I am looking forward to giving my talk at the Southampton International Boat Show about some of the British vessels in the Russian Civil War.
At the beginning of the British campaign in 1918, HMS Suffolk was on station in Vladivostok. Her guns were transported almost 5,000 miles by train to Perm where they were fitted to a barge and a tug and operated by Royal Navy personnel on the River Kama. In providing fire support against the Red Army, they set an unbroken record for operating furthest away from their ship. These crews were commanded by a young Royal Marine captain, who was awarded the DSO for his leadership and can be seen in the photograph below with the White Russian Navy’s commanders. During the talk, I will describe their close shave when they were almost captured and explain why they were treated scandalously by the British Consul.
Many other British merchant vessels and passenger ships were involved in the campaign and I will describe the intriguing journeys of three favourite workhorses that sailed the “Seven Seas”, concluding with the celebrated return of the Hampshire Regiment to Southampton aboard the HMT Tunisian in December 1919.
Rupert Wieloch 
Thank you for this information. I had a question about this topic. American archives at Columbia University (Bakhmeteff-archives) on Russian émigrés during and after the Russian Civil War are said to contain the personal documents and notes of the ‘White’ Admiral Vladimir Pilkin. He is said to have sailed from England in relative anonymity on a cargo ship called the ‘Gatortree’ to Rotterdam, and then on to Russia. However, there is no mention of this anywhere, neither in Great Britain nor in the Netherlands. What can you tell me about this and how can you help me with a historical research article? Hope you can help me (out) for my paper
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There is not much I can add to your research into Admiral Pilkin. I have checked my copy of The Evacuation of North Russia 1919 (an official UK government publication from 1920) and neither he, nor the Gatortree are mentioned. I see he ended up on the south coast of France in Provence, so perhaps that is your best start point. The first problem to solve is whether he served in North Russia, or the Black Sea with General Denikin, or with Admiral Kolchak in the White capital of Omsk. There was so much chaos in Vladivostok it would be difficult to trace him there. I suspect he might have escaped with the aid of the Royal Navy through the Black Sea; perhaps a trawl through the evacuation of Novorossiysk in March 1920 might be fruitful. Good luck with your project.
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