Historical Dictionary of the Russian Civil Wars, 1916-1926

In the aftermath of the events at Kronshtadt, being by then deeply disillusioned with general developments in Soviet Russia, Serge withdrew from active participation in national politics and became involved in an independent workers’ commune in a rural community near Petrograd. When that enterprise failed, he accepted a Komintern assignment to Germany, but was expelled from Berlin following the failure of the Communist uprising of November 1923. He then lived in Austria, but was a sympathizer of the Left Opposition during the power struggles of the 1920s in Soviet Russia and a stern critic of the creeping totalitarianism he associated with the rise to power of J. V. Stalin, particularly after his own return to the USSR in 1925. As an outspoken Oppositionist, he was expelled from the All-Union Communist Party in 1928 (and was briefly imprisoned), then turned to literary work (with which he had been engaged all his adult life), although his books and articles were banned in the USSR. He was arrested in 1933, but international protests led to his release and exile in 1936. He settled in France, but fled to Mexico following the German invasion of June 1940. His relations with the other famous Russian exile there, L. D. Trotsky, were strained (not least as a consequence of Serge’s continued criticism of the manner in which the Kronshtadt Revolt had been crushed). He died, penniless, of a heart attack, in Mexico City on 17 November 1947.

7TH RED ARMY. This appellation was applied to three formations of Soviet forces during the course of the civil wars.

The first 7th Red Army was created, by an order of the Revvoensovet of the Republic, on 1 November 1918, from forces operating around Olonets, in Karelia. It was attached initially to the Northern Front (1 November 1918–19 February 1919), then (from 19 February 1919) the Western Front, and then (from 22 November 1918) had operational command over the Baltic Fleet and the naval fortress of Kronshtadt. From 29 December 1918, included in it was the Army Group Latvia (from 4 January 1919, the [Red] Army of Soviet Latvia). Its forces were also reconstituted, on 8 April 1919, into the Estonian Red Army (which, from 2 June 1919, became the southern group of the 7th Red Army) during the battles against the advancing White forces of General N. N. Iudenich. Following the defeat of the Whites, this 7th Red Army was transformed into the Petrograd Revolutionary Labor Army (10 February 1920). Among the forces attached to the first 7th Red Army were the 1st (November 1918–August 1919) and 2nd (July–December 1919) Rifle Divisions; the 2nd Petrograd Infantry Division (November 1918); the 2nd Novgorod Infantry Division (November 1918–January 1919); the 6th (November 1918–February 1920), 10th (February–July 1919 and September 1919–February 1920), 19th (November–December 1918 and January–August 1919), 55th (November 1919–February 1920), and 56th (November 1919–February 1920) Rifle Divisions; the Pskov Rifle Division (November 1918); and the Estonian Rifle Division (June–July 1919).

The first 7th Red Army was initially engaged in battles against German forces in Estonia, as it marched on and captured Narva (22 November 1918) and subsequently reached a point 20 miles from Tallinn in January 1919, during the opening stages of the Estonian War of Independence. It was forced to retreat and abandon Narva (19 January 1919) and subsequently was engaged in defensive operations in Karelia against Finnish forces and the Whites’ Northern Army. From May 1919, it was involved in the defense of Petrograd against the advance, from Estonia, of the White North-West Army and in the suppression of the Krasnaia Gorka uprising (August 1919). The 7th Red Army, with a strength of 40,000 men, 453 field guns, 708 machine guns, 6 armored trains, and 23 aircraft, went on the counteroffensive on 21 October 1919, driving the Whites back from the outskirts of Petrograd into Estonia. Following the Soviet–Estonian peace (the Treaty of Tartu, 2 February 1920), the 7th Red Army was disbanded.