Aleksandr Rodzyanko

Alexander Pavlovich Rodzyanko (; 26 August 1879 – 6 May 1970) was an officer of the Imperial Russian Army during World War I and lieutenant-general and a corps commander of the White Army during the Russian Civil War. He also competed at the 1912 Summer Olympics.

Biography Rodzyanko came from an old Ukrainian aristocratic family: his father Pavel Rodzyanko was a major landowner and his uncle Mikhail Rodzianko chaired the State Duma from 1911 to 1917. Aleksandr received his education in the Russian Page Corps military academy and at the Cadre Noir cavalry-school in Saumur in France; he then joined the elite Russian Chevalier Guard regiment. An excellent equestrian sportsman, he also studied for a year at the cavalry school at Pinerolo in Italy under Captain Federico Caprilli, known as "the father of the modern forward seat". After successfully participating in London (1911), winning the King Eduard VII Cup, he competed in the 5th-placed jumping team for Russia at the 1912 Olympic Games in Stockholm. In 1919 General Nikolay Yudenich appointed Rodzyanko (then commander of the Whites' Northern Corps) as his aide, where he led the counter-offensive actions against the Reds and participated in the unsuccessful advance on Petrograd. Once the Northwestern Army had been pushed back to Narva, Estonia, on 23 November 1919, Yudenich sent him to England to seek financial support for the further anti-bolshevik combat. After his mission proved abortive, he chose not to return to Estonia but settled in the United Kingdom and later in the United States.

His brother Pavel Rodzyanko became an instructor at the Irish cavalry school in Dublin and later emigrated to the United States. Aleksandr Pavlovich Rodzyanko became president of the Chevalier Guards association, wrote memoirs and died in New York City aged 90. He is buried at the Novo-Diveevo Cemetery in Nanuet, Rockland County, New York.

Honours and awards Order of St. Vladimir, 4th class with Swords (1913) Order of St. Anna, 3rd class (1913) Order of Saint Stanislaus, 3rd class (1913) Order of St. Anna, 4th class (1915) More than 7 medals