Importance. The study examines the precedence of the Terek and Kuban Cossack troops regiments, approved by the Supreme Decree of Emperor Alexander II in 1874 according to the previously submitted report of the Commander-in-Chief of the Caucasian Army, Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich. The correspondence of the Kuban regiment of the Kuban Cossack troops precedence to published and unpublished sources of the imperial period is specifically considered. The research shows for the first time the discrepancy between the precedence appointed by the Emperor and various author’s certificates and documents, which contributes to the development of the regimental historiography of Kuban. The purpose of the study is to determine the actual precedence of the Kuban Regiment of the Kuban Cossack Army as being related to 1796 and not to an earlier period.
Materials and Methods. The research is based on the few published studies of the Caucasian War era where the Kuban Regiment was mentioned, and previously unpublished archival documents drawn from federal and regional archives. The principles of historicism, general scientific principles, and source-based and special historical methods are used in the research.
Results and Discussion. Based on the analysis of legislative acts of the Russian Empire, the study establishes that if the time of the beginning of military service to the Russian state of most of the Cossack formations of the North Caucasus correlated with published rescripts, however, in some cases, precedence was completely not confirmed by either the Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire, or special author’s works published before 1874, or archival primary sources. One of these incidents was the appointment of the Kuban regiment of the Kuban troops’ precedence, which, without any evidence, was correlated to the time of the creation of the Volga Cossack troops, settled on the Tsaritsyn line in 1732. Such a vision of the past of one of the honoured Kuban regiments is completely inconsistent with the available sources of various published and unpublished information of the 19th century. This absolutely far-fetched fact continues to be replicated in modern publications and various Internet publications.
Conclusion. According to the various sources, it is concluded that the true precedence of the Kuban regiment of the Kuban troops is still connected with 1796, when the military service of this Cossack linear formation, created exclusively from Don Cossacks resettled in 1794, really began on the frontier of the Northwestern Caucasus. The mentions of some imperial historians about the presence of “Volga Cossacks” in its composition are in no way confirmed by archival documents as well as by the author’s evidence of the era.