Boris N. Volkov papers, 1915-1963

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Summary

Creators:
Varneck, Elena, 1891-1976 and Volkov, Boris N., 1894-1954
Abstract:
Speeches and writings, correspondence, clippings, other printed matter, and photographs, relating to Russian literature, the Russian Civil War in Siberia and Mongolia, the career of the White Russian commander Baron Ungern-Shternberg, Russian émigré affairs, and anti-communist movements in the United States. Includes a translation by Elena Varneck and a fictionalized autobiographical account of the Russian Civil War.
Extent:
1 manuscript box, 23 microfilm reels, digital files (3.9 Linear Feet)
Language:
In Russian and English
Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Boris N. Volkov Papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

Background

Scope and content:

This collection consists mainly of the writings of the émigré poet and writer Boris Volkov. During the First World War, Volkov was a medic with the Russian army on its Western and Caucasian fronts. During the Civil War, he was active in the counterrevolutionary uprising in Irkutsk in 1918, and thereafter was an agent of the Omsk government in Mongolia, where he reported on the political and military situation, particularly with regard to the activities of Ataman G. M. Semenov and General Baron R. F. Ungern-Shternberg.

Among his writings, the most significant piece is the unpublished novel "Conscript to Paradise." The novel itself is based in part on his own experiences and in part on the diary of his wife, nee Elena Petrovna Witte, the daughter of the Russian Councilor to the Mongolian government, but the completed draft is significantly abridged from the original version. The original draft is in the form of a large volume of fragments, which may include typescript fragments of Witte's diary (or Volkov's reworked versions of it). The fragments indicate that the author had in mind a much larger autobiographical novel that would have encompassed his adventures in Siberia, the Transbaikal region of the Far East, and Mongolia during the 1917-1921 period. This material has been left largely in the order received.

Other elements of the collection include Volkov's poetry and smaller prose works, some also of an autobiographical nature, as well as evidence reflecting his anti-Communist views and work in America in the 1930s-1950s. The subject file and printed matter series contains brochures and clippings on this and other subjects.

Left unfilmed due to the general accessibility of materials are a large number of boxes containing clippings and printed matter (in Russian and English, from periodicals such as the San Francisco Chronicle and Examiner, Reader's Digest, American Mercury, Look, etc.) relating to diverse subjects, the most significant of which are Communism and anti-Communism in the United States (including large amounts of materials on McCarthy, espionage trials and Communist propaganda and subversion, as well as dossiers on various public figures representing these movements), international affairs (especially the spread of Communism), and domestic affairs in the USSR and its satellites and in the United States. This material covers the period from the 1930s to 1953.

Detailed processing and preservation microfilming for these materials were made possible by a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and by matching funds from the Hoover Institution and Museum of Russian Culture. The grant also provides depositing a microfilm copy in the Hoover Institution Library & Archives. The original materials and copyright to them (with some exceptions) are the property of the Museum of Russian Culture, San Francisco. A transfer table indicating corresponding box and reel numbers is available at the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

The Hoover Institution assumes all responsibility for notifying users that they must comply with the copyright law of the United States (Title 17 United States Code) and Hoover Rules for the Use and Reproduction of Archival Materials.

Biographical / historical:

B. N. Volkov was born in Ekaterinoslavl' (Siberia) on 30 May 1894 (N.S.). A university student in law, he volunteered for military duty at the front in 1915, serving in Poland and the Caucasus as commander of a medical unit responsible for retrieving wounded soldiers from the front lines. In December 1917, he was involved in an anti-Bolshevik uprising in Irkutsk. During the Russian Civil War, Volkov served as an agent of the Siberian Provisional (later All-Russian) government in Mongolia.

Escaping from Baron R. F. Ungern-Shternberg, who had sentenced him to death, he spent the following few years in China, as a commercial and sales agent for Gilchrist and Co. and the Tientsin Chemical Works Association.

In 1923 Volkov and his wife moved to the United States, where he worked as a longshoreman and construction worker, and at a variety of other jobs. He was also a poet and writer, and though his autobiographical novel, "Conscript to Paradise," was never published, he did see to press a book of verse entitled V pyli chuzhikh dorog (Berlin, 1933). Volkov also wrote for the émigré press, and much of his poetry was published in periodicals. He died in San Francisco on 9 June 1954.

Date Event
1894 May 30 [N.S.]
Born, Ekaterinoslav, Russia
1915
Medic, Russian army
1917
Completed university course, Legal Faculty, Moscow University
1918-1920
Agent of Provisional Siberian and All-Russian governments (Omsk) in Mongolia
1923
Emigrated to United States
1933
Author, V pyli chuzhikh dorog
1945
Translator, United Nations
1954 June 9
Died, San Francisco
Acquisition information:
Acquired by the Hoover Institution Library Archives in 1936.
Physical location:
Hoover Institution Library & Archives and the Museum of Russian Culture
Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Access and use

Restrictions:

The collection is open for research; materials must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual or digital media material in the collection, they must be reformatted before providing access.

Terms of access:

For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Boris N. Volkov Papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

Location of this collection:
Hoover Institution Library & Archives, Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305-6003, US
Contact:
(650) 723-3563
hooverarchives@stanford.edu
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