"Historian, Bastard, Refuse and I’ll Wipe You Out." How Kherson Resident Oleksiy Patalakh Survived Torture and Fooled the FSB
The occupation of Kherson lasted eight months. During that time, the Russians set up 11 torture chambers across the city and the region. These places became hell on earth not only for local patriots, soldiers, and resistance members but also for entirely random people who happened to cross the occupiers’ path at the wrong moment.
One of these camps held local historian and writer Oleksiy Patalakh. He was threatened with torture and forced to participate in Russian propaganda. Ultimately, the prisoner managed to regain his freedom.
Two years later, Oleksiy shared how the FSB coerces people into collaboration behind prison walls and how his knowledge of the history of the Russian Empire helped him preserve his life and health.
"Saldo Came to Us Before the Elections"
Now, as Oleksiy Patalakh lives in Kherson under constant shelling yet in freedom, he often recalls the peaceful and seemingly carefree years that preceded the occupation. He still harbors deep resentment toward the local leadership, which neglected the city, and the indifference of Kyiv—he sees in them the seeds of the tragedy that befell Ukraine’s south.
Oleksiy Patalakh was born and raised in Kherson, receiving his education during the 1980s when the city was already thoroughly russified. His paternal grandfather instilled in him a love for the Ukrainian language and history—it was from him that young Oleksiy learned he had Cossack ancestors. That discovery sparked his determination to become a Cossack himself, no matter the cost.
As he grew older, he enrolled in the history faculty at Mykolaiv Pedagogical University, but his fascination with Cossack registers had already begun back in high school. Around that time, he also became captivated by the works of historian Dmytro Yavornytskyand dreamed of creating something similar, even though the late 1990s and early 2000s in the south of Ukraine were far from fostering pro-Ukrainian sentiments.
“The history of Kherson region was always taught like this: Scythians, Sarmatians, then nothing—and suddenly, boom, here comes Catherine II,” Patalakh explains. “Frankly, it annoyed me, I tried to fill in that gap. Meanwhile, here in the 1990s, some pensioners started shouting: ‘Kherson is a Russian city; Khokhols, get out of Kherson!’”
In 2005, Oleksiy Patalakh published his first book—a guide titled "Journey Through Kherson Region." Written in Russian but infused with Ukrainian content, it explored Cossack churches, monasteries, burial mounds, ancient settlements, estates, Zaporizhian crosses, and natural landmarks.
Over time, the historian published several more works—on the role of the Zaporizhian Cossacks in the Russo-Turkish War and on Cossack settlements in the Kherson region. By then, he had become a member of a local Cossack organization, where he met Kherson politician Volodymyr Saldo. Saldo would later play a tragic role in the city’s history: in the spring of 2022, he betrayed Ukraine and became the head of the Russian occupation administration. Back in 2002, however, Saldo was running for mayor for the first time.
"Saldo came to our community before the election to gain our support. Before that, old neighborhoods were being demolished, and public funds were being embezzled. But under Saldo, this policy continued," Oleksiy Patalakh recalls. "I wouldn’t say he was ideologically pro-Russian—he was an ideological fighter for money. His worldview was all about getting the biggest kickbacks. Under Saldo, the demolition of old neighborhoods ramped up, and when he was finally ousted, I breathed a sigh of relief."
In 2012, Saldo entered parliament as a member of the Party of Regions. The local opportunists were replaced by outsiders who were just as focused on lining their own pockets. According to the historian, Kherson rejected the "Donetsk elites" because they pushed out local businessmen and tried to seize everything for themselves. This resentment made the city welcome the Revolution of Dignity with open arms.
After Maidan, interest in history grew. Oleksiy Patalakh completed a tour guide course and immersed himself in the study of the city’s past, unaware that he would soon find himself debating it in an FSB interrogation room.
“I asked, ‘Will I be executed?’ They replied, ‘We’ll roast you and eat you.’”
When the full-scale war began, Oleksiy Patalakh tried to join the Territorial Defense Forces. He reached out to an acquaintance, the deputy commander of a local battalion, but was turned down—just a few months earlier, the historian had suffered from severe COVID-related pneumonia, leaving him unable to run or lift heavy objects.
