Basil N. Strandtman Papers

Collection

Identifier: GTM-000009

Request

Scope and Contents

This collection includes personal correspondence and official documents pertaining to the life and career of Basil N. Strandtman, of the Imperial Russian Diplomatic corps to Yugoslavia (1911-1940), as well as correspondence from members of his family, including his wife Xenia and brother Nikon, postcards, and photographs.

Included are official documents from the Imperial Government of Russia regarding the military, civilian, and government service of the Strandtman family dating back to 1843, as well as United States Government documents concerning aid given to Serbia during World War I and political relations between the two governments.

Dates

Creation: 1840s-1968

Conditions Governing Access

Most manuscripts collections at the Georgetown University Booth Family Center for Special Collections are open to researchers; however, restrictions may apply to some collections. Collections stored off site require a minimum of three days for retrieval. For use of all manuscripts collections, researchers are advised to contact the Booth Family Center for Special Collections in advance of any visit.

Conditions Governing Use

Researchers are solely responsible for determining the copyright status of the materials being used, establishing who the copyright owner is, locating the copyright owner, and obtaining permission for intended use.

Biographical Note

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Vassili "Basil" Nicholaevitch Strandtman or Shtrandtman (1877-1963) was born in Pau, France, to Major General Nikolai Karlovitch (1835-1900) and Praskovia Vassilevna Orgewsky Strandtman (1846-1900). He spent his early childhood in Tzarskoe Selo and was educated at home until he entered the Page Corps (1888-1897). In 1900 he married Julia Nikolaevna Etter (1879-1960, div. 1933) with whom he had one daughter--Sophy (1901-1972)--and, after service in Her Majesty's Calvalry in New Peterhof (1897-1901), he entered the diplomatic service as an attaché at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in St. Petersburg (1901-1906).

Strandtman was thereafter Secretary to the Imperial Legation in Darmstadt (1906-1908); Secretary to the Imperial Russian Mission in Sofia, Bulgaria (1908-1910); Second Secretary at the Russian Embassy in Constantinople and a member of the staff of the Russian Imperial Mission in Cetinje, Montenegro (1910); First Secretary at the Russian Legation in Belgrade (1911-1915); and interim Chargé d'Affaires of the Russian Delegation in Belgrade (1914). After the Yugoslav government moved to Niš, he served as secretary of the mission there (1914-1915) before being transferrred to the Russian embassy in Rome (1915-1917), where he stayed until volunteering to serve in the Serbian Army cavalry (1917-1918). Next he was Minister to the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (SCS, 1919-1924), later known as Delegate in Charge of Russian Interests in the Kingdom of the SCS, while meanwhile acting as a Special Authorized Agent for the old Russian Red Cross in Belgrade (1924-1940).

Basil and his second wife Xenia Orestovna Evetsky (1894-1984, m. 1934) stayed there until September 1944 when they fled the city, staying in Salzburg and Füssen before joining his daughter Sophy in Geneva in late 1945. The Strandtman family then moved to Washington, DC, in January 1947 where they resided with Alice Dodge, daughter of a former US Minister of the Kingdom of the SCS, Henry Percival Dodge. Strandtman died there in 1963.

Basil had at least two siblings: Konstantin Nicholaevitch (1881-1905) and Nikolai Nicholaevitch, also known as Nikon (1875-1963). Nikon served as a military officer in the Russo-Japanese War as well as WWI before becoming a hieromonk in the cell of St. John the Chrysostom of Hilandar Monastery at Mount Athos, Greece.