Red Hogwarts. Officers, or Why a historian is like a detective

(We continue a series of essays from the history of our university called Red Hogwarts.)

NITU MISiS is now very actively celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Great Victory. This will be the first big anniversary without veterans. Four more, if not confused, veterans of the war were still alive at the university’s 70th anniversary; during these five years, they all left.

Further - only documents. But, as a historian, I want to note that sometimes documents are no less impressive than the stories of living people. I often recall my last year’s investigation into a riddle related to four not ordinary employees of our university.

Like all interesting historical investigations, it started small. I would even say - with small and boring. From the boring legacy of the bureaucrats - the minutes of the meeting of the Board of the Moscow Mining Academy in June 1924:

“Paragraph 25. Heard: Statement by surveyors S. Lobik, V. Fedorov, Rumyantsev, Oreshkin on their enlistment in the topography. geodesic parties of the Committee on Grozny intelligence under M.G.A. Resolved: Enroll. "



A boring document lay in the equally boring archival case of the topographer Vasily Andreevich Fedorov . Not only is it boring, but also skinny as a bicycle - only 18 leaves. Working in the archive, I decided to scroll through it solely out of a sense of duty and did not expect anything interesting.

Application for employment, notice of admission, on-line certificates on the right of employees of technical colleges to additional living space of 20 square arshins and the prohibition of “compaction”, a business trip to Chechnya ...

What is this?

On June 25, 1924, the head of the administrative and economic department Miron Cherednichenko sent a telegram to Grozny to the rector of the Moscow Mining Academy, the famous academician Ivan Gubkin: “FEDOROV FORMER OFFICER OF THE WHITE ARMY MUCH GUARANTEE I NEED TO KNOW IT”.



Gubkin at lightning speed sends from Grozny the answer: FEDOROV WILL NOT BE GIVEN ANY GUIDANCE TO SEND IMMEDIATELY ANOTHER TOPOGRAPH GUBKIN. ”

Gubkin’s reaction is not surprising - 1924, the Civil War has just ended, what kind of white officers can be in the first Soviet technical university? But from the documents remaining in the case, it becomes clear that for some reason the “unfinished officer” was not expelled from the MGA. He worked for several more years at the academy, annually going to Chechnya for topographic surveys, and quit only in 1928 "in view of the cessation of topographic work in the Committee . "

In the description written by Gubkin it read: “V.A. Fedorov worked for the MGA Committee as a surveyor and topographer for four years (1924-28) and expressed himselfknowledgeable and very conscientious employee . ” The “red academician” pretty much said about the white officer.

So what do we have? We have some strange topographers, four surnames with initials and ... And nothing more.

The story is eternal for the historian - a scattered mosaic, from which someone stole half of the puzzles, put it in his pocket and left to meet. If the fragment of someone's life that has fallen into your hands interests you, the old principle of the historical detective is working - one, two, three, four, five, I’m going to look.

The first

In Fedorov's personal file, the initials were deciphered, but this was not very pleasing. The search for a man with the surname Fedorov and the name Vasily Andreyevich is rarely crowned with success - there are too many Vasilyev Fedorovs in great Russia. But I was lucky - at one of the military forums someone posted this photo here and asked for help in identifying the officer.



On the back was a half-erased inscription in pencil, "Nadia and B ... I." Two letters are erased, only “B” and “I” are read, which incredibly expands the options - it can be “Vanya”, “Vasya” and even “Valya”. The picture was taken in the Vilnius province in the studio of photographer Alexander Strauss. They no longer know anything about him, as Marshak wrote.

But military historians are a gambler. For about two months, they sifted through all the officers in their file cabinets, which could be in this place at that time. And by the method of elimination, nevertheless, the military topographer Fedorov Vasily Andreevich, the captain, the manufacturer of the work, was calculated. Here is a reference.



Maybe this is my Vasily Andreevich from the Moscow State University? The candidacy, taking into account the military specialty, was perfect, but there was no direct evidence. And then one of the people with good visual memory remembered that he had seen a similar photo on one of the sites selling old photos.



