Tersk Stud

The Tersk Stud was officially established on February 11, 1921, on the orders of Marshal Semyon Budyonny. The breeding farm was used to restore the Russian horse population, which suffered heavy losses during the Russian Revolution.

Early history

In the 1880s, Count Sergei Aleksandrovich Stroganov and his brother-in-law Prince Aleksandr Grigorievich Shcherbatov found a spot at the foot of Mount Zmeika (“small snake” in Russian) in the Northern Caucasus they felt was ideal for establishing a horse breeding farm. The two traveled to the Middle East in 1889 and purchased several purebred Arabian horses for use in their new breeding program. Stroganov also purchased horses from Crabbet Arabian Stud in England, including the mares Makbula and Sobha, and the stallion Mesaoud, who came from Crabbet Stud by way of Kleniewski Stud in modern-day Poland.

Russian Revolution & Civil War

Shcherbatov died in 1915. During the 1917 Russian Revolution, Stroganov fled to Paris where he remained with his family until he died in 1923. The Stroganov estate was seized by Russian revolutionaries and none of the Arabians of the Stroganov and Shcherbatov programs are known to have survived the Russian Revolution. In 1921 Marshal Semyon Budyonny, an accomplished horseman and cavalry officer, ordered two farms near Mineralnye Vody, the former Stroganov breeding farm and the nearby farm of White Army General Sultan Ghirey-Klych to be renamed and used for restoring the devastated Russian horse population. Today the stud is known as Tersky Horse-Breeding Farm No. 169. There is no indication Stroganov and Shcherbatov or their breeding stock had any involvement in the founding of the Soviet-run Tersk Stud.