Commander of the West Russian Volunteer Army who led German Freikorps against Riga
Refusing Yudenich's order to join the Narva front, in October 1919 he proclaimed himself 'representative of Russian state power' and marched on Riga.
A Russian cavalry officer who styled himself 'Prince Avalov', he gathered tens of thousands of German Freikorps men who refused to leave Latvia into the West Russian Volunteer Army and attacked Riga in October 1919, only to be repelled. In exile he led a Russian fascist organization in Berlin and died in New York in 1973.
Career timeline
- 1901Enlisted as kapellmeister in the 1st Argun Regiment
- 1904–1905Fought in the Russo-Japanese War; awarded the Cross of St George
- 1918Head of recruitment and counterintelligence, Southern Army, Kiev
- 1919.04Formed a volunteer detachment at the Salzvedel POW camp
- 1919.07Formed the Count Keller detachment at Mitava
- 1919.09Proclaimed himself CinC of the West Russian Volunteer Army; marched on Riga in October
- 1925Published memoirs 'In the Struggle against Bolshevism'
- 1933Founded the Russian National-Socialist Movement (ROND)
Lieutenant general of aviation and founder of Soviet ice hockey, the leader's son
At his father's funeral in March 1953, a drunken Vasily arrived shouting 'They poisoned him!' Less than two months later he was under arrest.
The younger son of Joseph Stalin, he flew 27 combat missions as a fighter pilot during World War II and rose to lieutenant general of aviation. Appointed commander of the Air Forces of the Moscow Military District in 1948, he served until 1952; his rapid rise, becoming the youngest major-general in the Red Army at 24, owed much to paternal patronage. Yet beyond the role of 'the leader's son,' he was a sports administrator who, as the first chairman of the USSR Ice Hockey Federation, founded the VVS Moscow team and recruited Anatoly Tarasov as its inaugural coach, laying the institutional foundation for Soviet hockey. Arrested on charges of anti-Soviet agitation shortly after his father's death in 1953, he was sentenced to eight years and served time under an assumed name in Vladimir Central Prison.
Career timeline
- 1940Graduated Kacha Military Aviation School, commissioned as air force lieutenant
- 1941–1942Served in 16th Fighter Aviation Regiment, flew combat sorties
- 1943Commander, 32nd Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment
- 1944–1945Commander, 3rd Guards Fighter Aviation Division, then 286th Fighter Aviation Division
- 1946Promoted to Major General of Aviation; commander, 1st Guards Fighter Aviation Corps
- 1948–1952Commander of Air Forces, Moscow Military District; promoted to Lieutenant General of Aviation (1949)
- 1953Arrested; sentenced to 8 years for anti-Soviet agitation
- 1960–1962Released, re-arrested, exiled to Kazan; died of alcoholism
