Alexandre Tissot Demidoff
Representative for Europe International Demidoff Foundation

To this day the Demidoffs are renowned as a Russian family of industrialists, patrons, and collectors. The earliest members of the family belonged to the leading industrial house of 18th Century Russia, having made their immense fortune in the development of the mining industry and iron works in Siberia.

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ikita Antoufev Demidoff (1656– 1725), always a ‘free’ man engaged in fabricating and importing arms in Tula, became an armourer to the State of Russia during the reign of Peter the Great. Peter the Great recognised Nikita’s entrepreneurial talent and agreed in March 1702 to privatise for him the steel foundry of Neviansk in Tula to supply the Tsar’s arms. During the time of the war against Sweden (1700–21), the Demidoff arms factories became the chief suppliers to the Russian forces providing high quality munitions at one-half the market price and on schedule. Nikita’s management skills impressed the Tsar to grant him other munitions factories in the Urals. For his service to the State and especially for making victory over Sweden possible, Peter the Great ennobled Nikita five years before his death.

Nikita Akinfievitch Demidoff (1724–1789)

Nikita’s son, Akinfy N. Demidoff (1678 –1745), took over from his father and importantly expanded the mining and munitions business. Nikita and Akinfy between 1717 and 1735 developed eight more steel foundries and arms factories in the Urals. Akinfy was responsible for expansion to Siberia where he developed the first factories in Kouznetsk and Altai giving rise to the Kolyvan-Voskressnesk complex in 1727. Production of copper with furnaces started I 1729, followed with the first refinery hearth in 1730, with the black copper smelted at the works transported to the Urals and refined at the Demidoff plants in Visk, Nizhny Tagil, and Neviansk. Between 1726 and 1746 the four mines in Siberia produced some 100 tons of iron ore on average each year. The output of refined metal from copper rose from 2,000 puds each year in the early 1730’s to 4,000 puds each year by the end of the 1730’s and peaking at 6,000 puds in the early 1740’s. In Siberia Akinfy unearthed a large cache of ‘Scythian’ golden treasures in burial mounds that were presented to the Tsar and today can be found displayed in the State Hermitage Museum. To modernise metallurgy processing techniques Akinfy studied first-hand the industrial and mining techniques in the city of Freiburg, Germany in co-ordination with initiatives of Peter the Great. A group of Saxon-trained master workers, free workers, and peasants numbering 482 were employed and salaried by the Demidovs for the mines of Siberia. In the 1760’s copper output from the Demidoff mines totaled 3,500 tons each year positioning Russia as the world’s dominant producer. For his services, Peter the Great raised Akinfy and offsprings to the rank of hereditary nobility.
However, there were also important troubles with the State. In 1733 an inquiry was launched by Shafirov, the head of the Commission and formerly the President of the Commerce of Colleges, at the request of Catherine the Great into the affairs of the leading private enterprises. Government envoys were sent to the Demidoff mines and factories in the Urals, Moscow, and Tula and over a period of two years closely investigated business practises and records. The results of the Shafirov Commission found that the reduction in taxes was not due to lower profit at the mines and factories but fraud and Akinfy was forced to pay 800,000 in back taxes. These findings further accelerated a drive to privatise further state-controlled mines to improve productivity and raise public taxes.
Nikita A. Demidoff (1724–1789) took over his father’s industrial enterprise and developed them further. Over the next two hundred years the family’s mining holdings in the Urals, apart from iron deposits, included such metals and minerals as copper, silver, porphyry, gold, platinum, and malachite. At the height of the production boom in the early 1770’s the output of precious metals from the mines of Kolyvan-Voskressenks, Beresove, and Nerchinsk amounted to 2.2 millions of roubles that collectively produced more than all of the rest of Europe combined.
By the middle of the 18th Century the Demidoff mining empire spanning over 3 million acres positioned Russia as the leading exporter of high-grade iron ore in the world with shipments to England accounting for 60% of the production from the mines. Although many of the mining techniques were indigenous to Russia, the Demidoffs studied first-hand the leading metallurgical methods employed in England and Germany and posted their leading scientists and managers in those countries over extended training periods. This practise commenced with Nikita A. Demidoff in the mid-18th Century and accelerated under Anatole N. Demidoff one hundred years later. By 1750 the high quality production of the Demidoff mines accounted for 40% of gross national production in Russia.

