Discussions about Russian History > Imperial Russian History
British subjects in Imperial Russia
Phil_tomaselli:
This is a subject that has interested me for a long time. I estimate that there were some 10,000 British subjects throughout the Empire in 1914, about 4,000 in St Petersburg, 700 in Moscow and the rest scattered through the north (mainly timber merchants), the Urals (mining engineers) and the Caucasus (heavily involved in oil). There was an English Shop in St P that sold marmalade, shortbread and other English goods, an English Club that offered to support the families of men who volunteered to return to Britain to fight, and English churches in St P and Moscow.
There were extended families of Carrs, Gibsons and Hills that had been there for scores (if not hundreds) of years but which maintained their Englishness by sending their wives abroad to give birth and their sons to British Public Schools. Donald Swann the singer/entertainer from the 1950's and 1960's was from a family that went to Russia in the late 18th century.
After the revolution most of them fled, the sensible ones in 1917, the remainder coming out in 1918 and 1919 as part of a trade off with HMG to allow out Russians from Britain. A few dozen (mainly those who were British only by virtue of possessing a British passport) stayed on and were looked after by charity from Britain. They even had their own dacha outside Leningrad. Unfortunately they seem to have disappeared during the siege.
Is anyone here related to any of these families? The White Russian diaspora is one people seem to be aware of, but the tribulations of these British subjects seems to have been largely forgotten. Presumably there were also large numbers of Frenchmen and not a few Americans also caught up in the wreck of the revolution about who we also hear little.
Phil Tomaselli
Georgiy:
A very interesting topic! I don't know anything about it, but I found the House by the Dvina, and its sequel interesting reads, about a girl whose mother was Scottish, and father Russian, growing up in Archangelsk before the revolution, and how she got out of Russia after the revolution. She wrote that the assasination of the Tsar affected people quite deeply when they heard the news.
lexi4:
Good topic. I hope we learn more. How many Brittish do you think actually got out of Russia, Phil?
Phil_tomaselli:
As many as wanted to, as far as I can see Lexi though the last probably came out in 1920. The Bolsheviks had a major clamp down on letting Britons out, but we British retaliated by by holding hundreds (possibly thousands) of Russian emigres who wanted to return home in Britain. The passport control system designed to keep German agents out of Britain worked just as well in keeping people in when necessary.............
There were discussions in Scandinavia between the Russians and British in 1919 which eventually came to an agreement whereby people were allowed in and out. The Finns set up a camp at Terioki to quarantine refugees (as a protection against Typhus). Many of the later refugees were half starved and brough out no assets. The Guildhall Archive in London has records of the relief committee which suggest that some were still dependent on charity as late as 1930.
The few who remained in Russia were mainly people who. to all intents and purposes, were genuinely Russian but who happened to be legally British. In Petrograd/Leningrad there can't have been more than a couple of hundred and Lady Muriel Paget (who organised the Anglo-Russian Hospital 1914-17) ran the relief committee in the 1930's.
I have, somewhere, an article I wrote a couple of years ago on British subjects in Russia. Once I can find it I'll post bits of it.
Phil T
Phil_tomaselli:
In fact here is a very brief excerpt:
"The British community was essentially middle-class, though some more interesting professions were represented. A glimpse at the St Petersburg consulate register of births from 1856 to 1912 includes, amongst the fathers’ professions: merchant, accountant, jockey, ringmaster, cotton mill manager, clerk, weaving manager, banker, iron moulder, cotton carder, mechanic, electrical engineer, mining engineer, foreman printer, resident manager of Kodak Ltd and technical brewer."
Phil T
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