DESERTERS WILL BE SHOT: A TROTSKY AUTOGRAPH FROM 1918. Well-preserved in its original envelope with the hammer-and-sickle wax seal of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, this is Trotsky’s Order No. 311, issued to Red Army soldiers during their struggles against the White Army in the aftermath of WWI. Depleted by war with Germany, Red Army soldiers lacked morale to take up arms again during the winter of 1918, with much of the fighting concentrated in Western Siberia. Trotsky here threatens deserters with execution by firing squad and warns of punishments for looting and the abuse of military property. He signs the order in blue crayon as head of the Red Army (Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council), above the signature of Ephraim Sklyansky (1892-1925), a hand-picked associate of Trotsky who served as People’s Commissar for War. By coincidence, not only were the two men Jewish by birth, but both perished under mysterious circumstances: Sklyansky by drowning during a visit to the Adirondacks in 1925; and Trotsky by ice-axe in Mexico in 1940. Provenance: German auction.