On February 23, 1939, the Soviet Union celebrated the 21st anniversary of the founding of the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army. But for one of the most famous Soviet commanders at that time, one of the five marshals of the Soviet Union, this day was the last in his life. Eighty years ago, Alexander Ilyich Yegorov was shot by the verdict of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR.
Until the second half of the 1930s, everything in the life of Alexander Yegorov was developing very well. On November 21, 1935, Yegorov became one of the five Soviet top military leaders who were awarded the title of Marshal of the Soviet Union, introduced two months earlier. Together with Egorov, Kliment Voroshilov, Mikhail Tukhachevsky, Semyon Budyonny and Vasily Blucher were awarded the highest rank. That is, Yegorov was among the five most authoritative and famous Soviet commanders of that time. And this was doubly surprising, since Yegorov came to the Red Army from the old Russian army, where he rose not to the rank of a non-commissioned officer or even to a lieutenant, but to a whole colonel.
Senior officer of the tsarist army, colonel - and marshal of the Soviet Union! It was difficult to imagine, but the awarding of the title to Yegorov was the initiative of Stalin himself. Moreover, Alexander Ilyich Yegorov in 1935 held the second most important military post in the country - he was the chief of the General Staff of the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army. Egorov held this position for six years - from June 1931 (then the position was called "Chief of Staff of the Red Army") until May 1937. In principle, Yegorov's origins and his past until 1917 played both against the red commander and in his favor. After all, he was a career officer, had a classical military education, received in the Russian Empire, extensive experience in the tsarist army, participated in the First World War as a combat commander.
Egorov came to the post of Chief of Staff of the Red Army in 1931 as an experienced 48-year-old man. Behind Yegorov's shoulders were 13 years of service in the Red Army and 16 years of service in the tsarist army. A graduate of the Samara classical gymnasium, Yegorov entered the military service as a volunteer in 1901, at the age of eighteen. He was assigned to the 4th Grenadier Nesvizh Field Marshal Prince Barclay de Tolly Regiment, and in 1902 he entered the Kazan Infantry Junker School, which he graduated with honors in 1905. Thus began the military career of the 22-year-old second lieutenant.
Egorov was assigned to the 13th Life Grenadier Erivan Regiment. Later, in his autobiography, Yegorov pointed out that since 1904 he joined the socialist revolutionaries. For young people of his age, sympathy for the revolutionary movement was very common. True, Yegorov was a career soldier, but even among the officers, especially of an ordinary origin (and he was from a bourgeois family), there were many sympathizers both for the Social Democrats, and, especially, for the Socialist-Revolutionaries.
Whatever it was, Yegorov's military career was developing very successfully. In January 1916, he was already a captain, served in the Alekseevsk military school, after which he was transferred to the Tiflis Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich military school as an assistant to the head of the school, and was responsible there for accelerated courses for the training of warrant officers for the active army. In August 1916, Yegorov was appointed acting headquarters officer for the instructions of the headquarters of the 2nd Caucasian Cavalry Corps, in the same year he was promoted to lieutenant colonel, after which he was transferred to the battalion commander, and then became the commander of the 132nd Bendery Infantry Regiment. Interestingly, Yegorov received the rank of Colonel half a month after the October Revolution of 1917 - due to the bureaucracy of the military-administrative institutions, the papers were delayed.
By the time of the February Revolution, when it was no longer possible to hide his political views, Yegorov officially joined the Party of Socialist-Revolutionaries. He, of course, remembered this twenty years later, during the years of Stalinist repressions. Nevertheless, in December 1917, Yegorov already took part in the preparation of the formation of the Red Army, and was responsible for selecting officers for its composition.
Since August 1918, Yegorov fought on the fronts of the Civil War. December 1918 to May 1919 he was the commander of the 10th Army of the Red Army, was seriously wounded, then in July - October 1919 he was the commander of the 14th Army of the Red Army. Egorov fought near Samara and Tsaritsyn, took part in the war with Poland. In October 1919 - January 1920. he served as commander of the Southern Front and later as commander of the Southwestern Front.
Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny spoke warmly about commander Yegorov during the Civil War. He emphasized that Yegorov was a major military specialist, but at the same time a man devoted to the revolution, ready to give his military knowledge to the new government. In Yegorov, modesty bribed, the future marshal did not seek to boast of his knowledge and command experience, but at the same time he willingly went on the attack with ordinary Red Army men. Courage has always been one of Yegorov's distinguishing features - during the First World War, he was wounded and contused five times.
After the end of the Civil War, Alexander Egorov continued to serve in the Red Army in command positions. As a former front commander, he no longer occupied low positions. So, from December 1920 to April 1921. Egorov commanded the troops of the Kiev Military District, from April to September 1921 - the troops of the Petrograd Military District, from September 1921 to January 1922. was the commander of the Western Front, and in February 1922 - May 1924. - Commander of the Caucasian Red Banner Army. In April 1924 - March 1925. Egorov commanded the troops of the Ukrainian Military District, and then, until 1926, served as military attaché in China. It was also a very responsible assignment from the Soviet leadership, since at that time the young Soviet Union sought to protect its own interests in China and help the local revolutionary movement.
After returning from China, Yegorov took up the issues of improving the weapons of the Red Army. May 1926 to May 1927 he served as deputy head of the military-industrial department of the Supreme Council of the National Economy of the USSR, and in May 1927 he returned to command positions - he became the commander of the troops of the Belarusian Military District. Egorov held this position until 1931.
