Secret police Russian Empire

The security department appeared in Russia in the 1860s, when a wave of political terror swept the country. Gradually, the tsarist secret police turned into a secret organization, whose employees, in addition to fighting the revolutionaries, solved their private tasks ...

Special agency

One of the most important roles in the tsarist secret police was played by the so-called special agents, whose inconspicuous work allowed the police to create an effective system of surveillance and prevention of opposition movements. These included filers - "surveillance agents" and informers - "auxiliary agents".

On the eve of the First World War, there were 70,500 informers and about 1,000 fillers. It is known that from 50 to 100 surveillance agents were deployed daily in both capitals.

There was a rather strict selection in place of the filler. The candidate had to be "honest, sober, courageous, dexterous, developed, quick-witted, hardy, patient, persevering, cautious." They usually took young people no older than 30 years old with an inconspicuous appearance.

The informers were hired for the most part from among the porters, janitors, clerks, and passport officers. Auxiliary agents were required to report all suspicious individuals to the district warden who worked with them.

Unlike fillers, snitches weren't full-time employees., and therefore did not receive a permanent salary. Usually, for information that, when checked, turned out to be “substantial and useful,” they were given a reward from 1 to 15 rubles.

Sometimes they were paid with things. So, Major General Alexander Spiridovich recalled how he bought new galoshes for one of the informants. “And then he failed his comrades, failed with some kind of frenzy. This is what the galoshes did,” the officer wrote.

Perlustrators

There were people in the detective police who did a rather unseemly job - reading personal correspondence, called perusal. Baron Alexander Benckendorff introduced this tradition even before the creation of the security department, calling it "a very useful thing." The reading of personal correspondence became especially active after the assassination of Alexander II.

"Black cabinets", created under Catherine II, worked in many cities of Russia - Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kyiv, Odessa, Kharkov, Tiflis. The conspiracy was such that the employees of these offices did not know about the existence of offices in other cities.

Some of the "black cabinets" had their own specifics. According to the newspaper Russian word”for April 1917, if in St. Petersburg they specialized in perusal of letters from dignitaries, then in Kyiv they studied the correspondence of prominent emigrants - Gorky, Plekhanov, Savinkov.

According to data for 1913, 372 thousand letters were opened and 35 thousand extracts were made. Such labor productivity is astonishing, considering that the staff of illustrators was only 50 people, who were joined by 30 postal workers.

Yours among strangers

For more effective work of the security department, the Police Department has created an extensive network of "internal agents" that infiltrate various parties and organizations and exercise control over their activities.

According to the instructions for recruiting secret agents, preference was given to "suspected or already involved in political affairs, weak-willed revolutionaries, disillusioned or offended by the party."

Payments for secret agents ranged from 5 to 500 rubles per month, depending on the status and benefits. The Okhrana encouraged their agents to move up the party ladder and even helped them in this matter by arresting higher-ranking party members.

The Okhrana, (until 1903 it was called the “Department for the Protection of Public Security and Order”), a local body of political investigation in pre-revolutionary Russia, subordinate to the Police Department. The main task of the security departments was to search for revolutionary organizations and individual revolutionaries. The security departments had extensive special agents of both "surveillance" - fillers, and secret agents (passive informers and active participants in the activities of revolutionary organizations - provocateurs).

With great caution, the police treated those who voluntarily expressed a desire to serve as the protection of state order, since there were many random people among them. As a circular from the Police Department shows, during 1912 the Okhrana refused the services of 70 people "as untrustworthy."

For example, the exiled settler Feldman recruited by the Okhrana, when asked about the reason for giving false information, answered that he was without any means of subsistence and went on perjury for the sake of reward.

provocateurs

The activities of the recruited agents were not limited to espionage and the transfer of information to the police, they often provoked actions for which members of an illegal organization could be arrested. The agents reported the place and time of the action, and it was no longer difficult for the trained police to detain the suspects.

