Melekhov prototype. The real characters of the book by M.A. Sholokhov "Quiet Flows the Don"

In No. 1818 of the Russkaya Mysl newspaper, a note was placed that, according to Sholokhov to a group of visitors, the Cossack Kharlampy Yermakov, from whom he copied one of the main characters of his novel Quiet Flows the Don, was shot by Stalin in 1925, during the period denunciations, purges and "Stalinist perversions".

Kharlampy Yermakov in the Rostov Department of the NKVD 30s.

I met Kharlampy Ermakov and for a long time I guessed, reading and rereading the chapters relating to the uprising, that it was he who was brought out in the novel as the main character. Although he is also mentioned in the novel, the role that he played during the uprising was assigned to Grigory Melekhov, whose appearance was similar to that of Kharlampy Ermakov, and it was emphasized that Grigory loved "this insanely brave commander."

In mid-July 1919, I was sent from Novocherkassk to the post of battery commander in the newly formed 4th Don. con. a brigade of the rebellious Upper Donets, which included, having received numbers: the 19th Elansky, 20th Veshensky and 24th Kalinovsky regiments and the 1st (which I accepted) and 2nd Veshensky batteries, which soon also received numbers 14 th and 18th Don. con. batteries, forming the 4th Don Kon.-artil. division. In this brigade there were many really existing heroes of Sholokhov's "Quiet Flows the Don", including Kharlampy Yermakov.

I remember, in early August, after the breakthrough of the gene. Mamantov, when the 20th regiment with the 14th battery, having taken the next. Makarovo, then moved to Wed. Karachan, where the battle began, someone pointed out to me one of the officers who was in the group of chiefs, saying:
- “Do you know who? This is Yermakov, assistant commander of the 20th regiment. During the uprising, he commanded a division."

I began to follow him with curiosity. Good horse, good posture. Height of average or above-average. Black-haired. Proper facial features. Sharp, slightly predatory nose. Listening to the chief of staff of the brigade, who explained the situation, he watched the enemy with keen, slightly narrowed eyes, without looking up. The habit of command was manifested in short remarks - it was clear that he had already assessed the situation and had his own opinion about it.

Having received the task, he, at the head of two hundred, quickly moved towards the enemy and disappeared into the folds of the terrain. Some time passed, and on the opposite slope of a wide beam, we saw the red infantry running in disorder, hurrying to hide from our cavalry in the nearest forest.
A few days later, parts of our brigade were operating in the rear of the Reds. In anticipation of the return of the demolition men sent to blow up the railway. the road to Balashev, the brigade stopped, sending two hundred with one gun of my battery in the direction of Tantsyrey, under the command of the captain Ermakov, to ensure our right flank. By evening, this barrier was attacked by two regiments of red cavalry, followed by infantry, and withdrew to the brigade. Soon, red lava appeared rushing into the attack, on which our batteries opened rapid fire, and the 19th and 20th regiments, who were secretly standing behind the forest, attacked in cavalry formation to the flank, overturned the enemy and began the pursuit. The red cavalry crushed their infantry and Ermakov returned after the battle, bringing 600 prisoners and 10 machine guns.

Soon after that, under pressure from Shorin's shock group, part of the 2nd Don. otd. the corps retreated behind Khoper and regrouped, and an equestrian group was formed from two brigades: the 4th and 5th. Having defeated the enemy at x. N.-Rechinsky and Art. Lukovskaya, the cavalry group turned south and on August 30 (September 12) launched an offensive on x. Popov (Fedoseevsky).
Under the blow of the 4th con. brigade, the red infantry began to retreat, lingering in convenient positions, but until the evening we were unable to liquidate it and the battle began to subside. Taking with me, just in case, one gun, I climbed to the plateau where the regiment commander was. Salnikov, commander of the 5th con. brigade, with its headquarters, as well as the headquarters of the 4th con. brigade and commander of the 20th regiment. From here it was perfectly visible the location of the Reds, who stopped not far from the farm at a respectful distance from our cavalry.