Patalakh returned home and soon fell ill again with a fever. For the first weeks of the occupation, he stayed indoors, learning about events through his wife. According to him, while the regular Russian army was in the city, things were relatively quiet. But in late March 2022, the National Guard of Russia (Rosgvardiya) arrived, bringing brutal crackdowns on protests and widespread terror.
“Rosgvardiya is very good at dispersing protests, though, as the frontline soldiers say, on the battlefield they ran like rabbits. Among all the state structures, they’re the biggest thugs. They would beat women and even attacked an elderly man,” the historian recalls. “But a group of medics secretly treated our wounded, gave them documents and civilian clothes so they could hide. My wife works at the Luchansky Hospital, so I know about this through her.”
Like all patriotic Kherson residents, Patalakh tried to avoid encounters with the Russians. He eventually left for his dacha to keep out of sight. However, in September 2022, he returned to the city to buy supplies for himself and his cat, who had the exotic name Philip Bedrosovich.
It was because of his cat that Oleksiy abandoned the idea of leaving the occupied territory. By that time, the cat was already 20 years old and had lived a hard life. His previous owners had abandoned him near a summer cottage village. The cat meowed so loudly that the local dacha residents nicknamed him Kirkorov—after the singer known for his powerful voice. At first, the cat was cared for by a neighbor. After the neighbor’s death, Oleksiy’s mother took over, and when she passed away, Oleksiy himself became the cat’s guardian.
On September 6, Oleksiy Patalakh left his apartment to go to the market and restock on food for Philip Bedrosovich. However, on the staircase, he was surrounded by a group of armed men in masks. They ordered him to identify himself, confiscated his passport, and after reading his name, declared, "You’re exactly who we need." They cuffed him and forced him back into his apartment, where they began turning everything upside down. It was at that moment, Patalakh recalls, that he realized just how ignorant the Russian special forces were.
"I concluded that the Russians are some kind of Neanderthals," he explains. "Just before this, I had made grape juice and set it to ferment. They asked, ‘What, are you making drugs?’ They saw a souvenir pistol and started fumbling with it, trying to figure out how it’s loaded. Then they noticed a whip and a bridle. ‘What, are you into sadomasochism?’ Meanwhile, right next to them, there were photos of me on horseback from a historical reenactment, and they didn’t even make the connection."
The Russian operatives were desperate to find evidence linking Oleksiy to Ukrainian nationalists, all the while displaying their remarkable ignorance.
One of them—Oleksiy later learned he was from the FSB’s "Anti-Terror" unit—claimed to be a Kuban Cossack. Yet when he noticed a portrait of Zakhar Chepyha, the ataman who had led the Black Sea Cossacks to the Kuban, he asked, "Is that Bandera?"
The uninvited guests claimed that a simple winter cap was actually a cap from the SS Division "Galicia."And these weren’t uneducated Buryats or residents of some remote Russian backwater towns with limited access to education—even Russia’s so-called elite security forces turned out to be completely ignorant.
Eventually, the conversation about Cossacks and horses bored the operatives. They blindfolded Oleksiy with his late mother’s scarf and ordered him to move.
"I asked, ‘Are you going to execute me?’" the historian recalls. "And they said, ‘No, we’ll roast you and eat you.’"
Patalakh prepared himself for death, but it soon became clear that the Russians needed him alive—for their propaganda machine.
"So, Historian, Where Did Ukrainians Come From?"
An hour later, Oleksiy Patalakh was taken to some building, blindfolded, and thrown into a cell. He was told not to remove the blindfold until their footsteps faded in the corridor. After sitting motionless for a few minutes to make sure no one was around, he freed himself from the scarf and began to look around.
It was a solitary cell with no sunlight, as the window was blocked by a sheet of iron. Instead of a bed, there was a wooden platform. From the layout, the prisoner deduced that he was in the SBU building in the city center. Later, a guard brought in two buckets: one meant for water and the other to serve as a makeshift toilet. The water could be drained from heating pipes. Of course, it wasn’t drinkable, but he had no choice but to use it.
