Born to a poor peasant family from theDon Cossack region in southern Russia, Budyonny was drafted into theImperial Russian Army in 1903. He served with distinction in adragoon regiment during theFirst World War, earning all four classes of theOrder of St. George. When the Russian Civil War broke out Budyonny founded theRed Cavalry, which played an important role in the Bolshevik victory; Budyonny became renowned for his bravery and was the subject of several popular patriotic songs. In 1922 he also became commander of all the troops in the north Caucasian military district. While serving as inspector of the Red Army's cavalry (1924–37) and commander of the Moscow military district (1937–40), as a political ally of Joseph Stalin, he became one of the original fiveMarshals of the Soviet Union. He was one of the two most senior army commanders that survived theGreat Purge and in post at the time ofGerman invasion of the USSR in 1941. After the Soviet forces under Budyonny's command were routed in thebattles of Kiev andUman, he was removed from frontline command. He received the blame for many of Stalin's military strategic errors in the early part of World War II, but he was retained in the Soviet high command. In 1953 he resumed his post of inspector of the cavalry.
Budyonny was a staunch proponent ofhorse cavalry. During the Great Purge, he testified againstMikhail Tukhachevsky's efforts to create an independenttank corps, claiming that it was so inferior to cavalry and illogical that it amounted to "wrecking" (sabotage). After being told of the importance of thetank in the coming war in 1939, he remarked, "You won't convince me. As soon as war is declared, everyone will shout, 'Send for the Cavalry!'"[2]
Budyonny was born into a poor peasant family on the Kozyurin farmstead near the town ofSalsk in theDon Cossack region of the southernRussian Empire (nowRostov Oblast). Budyonny's family stemmed fromVoronezh province, formerly part ofSloboda Ukraine, and was likely of Ukrainian descent (the Ukrainian wordбуденний -budenny can be translated as "everyday" or "common").[3] He worked as a farm labourer, shop errand boy,blacksmith's apprentice, and driver of a steam-driventhreshing machine, until the autumn of 1903, when he was drafted into theImperial Russian Army.
He became a cavalryman reinforcing the 46th Cossack Regiment during theRusso-Japanese War of 1904–1905. After the war, he was transferred to the PrimorskDragoon Regiment. In 1907, he was sent to the Academy for Cavalry Officers in theSt. Petersburg Riding School. He graduated first in his class after a year, becoming an instructor with the rank of junior non-commissioned officer. He returned to his regiment as a riding instructor with a rank of senior non-commissioned officer. At the start ofWorld War I, he joined a reserve dragoon cavalry battalion.[4]: 9–12
During World War I, Budyonny was the 5th Squadron's non-commissioned troop officer in theChristian IX of Denmark 18th Seversky Dragoon Regiment, Caucasian Cavalry Division on theEastern Front. He became famous for his attack on a German supply column nearBrzeziny, and was awarded theSt. George Cross, 4th Class. However, there was general ineptitude among the officers under whom he served (primarily Caucasian aristocrats who received commissions based on their social standing).[4]: 12–16
In November 1916, the Caucasian Cavalry Division was transferred to theCaucasus Front, to fight against theOttoman Turks. He was involved in a heated confrontation with the squadron sergeant major regarding the officers' poor treatment of the soldiers and the continual lack of food. The sergeant major struck out at Budyonny, who retaliated by punching the ranking officer, knocking him down. The soldiers backed Budyonny during questioning, claiming that the sergeant major was kicked by a horse. Budyonny was stripped of his St. George Cross, though he could have faced acourt martial and death.[4]: 16–22
Budyonny would go on to be awarded the St. George Cross, 4th class, a second time, during theBattle of Van. He received the St. George Cross, 3rd class, fighting the Turks near Mendelij, on the way toBaghdad. He then received the St. George Cross, 2nd class, for operating behind Turkish lines for 22 days. He received the St. George Cross, 1st class, for capturing a senior non-commissioned officer and six men.[4]: 22–26
After theFebruary Revolution overthrew the Tsarist regime in 1917, Budyonny was elected chairman of the squadron committee and a member of the regimental committee. When the Caucasian Cavalry Division was moved toMinsk, he was elected chairman of the regimental committee and deputy chairman of the divisional committee.[4]: 29–30
Returning toPlatovskaya, Budyonny was elected deputy chairman of the Stanitsa Soviet of Workers', Peasants', Cossacks' and Soldiers' Deputies on 12 January 1918. On 18 February, he was elected to be a member of the Salsk DistrictPresidium and head of the District Land Department. On the night of 23 February, Budyonny organized a force of 24 men to retake Platovskaya from thewhite guards, but was soon joined by a large number of new recruits. By morning, they had freed 400 inhabitants and killed 350 White Russian soldiers. His force now consisted of 520 men, from whom, on 27 February, he formed what was later recognised[5] as the first 120-strongsquadron of red cavalry. Eventually he was electedbattalion commander.Budyonny met Stalin andVoroshilov in July 1918. Both supported the idea of creating a cavalry corps to fight on the Bolshevik side in theRussian Civil War; but whenLeon Trotsky, the People's Commissar for War, visited south Russia soon afterward, he told Budyonny that cavalry was "a very aristocratic family of troops, commanded by princes, barons, and counts."
