Tuesday 17th September 1839
[Ann’s tea-making apparently involves brandy (!) and they have this for breakfast (!) before Anne writes a note to the customs officer (exaggerating her ancient lineage, as well as passing Ann off as her niece, as per their passport), and they finally set off from Valkiasaari on the last leg of the St. Petersburg trip (on the way they even manage to catch a glimpse of a World Heritage site that has since been destroyed). But when at long last Anne and Ann arrive in that fabled city, Anne’s first impressions of it are decidedly underwhelming! Be that as it may, the Ann(e)s pay off the coachman they hired in Stockholm (who Anne quite correctly suspects is trying to swindle her, indeed asking for more money than originally agreed), and then settle down for several weeks of exploring St. Petersburg and its environs. Perhaps Anne’s opinion of the place will improve? Stay tuned to find out.]
Fahrenheit 54 1/2 at 7 1/4 a.m. Very rainy night and morning – the rain fell poured down so noisily last night, it kept me awake some time – terribly rainy this morning and now at 9 1/2 breakfast just over – Ann made tea of one spirit of wine bottle that the sub-douanier broke yesterday Gross had saved a little – just enough for this morning and we have done very well – boiled our 4 eggs at the top of our tea-urn (Samovar) Ann ate biscuits and I finished our Viborg bread and we had each a little Deventer gingerbread – Gross says the Douanier this morning begged I would leave my address in Petersburg – till 10 20/” still raining fast, wrote note explanatory (vide Journal book at the Index end) ‘à monsieur le chef de la Douane à Walkiasari’* put it an envelope sealed with my arms and left it en passant at the Douane – then came the gentleman himself – gave him the note sealed with my arms – long explanation – said I had written every thing in the note – had in the old German speaking woman – said I would send my books to the committee in Petersburg and do all right – then said I had a letter to our ambassador Lord Clanricard, which seemed to /Anne trails off here at the end of a page, and forgets to finish her sentence at the beginning of the next one/
then having before paid for our 4 horses (must pay before we we set off) had the man of the house in to be paid – he 1st asked 9 rubels, then ten, then nineteen – I said I would give one more (ten) but that was all, without a written bill in Russian – they said he could not write – gave the woman servant 20 kopeks at last off at 10 55/” from Walkiasari – little unpainted village beyond our station and there 2 or 3 good houses seen as we entered the town – our subdouanier lifted the Schlagbaum at the Douane and bowed as did the 2 officers and thro’ and off – we went sedately at foot’s pace – (the douane 50 or 60 yards from the station post-house) – damp but almost fair at 10 55/” – Jean take John Winter with Gross – our harness tied onto the perch or somewhere as it could Grotza inside as from Åbo, and Russian driver and harness – the road a baddish (worn) pavé for a little distance out of the town – then broad sandy road the ruts and holes full of water and the sand as muddy as a deluge of rain last night and this morning could make it low forest of Scotch fir and birch – our driver will not break our springs by galloping – we go foot’s pace rarely breaking into a little trot for a minute or 2 – they wanted to put us 6 horses – I said they might do as they liked by my podaroshna was for 4 and I should only pay for 4 – had I known the road I should not have thought 6 too many – but perhaps we are our carriage is safer with 4 –
An example (from 1850) (picture source) of a podorozhnaya (подорожная, short for подорожная грамота, ‘travel certificate’), a document employed by travellers in the Russian Empire that entitled them to the use of a specified number of post horses to be hired at post stations. There are frequent references to using a podorozhnaya (in a variety of eclectic spellings) in Anne’s journals and notes of 1839-1840.
