The Russian Century: A Hundred Years of Russian Lives

The first thing that shocked me was a grand piano hacked to splinters by an axe. Parquet, with an inlaid pattern of dark wood, had been ripped up and left scattered: they had been searching for hidden treasure. Doors, much too large for a peasant’s hut, were hacked apart; some windows were carried away, others ripped out. Small furniture had vanished. Large pieces, chiffoniers and bureaus, were chopped up. Paintings were slashed. The portraits,

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some of them valuable, had their eyes gouged out and stomachs slashed. Porcelain was shattered . . .

This was not simple looting, but a bestial destructiveness. The ancient house was enormous, more like a palace. There is an order to looting. I have seen some fifty estates, and all were looted in the same matter.

On the top floor, apparently in the bedrooms, photographs and letters were always strewn about. The dressers had been carried off, and the letters dumped. I picked up a letter. Through it and some photographs I tried to reconstruct the past. A young woman was describing a holiday to either her friend or sister. It had been either a birthday or a name-day. “A wire was stretched between the oaks,” I read, “and multicolored lanterns were hung on it.” “It must be these very oaks,” I said to myself. “Beyond the pond there were fireworks . . .” “And there’s the pond,” I thought. “I danced with Andrei and Vasilii . . .” Which one of these elegant young officers in the photographs was Andrei, and which was Vasilii? And here, probably, was the prince himself, and the princess.

I went down a broad stone staircase into an enormous hall. To my surprise, large and beautiful tapestries still hung there. They were ancient and their fabric had deteriorated in places. Apparently the looters found them useless: “The fabric is rotten, can’t sew anything worthwhile out of them.”

There was a library one story above. Books lay in heaps all over the floor. They had been walked on. The books in old leather bindings were of no interest to anyone. The mahogany bookcases, however, had been chopped up for firewood.

I began to dig through the books. A soft coughing caught my attention. An old servant stood before me. I was embarrassed. He probably took me for a thief as well. I greeted him and asked whose estate this was. He began to speak eagerly.

This estate, the famous Veprik, had belonged for centuries to the princes Golitsyn. It had been looted many times since the revolution but was finally devastated some three weeks ago. He showed me the stables. The horses and livestock had been taken away, the fowl slaughtered. The agricultural machinery ruined. There had been a fruit orchard—only stumps were left. This was the hothouse. The princess was fond of it and came by frequently. Rare plants grew here; peaches, orchids. Everything was smashed now, the glass panes knocked out.

With a heavy heart I started for home, that is, the house of the peasant who, of course, took part in the looting. The French book was witness to that. The housewife attentively watched my facial expression and made a very good dinner. My comrades were even surprised. I explained to them that this was reparation for the looting. I felt no love at all for the Russian people. To have

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Chapter Fifteen

destroyed such high culture and civilization was totally mindless. They probably even cut the tapestries into foot-cloths.

I suggested to Colonel Shapilovskii that we round up the estate’s stolen horses for the battery. This would have been very easy to do. Find one horse, and all the thieves will inform on each other on the principle, “Well if they took mine, let them take Petr’s also . . .”

“That wouldn’t be bad,” said the colonel. “But we’re operating in the rear and must not provoke the local population. They supply us with information now, but otherwise they will inform the Reds.”

Chapter Sixteen

Vera Volkonskaia, Orphaned by Revolution

Volkonskaia’s story is one which was replicated in thousands of lives, that of children separated from their families and lost during the cataclysms of the Russian Revolution. She was an orphan with talents which unscrupulous people quickly recognized and tried to use. Her personal tragedy of this period was not her last. She was to endure the 900 day blockade of Leningrad in World War II as well. This is an excerpt from O. [Vera] Volkonskaia, Ta k tiazhkii mlat [Thus the Heavy Mallet]. Paris: LEV, 1979.