Repatriates or Refugees? Narrating the Loss of Transnational Community

Abstract

The article examines the memory writings of a group of transnational “return migrants” in order to illuminate the experience of loss of “home” on relocation to the “homeland”, a fairly common modern trajectory. The primary data analysed were produced by members of a British merchant community established in St Petersburg from 1723, until the Bolshevik revolution in 1917 forced its dispersal and return to the titular homeland. It is suggested that the relationship between narrative templates employed in the memories of returnees and the actual socio-political context in which memories are reproduced is vital to understanding the values and priorities of any such group.

Keywords:

• Anglo-Russians
• Homecoming
• Memory Writings
• Return Migration
• Transnational Community

Acknowledgements

The research and writing of this article took place during a period of funding provided by the Finnish Cultural Foundation, for which I am grateful. The material was first presented at the annual Finnish Anthropology Conference 2011, organized by the Finnish Anthropological Society, so I would also like to thank colleagues who attended the session and provided valuable feedback.

Notes

[1] Imperial Russia operated on the Julian calendar.

[2] Contacting families mentioned in a genealogical text by an active community player (Whishaw 1992) resulted in my acquiring a large corpus of unpublished memoirs. The Russian Archive at Leeds University (LRA) is a treasure trove of similar material. The term “Anglo-Russian” is used, like “Anglo-Indian” in the nineteenth century, to refer to Britons who lived in Russia.

[3] “Naturally we all skated and were members of the ‘English Skating Club’ which had a most splendid rink made on the river just below the English Quay and near the English Church” (LRA 1406, Edith Cattley n.d., 51).

[4] See Karttunen (2004) for discussion of the community during its existence.

[5] An archive of letters written between Caroline Cummings—whose husband had died and left her and six children almost penniless—and her step-daughter, Baroness Lily Ramsay, who had married well, indicate that even those who lived a precarious existence still took part in English sociality and could expect assistance when work was scarce and shoes could not be bought (Cummings–Ramsay Collection).

[6] A charitable Council for British Repatriated from Russia, linked to the Russia Company (the chartered joint-stock company which had instigated trade between Russia and Britain in 1554), was started in 1921 to help with individual cases requiring assistance. Its records are kept with Russia Company documents at the Guildhall Library in London (Ms 11752-3, Ms 11747) but they are not very informative and peter out in 1932.