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An Inconceivable Odyssey 

The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 1914-1920 
 
 

Nicholas William Fixler 
University of Minnesota 

 
 

Abstract 
A great deal of the material produced regarding the Czechoslovak Legion that fought in 
Russia focuses on its story rather than the reasons for its remarkable successes. This article 
begins by briefly summarizing the Legion’s activities in Russia, then outlines the various 
military and geopolitical challenges that beset this army, and finally explores why the 
Legion was able to overcome these difficulties, which, I argue, was due to the Legion’s 
unorthodox structure, its adaptable diplomatic policy, and its ability to supply itself. Along 
with secondary sources, newspaper articles, and contemporary accounts of both the 
Legion’s campaigns and the Allied intervention in Siberia, this article primarily uses the 
memoirs of Gustav Bećvář, a former Legionnaire who published The Lost Legion, an account 
of his time in the Legion, in London in 1939. 

 
 

Article 
Introduction 
The Czechoslovak Legion’s achievements on various Russian fronts between 1914 and 
1920 cannot be understated. A small force of men, initially fighting under the banner of the 
Russian Empire, was forced, during the Russian Civil War, to transform itself into an army 
and to make its way across thousands of miles of desolate and potentially hostile territory, 
going all the way from the Ukraine to Vladivostok in the Russian Far East. For much of its 
existence, this detachment operated as an army without a country. It was an army whose 
aim was to aid in the creation of a country through military service with the Entente 
against the Central Powers. Even after that aim had been fulfilled with the creation of 
Czechoslovakia on October 28, 1918, the situation on the ground remained unchanged, and 
the Czechoslovak Legion stayed in Russia until its final evacuation was complete in 1920.1 
The Legion was obliged to conduct its campaign on unfamiliar terrain, surrounded by 
foreign forces, and without the prospect of steady supply and reinforcement from the 
Czech lands, as Czechoslovakia did not achieve independence until October 28, 1918 and 
was unable to support an expeditionary force in the middle of Russia even after it had 
achieved self-rule, and the Legion itself was blocked from overland supply routes by the 
Red Army. 
 

                                                           
1 John F. N. Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 1914-1920 (New York: Columbia University Press, 
1991), 148-156. 



 
 

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With hindsight, the odds stacked against the soldiers of the Czechoslovak Legion seem 
nearly insurmountable to any modern army. They belie the question of how was the Legion 
able to successfully fight across and extricate itself from Russia? However, the Legion was 
not an ordinary army. Predating the creation of Czechoslovakia, in the eyes of the Entente 
the Legion was one of the greatest legitimating forces for the nascent Czechoslovak 
liberation movement. It behaved akin to a state unto itself, as, for all intents and purposes, 
it was one. It was viewed as a co-belligerent with the Entente, though the Volga-Ural 
campaign would show this to be a double-edged sword. It had its own command hierarchy, 
independent from a central government prior to Czechoslovak independence, and far too 
removed for effective governmental control afterwards. Though it did receive some blanket 
directives from Czechoslovak political leadership, the Legion by and large pursued its own 
foreign policy. It also maintained its own independent economy as it traveled through 
Russia from 1918 onward. In this regard, it can be viewed as a Czechoslovakia in absentia. 
Despite the difficulty of its journey through Russia, the various military forces and political 
entities it had to contend with, and the lack of a supply and reinforcement base, the 
Czechoslovak Legion was mostly able to maintain its cohesion as a unit and successfully 
extricate itself from Russia to an independent Czechoslovakia in 1920. It did so through an 
organized yet unorthodox structure that allowed flexibility when dealing with the warring 
Soviet and White Russian governments as well as with British, French, American, and 
Japanese interests, and successfully creating and maintaining its own supply base.  
 
This article focuses solely on the Czechoslovak Legion that fought in Russia. Through four 
sections, this article first examines the origin of the Legion in Imperial Russia. It then 
briefly traces the Legion’s various campaigns across Russia. The final two sections are 
devoted to analyzing the various obstacles the Legion faced during its time in Russia and 
the solutions it undertook in response to these challenges. This article shows that, thanks 
to its unusual structure and state-like attributes, including an independent foreign policy 
through an independent command and its own mobile economic infrastructure, the 
Czechoslovak Legion had the wherewithal to fight in and withdraw from Russia 
successfully.  

