Giorgi Mazniashvili
Native name	გიორგი მაზნიაშვილი
Born	(1871-04-06)6 April 1871 Sasiresti, Tiflis, Russia (now Sasiresti, Georgia)
Died	9 September 1937(1937-09-09) (aged 66)
Allegiance	Russian Empire(1905–1917) Democratic Republic of Georgia(1918–1921)   Soviet Union(1921)
Years of service	1905–1923
Rank	Captain & Colonel (Russia) General (Georgia) Divisional general (Red Army)
Battles/wars	Russo-Japanese War World War I Caucasus campaign Battle of Choloki (1918) Abkhazia conflict (1918) Sochi conflict Armeno-Georgian War Red Army invasion of Georgia Battle of Batumi

Giorgi Mazniashvili ( Georgian: გიორგი მაზნიაშვილი) (6 April 1871 – 9 September 1937 ^[1]) was a Georgian general and one of the most prominent military figures in the Democratic Republic of Georgia (1918–1921).

Early life and education

Mazniashvili was born on 6 April 1871 in the village Sasireti, Tiflis Governorate, Russian Empire (present day Kaspi Municipality, Shida Kartli, Georgia). Having taken a proper military education, he was later promoted to colonel of the Russian army. ^{[2] [3]}

Career

Wounded in the Russo-Japanese war (1904–1905), he was visited at a hospital by the Tsar Nicholas II, who awarded him St George's Cross and invited to the palace. He fought also on the battlefields of World War I, but returned to Georgia after the February Revolution in 1917. He formed two national divisions and secured the capital Tbilisi from the chaotically retreating and increasingly Bolshevist Russian soldiers. In April 1918, he successfully defended the southwestern province Guria from the Ottoman offensive winning a victory on the Choloki River. In June 1918, he served as a governor general of Abkhazia and crushed there a pro-Bolshevik revolt; then he took Gagra, Sochi and Tuapse in the first phase of the Sochi conflict. ^{[1] [4][ citation needed]}

From October to December 1918, he served as a governor general of Tbilisi. During the December Georgian-Armenian war 1918, he was appointed a commander-in-chief and successfully defended the Georgian borders from the troops of General Dro and Stepan Shahumyan. In 1919 he served as a governor general of Akhaltsikhe and Akhalkalaki and was moved, on 6 October 1920, as a commandant in Tbilisi. During the Soviet invasion of February 1921, he repulsed the Red Army from the Soghanlughi heights at the outskirts of Tbilisi. The war, however, was lost. Mazniashvili did not follow the country's leaders in exile, but mobilized the remnants of the Georgian armed forces to recover the Black Sea city of Batumi from the Ottoman occupation in March 1921. ^[4] The newly established Soviet government of Georgia declared him outlaw, but later General Mazniashvili served in the Georgian Red Army and commanded a division. Soon, the division was disbanded due to the reduction of staff and Mazniashvili was appointed as an infantry inspector. ^[1]

Later life and death

On September 1921, he was arrested on charges of being a counter-revolutionary and he was convicted. ^[1] In 1923, he was sentenced to be shot, but later the sentence was commuted to exiled to Persia whence he moved to France. ^[5] In a few years, he was allowed to return and he lived in his native village Sasireti, far from political life. During the Great Purges, however, he was arrested and executed without a trial in 1937. ^[4] In the 1950s, Mazniashvili's son, a World War II veteran of the Soviet army, submitted a request for a political rehabilitation of his father, but this was turned down by the authorities. ^{[6] [7]}

Legacy

Mazniashvili is the author of the popular Soldier's Memoirs. In 2013, he was posthumously awarded the title and Order of National Hero of Georgia. ^[8]

Personal life

Ancestry

According to historian Ucha Murghulia, Mazniashvili's father was Georgian officer of Russian Imperial Army Ivane Mazniashvili. However, according to other versions, attested by his stepchild's descendent Anouki Areshidze, Giorgi Mazniashvili's father was an ethnic Russian officer Ivan Maznev and his mother was an ethnic Georgian Kristine Glurjidze. ^[9]

References

Sources

• Gogitidze, Mamuka; Bezhitashvili, Giorgi (2015). Faithfuls to the military oath. Tʻbilisi: Shota Rustaveli National University. ISBN  978-9941-0-7386-1.