Early Life and Russian Civil War
Skoblin was a cavalry officer in the Kornilov Division of the White Russian Army during the Russian Civil War, 1918–1920. He was known for both his bravery and cruelty. Red soldiers captured by Skoblin's men were hanged or shot on the spot. It is said he met his wife, Plevitskaya during the war. The romantic version is that Skoblin captured his wife during a raid against the Red Army. She was Nadezhda Plevitskaya, a committed Bolshevik considered to be a great beauty, who had been traveling the front singing and entertaining Red Army troops. Plevitkskaya used her considerable charms to seduce Skoblin and escape the gallows. Through her influence, Skoblin became a Bolshevik intelligence agent for the Cheka and later for the Soviet Union's NKVD.
Read more about this topic: Nikolai Skoblin
Famous quotes containing the words civil war, early, life, russian, civil and/or war:
“I wish to see, in process of disappearing, that only thing which ever could bring this nation to civil war.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“[In early adolescence] she becomes acutely aware of herself as a being perceived by others, judged by others, though she herself is the harshest judge, quick to list her physical flaws, quick to undervalue and under-rate herself not only in terms of physical appearance but across a wide range of talents, capacities and even social status, whereas boys of the same age will cite their abilities, their talents and their social status pretty accurately.”
—Terri Apter (20th century)
““The life of reason”Ma phrase once used by people who thought that reading books would deliver them from their passions.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“In Western Europe people perish from the congestion and stifling closeness, but with us it is from the spaciousness.... The expanses are so great that the little man hasn’t the resources to orient himself.... This is what I think about Russian suicides.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“If I thought that I could speak with discrimination and impartiality of the nations of Christendom, I should praise them, but it tasks me too much. They seem to be the most civil and humane, but I may be mistaken.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind”
—Stephen Crane (1871–1900)