 
The Legion’s Creation 
World War One provided the impetus for the creation of the Czechoslovak Legion. There 
was a large expatriate population of around 120,000 Czechs and Slovaks living in the 
Russian Empire by 1914.2 This fact did not go unnoticed by the Tsarist government, which 
had issued a proclamation at the outset of hostilities declaring the First World War to be a 
conflict between Germanic and Slavic cultures, regardless of the government’s actual 
interest in independence movements.3 Thus, Saint Petersburg was extremely receptive 
to—or at least eager to pay lip service to—the idea of pan-Slavism, wherein Russia would 
lead and protect a united Slavic world, and to a military force that embodied this vision. In 
this context, the Czechoslovak unit was made all the more attractive as it could provide 
valuable service against the Central Powers. Sensing Russian interest, the Czechoslovak 

                                                           
2 Ibid., 14. 
3 Henry Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand (New York: Arno Press, 1971), 20. This is a reprint of an 
account of the Legion first published in 1926. 



 
 

75 
 

nationalist committees, which had been formed in Russia, were only too happy to assist in 
this endeavor.4 Despite dissension both within the various Czechoslovak political 
organizations in Russia and between those organizations and the Russian government, the 
formation of the Česká Družina, or Czech Brigade, was approved by the Russian Army 
Council on August 20, 1914.56 This was the initial unit of what became the Czechoslovak 
Legion. 
 
Despite the enthusiasm surrounding its formation, the Brigade had a relatively muted 
beginning. The first volunteer drive within the Czechoslovak expatriate community was 
only able to produce 777 men willing to serve in the Brigade’s ranks. This inability to 
recruit would continue to challenge the Družina as well as the later Legion.7 Furthermore, 
many of the Brigade’s higher-ranking officers were Russian rather than Czech or Slovak.8 
Despite this, several talented Czech and Slovak soldiers went on to have distinguished 
careers in postwar Czechoslovakia. For example, Stanislav Čeček, Zdeněk Fierlinger, and 
Vojtěch Klecanda joined the Družina at its inception and helped provide the backbone for 
its later success.9  

 
The Legion’s Activities 
Following some further expansion to reach a strength of around 1,000 men, the Družina 
was assigned to the southwest front to fight against Austro-Hungarian forces.10 It soon 
distinguished itself in combat and in intelligence gathering.11 Until 1917 the Družina was 
engaged primarily in intelligence rather than combat, as the ability to glean information 
from the Czech and Slovak troops fighting for the Central Powers was deemed to be more 
important than fighting on the front lines.12 Then, in the late spring and summer of 1917, 
the Družina saw real action as an entire unit for the first time and distinguished itself in 
Galicia at the Battle of Zborov.13 This was a critical juncture in the history of the Legion. It 
was at this point that the Legion evolved from an intelligence unit into a fully fledged 
fighting force. At the close of the 1917 offensive, the former Družina, now part of the 1st 
Czech Division, was sent behind the lines in Ukraine for rest, replenishment, and 
reorganization.14 By the end of 1917, the Czechoslovak Legion had become a reality, 
consisting of two divisions and at least 28,000 soldiers.15 During the interim, another 

                                                           
4 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 16. 
5 Ibid., 18-21. 
6 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 22. 
7 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 17. 
8 George Kennan, “The Czechoslovak Legion,” The Russian Review 16, no. 4 (October 1957): 4. 
9 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 26. 
10 Ibid., 27. 
11 Ibid., 29. For example, seven men under then-Lieutenant Čeček captured 127 prisoners on December 24-
25, 1914. 
12 Ibid., 42. 
13 Ibid., 54-55; Edwin P. Hoyt, The Army Without a Country (New York: Macmillan, 1967), 48. At Zborov, the 
Družina captured over 4,000 enemy troops while suffering less than 1,000 casualties of its own. 
14 Vladimir Nosek et al., “The Odyssey of the Czecho-Slovaks,” in Source Records of the Great War, vol. 6, eds. 
Charles F. Horne et al. ([New York]: National Alumni, 1923), 148.  
15 Ibid.; Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 57; Hoyt, The Army Without a Country, 56. There are 
numerous estimates of force size within the sources I have used for this article. Bradley gives the most 



 
 

76 
 

revolution had convulsed Russia in November 1917, this time advancing the cause of 
Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks.16 Czechoslovak leadership, worried that the Legion 
might find itself entangled in the Russian Civil War, counseled a policy of nonintervention, 
and, outside of some early November engagements in Kiev, this was adhered to.17 The 
Legion spent the remainder of 1917 actively abstaining from the conflict.18 
 
