Craiova Army in Belarusian Polesie. Gang "Basti". Part II
"Last Captain" or agony and the end of the gang "Basta"
The Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Brest Region made several attempts to destroy the gang "Basta". In addition to an attempt to clean up Brest forests in June 1945, the second sweep was performed on 1-4 in September 1946 year, after a major raid by AK fighters at the end of last month.
A whole regiment of internal troops numbering about 2300 fighters was thrown at this operation. Parts of the fighters were thrown into the area of the villages of Cherni, Zelenets, Zditovo, Telma and Ivakhnovichi. There was a sweep of the forest around these villages, as well as some of the other nearby settlements. The ringleaders of the gang, Captain Treplinsky, Lieutenant Fedinsky and Lieutenant Rusovsky, could not be captured and smashed by their troops, but this sweep caused significant damage to the AK formations in these areas. In particular, the large dancers of Sergeant Chesakovsky (“Brother”) and the cornet Gushchinsky, together with their leaders, were eliminated. In total, during the stripping operation, 104 of the AK gangster was destroyed and 29 captured. 64 rifles, 57 submachine guns, 13 machine guns, 4 pistols, 40 grenades and 3 radio communications were seized from the bandits. An 34 bandit and AK agent was also identified and arrested. On the part of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the losses amounted to 31 killed and 7 injured.
“Basta” finally refuses such large attacks, which he made in August 1946 of the year. Now he orders his akhovtsam to make small sabotage and engage in battle only in the event of an attack.
In particular, from the end of 1946 onwards, manifestations of ordinary, non-political, banditry on the part of AK troops begin to take place. So, 20-28 December 1946 of the year, before the start of the New Year holidays, in the territory of Brest and Zhabinka districts, X-NUMX structures bypassing the AK made a massive robbery of stores. In particular, the robberies were committed in Thelmach, Zhabinka, Yamno, Chernavchitsy and other villages. Brought almost all products, especially alcohol, and money. Moreover, it is surprising that part of the loot was handed out to the villagers, especially the poor. So they tried to attract more simple people to their side.
From 1947, the leadership of the Ministry of Internal Affairs is no longer trying to simply destroy this AK structure, but to behead it, to eliminate the leaders of this gang. This year there were two attempts to seize the "Bast". But he was extremely cunning and cautious, so it was not an easy task. He was an experienced warrior, had experience in service before the war in the Polish army and had experience during the Great Patriotic War, serving as a commissioner for one of the commanders of the Polesia region AK. Therefore, he knew well many of the methods for capturing the commanding personnel of the formations and, apparently, he even worked out a scheme in advance how he would act in a given situation.
In March, 1947, the year they tried to grab him at a meeting in which four agents of the Ministry of Internal Affairs would be disguised as AK militants and, according to legend, would be sent from Lieutenant Viktor. “Basta” sensed something wrong right away, and so he sent his assistant and another militant to a direct meeting with imaginary envoys, but he disappeared next to the meeting place and waited for them to meet. When the agents of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the two men met, the first immediately began to threaten them. weapons and demand surrender, but it was not there - after a moment they were surrounded by a whole platoon of AK. These four were found dead a week later at the edge of the forest.
In general, the operation against the gang leader was difficult enough. The "Basta", among the local population, had a whole network of connected. And it was mostly young women, as they cause less suspicion. Almost all of them were also his mistresses. For a certain time, they collected various information from where they could get and hear. When he visited them, they laid out to him the whole situation and situation, in connection with which he thought how to proceed further and where to be more careful.
At one time it seemed to the Chekists that there was nothing left to do, how to create their own network of agents in the villages and identify those very “fighting friends” of his, through whom, in turn, he could be caught. But it was also an unsuccessful step - the same coherent "Bastes" in a flash found out about the agents, as they were always very attentive.
Here's a story about an attempt to detain the gang leader in Zalesye in July 1947, told to us by the former liaison "Basta" Niksic J., who was condemned to 10 years for having connected with the gang:
“Since youth, Treplinsky knew. So, we talked at one time ... Well, he somehow found me and we had a connection with him. I fed him, washed at me, stayed with me for a week.