Being an experienced man in military affairs and well versed in theory, Yegorov perfectly understood that tanks would play a key role in the upcoming wars. Therefore, he was among those Soviet commanders who insisted on strengthening the armored forces, the development of tank building. So, in the summer of 1932, Yegorov presented to the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR theses "The tactics and operational art of the Red Army in the early thirties", in which he defended the course on the maneuverability of operations in a future war. Egorov believed that the main task would be the simultaneous deployment of hostilities to great depths.
How significant Yegorov's figure was is evidenced by the fact that in June 1931 he was appointed Chief of Staff of the Red Army. Despite the past colonel of the old army, Stalin considered it possible to appoint Yegorov to this position, paying tribute to the military knowledge, experience and abilities of the military leader. The first half of the 1930s was the period of his maximum career rise for Yegorov. In 1934, he, a former tsarist officer, and even with a Socialist-Revolutionary past, was elected a candidate member of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b). In 1935, the People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR Kliment Voroshilov ordered the 37th Novocherkassk Infantry Division to be named after Yegorov. It was a very great honor to be honored with this during his lifetime.
It seemed that everything was going well for the Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army. On May 11, 1937, he was appointed First Deputy People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR Kliment Voroshilov. Formally, he was the second most important Soviet military leader. However, in the following year, 1938, clouds began to gather over Marshal Yegorov. The start was given by Yefim Shchadenko, appointed in November 1937, Deputy People's Commissar of Defense and Head of the Directorate for the Commanding Staff of the Red Army. A few days later, he prepared a denunciation of Marshal of the Soviet Union Alexander Yegorov.
Shchadenko described a meeting with Yegorov at the Barvikha sanatorium, where he arrived on November 30, 1937, together with A. V. Khrulev to visit the wife of the latter. Yegorov also came there. Allegedly having drunk hard with Khrulev and Shchadenko, Yegorov began to talk about the events of the Civil War and give them his assessment. According to Shchadenko, the marshal shouted:
Don't you know that when it comes to the civil war, everyone everywhere shouts to the point of hoarseness that Stalin and Voroshilov did everything, but where was I, why don't they talk about me ?! Why is the struggle at Tsaritsyn, the creation of the Cavalry Army, the defeat of Denikin and the White Poles attributed only to Stalin and Voroshilov ?!
Denunciation of the marshal lay on the table of the People's Commissar of Defense Voroshilov. A month and a half passed … On January 20, 1938, Stalin gave a solemn reception in the Grand Kremlin Palace. At it, Stalin proclaimed a toast in honor of the heroes of the Civil War, and they drank to Comrade Yegorov. But two days later, at a closed meeting of the country's military leadership, the leader subjected Yegorov, Budyonny and some other military leaders to sharp criticism. Yegorov got it for his "wrong" origin. In a speech delivered to the Soviet military elite, Stalin emphasized:
Egorov - a native of an officer's family, a colonel in the past - he came to us from another camp and, relative to the listed comrades, had less right to be awarded the title of Marshal, nevertheless, for his services in the civil war, we conferred this title.
Stalin ended his speech with a rather unambiguous hint, saying that if the military leaders continue to “waste their authority before the people,” the people will sweep them away and put forward new marshals in their place, who may and will be “less capable than you, for the first time, but they will be connected with the people and will be able to bring much more benefit than you and your talents. This statement was a very disturbing signal for Yegorov.
In January 1938, Alexander Egorov was relieved of his post as First Deputy People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR by a resolution of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. He was appointed commander of the troops of the Transcaucasian Military District, which was an obvious demotion. At the same time, the resolution of the Politburo of the CPSU (b) emphasized that Yegorov, who had been head of the Red Army headquarters for six years, worked in this post extremely unsatisfactorily, ruined the work of the headquarters, "entrusting it to the seasoned spies of the Polish, German and Italian intelligence services Levichev and Mezheninov."
On March 2, 1938, Yegorov was removed from the list of candidates for membership in the Central Committee of the CPSU (b). On March 27, 1938, Marshal of the Soviet Union Alexander Egorov was arrested. The career of the renowned military leader came to an end, and Yegorov's life was inexorably approaching a tragic end. Already on July 26, 1938, the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR Nikolai Yezhov presented to Stalin a list of persons to be shot.
There were 139 names on the list. Joseph Vissarionovich got acquainted with the list, crossed out Yegorov and wrote on the list: "For the execution of all 138 people." This last intercession of the leader gave Yegorov an extra six months of life. Pavel Dybenko, who was also on the list, was not deleted, and he was shot in July 1938.
On February 22, 1939, the Military Collegium of the USSR Supreme Court found Yegorov guilty of espionage and military conspiracy and sentenced him to death. On February 23, 1939, Alexander Ilyich Yegorov was shot. Since that time, the name of the former chief of the General Staff of the Red Army was consigned to oblivion. Only seventeen years later, on March 14, 1956, Alexander Ilyich Egorov was posthumously rehabilitated. However, the Soviet government did not pay special posthumous honors to him. We confined ourselves to a postage stamp issued in 1983 and a street named after him in the city of Buzuluk, where, 55 years before his execution, in 1883, the future marshal was born, who was destined to live a great life and end it tragically.
