Tattered Banners : An Autobiography

War, like love, is an experience that each generation must learn for itself. Born into Russian aristocracy at the end of the 19th Century, Paul Rodzianko led a life rich in love, challenged by war, and inspired by great jumping horses. With humor and infectious joy, he recounts the adventures of his charmed childhoodplaying with his cousins at the Winter Palace, riding horses at his familys many country estates, and, most spectacularly, serving as a page in the court of Tsar Nicolas II. Then, on August 1, 1914, Russia and Germany declare war on each other, and, Rodzianko writes, The hurricane descended and swept our world away. Serving in the Chevalier Guards, he fights first against the Germans and then, after the Revolution, against the Reds in Siberia. He writes movingly about WWI and the Russian Civil War: the initial excitement about going to war and the grim realities, the frustrating shortages of munitions and the failures of the railroads, the shocking execution of the Romanovs, and the brutal deaths of millions of young men. Tattered Banners is an evocative and haunting account of a time and people that have continued to intrigue us for more than a century.