Background
Shul'gin, Vasilii was born in 1878.
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Vasilii Vital’evich Shul'gin
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Of Ukrainian parentage. Right-wing member of the Duma. Travelled with A. I. Guchkov to Pskov in February 1917 in order to receive the abdication proclamation from Nicholas II (who was returning from the Army HQ in Mogilev to his family in Tsarskoe Selo).
Soon became disillusioned with the February Revolution, and fled abroad after the October Revolution 1917. Lived in Yugoslavia, and continued his political activity (retaining his private estate in Western Ukraine, then Poland). In the 1930s, became the victim of skilful provocation by Soviet intelligence, which masterminded a special operation (Trest) masquerading as an underground monarchist organization.
Travelled secretly (as he thought) to the USSR with agents of Trest, and after his return wrote a book, Tri Stolitsy, praising the strength of monarchist underground groups in the USSR. After the disclosure of the operation by the GPU, retired from politics. At the end of World War II, fell into the hands ofSMERSH in Yugoslavia, was deported to the USSR and sent to the Gulag camps. Released during the Khrushchev thaw, 1956.
Wrote memoirs, which were published in the Soviet Union in the 1960s. Also took part in the documentary film Pered Sudom Istorii, in which very valuable and rare excerpts from 1917 (Nicholas II after the abdication) and World War II (Vlasov) newsreels were incorporated.
