Vasilii Samutin

Born June 15 (28), 1906, in the village of Volchkov Perevoz, now in Volyn’ Oblast. Soviet party official. A leader of the partisan movement in Byelorussia in the Great Patriotic War. Journalist. Member of the CPSU from 1926. Son of a worker.

From 1927, Samutin was a leader in the Komsomol and a journalist in the Byelorussian SSR. In 1934 he engaged in underground work in Western Byelorussia and was secretary of the Białystok regional committee of the CP of Western Byelorussia. In 1935 he was arrested by the police of bourgeois Poland and put in prison. From 1939 he worked as a party official and a journalist in the Byelorussian SSR.

From May 1943, Samutin was first secretary of the underground Białystok oblast committee of the CP (Bolshevik) of Byelorussia and the leader of the partisan movement in the oblast. He was editor of the newspapers Zvezda and Sovetskaia Belorussiia from 1944 to 1946. He was second, then first secretary of the Baranovichi oblast committee of the CP(B) of Byelorussia from 1946 to 1950. Samutin served in responsible governmental and journalistic positions from 1950. He was a candidate member of the Central Committee of the CP(B) of Byelorussia from 1949 to 1952. He was awarded the Order of Lenin, five other orders, and various medals.