According to the creator of the CIA, Allen Dulles, it was the Russians who raised provocation to the level of art. According to him, "this was the main means by which the tsarist secret police attacked the trail of revolutionaries and dissidents". The sophistication of Russian agents provocateurs Dulles compared with the characters of Dostoevsky.

Evno Fishelevich Azef is a Russian revolutionary provocateur, one of the leaders of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party and, at the same time, a Secret Officer of the Police Department.

The main Russian provocateur is called Yevno Azef - both a police agent and the leader of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party. It is not without reason that he is considered the organizer of the murders of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich and Minister of the Interior Plehve. Azef was the highest paid secret agent in the empire, receiving 1,000 rubles. per month.

A very successful provocateur was Lenin's "comrade-in-arms" Roman Malinovsky. The Okhrana agent regularly helped the police to locate underground printing houses, reported on secret meetings and secret meetings, but Lenin still did not want to believe in the betrayal of his comrade.

In the end, with the assistance of the police, Malinovsky achieved his election to the State Duma, moreover, as a member of the Bolshevik faction.

Strange inactivity

The activities of the secret police were connected with events that left an ambiguous judgment about themselves. One of them was the assassination of Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin.

On September 1, 1911, at the Kiev Opera House, an anarchist and a secret informer of the Okhrana, Dmitry Bogrov, without any interference, mortally wounded Stolypin with two shots point-blank. Moreover, at that moment, neither Nicholas II nor members of the royal family were nearby, who, according to the plan of events, were supposed to be with the minister.

On the fact of the murder, the head of the Palace Guard Alexander Spiridovich and the head of the Kiev security department Nikolai Kulyabko were involved in the investigation. However, on behalf of Nicholas II, the investigation was unexpectedly terminated.

Some researchers, in particular Vladimir Zhukhrai, believe that Spiridovich and Kulyabko were directly involved in the murder of Stolypin. Many facts point to this. First of all, suspiciously easily experienced Okhrana officers believed in Bogrov's legend about a certain Social Revolutionary who was going to kill Stolypin, and moreover, they allowed him to get into the theater building with a weapon in order to allegedly expose the alleged killer.

The case of the murderer of Stolypin - a secret agent of the Kiev security department Dmitry Bogrov.

Zhukhrai claims that Spiridovich and Kulyabko not only knew that Bogrov was going to shoot Stolypin, but also contributed to this in every possible way. Stolypin, apparently, guessed that a conspiracy was brewing against him. Shortly before the murder, he dropped the following phrase: "They will kill me and the members of the guard will kill me."

Okhrana abroad

In 1883, a foreign secret police was created in Paris to monitor Russian emigre revolutionaries. And there was someone to follow: these were the leaders of the People's Will, Lev Tikhomirov and Marina Polonskaya, and the publicist Pyotr Lavrov, and the anarchist Pyotr Kropotkin. It is interesting that the agents included not only visitors from Russia, but also French civilians.

From 1884 to 1902, the foreign secret police was headed by Pyotr Rachkovsky - these were the heydays of its activity. In particular, under Rachkovsky, agents defeated a large Narodnaya Volya printing house in Switzerland. But Rachkovsky was also involved in suspicious connections - he was accused of collaborating with the French government.

Pyotr Ivanovich Rachkovsky - Russian police administrator, head of foreign intelligence, organizer of political investigation in Russia.

When the director of the Police Department, Plehve, received a report about Rachkovsky's dubious contacts, he immediately sent General Silvestrov to Paris to check on the activities of the head of the foreign secret police. Silvestrov was killed, and soon the agent who reported on Rachkovsky was also found dead.

Moreover, Rachkovsky was suspected of involvement in the murder of Plehve himself. Despite compromising materials, high patrons from the environment of Nicholas II were able to ensure the immunity of the secret agent.

Taras Repin

One of the common myths about Tsarist Russia is the description of it as a police state.