Despite Trotsky's objections, the 1st Socialist Cavalry Regiment was formed inTsaritsyn in October 1918, commanded byBoris Dumenko, with Budyonny as deputy commander.[4]: 43–45, 50–53, 70, 79, 85, 89 Budyonny joined theCommunist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) in 1919. During the summer of 1919, while the Red Cavalry were in action against the White GeneralAnton Denikin, Trotsky described them contempuously as "Budyonny's corps — a horde, and Budyonny — theirAtaman ring leader...He is today'sStenka Razin, and where he leads his gang, there will they go: for the Reds today, tomorrow for the Whites."[6]
However, in October 1919, Budyonny pulled off a spectacular victory when, in the greatest cavalry battle of the civil war, he attacked and defeated the White army corps commanded byKonstantin Mamontov. On 25 October, Trotsky sent a dispatch forecasting that the White army in the south would never recover from this defeat, and hailing Budyonny as "a true warrior of the workers and peasants".[7]
When Poland declared independence, there was no agreement between its government and the Soviet authorities over where the border would be. In April 1920, Budyonny's cavalry was assigned to driving the Polish army out of Ukraine. On 5 June, he took part in recapturingKiev, and over the next few days successfully drove the Poles westward. At the start of the war with Poland, he was assigned to the southern front, which Stalin commanded. On 15 August, he asked the commander-in-chief of Soviet forces in Poland,Mikhail Tukhachevsky, for authority to swing north and assist in capturing Warsaw. With Stalin's agreement, he attempted to captureLviv first. Unsuccessful, he eventually diverted to the North but by that time Tukhachevsky's forces had been driven back, forcing a general retreat. After Budyonny's army was defeated in theBattle of Komarów (one of the biggest cavalry battles in history), he was forced to withdraw onto Soviet-held territory.
Budyonny took part in the reconquest ofCrimea, the final phase of the Russian Civil War.
In 1920, Soviet songwriterDmitry Pokrass wrote the song "Budyonny's March", which was one of the first songs to become widely popular throughout the Soviet Union.[8]
The writerIsaac Babel rode with Budyonny's cavalry in Poland, and published a series of short stories about the experience, which achieved worldwide acclaim as one of the greatest contributions to Soviet literature – but which offended Budyonny, who made a "rare and furious foray into print" in March 1924, demanding that the Red Cavalry's reputation should be protected against "slander" by a "literary degenerate". This provoked a response fromMaxim Gorky, then the most famous living Russian writer, defending Babel, but in 1928, Budyonny returned to the attack in an open letter to Gorky accusing Babel of "crude, deliberate and arrogant slander", which Gorky said was an "undeserved insult".[9]
William Reswick, a correspondent for the American agency AP, described a celebration backstage at an opera house around the 10th anniversary of the revolution, at which:
Budyonny, the celebrated cavalry, an amateur dancer and admirer of the ballet joined us. He was in high spirits. After helping himself to some vodka, he offered to outdance any professional in theKamarinskaya. BallerinaAbramova took up the challenge. Thereupon Budyonny called over a harmonic player and went into a spin, cutting aCossack caper with the ease and grace of a youngster.[10]
From 1921 to 1923, Budyonny was deputy commander of theNorth Caucasian Military District. In 1923, Budyonny arrived inChechnya with a proclamation from theCentral Executive Committee announcing the formation of the Chechen Autonomous Region. The same year, he was also appointed assistant commander of theRed Army's cavalry. During 1924–37, he was Inspector of Cavalry of the Red Army. He spent a great amount of time and effort in the organization and management of equestrian facilities and developing new breeds of horses.
