George Nathaniel Nash was born on August 3, 1888. During the First World War, he was
an
officer in the British Army and stationed in Russia as a translator from 1917 to 1919.
It
appears that he had been to Russia previously in 1914 or 1915, though the nature of
that
trip is unknown. Nash had a command of the Russian language, and was promoted from
lieutenant to captain in January 1918. He ended his military service after returning
to
London in 1920.
Nash's diary title page contains an address for St. Anne's Road, London. There is
an entry
in the 1901 UK Census for a George Nash of the correct age living with parents and
a sister
at a different address on St. Anne's, but further information on Nash is unknown.
Scope and Contents
The collection consists of a diary, scrapbook, and photograph album of George Nathaniel
Nash, a British Army officer stationed in Russia from 1917 to 1919. These materials
chronicle
Nash's experiences during World War I and the Russian Revolution. The collection breaks
down
into three main components: first, two copies of Nash's unpublished diary, one a typescript
and the other a carbon copy; second, a scrapbook extensively cross-referenced with
the
diary; and third, a photograph album with typescript index by the author.
The diary is summarized by a Table of Contents and covers experiences in Petrograd,
Vladivostok, Moscow, and the Russian Southwestern front. Nash does not set out to
provide
in-depth analysis of political change in Russia, but does give a first-hand account
of the
unrest in the region at the time, as well as his own experiences there as a British
soldier.
Included are accounts of his meeting with Tsar Nicholas II, of a disorderly Russian
army,
and of his own imprisonment. Copy 1, Vol. 1 is the original diary, which contains
several
newspaper clippings, typescript translations, typescript tsarist proclamations concerning
abdication, and two pages of paper money. Copy 2, Vol. 1 is a carbon copy; it omits
the
clippings and bills but contains English translations of news articles in the back.
The
original diary's three-ring binders have been retained.
Vol. 2 is Nash's scrapbook, which consists of numerous examples of the following:
military
cartoons and notices, personnel listings, programs, invitations, menus, receipts,
seating
arrangements, telegrams, visiting cards, travel permits, and newspaper clippings.
Especially
notable are a tsarist wax seal, an invitation to view the burial of Revolutionary
victims,
and a rare early Soviet propaganda pamphlet entitled "Say! What Are You!" and attributed
to
Lenin.
Nash's photograph album is a leather-bound volume consisting of 158 chronologically
indexed
photos. A folder houses the album, its typed index, and one loose picture. Included
are
photographs relating to the diary: revolutionary Petrograd; the "Kerenski" offensive
and
retreat; the Southwestern front; the Trans-Siberian Railway; Vladivostok; the journey
from
Tiflis (Caucasus) to Erzerum (Turkey); crossing the Astrachan Steppe; and the Boutirke
Criminal Jail.
Index Terms
People
Headlam, John Emerson Wharton, Sir, 1864- .
Kerensky, Aleksandr Fyodorovich, 1881-1970.
Lenin, Vladimir Il'ich, 1870-1924.
Maria Fyodorovna, Empress, consort of Alexander III, Emperor of Russia,
1847-1928.