Well, many here knew about it that I am connected to the Home Army. Well, I knew about many here ... And when he visited me in the summer, 1947 in June, I learned that our neighbor lived through my house and contacted the Bolsheviks. I personally saw him accompanying the security officers. Well, I told Dana. I didn’t sleep at night, I went around the house, I looked through the windows ... And on the second night, he wakes me up and says: "Wake up, they arrange a red raid!".
I run up to the window and yes - the car with the security officers on the path stopped, about fifty meters from the house. Well, here he pulled his pants, put on his boots, threw his jacket on his shoulders, put on a slingshot, threw up his machine gun ... He smacked my cheek and flew out the window, sighed towards the forest. And in a minute the security officers broke in - and the trace of him was gone! ...
I loved and love my Motherland! For them, this gang was, and for us - the Craiova Army, which defended our native Poland and the Christian faith! What am I ashamed of? And you know a lot about him? ... "
But, in general, the activity of the AK in the Brest region has subsided and weakened. Already there were no large blasts and arson on the part of the akhovtsev. Just banal causeless murders of the Red Army soldiers, police officers and activists. For example, in the same Zalesye, on the night of June 23 1947, after a raid on the leader of the gang, on suspicion of collaboration with the Soviet authorities, 5 people were killed. Or in the village of Wielun 8 in November of the same year, Lieutenant of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Zavernyaev M. and two more employees were killed.
And at the same time he began to strike blow after blow to the structures of the Polish underground in those areas. So, in 2 in December 1947, near the village of Nagorany, was destroyed along with the leader one of the large dancers of the Zhabinsk department of 47 of the Brest Bypass of AK under the command of Second Lieutenant Dimitri Samarsky (“Samara”). His gang was involved in the murder in the 4 village of the Ministry of Internal Affairs staff and the massacre of the local Ukrainian population. From 23 the thugs were killed 17 and 6 taken prisoner. 15 machine guns, 8 rifles, 2 pistols and 4 grenades were captured. During the operation, an 3 Interior Ministry officer was killed and 5 was injured.
The brutal massacre of employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was an ordinary matter of akovets, especially during the years of agony of the Home Army in Western Belarus. Here is the testimony of a member of the gang "Basta", the senior private AK Denis Shchevelskogo, who was captured in May 1948, and also received 10 years of camps:
“In the summer of Craiova, I joined 1945 in the summer, in 19 years. I was called there by the captain himself, the commandant of the bypass. In the department of the captain "Basta" I was a machine gunner. Usually I stood on the line when we went to the action. He also took me with him as a guard, and ordered me to shoot groups of several people a couple of times. Well, there were Red Army men, activists, Ukrainians ... He gave me the rank of senior soldier in 1946 for good service.
Once a week, mostly on weekends, he sent us home in the morning until the evening. We ate, bathed, saw our relatives. Well, we 2 May went to our native village Yamno, which was not far from our then deployment. Gusinsky, Andreev and Vednevsky were also with me. One acquaintance runs up to us, from where not to take it, and says that the security officers came to the mother of Gusinsky.
We neatly crawled to his house and yes: on the threshold his mother and two security officers stood interrogating her. One officer with a notebook, another soldier young with a papeshka. Well, we surrounded them and ordered to raise our hands up, and Gusinsky's mother ran off to the house. We took them to the forest and killed them there. We didn’t want to shoot: it’s pathetic, and the shots can be heard.
On Saturday, May 8, Mr. Pan Captain let us go again until the evening to go home. We went to Yamno again, but instead of Vednevsky, we had Frost and Zabotinsky with us ... We then, after killing those two, told him everything, and he did not recommend us not to go to Yamno for two weeks, but did not forbid it. I wanted to eat ...
Once we entered the village - there was no one, oddly enough ... And suddenly a shot from somewhere and in an instant squinted Gusinsky. He was killed ... We soon realized that we were surrounded and, shooting back, ran back to the forest. Zabotinsky and Vednevsky ran away, but I decided to stop the security officers and tried to mow out with a machine gun. Well, I then quickly got up and started to catch up with them, when suddenly I fell from the pain. My legs were shot and I lost consciousness because of the pain ... Well, you picked me up.
