Appendix E: Biographies

Benson1

The misses Benson – Sarah (b. 27 March 1805; bap. St. Peter’s Monkwearmouth, Durham 24 April 1805; d. Hartlepool, County Durham 1 April 1866; buried Mere Knolls Cemetery, Sunderland 3 April 1866)2 and Elizabeth (b. 3 March 1804; bap. St. Peter’s, Monkwearmouth, Durham 24 April 1805; d. Kingston-upon-Hull, Yorkshire 18 June 1887; buried Mere Knolls Cemetery, Sunderland, County Durham 21 June 1887)3 – ran a boarding house on the English Embankment a few doors down from Ritter’s house, where the Whistlers and Ropeses lived.4 They were the daughters of George Benson (b. Monkwearmouth, Durham 10 November 1777; d. November or December 1819; buried Monkwearmouth, Durham 2 December 1819) and Barbara (Finley) Benson (b. c. 1783; d. February 1851; buried Monkwearmouth Shore 21 February 1851), who were married by license on 7 June 1802 in St. Peter’s Church, Monkwearmouth, County Durham.5

The reason they had chosen to come to St. Petersburg may possibly be that their first cousin, Lucy Sherrard Finley (Sunderland, Durham 15 April 1817 – London 13 November 1893; see Image 340) had chosen to go there. Lucy Finley was the fourth child and eldest daughter of the ten children of Mary Ann (York) Finley (b. Southwark, London 1793; bap. St. Saviour’s, Southwark, May 1793; d. New South Wales 1877; buried Dubbo Cemetery, New South Wales) and Matthew Smith Finley (Monkwearmouth, County Durham 12 December 1778 – Tower Hamlets, London 24 February 1847), who were married on 25 April 1810 at St. Dunstan’s in the East near London Bridge. Required by circumstances to earn her own living, Lucy Finley went to St. Petersburg in about 1840, when she was about twenty-three years old. There, she was employed for eight years as governess to Sofia Mikhailovna Muravieva (1833–1880)6 the only daughter of the eminent family of Count Mikhail Nikolaevich Muraviev-Vilenskii (1796–1866; see Image 342).7 Her success may have encouraged Sarah and Elizabeth Benson to also venture out of England. One must remember, however, that they were about a dozen years older than she and must have already been engaged in a profession in England, which it has so far not been possible to establish. When her duties permitted, Lucy Finley spent time with her two cousins at their boarding house, a traditional English governess whose bad teeth the American dentist Edward Maynard, a boarder (see Image 329), operated on without remuneration; and the maker of beautiful embroidered gifts that she gave for Christmas at her cousins’ celebrations.

The Benson sisters came to St. Petersburg in about 1841 and in 1855, during the Crimean War (1853–1856), returned to England. On 19 March 1855, Elizabeth Benson “presented a petition for a licence” to run a boarding house, which was granted.8 It was called the Mansfield Hotel and was located at 4 Mansfield Street, Portland Place.9 On 9 April 1855, Miss Benson announced that “she has taken the above-named Hotel, and hopes to make it as comfortable and convenient to her Guests, as that she has just left in the capital of Russia. N.B. French and German languages spoken.”10 On 5 January 1856, a Petition in Bankruptcy was filed against “Elizabeth Benson and Sarah Benson … Spinsters and Copartners, Hotel and Boarding-house Keepers.”11

They were treated with great sympathy by the Bankruptcy Court in its proceedings of 26 March 1856, where it was explained that they were “single ladies [who] had for twelve years carried on business at St. Petersburgh, keeping a boarding establishment in that city, but which they had been compelled to give up at the commencement of the war. On their return to England they invested the whole of their capital, about 1500l., in a similar establishment in Mansfield-street, Portland-place, but which proved a failure … the official assignee said he had no doubt that the bankruptcy had arisen through the bankrupts believing that they would have equal success in London as in St. Petersburgh … [it was] also thought it was a case in which the Court might grant a first-class certificate with the full approbation of the creditors. His honour had much satisfaction in granting a certificate of the first class,”12 which was the least severe of bankruptcy laws.13 On 19 December 1856, “one of Her Majesty’s Commissioners was to sit … at the Court of Bankruptcy … in order to make a Second Dividend,” which means that the government would make a second payment to the debtors in England to whom the Benson sisters were liable.14 In the meantime, they had applied for passports on 12 May 185615 and had returned to Russia.16

