On this day in History General Shkuro

February 19th, 1886, is the birthday of General Andrei Shkuro. He was born in the stanitsa of Pashkovskaya in Kuban. Shkuro graduated from Nikolayev Cavalry School in 1907 and served in the Kuban Cossack Army. In World War I Shkuro became the commander of a special guerrilla unit which executed several daring raids behind Austrian-Hungarian and German lines. During World War I, Shkuro was promoted to the rank of colonel. In the spring of 1918, after the establishment of the Bolshevik régime, Shkuro organized an anti-Bolshevik Cossack unit in the area of Batalpashinsk in the Caucasus. In May and June 1918 he raided Stavropol,Yessentuki and Kislovodsk. After officially joining Denikin's White Army, he became the commander of the Kuban Cossacks brigade which soon increased in size and became a division. In May 1919 Shkuro, as a young lieutenant-general, had a whole cavalry corps of Cossacks under his command. After the defeat of the Whites, Shkuro lived as an exile, primarily in France and Serbia. For the first few years he and a few other Cossack partners, displaying their great horsemanship, performed in circuses as trick riders across Europe. In addition, he continued to conduct anti-Soviet activities. Russian émigré memoirs depict Shkuro as a very lively man who enjoyed social gatherings with plenty of dancing, singing, drinking, and vivid storytelling about times past.