The proximity of the settlement and the approaching twilight made us think that the Reds would be able to escape. And suddenly everyone gasped...
A rider separated from the ranks of the 20th regiment and rushed towards the enemy in a quarry. Behind him two more, then a whole hundred, then the rest ...
- "What are they doing! ... What are they doing! ..." exclaimed the commander of the regiment. Salnikov.

The commander of the 20th regiment lashed the horse and galloped to the regiment. I opened fire to support the attack, which was developing brilliantly. Everyone watched with bated breath as, despite the indiscriminate fire of the Reds, the valiant Veshenians quickly approached the enemy and finally reached.

In a short time everything was over. More than 1,000 prisoners, machine guns, the entire convoy and a large transport of artillery shells fell into our hands.
Since the regiment commander was at the brigade headquarters at the time of the attack, his assistant was the initiator of it. The temperament of a descendant of one of Yermak's associates had an effect.

Twice slightly wounded in the August battles, Poesaul Yermakov was soon seriously wounded, evacuated and I never met him again. It must be assumed that by the time the Don Army left in the fall of 1919, he had not yet recovered from his wounds and remained in his village, where he met Sholokhov, who used him for his novel.

Ermakov had a brother, also an officer, promoted, like him, for military distinctions, to the rank of cornet or centurion. He commanded a hundred in the 20th regiment, but he did not die as described in the novel.

In mid-October 1919, the cavalry of Gen. Konovalov under his personal command, having defeated and destroyed the enemy in the area of ​​​​st. Mikhailovskaya, moved the next day to x. Uvarovsky and s. Kalmyk. The left-flank 4th brigade, having passed the village near the Kalmyk station, received a report from their quarters, sent to the village. Kalmyk, that they caught the Red lodgers there, from whom they learned that from the city of Novocherkassk, along the high road, a brigade of red infantry with two batteries was going to this village. Valiant Chief of Staff of the 4th con. brigade V.-St. N. A. Khokhlachev decided to intercept and destroy it. We turned off the road and trotted straight to the cut east of x. Bogdanovsky. I was ordered to drive the horses, but to arrive with a battery on time, so that at the moment of the attack, suppress the fire of the Red artillery.

Everything was played out like clockwork. The Reds, marching without any security measures, were suddenly attacked in the cavalry formation. In a few minutes, I silenced both of their batteries, which were trying to defend themselves with buckshot, and 5 guns were captured in full serviceability in the position, from which I opened fire on the enemy. The rest were abandoned nearby or captured by our cavalry. The Red Brigade was completely destroyed. We captured hundreds of prisoners, all the "wheels", machine guns and artillery. But in this battle, the brother of Kharlampy Ermakov, who commanded a hundred, was killed.

E. KOVALEV,
"Native Land", Paris.

Kharlampy Ermakov, from whom Sholokhov wrote Grigory Melekhov, was shot by the Chekists in 1927.

In January 1928, the publication of the first two books of The Quiet Flows the Don began in the October magazine. And six months before that, on June 17, 1927, by order of the PG OGPU SNK of June 15 of the same year, No. 0314147, a death sentence was carried out against Ermakov Kharlampy Vasilyevich, from whom Mikhail Sholokhov wrote Grigory Melekhov.

There is no doubt that the Veshenskaya Cossack, Kharlampiy Yermakov, Knight of the Four Georgievs, red cavalry commander of Budyonny and leader of the anti-Soviet insurgents in the Donetsk district in 1919, is the prototype of Melekhov. This is evidenced by numerous studies, and the Sholokhov scholars themselves for the most part agree that it is the vivid prototype of the protagonist that is the core of the novel, which is not inferior in importance to Leo Tolstoy's "War and Peace".

In Soviet times, especially during the years of Stalinism, Sholokhov denied any connection between Melekhov and Yermakov, however, over the years, answering journalists' questions about the novel Quiet Flows the Flowston, he spoke more and more often about Kharlampy Yermakov as a prototype of the protagonist. “Ermakov is more suited to my plan, what Grigory should be,” Sholokhov admitted in 1974 to journalist Konstantin Priyma. - His ancestors - a Turkish grandmother, - four St. George's crosses for courage, service in the Red Guard, participation in the uprising, then surrender to the Reds and a trip to the Polish front - all this fascinated me in the fate of Yermakov. It was difficult for him to choose a path in life, very difficult. Ermakov revealed to me a lot about the battles with the Germans, which I did not know from literature ... So, Grigory's experiences after the murder of the first Austrian by him - this came from the stories of Ermakov.