... Frost did not run away with those two. And did not die. He put his carbine on the ground and raised his hands up. ”
The mentioned gangster “Frost”, who surrendered, is a certain Morozich S. He laid down his arms and decided to cooperate with the authorities. He even gave the location of the headquarters of the captain "Basta" and 14 on May to the leader of the gang decided to conduct a raid, but the gangsters and the leader at that place was not. And on May 21, Morozic S. was found killed in his apartment in Brest. The gang got him even in the city.
The liquidation of the Polish armed forces in Western Belarus, including in Polesie, continued in the meantime. In 19 in February 1948, the Ministry of Internal Affairs in the village of Karabani crushed the dance “Pitcher”, which consisted of 11 militants. 8 was killed and captured by the 3 akovets. 1 was killed by the Interior Ministry and an 2 employee was injured. 5 machine guns, 6 rifles, 1 pistol and 2 grenades are captured.
2 August 1948, near Yamno, the Rudika dancer, consisting of 17 militants, whose leader was deputy commandant of 47 bypassing AK Captain Basty, was eliminated. 10 was killed, including the leader, captured by the 7 akhovtsev. 11 machine guns, 5 rifles, 1 machine gun, 3 pistol, 5 grenades and one radio communication device were seized. 2 and 4 were injured by the Interior Ministry.
October 26 1948, an attempt was made to eliminate the leader of the Zhabinka department 47 of the Brest bypass of AK AK of lieutenant "Victor", together with his gang, consisting approximately of 30 fighters. The forest area near the village of Putischa in the Zhabinka district was combed. Police officers stumbled upon this gang and surrounded her. The leader of this gang and about 10 akovtsev escaped from the environment and fled. 14 militants were killed and 2 captured. 10 machine guns, 3 carbines, 2 machine guns, 3 pistols, 10 grenades and one radio communication device were seized. On the part of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, losses amounted to 5 killed and 11 injured.
The conspiratorial network of the Home Army also suffered. During the 1948 year, 57 bandit landlords were arrested in the Brest and Zhabinsk districts of the Brest region.
By 1949, it became clear that there would be no Third World War, on which the entire anti-Soviet underground was counting. It became clear for the militants of the Home Army, including the militants of the gang "Basta". However, they all understood: outside the forest, only 10 years of camps in Siberia are waiting for them, at best. They had no choice, and they decided to wage their senseless "struggle for the Polish Fatherland" to the end.
And somehow the captain Treplinsky, the leader of this gang, decided to return at least to semi-civilian life. He arranged his private life in a peculiar way ... The fact is that he had a beloved from school - the same girl to whom he molested, and about which Andrei Kireev spoke in an interview.
And so, citizen Yulia Lapinskaya (and this is her maiden name, in marriage as her name was not mentioned) in the middle of 1948, she returned to Yamno. This was reported to the captain by the commandant of the local “Rudik” dancer to the captain. In general, Mr. Treplinsky took and killed her husband, plus his comrade Lieutenant Fedinsky “helped” him in the Zhabinka district, whose gang made his way into Zhabinka and killed the parents of her husband and completely “cleaned” his apartment. And the main character of our article on Christmas 1949 was married to her in a small Orthodox church (recall that many Poles are Orthodox in Polesye), because, for obvious reasons, he could not enter into an official marriage.
Now he was, so to speak, a family man. Although Pan Treplinsky spent most of his time at home with his Julia, who brought him his son Stephen in October of the same year (he still lives and lives in Poland in the city of Lodz, got children and grandchildren), but about his “holy cause of the struggle for Poland He did not forget. According to the memoirs of his former fighters, he once a week went to the forest where the construction took place, he examined them, and distributed orders to his other subordinate commanders. In place of his deputy, he put one of his childhood friends, the commander of one of the dancers, Second Lieutenant Sergei Krupsky (“Gray”).
The “gray” often visited him home, where the pan captain continued to give his instructions and instructions for eliminating the “enemies of the Fatherland”. Once a month, Lieutenant Rusowski and Fedinsky also visited him, as it were, they conducted gatherings of the command of the circuit, where they resolved questions about the future "activities" of the former Home Army, whose commanders in these areas they considered themselves to be.
