19 September 1917. Anna Vyrubova

Non-fiction

Project 1917 is a series of events that took place a hundred years ago as described by those involved. It is composed only of diaries, letters, memoirs, newspapers and other documents

Anna Vyrubova

Sveaborg fortress, Finland

Erika and I were pushed into a small cell with two wooden bunks covered with dust and alas, nothing else. The place smelled as only old prisons do smell, and the only air came in through a small window high in one of the walls. Wrapping ourselves in our coats, we lay down on the hard planks and tried to sleep.

In the early dawn we got up, our backs aching and our throats choked with dust, but the Irrepressible Erika laughed so heartily and sneezed so comically that I found it impossible to lament our surroundings. The place was a dreadful hole just the same, no proper toilet facilities at hand, and of course no opportunity of washing, to say nothing of bathing. We had to pay for our food at the rate of about ten rubles a day, at that time no small amount of money.

The prisoners were exercised every day in the open. Doctor Badmieff continued to be a center of interest in the prison. Erika, his faithful disciple, demanded the privilege of attending him, and this was granted. Every day he sat cross-legged like the Buddha he so much resembled, dictating endless medical treatises to Erika. In the evenings he used to put his lamp on the floor at the foot of his bunk, strew around it flowers and leaves brought from outside, burn some kind of ill-smelling herbs for incense, and generally create what I assumed to be the occult atmosphere of his beloved Thibet.

, and others

Comment

✍ Also today

Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna (the Younger)

Nevsky Prospekt, Petrograd, Russian Republic

Marries Sergei Putyatin

, and others

Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna (the Younger)

Pavlovsk. It was a beautiful autumn day; the vast park glittered with ember and gold, contrasting brilliantly against a clear,cold sky. My dear grandmother, the Queen of Greece, met me that day particular tenderness. After a light lunch Princess Helen took me to my rooms. Mlle. Hélène drew from the box the grey satin dress, the grey lace cup, and the rest of my wedding costume, and helped me to dress. With tears in her eyes, my grandmother also blessed me. Then on Prince John’s arm I went to the private chapel of the palace where Putiatin was waiting for me. After the ceremony we had tea and even sipped champagne, a rarity in those days. Friends had succeeded in securing for me and my husband another permit to see my father; we went almost immediately to Tsarskoie-Selo.

1 more comment

1 Like

Comment

Sergei Eisenstein

9, Tavricheskaya str., Petrograd, Russian Republic

I am on my way to a meeting for "Ogonek". The journal is produced along with the weekly "Birzhevye vedomosti". The caricature division operates under the (seemingly exclusive) charge of Pierre-O (Zhivotovsky). It’s awful stuff… He snuck out of the school for engineering ensigns, the one on Furshtadtskaia street. See more

, and others

Comment

John Reed

Petrograd, Russian Republic

There remains a phenomenon which puzzled foreign observers: the fact that the Central Executive Committees of the Soviets, the Central Army and Fleet Committees and the Central Committees of some of the Unions–notably, the Post and Telegraph Workers and the Railway Workers–opposed the Bolsheviki with the utmost violence. See more

, and others

1 Like

1 Comment

Paul Klee

works on «Marked ships»

Summer school, Gersthofen, Bavaria, German Empire

, and others

1 Like

Comment

Nikita Okunev

Moscow, Russian Republic

The Presidium of the Petrograd Soviet in its entirety, that is, Chkheidze, Ansimov, Gots, Dan, Skobelev, Tsereteli, and Chernov, has resigned its duties. The cause is the adoption of regulations dictated by the Bolsheviks by a majority vote of the Soviet. Yes, the Bolsheviks are gradually becoming stronger and stronger. All of Russia will soon have to reckon with them; otherwise, they will themselves reckon with everyone else, with all the “non-Bolsheviks.”

, and others

1 Comment

18 September

Democratic Council is gathered in Petrograd

Monarchist Purishkevich is released due to absence of the event of a crime

University classes in Petrograd in Moscow are put on hold

Nightmare before Christmas

Death of Rasputin. Murder conspiracy and its consequences

From one revolution to another

Russia in 1917

+11

in Petrograd

+11

in Moscow