Guba, April-May 1918. Documented Pogroms of the Muslims
38
the assistant of A.Zizikski in his capacity of the Uyezd Commissar. (86)
Promotion of “a young people’s teacher to the position of a
commissar of Guba’s Jewish section since the very first days of the
February Revolution” (87) and thus his appointment to the position of
“one of the leaders of Guba Uyezd” was the result of A.Zizikski’s dis-
position towards Baghirov. Bolshevism was completely out of ques-
tion then. Yet further paths of Baghirov and Zizkski parted when the
former one took the stance of fighting Bolshevism and anti-national
regime of the Baku Soviet, whereas M.Baghirov was trying to under-
take the role of a representative of the central power he associated
with the Baku Soviet”. (88)
It becomes clear why upon Guba’s takeover by A.Zizkski’s units
in late April 1918, as Assistant Chairman of the Guba Revolutionary
Committee (Revkom) M.Baghirov could no longer stay in town. “This
was the way M.Baghirov unwittingly found himself bundled with mili-
tant Armenian nationalists acting under the red flag of Baku’s Bolshe-
vik Government. That was probably the most disgraceful part of his
life history”. (89)
Description of further events by Baghirov reveals further details
of his involvement in Amazasp’s unit and in the meantime presents
the most important evidence of the squad’s real mission: “…under the
lee of a purely Dashnak squad arriving from Petrovsk we retreated to-
wards the railroad. We decided to set off to Derbend. Upon our arrival
there, we met train troops of comrade Naneyshvili returning from the
North Caucasus. After a meeting we decided to move to Baku to re-
arrange defeated units and undertake a new attack upon Guba…With
enormous hardships we somehow reached Davachi when we came
across four trains from Baku delivering the notorious squad of Ama-
zasp, one of Dashnaktsutyun leaders who stated that they were moving
to Guba following the order from the Center, i.e. comrade Shaumyan
with a view to wipe the town from the face of earth. However for proper
appearance they asked comrade Naneyshvili to second a representative
of our party. Even though a member of the Social Revolutionary Party
(SR) named Belunts (more a fervent Dashnak than a true SR) was Ama-
zasp’s special commissar, Naneyshili, after a deep reflection, offered me
to join the squad. I refused blatantly for I understood what the squad
was capable of ”. (90)
Thus it were not only ordinary Guba residents but, in this case,