The Trial of the Four, also Galanskov–Ginzburg trial, was the 1968 trial of
Yuri Galanskov
Yuri Timofeyevich Galanskov (russian: Ю́рий Тимофе́евич Галанско́в, 19 June 1939, Moscow - 4 November 1972, Mordovia) was a Russian poet, historian, human rights activist and dissident. For his political activities, suc ...
,
Alexander Ginzburg
Alexander "Alik" Ilyich Ginzburg ( rus, Алекса́ндр Ильи́ч Ги́нзбург, p=ɐlʲɪkˈsandr ɨˈlʲjidʑ ˈɡʲinzbʊrk, a=Alyeksandr Il'yich Ginzburg.ru.vorb.oga; 21 November 1936 – 19 July 2002), was a Russian journalist ...
,
Alexey Dobrovolsky
Alexey Aleksandrovich Dobrovolsky (also known as Dobroslav; October 13, 1938 – May 19, 2013) was a Soviet-Russian ideologue of Russian Rodnoverie (a form of Slavic neopaganism), national anarchist, neo-Nazi, and volkhv of the Nature Conservat ...
and Vera Lahkova for their involvement in
samizdat
Samizdat (russian: самиздат, lit=self-publishing, links=no) was a form of dissident activity across the Eastern Bloc in which individuals reproduced censored and underground makeshift publications, often by hand, and passed the document ...
publications. The trial took place in
Moscow City Court
The Moscow City Court (russian: Московский городской суд (Мосгорсуд), Moskovsky gorodskoy sud (Mosgorsud)) is the highest judicial body of the city of Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Моск ...
on January 8–12. All four defendants were sentenced to terms in
labour camps
A labor camp (or labour camp, see spelling differences) or work camp is a detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor as a form of punishment. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons (espec ...
. The trial played a major part in consolidating the emerging
human rights movement in the Soviet Union In the 1980s a human rights movement began to emerge in the USSR. Those actively involved did not share a single set of beliefs. Many wanted a variety of civil rights — freedom of expression, of religious belief, of national self-determination. T ...
.
Defendants
Yury Galanskov was a second-year student at the Historical Archives Institute and worked at the State Literary Museum in
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...
. From 1959 onwards he took part in
readings by young poets in Mayakovsky Square. His poems were published in ''
Sintaksis'', a typescript poetry anthology edited by
Alexander Ginzburg
Alexander "Alik" Ilyich Ginzburg ( rus, Алекса́ндр Ильи́ч Ги́нзбург, p=ɐlʲɪkˈsandr ɨˈlʲjidʑ ˈɡʲinzbʊrk, a=Alyeksandr Il'yich Ginzburg.ru.vorb.oga; 21 November 1936 – 19 July 2002), was a Russian journalist ...
. In 1966, Galanskov compiled and issued the typewritten literary collection ''
Phoenix-66''.
Alexander Ginzburg
Alexander "Alik" Ilyich Ginzburg ( rus, Алекса́ндр Ильи́ч Ги́нзбург, p=ɐlʲɪkˈsandr ɨˈlʲjidʑ ˈɡʲinzbʊrk, a=Alyeksandr Il'yich Ginzburg.ru.vorb.oga; 21 November 1936 – 19 July 2002), was a Russian journalist ...
was a first-year student at the Historical Archives Institute who also worked at the State Literary Museum. In 1959–1960 he helped to organize several
unofficial exhibitions of young artists. In 1960, Ginzburg had been sentenced to two years in
labour camps
A labor camp (or labour camp, see spelling differences) or work camp is a detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor as a form of punishment. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons (espec ...
in connection with issuing three issues of his ''
Sintaksis'' poetry collections. Ginzburg put together a collection of materials on the case and trial of writers
Sinyavsky and Daniel (later called ''White Book''), and in November 1966 sent copies to deputies of the
USSR Supreme Soviet
The Supreme Soviet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( rus, Верховный Совет Союза Советских Социалистических Республик, r=Verkhovnyy Sovet Soyuza Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respubl ...
and to the
KGB
The KGB (russian: links=no, lit=Committee for State Security, Комитет государственной безопасности (КГБ), a=ru-KGB.ogg, p=kəmʲɪˈtʲet ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)əj bʲɪzɐˈpasnəsʲtʲɪ, Komitet gosud ...
