Historical Dictionary of the Russian Civil Wars, 1916-1926

In May 1918, Vedeniapin journeyed to the Volga region, where the following month he became director of the Departments of Foreign Affairs and Post and Telegraph of Komuch and participated in its negotiations with the Provisional Siberian Government at Cheliabinsk (15 July and 23 August 1918) and at the Ufa State Conference. In November 1918, he was among the most vocal opponents of the Omsk coup, but managed to evade arrest by the White authorities at Ufa. Subsequently, however, in 1920, upon the Bolsheviks’ investment of Siberia, he was arrested and imprisoned by the Cheka. In July 1922, he was among those leaders of his party who were tried by the Supreme Tribunal of VTsIK in Moscow. He was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment, but released on amnesty after five. However, he was rearrested, imprisoned, and exiled a number of times over the succeeding years. Finally, in 1937 the Supreme Court of the USSR sentenced him to another 10 years’ imprisonment. He died in a labor camp near Khabarovsk (Vostlag) and was posthumously rehabilitated in 1989.

VELIKANOV, MIKHAIL DMITRIEVICH (27 December 1892–27 July 1938). Ensign (1915), sublieutenant (1916), komandarm (15 June 1937). A Red commander of great distinction during the civil wars, M. D. Velikanov was born into the family of a village sexton at Nikol′sk, Riazan′ guberniia, and trained and worked as a rural schoolteacher, but was mobilized during the First World War and graduated from the Pskov Ensign School (1915).

Velikanov joined the Red Army, initially as battalion commander, in February 1918, and from July 1918 distinguished himself as commander of the 2nd Simbirsk Regiment on the Eastern Front, participating in the recapture of Simbirsk from anti-Bolshevik forces (October 1918), and as commander of the 1st Brigade of the 24th Iron Division (from December 1918). He was subsequently commander of the 25th Rifle Division (February–March 1919) and the Ufa Group of Forces (March–April 1919) on the Eastern Front, which played a decisive part in repelling the advance of the Western Army of Admiral A. V. Kolchak. He then commanded the defense of Orenburg (April–June 1919), and in February 1920 was commander of the Strike Infantry Group of the 1st Cavalry Army in the Kuban, mopping up the remnants of the Armed Forces of South Russia. He then transferred to Transcaucasia, where he commanded Red forces in crushing the anti-Soviet Ganja uprising in Azerbaijan in May 1920 and played a leading role in the Red Army operations to invade the Democratic Republic of Armenia and the Democratic Republic of Georgia.

After the civil wars, Velikanov completed the Higher Academic Course of the Command Staff, joined the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) in 1924, served as inspector of infantry of the Red Army from 1926, graduated from the Red Military Academy in 1928, and (1930–1933) was assistant commander of forces of the North Caucasus Military District. From December 1933, he served as head of the Central Asian Military District and subsequently, from June 1937, was head of the Transbaikal Military District. On 28 November 1937, Velikanov was suddenly relieved of his various duties, and on 20 December 1937, he was arrested. He was condemned to death as a spy and a wrecker by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR on 29 July 1938 and executed that same day. He was posthumously rehabilitated on 1 September 1956.