Vasilii Kelsiev

Born June 16 (28), 1835, in St. Petersburg; died there Oct. 2 (14), 1872. A leader of the social movement in Russia.

Kel’siev moved to in London in 1859, where he contributed to A. I. Herzen’s Free Russian Press and compiled the Collection of Governmental Documents on the Raskolniks (1861–62). In March-April 1862 he made a clandestine trip to Russia to arrange for the transmittal of Herzen’s publications and to strengthen contacts with the Russian underground and raskolniks (religious dissenters), among whom he hoped to find allies in the revolutionary movement. In December 1862 he was ordered to Russia by the government in connection with the Trial of the Thirty-two. For his refusal to appear he was officially expelled from Russia. At the end of 1862 he broke off relations with Herzen and N. P. Ogarev. He lived subsequently in Turkey and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In May 1867 he gave himself up to Russian authorities. While under arrest in the Third Section, he wrote the repentant Confessions and was pardoned.