At the beginning of 1918, it was clear that the situation in Ukraine was becoming 
untenable. The country had declared independence in January 1918, but was heavily 
dependent on Germany, and, in any event, it was roundly defeated by the Red Army at the 
end of the month.19 The Czechoslovak Legion, though ostensibly neutral in “Russian” 
internal affairs, was still an army of a belligerent power fighting on the side of the Entente, 
and it became increasingly threatened by German and Austro-Hungarian forces throughout 
the late winter of 1918, being compelled to make a fighting retreat out of Kiev at the 
beginning of March.20 
 
On March 15, 1918, Czechoslovak representatives concluded an agreement with the Soviet 
government for the Legion’s free and unmolested passage across Russia to Vladivostok, and 
units immediately began to embark on trains.21 However, this agreement broke down by 
mid-May 1918 due to an incident between the Legion, repatriated prisoners of war, and 
Bolshevik officials in Chelyabinsk.22 As a result, the Legion had to engage in open conflict 
with Red forces in order to withdraw from Russia, and, by September, it had fought its way 
into control of a contiguous portion of almost the entire Trans-Siberian Railway, the sole 
transportation artery in 1918 that crossed the whole of Russia and upon which the 
Czechoslovak forces were moving.23 It seemed that a rapid redeployment to the Western 
Front was in the offing. However, this was not to be. Tomáš Masaryk, who would later 
become the first president of Czechoslovakia, was instrumental in the Czech Legion and 
had by this point engaged in talks with the Americans, British, and French, and, despite his 
“Tokyo Memorandum” urging recognition of the new Soviet government, anti-Bolshevik 
elements prevailed upon him.24 At the urging of the Entente powers, it was decided that the 
Legion would, in conjunction with an allied expeditionary force and White counter-
revolutionary troops, open up an anti-Bolshevik front.25 

                                                           
conservative estimate, at 28,000 troops, which is the one listed. Hoyt gives a figure of 40,000 men, and Nosek 
claims that there were between 60,000 and 80,000 effectives within the Legion at this time. 
16 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 54-55. 
17 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 61. 
18 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 92. 
19 Ibid., 94. 
20 Ibid., 98-99. 
21 Ibid., 80. 
22 Gustav Bečvář, The Lost Legion: A Czechoslovakian Epic (London: S. Paul & Co., 1939). 88. This was the only 
full original account from a legionnaire’s perspective that I was able to find in English. Bečvář began the First 
World War serving in the Austro-Hungarian Army, was taken prisoner by the Russians, and later joined the 
Legion in 1917. He served though the final evacuation in 1920. 
23 Ibid., 151. 
24 Josef Kalvoda, “Masaryk in America in 1918,” Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas 27, no. 1 (1979): 86-90. 
25 R. Ernest Dupuy, Perish by the Sword: The Czechoslovakian Anabasis and Our Supporting Campaigns in North 
Russia and Siberia 1918-1920 (Harrisburg: The Military Service Publishing Co., 1939), 78. 



 
 

77 
 

 
The front took shape along the Volga River in the late summer and fall of 1918 and despite 
early victories, the Legion soon found itself engaged in a fight it could not hope to win.26 It 
was outnumbered by four Red armies in the Volga area and was stretched out with other 
military formations in a 150,000 man army across an 800-mile front.27 The hold on the 
front grew steadily more tenuous while morale began to drop precipitously, and several 
regiments mutinied.28 This demoralization had become so pervasive that the Legion was 
ordered off the line for good in January 1919 and was instead assigned to guard the length 
of the Trans-Siberian Railway.29 From then on, the Legion was not involved in any front-
line combat. At this point, it seemed nigh-on-impossible that the Legion would be able to 
successfully remove itself from Russia, and if not for its innovation in the face of such 
adversity, this would have almost certainly been the case. 
 

 
Figure 1: A patrol of Czechoslovak Legionnaires in Russia., c.1918.30 

 
Throughout 1919, the Czechoslovak Legion stood guard along the railroad, while the White 
government in Siberia lurched from crisis to crisis.31 It became increasingly clear that the 
Legion would need to be evacuated from Siberia for good or face its own destruction, as the 
White armies had collapsed and internal dissension became more pronounced by the day.32 
Finally, on September 28, 1919, the official order for a final retreat to Vladivostok and 
subsequent departure from the port was given.33 The evacuation—a chaotic and grim affair 
                                                           
26 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 186; Dupuy, Perish by the Sword, 194. The important town of 
Kazan, along with the State Bank of Russia’s gold reserves, fell in early August, but was evacuated in 
September. 
27 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 187. 
28 Ibid. 
29 Hoyt, The Army Without a Country, 186. 
30 A Czechoslovak Legion patrol in Russia. 1918, Wikimedia Commons, accessed April 22, 2019, 
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Czech_Legion_in_forest.jpg. 
31 Ibid., 187-189. 
32 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 137-139. 
33 Ibid., 141. 