At the beginning of the 1949 of the year, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and seized records of field commanders of bandit groups, the 47 structure of the Brest bypass of AK, deployed in forests and rural areas in Brest and Zhabinkovskiy districts, accounted for slightly more than 220 militants. The activity of the Polish armed forces in general was declining.
Still, the killing of police officers and activists continued. For example, 15 in March 1949 of the year in Berdichi, Brest district, killed activist Kuzina A. among them was Chistyakovsky A., an active participant in the fight against armed gangs. In all, during 7 a year, 9 people were killed in the Brest and Zhabinka districts, of which 1949 were police officers.
There were banal robberies by akovets. Especially distinguished in this department is Lieutenant Rusovsky. During 3-8 in May 1949, his gang robbed stores in Pokhry, Skoldychy and Kholmichi, in the territory of Brest region. 23 November they also robbed two stores in Chernavchitsy.
And after this action, the employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs went on the trail of Lieutenant Rusovskiy - a new headquarters of his department was revealed. December 5 1949, three companies of the Ministry of Internal Affairs were sent to the village of Chernavchitsy with an approximate total number of 400 people. The detachment broke into three parts and began to comb the forest near the villages of Nesvilo, Zelenets and Pokry.
During the sweep, on December 6, the headquarters of the leader of the Chernavchitsky department of 47 bypassing the AK of Lieutenant Rusovsky, consisting of 18 people, was surrounded and liquidated. He and another 11 militants were killed, the remaining 7 captured. Total 5-8 December 42 was killed by AK militants and captured by 11. The rest, presumably about 30 militants, disappeared. 27 machine guns, 18 rifles, 8 machine guns, 9 pistols, 36 grenades and 2 radio communications were captured. Valuable documentation was withdrawn from the murdered Rusovskiy, where there were various maps, instructions from the captain “Basta”, diaries about the activities of the department, etc. MIA fighters lost 19 people killed and 15 was injured. And yet, the gang "Basta" was again hit hard.
In general, at the beginning of the 1950-s in the territory of Western Belarus, there were no more than 2 thousands of militants of the former Home Army. By that time, larger gangs in the Grodno region were also eliminated, for example, the Olekh gang (commander - Second Lieutenant AK Anatoly Radzivonik). And, basically, the structures continued to operate on the territories bordering with Poland and Lithuania, the districts of the Grodno region. By that time, the gang of “Basta” was the last AK structure in the Brest region, if not in the whole of Western Belarus as a whole. In the same Grodno region, much more numerous militant groups were not so organized.
In general, the existence of these units was already the most real agony of the Home Army. The last major action that the gang "Basta" made was 12-14 March 1950, before the upcoming elections of people's deputies of the USSR. Akovtsy personally under the command of the captain "Basta" blew up an electoral precinct in Thelmach and shot two policemen and one activist near the building. The same with the electoral districts was done by detachments of second lieutenant "Gray" in the villages of Cherni and Zaberezye, and the detachment of lieutenant "Victor" in Zhabinka. In total, in those days, on the territory of the Brest and Zhabinsk districts, 5 militiamen and 4 activists were killed.
In total for 1950 a year in those areas, 17 militiamen and 9 activists were killed at the hands of akhovtsevs. There were also numerous raids on shops and general stores in the villages of Thelma, Cherni, Zhabinka, Yamno, and some other settlements.
The Craiova army then suffered losses not only because of the constant raids by the Interior Ministry. In those years, many were finally convinced that the Soviet government was rooted in these places in earnest and for a long time, so it makes no sense to fight. Many militants simply ran away: either they surrendered to the authorities, or fled to Poland, where they were treated much more condescendingly. Thus, according to the Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Brest Region, in 1950, in the Brest and Zhabinka districts, an AK militant 52 confessed.
But to those who remained in the woods, especially the AK officers, the measures were merciless. 10-13 December 1950, the four companies of the Interior Ministry conducted another sweep in the forests of the Zhabinka district. At the village of Pshenai, December 12, three companies stumbled upon the headquarters of Lieutenant Viktor, the commander of the Zhabinka department of 47 of the AK Brest bypass.
