In March 1901, a petition was published by a group of Russian exiles as part of a protest at the compulsory drafting of 183 students at Kiev University into the Tsar’s imperial army. According to a report that accompanied the petition, the same fate had befallen a further twenty-five students of St Petersburg University. According…
Category: Russia
Herbert Elvin, Father Baker, Josef Stalin and the 5th Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party
One of the most frequently overlooked allies of Kinder Scout ‘right to roam’ campaigners, G.H.B Ward, William Rust and Benny Rothman was Herbert H. Elvin. Like Ward, Elvin had emerged in Britain’s blooming Trade Union movement, quickly recognising the positive trade-off between working men’s groups and sport. The Clarion Ramblers and Clarion Cyclists were among…
Alexis Sheftel’s Stars and Stripes Revolution
Less than 72 hours after the missing police chief’s daughter Barbara Lopukhin knocked at the door of Woburn Place and reassured everyone of her safety, Hastings compositor Alexis Sheftel boarded the RMS Lusitania in Liverpool and made the three thousand mile journey in steerage to start a new life in New York. The date was…
United Russia Societies Association
Just weeks before Russia February Revolution swept Tsar Nicholas II from power, a crack team of Russian intelligence specialists, diplomats and Anglo-Russian Oligarchs pooled resources to form the United Russia Societies Association. As Britain pinned its hopes on the incoming Kerensky Government, Liberals and Conservatives In Britain looked forward to a whole new era in…
Lenin at 21 Tavistock Square, London, St Pancras 1908
21 Tavistock Place, St Pancras — 1908 In May 1908, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin arrives back in London carrying a written recommendation from Joseph J. Terrett in support of a request for entry into the British Museum Library. Sadly, on being unable to find a Joseph J. Terrett at the address provided on the reference, the…
Lenin at 30 Holford Square, London 1902
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and his wife Nadezhda Krupskaya resided at 30 Holford Square from April 1902 until May 1903. As Bob Henderson’s seminal article, Lenin and the British Museum (Solanus, Vol 4) points out, it was from this address that Lenin, using his now customary pseudonym, Jacob Richter, first wrote to the Director of the…
Nachman Syrkin arrives in New York
After a closer look at travel records it appears that Alexei Sheftel was joined in New York by one of Chaim Weizmann’s closest allies, the Socialist Zionist, Nachman Syrkin, who immediately prior to moving to America had spent much of his time in London and Berlin. Press reports in July and August 1907 see him…
7 Oakley Square – J.W. Kolckmann & Family
Before we moving on, I think it should be remembered that the homes and contacts used by Vladimir Lenin and other political exiles during the early 1900s were critical to their safety. Trusted sources and associations were key to their survival and so when it came to lodgings when travelling abroad, the exiles were careful…