In books about the revolution or the life of revolutionaries, policemen, gendarmes, fillers, and detective agents flicker on every page. In my time, in school literature textbooks, there was a phrase attributed to General Yermolov: “In Russia, everyone wears a blue uniform, and if not a uniform, then a blue lining, if not a lining, then a blue patch.” After reading this, the students should have been imbued with the feeling of total police control in old Russia.

And what was really? Let us give the floor to an unusual witness - First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev. Speaking in 1953 at the July plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU with criticism of the Soviet state security agencies, he recalled: “Comrades, I saw the gendarme for the first time when I was probably already twenty-four years old. There was no gendarme in the mines. We had one Cossack policeman who walked and drank. There was no one in the volost, except for one sergeant.” Let's leave on the conscience of the Secretary General a message about the unworthy behavior of a police officer, and we will take into account his information about the size of the police apparatus.

And here is another example - while still heir to the throne, the future Emperor Alexander III was met at the pier of the city of Uglich by a huge crowd of townspeople and peasants from the surrounding villages. For a long time, the Tsarevich and his retinue could not pass through the dense mass of people to the city cathedral, and there was no one to clear the way for him, since there were only 2 (two !!) police ranks in the entire county town of Uglich.

When, after the "Uglich pandemonium", Tsarevich Alexander met with the Yaroslavl military governor, Vice Admiral I.S. Unkovsky and asked him a question about the small number of police in Russia, he received an unexpectedly simple answer: “The police in Russia have a purely symbolic meaning; it does not protect anything, because it cannot protect anything: it exists only to testify to the power of the Russian God over Russia and every corner of it. As a force, the police is only a mockery of the force, this is such a police as the one that appears in other plays in theaters. But at the same time, the improvement in Russia of the right to life and property is supported by it, if not by the power of the Russian God! - that is, the conscience of the Russian people.


Officers and lower ranks of the St. Petersburg police

Let's turn to the documents. In December 1862, the county and city police were merged into one structure - the county police department ("Temporary rules on the organization of the police"). The counties were subdivided into camps, headed by bailiffs. Cities were controlled by city and district bailiffs, as well as police officers.

Police institutions were subject to double control: "vertically" - from the Department of Police and "horizontally" - from the governor and provincial government.

From the end of 1889, to help the county police department, the bailiffs were given foot and horse officers, with the preservation in the villages of Sotsky and Ten. In cities not under the jurisdiction of the county police, city police departments are created, headed by chiefs of police and their assistants with a salary of 1,500 and 1,000 rubles a year. They are subordinate to district and city bailiffs, as well as police officers. In cities with a population of no more than 2 thousand people, according to the law of 1887, no more than five police officers were supposed to be, in larger cities - no more than one policeman per 500 inhabitants. For every four policemen, there was one senior. Their salary ranged from 150 to 180 rubles annually and 25 rubles for uniforms. All expenses were paid by the city.

In 1903, taking into account the ever-increasing amount of work performed by this institute, an additional category of lower ranks, guards, was introduced into the county police. United with the officers, they made up the police guard. The position of police officer was introduced in each volost, and the total number of guards was determined at the rate of no more than one per 2.5 thousand inhabitants.

The guards were armed with revolvers and edged weapons (sergeants) and checkers (guards; although they had the right to carry firearms but purchased at my own expense).

Thus, the police in the Russian Empire was a very small structure, and the number of police officers in the provinces rarely exceeded two or three hundred people.

So, at the beginning of the 20th century, a police chief with an assistant and a secretary, three bailiffs with assistants, twelve police officers, twenty senior and eighty junior police officers served in the Kaluga province.

In Khabarovsk, the number of police officers was 30 (including a translator from Chinese and Manchu), in Vladivostok - 136, in Rostov-on-Don - 57.

The small number of lower-ranking police officers was somewhat compensated by the assignment to the janitors of the duty to assist the policemen if necessary: ​​“As soon as the law enforcement officer squeals his whistle, two or three janitors from the nearest doorways immediately grow near him”

With this help, and also due to the fact that the crime rate in the country was 10 times lower than it is now, the police were quite able to control the situation and maintain law and order.