On the back was an inscription: “Dear and sweet Nadia from Vasya. Riga, February 15, 1903 ”.



Solitaire has developed. "First" is installed. Having all this information, it was not difficult to get Vasya’s biography.

A cadre officer, “military bone” - this, however, is also visible in the photographs. Born in Smolensk in 1866, graduated from the Military Topographic School, worked for many years on the shooting of the North-Western border space, in 1906 he was sent to the 3rd Manchurian survey. Since 1912, he was seconded to the Military Topographical Directorate of the General Staff. Then he served in the General Staff - until 1918.

After the revolution in 1921, it was briefly discovered in Irkutsk, but then returned to the General Staff again, but now it is the General Staff of the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army. The last position is a senior surveyor for assignments under the chief inspector of the work of the Department of Cartography and Military Topography.

Colonel of the Russian army (from 6.12.1915), holder of the orders of St. Stanislav III degree, St. Anna III degree, St. Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir IV degree.

The reference in the biographical dictionary ended with the phrase "Dismissed from service on December 1, 1923, the further fate is unknown . " Well, it turns out that I at least slightly pleased the domestic history, extended the biography of a person for several years. A trifle - but nice.

It is the date of dismissal that makes it possible to understand what happened and why four topographers appeared at the Moscow Mining Academy, who did not particularly advertise their past.

The fact is that it was precisely in 1923-24 that this was the beginning of a large-scale purge of the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army from suspicious "gold-mining military specialists." It all started with the Corps of Military Topographers.


Officers of the Military Surveyor Corps.

Back in the spring of 1923, the chief of the military topographers corps, former Colonel Ditz, his assistant Ivanishchev, the head of the aerial photography detachment Zhivotovsky, and Commissar Tsvetkov were brought to trial. Several more officers were expelled from the Red Army.

But this was only a hint, the tale came at the end of 1923, when at the insistence of the new commissar A.I. Artamonov in the Corps there was a natural pogrom and almost the entire leadership was dismissed. As contemporaries complained, after this purge, only four professionals with a specialized education, geodesic department of the Academy of the General Staff remained in the Military Topographic Corps: the new chief of the corps, former colonel A.D. Taranovsky, his deputy, head of the geodetic department, lieutenant colonel P.P. Aksenov, and generals N.O. Shchetkin and Ya. I. Alekseev, heads of the department of scientific works.

Remember the name of Aksenov, it will still be useful to us.


Lt. Col. Porfiry Petrovich Aksyonov, 1883-1930.

Even a superficial check confirmed: my four mysterious topographers are from these. From the expelled general staffists who were in a desperate situation. In a country of devastation, famine, everyone has a family, and it’s almost impossible to find work for the former "gold miner", and even with the scandal, who was fired from the Red Army.

And here academician Gubkin, who was always allowed somewhat more than others, took advantage of the situation. Shortly before this, his Moscow Mining Academy, together with Grozneft, launched a large-scale project in terms of money and tasks, called the Committee on Grozny Intelligence of the Moscow State Academy. The main task was extensive exploration and detailed exploration in Chechnya and the Kuban. The “Baku Oil Intelligence Committee” will appear next year, then they will merge into a single “MGA Oil Intelligence Committee”, and large-scale studies will last four years and will end only in 1928.

Knowing topographers and surveyors were desperately needed, and here - such luck, at once four specialists, but what! Overqualified - this is to say the least.

And the military is even better. Chechnya is a turbulent region, in this "land of Abreks" they always played pranks, and after the Civil War, there really was everything that was going on. And with officers, at least students will not be cut in practice.

In general, the situation was resolved to the common good. General Staff officers got a job, and the Academy got brilliantly educated specialists, the color of Russian military geodesic science. Of course, the officers of the General Staff were no longer in ranks and age to run around the mountains with ordinary topographers, but fate had no choice for them.

Particularly difficult was probably Colonel Fedorov, who was the eldest of the four. He was over fifty in his twenties, and spending half a year on field expeditions in Chechnya was, I think, already hard.

