Russia to France

Pavel Vassilivich Mordin, c. 1895

Cabinet card of Russian gold miner and philanthropist, Pavel Mordin (1864-1925). According to his biography, Pavel was born to peasants and in 1890, after completing his military service, Pavel Mordin and two workers went to the taiga of the Un'ya-Bomsky District to mine gold. Mining this precious metal became his main interest and source of wealth for many years. . As a result of expeditions to the Far Eastern taiga, he discoveredseveral large deposits. In the Selemzhinskaya taiga on the Kharga River, he discovered the Zhedrinsky, Kazansky, Zlatoustovsky and other mines. From the beginning of the 20th century, Pavel Mordin became the managing director of the Amur Gold Mining Society. After a trip to America in 1899 and becoming acquainted with local gold mining methods, he began to advocate gold mining using dredges.

Maria Mordina Khovan, c. 1895

Intimate photos of Noblewoman Maria Khovan of St. Petersburg in Marie Zvenigorodsky's collection lead us to believe she was of relation to the Medem-Fersens. Not only a woman of the nobility, Maria was also a business owner in he own right.

Svetozar at a Mine, c. 1900

During the late 1800s and early 1900s, Svetozars fascination with gold and mining grew. In young adulthood, he worked with Pavel Mordin in his mines located in the Amur region of Far-Eastern Russia.

Pavel and Maria Mordin's Wedding Photo, c. 1901

Pavel and Maria Mordin married in 1901. Svetozar writes of their union in Is there a God?: "The loviest girl in the Capital, of the bluest of blue blood, became the wife of the son of a serf." pg. 15

The Mordins, c. 1902

The Mordins in Cossack uniforms. Accrding to Pavel's biography: "Together with his wife Maria Alexandrovna, he moved to St. Petersburg , where he worked in local government, periodically traveling to the taiga, spending 4-5 months a year there. After the start of World War I, Mordin opened a hospital for military personnel in his mansion, which was managed by his wife."

The Mordins in a Photobooth, 1901

This micro image is currently on view in SVETOZAR: The Early Life of Baron Euegen Fersen. Svetozar writes further of their love in Is there a God?: "More; she brought him what he least expected, Love… He, who in his days of struggle had learned to despise love as a luxury, even a weakness- he met love with love." pg. 15

Maria in Her Home, 1915

Fersen writes of their illustrious home during the war: "Suddenly the Great World War burst like a destroying flame over Europe. All his flourishing plans withered in the blast of a more commanding emergency. He transformed his beautiful residence in Petrograd into an Ambulance, where he lived with his wife in two rooms of their own vast palace. She became a nurse and took charge of that Ambulance, which his money supported. And there, in those lofty marble halls which so recently had echoed to the laughter and the wit of brilliant companies, lay now row upon endless row of shattered bodies in clean white cots..." pg. 16-17

The Woodwards, c. 1913

Heirs to a railroad fortune, the Woodward family was very well known as city developers, aiding the construction of countless buildings across Philadelphia.

Their eldest son, Henry Howard Houston, pictured at the top right, was his parents’ pride and joy. In 1917, he resigned from his sophomore year at Yale and left his family for France to enlist in the American Field Service.

Houston Woodward, c. 1913

While on leave from duty as Corporal Pilot in France, Houston Woodward rented a room in Fersen's Paris home. The pair became close friends. In 1918, Woodward was shot down in combat at the age of 22.

Svetozar wrote of him in Is there a God?:

“So died a bold American Eagle, killed fighting for a country that was not even his own.”