As for the Separate Corps of Gendarmes, by 1917 it had only 1,000 officers and 10,000 lower ranks in its ranks, while most of ranks of the corps was involved in security railways, the share of the actual political police remained less than a third.

A significant shortcoming of the Russian pre-revolutionary police and gendarme corps was the lack of their own educational institutions. The lower ranks were recruited, as a rule, from retired army non-commissioned officers, and the commanding staff - from officials and officers of the armed forces. Russian Prime Minister P.A. Stolypin, in his draft reform of the Russian police, proposed the creation of special educational institutions. But "in order to save money" the project was postponed. Therefore, the police officers had to learn the wisdom of the police service exclusively in practice.

Service in the police has always been difficult and dangerous, and in the years of exacerbation political struggle especially. The revolutionaries referred to all police officials without exception as "enemies of the people" and sentenced them all to death in absentia. Killing a policeman was revered among the "fighters for the happiness of the people" for special valor.

The ranks of the police tried to honestly fulfill their duty. Let's give just one example. Served in the Moscow Presnensky police unit police officer Sakharov. Being a strict and fair police officer, he enjoyed well-deserved respect in the working-class districts. And when in 1905 an uprising broke out in the city, the neighbors-workers begged the policeman not to go to work. “I do not serve my sovereign in order to hide,” answered the honest warder and went on duty. Two days later, his corpse was fished out by soldiers in the Moscow River. There were 19 bullet and stab wounds on the body of the policeman - this is how the squad of militants dealt with him, sealing the "revolutionary brotherhood" with blood.

During the "bloodless" revolution in February 1917, the revolutionary squads and the rebel soldiers of the Petrograd garrison ruthlessly killed almost the entire staff of the capital's police. Police officials tried to the end to maintain order in the city. The sovereign had already been removed from power, the Provisional Government had already appeared, and the police stations surrounded by the rebels held out. They still hoped for help, which never came. According to some reports, up to 80% of the city's policemen were killed in those days ...

From the book "10 Myths about Russia" Alexander Muzafarov.

In Russia, for several centuries, police functions were carried out by various state bodies.

IN Ancient Russia police functions were performed by the prince and his team.

As it improves and becomes more complex public organization, some officials of the princely administration begin to perform police functions: governors, posadniks, sotsky, elders, etc.

In addition, police functions were carried out by the archbishop, who headed the Christian church, which considered cases of special jurisdiction.

The network of bodies performing police functions is gradually expanding. In medieval Russia, the creation of special police bodies is noted, such as the Robbery Order, which acted as the central police and judicial body and operated throughout Russia, with the exception of Moscow and the Moscow Region, where the Zemsky Order was created as a police body.

Initially, the police originated in St. Petersburg. In 1715, a police chief's office was established here, and three years later, the post of police chief general was introduced, corresponding to the fifth class of the "Table of Ranks". In 1722, the police chief's office was established in Moscow.

Under Peter I, the Preobrazhensky Prikaz acts as a special body of political police. Since 1695, the order has been in charge of maintaining order in Moscow and investigating especially important court cases. The order was led by Prince-Caesar Fedor Yuryevich Romodanovsky.

Along with the Preobrazhensky Prikaz, there were major offices in Russia, which arose as a result of Peter I giving special personal assignments to close associates, most often guards officers in the rank of major.

In 1718, a new structure was created for political investigation - the Secret Chancellery.

The end of the 18th century was significant for the creation of secret agents - a new phenomenon for those years, but, as time has shown, very promising.

In 1802, Alexander I created new central government bodies in Russia - ministries, and among them - the Ministry of Internal Affairs Kuritsyn V.M. "History of the Russian Police". Brief historical outline and main documents. Tutorial. - M.: "Shield-M", 1998. S. 77.

