Machnowist Black Army (and also some Headdresses in RCW )

[Bako]

Quite true, but those who sell the cavalry follow a formula: more infantry=lower price, not so many cavalry=higher price. Mongols would be super expensive to do (which is probably why I've never seen a miniature army of them).

Does anyone other than Eureka make 28mm scale tachankas?

[Mark Plant]

Here is an article by a White about the Makhnovists I just found:

http://www.hrono.ru/libris/lib_g/geras_mahno.html

I can't read Russian, but with Google translate, a dictionary and some knowledge of technical terms, some useful bits can be extracted. In the middle he says:

XIII. Makhno's Army

By the end of 1919 those grouped around Makhno, all bore in common the name: "The Army of batko Makhno."

The main militant core of the army, the most active, serving as a skeleton, from which then deployed troops, composed of peasants, consisted of:

1) the personal staff and escort of Makhno, numbering up to 300 people. At the head of them, as Chief of Staff, was a former locksmith Kiiko and commander of the escort was a sailor Liashenko, [who wore rich coats looted from Ekaterinoslav] even in summer heat;

2) the cavalry - 1 000 riders, [as determined by Makhno himself], under the command of former sergeant Dolzhenko;

3) a machine gun regiment, ie, riding infantry - 800 carts with 1-2 machine guns on each and a crew of 3-4-5 including the driver, with in general up to 3,500 people, under the overall command of a former sailor, Guro;

4) the artillery - six three-inch field guns, with a full harness and the caisson, in general, up to 200 people, under the command of former gunner Zozulya;

5) commandant teams and other support units, moving exclusively in carts, and sometimes participating in the battles, with in general up to 500 people.

Permanent purely infantry units, sanitary facilities and commissariat waggons did not exist in the Makhnovist army.

The permanent forces available to Makhno, were composed mostly of former sailors of the navy, criminal elements, deserters from the Red and White armies, and only a small number of young peasants. They can be estimated as numbering 5,000, not counting the Revolutionary Military Council of the Army.

In addition to these permanent units there were temporary ones, mostly infantry units, obtained by mobilization of the peasants. Depending on the region, mobilization could give in one night 10-15,000 men and more, often with artillery and cavalry. These consisted exclusively of peasants and were distributed to regiments bearing the name of the villages who gave a contingent (Petrovsky, Novospasskij etc.).

The strength of these regiments and their weapons were very diverse. In most cases the three different types of weapons were kept in separate units.

Bits I struggled to understand are  [in square brackets].

This is the army at the peak, and the man writing is a White so has reasons to exaggerate its size, but while I might quibble about a couple of numbers quoted and that it is contradictory to have artillery but no supply commissariat, I doubt he is seriously wrong about the major points.

Interestingly from a wargamer's point of view, while he says that the peasant regiments looked just like peasants, that the commanders had a tendency to dress up in mock Ukrainian Cossack style, and to like rich fur coats. That would certainly add colour to an HQ!

He also adds that the carts (and the entire army was usually cart or horse mounted) had a tendency to be filled with loot. He mentions rich rugs and moonshine, both of which are rarely seen on wargames units.

[Bako]

Thanks for the link!

[former user]

interesting mobile army

thank's for the link

1600 MG
my god!

[Mark Plant]

I think we can take the size of the tachanka regiment with a grain of salt. Even if they had that many, full ammunition for them would be out of the question.

From a wargamer's point of view I think it says a few things though. The hard core of the army, those whose morale and skill should be high, are the permanent cavalry and tachanka regiments. The infantry should all be hastily raised, and of a much lower quality.

[former user]

yes, but expensive army, damn...
cavalry and tachankas...

[Bako]

Hoe yeah.

[former user]

looks like I was born to game such an army   

early 20th century, with WWI weapons, but also "old school tactics",
at the same time mobile infantry concept at it's best
(1919 constantly retreating from Denikin's troops and then artfully infiltrating their flank - at least as I read) - Blitzkrieg without tanks....
and then - Officers dressed like pimps or Opera singers, waggons full of loot
with an ideology (if it worked?)

there are so many controversies about this army...

anyway, I just thought of expanding my previous "fur hat" peasent concept by adding some workers Militia from Musketeers BCW range (no '30s hats or Tommy helmets)
and I need to search for some colourful officers

actually, the real background of the Black Army is so shrouded in the mists of soviet propaganda and anarchist ideology that it virtually cries out for an alternative  "what if" setting...

[Prof.Witchheimer]

some pics here - http://www.makhno.ru/photo.php





Makhno's Hundret, a sort of guard troop

[former user]

thx Prof.

as alway top supplier of Background
(I might be biased, but I see maaaaany  fur caps  )

how would you comment on the "egaliatarian Cosack-style" background
Makhnovia seems to lie within the historical hetmanate country, but I wonder how much "cosack" identity would have been present in the Anarchist ideology, since the "Cosacks" as an ethnic and political identity would appear to have sided with the Whites

The Term "Cosack" seems to be a comlicated "tag" in related to common concepts of ethnicity, political organization, social identity etc
as I understand, it is ethnical, but political at the same time, but there seems to be no "Cosack language", as would ususally be expected for a ethniv entity?

I am a bit confused on that...

[Poliorketes]

Cossacks are not ethnical. In fact their early days have something in common with the Machnovia. Cossacks have started as runaway unfree peasants who build communities in the then uncivilised ukrainian steppes. they fought tartars, but also with or against poles and moscovites/russians. The 17th and 18th century saw an endless range of cossack uprisings, first against the poles (http://www.kriegsreisende.de/ has a good article about this in german - not to mention the rest of this very good page), then against russia (remember Yul Brynner?). Afterwards the tsars seem to have had god relations with them, the cossacks got privilegs and fought for the tsar. And I guess you couldn't call them anarchistic any longer

[Prof.Witchheimer]

Cossacks are not ethnical.

exactly. They're just a social and a bit of political unity. It has nothing to do with anarchists either. In the same way anarchists don't deal with cossack-style.