That same day, Oleksiy met the head of the Anti-Terror unit, nicknamed Voron (Russian for "raven"). He personally came to Oleksiy’s cell and began quizzing the historian on various topics. At first, he played the "good cop" role—mentioning that he had read Oleksiy’s books and even praising them. But four days later, Oleksiy was taken to "Voron’s" office for interrogation, and the tone of the conversation drastically changed:
"He started questioning me: ‘So, historian, where did Ukrainians come from? Up until the 1990s, Russians lived here. Then the Americans came, drove them out, and brought in Ukrainians, whom they cloned. But soon, you’ll all be gone.’ This must be how Russian propaganda works—they drill these absurd ideas into people’s heads, and even intellectuals can come to believe it. "He claimed he had nothing against Ukraine as a cultural phenomenon. He said, ‘What, did we ever stop you from wearing vyshyvankas or dancing the hopak?’ That’s their entire understanding of Ukraine—hopak dances and vyshyvankas."
Oleksiy ended up speaking with "Voron” several more times. He got the impression that this officer had a relatively favorable attitude toward him—likely because Patalakh’s monarchist views resonated with the Russian.
Here, the historian wasn’t pretending—he genuinely believes monarchy to be the best form of government, and "Voron," as it turned out, fully agreed with him. However, during one of these interrogations, the occupier grew tired of playing the "good cop." He cuffed the prisoner’s hands with wire-laden bracelets and attempted to deliver an electric shock—but it didn’t work.
"He rushes over to the machine, shouting a torrent of profanity, with just a few clean words in between: ‘Nothing can be trusted! They’ve broken the machine!’" Oleksiy Patalakh recalls. "After that, the torture stopped for about five days."
But not everyone was lucky enough to avoid torture. During his month in captivity, the historian encountered many people.
One time, his cellmate was a 16-year-old boy who had been detained with his uncle. They were stopped by a patrol at a checkpoint while walking to get medicine for the boy’s mother. In the end, they were forced to remove their shoes, herded into a pit, and shot at near their feet before being thrown behind bars.
One of the cellmates was an ordinary shopkeeper from the village of Bilozerka. A Rosgvardiya officer didn’t like the way he had been served and beat the shopkkeper so severely that the poor man couldn’t even open his eyes.
"Capturing a real partisan is a very difficult thing, so these FSB officers grabbed whoever they could to meet their quotas. There were a lot of random guys from the market," Patalakh recalls.
Even agreeing to collaborate with the occupiers didn’t protect people from torture. Among Oleksiy Patalakh’s cellmates was a former police officer from Oleshky. After the occupation, his boss agreed to work for the Russians. Following his lead, Oleksandr, thinking he needed to feed his family, also accepted the offer. However, the boss was soon caught taking bribes, prompting the Russians to stage a public crackdown on all his subordinates as part of a show of their "anti-corruption efforts." According to Oleksiy, the former officer was beaten so badly that an old fracture reopened.
From time to time, the historian would hear screams and gunshots echoing through the hallways.
Another form of torture was hunger. Oleksiy now jokes that he was on a three meals plan there, that is — on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. They would give him a spoonful of pasta or pearl barley and a biscuit so hard it could be used to hammer nails. Over the course of a month, he lost so much weight that he had to punch two extra holes in his belt.
"I reminded myself of a monk from the early years of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra," Oleksiy recalls, "living in caves and surviving on nothing but roots."
But soon, an opportunity to return home presented itself—the Russians made him an offer.
"The First Toast Is to Russia." Whispering: "Without Clinking Glasses."
Oleksiy recalls that from the very beginning of his captivity, he decided to lull the enemy into a false sense of security in order to survive. To do so, he pretended to agree with everything. As a role model, the historian chose a character from his favorite author, Henryk Sienkiewicz—Pan Zagłoba, a cunning patriot who used his wit and ingenuity to escape unscathed from countless adventures.
Still, playing such a role was at times incredibly difficult. Once, during an interrogation, "Voron" asked about Oleksiy’s relationship with local activist and public figure Nina Usachova. Unbeknownst to him, she had already been captured and was being held in the same torture chamber. Oleksiy was forced to feign willingness to help locate her, even though he hadn’t been in contact with her since 2019.
