Anton Ivanovich Denikin (Анто́н Ива́нович Дени́кин; December 16 [O.S. December 4] 1872 – August 8, 1947) was Lieutenant General of the Imperial Russian Army (1916) and one of the foremost generals of the White movement in the Russian Civil War.

Denikin was born in Szpetal Dolny village, now part of the Polish city Włocławek (then part of the Russian Empire). His father, Ivan Efimovich Denikin, had been born a serf in the province of Saratov. Sent as a recruit to do 25 years of military service, Ivan Denikin became an officer in the 22nd year of his army service, in 1856. He retired from the army in 1869 with the rank of major. In 1869 Ivan Denikin married a poor Polish seamstress, Elżbieta Wrzesińska — his second wife. Anton Denikin, the couple's only child, learned to speak two languages (Russian and Polish) at the same time. His father's commitment to Russian patriotism and the Orthodox religion led to Anton Denikin's decision to become a soldier.

The Denikins lived very close to poverty, the retired major's small pension being their only source of income. After his father's death in 1885, Denikin's family financial situation got even worse. Anton Denikin began tutoring younger schoolmates so that the family could earn additional income. In 1890 Denikin began a course at the Kiev Junker School, a military college from which he graduated in 1892. The twenty-year-old Denikin joined an artillery brigade, in which he served for three years.

World War I (WWI), which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939 (World War II), and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918. It involved all the world's great powers, which were assembled in two opposing alliances: the Allies (based on the Triple Entente of the United Kingdom, France and Russia) and the Central Powers (originally centred around the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy; but, as Austria–Hungary had taken the offensive against the agreement, Italy did not enter into the war). These alliances both reorganised (Italy fought for the Allies), and expanded as more nations entered the war. Ultimately more than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, were mobilised in one of the largest wars in history. More than 9 million combatants were killed, largely because of enormous increases in lethality of weapons, thanks to new technology, without corresponding improvements in protection or mobility. It was the sixth-deadliest conflict in world history, subsequently paving the way for various political changes such as revolutions in the nations involved.