The Project Gutenberg eBook, Nelka, by Michael Moukhanoff

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Title: Nelka
Mrs. Helen de Smirnoff Moukhanoff, 1878-1963, a Biographical Sketch

Author: Michael Moukhanoff

Release Date: September 17, 2007 [eBook #22655]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NELKA***

E-text prepared by John Young Le Bourgeois

NELKA

(Mrs. Helen de Smirnoff Moukhanoff.)

1878-1963

A Biographical Sketch.

by Michael Moukhanoff

1964

FOREWARD.

In attempting this biographical sketch of Nelka I am using the
memories of 45 years together and also a great number of letters as
material. Her Aunt, Miss Susan Blow, had the habit of keeping
Nelka's letters over the years. There are some as early as when
Nelka was only five years old and then up to the year 1916, the year
her aunt died. These letters reflect very vividly the personality,
the ideas, the aspirations, the disappointments and the hopes of a
person over a period of a long life. They paint a very real picture
of her personality and for this reason I am using quotations from
these letters very extensively.

Nelka de Smirnoff was born on August 19, 1878 in Paris, France.

Her father was Theodor Smirnoff, of the Russian nobility. Her
grandmother had tartar blood in her veins and was born Princess
Tischinina. Nelka's father was a brilliant man, finishing the
Imperial Alexander Lyceum at the head of his class. A versatile
linguist, he joined the Russian diplomatic service and occupied
several diplomatic posts in various countries, but died young, when
Nelka was only four years old, and was buried in Berlin. Nelka
therefore hardly knew him, though she remembered him and throughout
her life had a great veneration for him and loyalty for his memory.

Nelka's mother was Nellie Blow, the daughter of Henry T. Blow of St.
Louis, Missouri. The Blow family, of old southern aristocratic
stock, moved from Virginia to St. Louis in 1830. Henry T. Blow was
then about fifteen years old and had several brothers and sisters.
He was a successful business man who became very wealthy and was also
a prominent public and pol