Mansions of the Yusupovs in Europe - Finland, France etc

[brnbg aka: liljones1968]

Feliks' great-grandmother, the princess Zenaîda Ivanovna Yusupova (who was also the marquise de Serre & the comtesse de Chaveau) bought the estate & chateau de Kériolet in Brittany for her 2nd husband, the chevalier de Chaveau.   she had also bought him the title of count (at the same time, buying for herself the title of marquise de Serre).   when he died, he left the chateau to his mistress.     the princess bought it back from her, closed it up & never went there again.     ownership eventually fell to Feliks, and once again, Feliks & Irina found a windfall had descended upon them.   the sale of the chateau & the estate enabled them to live well again, for a while....

[Joanna]

Amazing photos brnbg !!! Many thanks !!! Is this great-grandmother of Felix the one that was adored by Nicholas I and she had built the Yussupov dacha in Tsarskoye Selo as a replica of the Hermitage?

Joanna

[Annie]

Thanks! How could anyone forget they owned a place like that? Is this the Grandmother who lived to be 100 and used to feed him the moldy candy? Which Yussoupov was she married to, Boris?

[brnbg aka: liljones1968]

the answer to all of the above is yes.   she's the same one who lived to be 100; Feliks was the only one to ever eat the mouldy chocolates she always offered (that's why he was her favorite); she was the same one who was admired by Nik I & also built the dacha @ Tsarskoie-Selo (which was a copy of the Tsarskoie-Selo Hermitage); her first husband had been Boris Nikolaevitch.

[BobG]

Wasn't this the Yussupov who lived in the Liteyny Palace that I asked about under the Yussupov Palaces thread?  I'm still hoping to see a picture of it.  The interiors of the Palace are shown in The Hidden Interiors which mentioned that her palace is now used by the organization Znaniye (Knowledge), but no exteriors photos were shown.

[Martyn]

Gosh, that is some chateau!  So Felix inherited it and sold it when they were in exile?
By the way Brian, thanks for posting the great photos of the chateau; I love the portriat of Pcss Yusupova - do you know who the artist is?

[brnbg aka: liljones1968]

I love the portriat of Pcss Yusupova - do you know who the artist is?

unfortunately, i don't.   for either portrait, but the black&white image reminds me of Franz Xavier Winterhalter.    given the number of Russian (and French) aristocrats & royals he painted (& she was both [one by birth & the other by marriage and residency]), i wouldn't be surprised if it was painted by him.    or it may just be in his "style".

anyone know for sure?   or have any suggestions?

[Vera_Narishkin]

Feliks' great-grandmother, the princess Zenaîda Ivanovna Yusupova (who was also the marquise de Serre & the comtesse de Chaveau) bought the estate & chateau de Kériolet in Brittany for her 2nd husband, the chevalier de Chaveau.   she had also bought him the title of count (at the same time, buying for herself the title of marquise de Serre).   when he died, he left the chateau to his mistress.     the princess bought it back from her, closed it up & never went there again.     ownership eventually fell to Feliks, and once again, Feliks & Irina found a windfall had descended upon them.   the sale of the chateau & the estate enabled them to live well again, for a while....

Zenaida Ivanovna, née Narishkina, was my great-great-great-great-aunt (I think that's the right number of "greats"!). The story as is told in our family is that after her husband died, she inherited it (basically, it always was hers since she bought the old Château and had the neo-gothic addition built, using her fortune).  When she died, she bequeathed the Château to the French State, specifying that it should be used either as an orphanage or a hospital for the poor, or something to that effect. The French State did nothing of the sort but made a paying museum of it.

When Felix learnt this, he sued the French State for having breached the terms of her will, and won. This is how he became its owner. At one point, he sold the chapel to a Texan (I think) millionaire - it was dismantled stone by stone and reassembled in the US by that buyer. Felix sold the chapel so as to provide Baby with a worthy dowry.

My father and Felix, who were cousins, were very close since childhood (my father was born in St. Petersburg in 1891), and found each other in London in 1921 when my father reached there with his first wife and their two first children. He and Felix remained close until WWII, when so many destinies were parted.

According to my father, Zinaida was extremely tolerant of her husband's gambling habits. Since he had little money of his own, and since he often lost quite a lot at gambling, he'd take some tapestry or some painting from the vast collection of treasures that Zinaida had bought to grace their newly-built neo-gothic Château - he was too proud to ask her for money. Without a word, Zenaida, having noticed which piece of art was missing, would seek it out and buy it back from whoever had bought it, and put it back into place. She loved her husband to that point, and never criticized his actions because she understood him and accepted him the way he was.

That's about all I can remember from what I heard in my childhood.

[brnbg aka: liljones1968]

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thanks very much for painting-in some additional colors to the picture that Feliks started.  
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[Vera_Narishkin]

Let me get the number of "greats" right...

My father was Vadim Alexandrovitch Narishkin, son of Alexander Dimitrievitch Narishkin who was the son of Dimitri Ivanovitch Narishkin, who was the brother of Zinaida Ivanovna Narishkina. That makes Zinaida Ivanovna my great-great-aunt, and that makes Felix my father's first cousin once removed, and makes Felix my second cousin - please correct me if I'm wrong.

According to my family's genealogy (by Nicholas Ikonnikov), Zenaida Ivanovna was born on November 2nd, 1809, and died on the 16th of October, 1893, at Boulogne-sur-Seine (as announced by her granddaugher, princess Youssoupova, countess Soumarokova).

