| Total population | |
|---|---|
| Residents born in Russia 15,160 (2001 census) 39,529 (2011 census) 73,000 (2020 ONS estimate) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| London, South East England, [1] Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Cardiff | |
| Languages | |
| British English and Russian | |
| Religion | |
| Russian Orthodox Church Atheism Irreligion Judaism Church of England | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Russian diaspora |
| Part of a series on |
| British people |
|---|
| United Kingdom |
| Eastern European |
| Northern European |
| Southern European |
| Western European |
| Central Asian |
| East Asian |
| South Asian |
| Southeast Asian |
| West Asian |
| African and Afro-Caribbean |
| Northern American |
| South American |
| Oceanian |
Russians in the United Kingdom are Russians, or the persons born in the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union or the Russian Federation, who are or were citizens of or residents of the United Kingdom.
The 2001 UK census recorded 15,160 residents born in Russia. [2] The 2011 census recorded 36,313 people born in Russia resident in England, 687 in Wales, [3] 2,180 in Scotland [4] and 349 in Northern Ireland. [5]
The Office for National Statistics estimates that 73,000 people born in Russia were resident in the UK in 2020. [6] Estimates published by The Guardian suggest that the resident population of London born in Russia was over 150,000 in 2014. [7] The rise in population has led to jocular nicknames for London such as "Londongrad" and "Moscow-on-the-Thames". [8]
In London, in particular Notting Hill Gate there are a number of Russian schools aimed at transmitting Russian language and culture to the children of Russian immigrant parents. [9]
The Russian Embassy School in London is a Russian international school in the UK’s capital city.
After the abolition of slavery, Catholic emancipation and Jewish emancipation in the early 19th century, Britain came to be seen in Europe as a liberal destination, attracting free thinkers who were considered dangerous by the monarchies of continental Europe. [10] : 146–147 Alexander Herzen, a writer considered to be the "father of Russian socialism", lived in London for 13 years. He established the first Russian-language printing house outside Russia Free Russian Press, first at Judd Street and later moving to the Caledonian Road. [11] : 227, 230–231 Herzen's most influential publication, devised with the help of another Russian immigrant poet Nikolai Ogarev, was Kolokol newsletter. [11] : 235 Notable Russian anarchists Peter Kropotkin and Mikhail Bakunin lived and worked in London in the late 19th century. [12] [13] Freedom Press anarchist publishing house co-founded by Kropotkin in Whitechapel [12] still operates as of 2022.
Due to the political freedom in Britain, London will become central to the Russian revolutionary thinkers once again in the 20th century. Vladimir Lenin lived in London in 1902–1903, publishing a revolutionary journal Iskra in a building in Clerkenwell that later became a home of the Marx Memorial Library. The congress of Russian revolutionaries held in the Three Johns pub in Islington in 1903 became a critical point of division of the movement to hardline Bolsheviks, who would later establish the Soviet Union, and Mensheviks. The 1907 Bolshevik party congress was held in Hackney and was attended by future leaders of the Bolshevik revolution including, besides Lenin, Leon Trotsky, Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, Lev Kamenev, Maxim Litvinov and writer Maxim Gorky. [14]
Russian Jews emigrated to the United Kingdom beginning in the late 19th century to seek refuge from the persecution in Russian Empire and Eastern Europe. It's estimated that 150,000 Jewish people relocated to Britain between 1881 and 1914. [10] : 228–229 Slonim-born Michael Marks settled in Leeds where he co-founded Marks & Spencer retail chain in 1894. [10] : 226–227 Isaac Moses and his brother founded Moss Bros Group in Houndsditch. Montague Burton, then known as Montague Ossinsky, came to England from Lithuania, founding Burton in Sheffield in 1904, opening shops in Chesterfield, Manchester, Leeds and Mansfield within a year. Burton became the biggest retail empire in Europe by 1925. [10] : 227
The production of ready-made coats and jackets became the primary immigrant trade due to the combination of Jews facing restrictions on skilled trades in Russia and the abundant unskilled labor force in Britain. [15] : 15–16 The number of Russian and Polish tailors increased from 3,264 in 1881 to 19,218 in 1901. [15] : 17 Facing language barrier and unable to work on Saturdays for religious reasons, they were often employed by the London's East End sweatshops run by Jewish entrepreneurs. Jewish immigrants to London built a thriving clothes trade in Houndsditch and Petticoat Lane. [10] : 234
The hardships prompted some Jews to become revolutionaries. [10] : 236 A pioneer of Jewish socialism Aaron Liebermann came to London from Saint Petersburg in 1875. He organised the first Jewish worker's organisation Hebrew Socialist Union in London, however, the initiative wasn't supported by the Jewish establishment and the socialist organisation was short-lived. Morris Winchevsky, who moved to London from Lithuania, published a socialist Yiddish newspaper Der Poylisher Yidl from the premises in Commercial Street. [10] : 237
