Vasily Fomich Sharangovich (russian: Васи́лий Фоми́ч Шаранго́вич; be, Васіль Фаміч Шаранговіч, Vasil Sharanhovich; March 4, 1897 – March 15, 1938) was Belarusian

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

politician and first secretary of the

Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...

of Byelorussian SSR in the Soviet Union. He was executed after the last of the Moscow Trials, the

Trial of the Twenty-One In law, a trial is a coming together of parties to a dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to adjudicate claims or disputes. One form of tribunal is a court. The tribunal, ...

, in 1938.

Biography

Vasily Sharangovich was born into a peasant family in

Vilna Vilnius ( , ; see also #Etymology and other names, other names) is the capital and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city of Lithuania, with a population of 592,389 (according to the state register) or 625,107 (according to the munic ...

province, in modern-day Lithuania. He worked as a manual labourer. He joined the

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

in December 1917, after they had seized power, and enlisted in the Red Army. In 1919, he was sent to work underground in

Minsk Minsk ( be, Мінск ; russian: Минск) is the capital and the largest city of Belarus, located on the Svislach and the now subterranean Niamiha rivers. As the capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is the admi ...

province, which was under Polish occupation. Arrested by Polish intelligence in 1920, he was sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted to 10 years in prison. He was released after 18 months as part of a prisoner exchange. Sharangovich was Deputy People's Commissar for Justice in the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1921–23. In 1923–30, he was a trade union official in Byelorussia (Belarus) and in Siberia. In 1930–34, he was Second Secretary of the Byelorussian Communist Party. In 1934–36, he was a party official in Kazakhstan and Kharkiv. Sharangovich was appointed First Secretary of the Byelorussian communist party on 17 March 1937, and initiated the mass arrests of local officials who had been resisting the

Great Purge The Great Purge or the Great Terror (russian: Большой террор), also known as the Year of '37 (russian: 37-й год, translit=Tridtsat sedmoi god, label=none) and the Yezhovshchina ('period of Yezhov'), was Soviet General Secret ...

, including the head of government, Nikolai Goloded, who died while under interrogation, and the Chairman of the Executive of the Supreme Soviet (i.e. 'President'), Alexander Chervyakov. Chervvakov heard himself denounced by Sharangovich during the 16 Congress of the Byelorussian party, in June 1937, left the hall, and committed suicide. Sharangovich described it as "a dog's death for a dog". He told the Congress: Despite his zealotry, Sharangovich was removed from office in August 1937, when

Yakov Yakovlev Yakov Arkadyevich Yakovlev (real name: Epstein; russian: Я́ков Арка́дьевич Я́ковлев, 9 June 1896, Grodno – 29 July 1938) was a Soviet politician and statesman who played a central role in the forced collectivisation of ag ...

was sent from Moscow to denounce and replace him. He was then forced to confess that he had been a Polish spy since 1921, a member of a 'national fascist' gang that included his former victims, Goloded and Chervyakov, and one of the 'Trotskyist-Bukharin gang' that he had denounced. In March 1938, he appeared in the third of the

Moscow show trials The Moscow trials were a series of show trials held by the Soviet Union between 1936 and 1938 at the instigation of Joseph Stalin. They were nominally directed against "Trotskyists" and members of "Right Opposition" of the Communist Party of t ...

, where Nikolai Bukharin was the principle defendant, and testified that Bukharin had been a spy. Bukharin denied it, called Sharangovich an ''agent provocateur'', and said that he had never heard of him until he read his testimony. At that point, Sharangovich shouted at Bukharin to "stop lying!". Despite all the help he gave the authorities, he was sentenced to death, and shot-his last words were Sharangovich was rehabilitated in 1958.

References

1897 births 1938 deaths People from Myadzyel District People from Vileysky Uyezd Heads of the Communist Party of Byelorussia Case of the Anti-Soviet "Bloc of Rightists and Trotskyites" Great Purge victims from Belarus Belarusian people executed by the Soviet Union {{Belarus-politician-stub