Notices in British newspapers confirm that their boarding house was in operation in 1852, 1853, 1854, part of 1855, part of 1856, 1857, 1864, 1867, 1868, and 1869.17 Murray’s Handbook which appeared in a completely new edition in 1865, having totally abandoned its 1849 edition, also listed it, with high praise.18 Sarah Benson died on 1 April 1866 in Hartlepool, County Durham, it would seem in the home of her sister Barbara (Benson) Hunter, on Regent Street.19 Elizabeth Benson closed the boarding house, located in these years at 78 English Embankment,20 which she had been operating with the help of her nieces, “and sold off her furniture in June [1869], and together with her nieces, left for England shortly afterwards.”21

No will has been found for Sarah Benson. She has not been found in any English census, so it seems she was in Russia on the dates of all the censuses during her lifetime (1841, 1851, and 1861). Elizabeth Benson appears in the English censuses of 1871 and 1881. She signed a will dated 3 January 1881 in Kingston-upon-Hull and two codicils dated 14 February 1882. She died on 18 June 1887. Her personal estate, after deduction of expenses, amounted to around £١٤٥0. She left, all to relatives, a considerable number of art objects and household items representing substantial wealth. For example, to “Lucy Sherrard [Finley] Atkinson (Widow) the large water colour painting of a Lake in Siberia painted by her late Husband – the two garnet studs – the gold broach in small diamonds and amethysts and the gold pencil case.” In addition to other paintings by Atkinson, one hundred and twenty-six stereoscopic views of European and English sites and subjects, along with her stereoscopic glass, were bequeathed to other family members, as were portraits of her friend, Charles Blacker Vignoles (1793–1875), British railway engineer, who may have stayed in the boarding house during the period of 1847–1853, when he was building the Nicholas Chain Bridge over the Dnepr River in Kiev, “the longest of its kind in the world” at that time.22

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The extant letters of two Americans residing at the boarding house in the 1840s – John Stevenson Maxwell to his mother and Dr. Edward Maynard to his wife – present amusing and informative impressions of the establishment located in the house of Rall and sometimes called “the home of the American Sea Captains.”23 Their correspondence contains comments about the two landladies, some of the other boarders, the internal arrangement of the two floors occupied by the boarding house, its amenities, and the social life it housed. John Stevenson Maxwell (1818–1870), secretary of the American legation in St. Petersburg from July 1842 to November 1844, stayed with the misses Benson for the month of October 1844, after returning from a summer’s tour of Europe and before resigning his post. As a Russian diplomat on home leave with his family required more spacious quarters, Maxwell graciously exchanged his rooms at the request of one of the landladies, but was happy with his new quarters: “My bed room, and my parlour, both very nice rooms, furnished and carpetted after the English fashion overlook the fine English Key (as it is called) and the Neva.”24

Counter to one of the misses Benson’s expectations, he announced that, while he would take breakfast and lunch in his room, he would appear at the public table for dinner.25 Dinner with the other boarders (eleven of the twelve were American sea captains and supercargoes and the twelfth another diplomat) became the occasion for Maxwell’s hilarious rendition to his mother of the Yankee dialect and the patterns of thinking of one of the sea captains, while praising them all for their demeanor:

These men were all respectable men, and after all my wandering I sat down with pleasure among them and found myself among eleven of the most intelligent persons I had dined with in a long time. It was quite exciting for me to hear them talk, and I went into politics – Tyler, Clay and Polk with a vehemence which had long lain dormant. Most of them were Whigs – all had their views original and striking. Some were temperence men, even to tea and coffee, tobacco and segars [sic: cigars] – others were full of fun, and all were entertaining. There was one character … who was a perfect specimen of far down East, a regular Yankee who looked more like a parson than a sailor. You should hear him talk. You would die. It is his first trip to Russia. “I’ve hearn tell,” says he, “on this country afore – but I’m astonished some I guess. I’ve hearn tell in the newspapers all about Russy but amazing sake’s they didnt tell one half. Wall, now, it is wonderful I’ll swan (swear). I went down to old Virginny once, and I thought that bad enough, kinder inhospitable like, nothing but agie (ague; sickness) hung on till I took Kinine [sic: quinine] enough to kill a horse. But I guess Russy is worse than old Virginny, any how. It looks agie like here, and kinder inhospitable too – Jist to see now, them ere people in the streets, eating black bread and salt, why the niggers to hum (at home) or do better than that. Do you call that living? do you tell me that them people in sheep skins are human critters? No you dont, no you cant any how you can fix it, I wish my wife and my dater Mealey Ann (Amelia Ann) could jist see the nasty fellers a chawing up of that black bread, they would open their eyes some and have something to tell to the folks down to Salem.” [Probably concerned over the icing up of the river], … leaning forward to Miss Benson, he said “Can you tell me marm how many days is required before I can receive my papers of clearance from the Custom House? No sir – said Miss Benson – Wall “said he, the gals to hum beat all the gals in this world for sailing afore the wind. My dater Mealy Ann couldn’t live no how, no where on earth, without knowing such things, as well as as teaching Sunday school.” This will give you some idea of this Yankee Captain and although he is such a queer one, I hear he is a man of means and a good merchant.26

