Transnational Diaspora: Interaction of Jewish Elites and the Poliakovs

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^{1Brandeis University Waltham}

²Petersburg State University

Transnational Diaspora: Interaction of Jewish Elites and the Poliakovs

¹Ch.Y. Freeze PhD, Professor of History

^1,2 G.L. Freeze, PhD, Professor of History

Massachusetts, USA

Petersburg, Russian Federation

Abstract

Recently historians have come to recognize the need to go beyond national history and to acknowledge the transnational, which became so important in the globalization of 1870-1914. It is no less essential to expand the focus beyond economics alone and to consider the array of other factors, especially cultural and religious, that were ever more powerful and capable of transcending national boundaries. One key analytic framework in recent scholarship is “intimacy,” which focuses on the social nexus and political connections that were so critical in the rise of the new industrial-financial elites across Europe. This paper examines the case of the Poliakovs, a Russian Jewish family that began as petty merchants in the Pale of Settlement but became leading bankers, railroad barons, and factory owners in late Imperial Russia. Drawing on family records (especially the diaries of two family members) but also an array of archival and printed sources (including the societal pages of leading French and German newspapers), this paper examines: a) how the Poliakovs learned to “perform” successfully in aristocratic high society; b) how and why that performance was so critical to the family's perceived affluence (and hence the credibility of their various businesses); c) how the transnational served simultaneously to cement the family's status in the Russian elite and to become part of the Jewish diaspora (not only to promote business but to avoid intermarriage). This was a family business in the fullest sense: the family was the business.

Keywords: Jews, transnational, intimacy, sociability, philanthropy, the Poliakovs.

Аннотация

Транснациональная диаспора: взаимодействие еврейской элиты и семьи Поляковых

Ш. Ю. Фриз PhD, профессор истории, Брандейский университет, США, Уолтем, Массачусетс, США

Г. Л. Фриз, PhD, профессор истории, Брандейский университет, США, Уолтем, Массачусетс, США; приглашенный исследователь, Санкт-Петербургский государственный университет, Российская Федерация, Санкт-Петербург

Европейские историки уже давно признали, что нельзя ограничить анализ в рамках традиционной национальной истории, а следует изучать транснациональную динамику, т. е. процессы, которые сопровождали глобализацию 1870-1914 гг. Не менее важно и то, что в последнее время историки стали изучать не только чисто экономические факторы, а обращать внимание на другие аспекты, в первую очередь культурные и этноконфессиональные. Особенно плодотворной является концепция «интимность», или личный момент, т. е. социальные и политические связи, которые были столь важными в успехе новых индустриально-финансовых элит. Не только капитал, банковские структуры и бизнес-планы, но и этноконфессиональные связи сыграли важную роль в деятельности и успехах новых элит в эпоху глобализации.

Данная работа изучает известную русско-еврейскую семью Поляковых, которые происходили из мелких купцов в черте еврейской оседлости и стали ведущими банкирами, железнодорожными королями и владельцами заводов и фабрик как в России, так и за границей. Без ассимиляции Поляковы не только использовали свое богатство, но и научились подражать поведению и культурной деятельности русских и западноевропейских еврейских элит. На основе семейных документов (в первую очередь дневников двух членов семьи), а также архивных и печатных источников (включая светскую хронику в ведущих западноевропейских газетах) настоящая статья предлагает ответы на следующие вопросы:

а) как Поляковы научились исполнять нужные роли в элитном обществе;

б) почему такой статус и такая роль были столь важными для восприятия семейного благополучия (и кредитоспособности семейного бизнеса);

в) как транснациональность подкрепила положение Поляковых не только дома, но и за границей (и тем самым помогла избежать межэтнических браков). Это был «семейный бизнес» в полном смысле этого слова -- семья и была бизнесом.

Ключевые слова: евреи, транснациональность, интимность, социальность, филантропия, Поляковы.