The further development of the central police department is associated with the implementation of the reform of M.M. Speransky, during which the Ministry of Police was formed. The Ministry of Police consisted of departments (the Economic Police Department, the Executive Police Department, the Medical Department) and two offices (general and special). The government has given the Ministry of Police great powers. In addition to guarding internal security, the Ministry monitored the implementation of laws by all other government ministries.

After the suppression of the Decembrist uprising, the Third Branch of His Imperial Majesty's Own Chancellery became the body of political investigation. When the Department was formed, as initial constituent parts it included a special office of the Ministry of the Interior, secret agents and a separate corps of gendarmes.

Proceedings in criminal cases were then divided into three stages: investigation, trial, execution of the sentence Ivanova E.A. "Legal foundations for the organization and activities of the general police of Russia", Krasnodar:, 2003 - P.102.

The reform of 1880 turned the Ministry of Internal Affairs into the dominant link in the state apparatus, in the role of which it remained almost until the fall of the autocracy.

The Police Department consisted of seven office work, two departments and an intelligence unit. Administrative office work led personnel work. Legislative - was in charge of the construction of police agencies throughout the country, the prevention of antisocial behavior of the townsfolk. Third, it was engaged in the secret collection of information about citizens wishing to enter the civil service, as well as about active social activities. In addition, he was entrusted with control over the search for criminals. Fourth - supervised the conduct of inquiries in cases of state crimes. Fifth - supervised the execution of decisions taken against state criminals. Sixth - oversaw the production and storage explosives, controlled compliance with the laws on the wine monopoly and Jews, regulated relations between entrepreneurs and workers. Seventh - supervised the activities of the detective departments.

The need to create special bodies dealing exclusively with criminal investigation was recognized in Russia by the beginning of the 20th century. In July 1908, a law on the organization of the detective unit was adopted, in accordance with which detective departments were created in the city and county police departments. Their task was to conduct inquiries in criminal cases with the support of the necessary operational-search activities.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the Russian criminal investigation department was recognized as one of the best in the world, since it used the latest techniques in its practice. For example, a registration system based on the systematization of information about persons into 30 special categories. Photo albums were actively used.

After the February Revolution of 1917 in Russia, the tsarist police were liquidated. The replacement of the police by the "people's militia" was proclaimed.

On May 10, 1918, the Collegium of the NKVD of the RSFSR decided that "the police exist as a permanent staff of people performing special functions." From this moment, the militia from the "people's" begins the transition to the professional category.

In 1920, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee approved the first regulation "On the Workers' and Peasants' Militia". In accordance with it, the police included: city and county police, industrial, railway, water, search police. Service in the police was voluntary. On November 17, 1923, a service of district guards was created in the system of internal affairs bodies - the current district police inspectors.

As part of the police, over time, there were new units. In 1936, divisions of the State Automobile Inspectorate (GAI) were created, in 1937 - to combat theft and speculation (BHSS).

By 1941, in the structure of the Main Police Department there were departments of criminal investigation, BHSS, external service, traffic police, railway police, passport, scientific and technical, to combat banditry.

Subsequently, in different years, the militia included such departments as police detachments special purpose- special forces, a special police detachment - OMON, the Main Directorate for Combating Organized Crime - GUBOP and others. In 1990, the National Central Bureau of Interpol was established in Russia.

On April 18, 1991, the Federal Law of the RSFSR "On the Police" came into force. The law addresses issues general position, the organization of the police in the RSFSR, the duties and rights of the police, the use of physical force by the police, special means and firearms, service in the police, guarantees of legal and social protection of police officers.

At the referendum on December 12, 1993. The Constitution of the Russian Federation was adopted, which consolidated the main provisions of the Law of the RSFSR "On the Police".

By 2004, there were more than 37 departments in the structure of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation.

On November 5, 2004, the President signed a Decree, according to which these departments were replaced by 15 departments, centers and special bodies.

The law "On Police" was signed by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on February 7, 2011. The effective date of the new law is March 1, 2011.