Second

However, the senior Fedorov was only by age, but not by position. The most impressive career in this four was made by Sergey Pavlovich Lobik , who before his dismissal (November 9, 1923) held the position of head of the Office of the Military Topographers Corps.

This was a man of a different generation - 20 years younger than Fedorov, born in 1887. Born in Shlisselburg, the origin of "from the simple" - the son of a teacher. He brilliantly finished the same Military Topographic study with the study of an additional geodesic class, and after graduation he was listed on the School's Honor Board.



He was released a few years before the First World War, managed to work on the set in St. Petersburg province and Finland. With the outbreak of war, it was not seconded somewhere, but carefully to the Life Guards Pavlovsky Regiment. And here the topographer surprised everyone - he became famous in the regiment for the courage reckless even from the point of view of the guards, resulting in a whole constellation of orders.

From November 1914 to June 1916 he received six orders. For a year and a half - six (!) Orders - Stanislav, Anna and Vladimir of various degrees. For the battle on October 12, 1914, Lobik was introduced to St. George’s arms, but they didn’t give “George”, replacing the Order of St. Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir of the IV degree with swords and a bow.

Despite the wound, and, perhaps, thanks to him - there was time for preparation - he finally fulfilled his old dream. He entered the Academy of the General Staff, which he graduated in accelerated graduation in 1917.

Filling out the questionnaire of an MGA officer, the former legend of the Pavlovsky Russian Imperial Life Guards Regiment, Captain Lobik described this very heroic period of his life in an extremely laconic way: "He was serving a combat qualification for the Academy in an infantry regiment . " The fact is that the Academy could not be reached without having served for several years “on the ground”, with personnel, company or regimental commander. But usually the future general staff nevertheless served the “combat qualification", let’s say, in less extreme conditions.



In the Lobik case, by the way, the final of the story with the White Guard Fedorov was also found. As it turned out, there was also a third telegram. It

sounded like this: GROZNY, GROZNEFT, GUBKIN. Topography forehead SATURDAY traveled fast train to travel Fedorov Tuesday guarantors have a language (the same language with which and began the cycle of essays)

forehead and Fedorov left the MCA at the same time, in mid-1928. Lobik, like his senior colleague, also received a certificate of recommendation from Gubkin that "he faithfully performed all the assignments assigned to him and special work. Issued for submission to the new service site ."

What kind of place this new service was and whether it was - history is still unknown.

And all that remains of their four-year wear work, overnight stays in the mountains, triangulations, heady air on the pass, tales that they poisoned students near the evening bonfire, clatter of horseshoes over stones, hazy summer heat, buzzing annoying gadfly and carbine thrown over saddle ...

From all this exactly one line remained in the book. In few readings of the proceedings of the Moscow Petroleum Institute. Gubkin edition of 1969. There, one of the very students whom they drove through Chechnya, who became the rector of the Moscow Petroleum Institute and the founder of the department of geology, already at the end of his life will write in his posthumous article on the Grozny intelligence committee: “Former military topographers were involved in the work of the Committee. P. Rumyantsev, V.A. Fedorov, G.P. Oreshkin, S.P. Lobik "...


Mikhail Mikhailovich Charygin, former student of the Moscow Mining Academy, professor, rector of the Moscow Petroleum Institute. I.M. Gubkin in 1939-42

Having left the Moscow Mining Academy, Fedorov and Lobik disappear in the dark. I do not know their further fate and, having won four years from obscurity, I have to repeat the powerless for my military colleagues: “the further fate is unknown.” I can only hope that the recommendations of the academician came in handy to the colonel and captain.

However, not all then quit. Vladimir Petrovich Rumyantsev stayed.

Third

Again a career officer, again a topographer, again a general staff officer. Like Fedorov - from the "pre-war" generation of topographers. A native of the village of Bolshaya Bereznyaki, Simbirsk province, born in 1879. Younger than Fedorov, but much older than Lobik, therefore, he didn’t get to the front - they knew knowledgeable topographers with good experience, and they tried not to send them to the meat grinder unnecessarily. Obviously I knew Fedorov long before the war, they worked together on the shooting of the North-Western border, then together in Manchuria, then Rumyantsev was transferred to the Kiev shooting. From 1914 until the revolution, Vladimir Petrovich Rumyantsev was a teacher at alma mater, the Military Topographic School.