Introduction

The meteoric rise of Iakov, Samuel, and Lazar Poliakov -- from a family of petty merchants in the Pale of Settlement to international bankers and railroad moguls -- has elicited comparisons with the famous Rothschilds. The diaries of Iakov Poliakov and Lazar's eldest daughter, Zinaida Poliakova (1863--1952) Poliakov I. Istoriia semeinykh nachinanii [s] 1748 goda (unpublished manuscript in the Central Archives of the History of the Jewish People, Jerusalem, Israel; for details on Zinaida Poliakova's life and diaries, see: Freeze C. Y. A Jewish Woman of Distinction: The Life and Diaries of Zinaida Poliakova. Waltham, 2019., show how a Jewish family not only accumulated great wealth, but integrated into Russian and European high society and did so without converting to Christianity. The key to success was a transnational “political economy of intimacy” -- a complex calculus of capital, aristocratic sociability, cultural patronage, and philanthropy For the concept of a “political economy of intimacies,” see: Lowe L. The Intimacies of Four Continents. Durham; London, 2015. P. 18.. Critical to this political intimacy was the role of the Poliakov women (Zinaida's mother and the three daughters), who were hosts of an aristocratic salon and munificent patrons of the arts. The Poliakovs helped to create a new imperial elite culture, one that was rossiiskii and not just ethnic russkii The distinction here is critical, if not easily rendered in English. Whereas “russkii” is specifically “ethnic Russian,” the term “rossiiskii” derives from the Latin and refers to the Russian state; it is currently used in the supra-ethnic sense to distinguish “Rossiane” (citizens of the Russian Federation) as more inclusive than “Russkie” (ethnic Russians), the latter comprising 81 percent of the population (2010 census)., hence one that was compatible with their Jewishness. That supra-ethnic culture enabled an affective identity with Russia, making it possible for elites -- Russians and Jews -- to socialize and transcend ethnic barriers.

Recent scholarship has challenged the traditional assumption that the intimate is separate from “the state and the market” and that intimacy “belongs to local level and private sphere” Wilson A. Infrastructure of Intimacy // Signs. 2016. Vol. 42, no. 2. P. 250.. Rather, Ann Laura Stoler has argued that “to study the intimate is not to turn away from structure of dominance, but to relocate their conditions of possibility” Ibid. P. 250; Stoler A. L. Intimidations of Empire: Predicaments of the Tactile and Unseen // Haunted by Empire: Geographies of Intimacies in North American History / ed. by A. L. Stoler. Durham, 2006. P 1-22.. Intimacy, in short, provides an analytic framework to illuminate how broader historical processes (such as the development of capitalism and ethno-confessional politics) interacted with the personal relationships, as in the case of the Poliakovs and their network of Russian and European elites. Their intimacy in Russia but also abroad afforded the Poliakovs unprecedented business opportunities, cultural patronage, and even political influence. Crucial too was the transnational diaspora, which not only was valuable its business networking, but also enabled the Poliakovs to preserve the Jewishness -- i. e., avoid intermarriage and sustain the Jewish half of their identity.

Political Capital

The Poliakovs, who originally hailed from the small town of Dubrovno (Mogilev province), prospered not only because of their business acumen but also because of their ties with officials in the provinces and later in the capital. Like the first-generation Jewish entrepreneurs (such as the Gintsburgs) who left the Pale of Settlement during the Great Reforms, the Poliakovs took advantage of the opportunities offered by a Russian state keen to consolidate its power in the western provinces Poliakov I. Istoriia semeinykh nachinanii. L. 17.. The Poliakovs first served as tax farmers and contractors, but their fortunes rose exponentially when I. M. Tolstoi (Minister of Posts and Telegraphs) hired Samuel to manage a vodka distillery on his estate and several postal stations in Riazan (which then Samuel subcontracted to Lazar). Tolstoi's patronage in turn led to lucrative contracts for Samuel to build railroads For details, see: Ananich B. V. Bankirskie doma v Rossii. Moscow, 2006. P 101., including the BenderGalats line for the military (for 8,546,153 paper rubles) Ibid. P 101.. In 1878, Iakov, who oversaw the construction, proudly described how he met the Tsesarevich Alexander (the future Alexander III) during the train's maiden voyage: “The heir shook my hand <.. .> and thanked me very courteously for the successful trip, [and] asked about the health of my brother [Samuel, at the time ill]. I presented him with the album [of the Bender-Galats railroad]. He remembered that I had also presented him with an album in Cherkassy. He began to examine the album at great length and asked for explanations and clarifications. This continued for more than half an hour and then he again shook my hand” Poliakov I. Istoriia semeinykh nachinanii. L. 82.. To the end, the Poliakovs were staunch supporters of the autocracy and cherished memories of such intimate encounters with the royal family.