The novel ends with the return of the Cossack home. In this regard, the end of the fourth book of the novel looks logical, seemingly broken, despite the strong final chords: “Kneeling down, kissing his son’s pink cold little hands, he repeated only one word in a strangled voice: - Sonny ... sonny ...

It was all that remained in his life, which still made him related to the earth and to all this huge world shining under the cold sun. Sholokhov succeeded in putting the last end of the novel on disturbing intonations prophesying a tragic and inevitable end.

However , it could not be otherwise . The continuation of The Quiet Don was already written in the OKPU, and so carefully that the investigation file No. 45529 Kharlampy Ermakov, which is currently in the KGB and FSB Museum of the Rostov Region, consists of three volumes.

The Don Cossacks developed a special style of internal democracy and love of freedom over the course of several centuries, so the Leninist government did not have to wait for obedience. Of particular danger was the military training of the Cossacks. Boys from the age of five cut sedge with checkers, mastering the merciless Baklanovsky blow, and to coming of age could cut the enemy in half on a gallop. At the same time, they were excellent riders, they shot accurately, they fought well, they were brave, but stupidly did not climb under the bullets, coming up with cunning and sudden attacks. In this vein, Yermakov's assessment is noteworthy given by Semyon Budyonny, who, according to Sholokhov, "remembered him from the 1st Cavalry Army and spoke of him as an excellent grunt, equal in strength to Oka Gorodovikov's saber strike." There were a majority of such fighters among the Don people.

Realizing this, the Orgburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) issues a circular letter dated January 24, 1919, which says: "Given the experience of the civil war with the Cossacks, recognize the only right thing is the most merciless struggle against all the tops of the Cossacks by their total extermination". Bolshevik punitive operations begin on the Don, in response to which a Cossack uprising breaks out, in which Yermakov participates.

This was imputed by investigator Donobsud Stakler to him when he was arrested on April 21, 1923: “with the advent of the Whites, ataman Bagaevsky promoted Yermakov to the rank of centurion for an active struggle against the revolutionary movement, and after a while - yesaul. At the time of the uprising, Yermakov personally hacked to death 18 captured sailors.” The accusation is based on the testimony of 8 witnesses.

Meanwhile, in the same criminal case there are documents demonstrating Ermakov's philanthropy. "I, undersigned citizen of the village of Bazki, a former member of the party and a former Red Army soldier Kondratyev Vasily Vasiliev, voluntarily joined the Red Army in 1918, and my family remained in Bazki, Vyoshenskaya volost. During the uprising, they wanted to exterminate or beat my family, but Mr. Ermakov did not allow it. There are dozens of such letters, as well as petitions for release, and hundreds of people who signed them.

It just so happened that Kharlampy Yermakov was not a convinced monarchist and understood the need for reforms. According to him, "In January 1918, I voluntarily joined the Red Army, held command positions all the time and in 1919 was the head of the artillery depot of the 15th Inza division." He explains his participation in the Upper Don uprising circumstances captured by the Whites, who forced him to fight against the Petrograd and Moscow regiments. Perhaps so, but most likely his insurgency was a meaningful reaction to terror. “There is no smallest village, wherever the Cossacks suffered from the Bolsheviks,” local newspapers wrote at that time.

On August 14, 1919, Lenin makes a political maneuver and addresses the Cossacks: " ... Worker-peasant the government is not going to dekulakize anyone, does not go against the Cossack life, leaving the Cossacks their villages and farms ... ". Unable to defeat the Cossacks, but mastering the art of propaganda to perfection, the Bolsheviks re-recruit them to your side. Ermakov "in 1920 again voluntarily enters the Red Army, bringing with him a detachment of 250 sabers." He participates in battles on the Polish and Southern fronts, as well as against the gangs of Makhno, Yushchenko and Belov. But , having hardly returned home , he is arrested under Art . 58 paragraphs 11 and 18 of the Criminal Code.