Budyonny was considered a courageous and colourful cavalry officer, but displayed disdain for the tools of modern warfare, particularly tanks, which he, along withGrigory Kulik, saw as "incapable of ever replacing cavalry".[11] This brought him into direct conflict with Tukhachevsky, who was in charge of weapons developed, and foresaw the imminence of mechanized warfare. Even after Tukhachevsky's arrest, the Red Army never stopped developing large scale mechanized corps, and each front had numerous such corps attached as a second echelon force by 1940–41, but Budyonny was never criticised for being on the wrong side of the argument, being a faithful ally of Stalin and Voroshilov.
In 1935 Budyonny was made one of the first fiveMarshals of the Soviet Union. Three of these five were executed in theGreat Purge of the late 1930s, leaving only Budyonny and Voroshilov.
Early in the Great Purge, Budyonny was appointed commander of theMoscow Military District, possibly because Stalin was nervous that there would be a military coup after he had decided to move against two of the most popular Bolsheviks,Nikolai Bukharin andAlexei Rykov. When Bukharin was trying to defend himself, during a plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, on 26 February 1937, Budyonny barracked him, calling him aJesuit.[12]
On 24 May 1937, Budyonny was copied into a resolution proposing to arrest Marshal Tukhachevsky, and the high ranking party officialJanis Rudzutaks. He wrote on it: "It's necessary to finish off this scum."[13]
On 11 June, he was one of the judges at the trial of Tukhachevsky and seven other Red Army commanders, whose execution was the start of a massive purge of the Red Army officer corps. At the trial, he provided testimony that Tukhachevsky's efforts to create an independenttank corps was so inferior tohorse cavalry and so illogical that it amounted to deliberate "wrecking".[14] Half a century after the trial, the Soviet authorities admitted that all eight defendants were innocent. The 'evidence' consisted of confessions forced out of them under torture. Two weeks after their execution, Budyonny sent a memo to Voroshilov disclosing that Tukhachevsky initially withdrew his confession, yet Budyonny concluded that all eight were "patented spies ... since 1931, and a few of them even earlier were worming their way into our ranks ever since the beginning of the revolution" .[15]
Later, as the Great Purge continued, theNKVD came to interrogate and arrest Budyonny; Budyonny's response was to arm himself with his serviceNagant M1895 revolver and call Stalin to demand he have the agents removed.[11] Stalin complied and the event was not discussed again.
By December 1937, Budyonny had been allocated a largedacha with orchards, raspberry and gooseberry bushes, a workhorse, a black cow and a pig weighing 250 kilograms (550 lb).[16]
In July–September 1941, Budyonny was Commander-in-Chief (главком,glavkom) of the Soviet armed forces of the Southwestern Direction (Southwestern andSouthern Fronts) facing theGerman invasion ofUkraine. This invasion began as part of Germany'sOperation Barbarossa which was launched on June 22. He also served as an original member of theStavka of the Supreme High Command, the highest Soviet body of military command during theGreat Patriotic War, from the start of the war until February 17, 1945.[17] Operating under strict orders from Stalin (who attempted tomicromanage the war in the early stages) not to retreat under any circumstances, Budyonny's forces were eventually surrounded during theBattle of Uman and theBattle of Kiev by Nazi forces. The disasters which followed the encirclement cost the Soviet Union 1.5 million men killed or taken prisoner.This was the largest encirclement in military history.
On 13 September 1941, Stalin sacked Budyonny as ascapegoat, replacing him withSemyon Timoshenko. He was never allowed to command troops in combat again. First he was put in charge of theReserve Front (September–October 1941), then made Commander-in-Chief of the troops in the North Caucasus Direction (April–May, 1942), Commander of theNorth Caucasus Front (May–August, 1942) - but was removed from this post as the Germans approached, and appointed Cavalry Inspector of the Red Army (from 1943), as well as various honorific posts.
Despite his bravery as a cavalry commander, the view of his fellow officers was that Budyonny was demonstrably incompetent at commanding an army in a mechanized war. Soon after the war, MarshalKonev told the Yugoslav communist,Milovan Đilas: "Budyonny never knew much, and he never studied anything. He showed himself to be completely incompetent and permitted awful mistakes to be made."[18] German Field MarshalRundstedt, commander ofArmy Group South in the battles of Kiev and Uman, said after the war: "Of Budyonny, who commanded the armies facing me, a captured Russian officer aptly remarked — ‘He is a man with a very large moustache, but a very small brain.’"[19]
Because of his exceptional Civil War record and public popularity, he continued to enjoy Stalin's patronage and suffered no real punishment for the disaster in Kiev.