Biochemist Chaim Weizmann came to Britain from Russia in 1904. He developed a method of producing cordite explosive that was essential to the Britain's World War I effort. His industrial success resulted in meeting then Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour and he is believed to have influenced Balfour Declaration, which led to the creation of Israel. [10] : 248
While earlier waves of immigration from Russia primarily consisted of political exiles, who were intent on continuing their activities in their new country, the migration of refugees from the Russian Pale of Settlement marked a significantly larger-scale movement. Eastern European Jewish immigration largely ceased following the passage of the Aliens Act 1905. [16] : 127
In the initial years following the October Revolution, the nature of Russian immigration to the UK underwent a significant transformation. While Britain continued to serve as a sanctuary for those unable to remain in Russia, anti-monarchists were succeeded by white émigrés, who represented a broad range of political beliefs. [17] : 18 Britain admitted an estimated 15,000 refugees, a relatively low figure compared to countries such as France or Germany, as asylum was granted only under exceptional circumstances. Some individuals such as Grand Duchess Xenia were evacuated aboard HMS Marlborough in 1919, sent by King George V to protect his relatives. [18]
Emigrant authors such as Ariadna Tyrkova-Williams contributed to documenting the contemporary life in England, writing for Russian magazines and newspapers. [17] : 19
Vladimir Nabokov's three-year stay in Cambridge as a student had a profound influence on his literary work. The author recounted his experiences in England in "Speak, Memory" and "Other Shores ", with Cambridge providing the backdrop for his novels Glory and The Real Life of Sebastian Knight . Yevgeny Zamyatin's time in Britain during World War I, spent as a naval architect on secondment, formed the basis for the works he wrote during his stay and upon his return to Russia. The concepts and symbolism in his dystopian novel We were rooted in his experiences in England and his familiarity with English literature. The novel subsequently influenced George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four and possibly Aldous Huxley's Brave New World . [17] : 19, 21
This is a list of Russian expatriates in the United Kingdom and Britons of Russian ancestry.
This is a list of monuments to Russians in the United Kingdom.
The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a far-left faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the Second Party Congress in 1903. The Bolshevik party seized power in Russia in the October Revolution of 1917, and was later renamed the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Their ideology and practices, based on Leninist and later Marxist–Leninist principles, are known as Bolshevism.
The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social change in the Russian Empire, starting in 1917. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and adopt a socialist form of government following two successive revolutions and a bloody civil war. The Russian Revolution can also be seen as the precursor for the other European revolutions that occurred during or in the aftermath of World War I, such as the German Revolution of 1918–1919.
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party civil war in the former Russian Empire sparked by the overthrowing of the social-democratic Russian Provisional Government in the October Revolution, as many factions vied to determine Russia's political future. It resulted in the formation of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and later the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in most of its territory. Its finale marked the end of the Russian Revolution, which was one of the key events of the 20th century.
Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin was a Russian anarchist and geographer known as a proponent of anarchist communism.
Bolshevism is a revolutionary socialist current of Soviet Leninist and later Marxist–Leninist political thought and political regime associated with the formation of a rigidly centralized, cohesive and disciplined party of social revolution, focused on overthrowing the existing capitalist state system, seizing power and establishing the "dictatorship of the proletariat".
Anatoly Vasilyevich Lunacharsky was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and the first Bolshevik Soviet People's Commissar (Narkompros) responsible for the Ministry of Education as well as an active playwright, critic, essayist, and journalist throughout his career.
Sidney George Reilly, known as the "Ace of Spies", was a Russian-born adventurer and secret agent employed by Scotland Yard's Special Branch and later by the Foreign Section of the British Secret Service Bureau, the precursor to the modern British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6/SIS). He is alleged to have spied for at least four different great powers, and documentary evidence indicates that he was involved in espionage activities in 1890s London among Russian émigré circles, in Manchuria on the eve of the Russo-Japanese War (1904–05), and in an abortive 1918 coup d'état against Vladimir Lenin's Bolshevik government in Moscow.
