ABSTRACT
During the early 1930s the triumvirate most closely associated with the emergence and establishment of Soviet power in the North Caucasus between 1917 and 1924 dramatically unravelled. Since the end of the civil war, Stalin, Sergei Kirov and Sergo Ordzhonikidze had remained close associates throughout their mutual rise to power. As with many other Bolsheviks, common experience acquired during the civil war in the Caucasus was reinforced, once the conflict was over, by frequent mutual holidays and ‘rest cures’ there, the warm springs and natural baths in the region soon becoming a favoured destination for the often over-stressed Bolshevik higher leadership. Kirov was one of the very few that Stalin felt comfortable enough to undress in front of in the bania, the traditional Russian steam-bath; Ordzhonikidze for his part was one of the few men that he physically wrestled with. One of the best-known photographs of the younger Kirov meanwhile shows him sitting on Ordzhonikidze’s knee, one arm draped around his shoulder, and in later life both men still kept signed photographs of each other in their offices.2 Some have argued that Stalin’s ascension to supreme authority after 1928 nonetheless marked the beginnings of a long-term fracture in their close three-way relationship.
