Sergey Durov

But, broken physically by his long ordeal, he fell critically ill soon after and died at the age of 54.

• Name — Sergey Fyodorovich Durov • Native Name — Сергей Фёдорович Дуров • Born — 15 January 1815 • Birthplace — Oryol Governorate, Russian Empire • Died — 18 December 1869 • Place of death — Poltava, Ukraine (then Russian Empire) • Occupation — poet, translator, political activist • Years Active — 1830s – 1869

Sergey Fyodorovich Durov was born in the Oryol Governorate in the family of a minor nobleman. His father, an army colonel, died penniless in 1834. The boy's education in the Nobility Boarding school at the Saint Petersburg University (1828-1833) was paid for by his uncle on his mother side, Nikolai Khmelnitsky, a well-known playwright of his time. From 1833 to 1847 Durov worked as a civil servant, before retiring and making literature his profession. Most of his works—poems, short stories and novellas—were published in almanacs, magazines and newspapers from 1843 to 1849, prior to the arrest. In late 1847 Durov began attending Petrashevsky's Fridays. In the spring of 1849, dissatisfied with what he saw as the chaotic nature of these meetings, he—along with his friends Alexander Palm and A.D.Shchelkov—organised another underground circle, which included brothers Fyodor and Mikhail Dostoyevsky, Aleksey Pleshcheyev, Nikolay Speshnev, Nikolai Grigoriev, P.N.Filippov, V.A. Golovinsky and F.N.Lvov. The social and economical situation in Russia was taken as the main issue. Among the documents read there was the banned Belinsky's Letter to Gogol, and "The Soldier Talk" (Soldatskaya beseda), the first ever document propagating revolutionary ideas in the Russian army. Four of the circle members, Speshnev, Dostoyevsky, Filippov and Lvov, decided to organize an underground lithograph. Durov disliked the idea and in April 1849 declared his 'evenings' closed. On April 23, 1849, Durov was arrested and spent 8 months in a single camera in the Petropavlovskaya Fortress. Along with the other Petrashevtsy he was taken to the parade ground of the Semionovsky Regiment in Saint Petersburg, and lined up for execution. At the last moment the execution was stopped and it was revealed that his sentence had been commuted to katorga. Durov, along with Fyodor Dostoevsky, was sent in chains to Omsk, where he was to spend 8 years in a convict colony and the rest of his life as a soldier in Siberia. That sentence was reduced to 4 years as a Prisoner by Nicholas I. The sentence only commenced when the convicts entered the Prison at Omsk. Dostoyevsky wrote about his experience as a convict in Omsk in his memoir-novel Notes from the House of the Dead. After Durov's release he spent one year serving in the army as a soldier, then retired due to ill health and settled in Omsk. Having received permission to leave Siberia, he went to Odessa and stayed at his friend Palm's house. There he died in 1869, after a long illness.

The authorities additionally record the heading Sergey Fyodorovich Durov. His recorded languages were French and Russian.

• Somebody Else’s Child (Chuzhoye ditya, Чужое дитя. 1846, short novel) • "Publius Sirus" (Публиус Сирус, 1847, short story) • "Khalatnik" (Халатник, 1847, short story) • "A Novel in Notes" (Roman v zapiskakh, Роман в записках, 1847) • Auntie (Tyotinka, Тетинька, 1848, short novel) • "A Sad Story With a Happy End" (Grustnaya povest s vesyolym kontsom, Грустная повесть с веселым концом, 1848, short novel)