COUNT NICOLAS N. DEMIDOFF
Count Nicolas N. Demidoff (1773– 1828) inherited the family empire when only fifteen from his father Nikita A. A period that can be characterised as "reckless" youth followed that resulted in Nicolas accumulating the staggering amount of personal debt of 840,000 roubles by 1797. By this time, Nicolas was married Elisabeth A. Stroganoff, who eighteen years of age. It was at this time that the French artist Vigee Le Brun fleeing the Revolution in France painted the portrait of Elisabeth Stroganoff that remains in the family to this day. The shortage of capital negatively affected production in the mines and, in co-ordination with Stroganoff family members, Nicolas was forced to receive permission from the Tsar to mortgage his palace in Moscow and defer tax payments for five years. In turn, Nicolas handed management of the business to the Stroganoffs. It was only on his return from an intense work-study programme in England and Germany that Nicolas returned to Russia to seriously assume his responsibilities over the family business. He fought in the Russo-Turkish War (1787–92) and during the reign of Catherine the Great became a Gentleman of the Chamber at her court. Under Paul I, Count Nicolas became one of the nine original Hereditary Commanders of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem (Knights of Malta). He further distinguished himself by financing and raising a battalion that fought with distinction at the battle of Borodino. In 1819 he was appointed the Russian Ambassador to the Court of Tuscany in Italy and brought his two boys, Paul and Anatole, to Florence in 1822. This followed the death of Elisabeth Stroganoff in 1818 while she was living in Paris.

Count Nicolas Nikitich Demidoff (1773–1828)

In Florence, Count Nicolas commissioned to have Villa di San Donato built after acquiring a large swamp-infested tract of land north of Florence from the Catholic Church. He further initiated a series of schools, hospitals, and public charities throughout Tuscany. At Villa di San Donato, that in reality was more a palace than villa, Nicolas set up a theatre for performances of the latest Parisian vaudevilles and comic operas, established an academy for foreign teachers to study languages, mathematics, and physics, and formed an art collection and library that became famous throughout Europe. In addition to private quarters, containing priceless furnishings, the villa had fourteen salons built expressly for the display of oil paintings and watercolours, drawings, sculpture, furniture, porcelain, glass, tapestries, and objets d’art of all types; it also had an extensive library of rare books. From his father Nicolas inherited paintings of Greuze and Jean-Louis Demarne. He also collected Dutch, Flemish, and Italian Old Master paintings and decorative art, and built a spectacular collection of armoury now found in the Wallace Collection in London. His collection of Roman and Greek statues are in the State Hermitage Museum. It is not always possible to ascertain which items were acquired by him or by his son, Anatole. At Nicolas’ death in 1828 his estate passed to his sons, Anatole and Paul.
Nicolas’ eldest son, Paul N. Demidoff (1798–1840) was educated at the Lycee Napoleon in Paris and served in the Army of Russia from 1812 to 1826. He further instigated the ‘Demidoff Prize’ that was awarded each year by the Academy of Sciences of Russia and in the 1980’s resurrected by the International Demidoff Foundation. In 1836 Paul married a lady-in-waiting to the Russian Court, the Finnish beauty, Aurore Sjernwell. On the morning following the wedding, Paul surprised his new wife with the gift of the ‘Grand Sancy Diamond’, the world’s seventh largest diamond. Today the diamond forms part of the Crown Jewels of France and can be seen at the Gallerie d’Apollon in the Louvre (weight of 55.23 metric carats). The few widely scattered descendants of Paul and Aurore are the last living descendants of the Demidoff Princes of San Donato. Baronne Aurore later married Andrej Karamzin, the son of the famous historian, in 1846. Unfortunately, in 1854 Aurore lost her second husband a brave casualty of the War in Crimea.

Anatole Nicolaievitch Demidoff, Prince of San Donato (1813–1870)

ANATOLE N. DEMIDOFF, FIRST PRINCE OF SAN DONATO
Born in St. Petersburg in 1813, Anatole N. Demidoff, First Prince of San Donato (1813–1870), was one of the most talented, energetic, and extravagant of the Demidoffs of Tula. Anatole was passionately interested in the social and natural sciences, industry, politics, and the arts.
Following the death of his father in 1828 and that of his elder brother in 1840, Anatole and the co-owner of the mining empire, Baroness Aurore Demidova, continued to develop activity raising production of iron at the Demidoff mines by 32% to 1.4 million ‘puds’ from 1837 to 1851. The empire consisted of fifteen villages and nine munitions and mining factories. He further continued the tradition of sending his most ambitious and talented managers to work-study programmes in Germany and England and brought talented scientists and business people like the Frenchman, Frederic Le Play, to Nizhny Tagil to further improve productivity and work techniques at the mines. Anatole further raised a series of schools, hospitals, and living places for his workers as part of his scientific approach to work life. Anatole showcased the talent of his talented workers at international forums, where they won prestigious awards, such as the Great Exhibition at Crystal Palace in London in 1851 hosted by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Massive malachite blocks and delicate steel ‘butterflies’ were shown from the mines of Nizhny Tagil that were financed at great cost by Anatole.

