DISPATCHES
FROM THE FRONT
Tales of Survival and Sacrifice
The Fall of Kazan
They warned us, you know. The peasants in the villages - those poor, hollow-eyed souls - said the dead were coming. We laughed at them. How could the dead come? The commissar called it counterrevolutionary nonsense, a plot by the Whites to frighten us. But when the night came, and the frost bit through even the thickest coat, we heard them. Quiet at first, like the creaking of snow underfoot. Then louder. So loud it was like the earth itself was groaning.
The barricades held until dawn, but it didn’t matter. They kept coming, climbing over their own to breach the walls. We fired until our rifles burned our hands. Some of us ran. Some of us didn’t. I remember turning back as I fled and seeing the commissar standing on the barricade, screaming at them, daring them to take him. And they did. Kazan died that day. We left it behind as ashes, and the dead kept walking.
—Private Mikhail Orlov, 3rd Red Guard Battalion, Red Army
The Siege of Orenburg
We held the bridge for three days, watching as the bodies piled in the river like driftwood. But the Greys wouldn’t stop. They clawed over their own corpses, slipping on the frozen flesh but never giving up. We fired until our ammunition ran out, and then we fought with bayonets and sabers. On the third night, the river froze. The Greys swarmed across ice, and all we could do was light barrels of oil and roll them onto the frozen river, praying the flames would melt a hole large enough to swallow the bastards. But it wasn’t enough. It was never enough.
On the fourth day, the order came to retreat. Not all of us obeyed. Some of us couldn’t bear to leave the city behind, even as it burned. I saw Captain Zverev at the barricade, his uniform soaked with blood, barking orders that no one could hear over the din. When the Greys breached the lines, Zverev drew his saber and charged. It wasn’t heroism. It was defiance. We followed, not because we thought we could win, but because we couldn’t imagine living with the shame of running. Orenburg is gone now, but I like to think that for a moment, the dead remembered what it meant to fear the living.
—Private Dmitri Voronov, 1st Orenburg Cossack Corps, White Army
Reclaiming Karelia
We crossed the border at dawn, the frost biting at our boots and the sky turning pale with winter light. Commander Haapala led the charge, his voice steady despite the chaos that lay ahead. For weeks, we had watched the Russians tear each other apart - Reds burning towns to ash, Whites digging trenches they couldn’t hold. They were too busy killing each other to notice us marching toward Karelia.
I carried my father’s rifle, an old Mosin-Nagant that had seen action in the Great War. The stock was worn smooth, its iron sights rusted, but it fired true. When we reached the village of Sortavala, the people were already waving the blue-and-white cross. They greeted us not as invaders, but as liberators. Some joined us, taking up arms to reclaim what had been stolen by the Russian empire for centuries. The Reds were quick to respond, of course. By nightfall, their artillery had turned the hills into craters. But we stood firm. This wasn’t just a battle for Karelia. It was a battle for Finland’s future, for a nation that would never again kneel to its neighbors.
—Private Ilmari Koivisto, Finnish Expeditionary Forces
Ghosts of Vladivostok
When we landed in Vladivostok, we expected resistance - trenches lined with desperate Russian soldiers, artillery roaring from the hills, anything to match the stories we had been told. Instead, we found silence. The docks were littered with abandoned crates, the streets choked with the stench of smoke and rot. It was as if the city had fled from itself.
Commander Takeda ordered us to secure the city center, but by the time we reached Svetlanskaya Street, we understood why the soldiers had retreated so quickly. They hadn’t left the city unguarded - no, they had left it in the hands of the yūrei. They shambled out of the ruins near the station, their uniforms tattered, their faces bloated with death. They moved like a tide, indifferent to bullets, immune to fear. Vladivostok wasn’t a city anymore. It was a graveyard.
—Corporal Hiroshi Nakamura, 12th Division, Imperial Japanese Army