Valery Rozhdestvensky Status: Deceased 2/13/1939 – 8/31/2011 Nationality: Russian Type: Government Agency: Russian Federal Space Agency (ROSCOSMOS) Valery Ilyich Rozhdestvensky (Russian: Валерий Ильич Рождественский, 13 February 1939 – 31 August 2011) was a Soviet cosmonaut. Rozhdestvensky was selected as a cosmonaut on 23 October 1965 and flew as Flight Engineer on Soyuz 23. After his space flight he continued to work with the space program at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center.