Budyonny died ofbrain hemorrhage on 26 October 1973, at the age of 90. He was buried with full military honours in theKremlin Wall Necropolis, in one of the twelve individual tombs located between theLenin Mausoleum and theKremlin wall. Pallbearers at his funeral included the General Secretary of the CPSULeonid Brezhnev and the USSR Minister for Defence, MarshalGrechko.
Budyonny wrote a five-volume memoir, in which he described the stormy years of civil war as well as the everyday life of the First Cavalry Army. He was frequently commemorated for his bravery in many popular Soviet military songs, includingThe Red Cavalry song (Konarmieyskaya) andThe Budyonny March.Budenovka, a part of Soviet military uniform, is named after Semyon Budyonny. He was also frequently named in the cavalry-oriented works of Isaac Babel.[20] Babel had originally begun covering Budyonny as a writer for a Soviet newspaper during the Polish–Soviet War.[21]
Budyonny, who was a renowned horse breeder, also created a new horse breed that is still kept in large numbers in Russia: theBudyonny horse, which is famous for its high performance in sports and endurance.
Semyon Budyonny was also an amateurbayan player; a few instrumentalvinyl records were issued in the USSR featuring a duo with his friend, cossack bayanist Grigory Zaytsev, titled as "Duo of bayanists" (Дуэт баянистов).[22]
Budyonny's first wife was an illiterate Cossack whose forename and patronymic were Nadezhda Ivanovna. They were married in 1903, immediately before he joined the army. He did not see her for seven years. After the Bolshevik revolution, she travelled with the Red Cavalry, organising food and medical supplies. In 1920–23, the couple lived with the Voroshilovs inYekaterinoslav. They moved to Moscow in 1923.
In 1924, Nadezhda Ivanovna was killed by a gunshot. Her death led to numerous stories. Mikhail Soloviev, a Soviet army officer who settled in the west after being captured early in theGerman–Soviet War, alleged that Budyonny killed his wife after she had confronted him over his infidelity.[23] Budyonny told his daughter by a subsequent marriage that she shot herself, possibly unintentionally, when their marriage was failing.[24]
In 1925, he married a singer, Olga Stefanovna Mikhailova, who was around half his age, the daughter of a railway worker fromKursk. After their marriage, she entered the Moscow Conservatory, graduating in 1930, then joined the Bolshoi Theatre. According to the Croatian communist,Ante Ciliga, members of the Communist Youth (Komsomol) were so shocked to see him with his new bride at a public banquet, kissing her hands, that they threatened to create a scandal which the party authorities "had to use a very heavy hand to stifle".[25][26] Budyonny divorced her before September 1937.[citation needed]
Next, Budyonny married Olga's cousin, Maria Vasilevna, a student 33 years his junior, who cooked for him after Olga's arrest. This marriage lasted until his death. They had two sons, Sergei, born 1938, and Mikhail, born 1944, and a daughter, Nina, born 1939.[27]
Order of Lenin, eight times (23 February 1935, 17 November 1939, 24 April 1943, 21 February 1945, 24 April 1953, 1 February 1963, 22 February 1968, 24 April 1973)
Order of the Red Banner, six times (29 March 1919, 13 March 1923, 22 February 1930, 8 January 1941, 3 November 1944, 24 June 1968)
^McSmith, Andy (2015).Fear and the Muse Kept Watch, The Russian Masters – from Akhmatova and Pasternak to Shostakovich and Eisenstein – under Stalin. New York: New Press. p. 125.ISBN978-1-62097-079-9.
^abMontefiore, Simon Sebag (September 14, 2005).Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar. Vintage.ISBN1400076781.
^Getty, J.Arch and Naumov, Oleg V. (1999).The Road to Terror, Stalin and the Self-Destruction of the Bolsheviks, 1932–1939. New Haven: Yale U.P. pp. 397, 412.ISBN0-300-07772-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Hill, Alexander, 1974– (2017).The Red Army and the Second World War. Cambridge, United Kingdom.ISBN9781107020795.OCLC944957747.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
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