.
Alexey Dobrovolsky
Alexey Aleksandrovich Dobrovolsky (also known as Dobroslav; October 13, 1938 – May 19, 2013) was a Soviet-Russian ideologue of Russian Rodnoverie (a form of Slavic neopaganism), national anarchist, neo-Nazi, and volkhv of the Nature Conservat ...
was a first-year student at the
Moscow State Institute of Culture
Moscow State Art and Cultural University (russian: Московский государственный университет культуры и искусств) is a Russian university, a vocational training center in the field of culture and a ...
, working in the State Literary Museum. In 1957 he had been sentenced under
article 58-10 of the RSFSR Criminal Code to three years' corrective labour.
In 1964, he again faced criminal charges but, after a forensic psychiatric examination, was sent to a
special psychiatric prison hospital in Leningrad. Galanskov's literary almanac ''Phoenix-66'' published an article by Dobrovolsky on "Relations between knowledge and faith".
Vera Lashkova worked as a typist at Moscow University and was a second-year student at the Institute of Culture.
She typed part of the material for ''Phoenix'' and ''The White Book''.
Lead-up
In February 1966, writers
Yuli Daniel
Yuli Markovich Daniel ( rus, Ю́лий Ма́ркович Даниэ́ль, p=ˈjʉlʲɪj ˈmarkəvʲɪtɕ dənʲɪˈelʲ, a=Yuliy Markovich Daniel'.ru.vorb.oga; 15 November 1925 — 30 December 1988) was a Russian writer and Soviet dissident ...
and
Andrei Sinyavsky
Andrei Donatovich Sinyavsky (russian: Андре́й Дона́тович Синя́вский; 8 October 1925 – 25 February 1997) was a Russian writer and Soviet dissident known as a defendant in the Sinyavsky–Daniel trial in 1965.
Sinyav ...
were sentenced to labour camps on charges of
Anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda for having published their satirical writings abroad. Regarding the sentence as unjust and the information on the trial as inadequate, Alexander Ginzburg decided to produce a collection of known materials on the trial. This included reconstructed trial transcripts and protest letters by intellectuals and citizens across the USSR which were not published in the official press.
The collection, which became known as ''The White Book,'' was complete at the end of November 1966. Ginzburg produced five typewritten copies of the collection and sent them signed with his own name to deputies of the
USSR Supreme Soviet
The Supreme Soviet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( rus, Верховный Совет Союза Советских Социалистических Республик, r=Verkhovnyy Sovet Soyuza Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respubl ...
, and to the
KGB
The KGB (russian: links=no, lit=Committee for State Security, Комитет государственной безопасности (КГБ), a=ru-KGB.ogg, p=kəmʲɪˈtʲet ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)əj bʲɪzɐˈpasnəsʲtʲɪ, Komitet gosud ...
.
He was summoned to the KGB in December and urged to repudiate the collection, to stop its circulation and to state who had helped him compile it. Ginzburg refused, and was informed that he would soon be arrested.
In December 1966
Yuri Galanskov
Yuri Timofeyevich Galanskov (russian: Ю́рий Тимофе́евич Галанско́в, 19 June 1939, Moscow - 4 November 1972, Mordovia) was a Russian poet, historian, human rights activist and dissident. For his political activities, suc ...
had finished work on a typewritten literary magazine titled ''
Phoenix-66''. In this miscellany, he included material in samizdat circulation among the Moscow
intelligentsia, such as his own letter to writer
Mikhail Sholokokhov, in which he condemned the writer for his position on the Daniel–Sinyavsky case.
