Mikhail Dieterichs

Mikhail Diterikhs ( _ru. Михаил Константинович Дитерихс, May 17 1874 – 9 September, 1937) was a Russian general and a key figure in the White movement in Siberia during the Russian Civil War.

Diterikhs was born to a father of Czech ancestry who served a general of the Russian Imperial Army in the Caucasus. In 1900, Diterikhs graduated to the Pazhevsk cadet corps and served in Turkestan. He participated in the Russo-Japanese War after which he served in the Imperial Army's headquarters. As a general Diterikhs participated in World War I, developing the strategy of the South-Western front.In 1916 he headed the 3rd Russian Army's headquarters in Greece, and commanded an expedition corps in Thessaloniki.

In August of 1917 the Russian provisional government offered Diterikhs the position of Minister of War, which he refused. By November 3, 1917, Diterikhs was promoted to the chief of staff of the Russian army's headquarters, but managed to escape arrest during the Bolshevik revolution. Diterikhs escaped to Kiev, then made his way to Siberia where the Czechoslovak Legions asked him to head their staff. He helped the Czech Corps to organize their first resistance in May 1918, and commanded their Irkutsk-Chita-Vladivostok armed group.

Diterikhs was ordered by Admiral Kolchak to arrest the Ufa directory but delayed his move. After a few days on November 26, 1918 he finally agreed to obey to Kolchak's order and simultaneously resigned from the Czechoslovakian Corps after a period of tense relations.

From January to July of 1919 Diterikhs personally supervised the Sokolov investigation of the murder of Tsar Nicholas II. He later published a book on the subject when already living abroad titled "The Murder of the Royal Family and members of the House of Romanoffs in the Urals" ("Убийство Царской семьи и членов Дома Романовых на Урале").

In July 1919 Diterikhs took command of the Siberian army of Admiral Kolchak. In December 1919 he resigned after a bitter quarrel with Kolchak and emigrated to Harbin in Manchuria. Periodically Diterikhs figured in the negotiations between the Provisional Priamurye Government and other White forces. On June 8, 1922, Diterikhs returned to take over the army of Verzhbitski as well as the civil administration.

Based in the Amur Krai, Diterikhs proceeded to reorganize the army and civil government, much in the way General Pyotr Wrangel had done in the Crimea two years earlier. Taking a hands on approach, Diterikhs made efforts to enlist the support of the local population for his cause, calling his battle a religious crusade against Bolshevism. He had also tried, in vain, to convince the Japanese not to withdraw their military support.

Diterikhs founded the last Zemsky Sobor on Russian soil on July 23, 1922. On August 8, 1922, the sobor declared that the throne of Russia belongs to the house of Romanovs in the face of Grand duke Nikolai Nikolaevich Romanov. It also named Diterikhs as the ruler of the Provisional Priamur Government and its armed forces. On October 25, 1922, the Bolsheviks defeated Diterikhs's army, forcing an evacuation from Vladivostok to China and Korea via Japanese ships.

After May 1923 Diterikhs moved from a military refugee camp to Harbin where many White emigres settled. He became the head of the Far East chapter of the ROVS military organization. Diterikhs died in Shanghai in 1937.

References

* [http://www.hrono.ru/biograf/bio_d/diterihs.html Biography in the Russian Biographical Dictionary]