tis now 12 5/” and we walk on – damp but fair our forest thicker and twice as tall but still young – now at 12 10/” pavé and we trot gently – a minute or 2 – then walk – then trot gently again – at 12 25/” break in the forest, and 2 or 3, or 4 parcels of unpainted buildings – farmsteads – corn long straw (rye I think) in short stook capped by a couple of sheaves as with us – fences and buildings as in north of Sweden, Norway, and Finland – and corn short straw – and stack long and narrow as 1st observed a day or 2 ago – the stack perhaps 5 or 6 or more yards long and 1 yard or rather more broad and 3 or 4 yards high – now at 12 1/2 steep paved pitch and the drag – 5 yards deep of sand in this hollow in bank on each side the road – bad harness, bad driver – but they would neither let us find harness or coachman –
Reading classical antiquities Lardner page 5. vide get Williams’s Geography of Asia Taylor’s Herodotus page 10 at 1 5/” another scattered unpainted poor picturesque hamlet or 3 or 4 farms and their appurtenances – log-houses generally not flattened a woman milking now at 1 10/” out of doors in stubble field close to the house – at 1 1/2 in another pretty break in the forest 4 or 5 more farmsteads – and our station at 1 35/” looks about as good as our station house last night with a building opposite to it on the other side of the broad (40 or 50 yards broad?) paved road a couple of carts stopping there, and a board with something written on it in gold letters – a sign board? – a little portico 4 wooden pillars here with balcony over it in the end, and
St. Petersburg 18 1/2 versts
the station is 6me sixième КУРѢEРСКИХЪ**
2 windows on each side – house covered with boards unpainted – and 2 little round windows in the roof on each side the porticoed middle – the opposite building has a little balcony but no portico underneath – the porch and entrance door being into the lower building adjoining the middle 2 story part – last we had a projecting gabelended porch; glazed at the sides – a little calêche and 3 horses drives up now at 2 p.m. cannot read the guide post but distinctly make out that from here to St. Petersburg is marked 18 1/2 versts – I have just paid as demanded 7 rubels 40 kopeks for the 4 horses – and have paid my Finnish money – hear nothing said against it as yet – nothing against it yesterday or this morning – off again at 2 3/” – pretty undulating ground wooded and parky – at 2 18/” gentlemans house yellow and pea green roof (right) – large 6 or 8 white style portico and pediment front and a little maison carrée at the top of the house across the ridge – therefore the queer effect of one temple above another –
The gentleman’s house Anne saw must have been Osinovaya Roshcha (literally ‘Aspen Grove’), built in 1828-1830 and declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1990, along with a number of other buildings in St. Petersburg and its vicinity. Sadly, it burnt down in 1991 and has not been restored. This sketch from 1833 shows the road-facing side which Anne observed and described perfectly (image source):
One of the last photos of the house before the fire (image source):
See more photos here and here. Interestingly, one of the later owners of the house, General Vladimir Vassilevich Levashov (1834-1898), would for three years serve as the military governor of... Kutaisi.
but very pretty undulating road and ground beautifuly pine wooded – Road broad and pavé nearly 2/3 in the middle all the last stage from 12 1/2 and will be all this (apparently) baddish roughish pavé but no worse than the common pavés in the South of France where they still exist – but luckily they macadamize there now – this man better driver than the last but now 2 25/” stopping 2nd time – 1st a trace broken and now something else – red sand each side of road – 6 or 8 inches of soil – to 2 or 3 above the red sand – green rye fields large enclosures – here along side the road (not foresty since 2 25/” now 2 35/”) double and treble railing but tied between thin long uprights as in Sweden and Finland and Norway – now at 2 40/” hamlet, one broad street of gabel ended log houses unflattened and unpainted – roofs projecting 4 or 5 feet – often a balcony or gallery in front of the top window 2nd story in the gabel end, and window frames and weather boards carved and [sortied?] these and shutters variously painted
