Lavr Kornilov

Lavr Georgiyevich Kornilov
General Lavr Kornilov in 1916
Born	(1870-08-18)18 August 1870 Ust-Kamenogorsk, Turkestan, Russian Empire
Died	13 April 1918(1918-04-13) (aged 47) near Ekaterinodar
Allegiance	Russian Empire
Service/branch	Imperial Russian Army White Movement
Years of service	1892–1918
Rank	General
Commands held	Black Sea Fleet (1916–1917) Russian Army (1918–1920)
Battles/wars	Russo-Japanese War World War I Russian Civil War
Awards	Order of St. George (twice) Order of Saint Anna Order of Saint Stanislaus

Lavr Georgiyevich Kornilov (Russian: Лавр Гео́ргиевич Корни́лов, IPA: [ˈlavr kɐrˈnʲiləf]; 18 August 1870 – 13 April 1918) was a military intelligence officer, explorer, and general in the Imperial Russian Army during World War I and the ensuing Russian Civil War. He is today best remembered for the Kornilov Affair, an unsuccessful endeavor in August/September 1917 that purported to strengthen Alexander Kerensky's Provisional Government, but which led to Kerensky eventually having Kornilov arrested and charged with attempting a coup d'état, and ultimately undermined the rule of Kerensky; strengthening the claims and power of the soviets, and the Bolshevik party.

One story relates how Kornilov was originally born as a Don Cossack Kalmyk named Lorya Dildinov and adopted in Ust-Kamenogorsk, Russian Turkestan (now Kazakhstan) by the family of his mother's brother, the Russian Cossack Khorunzhiy George Kornilov, whose wife was of Kazakh origin. But his sister wrote that he had not been adopted, had not been a Don Cossack, and that their mother had Polish and Altai Oirot descent. (Though their language was not a Kalmyk/Mongolian one, but because of their Asian race and their history in the Jungar Oirot (Kalmyk) state, Altai Oirots were called Altai Kalmyks by Russians. They were not Muslims or Kazakhs.) But Boris Shaposhnikov, who served with Petr Kornilov, the brother of Lavr, in 1903, mentioned the "Kyrgyz" ancestry of their mother - this name was usually used in reference to Kazakhs in 1903. Kornilov's Siberian Cossack father was a friend of Potanin (1835-1920), a prominent figure in the Siberian autonomy movement.