Historical Dictionary of the Russian Civil Wars, 1916-1926

Shilling, Nikolai Nikolaevich (16 December 1870–1946). Colonel (7 September 1909), major general (19 May 1915), lieutenant general (May 1919). The much-maligned White governor of Crimea, N. N. Shilling was a graduate of the Nicholas Cadet Corps (1888) and the 1st Pavlovsk Military School (1890) and served with the elite Ismailovskii Guards from 1888 to 1913. During the First World War, he commanded the 5th Finnish Rifle Regiment (1913–May 1915), a brigade of the 2nd Finnish Rifle Division (March–July 1916), the Ismailovskii Guards Regiment (July 1916–May 1917), and the 17th Army Corps (July–December 1917).

After working with the staff of Hetman P. P. Skoropadskii in Kiev, when the Ukrainian State collapsed, Shilling joined the Volunteer Army in December 1918, and in the Armed Forces of South Russia became commander of the 5th Infantry Division in Crimea (February–June 1919) and commander of the 3rd Army Corps (the former Crimean-Azov Volunteer Army, June–August 1919). In those roles, he played a leading part in the Whites’ capture of Kherson, Nikolaev, and Odessa. He was then named governor-general and commander of the Military Forces of New Russia (September–December 1919) and then governor-general and commander of the Military Forces of New Russia and Crimea (December 1919–March 1920). In the latter of these capacities, he was held responsible for the botched and disastrous White evacuation of Odessa (6–7 February 1920) and was widely criticized. When General P. N. Wrangel succeeded A. I. Denikin as commander in chief in late March 1920, Shilling was removed from his post and placed on the reserve list of the new Russian Army.

Unable to secure an active posting under Wrangel, Shilling went into emigration in 1920 and settled in Czechoslovakia, where for a time he led the Foreign Union of Russian War Veterans. When Soviet forces entered the country in May 1945, he was immediately arrested by SMERSH, but was soon set free (apparently in view of his very poor health). He died shortly afterward and was buried in the crypt of the Uspenski Cathedral, in the Olšanské cemetery in Prague.

SHIROKOV, TIMOFEI VLADIMIROVICH.See SAPRONOV (SHIROKOV), TIMOFEI VLADIMIROVICH.

Shkuro (shkura), Andrei Grigor′evich (7 February 1887–17 January 1947). Colonel (December 1912), major general (30 November 1918), lieutenant general (4 April 1919). One of the most charismatic and, his critics would claim, ruthless and reckless Cossack commanders in the White forces in South Russia, A. G. Shkuro was born near Ekaterinodar, into the family of an officer of the Kuban Cossack Host, and was a graduate of the 3rd Moscow Cadet Corps and the Nicholas Cavalry School (1907). In the First World War, he was prominent as the commander of a cavalry detachment that adopted his name and conducted audacious raids in the rear of enemy forces on the Romanian Front (December 1915–March 1917). He then became a commander of mounted units in northern Persia (March–December 1917).

After briefly returning to the Romanian Front at the beginning of the year, in May 1918 he transferred to the North Caucasus and formed a partisan unit (the “White Wolves”) that challenged Soviet rule at Kislovodsk. He briefly captured the city, but was driven out by Red forces and moved to the Kuban, where he created another partisan unit that earned a reputation for merciless treatment of enemies (real and imagined). In June–July 1918, Shkuro’s Wolves united with the Volunteer Army near Stavropol′ and became the basis of the 1st Caucasus Cossack Division, under Shkuro’s command (August 1918–May 1919). From May 1919, he commanded the 3rd Kuban Corps of the Armed Forces of South Russia (AFSR) and undertook a series of independent raids in the rear of Red forces, as well as participating in the Mamontov raid (during which, on 17 September 1919, his forces captured Voronezh). His generalship in these actions was extremely effective, although Soviet historians always alleged that Shkuro’s Cossacks treated the Russian population with exceptional cruelty and lacked all military discipline (the latter point being conceded by some White memoirists). He was also a frequent speaker to the Kuban Rada, where he opposed Cossack separatism.