[Prof.Witchheimer]

It has never turned up in my searches, but did the Makhnovists have a flag? I've never seen pictures or illustrations of such a thing so it's uncertain to me. Such a detail would really bind a miniature army more so, methinks.

of course, they did, see attachment. With "Freedom or Death" or "Death to the soviets" etc. slogans. The last one isn't so spectacular as the rest, it's of the 2.infantry regiment of Makhno's army.

[former user]

well...

the matter is a little complicated, being the reason why I asked the question
I have done some research on that:
"Andreas Kappeler, Kleine Geschichte der Ukraine. Munich 1994"
being my core reference. (Kapeler is Prof. for Eastern European History at the Univ. of Cologne)

what I understood about Cossacks is in short-
Cosacks migrated in the 16. and 17. C into the main river basins of southern "Russia",  and were a warrior society who lived of hunting, fishing and livestock, with frequent looting campaign.
after the political crisis in the end of the 17. C, the then political entity of the "hetmanate" was tricked into an alliance with the Muscovites against the poles, after which the Cossacks essentially belonged to the Tsar (including the differences mentiones as uprisings above).
Until the revolution, they formed a social class of theit own (which was rather normal in a multilayered society) owing military allegiance to the Tsar and profiting of a special legal status.
(what I read about Yul Brynner is that noone really knew wghat he was, he himself variously claiming Cosack, Gypsy and whatever descent)
the problems with such historical references is that the POV is usually from outside (biased or not) and refers to the socioploital role of a certain group.

As I understand, throughout time "Cosack" means different things
the essence of my "confusion" relates to the fact that I fail to understand what from 16. C to today, the term "Cosack" means for someone who claims to belong to this group (the inner POV so to say)

for example, the typical "Cosack" dressing as perceived by us and as displayed today in newly formed cosack units is actually a "tscherkassian" dress, used in early 20C. only by few Cossack communities
(for instance, the mercenery guard od the King of Jordan after WWII displayed this uniform)

the only persistant aspect of Cosacks seems to be the special social rules and the election of leaders.
This is the way I understand the "Anarchist" link.
The Essence of Anarchism I view as the refusal of inherited leadership, and social management by mutual respect - which is indeed Cossack-style
while the outer perspective on anarchism usually incudes disorganisation and lack of leadership, from the inner perspective there was never an anarchist community without, but it was based on election.

related to the special role of cossacks under the Tsar (and Putin ), a military community based on elected (and not inherited) leadership forming a mutual alliance with another ruler is basically "anarchist" (though unrelated to the sociopolitical ideologs of late 19.C)
this would be the cossack perspective, whereas the Muscovites saw them merely as new subjects of the Tsar  (this being the basic reason for the cossack "uprisings")

now back to my original question:
In RCW, Cosacks appeared as:
1. the original organised groups formerly "serving" the Tsar and siding with the Whites in order to keep their privilages (though the Whites were not monarchists but simply revisionists)
2. individual subjects to the bolsheviks who were denied cossack identity
3. and finally the (formerly unknown to me) aspect of the Makhnovist elite relating themselves to cosack identity
since the location of "Makhnovia" and the ethnic mixture of that part of Ukraine is totally consistent with cosack ancestry, I would be curios to know if the Makhnovist elite viewed themselves as the "better" or more "original" cossacks who had managed to shake off the Tsarist yoke and wanted to return to original cosack tradition or if they used that tag for propaganda (which would be more in line with the White account of officers wearing "mock" cossack style, this accont however also revealing white propaganda as the Whites would see themselves as allied with the "true" Cossacks)

for wargaming this is of course totally unimportant, but I am simply curious

thanky for the flags
is there a translation?

[Mark Plant]

When the Ukraine started to try to reassert its old/imagined identity against Russia in the late 19th century, the Cossacks were one solid thing they had to fall back on. They couldn't really claim language or ethnicity too much, since these are clearly similar to Russian. Lots of Ukrainians are Catholic or Uniate, but many are Orthodox too, so religion is not a basis.

With the revolution in 1917 there were loads of "Free Cossack" associations formed in the Ukraine. Local militia, essentially. They dressed in traditional Zaporozhian dress, often quite flamboyantly. This dress is recogniseably different from the both the Steppe and Mountain Cossacks of Russia.

Two regiments of the Ukrainian National government went for this look too. One can be seen in Plate C1 of the Osprey on the Whites. The other was the Grey Zhupans, who looked somewhat similar but in grey. The best regiment in the UNR was the Sich Riflemen, with a name also reminding of the Cossack days.

The Germans recognised this when they put a Skoropadsky in charge of the new Hetmanate! There was a name to strike a good anti-Russian note!

The attraction of the Cossack theme to the Makhnovists was obvious. It combined everything they stood for. Ukrainian nationalism in opposition to Russian centralism. Free associations of men, as opposed to formal government from the centre. Combined with a sexy history of violence and free-booting!

The other Ukrainians would not have associated Zaporozhian Cossacks with the other Cossacks. Not that they would necessarily have minded anyway - they supported Cossack separatism on the Don (Hetman Skoropadsky supplied loads of arms to the Don Host) and many Ukrainians claim the Kuban Cossacks as Ukrainians.

There has been an attempted revival of things Cossack in the post-Soviet Ukraine too.
http://www.kozatstvo.org.ua/statut_e.php