In January 1967 the place of Vera Lashkova, who had helped type ''Phoenix-66'' and ''The White Book,'' was searched and documents confiscated. This was followed by the arrest of Galanskov and Alexey Dobrovolsky, who also had published in ''Phoenix-66'', on 19 January 1967. Vera Lashkova herself was arrested on 21 January 1967. Alexander Ginzburg was arrested on 23 January 1967.
The arrested spent the next twelve months in pre-trial detention in Moscow's
Lefortovo Prison.
Trial
Charges
All four defendants were charged with Article 70 of the RSFSR Criminal Code (
Anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda):
* Ginzburg was charged with the article for compiling the ''White Book'' on the Sinyavsky–Daniel case.
* Galanskov was charged for editing the typewritten literary almanac ''
Phoenix-66''.
* Dobrovolsky was charged for his article on "Relations between knowledge and faith" in ''Phoenix-66''. Additionally, he was accused of dealing in foreign currency.
* Lashkova was charged for assisting in the typing of the ''White Book'' and ''Phoenix-66''.
All four were additionally accused of "criminal association" with the emigre anti-Soviet organization
National Alliance of Russian Solidarists
The National Alliance of Russian Solidarists (NTS; russian: Народно-трудовой союз российских солидаристов; НТС; ''Narodno-trudovoy soyuz rossiyskikh solidaristov'', ''NTS'') is a Russian anticommunist o ...
, a charge that was stressed in the
propaganda campaign
White propaganda is propaganda that does not hide its origin or nature. It is the most common type of propaganda and is distinguished from black propaganda which disguises its origin to discredit an opposing cause.
It typically uses standard pu ...
around the trial.
Hearings
The hearings took place between 8 January and 12 January 1968 in
Moscow City Court
The Moscow City Court (russian: Московский городской суд (Мосгорсуд), Moskovsky gorodskoy sud (Mosgorsud)) is the highest judicial body of the city of Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Моск ...
.
While the trial was formally public, admission to it was by permit issued by district committees of the Communist Party.
As a sign of protest, supporters of the accused stood on the street in front of the court during the hearings.
The case of the defendants was taken up by three prominent Moscow defence lawyers:
Dina Kaminskaya,
Sofiya Kalistratova, and Boris Zolotukhin. Uncommonly for Soviet trials, they did not disassociate themselves from the politically accused defendants.
Zolotukhin opened his defence with the words "I have the honor to defend Aleksander Ginzburg." Stating that "I need not dwell on Ginzburg's moral virtues, as, whether he is a good or an evil man, I can confidently state that he is not a guilty one," he called for his complete acquittal.
Zolotukhin's final statement widely circulated in ''
samizdat
Samizdat (russian: самиздат, lit=self-publishing, links=no) was a form of dissident activity across the Eastern Bloc in which individuals reproduced censored and underground makeshift publications, often by hand, and passed the document ...
.''
All three lawyers were subsequently barred from legal cases, and Zolotukhin was removed from the Collegium of Lawyers and from his post as head of a legal consultation office.
Yuri Galanskov and Alexander Ginzburg disputed the criminal nature of their activity and plead not guilty. Vera Lashkova plead not guilty to anti-Soviet agitation under article 70. She asked to reclassify her offence under the less severe article 190-1 which does not stipulate intent to subvert the Soviet system.
Alexey Dobrovolsky had worked with the prosecution and plead guilty to the charges.
Sentence
On 12 January 1968, the court found all defendants guilty. The four were sentenced to forced labour:
* Yury Galanskov was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment to be served in
strict-regime camps;
* Alexander Ginzburg was sentenced to five years;
* Alexey Dobrovolsky was sentenced to two years;
* Vera Lashkova was sentenced to one year.
The lawyers of all four convicted individuals entered appeals. The appeals were heard in the Russian Supreme Court on 16 April 1968. The sentence of the Moscow City Court was upheld.
Vera Lashkova had spent her entire sentence in pre-trial detention and was released.