Ermakov's first imprisonment in the Rostov Correctional House lasted a little over two years. In the summer of 1924, Kharlampy Vasilievich, 33 years old, was released on bail, and a year later his “case” was terminated, with a strange wording for “inexpediency”. This was the personal merit of Ermakov, who competently, no worse than a professional lawyer, built his defense and accurately counter-argued all the points of the accusation.

On January 20, 1927, Yermakov's second arrest took place. The Chekists did not manage to gain a legislative basis for prosecution, and even more so to knock out their Kharlampy Vasilyevich "testimonies" against anyone. The Cossack did not slander himself, as the investigators of the Rostov OGPU wanted. By this time, the Central Executive Committee of the USSR approved the Decree of the Presidium of May 26, 1927 on the out-of-court procedure for considering cases, on the basis of which the OGPU continuation of The Quiet Don ended with two short sentences: “Ermakov - shoot. File the case."

Alexander Sitnikov

According to svpressa.ru

Kharlampiy Vasilyevich Ermakov

Esaul. The prototype of Grigory Melekhov - the main character of the novel by M. A. Sholokhov "Quiet Flows the Don"

Mikhail Sholokhov, the world-famous Soviet novelist, Nobel Prize winner in 1965, creating The Quiet Flows the Don, made his countryman the main character, whom he knew personally and with whom he talked a lot about his life. Today it can be argued that the prototype of Grigory Melekhov was indeed the legendary personality of the Cossack Don in the First World War and the Civil War - Kharlampy Vasilyevich Ermakov ...

This man, even for the times of the Civil War in Russia, has an amazing fate in terms of personal tragedy. He lived for only a little over 36 years. Of these, ten years was in military service, but what?! For five years he faithfully served "God, the Tsar and the Fatherland" in the old Russian army. He served in the Red Army for three and a half years. He served in the White Army for a year and a half.

And besides, he spent two and a half years in Soviet prisons until he was shot as a "counter-revolutionary" and "enemy of the people." The signature under the decree on the execution of Kh. V. Ermakov was put by the notorious in the history of the USSR Genrikh Yagoda, who was involved in the mass Stalinist repressions, who in 1927 was still only the deputy chairman of the OGPU.

And Kharlampy Yermakov began his life in the same way as the vast majority of the Don Cossacks at the turn of two centuries.

... Born on the farm of Bazki (or the farm of Antipovsky) of the village of the Vyoshenskaya Region of the Don Cossacks (now the Rostov Region). He grew up and was brought up in a working healthy Cossack family. He graduated from the Vyoshenskaya two-year parochial school.

I read a lot, doing self-education. Kharlampy Ermakov thoroughly replenished his education, already in the service. In 1914, he took courses for a training team and general education in Novocherkassk; in 1917 - short-term training at the Novocherkassk Cossack military school; in 1921 - red courses in Taganrog.

The young Cossack began active service in January 1913. Until 1916, he served in the 12th Don Cossack Field Marshal Prince Potemkin-Tavrichesky Regiment, which was on the Russian-German front. He received the rank of cadet, was a platoon officer.

There is no doubt that Kharlampy Yermakov was a true hero of the First World War, since in the first two years of hostilities the brave Don Cossack of the village of Vyoshenskaya (like Sholokhov's Grigory Melekhov) was awarded the full St. George's bow. That is, he had all four St. George's crosses - 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th degrees - and four St. George medals "For Courage"!

At the same time, it should be taken into account that the Cossack Ermakov was wounded 14 (!) times during this time and had a shell shock. In November 1916, having received a severe wound in his left hand, he was sent from the front for treatment to the Rostov hospital, from where he was then sent home.

In June 1917, he was mobilized into the 2nd Don Cossack Reserve Regiment, stationed in the village of Kamenskaya. According to the Statute of St. George, the full St. George Cavalier is promoted to officer - to the cornet. In Kamenskaya, he met October 1917 and the beginning of the Civil War on the Don, which became the most difficult and controversial period in his life, as well as in the fate of the Sholokhov hero.