A few days later, when the sea captains had mostly sailed, there were “only one or two Americans left.” But Maxwell, along with two other diplomats – the Russian diplomat with his wife, sons, and daughter; the other diplomat alone – “shed quite a diplomatic lustre around the banquet hall of the men who go down to the sea in ships; [they occupied] the upper part of the table and the Captains [were] seated below … All goes very well, nobody has been choked, nobody lost an appetite.” The social difference seemed not to matter. There was, however, an awkward moment. “The conversation [was] general and often turn[ed] upon the United States.” While Maxwell was talking to the Russian diplomat

about the probability of the election of Mr Clay [see Image 281] … one of the Captains, informed the company that he had won a chest of tea here upon the election of General Harrison and would be very happy to make the same bet upon the election of Mr Clay, and informed the [Russian diplomat], who was speaking English at the moment, that if he had any doubts as to it he would like to be taken up. Of course this was a stumper to his Excellency, but as it was said with good grace, it was taken in good spirit. Some of these strangers can scarcely credit that these men are sailors, so well behaved and well dressed are they.27

Maxwell’s most charming vignette, however, captures the personality of one of the misses Benson as well as revealing more of his own. With the departure abroad or elsewhere into the city of its boarders,

[e]very noise has hushed in the now deserted rooms and our landlady looks quite woful [sic], with the end of the travelling season, which has been by no means profitable … A few minutes since I had a visit from Miss Benson, who seemed in considerable trepidation – She is a kind landlady, but unfortunately very fat and ugly. Nevertheless I was glad to see her and directed the man in waiting to place a chair for Miss Benson. Miss Benson, then proceeded to unravel her mystery and like all women who have really any thing to say was sometime coming to the point – The amount of her story was, that no less a person than Sir Dyce Sombre [see Image 321] was in the house and she had heard dreadful things about him and wanted to know if he was really mad or not. I informed her that Sir Dyce Sombre was the produce of an Englishman crossed upon a woman of Hindostan, that his mother was a princess of India of great rank and wealth and that he had inherited her titles and her money – That he was educated partly in India partly in Gt Britain, that upon his visit to the latter country he married the daughter of the Earl of Somebody and soon after his marriage evinced such a jealousy and acted so strangely in consequence thereof, that he was pronounced a mad madman by the family of his bride, who took proceedings not only to effect a divorce but to deprive him of the disposal of his property – and that in the discussion that ensued thereon the opinions of the faculty both in London and in Paris, were decidedly that Sir Dyce, from constitutional or[g]anization or from Eastern habits and ways of thinking, was mad upon the subject of his wife, but perfectly sane in all other particulars. It was true he had challenged Sir Robert Peel, and the Prince Albert with for having criminal conversation with his lady but all this arose from his diseased state of mind at the moment – Miss Benson seemed relieved upon my statement. Oh M Maxwell, how I wish you had been home to dinner yesterday to see what a dark complexion he has. I was sure he was a Prince all the time – one of the real old fashioned princes such as they used to have in the Arabian nights – and then such big black eyes. looking seven ways for Sunday – What said I, did his eyes glare. Yes they did indeed – they shone like mahogany tables – Beware then, said I, for these Indians are terrible fellows after the girls and if you should strike his fancy, what might not happen. Miss B. tried to look killing and said with a sigh, Ah, Mr Maxwell I have seen too much of the world and grown too wise to marry, and I wouldn’t have such an old fellow any way – Well, I replied, take care, there’s no telling – and there’s no immediate danger from your lodger. Did you ever hear of Shakspeare [sic]? Didn’t I, said she. I saw him play Helmet [sic: Hamlet] in Lannen [sic: London] once – Well, Shakspeare said once upon a time, “beware of jealousy, tis a green eyed monster,” and there is nothing so correct. so whenever you see anything green in the eye of M Sombre, look out for a storm, keep out of his reach and lock up all the servant girls – Oh law Mr Maxwell is he so bad as that, oh the wretch must be worse than a Frenchman I had here last year; how his poor wife must have suffered. Well said I, there is no danger, and he will reward you handsomely if you make him comfortable, for his allowance as directed by the English Court of Chancery is £100 per day, about $500 – Miss Benson having satisfied her curiosity as to the history of her new guest, arose, courtesied [sic: curtsied] and disappeared – she capita captivated the heart of Carter the lion tamer28 who was here last year, and who knows but her dumplings and puddings, may not successfully “minister to a mind diseased.”29

