Sometimes history allows itself to do quite extraordinary things. For example, it endows the commander with immortality not for a brilliant victory, but for the defeat and death suffered, although it was an example of a true manifestation of officer honor, but did little to defeat the enemy. One of these heroes of the past was General Alexander Vasilyevich Samsonov, whose brief biography formed the basis of this article.
The first-born in the family of a retired lieutenant
After retiring, lieutenant Vasily Vasilyevich Samsonov settled with his wife Nadezhda Yegorovna in the Kherson province, where they had their own estate. On November 14, 1859, a son was born in their family, who was given the name Alexander in holy baptism. Samsonov dreamed of a military career for his firstborn, and therefore, upon reaching the required age, he got him a job at the Kyiv Vladimir Military Gymnasium, and after graduating from it, at the St. Petersburg Nikolaev Cavalry School. From the Kyiv chestnuts, the young man went to the banks of the Neva.
Alexander Vasilyevich Samsonov, whose date of birthfell on a period when Russia, having been defeated in the Russian-Turkish war of 1853-1856, was rapidly increasing its combat power and striving to regain its former glory, it was not by chance that it chose its own path in life. In those years, officers enjoyed special honor in society, and serving in the army was a matter of honor for every nobleman.
First battles and career growth
He was barely eighteen when, after graduating from college and having been awarded the title of cornet, Samsonov first came under fire from the battles of the Russian-Turkish war (1877-1878). It was as a result of the heroism shown by him during this military campaign, and not because of class privileges, that the young officer Alexander Vasilyevich Samsonov received the right to enter the General Staff Academy.
The years following graduation from the academy became the steps of a rapid career growth for an honest and diligent officer. Cities changed, military districts where Samsonov had a chance to serve changed, but invariably he was among the most valued, and, accordingly, promoted commanders.
Battles in the Far East
Russian-Japanese war met already in the rank of Major General Alexander Vasilyevich Samsonov. Photos of the officer began to appear on the pages of newspapers. He, as an experienced commander, was instructed to lead the Ussuri cavalry brigade, which on May 17, 1905, in a bloody battle near Yudzyatun, destroyed a squadron of Japanese troops. In the next major battle of this war, which took place soon near Wafangou,Samsonov's Cossacks managed to bypass the Japanese division and, striking from the rear, decided the outcome of the operation.
In the future, the general had a chance to become a participant in almost all the most significant episodes of the war that unfolded on land. Under his command, the Cossacks attacked the enemy near Gaizhou, Tashichao and Liaoyang. When a turning point occurred in the course of the war, and the Russian troops were forced to retreat, the Cossack regiments subordinate to the general, together with the horse battery, covered their retreat, holding back the enemy with all their might. For merits during this campaign, Alexander Samsonov was awarded three military orders, a golden saber and promoted to lieutenant general.
Between two wars
In the early post-war years, General Alexander Samsonov, who had already become one of the most prominent Russian military leaders by that time, occupied a number of command posts in the leadership of the Warsaw Military District and then was appointed Ataman of the Don Cossacks. Everywhere he performs the duties assigned to him with his characteristic energy and conscientiousness. In May 1909, the sovereign orders him to leave for Turkestan to take up the post of governor-general of the region, and in addition, the commander of the Turkestan military district and the ataman of the Semirechensk Cossack army.
Alexander Vasilyevich managed to show the same outstanding abilities in administrative work as in military affairs. He managed to largely stop the conflicts that arose on ethnic grounds between the local population and the Russians, most of whom weremilitary.
In addition, he launched a wide educational activity among the inhabitants of Turkestan, the vast majority of whom were illiterate. And a special merit can be called the initiative to create irrigation systems, which made it possible to establish the cultivation of cotton. His works were duly appreciated by the sovereign. Samsonov was promoted to cavalry general.