The two older Poliakov brothers were successful, but Lazar surpassed both in wealth and influence. In 1870, Lazar established his own banking house in Moscow and made it the hub for an empire of joint-stock and commercial banks, railroad and insurance companies, and multiple enterprises in Russia and abroad. While traditional Moscow banks catered to established industries in the city and shunned the stock market and risky new ventures, the Poliakovs offered credit and higher returns on investments. The Poliakov success, predictably, antagonized the competition, notably the Old Believers. When the Riabushinskiis opened a branch in St. Petersburg, they warned their employees about the dangers of the capital city, where “exchange orgies and unprincipled brokers, mainly of Jewish origin <.. .> [are] masters of the game” Ananich B. V., Beliaev S. G. St. Petersburg: Banking Center of the Russian Empire // Commerce in Russian Urban Culture 1861-1914 / eds W. C. Brumfield, B. V. Anan'ich, Y. A. Petrov. Baltimore, 2002. P 19.. Reinforced by their traditional animosity toward the state and tsar On the Old Believers' hostility toward the state and tsar, see: Robson R. Old Believers in Modern Russia DeKalb, 1995., Old Believers resented Lazar Poliakov's close ties to government officials at the highest levels. Not only Old Believers, but others took exception to the rising influence of the Poliakovs. The nobleman Dmitri Nikiforov, for example, invoked the suspicion of unfair Jewish influence to explain his failure, along with four other partners, to establish a Moscow Land Bank. Despite assurances from state officials, Nikiforov learned that a rival group linked to Poliakov had submitted the exact same proposal to the Ministry of Finance, and that the competitor adroitly persuaded two of his partners to join them. One of them warned Nikiforov to abandon his project and “not to struggle against such forces as Prince [Vladimir] Cherkasskii V. A. Cherkasskii was an influential figure in Moscow and served as the city mayor (1869-1871). and the railroad man [Lazar] Poliakov”. In the end, claimed Nikiforov, “the entire business was controlled by Cherkasskii and Poliakov, and there was nothing left for us to do but sell our shares because we did not have any influence” Nikiforov D. Moskva v tsarstvovanie imperatora Aleksandra II. Vospominaniia. Moscow, 1904. P 144-147. -- Lazar remained the head of the Moscow Land Bank Board until his death in 1914, at which point his son Isaak took over his position.. While Lazar's financial success owed much to favorable market conditions, his connections to high officials, most famously his legendary ties to Prince Vladimir Andreevich Dolgorukov, general governor of Moscow, were entirely due to his mastery of establishing contacts. As Zinaida's diaries show, Lazar nurtured those ties to Dolgorukov and others in high society by relying on the social labor of his wife and daughters, who helped make the political intimacy personal and authentic. That personal nexus was evident in Zinaida's entry for 6 July 1884: “Dolgorukov (among others) came for lunch on Tuesday for Mother's birthday” Freeze C. Y. A Woman of Distinction: The Life and Diaries of Zinaida Poliakova. P. 249.. The Poliakov-Dolgorukov ties were well known. Roza Vinaver, the daughter of a wealthy merchant, recalled the reaction of Moscow Jews to the assassination of Alexander II (which aroused fears of pogroms): “The fact that Dolgorukov was friends with the Jewish banker, Lazar Poliakov, had an especially soothing effect on my childish imagination. We children were convinced that no one could touch us as long as Dolgorukov went to the Poliakovs for dinner” Vinaver R. G. Vospominaniia (unpublished memoir, Hoover Institute Archives [Stanford, California], Collection V Maklakov. B. 15. Fol. 3, 9. -- See also: FreezeC. Y. The Evolution of Roza Georgievna Vinaver: The Making of a Jewish Liberal Politician's Wife in Imperial Russia // The Individual in History / eds ChaeRan Y. Freeze, S. F. Fried, E. Sheppard. Waltham, 2015. P. 317-334.. Another memoirist, B. A. Shchetinin, wrote that the Poliakovs were “indispensable” guests at Dolgorukov's lavish balls “with [their] sea of champagne, the tried and true Riabov orchestra, and magnificent live flowers from Nice”. “Malicious tongues” wagged that Poliakov had opened an account for Dolgorukov “in his Land Bank for any sum”, and gossips claimed that Poliakov's largesse was irresistible to Dolgorukov, who “loved to live in grand style, and to exercise charity with a generous hand”. Dolgorukov, in turn, purportedly allowed Zinaida's mother to open a winter ball to show gratitude to her husband for helping his “adjutant with his debts” Poliakoff A., Sacks D. The Silver Samovar: Reminiscences of the Russian Revolution. Moscow; Nottingham, 1996. P. 23.. In short, this intimacy -- derided by critics as commercial and corrupt -- was an important factor in the family's social prominence and access to political power.