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Dr. Edward Maynard30 spent the period from 20 September 1845 to 20 April 1846 at the misses Benson’s. He described the sisters as being “fat enough to be what they seem – very good people.”31 And so they were. During his seven months with them, they looked out for his every need, e.g., supplying him with steel pens when his broke and he had to use a quill instead.32 During “a rather threatening illness – brought on by a cold in the head,” they gave him the best of care.33 When he was preparing to leave St. Petersburg, they offered to “procure anything for [Mrs. Maynard] or the children that [he might] direct and have all packed and shipped in order” after his departure.34

His expenses were to be “about $2.20 per day” and he expected that there would be “extra charges; as in England, enough to double it:– so much for candles, … soap, … washing bed linen…”35 He described and drew his room from the point of view of sitting at a table, where he was writing, naming what was to the left, right, back, and front of him:

On my left in the corner is the “peechky” or stove – following around toward the left, comes next the door from the passage – in the corner the wash stand, – towel stand – bed with its two pillows one atop the other, by the head of which is the candle stand where I lay your picture that I may see it the last thing every night – a closet in the partition wall (2 feet thick) made by closing the door that leads through to the next room and hanging another so as to enclose the 2 feet depth – bureau and in front of it my guncase and trunk; – then comes 3 windows towards the quay with 2 pier glasses and tables – an operating table and chair before the centre window – a sofa behind me, (closing another doorway) and chairs in various places. The walls you see are very thick – yet such is the marshy nature of the ground that the passage of a carriage rapidly on the pavement in front of the house will make the whole house vibrate and the dishes rattle on the table. This house had, like many if not most houses here, no passages like those in use with us at home; and the thin partition between my room and the passage now existing, has been recently made by the present occupants and account for this partition being so thin. Before the fire is a yard and a half of common carpeting, and under my feet some 6 by 8 of carpet in one piece something like a Brussels carpet but not so rich – woven with a border all around. There is another yard or so of ingrain before the bed, and the rest of the floor is naked and polished with wax every week by fellows who wax all the floors in the house (except the kitchen, etc.) at so much a month or year. My floor is one of those figured [inlaid] ones of which I wrote and of which I have made sketches.36

  Breakfast is on the table … from 8 to 10 or 11. Lunch at 1 or half past, dinner at half past 5, and tea about half past 9 or 10. Go to bed somewhere between 11 and 2 and get up in time for breakfast. The good custom of having a cup of coffee about 10 minutes or so after dinner prevails here; with the coffee, Turkish pipes or cigars – quite after the manner of the Asiatics.37

(For the floorplan of Maynard’s room, see Image 330.)

After learning that the emperor was not in town nor expected back in less than a month, Maynard and his fellow dentist, George Washington Parmly (b. 22 October 1819; d. London 15 August 1892; buried Brompton Cemetery, London; see Image 339),38 a family friend practicing in Europe, who had accompanied Maynard from London, engaged a “valet de place,” an Englishman who had been living in Russia for some twelve years; this man was their guide and interpreter when they went sightseeing. They needed him, as the “very waiters of the house where we board do not seem to have, all of them put together, a dozen words of English or anything else except Russian.”39

Maynard “did not attempt anything but English” at meals, where, in addition, French, Russian, and German were spoken, but he listened “very attentively to the pronunciation of all others and [could] generally know what [was] the subject of conversation.”40 He admired the presentation there of meals: “They have a good way of serving at the table – the meats are cut and put on a dish, nicely, and the dish (with a knife or fork or spoon or all) is carried to each one, that he may take such a piece as he pleases.”41