... Initially, cornet Kharlampy Ermakov sided with the Soviets, joining the detachment of F. G. Podtelkov. In a battle with a detachment of Kaledinsky officer V. M. Chernetsov (the legendary hero of the White Don) near the village of Likhoy, he is wounded and sent home.

In the village of Vyoshenskaya, in February 1918, he was first elected chieftain, then chairman of the executive committee of the same village, and soon, when power changed again, he became an assistant to the village chieftain. But peaceful life lasted for Ermakov only two months.

In the summer and autumn of 1918, Kharlampy Yermakov served in the ranks of the White Don Army of General Krasnov. The Cossack officer fights on the anti-Bolshevik Northern Front as part of the 26th Don Cossack Regiment, where he was a hundredth wahmister. The regiment fought in the Tsaritsyno and Balashov directions.

In December 1918, together with the Cossacks of his regiment, he left the front and returned home to the village of Vyoshenskaya. There, by the will of fate (like Grigory Melekhov), he takes an active part in the Upper Don (or Vyoshensky) uprising of the Cossacks of 1919, which broke out on March 12.

First, the cornet Kharlampy Yermakov was elected commander of the insurgent hundred, then commander of the Cossack regiment, and soon after that he was appointed commander of the detachments of the Kargaly region of military operations, reduced to a division under his command.

Naturally, the question arises: why did the recent front-line soldier, who abandoned the ranks of the White Cossack army of General Krasnov, tired of the war with its bloodshed, take up arms again? What made him do it? Why did the hero of the First World War again begin to participate in a new war for himself, the Civil War?

The reason was weighty and deadly for a man who wore officer epaulettes on his shoulders, and “royal” crosses and medals on his chest. The red military units that entered the Upper Don, having received a circular letter from the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) dated January 24, 1919, signed by Ya. In many places, it resulted in a genuine genocide of the Cossack population, mass executions of Cossacks - old people and people of military age.

Officer Kharlampy Yermakov, in accordance with the requirements of the above document, was subject to unconditional destruction as a "class enemy." Therefore, he ended up in the ranks of the participants in the Vyoshensky uprising, who defended their lives, their families, their way of life and the right to be called Cossacks.

The cornet Ermakov commanded his consolidated division until the connection of the Vyoshensky rebels with the White Army. When a group of Major General A. S. Secretov approached the village of Vyoshenskaya, he surrendered command of the division and was appointed an officer for assignments at his headquarters. In August 1919, in a battle near the village of Filimonovskaya, he was wounded in his left hand and again ended up in the hospital.

In October, Kharlampy Yermakov, who had recovered, was appointed assistant commander of the regiment for the economic part, then for the combat part. The new ataman of the All-Great Don Army, General A.P. Bogaevsky, first promotes him to centurions, and a month later - to captains.

White troops in the South of Russia, after the failed Denikin campaign against Moscow, were retreating. Part of the Don White Cossack Army went to the Kuban. In early March 1920, Ermakov, near the village of Georgievskaya, with a large group of Donets, was captured by the red-greens.

White Cossack prisoners of war soon join the ranks of the Red Army. Red Army soldier Kharlampy Yermakov takes part in the capture of Novorossiysk. Soon he becomes the commander of a cavalry squadron, then takes over the affairs of the commander of the 3rd separate cavalry regiment.

At the head of this regiment, which became part of the 1st Cavalry Army, he takes part in the battles on the Polish front, participates in the capture of the city of Lvov. Then his regiment is transferred, along with other Budyonnovsky units, to the Southern Front, against the Russian army of General Wrangel.

Yermakov feels that distrust of the former white officer in his person, despite all his military prowess, has not weakened among the red command. He is twice filtered in the Special Departments of the 1st Cavalry Army and the Southwestern Front. But nothing compromising him is found.

Ermakov was reassigned to the 82nd Cavalry Regiment, which included many Don Cossacks. After the end of the war in the Crimea, the regiment is transferred to the Don, which still lives with the echoes of the Civil War. There he is assigned to fight the rebel "gangs" of Popov and Andrianov.