After Zinaida's marriage to Reuben Gubbay (grandson of Sir Albert Abdullah Sassoon), she nurtured the family's intimacy with political elites abroad at her fashionable salon on Avenue du Bois de Boulogne. French aristocratic salons not only persisted after 1789 but made haut monde “more distinctive and attractive as a cultural model” at a time when the power of the aristocracy was in a precipitous decline Kale S. D. Women, the Public Sphere, and the Persistence of the Salon // French Historical Studies. 2011. Vol. 25, no. 1. P. 142. The salon was an instrument for social assertion, not mere survival Ibid.. As in earlier times, the salon helped to “link private interests to political power and public influence” Ibid. P. 146..

A report in Le Figaro on 17 March 1904 graphically shows how Zinaida's salon served Poliakov family interests: “On Monday, Madame Reuben Gubbay gave a brilliant dinner party with twenty-four place settings in honor of His Excellency, Monsieur Kartsov, the very distinguished Consul General of Russia in Paris, who learned the day before about the exploits of his son at Port Arthur” Salons // Le Figaro. 17 March 1904.. Zinaida entertained family business associates, such as the Proppers (a prestigious banking family from Prague) Iakov Poliakov also underscored the ties to the Proppers, as in this entry from 11 April 1903: “I met with Propper in Vienna; he passionately praised Samuil [Iakov's youngest son].” See: Poliakov I. Istoriia semeinykh nachinanii. L. 360., the businessmen Henri and Philippe Brьll In 1906, Zinaida wrote that Philipp Brьll was at their home for business negotiations with her father to combine his three banks into one commercial company. (Nauchno-issledovatel'skii otdel rukopisei. Rossiiskaia gosudarstvennaia biblioteka (hereafter NIOR RGB). F. 743. K. 139. D. 1. L. 88 ob.), and the English stockbroker Alex Waley and his wife Marguerite (regular guests at the Gubbay home).

Marguerite indeed was Zinaida's close friend and the granddaughter of Lйopold Louis-Dreyfus, who had established a lucrative trading house in Basel in 1851 and built an expansive network in Eastern Europe and Russia Grange C. Une йlite parisienne: Les familles de la grande bourgeoisie juive, 1870-1939. Paris, 2016.