 
 

78 
 

that witnessed the final breakdown between the Legion and the White Siberian 
government and subsequent handover by the Legion of the head of that government, 
Admiral Kolchak, to leftist elements—finally ended on November 30, 1920, well over a year 
since it had begun.34 Czechoslovak military involvement in Russia was over, more than six 
years after the Družina was formed. Though it had been a bloody, complicated, and drawn-
out journey, the Czechoslovak Legion was eventually able to make its way across Russia to 
be sent home at long last. 
 
The Legion’s Obstacles 
In order to appreciate the how the Legion was able to succeed, it is first necessary to 
examine how it could have failed. The three greatest issues that dogged the Legion were 
bolstering morale, the geopolitical circumstances in which the Legion found itself 
entrapped, and the lack of a supply base. The maintenance of morale and unit cohesion in 
an entirely foreign setting was of great importance to the Czechoslovak Legion. This is an 
issue that plagues any army, especially those that are isolated without the recourse of 
calling up fresh troops, but, due to various events that transpired in Europe from late 1917 
onward, was made doubly important for the Legion. The Russian Revolutions brought with 
them a breakdown in the social hierarchy, as illustrated by this episode witnessed by 
Gustav Bečvář, a former prisoner of war who joined the Legion prior to the retreat from 
Ukraine: 
 

Just then a policeman rode up and shouted at the carter to stop torturing his beasts. 
Long custom had taught the officer to expect almost abject servility in response to 
the smallest complaints, and it was clear that he was astonished at the immediate 
effect produced by his words. Instead of obeying the order, the carter shook his 
whip furiously and swore aloud. “You—, you have nothing to say any more. Your 
time has gone for good. Clear out of my way, or I’ll smash you as you deserve.” 
In the old days such a reply would have been utterly inconceivable. Now the 
constable looked round awkwardly to see if anyone had witnessed the incident, and, 
turning his horse, rode away without a word in reply to the insult that had been 
offered to his authority and to the uniform he wore. We watched this scene with 
amazement. “That,” said Fiala solemnly as we passed on our way, “means that the 
Tsarist regime is finished.”35 

 
This phenomenon was, of course, not solely limited to the home front in Russia. In fact, the 
Russian Army and Navy experienced even more extreme versions of it, with unpopular 
officers being removed from their units and occasionally lynched.36 Such attitudes were 
extremely common in Russia during the Civil War, and so this kind of revolutionary fervor 
was always going to be a threat to unit cohesion in the Legion, given its regular interactions 
with Russian soldiers, officials, and civilians who espoused these views, as well as its 
extended and steadily more unpopular stay in Russia. 
 

                                                           
34 Ibid., 148-156. 
35 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 50. 
36 S.A. Smith, Russia in Revolution: An Empire in Crisis 1890-1928 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 115. 



 
 

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Morale was also negatively impacted by events happening outside of Russia. The 
declaration of Czechoslovak independence and the armistice on the Western Front both 
occurred at roughly the same time and were twin blows to Legion morale when word 
arrived of their occurrence in late fall 1918.37 As Czechoslovakia now existed and the 
German Empire was no longer fighting on the Western Front, the Legion now had no 
reason to continue to fight, and many Legionaries began to question why they were still in 
combat in Russia.38 Mutinies and more mundane acts of insubordination happened with 
greater and greater consistency throughout the last quarter of 1918, to the point that the 
Czechoslovak Legion was no longer viable as an offensive fighting force, and it was ordered 
off the line in late January 1919.39 The Hungarian invasion of Czechoslovakia was a further 
blow to morale, though this occurred after the Legion had been pulled off the line.40 
 
Another challenge that the Legion faced was that it was isolated on foreign soil and caught 
between competing interests at almost all times. These interests were not necessarily well-
disposed towards the Legion, especially since the Legion’s nominal allies could prove 
troublesome. The Družina did not engage in much front-line combat while the Tsar was in 
power, and even after the February Revolution the Družina’s status was very much murky, 
as Kerensky, the Defense Minister in the Provisional Government, did not trust 
Czechoslovak soldiers and considered them to be “reactionary.”41 As a result, the 
challenging task of negotiating with Kerensky and the Provisional Government had to be 
undertaken, and it would require an exceptional individual to do so. 
 