"I left that interrogation with a heavy heart," Patalakh recalls.
After that conversation, the captors began treating Oleksiy much more leniently—likely believing he had broken psychologically and would do whatever they ordered. They brought him a Russian brochure titled 200 Years of Kherson and instructed him to think about writing a series of historical articles. In return, they moved him to a better cell and allowed him longer walks. Soon after, the investigator, whom everyone called Palich, said:
"Historian, get ready to leave—you’ll be giving an interview."
And indeed, Oleksiy Patalakh was blindfolded with a scarf once again, taken out of the prison, and driven back to his home. There, he was told to shave and tidy up his room.
It turned out that Oleksiy was released specifically to participate in an interview for the Russian state outlet RIA Novosti. The propagandists chose as their topic the journals Ukrainian Cossacks, published by Ukrainian émigrés in Chicago during the 1960s and 70s.
Oleksiy recalls that a local journalist came to his home and started recording everything on a phone. Among other things, Oleksiy spoke about the commander of the Ukrainian National Army, Pavlo Shandruk, who agreed to collaborate with the German occupiers during World War II. The Germans ordered him to form the Galicia-2 division, but he deceived them by surrendering the division directly to American forces instead of taking them to the battlefield. In Russian news reports, this was twisted into a narrative claiming that Ukraine glorifies Nazi collaborators.
After the filming, the occupiers’ mood noticeably improved—they even allowed Oleksiy to bring homemade wine and jam back to his cell. That evening, he and his cellmate Vadym held a small celebration.
"We knew perfectly well that we were being listened to," Patalakh recalls. "So, I poured the wine, raised my glass, and loudly proclaimed: 'The first toast is to Russia.' Then I whispered, 'Without clinking glasses.' The second toast: 'How could we forget to drink to President Putin?' Whispered: 'May the earth be fiberglass for him.' And so, we had ourselves a little banquet. Humor is what keeps you going in places like this."
After the interview, the investigator Palich became convinced that the Kherson historian was on their side and even offered him a position in the occupation administration. Realizing the game had gone too far, Oleksiy tried to decline, citing poor health and lack of qualifications.
"At that point, he shouted: 'Historian, damn it, refuse, and I’ll erase you!' Vadym and I talked it over and decided we had to agree. If things went badly for them, I could run and hide somewhere until our forces arrived. And if things went badly for our side, I’d be in the administration, with access to information. From time to time, our underground resistance could reach out to me," Patalakh reasoned.
But there was no need to put the plan into action—October arrived, and the Ukrainian Armed Forces were approaching Kherson. Explosions echoed daily as the Ukrainian army targeted the Antonivskyi Bridge. The occupiers had no time for propaganda, so they simply released Oleksiy and sent him home. This happened on October 4—once again, they blindfolded him and drove him all the way to his apartment building.
"I went into my apartment and couldn’t figure out for a long time why it smelled exactly like the cell," Oleksiy recalls in astonishment."Then I discovered that snipers had used my apartment as a hideout. They ate my food, drank my wine, and even stole my clothespins. For some reason, they didn’t use the toilet but relieved themselves in plastic bottles, which they stashed behind the gas stove."
But by then, it didn’t matter much—on November 11, 2022, Ukrainian forces liberated Kherson. The former prisoner of a Russian torture chamber hung a blue-and-yellow flag on his balcony, which he had managed to hide from the occupiers in an electric razor case. When Ukrainian police returned to the city, Oleksiy went to them himself and recounted his time in the torture chamber.
Oleksiy believes that what helped him and other FSB prisoners survive and endure was their sense of humor and solidarity—they shared everything they had with one another.
"Places of confinement run on humor," the historian says.
***
Now, two years after the liberation of Kherson, Oleksiy’s life has changed.
His wife left the city in early November 2022, when Russian forces began shelling the regional center. She sought refuge in Finland and continues to live there.
The cat, Philip Bedrosovych, survived the occupation and passed away from old age in 2023.
The one constant in Oleksiy Patalakh’s life is his enduring interest in the history of the Kherson region. He continues to study the past and occasionally delivers lectures about it.
