White Power, Cossacks and Peasants in Southern Russia. Confrontation and Cooperation. 1918-1919

The book is devoted to one of the key themes of the Civil War in Russia - the interaction between political power and the peasant majority of the country's population. The events of 1917-1922 gave rise to numerous variants of such interaction on both the red and white sides. All sides of the confrontation involved the village in armed struggle, as it was impossible to expect military victory otherwise. At the same time, communication with the "muzhik" was a widely recognized Achilles' heel of the White movement. The inability to create confidence in the arrival of a stable power, dispel old social phobias, and mobilize the village under national banners became one of the obvious reasons for the failure of the white struggle. Thus, a detailed analysis of the experience of successful cooperation between white military and political entities and the rural population is all the more important. One such plot unfolded on the border of the Don Army Region and the Saratov Province, against the backdrop of the famous battle for Tsaritsyn. Energetic officer V.K. Manakin, with the support of Don Ataman P.N. Krasnov, managed to create a combat-ready formation from the peasants of southern Saratov province - the Saratov Corps. The history of this military formation is examined in the contexts of the Civil War in the South, peasant-Cossack relations, and the peculiarities of military construction of the Don Army, the Volunteer Army, the Southern Army, and the Astrakhan Army. The mood and behavior of the Saratov peasants are compared with those of the peasants from Stavropol, Astrakhan, and Voronezh provinces.