Arthur Toulmin Smith: A British Engineer in 19th Century Russia

This treasure trove of letters tells the story of Arthur Toulmin Smith, a British engineer who established Ludwig and Smith (an iron-copper foundry and mechanical plant producing weighing equipment and fire engines, among other things) in Moscow, living there from the 1870s until his death in 1914. There is much to learn here about the history of the British expat community in Moscow, and about daily life in Russia in the period; Bessie White's meticulous research adds contextual detail, and contemporary photographs (some by Arthur) give a vivid sense of place and time. Arthur's family relationships are at the heart of the book: most of his letters are addressed to his eldest sister, Lucy Toulmin Smith (1838-1911), Librarian of Manchester College, Oxford (later Harris Manchester College), and one chapter contains a set of letters from Arthur's daughter Alice to her Aunt Lucy. News of Arthur's extended family in England (looms large, and the letters collected here provide a glimpse into an absorbing family saga across the generations. Highly recommended.

A wonderful family account of life within a British community living in Russia in the run up to the First World War. Arthur’s story is told through his letters home and paints a fascinating picture of Tsarist Russia. It is wonderful that Bessie White has managed to pull all this information into one very readable volume. I highly recommend it!

What a book! With the publication of Arthur Toulmin Smith's letters, Bessie White presents a work of meticulous research, the fascinating disclosure of what Europe has been, means, and ought to be. Moreover, it shows the values of education, of creativity, and of respect as guiding human principles for the individual - in any society of whatever cultural background. Most of all it leads to seeing family bonds as an obligation beyond national understanding. With the story of her own great-grandfather, Arthur Toulmin Smith, Bessie White tells the life of the Russian grandfather of a British family in Mansfield and that of the British engineer, co-owner of an Anglo-German company, in Moscow at the same time: The sophisticated Englishman in Russia, the Russian patriarch in England. Having lived abroad for many years myself, I highly appreciate this descrription of being "at home" in one civilizaion, but obliged to one's roots, one's family in another. To me, it seems some kind of parable for many sociocultural problems of our time, for the dangers of ignorance, of misleading, yet for the importance of supramational education in order to understnad oneself as well as the other. A wonderful book worthwhile being written and published!