V. I.

Lenin

454

To:   THE REVOLUTIONARY MILITARY COUNCIL OF THE SOUTHERN FRONT [1]

25. X. 1919

Comrade Smilga and other members of the R.M.C. of the
Front and Armies

I strongly recommend the bearer, Comrade Stepan
Nazarov, a Bolshevik, whom I have known personally for a
long time.

He and other Ivanovo-Voznesensk comrades have formed an intelligently organised group (of from 300 to 500 men)
for all-round service to and revitalisation of the whole
army.

I warmly recommend the comrades and earnestly request that all measures be taken to ensure they will not be lost,
but allocated correctly and carefully. I particularly ask
to be informed of the receipt of this letter and of where
and how the comrades are assigned.

V. Ulyanov (Lenin )
Chairman, Council of Defence

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Notes:
[1]
This letter was written in connection with the departure for the
front of Ivanovo-Voznesensk Communists who had been called up. A meeting of the city Party organisation took place in
Ivanovo-Voznesensk on October 3. It called on every member of the
Party to devote himself to the cause of routing Denikin’s army
and instructed the Party organisations to begin mobilising
Communists for the front. The first party of mobilised men were
seen off to the front on October 22. On October 24, the
mobilised Ivanovo-Voznesensk Communists arrived in Moscow. Lenin