Where the Iron Crosses Grow

In April 1918, the UPR dispatched General Peter F. Bolbochan, a former Tsarist officer, with the the 1st Division from the Zaporozhye Corps to seize the Crimea. The UPR had quickly begun to form an army from prisoners returning from Austrian captivity, and Bolbochan’s division comprised three small infantry regiments. A small German expeditionary force, initially consisting of General Robert von Kosch’s 15. Landwehr-Division and a Bavarian cavalry division, followed Bolbochan’s division and tentatively cooperated with the UPR in disarming Russian troops in the area. Slutsky rushed what troops he had to the Perekop, but Bolbochan conducted an end-run at the Chongar crossing, which was seized on April 22, 1918. Once they realized that they were flanked, the Red forces disintegrated in panicked flight, allowing Kosch’s German troops to easily pass through the Perekop Isthmus. Local Tatars were eager to join with Bolbochan’s division, and when his troops reached Simferopol on April 24 and captured Slutsky, Crimean Tatars avenged the Bolshevik murder of Çelebicihan by executing Slutsky. Two days later, the Germans arrived at Simferopol, but now German–Ukrainian military cooperation came to an abrupt end. Kosch ordered his troops to surround and disarm Bolbochan’s division and the UPR was ordered to leave the Crimea, which he pointed out belonged to Germany now. Lenin was furious that the Germans were occupying the Crimea but his protests were ignored.[12]

Control of the Black Sea Fleet now became a primary objective of the Germans, Ukrainians and Bolsheviks. Rear-Admiral Mikhail P. Sablin had saved himself from mob violence in January by openly joining the Bolsheviks – as other former Tsarist officers did as well – and Slutsky had put him in charge of the fleet. Now with German and Ukrainian forces approaching Sevastopol, Sablin was ordered to take the fleet to Novorossiysk, but he was only able to convince the crews of the dreadnoughts Svobodnya Rossiya and Volya, plus 11 destroyers, to follow him. The rest of the fleet, including the seven pre-dreadnoughts and another nine destroyers, fell into German hands when Kosch’s troops seized the city on May 1, 1918.[13] German forces overran the rest of the Crimea forthwith, including the Kerch Peninsula. Alarmed that the Germans might continue eastward to seize the remainder of the Black Sea Fleet at Novorossiysk, Lenin personally ordered Sablin to scuttle his fleet on June 18, 1918. The dreadnought Svobodnya Rossiya and five destroyers were scuttled, but the crews of the Volya and nine other destroyers refused and opted to return to Sevastopol. A large proportion of the crews of the Black Sea Fleet were Ukrainian and they hoped that the Germans would support the creation of an independent Ukrainian navy.[14]

The Germans enjoyed the Crimea for six months and installed a puppet government in Simferopol, which allowed a limited amount of Tatar autonomy, thereby gaining some degree of local support. The Germans stabilized the situation in the Crimea and even brought the damaged battlecruiser Yavuz to be repaired in Sevastopol’s dockyards during the summer of 1918 – one could even say that Kaiser Wilhelm II got better use out of the naval facility than Tsar Nicholas II ever had. Yet when Germany agreed to an armistice with the Western Allies in November 1918, the German occupation of the Crimea came to an abrupt end. Concerned about the Bolsheviks regaining control of Sevastopol and the remnants of the Black Sea Fleet, the British Mediterranean Fleet sent a naval expeditionary force to the Crimea less than two weeks after the armistice. Landing parties from the cruiser HMS Canterbury were the first to reach Sevastopol on November 24, where they took control over the remaining Russian warships. The next day, a larger force with two British battleships arrived, joined by French and Italian warships. Vice-Admiral Albert Hopman, in charge of the 11,000 German troops in Sevastopol, was allowed to assist with maintaining order until more Allied troops arrived.[15] Although welcomed at first, the British were ignorant of local political factions, and their efforts to encourage a new anti-Bolshevik provisional government in Simferopol were ham-fisted. The famous British spy, Sydney Reilly, was sent to Sevastopol to gather information about political conditions in the area, but much of what he reported was inaccurate or overly optimistic. A contingent of 500 Royal Marines landed on December 1, but the British decided to hand responsibility for the Crimea over to the French, who landed the 176^e régiment d’infanterie at Sevastopol on December 26, 1918.[16]