The start of a new war
The First World War found Samsonov in the Caucasus, where he was vacationing with his family. Together with the message about Russia's entry into a new massacre, Alexander Vasilyevich received an order to urgently arrive in Warsaw, where he was waiting for the post of commander of the Second Army. The general command of the Northwestern Front was carried out by General Zhilinsky.
According to his plan, the Second Army of Samsonov and the First Army, led by General P. Rannenkampf, were to go on the offensive, which is part of the overall East Prussian operation. Despite the fact that the commanders of both armies pointed out the need for careful preparation for such large-scale military operations, orders were received from the Headquarters and personally from the commander of the troops, Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolayevich, for an immediate action.
The reason for such a rush was the difficult situation in which Russia's allied France found itself, and the personal appeal of Ambassador M. Paleolog to Nicholas I, in which he literally begged the Russian monarch to immediately order the offensive and prevent the defeat of their army. As a result, Alexander Vasilyevich Samsonov, a cavalry general andan experienced commander, was forced to launch an offensive, the failure of which he was sure in advance.
Death March
In East Prussia at that time the forces of the Eighth German Army were concentrated, and it was to destroy it, according to the disposition, that two Russian armies advanced. The troops under the command of P. Rannenkampf were the first to enter the battle with the enemy. Launching their attack at dawn on 4 August, they forced the Germans to retreat. At the same time, Samsonov's army made a powerful march, covering eighty kilometers in three days and entering the territory of East Prussia.
Such a swift maneuver, dictated by tactical considerations, was extremely dangerous for the Russian army. On the territory devastated by the war, the advanced units were significantly separated from the rear convoys with food and ammunition. As a result of this, people have been starving for several days, and cartridges and shells have run out. The horses were left without food. But, despite repeated reports of a catastrophic situation, the high command demanded that the pace of the offensive not be reduced.
On the eve of the encirclement
Suddenly another danger became apparent. On the way, the Second Army did not encounter serious resistance, and it seemed that the enemy was deliberately creating conditions for them to advance unhindered. Experienced commander Alexander Vasilyevich Samsonov, whose biography has been connected with the army from an early age, intuitively felt the impending trap.
He shared his fears with the commander of the North-Western Front, Zhilinsky. However, due to incompetence, he did not sufficiently realize the seriousness of the situation and gave a number of orders that aggravated the already difficult situation in which Samsonov's troops found themselves.
Premonition did not deceive the experienced commander. The German command, using the extensive network of railway lines created in the prewar years, transferred a significant military contingent to the Second Army area. On August 13, the Sixth Corps, located on the right flank, was attacked and defeated, and the next day, on the left flank, the First.
The defeat of the Second Army
In the current critical situation, Alexander Samsonov personally comes to the front line, wanting to raise the morale of the troops, but, having studied the situation, he understands the hopelessness of the situation. The last hope was to support the army of P. Rannenkampf. Joint actions aimed at connecting with it could save the units entrusted to Samsonov from complete encirclement and death, but the commander of the First Army, having shown criminal slowness, did not fulfill his task.
As a result, three Russian corps, totaling one hundred thousand people, were surrounded. Participants in those events recalled that the vast majority of soldiers and officers were demoralized. The awareness of impotence to influence the situation, and extreme exhaustion caused by a many-day march through enemy territory, and physical weakness from prolonged starvation also had an effect. Most of them subsequently died, and onlya small part was able to escape from the enemy ring.
Court of Conscience
Consciousness of personal responsibility for the failure of the operation entrusted to him and the death of people who wholeheartedly believed him, caused a severe mental trauma that Samsonov could not cope with. On August 30, 1914, that is, just a month after the start of the war, he committed suicide. Eyewitnesses said that on that day, the general, unexpectedly for everyone, retired to the forest, from where a shot soon rang out.
In the irony of fate, which so unfavorably disposed of the end of the life of this worthy man, the honest Russian officer Alexander Vasilievich Samsonov, the photo of the last months of his life completes the article, remained in the memory of posterity not as a winner who fanned himself with swearing glory, but as an example of how a person decides on himself the verdict of the highest court - his own conscience.