our driver sings and whistles alternately and [aloud?] – now at 2 50/” have just trotted past the last house of the village – 10 or a dozen better houses chiefly towards this end – pretty little lake (left) people housing in sacks potato tops or getting up the potatoes – and pretty lake (right) distant – and large expanse of wooded plain right – the country (our road) beautifully and parkishly wooded – there is an air of novelty – our driver sings more like a Spaniard than any other – his dark grey frock and red belt or sash – and low crowned hat and buckles and peacock feathers
St. Petersburg at 2 55/” in the distance right ahead right (right) – 2 or 3 towers dimly seen – 1 above all the rest – at 3 village and lake close right – very pretty here but quite a dead woody flat all to the right and cross bridge over swamp and end of lake into the village – the better houses white and green roof and large verandah all window – another long street of village but all better than the last – lake very pretty neat grey stone coloured church with 2 pea green covered low square towers on a hill of red sand darkened with Scotch fir – great many little waggons (telegas) on the road now at 3 10/” vast wooded flat all round terminated only by the horizon – Scotch firs parkwise along on wide road and red sand barren land the pavé jolty but really very fair – corn out looking blackish – at 3 27/” the sea in the distance just distinguishable – at 3 33/” little distance right neat good white green roofed village or some manufactory? or government village establishment? – 3 40/” hay out in cock – at 3 50/” pass 1st barrier (schlag-baum) into St. Petersburg and a soldier took our passport and podorroshna to be visé – detained 4 or 5 minutes – enter the town i.e. pass the large brick barracks at 4 5/” and have passed a few calêches and 4 or 5 droschkies since passing the black and white and red striped Schlagbaum barrier. Straight along – no houses till 4 5/” – turn right at 4 18/” and 1st bridge and Neva at 4 19/” –
– Steamers and broad river and Troitskoi bridge at 4 26/” – handsome iron railing – 4 carriages and 4 passed us on the bridge –
The modern Troitski bridge was built 1897-1903, but its predecessor, the bridge Anne and Ann drove across, was a pontoon one, finished in 1827. Here is a photograph of it dating from the 1880s (image source):
at Mrs. Wilson’s at 4 47/” – asked our name – because a Mrs. Bishop expected whom she did not wish to receive – dressed in a hurry – dinner at 6 – coffee – paid John Winter 50 dollars banco as I believed was agreed and understood – asked 10 dollars rigs gold more – gave him 4 dollars Rigs and 72 skilings banco all the Swedish money (paper) I had left – coffee – fair in the afternoon – Fahrenheit 63.º now at 10 40/” p.m. – Disappointed with the statue of Peter – there is a lurking shabbiness about the fine buildings and a dullness in the vastness – I like Regent street and our squares better and Paris best –
[visible in pencil after the inked text:] – I like Regent street and our squares better and Paris the best – Il n’y a que Paris*** –
The monument to Peter the Great that Anne was disappointed with, in an exactly contemporary (1839) sketch by André Durand (image source):
arrive at St. Petersburg.
*The note that Anne wrote in French to the customs chief at Walkiasari:
Copy of note left at the douane at Walkiasari 2 stages from St. Petersburg
Madame Lister née Lister de Shibden-hall dans la comte de York en Angleterre, très ancienne famille anglaise - Madame Lister voyage avec Mademoiselle Walker sa nièce pur s’amuser, et s’instruire - et elle se propose de passer l’hiver à Moscou se elle n’en trouve pas le climat trop sévère - Madame Lister s’arrêtera à l’hotel tenu par Mrs. Wilson dans la rue Galernoy -
Toute lettre doit s’addresser
aux soins de Messrs. Thomson Bonar et Compagnie
ou aux soins de Messrs. A. Marc et Compagnie
Walkiasari. Tuesday 17th September 1839.
Mrs. Lister née Lister of Shibden Hall in Yorkshire, England, a very old English family - Mrs. Lister is travelling with her niece, Miss Walker, for pleasure and education - and plans to spend the winter in Moscow if she does not find the climate too severe - Mrs. Lister will stay at the hotel kept by Mrs. Wilson in Galernoy Street.
All letters should be addressed
care of Messrs. Thomson Bonar & Co.
or care of Messrs. A. Marc & Co.
Walkiasari. Tuesday 17th September 1839.
**This just means ‘of/for the messenger [post-coaches/staff]’
*** (French) “there’s only Paris”
The route (in red) that Anne and Ann took from Valkiasari to Mrs. Wilson’s hotel in Galernaya Street, St. Petersburg, with the villages/hamlets/gentlemen’s houses observed by Anne, the post station they stopped at, and the Troitsky bridge, all marked in orange (source for the original 1840 map):
WYAS pages: SH:7/ML/TR/14/0012 SH:7/ML/TR/14/0013 SH:7/ML/TR/14/0014 SH:7/ML/TR/14/0015 and SH:7/ML/E/23/0234 (note to the customs officer)