For three hours there was a battle, and only the leader Fedinsky himself remained from the squadron. He barricaded himself in one barn and fired back for another half an hour. When the cartridges ran out, he set fire to the shed and burned there. In all these days, from around 70 militants of Fedinsky, 31 was killed and captured by 25. About 20 aktovtsev disappeared. 38 machine guns, 11 rifles, 7 machine guns, 9 pistols, 20 grenades and one radio communications device were captured. Like Rusovsky, under Fedinsky, there were also documents about the activities of the bandit underground, instructions, lists, etc. MIA losses: 16 killed and 19 injured.
The remains stretched to the detachment of the captain "Basta" and waited for his further decision. In early January, 1951, on one of the forest edges, he gathered all his "soldiers". Here is what the summer veteran of the Home Army, Oleg Mastiugich, who joined the AK in 1992 years, told us in 61, 16:
“The captain gathered all of us ... At that time, no more than 80 people were left. For a long time we didn’t have such meetings ... Once again we were in a big formation, the captain in front of us in his battered uniform and a sheepskin coat on one shoulder stood on stump ...
The priest read a prayer about the dead of our soldiers. And then the captain said: “Who is younger than 22 years, step forward, march step!” About twenty people came out. In general, there were some young ones ... I was the youngest. Mostly there are longtime warriors from the year 1946, although there were some with 1945, but only a few. Here ... And he ordered us to fail and pile up with the right to crowd. And then he sighed ... I thought ... And he said at all: "Who is tired of fighting, step forward, march step!" Everyone looked at each other like that ... No one came out.
The captain went through these four rows ... A dozen guys were still taken away and put out of action ... Young ones, too, were wounded ... Then he stood in front of us and said: “The war is over. You fought like eagles. But there are very few of us left, and Poland is now finally in the hands of the enemy. We, such a handful, will not do anything. You young guys that brought you out: live, have wives, give birth to new generations of Poles. You have fulfilled your duty to the Fatherland! I, and those who stayed, will wait for spring. There I will decide further on the situation, what to do next. ”
He announced the dissolution of the bypass. We, demobilized, he advised to break through to Poland. He said that there it would be safer for us, despite the pro-Soviet government. As far as I know, he and the rest of the group also wanted to break into the spring there ... "
The remnants of the fighters "Basta" divided into small groups, which left under the supervision of Second Lieutenant "Gray." At the beginning of 1951, no more than 40 AK fighters from the gang "Basta" remained in the Brest region.
However, “Gray” was killed next month, February 8 1951. He, along with a group of 6 gangsters, was discovered by police in the village of Wielun. All 7 were killed. Withdrawn 6 machine guns, 1 rifle, 1 gun. During the battle, gangsters used a grenade. The "Gray" was also captured documentation. On the part of the Ministry of Internal Affairs there were 3 wounded.
In February and early March, 1951 of the year in the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Thelmakh, Chernyakh and Yamno came to confess all 17 akhovtsev. Part, unbeknownst to "Basta", broke through to Poland.
And 11 March 1951, the Interior Ministry officers went on the trail “Basta”: near the small village of Lidymo, a group of akhovtsevs was found along with captain Treplinsky, consisting of 13 fighters. A fierce battle ensued. Against this bunch of thugs, there were about 100 policemen. During the battle, the bandits set fire to one house and used two grenades. The akhovtsev 6 was killed, the rest of the 7 disappeared, but 4 from the bottom two days later returned to the station in Černyi. Among the runaways was "Basta". A total of 3 were killed by the Interior Ministry and 5 was injured.
According to the testimony of one surrendered akovets, one of those hiding during the raids, Captain Treplinsky ordered the remaining fighters to flee to Poland. According to his statements, the commandant of the dismissed bypass was also going to flee there.
Informers from the village of Yamno confirmed - Treplinsky was there one night, visited his wife Yulia. But then he disappeared again.
And so, perhaps, “Basta” would have escaped, but now he did not let himself down, which he rarely did, but his wife. Many saw how she often headed towards the village of Shebrin, but did not go into the village itself, but into its vicinity. And indeed: there, in a clearing, there was a small abandoned house, in which, as investigators had guessed, Basta was temporarily hiding.
