In 1916, in an exchange of human flesh for war materiel, the Russian government sent to France two brigades to fight on the side of their French allies.

By the end of World War I, these two brigades had experienced their own form of the Russian Revolution, had been isolated at a southern training post in a disciplinary move by the French government, had battled against each other in what was one of the first confrontations of the Russian Civil War, and had emerged from the conflict as a single force, the Russian Legion of Honor, which would remain loyal to France until the end of the war. Jamie Cockfield, in With Snow on Their Boots, explores the journey and transformation of these men and, in so doing, examines the impact of the revolution on the Russians who were caught in the middle of wartime alliances and nationalist ardor.

A microcosm of the political, social, and military struggle that was to occur in Russia in 1917 and in the years to follow, With Snow on Their Boots also looks at the changes in the relationship between France and Russia during and after the war.