In the winter of 1924, Gleb Bokiy recruited a mystic scientist Alexander Barchenko to work for the Special Department. The main scientific interests of this researcher were focused on the study of bioelectric phenomena in the life of the cell, in the work of the brain and in the living organism as a whole. Barchenko combined his laboratory experiments with the position of Bokii's expert in psychology and parapsychology. In particular, he developed a technique for identifying persons inclined to cryptographic work and to decipher codes.
The scientist also acted as a consultant when examining all kinds of healers, shamans, mediums, hypnotists and other people who claimed that they were communicating with ghosts. Since the late 1920s, the Special Department has actively used them in its work. To check these "psychics" one of the divisions of Bokiya's service equipped a "black room" in the building of the OGPU on Furkasovsky lane, building 1.
Barchenko's research and methodology were also used in especially difficult cases of decrypting enemy messages - in such situations, group communications with spirits were even conducted.
Barchenko brought metaphysical theories to Bokii's life and persuaded the prominent Chekist to join the secret occult organization "United Labor Brotherhood", which studies Ancient Science (Dunhor), which supposedly surpassed modern knowledge, but whose principles were lost over time.
During interrogation with the investigator, Bokiy said that he changed his worldview from materialistic to idealistic after Lenin's death:
“Later Lenin's death had a decisive influence. I saw in her the death of the Revolution. Lenin's testament, which I did not remember from whom, prevented me from perceiving Stalin as the leader of the party, and I, seeing no prospects for the Revolution, went into mysticism. By 1927-28. I had already departed so far from the Party that the struggle against the Trotskyists and Zinovievites that was unfolding at that time passed me by, and I did not take any part in it. Deeper, under the influence of Barchenko, more and more into mysticism, I eventually organized a Masonic community with him and embarked on the path of direct counter-revolutionary activity …"
Indeed, at the end of 1925, to transfer esoteric knowledge to the most "worthy" representatives of the Bolshevik Party, Alexander Barchenko, with the participation of Bokii, organized a small circle in the bowels of the OGPU for the study of ancient science. It included the leading employees of the Special Department: Gusev, Tsibizov, Klemenko, Filippov, Leonov, Gopius, Pluzhnitsov. Classes with the employees of the Special Department did not last long, because, according to Bokiy himself, the students were "not prepared for the perception of the secrets of Ancient Science." Barchenko's circle fell apart, but the energetic head of the Special Department soon managed to find new, more capable, students "from among his old comrades at the Mining Institute." The second group consisted of Kostrykin, Mironov (both engineers), Stomonyakov (Deputy People's Commissar in 1934-1938), Moskvin (member of the Organizing Bureau and the Secretariat of the Central Committee,head of the organizational distribution of the Central Committee), Sosovsky. Several times the circle was attended by Henrikh Yagoda, the future chief of the NKVD.
We learn about what Barchenko's "students" specifically studied in these classes from the letters of this occultist, which say that the group he created for two years "studied the Dunhor theory in its main points and compared it with the theoretical foundations of Western science." …
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In turn, Gleb Bokiy testified during interrogations:
“Barchenko put forward the theory that in prehistoric times there was a highly culturally developed society, which then perished as a result of geological cataclysms. This society was communist and was at a higher stage of social (communist) and material and technical development than ours. The remnants of this higher Society, according to Barchenko, still exist in the inaccessible mountainous regions located at the junctions of India, Tibet, Kashgar and Afghanistan, and have all the scientific and technical knowledge that was known to the ancient society of the so-called “Ancient Science”, representing a synthesis of all scientific knowledge. The existence of both Ancient Science and the very remnants of this society is a secret carefully guarded by its members. Barchenko explained this desire to keep his existence secret by the antagonism of ancient society with the Pope. Popes throughout history have persecuted the remnants of ancient society that survived elsewhere, and, in the end, completely destroyed them. Barchenko called himself a follower of the ancient society, claiming that he was initiated into all this by secret messengers of his religious and political center, with whom he once managed to get in touch. "with whom he once managed to get in touch. "with whom he once managed to get in touch."
In addition to giving lectures and selecting mediums for the Special Department, the occultist Barchenko tried to apply Dunhor in his daily practice. And Bokiy supported his undertakings. For example, these two were serious about controlling the weather!
Here is what the astronomer and associate of the occultist Alexander Kondiain reported: “In 1925 I was sent by Barchenko and Bokiy to Vinnitsa with the task of meeting prof. Danilov Leonid Grigorievich and find out the practical results of his work, which he has been doing for 20 years. His work is of great scientific importance, since it reveals the entire mechanism of the atmosphere and, in particular, makes it possible to predict the weather for long periods. Together with Kondiain, Danilov sent to Moscow for Barchenko his large study, The Theory of Wave Weather.
Alexander Kondiain in his study (late 1920s)
Barchenko and Bokii were especially interested in the theory of the 11-year periodicity of sunspot formation on the Sun. So, in one letter at the beginning of 1927, referring to an article by French astrophysicist Emile Touchet "Secrets of the Sun", Barchenko wrote:
“For the initiate into the Dunhor secret, there can be no doubt that Western European science accidentally came across in this theory the mechanism that constitutes the main secret of Dunhor. The still analytical method of European science prevents it from appreciating the importance of this theory. But it is enough for some thoughtful researcher to make an attempt to transfer onto paper, onto a plane, a picture analytically calculated by prof. Touchet to reveal the secret of Dunhor and other mechanisms. And in the hands of modern technology, already familiar with the use of ultraviolet and infrared rays, these mechanisms, opening the mechanism of action of "small causes", the mechanism of cosmic resonance and interference, the mechanism of stimulation of cosmic energy sources, threaten to arm bourgeois Europe with even more bloody means of destruction."
A. Pervushin