Esther Aksel-Hansen - Bernadette Preben-Hansen

En upubliceret arbejdsudgave (en transskription in extenso) af originalbrevene
(NKS 5244, 4°) er indgået på Det Kongelige Bibliotek, Center for
Manuskripter og Boghistorie, København 2010: 200 sider, 640 noter på
grundlag af forskning i Statens Arkiver 2005-7. Udgiver kan kontaktes for
en PDF, http://preben.nl Bernadette Preben-Hansen
Esther Aksel-Hansen var skrivedame
for Harald Scavenius,
Danmarks gesandt i Rusland.
Hun sad på Scavenius’ forkontor
1917-18, og skrev 101 private
breve hjem til sin mor. Brevene
er skrevet med journalistisk flair
og handler om dagligdagen i St
Petersborg under den russiske
revolution
Esther Aksel-Hansen
Breve fra Petrograd
1917-18
Det Kongelige Bibliotek
NKS 5244, 4°
The Danish Embassy in St Petersburg
during the Days of the Russian Revolution
Letters in Danish, edited by Bernadette Preben-Hansen 2007

Esther Aksel-Hansen (1891-1963)
In 1915, Esther travelled to Rybinsk, a port on the River Volga in Russia.
She worked half a year as an English teacher for a Russian lawyer’s family.
And she formed a friendship with a Danish family. The Preben-Hansen
family (three brothers being settled in Russia and Siberia as Danish butter
merchants) did business in Rybinsk, Yaroslavl and in Kurgan in West
Siberia, 1899-1919. In 1917, Esther was back in Copenhagen, where
she taught Russian. One of her students was a secretary of the Danish
Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Copenhagen. Through him, she got a job.
In April 1917, Esther was appointed a typist at the Danish Embassy in St
Petersburg (Petrograd 1914-24). She became attached to Section B: The
Department for the Danish Safeguarding of Austria-Hungary’s Interests
in Russia. And on May 6 th 1917, she travelled with the Danish legation
heading towards St Petersburg. At the embassy she changed places with
Isabella Smith, a typist in Section A: “the old Danish legation”.
›Esther typed for Harold Scavenius. He was the Danish Ambassador
in Russia from 1912-18. Working in his front office, she typed
reports, kept the journal of incoming and outgoing post and packed the
diplomatic bag. From May 9 th 1917 to May 19 th 1918 she sent one hundred
long letters home to her mother, as well. The letters reached Copenhagen
by courier for the Foreign Ministry, where they were picked up by
family. The letters, gradually turning into diary entries, are written with
journalistic flair. Esther writes at night telling of daily life, bread shortages,
increasing famine and dying horses in the streets of St Petersburg.
Against the orders of the legation, she participates in street demonstrations.
She takes sleigh rides through an icy St Petersburg in the evenings,
visiting the city’s railway stations at night. And she breaks the Embassy’s
confidentiality, particularly on personnel matters. Occasionally she makes
an extra carbon copy of a confidential embassy report and sends it with
the letter to her mother.
›On June 20 th 1918 Esther travelled with Isabella Smith and Wilhelm
Voigt Broch from St Petersburg via Beloostrov and Tornio to Copenhagen
on leave. Shortly afterwards she was dismissed. The legation was
in the process of closing down. Esther’s letters are a main source for daily
life at the Danish Embassy in St Petersburg 1917-18. Selected letters
from 1917 have been published in Russian translation by Ludmila Weil in
a literary magazine in Moscow. Bernadette Preben-Hansen