Suffering heavy losses, the corps retreated through Lithuania and Latvia to Estonia in the Baltic Strategic Defensive Operation.
It defended positions in Estonia in July and early August during the Leningrad Strategic Defensive before being disbanded that month when the Red Army abolished rifle corps.
Reformed in October 1942 when the Red Army reestablished its rifle corps, the 11th fought in the Battle of the Caucasus for the next year.
The 11th Rifle Corps was formed in accordance with orders of the Petrograd Military District of 25 and 26 November 1922, headquartered at Staraya Russa.
[3] Yepifan Kovtyukh (promoted to Komkor when personal ranks were introduced in 1935) served as corps commander and commissar from January 1930 to June 1936, when he became army inspector of the district.
[4] In August of that year, Komdiv Semyon Nikitin took command of the corps; he was arrested during the Great Purge in March 1938.
Between June and July 1940 it was briefly headquartered at Kovno before moving to Šiauliai in August, part of the Baltic Special Military District.
[10] As a result of increased tensions with Germany, on 14 June 1941, the district command approved a plan for the redeployment of units closer to the border.
On 15 June, an order was issued on increasing the district's combat readiness, which noted that the 125th Rifle Division had revealed serious shortcomings in tactical exercises, as unit commanders did not fully study their sectors.
Shumilov later recalled that soldiers in advanced units were issued cartridges on 20 June, but that a member of the district military council demanded that they be withheld.
The division's position was made worse by its open left flank – the 48th had been caught by German bombers while marching from Riga and had lost 70% of its men to a tank attack near Eržvilkas, forcing its withdrawal to the Raseiniai area.
From 07:00 on 22 June the 125th defended its sector and was pushed back 12 kilometers by the end of the day after German tanks crossed the Jūra River bridge.
The seizure of Daugavpils by the LVI Motorized Corps forced a further retreat towards Riga to the northern bank of the Daugava, ordered on 27 June.
[10] On 22 July, preceded by massive artillery and aerial bombardment, German troops launched an attack at the junction of the 10th and 11th Corps, attempting to split the army in half.
The defenses on the 11th's right flank were broken, and by the end of 24 July, German units reached the Mustvee River in the corps' rear after advancing to the northeast.
Retreating north, units of the corps reached the Omedu River on the night of 25 July but were attacked by the 254th Infantry Division on the next day.
In a report to the headquarters of the front, the Military Council of the army stated that the 11th Corps "did not actually exist, as its units leaving the encirclement were extremely weakened and demoralized by the enemy air superiority".
The 11th, constituting the main part of the army's eastern group, defended positions from Lake Peipus to the Gulf of Finland, stubbornly resisting the German advance along the Narva highway.
The 118th Division, which had not yet completed its concentration, was forced to leave Jõhvi under the threat of encirclement and retreat along the railway to Narva, although the 268th was able to repulse the attack.