In the middle of 1921, a new appointment follows - the commander of the school of junior commanders (divisional cavalry school) in the city of Maikop. Ermakov continued to grow through the ranks in the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army (RKKA) ...

But the clouds were already gathering over his head. The commander of the North Caucasian Military District, a loyal companion of Stalin, one of the leaders of the military opposition at the VIII Congress of the RCP (b) K. E. Voroshilov launched a merciless struggle against former officers. In February 1923, the senior painter Kharlampy Yermakov was dismissed from the ranks of the Red Army.

He returns to the village of Vyoshenskaya, to Bazka's native farm. He is invited to work in the village council. But in the same 1923, Ermakov was arrested. The investigation turned up no evidence against him, and the following year the former white and red officer is released on bail. The decision to release was made by the regional court.

Ermakov meets with a young, already well-known writer Mikhail Sholokhov, his fellow countryman. He tells him about his fate, about participating in wars, about serving in three armies - the Russian Imperial, White and Red. The fate of the hero-Cossack, striking in personal tragedy, struck Sholokhov. This is how the idea of ​​creating "The Quiet Flows the Don" with its main character Grigory Melekhov appeared.

In January 1927, Kharlampy Ermakov was arrested again. But it was not possible to fabricate a case against him. Then Moscow intervened - the judicial board of the United Main Political Directorate of the USSR, which takes the execution order.

Rehabilitation took place only in August 1989. The Presidium of the Rostov Regional Court canceled the decision of the OGPU collegium and dismissed the case against Kharlampiy Ivanovich Ermakov "due to the lack of corpus delicti."

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In chapter

On the channel "Russia" ended the show of the series "Quiet Don". It has already become the fourth version of the adaptation of the great novel by Mikhail Sholokhov, who, using the example of his hero, managed to show the catastrophe of human fate in the era of the Civil War. Did Grigory Melekhov really exist? Sholokhov was asked this question thousands of times after the publication of the work.

For half a century, the writer stated unequivocally: his hero is a character completely invented. And only on the slope of his life did the writer Sholokhov admit: Melekhov really had a real prototype. But it was impossible to talk about this, because the prototype of Grigory, by the time the first volume of The Quiet Flows the Don was published, lay in a mass grave, shot as an "enemy of the people."

It is worth noting that Sholokhov nevertheless made attempts to reveal the secret. So, back in 1951, at a meeting with Bulgarian writers, he mentioned that Grigory had a prototype. However, to further attempts to extort details from him, he answered with silence. Only in 1972, the Nobel laureate named literary critic Konstantin Priima the name of the one from whose biography he almost completely copied the image of his hero: the full Cavalier of St. George, the Upper Don Cossack Kharlampy Vasilyevich Ermakov.

From red to white and back

“Almost completely” is not a figure of speech in this case. Now that the researchers have studied The Quiet Don from the first to the last line, comparing the plot with the life of Ermakov, we can admit that Sholokhov's novel came out almost biographical, down to the smallest detail. Remember how "Quiet Flows the Don" begins? "Melekhovsky yard - on the very edge of the farm ...". Here is the house in which Kharlampy grew up, also stood on the very outskirts. And even the appearance of Grigory is written off from him - Ermakov's grandfather actually brought a Turkish wife from the war, which is why the swarthy children went. Unless Kharlampiy went to war not as an ordinary Cossack, but as a platoon officer, having managed to graduate from the training team. And he fought, apparently, he was desperate - in two and a half years he earned four soldier's St. George's crosses and four St. George's medals, becoming one of the few full cavaliers. However, at the end of 1917 he caught a bullet and returned to his native farm.

On the Don, as in the whole country, confusion and vacillation reigned at that time. The Whites with Ataman Kaledin called to fight further for the "single indivisible", the Reds promised peace, land and justice. Coming out of the Cossack wilderness, Ermakov, of course, joined the Reds. Soon the commander of the Cossacks Podtelkov appoints an experienced warrior as his deputy. It is Ermakov who smashes the detachment of Colonel Chernetsov - the last counter-revolutionary force on the Don. However, immediately after the battle, a fatal turn occurs. Podtyolkov ordered the execution of all the prisoners, for example, personally slaughtering a dozen of them.