P. 91.. Iakov Poliakov's diaries regularly report seeing various members of the Dreyfus family at the Gubbays On Iakov Poliakov's difficult Azov-Don Bank affairs with Ruben and Constant Dreyfus, see: Polia-kov I. Istoriia semeinykh nachinanii. L. 156, 157, 171 (entries from 1892 and 1893). “In general, the Drey- fusses have cost me a lot in both money and health, and there is no accounting,” Iakov wrote on 19 July 1895 (Poliakov I. Istoriia semeinykh nachinanii. L. 208).. The presence of such illustrious banking families at Zinaida's salon appeared in the societal pages of leading newspapers and generated favorable -- and valuable -- publicity for the Poliakovs. That publicity became all the more important when the Poliakov fortunes began to fail. By the late 1890s, the Poliakov financial empire was perilously overextended and, despite Lazar's attempts to conceal losses, his enormous assets were quickly turning into enormous debts. Indeed, Lazar's business acumen left much to be desired. A perfect example of poor judgment was his decision in 1889 to build a match factory in Tehran for 400,0 rubles: because of its ill-advised location (far from cheap supplies of wood), the inferior quality of the matches, and high production costs, the Poliakov matches simply could not “compete with the Austrian import” Ananich B. V. Bankirskie doma v Rossii. P. 200..

Rather than cut his losses, however, Lazar chose to expand operations, and in 1893 he used capital from his Moscow International Bank to enter the Persian cotton market. His losses rapidly snowballed. To hide the red ink, Lazar resorted to bookkeeping tricks: he bought a textile mill in Pдrnu (which was neither incorporated nor even fully built), had the mill purchase three of his unprofitable Persian cotton factories, and thereby reduced the book debt of his Persian and Central Asian Society Ibid.. family elite рolyakov creditworthiness

Lazar even speculated on American cotton, with a scheme to buy cheap and sell dear in New York, Liverpool, and Alexandria. As long as the global markets were on the upswing, his enterprises managed to stay afloat and his global reputation remained strong. As one historian observes, a desperate Lazar plunged ever deeper into speculative ventures: he “mortgaged shares of his own companies at a preferential rate in his own banks, and immediately invested the bank loans he received into new stock-exchange transactions” Petrov Y. The Banking Network of Moscow at the Turn of the Twentieth Century // Commerce in Russian Urban Culture, 1861-1914 / eds W. C. Brumfield, B. V. Anan'ich, Y. A. Petrov. Baltimore, 2002. P. 56.. But Lazar's risky machinations caught up to him in 1899, when European markets plunged into recession. That misery was compounded by bad timing: his Moscow State Bank's bonds came due in 1900 and 1901. The catastrophic losses caused the bank stockholders--three-quarters of whom were small investors -- to demand that the government hold Poliakov accountable Anan'ich B. V. Bankirskie doma v Rossii. P. 122..

In 1901, their complaints triggered an audit by the State Bank and the Special Chancellery of the Credit Division. The audit found that Lazar had inflated the book value of his securities and stocks and that his liabilities far exceeded his assets Ibid. P. 127.. In a memorandum to Nicholas II in October 1901, Minister of Finance Sergei Witte warned that the heavy losses sustained by just three of the Poliakov banks (the Moscow International, Southern Russian, and Orlov Banks) could “lead Poliakov to bankruptcy” Ibid. P. 125..

But the banks were not only too big but also too intimately connected to fail: Poliakov's ties to influential patrons and investors saved him. Elite supporters, like Witte, wrapped the defense of Poliakov in the seemly discourse of state interest: “The solvency [of private banks] is of interest not only to stock-holders but also depositors. <...> A cessation of payments by these banks, which have existed about thirty years, would ruin not only a multitude of depositors all across Russia, but would deal a heavy blow to private credit, undermining confidence in private banks that has already been shaken” Ibid..

In short, warned Witte, Poliakov's problems threatened to precipitate an economic crisis Malik H. Bankers and Bolsheviks: International Finance and the Bolshevik Revolution. Princeton, 2018. P. 179.. Despite Nicholas II's express desire to remove the Poliakov Banking House and Poliakov himself “once and for all” from the picture and to liberate “Moscow from the Jewish den,” that was not a viable option Lebedev S. K. European Business Culture and St. Petersburg Banks // Commerce in Russian Urban Culture. P. 129.. In the end, the committee decided to place the Poliakov Banking House under the State Bank, authorize it to service his debts, and thus keep his enterprises afloat. Hence Poliakov's “political capital” was crucial in saving his financial capital.