V.P. Rumyantsev (in uniform) with brothers and sister

After the revolution, he worked as the head of the theodolite department of the astronomical and geodetic detachment of the Topographs Corps, according to the results of the cleaning, he was dismissed in October 1923, admitted to the Mining Academy by Gubkin, and along with his co-workers he traveled around Chechnya, Kuban and Azerbaijan for several years.

I don’t know what was the matter, but Rumyantsev’s only one, after the termination of the Committee’s activity, was not reduced, but transferred to the post of full-time topographer of the Moscow Mining Academy. Most likely, the fact that Vladimir Petrovich, unlike his comrades, had many years of pedagogical experience, played the role of rector Gubkin and decided to leave him at the university.



As it turned out - in trouble.

Because the purges of the Red Army did not end at all.

In October 1929, the conflict commission of the Political Administration of the Red Army received a complaint from the former military commissar of the Military Aero Topographic Division L. F. Gaidukevich against the head of the military topographic department of the Main Directorate of the Red Army A. I. Artanov. According to the complaint, a check was ordered, and according to the results of the check ...

Based on the results of the check, the conscript was discovered by the Chekists in the topographical department of the General Staff, headed by former lieutenant colonel Porfiry Petrovich Aksenov - remember the surname?

More than fifty people went on the “case of military topographers”, ten people were shot, the rest received different terms of the camps. I will quote a few names from these ten people sentenced to “the highest measure of social protection”:

, , /, . , .. - .

, , /, . , . - .

, , /, . , . - . .

, , /, . , , . . . . -, . - -. .

, , /, . , . . «» -...

The former lieutenant colonel was found guilty of sabotage, the preparation of an armed uprising and participation in a counter-revolutionary organization. Here is his last photograph taken for the investigation, shortly before the execution.



The verdict was executed on September 30, 1930, the burial place - Moscow, Vagankovskoye cemetery. Rehabilitated January 16, 1989.

Fourth

There was the last one - Grigory Petrovich Oreshkin, the youngest in the four, born in 1889, at the time of admission to the Moscow State Academy he was 35 years old.

Oreshkin somewhat dropped out of this company, unlike his associates, he did not finish the Military Topographic School, and in general he turned to topography quite late.

Grigory Petrovich was a hereditary Cossack who was born in the village of Uryupinsky Khopersky District of the Don Cossack Region. Therefore, the path of the Cossack officer was written to his family. He graduated from the military training courses of the Novocherkassk Cossack Cadet School, and on August 6, 1910 he was released "from the canton of the cadets" in the coronet in the First Don Cossack Regiment.


Barracks of the 1st Don Cossack Regiment

Already in the service of the regiment, he became interested in topography and from 1912 to 1914 he studied at the geodesic department of the Nikolaev Military Academy. But here the war begins and immediately after graduation, the centurion Oreshkin goes to the front, in the "native" 18th Don Cossack Regiment, formed from the Cossacks of the villages of the Khopersky District, the assembly point is the village of Uryupinskaya.

Like Lobik, the whole war was at the forefront. He fought no less heroically, and in terms of the number of orders received, Oreshkin, even if he was inferior to a comrade, is insignificantly five instead of six: Stanislav III and II degree, Anna IV (Anninsky weapon “for courage”) and III degree, order of the Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir IV- 1st degree with swords and bow.

In 1915 he was wounded, was treated in Kiev and in Moscow, newspapers recorded: "The sick and wounded officers, who arrived in Moscow: the centurion Oreshkin Grigory Petrovich in the 12th evacuation hospital ... "(The newspaper" Russian word "Friday, 17th April 1915 N 87.)


From awarded orders lists

podesaul Since 1916 Oreshkin serves in the General Staff, in 1917, on the eve of the revolution, he was a senior adjutant in the service of the General Staff of the 47th Army Corps of the 6th Army of the Romanian Front.