17 March Lapinskaya went to visit her husband again. But behind her was an agent. So he got to Shebrin, where there was already a truck with 30 operatives led by captain MVD Kuzin. When she entered that house, he signaled and the building was surrounded. The order sounded: "Surrender!". However, for the place of any words, two muzzles of the PCA came out of the window and the window in the attic. Treplinsky and his wife opened fire on the operatives. From the attic in them was launched a grenade. Here is what the captain of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Kuzin himself later told:
“Shooting subsided, then again opened. And everything seemed to be quiet out of the lower window, but after a while the shooting continued again. One of our people got up and with a machine gun walked along the bottom of the house and hit the window. Shooting stopped there, and later subsided in the attic.
We began to approach the house, when Treplinsky suddenly flew out of there and, after shooting at us from the machine gun, ran towards the forest. We follow him. He turned to us, pulled out a pistol, and fired a couple of bullets, killing one of ours. And only he turned and ran, as a whole line flew into his back. He groaned loudly and coughed. He fell near a tree, a couple of times he shot at us again, and then he crossed himself and put a bullet in his temple.
Only two of ours they killed. Also a couple of people contused and a single bullet in the shoulder stung. "
AK captain Daniel Treplinsky "Basta" was liquidated together with his wife 17 March 1951. Nevertheless, the Ministry of Internal Affairs applied force a couple of times. March 20 near the village of Kleiniki, when 4 akovtsev from the gang "Basta" tried to cross the border and go to Poland, but they, without any resistance, surrendered to the police. Well, April 11 near the village of Cherni killed the last AK fighter in Polesye - a single terrorist Daniil Dubrovny, who was hiding with his PPS-42 submachine gun and managed to make a couple of raids on shops in Chernyakh and Zalesye.
So, in April 1951 of the year, the last structure of the Home Army - 47 Brest bypass or the Eastern Coast connection finally ceased to exist. Also the gang "Basta" was the last formation of this militarized organization in Polesie. In the general certificate of the department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Brest region about this gang it says:
"Participants of the gang" Basta "in the period from January 1945 to April 1951, on the territory of the Brest and Zhabinskovsky districts of the Brest region of the BSSR, 126 sabotage and terrorist acts were committed: attacks on military units and individual military personnel of the SA, employees and parts of the Interior Ministry and the NKVD, reprisals against activists and ordinary civilians. There have been numerous robberies of shops and general store.
In total, as a result of operations to eliminate this AK formation, for a specified period of time, 229 thugs were killed in these areas and 103 was captured. 78 gangsters confessed and went missing around 70. Arrested 88 bandit supporters.
In total, during operations against bandits and sabotage and terrorist attacks, 177 soldiers of the SA, the Interior Ministry and NKVD officers were killed, 54 was injured and 17 went missing. The victims of the bandits were 63 civilians. 34 has been damaged by farms, many of the houses have been burned to the ground. Damage of approximately 15 thousand rubles was damaged. ”
With the Home Army in Polesia was finally over. However, even after 1951, small AK gangs operated in the Grodno region: Arkan, Senki, Byrzhis, Grazhoulis and some others. However, by 1953, they were all destroyed. And the last AK terrorist, Vaclav Ozim, was liquidated in Lida 26 on April 1954.
The uncompromising struggle in Western Belarus went from 1944 to 1954 - long 10 years. Of the approximately 11 thousands of militants of the Polish Home Army in those years, about 4 thousands were liquidated, according to various sources, the rest were sentenced to different terms of imprisonment or amnesty. Although in addition to the AK, other formations operated in the Byelorussian SSR: Belarusian, Jewish and Lithuanian. The total number of the anti-Soviet underground in the BSSR reached approximately 30 thousand.
Soviet troops, the Interior Ministry and the NKVD, according to various sources, in those years in the territory of Western Belarus, thousands of their fighters and employees lost approximately 1,5-3. About 2 thousands of civilians became victims of bandit underground and about 80 thousands, mostly members of the families of bandits and their accomplices, were expelled by the Soviet authorities from the territory of the BSSR.
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