He enjoyed the performances put on at the misses Benson’s establishment. One such entertainment was a group of about twenty soldiers whom an army officer brought there

to sing national Russian songs … The soldiers (in uniform – they are never out of it) stood in a knot facing each other, and at the conclusion of each song the time was quickened – one struck in with a tambourine, a little circle was formed, open on one side to the view of the audience, and another commenced a peculiar sort of noisy, shuffling dance – then another joined him, holding in each hand a stick a foot long on which were arranged little bells and red bits of cloth so as to make them look like 2 bouquets of flowers at a distance – these he flourished about as he danced – the two moving about in the circle and dancing not merely with their feet and legs, but all over, and putting themselves into queer and amusing attitudes – very greatly to the gratification of those who had the good luck to see him.42

During the Christmas and New Year’s season of 1845–1846, Maynard “was requested to go upstairs (where the boarders usually spend the evening) and see a Russian custom,” the mummers:

I … went up and saw five men in masks and fantastic dresses – one played a guitar while four danced a simple but peculiar figure and step – for about five minutes, when they bowed to the company and withdrew. Miss Benson tells me this is one of the ways in which the Russian servants amuse themselves at this time of year, – they mask [see Image 333] and go about from house to house where they have acquaintances in the kitchen and so amuse themselves, each other, and the company.43

On Christmas Day, they had a Christmas dinner, including champagne.44 On Sunday, 30 December 1845, when the emperor returned to St. Petersburg, the boarders and one of the landladies “filled four sledges and took a nice ride about the city” to see the illuminations.45 In the evening, another group of mummers, “not servants like the others but respectable people, probably some acquaintances of the Bensons, but who, nobody knows, came in and danced.” Because of some robberies that had taken place, the mummers were now required to include among them at least one person known to them. These mummers “were 3 men or 4 women – one woman played the piano while the rest of the party paired off with some of [the boarders] and danced quadrilles.”46

On New Year’s Eve (OS) 1845, the boarders

had a great merry-making. First of all, in a separate room there were privately arranged several tables covered with presents of candy, bon-bons, jewelry, and all sorts of things usually given away at such times. The presents were divided into parcels or lots and the name of the person for whom it is designed written upon a label and placed by the side. In the centre of the room is a pine (or other evergreen) tree, like those in our door-yard for size, the branches all hung with candles, kisses, bon-bons, fruit, etc. etc., and on the branches are placed a dozen or two little wax candles of various colors, all burning and lighting up the tree most beautifully. Some of the presents last night were of considerable value – sets of silver table spoons, ditto gold-band china plates, etc. – made to the Misses Benson by two brothers who visit them frequently. Having been of some service professionally to three of the family, gratuitously, I came in for a liberal share of their favors – the more valuable for having been, most of them, wrought by the hands of the givers with a feeling of gratitude. My presents were – from Miss Elizabeth Benson a black velvet Greek hat, elaborately worked with a pattern in chain stitch (from a design I gave) lined with pink silk, and decorated with a splendid variegated silk tassel. From Miss Sarah Benson a pair of purple velvet slippers wrought in chain stitch and bound with the fur of the gray Siberian squirrel; – From Mrs. Flood an elderly lady, a pair of red woollen knit cuffs to draw over the hand above the gloves to keep the wrists warm. From Miss Lucy Finley (cousin of the Bensons [see Image 340]) a gilt morocco case or box to hang against the wall and contain matches; – the front of the box being a running flower piece beautifully wrought in fine worsted. Beside these I had a plate full of little sugar bon-bons, etc, etc. After the company was admitted to the room and the presents had all been admired, thanks given, congratuations received, jokes passed etc., etc. we returned to the dining room (it being large) and there we danced until about 2 o’clock; stopping just before 12 long enough to fill our glasses with champagne all around and as the first stroke of the clock announced the New Year, wishing each other a happy new year and many return of it – touching our glasses with those of the ladies, etc. – etc. – etc. – etc. – we drank bumpers. I ought to have mentioned before that from another lady, a boarder, a Miss Spershott, I received a present of a purse at Christmas as a token of gratitude for services in saving some of her teeth and taking out a half dozen others.47

The Benson sisters also took Maynard shopping and to visit their friends, such as Mrs. Flood, whom he came to call “mother,” because she was close in age to his wife’s mother.48

The passing years show that the Benson sisters and their establishment in St. Petersburg continued to be praised by boarders for hospitality and kindness.49 The sisters themselves gave the “first impression … (confirmed on near acquaintance)” of being “a couple of good hearted, jolly, old (no elderly) maids; fat, fair, and forty or fifty.”50

Notes