“Killing without trial is not the point,” Yermakov objected. - Many were taken on mobilization, and many were intoxicated due to their darkness. The revolution was not made in order to let dozens of people into dispersal. After that, Ermakov, citing a wound, left the detachment and returned home. Apparently, that bloody execution firmly stuck in his memory, since with the beginning of the Cossack uprising on the Upper Don, he immediately joined the whites. And again, fate threw a surprise: now the former commander and comrade Podtelkov with his headquarters himself was captured. "Traitors to the Cossacks" were sentenced to hanging. Ermakov was instructed to carry out the sentence.

And again he refused. The military field court sentenced the apostate to be shot, but his hundreds of Cossacks threatened to stage a riot and put the matter on the brakes.

In the Volunteer Army, Ermakov fought for another year, rising to the rank of colonel

shoulder strap However, by that time the victory had passed to the side of the Reds. Having retreated with his detachment to Novorossiysk, where the defeated parts of the White movement boarded steamships, Yermakov decided that the Turkish emigration was not for him. Then he went to meet the advancing squadron of the First Cavalry. As it turned out, yesterday's opponents had heard a lot about his fame as a soldier, not an executioner. Ermakov personally received Budyonny, giving him command of a separate cavalry regiment. For two years, the former white captain, who changed his cockade to a star, alternately fought on the Polish front, crushed Wrangel's cavalry in the Crimea, chased Makhno's detachments, for which Trotsky himself presented him with a nominal watch. In 1923, Ermakov was appointed head of the Maikop cavalry school. From this position, he retires, settling in his native farm. Why did they decide to forget the owner of such a glorious biography?

Judgment without trial

The archives of the FSB department for the Rostov region still store volumes of investigative file No. 45529. Their contents provide an answer to the above question. Apparently, the new government simply could not leave Ermakov alive.

According to his military biography, it is not difficult to understand: from one side to the other, the brave Cossack did not run at all because he was looking for a warmer place for himself. “He always stood for justice,” Ermakov’s daughter said years later. So, returning to civilian life, the retired red commander soon began to notice that he actually fought for something else. “Everyone thinks that the war is over, and now she is going against her own, worse than the German one…” he once remarked.

In Bazka's farm, Ermakov was met by young Sholokhov. The story of Kharlampy, who rushed about in search of the truth from the Reds to the Whites, interested the writer a lot. In conversations with the writer, he spoke frankly about his service, not hiding what they did during the Civil War, both white and red. In the Kharlampy file there is a letter sent to him by Sholokhov in the spring of 1926, when he was just conceived of The Quiet Flows the Don: “Dear comrade Ermakov! I need to get some information from you regarding the era of 1919. This information relates to the details of the Upper Don uprising. Let me know what time would be more convenient to come to you?

Naturally, such conversations could not go unnoticed - the detective of the GPU rushed into Bazki.

It is unlikely that the Chekists brought Yermakov on himself - as follows from the investigation file, the former white officer was already being monitored.

In early 1927, Ermakov was arrested. Based on the testimony of eight witnesses, he was found guilty of counter-revolutionary agitation and participation in a counter-revolutionary uprising. Fellow villagers tried to stand up for their fellow countryman. “Very, very many can testify that they survived only thanks to Yermakov. Always and everywhere, when catching spies and taking prisoners, dozens of hands reached out to tear apart those caught, but Yermakov said that if you allow the prisoners to be shot, then I will shoot you like dogs, ”they wrote in their appeal. However, it went unnoticed. On June 6, 1927, the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee, chaired by Kalinin, allowed Kharlampiy Yermakov to be sentenced "out of court." After 11 days, he was executed. The prototype of Grigory Melekhov by that time was 33 years old.

On August 18, 1989, by the decision of the Presidium of the Rostov Regional Court Kh.V. Ermakov was rehabilitated "due to the lack of corpus delicti". Ermakov's burial place, for obvious reasons, remained unknown. According to some reports, his body was thrown into a mass grave in the vicinity of Rostov.