Aristocratic Sociability

To cultivate ties with investors and to project affluence and prominence, the Poliakovs actively engaged in aristocratic sociability. Although neither native Muscovites nor hereditary nobles, the Poliakovs instilled the culture of gentility in their children. Zinaida's mother employed the best tutors and governesses to ensure that her offspring received an elite education, and that included modern foreign languages (with an emphasis on Russian and French), music, and dance. As the diaries show, Zinaida and her siblings took music lessons from V. V. Bezekirskii (the talented violinist and concertmaster of the Bolshoi Theater orchestra) and famous pianists like Emiliia Isaakovna Ogus-Shaikevich, Max Erdmannsdorfer, and his wife Pauline (nйe Fichner).

For Zinaida, attending balls, soirйes, social calls, and dinner parties represented a principal social responsibility. She was particularly fond of private balls, which allowed her to demonstrate her dancing skills and indulge in society gossip, an important performance of aristocratic intimacy. The balls also gave an opportunity to show off her latest fashions from Paris and thereby flaunt family wealth. On 1 March 1886, after receiving an invitation to one such ball, Zinaida mulled over what she might wear and decided she would wear her “blue silk dress, very beautiful, from the famous [Charles Frederick] Worth” Freeze C. Y. A Woman of Distinction: The Life and Diaries of Zinaida Poliakova. P. 284.. The family even invoked its status as Russian elite at the Trinity-Sergius Monastery. Told that their party must wait until the conclusion of services to see the riches in its sacristy, the visitors insinuated ties to the imperial court, threatened to complain to the metropolitan -- and “open sesame” -- promptly gained admission to the sacristy Ibid. P. 251-252.. Performing their aristocratic identity meant ostentatious indulgence, not just for its own sake, but as a public display of creditworthiness, so important in a new age of unregulated private business. Travel abroad was an important part of this performance. The Poliakovs became regulars at the most prized -- and pricey -- spas and hotels in Europe. The society pages of European papers chronicled the Poliakovs' movements and the aristocratic company with whom they were traveling, as in this report for 2 January 1885 in the Deutsches Volksblatt: “Lazar Poliakov and family, who came from Paris, traveled with Princess Marie Dolgurukoff and Princess Sophie Scherbatoff, who came from Italy. The Russians are staying at the Hotel Imperial” Report // Deutsches Volksblatt. 2 January 1895.. Identified as distinguished “Russians” (with no allusion to their Jewishness), the Poliakovs had publicly established themselves as part of a transnational aristocratic elite.

Aristocratic sociability with Russians, however, did not extend to marriage, and the Poliakovs relied on their transnational networks to marry off their children to members of the Jewish elite in Western Europe. The family sought eligible Jewish partners at the resorts and spas -- Jewish hives of Jewish matchmaking -- where Zinaida met her future husband Reuben Gubbay On Jewish spa culture, see: Zadoff M. Next Year in Marienbad: The Lost Worlds of Jewish Spa Culture. Philadelphia, 2012.. “We spent five months abroad. So I was two and a half months with Mama in Paris after the treatment in Franzensbad and in Nachhut [sic] in the Swiss mountains) and made a pleasant new acquaintance. I initially did not like the Gabbe [Gubbay] family, but later became close to them” Freeze C. Y. A Woman of Distinction: The Life and Diaries of Zinaida Poliakova. P. 268.. Despite concerns that Gubbay intended to move to China to engage in his family's business, the family concluded the betrothal in 1891 -- an event reported in the international newspapers that highlighted the brilliant match between the daughter “of a rich Russian banker of Moscow” and “the grandson of Sir Albert Sassoon” Carnet de marriage // Le Figaro. 25 July 1891; Times of India. 25 July 1891; Echos Mondains // New York Herald, Paris. 25 July 1891.. Zinaida's sisters and cousins even married into titled aristocratic families like the de Hirschs in Germany and the Levys in Italy For more on the marriages of Zinaida's siblings and relatives, see: Freeze C. Y. A Woman of Distinction: The Life and Diaries of Zinaida Poliakova. P 54-57.. Transnational marriages cemented the Poliakov family's status and prestige both in Russia and abroad.

Cultural Intimacy