Law "On Police", developed as part of the reform Russian authorities Internal Affairs, provides that the militia will change its name to the police. police legal federal law

The law defines the status, rights and duties of a police officer; frees the police from duplicating and unusual functions, fixes, as it were, a partnership model of relations between the police and society.

In 2017, the history of the police exchanged its second century. On November 10, 1917, the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the RSFSR, under the leadership of Alexei Ivanovich Rykov, adopted a resolution "On the Workers' Militia". This decree served as the legal basis for the creation of the police as a law enforcement agency. Subsequently, November 10 became an official holiday - Police Day.

In fact, the history of the police goes deep into the past. The first predecessors of modern law enforcement agencies appeared in the days of Ancient Russia. Before the creation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, it was still far away, but criminals, of course, have always existed, as well as those who fought against them.

An excursion into the history of law enforcement agencies, including the police and criminal investigation, was conducted for us by Alfiya Alkinskaya, Deputy Head of the Central Museum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, Honored Worker of Culture of the Russian Federation. About what the first Russian detectives were called, for which in Russia they were executed with molten metal, which of the kings invented the peasant police and what the word “police” means, read below.

“Murder “in robbery” was considered more serious than “at a feast”

The very terms "police", "investigation" and everything connected with them seem to us something relatively modern. But the history of law enforcement agencies in our country has more than one hundred years! Alfiya Aminovna, tell us, when did we get the first semblance of a modern criminal investigation department?

The formation of the detective as a police service really took place in the 19th century, and at the beginning of the 20th century, its legislative, legal design. But before that, domestic detective work has come a long way, almost a millennium long. The very first Russian code of laws was called "Russian Truth". It appeared during the reign of Yaroslav the Wise and operated until the end of the 15th century. This was the first system of laws of the Rurik dynasty.

- And what were the names of people involved in catching criminals in those days? And what exactly were they caught for?

At that time, crimes directed against private individuals were mostly known, so in written documents they were denoted by the word “offense”. And the word "spy" itself, obviously, comes from the Old Russian verb "seek" ("search"). After a crime was committed somewhere, it was announced publicly in some crowded place, for example, in a market square (“at the market”). And this procedure itself was called "cry" - in fact, it was the first stage of the ancient Russian trial. Later, the term "general search" will appear in legislative documents - a survey of all witnesses to establish involvement in a crime. Torture in those days was called experience and thieves and other criminals tatami. In that era, the prince was the head of justice, and everyone was judged in the princely court.

- And what was the name of those who were engaged in the search for criminals?

The prince entrusted these powers chiunam. Those who investigated criminal cases were called virniki.

How was the punishment determined?

Punishments were different, even for the same crime. Historians argue that this depended on how great the role of the evil will of the criminal was.

- You mean malicious intent?

Quite right. Thus, premeditated murder "in robbery" was considered more serious, more serious than, say, "at a feast", where the participants heated up by drinks used to get into a fight. It was believed that in this case it happened through negligence, without malicious intent and in a state of excitement. A lot of time passed before the attitude towards crime changed and it began to be perceived as a phenomenon that harms the whole society, and not just the victim.

“At every step one could meet a man with a cut off ear”

- Punishments, presumably, were much more severe and cruel than now?

During the reign of Ivan III, under which the first Sudebnik was created (1497), people were often branded, their limbs were cut off - this is how criminals were registered. Therefore, in Muscovite Russia, at every step one could stumble upon a person with a cut off ear, nose, and without a tongue. So the guilty could easily be identified in the crowd. Hallmarking was abolished only in the 19th century.

- The inhabitants believe that the most severe punishments were in the era. Is it so?

Ivan Vasilyevich, on the one hand, grew up on atrocities. On the other hand, he was a richly gifted man, well educated. He did not tolerate bribe-takers, drunkards and flatterers. But his desire to create the most just legal system was simply unbridled. It was often expressed in cruelty, including with the help. In 1550, Grozny adopted a new code of laws, consisting of 100 articles. It contained new norms of criminal law. By the way, it was under Grozny that the situation began to take shape in our country. state system fight against criminality. There were so-called orders - bodies of central control.

