“The secret war in the Crimean capital”: activities of the underground patriotic organization of Pyotr Smirnov in occupied Simferopol

The article addresses the activities of the underground patriotic organization headed by Pyotr Vladimirovich Smirnov in Simferopol and the Simferopol region during the Nazi occupation (1942-1944), about which there is practically no information in Russian historiography. The aim of the study is to investigate the activities of Smirnov’s underground patriotic organization through the analysis of its internal structure, the formation of its underground intelligence network, and the conduct of outreach, propaganda and sabotage work. The research novelty is determined by the use of unique unpublished archival materials from the repositories of the Feodosia Museum of Antiquities, the Memorial to the Victims of the Nazi Occupation of Crimea in 1941-1944 “Krasny Concentration Camp”, and the State Archives of the Republic of Crimea. The correspondence, memoirs, and the identification cards of the participants of the resistance movement - P. V. Smirnov, M. M. Korobanya (Karabanya), L. Prigarina and M. V. Mihailescu - are introduced into scientific circulation for the first time. The analysis of the sources leads to the conclusion that Smirnov’s underground organization managed to establish contacts with the party bodies, and later with Soviet intelligence, recruit Romanian and Slovak patriotic anti-fascists and infiltrate them into the structures of the German and Romanian military command. The patriots liberated Soviet citizens from Nazi concentration camps and prisons, and distributed propaganda literature.