Viacheslav Zof

Born December 1889; died June 20, 1937. Soviet statesman and military figure.

Zof, of Czech nationality, was born in the city of Dubno, in present-day Rovno Oblast. He joined the revolutionary movement in 1910 and became a member of the Communist Party in 1913. During World War I, Zof was a metalworker at the Sestroretsk arms factory, where he led the Bolshevik underground. After the February Revolution of 1917, he led the Bolshevik organization of Sestroretsk and was a deputy on the Petrograd soviet. In July 1917, on the instructions of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (Bolshevik), Zof prepared the identity papers for V. I. Lenin when Lenin disguised himself as worker K. P. Ivanov. He organized Lenin’s trip from Petrograd to Razliv and then established ties between Lenin and the Central Committee. Zof was a commissar of a brigade and a division and chief of supplies for the Third Army of the Eastern Front in 1918-19. In 1919-20 he was a member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Baltic Fleet and a member of the committee for the defense of Petrograd. He was commissar under the commander in chief of the naval forces of the republic from 1921 to 1924. Zof was chief of the navy and a member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR from December 1924 to 1926 and was chairman of the Soviet commercial fleet from 1927 to 1929. He was deputy people’s commissar of railroad communications in 1930-31 and in 1931 became first deputy people’s commissar of water transport. He was awarded the Order of the Red Banner.