- And what crimes were considered the most terrible and most severely punished?

First, crimes against the church, then against the state and the order of government, and only then - against the individual. The death penalty provided in 30 cases. They were executed in different ways: by hanging, beheading, burning too, burying alive in the ground ... Even pouring metal into the throat was practiced - this is how counterfeiters were punished. Such was the century, and such, as they say, were morals.

“Policemen were jokingly called “Arkharovites””

What has changed since coming to power? In history, he was known as an innovator king. Perhaps his reforms also affected the judicial system?

Undoubtedly, his reign brought many changes to Russian legislation. First of all, Peter I formed the administrative system. It was a special class of officials who controlled all spheres of life and activity of society. In 1718, the Chief of Police Office appeared in St. Petersburg. It was headed by the personal batman and favorite of the king, the former naval cabin boy Anton Devier. The police and the military were involved in the service in the office. Later, since there were not enough personnel, on-duty assistants began to be allocated from each yard to help the police. It should be noted that under Peter the police were only in the capital. And already during the reign of Catherine II, law enforcement officers appeared in other Russian cities. In 1775, she created a rural police force made up of peasants and villagers. By the way, although Catherine was a supporter of European values, she did not cancel branding.

- Today, we are well aware of the names of the great legislators, but have the names of famous detectives come down to us?

Of course, and since the most ancient times. Known, for example, the names of some of the boyars who led the orders. So, in the Belozersky lip charter, the name of the head of the Robbery Order "boyar Ivan Danilovich Penkov and his comrades" is mentioned. When the Time of Troubles ended, the people elected the "Council of the whole earth." This provisional government also had a Rogue Order. One of its leaders after the end of the Time of Troubles was the Russian national hero -. In the era of Catherine II, there were also many wonderful detectives. Thanks to one of them, the famous term "Arkharovets" even appeared.

- It means "hooligan", "swindler". What's with the detectives?

In the old days, police agents were called so jokingly. The word arose thanks to the chief police chief of Moscow, Nikolai Petrovich Arkharov. He was a very clever detective: he had a live logical thinking and loved to unravel complex cases. His assistant is also known - the famous Moscow detective Maxim Ivanovich Schwartz.

N.P. Arkharov

- And when did the Ministry of Internal Affairs appear in Russia?

Alexander I was already its founder. The creation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was one of his innovations. The emperor entrusted the leadership of the new department to his close friend and colleague in the reformist policy, V.P. Kochubey. Subsequently, the ministry was led by many outstanding personalities, but the issue of creating an independent criminal investigation service within the ministry remained unresolved for a long time. This happened only after the peasant reform of 1861. It was a time of great reforms in Russia, within which educational, financial, military and judicial reforms successfully fit. In the context judicial reform there was a separation of the prosecution from the judiciary.

How did this affect the police?

Investigative functions were removed from the competence of the police. Such a narrowing of its activities was due to the incompetence of the police in investigative practice, the reason for which was the absence of an independent detective service in the operational structure.

“Dzerzhinsky brought rations and uniforms to the police”

The revolution turned life upside down in the country and, of course, had to affect the criminal investigation. What changed with the coming to power of the Bolsheviks?

The fate of police officers after 1917 was quite dramatic. Many had to emigrate. So, for example, did the head of the detective service of Moscow and the Russian Empire, Arkady Frantsevich Koshko. He invested so much love, energy and strength in his profession, and in the end he became an exile of the Motherland. And in general, an incredibly high wave of revolutionary terror touched very many representatives of the department. The fate of Koshko was nevertheless better than that of many others. Let us recall the Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, who was killed by terrorists, the Ministers of the Interior von Plehve or Sipyagin. The fate of Sergei Alexandrovich's adjutant, General Dzhunkovsky, who was appointed governor of Moscow after the death of the Grand Duke, was also terrible. He was Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, during the First World War he commanded an army corps. After the October Revolution, he was transferred from one prison to another, and in 1937 he was shot.