Elime Pavlovitch Demidoff, 3rd Prince of San Donato (1868–1943)

As a young man aged twenty-four Anatole raised a twenty-two man scientific team to explore Russia’s new territorial acquisitions in the South. The eminent French sociologist, Frederic Le Play, was responsible for the scientific part of the expedition, while Jules Janin chronicled the voyage, and Auguste Raffet maintained the pictorial history. As earlier noted, Frederic Le Play later was appointed to apply his sociological and scientific methods at the Demidoff Mining and Arms Empire in Russia. The outcome of the expedition was an important and richly decorated multi-volume series of books published in 1840 that covered the geographical, zoological, geological, botanical, and sociological findings of these new lands of Moldavia, Crimea, and Southern Russia.
Anatole later made use of his intimate knowledge of Crimea, as well as, his important friends in senior positions, when he organised at his own cost a charity and series of initiatives to assist the plight of Russian Prisoners of War during the War of Crimea. Attached to the Russian Embassy in Austria under Prince Gortchakoff, from 1854 to 1856 Anatole engaged the support of the brother of the Tsar, his own father in law, Jerome Bonaparte, and a network of friends in Constantinople, Paris, St. Petersburg, and London, to clothe, feed, and exchange, the prisoners. Many of these initiatives were later adopted as part of the Geneva Conventions where Anatole presented at the first convention.
Anatole was further interested in promoting industry in Italy. He participated in the management of the construction of the rail system that connects Florence to Livorno at the request of Grand Duke Leopold II. It was these industrial projects, combined with, raising a hospital in Lucca, a school for the poor families of Florence, and the Misericordia Charity, that led Leopold II to grant Anatole the Italian title Prince of San Donato on the occasion of his marriage with Princess Mathilde in 1840. The title, however, was not recognised in Russia. It was only for Anatole’s nephew and sole heir, Paul P. Demidoff and his wife, Princess Elena Petrovna Troubetskaii, that the title, Second Prince of San Donato, was recognised by the Tsar of Russia in June 1872.

Maria Pavlovna Demidova, Princess of San Donato (1877–1959)

PAUL P. DEMIDOFF, SECOND PRINCE OF SAN DONATO
Paul P. Demidoff (1839–1885) soon after graduation from the faculty of jurisprudence in St. Petersburg was attached to the Russian embassy in Paris, and later at Vienna. From 1871 to 1876 he served as mayor of Kiev.
During the Russo-Turkish (1877–78) Paul N. chose to follow the army as the authorised agent of the Red Cross, rather than engage as a leader of soldiers. Of progressive and liberal leanings in January 1872 Paul N. had the title Prince and Princess of San Donato authorised by the Italian authorities to include all male and female descendants. Paul continued to manage the mining empire but from afar. On his death the responsibility passed to his wife, and then to Princess Maria and her husband, Prince Abamelek-Lazarev, until the lands were made public property at the time of the revolution in 1917.
The last Princess of San Donato to reside at Villa Demidoff in Pratolino near Florence was Princess Maria P. Abamelek-Lazarev. She died in 1955. Like her Demidoff predecessors, Princess Maria supported charitable institutions such as the Invalids of War, the Russian Orthodox Church in Florence, and founded the Union des Invalides Mutiles Russe a l’etranger. She further donated land for the Music School in Pratolino in 1922, among many other civic actions over a long life.

CONCLUSION
Peter the Great ennobled the Demidoffs of Tula centuries ago for their position as the first industrialists of Russia. The successive generations of Demidoff Counts and Princes were industrialists first that served Russia and armed the armies of the Czars from Peter the Great to Nicholas II. In addition to being champions of industry, each Demidoff generation assumed civic responsibility constructing schools, orphanages, hospitals, and sustaining charitable institutions in Russia and in their adopted homelands. The Demidoff contribution over the ages can best be characterised as fostering a shared international cultural experience that has made Russia truly a part of Europe. These family traditions continue to this day in the form of the International Demidoff Foundation. Mr. Vladimir Melentjev and Mrs. Nina Demidoff in Moscow direct all activity of the Foundation that includes research, cultural and charitable projects. 

London
Photographs of the Demidoff family members are from the personal author’s collection