Historical Dictionary of the Russian Civil Wars, 1916-1926

Zigel′, Dmitrii MikhailovichVON (14 March 1869–11 July 1922). Colonel (6 December 1907), major general (1919), lieutenant general (1 January 1920). A senior figure in the White forces in South Russia, D. M. von Zigel′ was a graduate of Count Arakcheev Cadet Corps (1887), the Second Constantine School (1889), and the Academy of the General Staff (1898). He participated in the Russian expedition to China in 1900–1901 and in the Russo–Japanese War, and in the First World War rose to the post of commander of the 127th Infantry Division (from 20 June 1916) and the 6th Caucasian Army Corps (from 10 October 1917).

In 1918, von Zigel′ acted as Hetman P. P. Skoropadskii’s plenipotentiary to the forces of the Austro-German intervention. In the White movement, he was initially (February–August 1919) placed in the reserve of the Armed Forces of South Russia (AFSR), perhaps because of his prior association with the Hetman and the Germans, before serving as quartermaster general (August–December 1919) and then chief of staff (13 December 1919–29 January 1920) of the Caucasian Army. Evacuated from Odessa to Crimea during the collapse of the AFSR, he then joined the Russian Army of General P. N. Wrangel. He was named head of the garrison and commandant of Kerch (May–November 1920), in which capacities he played an important part in the organization of the Kuban landing operation (August–September, 1920) of General S. G. Ulagai and in the evacuation of Crimea (November 1920). In emigration, he lived first in Turkey and then in Serbia, where he died in hospital at Pančevo, near Belgrade.

Zinevich, Bronislav mikhailovich (aleksandr konstantinovich) (20 August 1868–1920?). Colonel (2 September 1915), major general (13 August 1918). Born in Orenburg guberniia and of petit bourgeois background, the White commander B. M. Zinevich was a graduate of the Kazan′ Infantry Officers School (1895). He served in the Russo–Japanese War, and during the First World War commanded the 534th Infantry Regiment (November 1916–November 1917).

Following the October Revolution, Zinevich organized an underground officers’ organization at Krasnoiarsk, and following the collapse of Soviet power in the region in May–June 1918, commanded the 2nd Rifle Division of the Mid-Siberian Corps in the forces of the Provisional Siberian Government. In the Russian Army of Admiral A. V. Kolchak, he became chief of staff of the 1st Mid-Siberian Army Corps (April 1919) and later (from 14 July 1919) its commander. At the same time, he was deputy commander of the 1st Army of Kolchak’s reorganized Eastern Front. On 20 December 1919, Zinevich also became head of the garrison at Krasnoiarsk; in that capacity, he played a prominent part in the revolt of the Krasnoiarsk garrison against Kolchak in December 1919, authored an ultimatum to the supreme ruler demanding that he transfer all powers to a Zemskii sobor′, interrupted communications to and from Kolchak’s train (as the admiral attempted to move from Omsk to Irkutsk), and in general supported the actions of the Political Center and its associate organizations. On 7 January 1920, he negotiated the peaceful surrender of Krasnoiarsk to the approaching 5th Red Army, but according to most accounts he was nevertheless arrested and was subsequently executed at Omsk.

ZIN′KOVSKII (ZADOV), LEV NIKOLAEVICH (11 April 1893–25 September 1938). Born at the Jewish settlement of Veselaia, in Ekaterinoslav guberniia, into the family of an unskilled laborer, but raised from the age of seven at Iuzovka, L. N. Zin′kovskii was to become one of the senior commanders of the Revolutionary-Insurgent Army of Ukraine of Nestor Makhno and later a servant of the Soviet secret police. He had only two years of schooling, before going to work at a metallurgical factory in the Donbass. There, he was attracted to anarchism and, in 1913, was sentenced to eight years of exile for an attack on a post office. He returned to the factory after having been liberated from prison in 1917, but by April 1918 was leading a partisan detachment against forces of the Austro-German intervention and the Don Cossack Host.