The October Revolution was a further complication. When the Legion was withdrawn from 
the front following the 1917 Kerensky Offensive, it was stationed in Ukraine, and there it 
found itself in an unenviable position following the Bolshevik takeover in Petrograd.42 At 
the beginning of 1918, it was clear that the situation in Ukraine was becoming untenable. 
The country had declared independence in January 1918 but was heavily dependent on 
Germany, and, in any event, was roundly defeated by the Red Army at the end of the 
month.43 However, German forces began to pour into Ukraine at the Ukrainian Rada’s 
request, and thus the Legion was caught between German forces and, because it had fought 
under the Provisional Government the year before, unfriendly Red ones.44 Eventually, the 
Legion chose what it perceived to be the lesser of two evils and negotiated with the 
Bolsheviks rather than fighting them along with the Germans. On March 15, 1918, 
Czechoslovak representatives concluded an agreement with the Soviet government for the 
Legion’s free and unmolested passage across Russia to Vladivostok, and units immediately 
began to embark on trains.45 Unfortunately for the Legion, this agreement was only 
honored in the breach throughout its journey to the Russian Far East, and subsequent 

                                                           
37 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 104 
38 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 198-200. 
39 Hoyt, The Army Without a Country, 186. 
40 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 207. 
41 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 51. 
42 Nosek et al., “The Odyssey of the Czecho-Slovaks,” 148. 
43 Ibid., 94. 
44 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 63. 
45 Ibid., 76-78. 



 
 

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confrontations with the Bolsheviks were commonplace.46 Some units found themselves 
almost completely disarmed, as the Bolsheviks sometimes demanded the surrender of 
most weapons and left only the bare minimum for self-defense.47 Furthermore, the Legion 
also encountered many German and Austrian former prisoners of war in the process of 
repatriation, and, as Bečvář illustrates, violence could break out: 
 

The train was actually beginning to move slowly out of the station when suddenly a 
piece of iron was hurled from one of the prisoners’ coaches. The missile struck a 
Czech named Duchacek in the head. Duchacek collapsed, badly wounded. Furious 
anger seized the friends of the victim of this malicious and entirely unprovoked 
attack. Leaping on the running-boards of the coaches, they succeeded in stopping 
the still slow-moving train. Other Czech troops came running, and when they heard 
what had happened they assisted in dragging the prisoners from their coaches, and 
only the strenuous efforts of officers saved the Austrians from being lynched on the 
spot. The Legionaries had had previous experience of the lenience often extended by 
the Bolshevik authorities towards the Austrian and German prisoners, and so they 
now insisted that the matter should be investigated on the spot, and the identity of 
the aggressor established before the train was allowed to proceed on its way. The 
prisoners were, therefore, interrogated at once, and, frightened by the threatening 
attitude of the Czechs, they indicated the man who had thrown the piece of iron. 
Fierce shouts broke out in the crowd, and a moment later the Legionaries had 
thrown themselves upon the culprit. It was useless for the officers to intervene. 
When, after a few minutes calm was restored, the Austrian’s limp body lay still upon 
the ground.48 
 
 

This incident, which occurred on May 14, 1918 in the town of Chelyabinsk, resulted in a 
complete breakdown in relations between the Legion and the Bolsheviks, and open 
hostilities had commenced by the end of May.49 This interrupted the already disorderly 
evacuation, and Czechoslovak forces were once again obliged to fight in order to leave 
Russia. 
 
Diplomacy with its allies was also problematic for the Legion. The Entente powers wished 
to keep the Legion in Russia to fight the Soviets alongside White forces, even after the 
Legion’s purpose for fighting in Russia in the first place had been fulfilled with 
Czechoslovak independence and the end of the First World War.50 The Entente Powers 
pinned their hopes in a counterrevolution against the Bolsheviks on Admiral Kolchak, the 
White dictator of Siberia after November 18, 1918 who was manifestly unsuited to the task 
set before him and greatly ill-disposed toward the Legion, both of which made him 

                                                           
46 Kevin J. McNamara, Dreams of a Great Small Nation: The Mutinous Army that Threatened a Revolution, 
Destroyed an Empire, Founded a Republic, and Remade the Map of Europe (New York: PublicAffairs, 2016), 
178. 
47 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 80-81. 
48 Ibid., 88. 
49 Nosek et al., “The Odyssey of the Czecho-Slovaks,” 149-150. 
50 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 199. 



 
 

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extremely difficult to deal with.51 However, the Entente’s support for an independent 
Czechoslovakia was of the utmost importance, even after official Czechoslovak 
independence, and so the Legion had to find some sort of accommodation with them, in 
spite of the frustrations such a course engendered. 
 
