A sluggish gendarme": the biography of V.N. Russiyanov (in addition to S.P. Zvyagin's report)

The article is implemented as a continuation of V.P. Zvyagin's report at the conference "The Civil War in the East of Russia: Objective View through the Documentary Heritage" (Omsk, 12-13 November 2014). In the article the biographical information about Victor Nicolaevich Russiyanov (1879-1936) is summarized. He was an officer of the Gendarmerie of the Russian Empire in 19101917 and of the Counterintelligence of A.V. Kolchak in 1918-1922. According to Z.I. Peregudova, Russiyanov was the author of a false document known as "Eremin's Letter", published in 1956. The false document was to confirm the cooperation of I.V. Stalin (a Soviet dictator from the 1920s to 1953) with the state bodies of political investigation before the Revolution of 1917. The article gives a coherent chronology of the main stages of V.N. Russiyanov's biography, an analysis of his activities in security police, provides different estimates of his contemporaries. In the article the documents of the Yenisei Provincial Gendarmerie Department and its divisions, P.P. Zavarzin's materials of inspection of Siberian special services (in October-December 1916), the Staff of the Corps of Gendarmes official orders, the materials of press and the NKVD (The People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs) reference book (1940) were cited for the first time. The author of the article used information contained in the report of S.P. Zvyagin, Z.I. Peregudo-va's monograph (2013) and a number of the sources published earlier. There is a full text of V.N. Russiyanov's testimony manuscript made in the spring of 1917 as an annex to the article. During the research the author of the article revealed the circumstances of V.N. Russiyanov's arrival to the Special Corps of Gendarmes; described the special mission of overseeing hieromonk Iliodor (Truf-anov) in 1910-1912; his participation in the gendarmes' "courts of honor" (from 1914) and Russianov's role in the revolutionary events in Yeniseisk in 1917. The author of the article casts doubt on the version of V.N. Russiyanov's contemporaries that he was a Soviet spy during the emigration in China after the Civil War in Russia. After analyzing his official biography in the secret services of different regimes the author made a conclusion that V.N. Russiyanov was not a professional in political investigation, a staunch supporter of the monarchy or enemy of the Soviet power. It has been shown that throughout his career and emigration after the Civil War only selfish goals moved him.

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