White Siberian units - which were most active?

[sepoy1857]

Browsing through this website they list a whole myriad of units, but which ones saw the most action against the Reds? Which units would be best to paint up (as far as units that can be used for more scenarios)?

http://kolchakiya.narod.ru/uniformology_main.htm Loads of good info here if you have some type of online translation program like Babelfish.

[Mark Plant]

The most versatile mounted units out East are Orenburg Cossacks. They saw action from the start to the finish in various guises. As they were distributed around, they can reliably be mixed with anyone.

If you want "officer" cavalry, then the 1st Cavalry Division, with the Tomsk Hussars, Kazan Dragoons, Simbirsk Lancers and Ekaterinburg Lancers is as good as any. (All are 50% lance armed, the name means nothing.)
http://kolchakiya.narod.ru/uniformology/kav_units.htm

Backed by the 1 st Horse-Artillery Battalion.

Best bet for foot is some sort of Rifle unit. This unit is as good as any: http://kolchakiya.narod.ru/uniformology/Ufim_shooter_div.htm
because I know it operated for some time with Orenburg Cossacks, was in the centre of the fighting, and it held up through the great retreat. (Note that these are not those Kornilovs. They are just similarly named in honour of him.)

Rifle units generally had crimson (technically "raspberry" i.e. dark pink) distinctions, so they don't differ much. This one is basically the same:
http://kolchakiya.narod.ru/uniformology/8_Kamsk_shooter_div.htm
Its divisional cavalry was an ex-partisan unit under Shchegolikhin, if that is more to your fancy.

The Izhevsk and Votkinsk units were the longest lasting elite infantry units:
http://kolchakiya.narod.ru/uniformology/ij_vtk_rebels_02.htm
I'm not sure how much they worked with other units however.

[Lt. Hazel]

Thanks for the links Mark! A shame I´m not able to understand Russian 

[sepoy1857]

Thank you Mark - very helpful. I really enjoy your Pygmy War Website.

@Lt. hazel: If you use Firefox Browser there is an add-on called Babelfish and you can translate anything. It comes in really handy. I have found so much good info in Russian using this translator.

[Mark Plant]

I have found that Chrome browser's built-in Google Translate is the most accurate, though I resort to Babelfish and dictionaries as well.

Sepoy, if you chose specific regiments, I'm happy to help clarify details. And Cuprum and others will probably correct any mistakes I inevitably make. 

I expect to add a page about the Orenburg Cossacks and their uniforms over the Christmas break. They're next on my list.

[cuprum]

There is such site:
http://swolkov.narod.ru/bdorg/list-num01.htm
On it the short history of the majority of white military units is stated. A site, unfortunately, only in Russian.

[sepoy1857]

Thank You Cuprum! Outstanding site; I translate it with Google's Chrome translation feature (thanks to Mark for the tip on that) and it is a goldmine of information. Thanks Again. Is there similar information for Red organizations?

[Mark Plant]

The book Cuprum gives is an excellent resource. I have a paper copy and recommend it to anyone really into the RCW. I generally turn to a Google Translate version as my first option though, as it is much quicker.

It pays to know a few wrinkles in the translators: "shelf" is a regiment, "bellies" are plastoons (Cossacks on foot), "VSYUR" is the AFSR (i.e. Denikin's army). The most dangerous is that a few references to "division" should be battalion or demi-regiment (because the Russian words are very similar).

The similar Soviet one is their Encyclopedia of Civil War and Intervention in the USSR, but it is quite different. It goes only down to divisions without sub-units mostly but gives a more thorough potted history. I've never found an on-line version. The cavalry divisions are here: http://www.pygmywars.com/technical/orbats/redcavalry.html .

[cuprum]

Yes, I have a list of red military units on all fronts. But it in the form of the scanned pages and in Russian. To spread?

[Mark Plant]

Yes, I have a list of red military units on all fronts. But it in the form of the scanned pages and in Russian. To spread?

To what level Cuprum? Please tell me it is down to regiments!

[cuprum]

Unfortunately, only divisional level :-(

[Leapsnbounds]

Thank you the links were very helpful.  A shame that I can't read Russian.

[sepoy1857]

Hi Mark
Yes I have found a lot of odd phrases: Spare shelves, bellies, Housing (?) and a few others. Figured it was just something missed in the translation, but overall it turns out pretty well with chrome. I have come up with a full list of every unit in the Northwest army in English, but I need to clean it up a bit to make it readable.

If anyone would like a copy in Open Office Doc Format just shoot me a PM with your e-mail addy and I'll send it on to you. Working on compiling the Siberian Theatre next.

@ leapsandbounds: Use an online translator like Google's Chrome Browser; it translates the entire page into English. These sights are a wealth of information.

[Mark Plant]

Generally it's not missed in the translation, it's just the Russian word for "Shelf" and "Regiment" is the same and sometimes the translation software guesses the wrong way. Likewise one translation option for "Corps" is "Housing" and once in a while it gets it wrong.

Plastoons were actually named for their crawling, hence the "Bellies" business. Little do they know that's one word we keep in the original.

When I auto-translate documents to store, I always keep a Russian version too. Two reasons.

If you open a stored page from your desktop, Chrome will still offer to translate. But because it is live you can track down the source of these errors by  hovering with the mouse. Proper names tend to get translated -- the town of "Orel" is the same word as "Eagle", for example -- and this helps track them back.

Also the translators are getting better and better quite fast. So by keeping the original you get to have the most up-to-date version.

[Hammers]

Generally it's not missed in the translation, it's just the Russian word for "Shelf" and "Regiment" is the same and sometimes the translation software guesses the wrong way. Likewise one translation option for "Corps" is "Housing" and once in a while it gets it wrong.

Plastoons were actually named for their crawling, hence the "Bellies" business. Little do they know that's one word we keep in the original.

When I auto-translate documents to store, I always keep a Russian version too. Two reasons.

If you open a stored page from your desktop, Chrome will still offer to translate. But because it is live you can track down the source of these errors by  hovering with the mouse. Proper names tend to get translated -- the town of "Orel" is the same word as "Eagle", for example -- and this helps track them back.

Also the translators are getting better and better quite fast. So by keeping the original you get to have the most up-to-date version.

Solid advice there, Mark.