- How was the fight against criminals carried out in Soviet Russia?

After the revolution new apparatus to combat crime became known as the NKVD. It was led by famous people like Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky. He certainly made a significant contribution to the development of our department. With his direct participation, the most important for that time were developed regulations. For example, on April 3, 1919, the decree of the Council of People's Commissars "On the Soviet Workers' and Peasants' Militia" was adopted. However, it is worth noting that this document was developed even before Dzerzhinsky, but significant changes in the life of the police began to occur when he was appointed People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the RSFSR. So, the content of the police was now carried out according to the estimate of the NKVD (that is, it was transferred to the state budget), which meant a new design - the final subordination of the police to the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs. The personnel were now provided with rear rations and uniforms. In addition, having headed the NKVD, Dzerzhinsky, with his iron will, managed to educate there the people he needed for the “cause of the revolution”, on whom he wanted to rely in the NKVD.

"Police” means "armed people"” »

- And where did this name come from - "police"?

According to the decree "On the workers' militia", which was adopted by the first People's Commissar Alexei Ivanovich Rykov, the militia was not a regular body. In fact, these were armed formations of workers. Hence the name: the word "militia" means "armed people". The resolution on the creation of the militia was adopted on November 10, 1917. This day subsequently began to be considered a professional holiday of the police - born of the revolution, as they began to talk about it. So it is, however, it is. But the activity of these formations in the conditions of the class struggle, devastation, in the context of the world and civil wars and the aggravated criminal crisis very soon demonstrated its unviability. And the militia became a professional body only on October 12, 1918, when the Instruction of the NKVD and the People's Commissariat of Justice "On the organization of the Soviet workers' and peasants' militia" appeared.

You can approve or scold the revolution in Russia indefinitely, everything here is very ambiguous. But if we talk specifically about law enforcement agencies, then what did this coup bring more - harm or good?

- Here, as you said, not everything is clear. An objective understanding of all facets of revolutionary events requires a sober and honest assessment. On the one hand, in new country the new authorities did not need the old staff, including representatives of the law enforcement system. It was bitter by human standards and unwise and inefficient from an economic point of view. Indeed, in those years, in conditions of very high criminal tension, the issue of training new police personnel and criminal investigation urgently required immediate resolution. But the modernization of personnel was impossible without trained specialists. However, along with the previous system of ranks and awards, which were put under the knife immediately after the revolution, the entire previous composition of the police unit was also rejected. They got rid of the former specialists in various ways, including by shooting representatives of law enforcement agencies. On the other hand, new people came to the internal affairs bodies for various reasons - often because of unemployment, often at the call of the heart. They learned the basics of fighting crime in a combat situation, during difficult events. They risked their lives, rejoiced at the success of their comrades. They managed to defeat criminal banditry. Tempered professionally together with the internal affairs bodies, helped to create and form the main units and police services. They always had a hard time - in the NKVD and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, a difficult financial situation constantly reigned. But they survived, having endured all the troubles.

It is interesting that even after the militia was renamed back to the police, many in our country continue to use the former name. Apparently, it has become somehow native ...

Yes, after all, the Soviet militia, together with the people, went through a difficult path connected with all stages of the construction and development of a socialist state. The police gave our society a lot of wonderful heroes and good specialists who, during the war years and in peacetime, demonstrated their best qualities laid down, including by its distant ancestors. And militia veterans continue to do a lot of good today. Believe me, these are amazing examples of kindness and decency: they conduct scientific research, take part in military excavations to search for the graves of soldiers of the Great Patriotic War who remained nameless in the land, establish the names of the buried, restore monuments, patronize orphanages and schools ... In a word, they provide real help. Their knowledge and experience should fall on fertile ground. There, where there is no place for an ideology that turns them into unnecessary "former", as it was 100 years ago. I think this time should teach us a lot.