Finally, the Legion was also faced with the task of staying supplied. It had to deal with 
either mistrustful or outright hostile Russian governments, who were loath to grant it 
assistance and sometimes even demanded the Legion’s own supplies in exchange for safe 
passage.52 The Legion did not have a home country for much of its existence, and even after 
Czechoslovakia had declared independence, it had to organize its own internal affairs and 
deal with a Hungarian invasion, so there would no help coming from that quarter.53 The 
Legion’s allies in the Entente were attempting to supply White forces in Russia and 
encountering enormous amounts of corruption and apathy, so any help from them would 
be limited as well.54 Therefore, the Legion had to assume the lion’s share of responsibility 
for supplying itself. 
 
The Legion’s Solutions 
The reasons for the Legion’s success can be distilled into three distinct factors. It was well 
organized, and yet it had an unorthodox structure. Given that the Legion acted akin to a 
state unto itself and adopted its own diplomatic stance in lieu of direction from Prague or 
the rest of the Entente, it was able to deal with various political and military bodies flexibly, 
no matter the alignment of those bodies, while, for the most part, keeping in mind its goal 
of eventually reaching the Western Front to fight the German army and then going on to an 
independent Czechoslovakia post-victory. Finally, the Legion was obliged to make its own 
supply base and did so with great success. 
 
The Czechoslovak Legion’s structure and organization stood it in good stead throughout its 
sojourn in Russia, especially given the social upheaval that unfolded around it. Some of the 
Russian officers in the Družina feared revolutionary fervor in their men like that which had 
gripped the Russian armed forces, but in 1917, these fears were not realized.55 The 
Družina’s structure, as stated by Bečvář, helped to prevent this: 

 
In certain respects our organization was curious, for we were certainly not a 
military group in the ordinary sense of the term. Discipline was strict, but the 
relationship between officer and private was brotherly. That is to say, we called 
each other “brother,” and when speaking to an officer the correct form of address 
was “brother captain,” “brother lieutenant,” as the case might be. And under all 
circumstances the second person singular, the intimate “thou,” was used.56 

                                                           
51 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 222-226. 
52 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 76-81. 
53 Ibid., 207. 
54 Phelps Hodges, Britmis: A Great Adventure of the War (London: Jonathan Cape, 1931), 74-76. 
55 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 53. 
56 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 53. John Reed mentions a similar relationship existing between the officers and 
men of the Serbian Army in his The War in Eastern Europe (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1916). Given 
that comparatively small force’s surprising successes against the Austro-Hungarian forces in the early days of 



 
 

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The importance of the relationship between officers and enlisted men cannot be 
overstated, particularly in the extremely demoralizing context of revolutionary Russia. The 
closeness of the enlisted Legionaries and their officers played a large part in insulating the 
Czechoslovak Legion from the instability and upheaval that characterized Russian 
formations during this period. It provided for the retention of pre-revolution organization 
and discipline. Furthermore, the Legion had its own “parliament,” giving the soldiers a 
sense of representation in government, though it was dissolved by Milan Štefánik in late 
1918 after Czechoslovak independence had been declared and the Legion was no longer 
obliged to act as a nation unto itself in that regard, as it now had a central government to 
direct it from Prague, though this did not change the situation on the ground.57 This 
stability enabled the Legion to embark on its campaign to Vladivostok and maintain the 
campaign for an extremely long period of time. The fact that discipline in the Legion only 
broke down well after the way to Vladivostok had been cleared is due in large part to the 
fact that the enlisted men trusted and obeyed their officers, at least in some measure due to 
their “brotherly” bond and to the feeling that even an enlisted man’s opinion counted for 
something in the Legion, despite the horrendous circumstances in which they found 
themselves. Furthermore, this meant that officers were able to retain their positions and 
gain valuable experience without having to worry about their men deciding to remove 
them from their positions or worse. This produced an experienced officer cadre, which was 
a great asset to the Legion when it was facing the less experienced, less organized, but 
numerically superior Red forces in 1918. Though the Legion did foster an extremely 
unorthodox officer-enlisted man dynamic and was far more democratized than armies 
generally are, this proved greatly beneficial in the long run, notwithstanding its 
“unmilitary” aesthetic. 
 
