The early years of the 20th century seem to have promoted conflict in a number of countries, especially in Europe. As I’m typing this, I am travelling on a train from Belfast to Dublin, having spent a couple of interesting days in what is still a walled city. My first
Today is Orthodox Easter. Unlike the rest of the Christian churches who have been using the Gregorian calendar for over three centuries, the Orthodox Church still follows the old Julian calendar. They also calculate Easter to fall on the first Sunday after the first ecclesiastical full moon. This means that
Among other interesting objects left by my parents, I inherited many Russian postcards. I assume they belonged to my maternal grandparents, Paul and Olga Woronoff. There are a couple of hundred of them and I know almost nothing about them. There are postcards depicting Tsar Nicholas I, his wife the
On 17 December 1837, the Winter Palace in St Petersburg, Russia, burst into flame. Almost as soon as the last embers ceased to burn, Tsar Nicholas I started to plan the rebuilding of this remarkable structure, hoping the new palace would wipe the memory of this disaster from the minds
There was good news and bad news when I discovered “Adapting to Modernity” by Heide W Whelan in the library. The good news, apart from the fact it is in English, was that it is the best resource I’ve found so far in my research about my father’s family. The
Now and again I pull out one of the large plastic tubs which house the memorabilia I brought from my parent’s house. Much of the memorabilia is letters, documents and various bits of paper, written in Russian or German. There is not very much in English. If I ever have