Tag #148635 - Interview #95166 (Semyon Vilenskiy)

In 1945 my friend Lev Malkin and few other University students were arrested. I would have been arrested at the same time, only I rarely met with my friends. Perhaps, for this reason I was arrested later. The trial took place in the town court. They were charged under article 58 (anti-Soviet activities). The court sitting were closed. One of my friends and Gulag fellow prisoners Gasteyev described the trial in detail in his book ‘The lives of destitute sybarites’ published in Russian in America. Gasteyev moved to USA. HE died in Boston. At that time he was also arrested later. I came to the court, when he was under trial. I saw my friend, when he was escorted in the corridor. The visitors, including me, were allowed to come into the court room, when his sentence was announced. I sat beside academician Williams [Williams, Vasiliy Robertovich (1863— 1939), Soviet Academitian, founder and first chief of the department ‘Basics of farming and plant cultivation’, a genius of the Russian scientific school of soil scientists and agronomists], whose son was under trial. When the sentence was announced, he dropped his hat on the floor. These actually youngsters were accused of anti-Soviet agitation, espionage for capitalist countries, corruption and disorientation of Soviet students and God knows what nonsense. My friend was sentenced to 5 years in prison. Later this sentence was changed to 3.5 years, but even this sentence was enough for him to never return and perish in the camp, stay there for good.