The Legion was also caught between powers which were at best unreliable allies and at 
worst bitter enemies, most of which could destroy the Legion if pushed hard enough. 
Therefore, the second factor contributing to the Legion’s success in the face of challenges 
was its flexibility. The Czechoslovak Legion had to deal with most of the players in pre-
revolutionary and revolutionary Russia in one form or another, outside of the Central 
Powers, and its pliability in handling various agendas was a major factor in its successful 
movement across Russia. Tomáš Masaryk was supremely important in this regard. He had 
contacts within the Russian Provisional Government, such as Paul Miliukov, and he not only 
utilized those contacts but also personally intervened with Kerensky in order to ensure 
that the Družina was properly looked after.58 After the October Revolution, the Legion was 
faced with the reality that it could no longer count on Russia as a patron and that it would 
have to find a way to leave the country. Meanwhile, German troops were closing in on the 
Legion’s positions in Ukraine.59 Rather than retreat pell-mell or engage the Germans alone, 
the Legion fought alongside Bolshevik troops.60 Following that, in March 1918, after 
                                                           
the First World War, as well as the aforementioned feats of the Czechoslovak Legion, there is some merit to 
the idea that a degree of familiarity between officers and men can be highly beneficial to an army.  
57 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 198. 
58 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 52-55. 
59 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 98-99. 
60 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 79. 



 
 

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protracted negotiations, the Legion was granted permission to cross Russia by the 
Sovnarkom.61 Unfortunately, the price of this freedom was the loss of a good deal of the 
Legion’s equipment to rapacious commissars who either modified or ignored Moscow’s 
instructions.62 This willingness to work with the Bolsheviks was not a mistake, however. As 
the Volga-Ural campaign of the summer and fall of 1918 illustrated in stark detail, the 
Legion was simply not capable of fighting a protracted land war on a wide front with the 
Bolsheviks. By negotiating with them, the Legion was able to buy itself valuable time to 
continue sending contingents down the Trans-Siberian Railway, as a break with the 
Bolsheviks was most likely inevitable in any case.  
 
Along with the Bolsheviks, the Czechoslovaks had to handle White Russian entities and 
their erstwhile allies in the Entente. Although it was not in outright conflict with the 
Entente or the Whites, the Legion still encountered difficulties with both of these groups, 
yet it was necessary to work with them. Though there was no real reason to stay in Siberia 
and fight the Red armies, the Legion acquiesced to an Entente-White request to remain on 
the Volga-Ural front, and then continue to guard the Trans-Siberian Railway once it had 
been withdrawn from the front lines.63 This was necessary for several reasons. Thanks to a 
1917 agreement, the Legion was technically considered to be part of the French Army.64 
Allied ships and money would have to be used in the final evacuation from Vladivostok, and 
the French, British, and Americans had to be kept mollified in order to ensure that, when 
the time came, the resources necessary to depart from Russia for good would be 
forthcoming.65 Further complicating matters in this regard, there was a great deal of 
dissension among the Entente powers concerning the degrees of responsibility Britain, 
France, and the United States would take when the Legion was evacuated, adding a greater 
sense of urgency to the Legion leadership’s efforts to forestall tensions with the Entente.66 
Additionally, there were some Allied troops fighting in Russia alongside the Legion, and, as 
such, the Legion had to accede to at least some Entente requests or risk abandonment and 
the destruction of the entire Czechoslovak Army Corps.67 To boot, Admiral Kolchak, the 
dictator of White Siberia after November 18, 1918, virulently disliked the Legion and could 
have easily worsened its situation had they not nominally been on the same side.68 Thus, 
the Legion had to work with the Allies and the Whites to leave Russia, though it 
paradoxically meant delaying its departure from Vladivostok.  
 
This flexible foreign policy would not have been possible if the Legion was not empowered 
to act with a remarkable degree of independence. Had it been more constrained by higher 
political authorities, there is a chance that the Legion would have either acted too slowly or 
simply would have made incorrect decisions due to directives that were not issued with an 

                                                           
61 Ibid. 
62 Bečvář, The Lost Legion, 80. 
63 Dupuy, Perish by the Sword, 78; Hoyt, The Army Without a Country, 186. 
64 Karel Herman, “The Czechoslovak National Liberation Movement in the Nineteenth and Beginning of the 
Twentieth Centuries,” East European Quarterly 24, no. 2 (June 1990): 222. 
65 Rowan A. Williams, “The Odyssey of the Czechs,” East European Quarterly 9, no. 1 (Spring 1975): 25. 
66 Ibid. 
67 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 278. 
68 Ibid., 212, 223-224. 



 
 

84 
 

understanding of the situation in Russia. Although there was some direction from higher 
authorities that could prove costly, most notably when the Legion was ordered to stay in 
Siberia to fight the Bolsheviks, the Legion exhibited a remarkable state-like autonomy, and 
this independence proved to be supremely valuable asset. 
 