Yuri Galanskov, Alexander Ginzburg and Alexey Dobrovolsky were sent to camps in
Mordovia
The Republic of Mordovia (russian: Респу́блика Мордо́вия, r=Respublika Mordoviya, p=rʲɪsˈpublʲɪkə mɐrˈdovʲɪjə; mdf, Мордовия Республиксь, ''Mordovija Respublikś''; myv, Мордовия Рес ...
. Yuri Galanskov died in the camps after an unsuccessful operation for a
stomach ulcer
The stomach is a muscular, hollow organ in the gastrointestinal tract of humans and many other animals, including several invertebrates. The stomach has a dilated structure and functions as a vital organ in the digestive system. The stomach i ...
in 1972.
Aftermath
Demonstration
In January 1967, a protest followed against the arrest of Ginzburg and Galanskov, and against the introduction of new articles to the Criminal Code that restricted the right to protest. Students
Vladimir Bukovsky
Vladimir Konstantinovich Bukovsky (russian: link=no, Влади́мир Константи́нович Буко́вский; 30 December 1942 – 27 October 2019) was a Russian-born British human rights activist and writer. From the late 195 ...
,
Vadim Delaunay, Victor Khaustov and Evgeny Kushev were arrested for organizing and taking part. Delaunay and Kushev received suspended sentences. Vladimir Bukovsky was sentenced to three years hard labour.
Bukovsky attacked the legal conduct of the case in his final words, which circulated in samizdat and as part of materials about the demonstration compiled by
Pavel Litvinov
Pavel Mikhailovich Litvinov (russian: Па́вел Миха́йлович Литви́нов; born 6 July 1940) is a Russian-born U.S. physicist, writer, teacher, human rights activist and former Soviet-era dissident.
Biography
The grandson of ...
.
Letter writing campaigns
Over the course of 1967 and 1968, the Trial of the Four motivated a renewed wave of ''podpisanty'' (signatories), individuals who signed a series of petitions against repression and re-Stalinization.
At this time, such protest was made at risk of expulsions from education or hindered careers.
The dissident periodical ''
Chronicle of Current Events
''A Chronicle of Current Events'' (russian: Хро́ника теку́щих собы́тий, ''Khronika tekushchikh sobytiy'') was one of the longest-running ''samizdat'' periodicals of the post-Stalin USSR. This unofficial newsletter reported v ...
'' lists 91 names of people subject to extrajudicial reprisals in connection with protesting the trial.
Andrei Sakharov
Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov ( rus, Андрей Дмитриевич Сахаров, p=ɐnˈdrʲej ˈdmʲitrʲɪjevʲɪtɕ ˈsaxərəf; 21 May 192114 December 1989) was a Soviet nuclear physicist, dissident, nobel laureate and activist for n ...
sent a letter to the
Central Committee of the Communist Party
Central committee is the common designation of a standing administrative body of communist parties, analogous to a board of directors, of both ruling and nonruling parties of former and existing socialist states. In such party organizations, the ...
in February 1967, asking that the case be closed. He was deemed an "unstable politician", and his salary was cut by half.
Dissident general
Pyotr Grigorenko
Petro Grigorenko or Petro Hryhorovych Hryhorenko ( uk, Петро́ Григо́рович Григоре́нко, russian: Пётр Григо́рьевич Григоре́нко, link=no, – 21 February 1987) was a high-ranking Soviet Army ...
warned in an "Open Letter to the Budapest Conference of Communist Parties" that "the possibility of a renewal of Stalinism exists as long as there is no glasnost of the judicial process, which was not present in Stalinist times.".
In November 1967, 116 Soviet intellectuals, including mathematician and initiator of the
1965 glasnost rally Alexander Esenin-Volpin
Alexander Sergeyevich Esenin-Volpin (also written Ésénine-Volpine and Yessenin-Volpin in his French and English publications; russian: Алекса́ндр Серге́евич Есе́нин-Во́льпин, p=ɐlʲɪˈksandr sʲɪrˈɡʲejɪ ...
