Sergei Nicholas Kournakoff

An excellent read. At times it read rather like a Hollywood script, but then the brutality of war and revolution came back.
I was surprised to find that Kournakoff, after settling in the US, became a writer for the Daily Worker and, apparently, a Russian spy.
Reading his memoir, he is very critical of Kerensky and the Provisional Government. His few mentions of the Communists are rather neutral. On the whole he comes over as an ardent supporter of the autocracy.
Unlike Vladimir Littauer (qv. Russian Hussar) Kournakoff was not a professional soldier. He trained as an engineer prior to the war, enlisting on the outbreak, eventually finding his way into the Caucasian Native Cavalry Division - the Savage Division - with whom he served up to the Kornilov affair in Petrograd. His book ends just as the Division rides off toward Petrograd in August 1917. What happened to Kournakoff from then until he arrived in the US is not recorded, which is a pity as whatever happened to make him embrace communism must have occurred in this period.… (plus d'informations)