Creating and maintaining a supply base was another large part of the Czechoslovak 
Legion’s success in Russia. Czechoslovakia had not declared its independence in 1917, and, 
even after it had in 1918, there was simply no feasible way for the Legion to be supplied 
from Czechoslovakia. It was alone in a foreign country, without its own stocks of weapons, 
ammunition, and other necessities of war, let alone food and clothing for the cold climate. 
In this regard, the February Revolution and the failure of the 1917 Kerensky Offensive 
were of great help. These two factors combined to form a heavily demoralized and almost 
entirely impotent Imperial Russian Army, which was apt to leave the field in a hurry, minus 
its weapons. For example, “At Tarnopol … they [Czechoslovak soldiers] came upon the very 
heart of the Russian retreat, and found field guns, rifles, ammunition, stores, and every 
military item lying on the roadside. But … the men managed to salvage only two rifles 
apiece, ammunition, and some machine guns.”69 Furthermore, the Provisional Government 
continued to supply the Legion before the October Revolution.70 The Ukrainian collapse of 
early 1918 also afforded the Legion similar opportunities to those found in Galicia.71 
Additionally, the Legion was able to avail itself of captured stocks on several different 
occasions.72  
 
The Legion also had an independent financial infrastructure that helped to spur economic 
development in its environs and helped ensure a steady supply of purchased supplies. This 
was the Legionaries’ Bank. Founded in 1918, the bank was funded by Czechs and Slovaks 
both in Russia (as part of the Legion or otherwise) and abroad.73 It was used (in Russia) to 
revive the war-torn economy of Siberia and restart production at munitions factories, as 
well as to make purchases of foreign weaponry, munitions, and parts.74 This was a truly 
unique entity, and further evidence of the Legion’s state-like qualities. Conventional armies 
generally do not operate their own banking systems, nor do those banking systems 
purchase munitions, provender, and other martial supplies, or help sustain regional 
economies. However, the Legion did just that and, in doing so, helped to secure its supply 
base. Thanks to the capture of foreign supplies as well as the purchase and production of 
the same financed by the Legionaries’ Bank, the Czechoslovak Legion was able to sustain its 
operations in a foreign country without a country of its own upon which it could depend 
for supplies. The creation of its own supply base and network was one of the greatest coups 
accomplished by the Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, and without it, the Legion would 
almost certainly have been destroyed or severely diminished. 
 

                                                           
69 Hoyt, The Army Without a Country, 52. 
70 Bradley, The Czechoslovak Legion in Russia, 56. 
71 Ibid., 74. 
72 Hoyt, The Army Without a Country, 141; Nosek et al., “The Odyssey of the Czecho-Slovaks,” 150. 
73 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 200-201. This entity has alternately been referred to as a 
“financial office.” However, “Legionaries’ Bank” is the term Baerlein gives. 
74 Baerlein, The March of the Seventy Thousand, 202. 



 
 

85 
 

Conclusion 
The Legion did not fade into irrelevance after it returned home. The Legion Bank in 
particular assumed great importance during the postwar years. The bank followed the 
Legion home in 1920 and immediately became a crucial part of the Czechoslovak central 
banking system.75 Though the bank would eventually decline before its nationalization 
after the Second World War, the Legion Bank building in Prague remains as both a 
memorial to the Legion and a testament to its lasting legacy in postwar Czechoslovakia. 
 

 
Figure 2: The façade of the Bank of the Czechoslovak Legions in Prague. 76 

 
The Czechoslovak Legion faced overwhelming odds during its service in Russia and still 
managed to accomplish its primary objective. This success would not have been possible 
without the Legion’s exceptional qualities. A conventional army with a conventional 
hierarchy that did not have the wherewithal to act as a sovereign power unto itself would 
most likely have met its doom on the steppes. However, the Legion was not a conventional 
army, and it acted with a state-like autonomy, and thus, it triumphed. Though the 
Czechoslovak state was not forged during the Legion’s trek, it is not at all a stretch to state 
that the Czechoslovak state’s shield was. Marching and fighting across the vast Russian 
wastes nearly broke the Legion, but it soldiered on and helped foster the hopes of an 
unborn country until it triumphantly returned after that country had been made a reality. 

 

                                                           
75 Jakub Šiška, “Bank der Tschechoslowakischen Legion-Sonderbare Kreditanstalt der Zwischenkriegsära,” 
Radio Praha auf Deutsh, March 3, 2015, https://www.radio.cz/de/rubrik/geschichte/bank-der-
tschechoslowakischen-legion-eine-sonderbare-geldanstalt-der-zwischenkriegsaera. 
76 Photo by Nicholas Fixler. “The Façade of the Bank of the Czechoslovak Legions in Prague,” April 15, 2019. 