,
Larisa Bogoraz
Larisa Iosifovna Bogoraz (russian: Лари́са Ио́сифовна Богора́з(-Брухман), full name: Larisa Iosifovna Bogoraz-Brukhman, Bogoraz was her father's last name, Brukhman her mother's, August 8, 1929 – April 6, 20 ...
and
Pavel Litvinov
Pavel Mikhailovich Litvinov (russian: Па́вел Миха́йлович Литви́нов; born 6 July 1940) is a Russian-born U.S. physicist, writer, teacher, human rights activist and former Soviet-era dissident.
Biography
The grandson of ...
, signed an appeal to the Court in which they demanded to be able attend the trial as formally guaranteed by the constitution, and criticized the practice of admitting people according to special lists and passes.
["To the Procurator-General of the USSR," 30 November 1967]
Appeal to World Public Opinion
As the trial was underway, physics teacher
Pavel Litvinov
Pavel Mikhailovich Litvinov (russian: Па́вел Миха́йлович Литви́нов; born 6 July 1940) is a Russian-born U.S. physicist, writer, teacher, human rights activist and former Soviet-era dissident.
Biography
The grandson of ...
and linguist
Larisa Bogoraz
Larisa Iosifovna Bogoraz (russian: Лари́са Ио́сифовна Богора́з(-Брухман), full name: Larisa Iosifovna Bogoraz-Brukhman, Bogoraz was her father's last name, Brukhman her mother's, August 8, 1929 – April 6, 20 ...
issued a famous one-page "appeal to world public opinion". In it, they protested against the closed hearings in which "the courtroom is filled with specially selected people, officials of the KGB and volunteer militia, who give the appearance of an open public trial". Reminding readers of "the celebrated trials of the 1930s," Bogoraz and Litvinov listed in detail the violations of law and justice committed during the trial, and asked the Soviet and world public to demand that the prisoners be released from custody and that the trial be repeated in the presence of international observers.
The appeal was notable for departing from the accepted tradition of addressing appeals to Soviet officials, and became the first direct appeal by dissidents to the international public.
The document was signed with their full names and addresses and was transmitted on foreign radio stations broadcasting in the Soviet Union on 11 January 1968.
''The Trial of the Four''
![Samizdat Pavel Litvinov Trial of The Four Cover](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/Samizdat_Pavel_Litvinov_Trial_of_The_Four_Cover.jpg)
Following the tradition of the convicted Ginzburg's ''White Book,'' a samizdat account of the "trial of the four" was in turn compiled by
Pavel Litvinov
Pavel Mikhailovich Litvinov (russian: Па́вел Миха́йлович Литви́нов; born 6 July 1940) is a Russian-born U.S. physicist, writer, teacher, human rights activist and former Soviet-era dissident.
Biography
The grandson of ...
. It included transcripts of the hearings (reconstructed from notes taken during the trial and eyewitness accounts), coverage of the trial in the
Soviet press as well as the texts of the numerous protest letters and appeals that were sent by dissenting citizens. It circulated in samizdat and was published in London and New York as ''The Trial of the Four.''
See also
*
Sinyavsky–Daniel trial
The Sinyavsky–Daniel trial (russian: Проце́сс Синя́вского и Даниэ́ля) was a show trial in the Soviet Union against the writers Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuli Daniel in February 1966. Sinyavsky and Daniel were convicted of ...
*
Human rights movement in the Soviet Union In the 1980s a human rights movement began to emerge in the USSR. Those actively involved did not share a single set of beliefs. Many wanted a variety of civil rights — freedom of expression, of religious belief, of national self-determination. T ...
References
External links
* – First issue of ''
A Chronicle of Current Events
''A Chronicle of Current Events'' (russian: Хро́ника теку́щих собы́тий, ''Khronika tekushchikh sobytiy'') was one of the longest-running ''samizdat'' periodicals of the post-Stalin USSR. This unofficial newsletter reported v ...
'', covering the trial
*
{{Authority control
Political repression in the Soviet Union
1966 in the Soviet Union
1967 in the Soviet Union
1968 in the Soviet Union
Trials in Russia
Soviet show trials
Censorship in the Soviet Union
1966 in law
1967 in law
1968 in law