After the revolution, like all four, he sided with the Reds, in 1921 he was a student of the geodesic department of the Academy of General Staff of the Red Army and at the Pulkovo Observatory. The last position before dismissal from service is the head of the 1st department of the famous astronomical and radio telegraph detachment. Dismissed from service on December 5, 1923 according to the decree of the same "special commission for the revision of the personnel of military topographers."

Next - like those three: the proposal of Gubkin, the Moscow State Academy, expeditions, students, reduction in 1928. But unlike friends, Oreshkin does not disappear without a trace.

His surname reappears in documents of the Great Patriotic War. Moreover, in the personal file of Oreshkin, a remarkable phrase appears: "Born in 1889. In the Red Army since 1941. Place of conscription: Bauman district military enlistment office, Moscow region, Moscow, Bauman district . "

The problem is that 1889 was not drafted into the Great Patriotic War.

Never.

With the outbreak of war, on June 23, 1941, mobilization of military men was declared 14 ages, from 1905 to 1918. After the terrible defeats of the first days of the war on August 10, the State Defense Committee issued a decree on the mobilization of military men born in 1904-1890 and conscripts born in 1922-1923 in the Kirovograd, Nikolaev, Dnipropetrovsk regions and areas west of Lyudinovo - Bryansk - Sevsk, Oryol region. Later this provision was extended to other territories, including October 16 - to Moscow and the Moscow region.

But here, as we see, the upper boundary is 1890. How did Oreshkin end up in the army?

By exclusion, we get the only possible option - the Moscow militia. It was then that after the terrible Vyazemsky cauldron the road to Moscow turned out to be open and the Germans had to be detained at all costs before the transfer of Siberian and Kazakh divisions, the volunteers under the age of 55 were allowed to recruit into the formed Moscow militia.

52-year-old Grigory Oreshkin left that terrible summer of 1941. He left to do his job - to defend his homeland.


Moscow militias. 1941

At the end of the battle of Moscow, of course, the elderly (and by the standards of the time, the 52-year-old is almost an old man) were discharged from the army to disband the militias. From the Moscow militia, only militiamen no older than 1902 were transferred to the army.

But, as we see, there were exceptions. Grigory Oreshkin turned out to be too short of a military specialty - good topographers were worth their weight in gold during the war. And he was a very good topographer.

And our Grigory Oreshkin got out of the fire - but into the fire. From Moscow - to Stalingrad.

Probably, we will never know what he brought to that war, his second world war. But, one way or another, and the first document that we have at our disposal is his submission to the medal "For the Defense of Stalingrad."



How he survived that hell on the Volga - I can’t even guess. But the fact remains - here is his last name among other fighters who were in the service of the control and parts of the 156 fortified area of ​​the MLO. The military rank is captain engineer. Position - head of the topographic group.

The road that began at the Bauman military registration and enlistment office was long.

Former dashing Cossack centurion, who became a surveyor and astronomer, went through the whole war. From beginning to end, from 1941 to 1945.

By order of the commander of the artillery of the Central Group of Forces of September 6, 1945 "for the exemplary performance of the combat missions of the Command at the front of the struggle against the German invaders and the valor and courage shown at the same time"Grigory Petrovich, a teacher of the topography of courses for junior artillery lieutenants of the Central Group of Forces, engineer-captain Oreshkin, was awarded the Order of the Red Star.

In a presentation to his sixth order, received exactly thirty years after the fifth, it was noted: “As a teacher of topography over the course of two issues, I coped well with the duties, and the cadets of his topography platoons were well prepared. It’s self-fulfilling and hardworking. He has extensive practical experience, as a result of which cadets easily and readily perceived material in his lessons. Personally disciplined, deservedly enjoys authority among cadets . "



And cadets, you know, can be understood. There was indeed something to respect for the former drive-in, and now the engineer-captain Grigory Petrovich Oreshkin.

He was a strong man, and the officer was real.

“From the heroes of bygone days, sometimes there are no names left - those that took the mortal battle became just land, grass ...”