"A la Gare Nicolas" - Grigori Zinoviev (s.d.) (14150880530)

Boris Souvarine Papers - Soviet Russia Photos
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Notes: The back of this picture holds the mention (both in Russian and French) "russe?/A la Gare Nicolas" ("At the Nicholas rail station"). It also shows this photographic company stamp:"Фотограф Н.Н. Будда. Легрогрд Невекiи Ир. 54".
The "Nicolas train station" may designate the Vitebsky Station, the first rail station built in the Russian Empire, inaugurated by Tsar Nicholas I on October 1837.
Between 1921 and 1924, Boris Souvarine was a member to the Secretariat of the Communist International. A close colleague of the Bolshevik leaders, he told about his work: "Le Bureau politique russe se réunit chaque jeudi, je m'en souviens bien, car le samedi, Zinoviev rentrait de Petrograd, par le fameux wagon du Tsar, que j'ai utilisé plusieurs fois avec lui". ("The Russian Politburo used to meet every Thursday, I remember it well, as on Saturdays Zinoviev used to go back from Petrograd by the famous Tsar's train, with which I have myself travelled several times with him" (our translation). This allusion may explain why Boris Souvarine kept this photo in his collection.
Description: 1 photograph. Black and white ; 11 X 15.5 cm.
Sources and further reading:

Souvarine, Boris, Branko Lazitch, Michel Heller, and Regis Gayraud. 1990. Sur Lenine, Trotski et Staline = O Lenine, Trockom i Staline. Paris: Ed. Allia. Quotation p. 15.

A la Gare

A painting depicting a scene at a train station with figures and trains.