Yakov Mikhailovich Sverdlov was a Bolshevik Party administrator and chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee from 1917 to 1919. He is sometimes regarded as the first head of state of the Soviet Union, although it was not established until 1922, three years after his death.
Georgy Vasilyevich Chicherin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and a Soviet politician who served as the first People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs in the Soviet government from March 1918 to July 1930.
Sir Robert Hamilton Bruce Lockhart, KCMG was a British diplomat, journalist, author, and secret agent. His 1932 book Memoirs of a British Agent became an international bestseller by telling of his experiences in Russia in 1918 following the Bolshevik Revolution. He left the country after he was accused of having led a failed plot to assassinate Vladimir Lenin, the so-called Ambassadors' plot, a charge which he always denied. Later research suggests that the "Lockhart Plot" was a sting operation orchestrated by Felix Dzerzhinsky with the goal of discrediting the British and French governments.
Mark Andreyevich Natanson was a Russian revolutionary who was one of the founders of the Circle of Tchaikovsky, Land and Liberty and the Socialist-Revolutionary Party. In 1917, he was a leader of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, which supported the Bolsheviks during the October Revolution. He was the uncle of Alexander Berkman.
Mikhail Isaakovich Liber, sometimes known as Mark Liber, was a leader of the General Jewish Workers' Union. He also played a role in the Russian Social-Democratic Workers' Party (RSDRP) and was a leading figure among the Mensheviks. Liber was instrumental in the soviets during the February Revolution of 1917 but opposed to October Revolution. He was reportedly shot during the Purges. Liber played a defining role in the development of the Bund and helped shaped the policies of the leaders of the February Revolution.
Leonid Borisovich Krasin was a Russian Soviet politician, engineer, social entrepreneur, Bolshevik revolutionary and a Soviet diplomat. In 1924 he became the first Soviet ambassador to France. A year later, he left Paris to become ambassador to London, where he remained until his death. He was an early and close associate of Vladimir Lenin and his financier and the first finance wizard of the Communist Party.
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until his death in 1924, and of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1924. Under his administration, Russia, and later the Soviet Union, became a one-party socialist state governed by the Communist Party. Ideologically a Marxist, his developments to the ideology are called Leninism.
Bevin Court is a housing project in Finsbury, London. It is one of several modernist housing projects designed in the city in the immediate postwar period by the Tecton architecture practice, led by Berthold Lubetkin. Following the dissolution of Tecton, the project was realised by Lubetkin, Francis Skinner and Douglas Carr Bailey. The project was completed in 1954.
Alexander "Sanya" Moiseyevich Schapiro or Shapiro was a Russian anarcho-syndicalist activist. Born in southern Russia, Schapiro left Russia at an early age and spent most of his early activist years in London.
Alexander Aleksandrovich Bogdanov, born Alexander Malinovsky, was a Russian and later Soviet physician, philosopher, science fiction writer and Bolshevik revolutionary. He was a polymath who pioneered blood transfusion and general systems theory and made important contributions to cybernetics.
Lev Borisovich Kamenev was a Russian revolutionary and Soviet politician. He was born in Moscow to parents who had both been involved in revolutionary politics in the 1870s. He joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) in 1901 and was active in Moscow and Saint Petersburg. Kamenev participated in the failed Russian Revolution of 1905. Relocating abroad in 1908, he became an early member of the Bolsheviks and a close associate of the exiled Vladimir Lenin. In 1914, he was arrested upon returning to Saint Petersburg and exiled to Siberia. Kamenev was able to return after the February Revolution of 1917, which overthrew the Tsarist monarchy. In 1917, he served briefly as the equivalent of the first head of state of Soviet Russia. He disagreed with Lenin's strategy of armed uprising during the October Revolution but nevertheless remained in a position of power after the fall of the Provisional Government. In 1919, Kamenev was elected a full member of the first Politburo.
Julius Martov or L. Martov was a Russian politician, revolutionary and the leader of the Mensheviks, a faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP). A close associate of Vladimir Lenin, Martov broke with him following the RSDLP ideological split, after which Lenin led the opposing faction, the Bolsheviks.
The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a socialist political party founded in 1898 in Minsk.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)Both parents were half Russian with assorted parts French, Italian and German. Many of their forebears were prominent figures in czarist Russia, including a country squire with 6,000 serfs, the owner of the largest caviar fishery in czarist Russia and a court architect.
{{cite news}}: |last= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)| Former Russian Empire or the USSR |
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