the Russian Civil Wars, 1916-1926

SEREBRIAKOV, LEONID PETROVICH (30 May 1888/1890–30 January 1937). A leading Red political and military organizer during the civil wars, L. P. Serebriakov was the son of a Samara worker and himself labored at a brewery at Ufa and a foundry at Lugansk, before joining the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party in 1905. He adhered to the party’s Bolshevik faction, participating in the revolutionary events of 1905–1906 at Lugansk, and was subsequently engaged in party work in the Donbass, Baku, Nikolaev, Odessa, Moscow, Samara, Petrograd, and Tomsk. He was arrested and exiled on numerous occasions. In January 1917, he was called up into the Russian Army and assigned to the 88th Reserve Infantry regiment at Kostroma.

Following the February Revolution, Serebriakov became one of the leaders and organizers of the Kostroma Soviet, then moved to Moscow in 1917, where (from October 1917 to 1919) he served as a member of the presidium of the Moscow Soviet and was secretary of the Moscow Oblast′ Committee of the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party (Bolsheviks). He was also a member and secretary of the presidium of VTsIK (1919–1920); from 23 March 1919 to 8 March 1921, was a member of the Orgbiuro of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks); and from 5 April 1920 to 8 March 1921, was also a member of the Secretariat of the Central Committee. During the civil wars, Serebriakov was also a member of the Revvoensovet of the Southern Front (16 July 1919–10 January 1920), in which capacity he played a leading part in planning the Red counteroffensive against the Armed Forces of South Russia, and served also on the Revvoensovet of the Republic (1920–1921). From 1921, he worked in the People’s Commissariat for Communications (as commissar from May 1922).

Serebriakov was a close associate of L. D. Trotsky during the civil wars and a leading member of the Left Opposition in the early 1920s. In 1927, consequently, he was expelled from the party as an adherent of the so-called United Opposition (of Trotsky, L B. Kamenev, and G. E. Zinov′ev). He was readmitted in 1930, after recanting his political “errors.” He then served, from 1931 to 3 August 1935, as head of the Central Directorate of Roads and Road Transport of the Sovnarkom of the USSR and as first deputy head of that office. He was arrested on 17 August 1936, and in January 1937 appeared (alongside K. B. Radek, Iu. L. Piatakov, and others) at the second of the major show trials (“The Trial of the 17”). (In the interim, the state prosecutor, A. Ia. Vyshinskii, had commandeered the Serebriakov family dacha for his own use.) Serebriakov was found guilty of various acts of terrorism and espionage as a member of the “Parallel Center,” and on 30 January 1937, was sentenced to death and shot. He was posthumously rehabilitated on 4 December 1986.

SERGEEV, EVGENII NIKOLAEVICH (1890–10 September 1937). Captain (14 June 1914), lieutenant (1917), komdiv (5 December 1935). The Soviet military commander E. N. Sergeev was the son of an artist. Having entered military service in 1909, he graduated from the Academy of the General Staff in 1914. During the First World War, he served in His Majesty’s Own Railway Regiment (from 24 March 1914), before moving to a post with the general staff in 1915. He then served as a senior officer on the staff of the 30th Army Corps (9 February–November 1915), as a senior adjutant on the staff of the 71st Infantry Division (from 14 July 1916), as an assistant senior adjutant on the staff of the 6th Army (from 6 July 1917), and as a senior adjutant with the intelligence section of the staff of the 6th Army.