Mamontov Raid
마몬토프 습격
The cavalry raid of 10 August to 19 September 1919 in which General Konstantin Mamontov's 4th Don Cossack Corps swept through the rear of the Red Southern Front. Breaking through the junction of the 8th and 9th Armies, it took Tambov, Kozlov, Yelets, Voronezh and other towns in turn and wrecked railways and depots. It badly disrupted the Southern Front's August counteroffensive without stopping it, and it is also remembered for plunder on a large scale.
In depth
The corps, some 6,000 cavalry, 3,000 infantry and 12 guns, crossed the Khopyor on 10 August, broke the 40th Division and rode into the rear. Mamontov passed through Tambov (18 August), Kozlov (23 August), Lebedyan (28 August), Yelets (31 August) and Kastornoye (6 September) and held Voronezh on 11 and 12 September. With Kozlov, the seat of the Southern Front headquarters, lost, the Reds had to form an "Internal Front" of about 23,000 men under Mikhail Lashevich. The corps also raised a Tula volunteer infantry division from prisoners and local volunteers, and it rejoined the White lines near Novy Oskol on 19 September.
Judgements differed. Yegorov, the Southern Front commander, later wrote that the raid drew off five rifle divisions, Budyonny's cavalry corps and more, and wrecked the railways and supply, but that the peasant rising it counted on never came. Denikin thought Mamontov could have achieved a far greater turn had he sought the destruction of enemy troops rather than booty, and Wrangel called his conduct "criminal", saying he avoided battle and came back loaded even with church plate. The raid left many weapons behind in the Tambov region that were later used in the peasant uprising.