She married prince Borkis Nikolayevitch Youssoupov (born June 9th, 1794 - died October 25, 1849 and buried in Kotovo, Moscow district). He was first married to princess Praskovia, daugher of prince Pavel Petrovitch Stcherbetov, and his wife née countess Anastasia Valentinovna Moussine-Pouchkine.

She later married the Marquess de la Serre, count de Chaveau.

Zinaida Ivanovna and Dimitri Ivanovitch were the children of Ivan Dimitrievitch Narishkin (born April 17, 1776, died April 15, 1847) and Varvara Nikolaievna née princess Ladomirsky (born May 17, 1785, and died burnt alive in an accident on November 26, 1840). She was the natural daughter of Ivan Nikolayevitch Rimsky-Korsakov from his union with princess Ekaterina Troubetzkoya, whom Rimsky-Korsakov - an erstwhile favourite of Catherine II - had "stolen" from her husband, count Alexander Sergueyevitch Stroganov. Varvara and her siblings (by the same father) were ennobled ("anoblis" in French) by an Imperial Ukaze on November 15, 1798, and given the name of Ladomirsky and the titles of prince & princess. So, Varvara was my and Felix's great-great-grandmother.  Varvara was a stunning beauty - you can find a portrait of her, painted by Vigée Le Brun, here:

http://www.batguano.com/VLBladom.jpg

As you can see, much of those Youssoupov good looks came from her! I can vouch (with lots of family photographs over 5 generations to prove it) that these good looks have been passed on to every generation since, including my nieces, their children, my son, my daughter, and my grand-daughter!  

[brnbg aka: liljones1968]

As you can see, much of those Youssoupov good looks came from her! I can vouch (with lots of family photographs over 5 generations to prove it) that these good looks have been passed on to every generation since, including my nieces, their children, my son, my daughter, and my grand-daughter!  

i'm sure i'm not the only one who would absolutely love to see some of those photos.    it's rare, these days, to hear of a photo collection that documents several generations of the same family that is still in the posession of that family.     it must, indeed, be "jaw-dropping" archive.....   i'm so incredibly green with envy!  

is it within any realm of possibility that you might post any of those photos.    besides being beautiful images, i'm sure, it's also a way for us, as observers of the past and "students" of history, to make part of that history more real.   you're lucky enough to have part of that history as part of your familial heritage --- which is something most of us simply cannot comprehend (we can imagine, but cannot truly comprehend. (did that make any sense?   it did to me, in my head, but i'm never sure if i phrase things correctly...)    but seeing photos of places, of events, and especially, of people, somehow makes that history more accessible.     looking into the faces of the participants in the events that fascinate us, gives them life again.

in any event, i know we all appreciate your presence here, and your generosity in sharing, with us, your memories & insight.  

[Vera_Narishkin]

i'm sure i'm not the only one who would absolutely love to see some of those photos.    it's rare, these days, to hear of a photo collection that documents several generations of the same family that is still in the posession of that family.     it must, indeed, be "jaw-dropping" archive.....   i'm so incredibly green with envy!  

is it within any realm of possibility that you might post any of those photos.    besides being beautiful images, i'm sure, it's also a way for us, as observers of the past and "students" of history, to make part of that history more real.   you're lucky enough to have part of that history as part of your familial heritage --- which is something most of us simply cannot comprehend (we can imagine, but cannot truly comprehend. (did that make any sense?   it did to me, in my head, but i'm never sure if i phrase things correctly...)    but seeing photos of places, of events, and especially, of people, somehow makes that history more accessible.     looking into the faces of the participants in the events that fascinate us, gives them life again.

in any event, i know we all appreciate your presence here, and your generosity in sharing, with us, your memories & insight.  

Sorry for the long delay, I haven't been back here for ages...

I think I understand your distinction between "imagine" and "comprehend", but I must say that such a heritage has its drawbacks and is quite weighty at times.

I will post most of these photos here at a later date, as soon as I've downsized them (most of them are very large) and uploaded them to imageshack, which will take a while. But first, here is a black and white portrait of Zinaida Ivanovna, painted when she was well over 50 years of age. I am told that I am a dead ringer of her at my advanced age of 58.... but I can claim many kilos more, alas...





My aunt Ljubov Alexandrovna Narishkina, aged 19




The following three pictures are clickable thumbnails:

My aunt Ljubov Alexandrovna and my father Vadim Alexandrovitch Narishkin, sometime around 1895




Ditto




My father Vadim Alexandrovitch Narishkin, taken at the same time as the above





My father in 1916





My father's artwork (click on the thumbnail)




I still have to upload photos of myself and photos of my son, my daughter, my grand-daughter, and since my scanner is dead, I cannot add photos of my brothers and nieces and my nieces' children, apart from one niece.

I reckon the above should keep you busy for a while!

Regards,

Vera

[amelia]

Dear Vera,


Thank you so so much for all this information, and the photographs are beautiful. Please post as many as you can, but in the forma of the last one, since I can not download the others.

I have a question: Are you related to Mme.Elizabeth Narishkin-Kurakin, who was lady in waiting for the court of three tsars?  Empress Alexander called her Mme. Zizi.I just read her book UNDER THREE TSAR, and it is fascinating. According to her memoirs she was able to flee Russia, after leaving for many years in a very small apartment.  She was already very old.

Thank you so much
Amelia

[lancashireladandre]

Madame Narishkin(nee Princess Kurakin) did leave Russia and died in St Genevive-de-Bois,Paris in 1928. If you look on the Imperial retainers thread (under Madame Zizi) you will see the full details.

[ellenln]

loved this chateau ... visited it several times
the princess has fascinated my husband and me for years.....

does anyone know if she's buried in paris near felix?