CHAPTER II: IN RUSSIA.
THE YEARS EIGHTEEN FORTY-THREE TO EIGHTEEN FORTY-NINE.
In 1843, when Whistler was nine years old, Major Whistler sent for his wife and children. Mrs. Whistler sailed from Boston in the Arcadia, August 12, 1843, taking with her Deborah and the three boys, James, William, and Charles. George Whistler, Major Whistler's eldest son, and her "good maid Mary" went with them. The story of their journey and their life in Russia is recorded in Mrs. Whistler's journal.
They arrived at Liverpool on the 29th of the same month. Mrs. Whistler's two half-sisters, Mrs. William Winstanley and Miss Alicia McNeill, lived at Preston, and there they stayed a fortnight. Then, after a few days in London, they sailed for Hamburg.
There was no railroad from Hamburg, so they drove by carriage to Lübeck, by stage to Travemünde, where they took the steamer Alexandra for St. Petersburg, and George Whistler left them. Between Travemünde and Cronstadt, Charles, the youngest child, fell ill of seasickness and died within a day. There was just time to bury him at Cronstadt—temporarily; he was afterwards buried at Stonington—and his death saddened the meeting between Major Whistler and his wife and children.
Mrs. Whistler objected to hotels and to boarding, and a house was found in the Galernaya. She did her best to make it not only a comfortable, but an American home, for Major Whistler's attachment to his native land, she said, was so strong as to be almost a religious sentiment. Their food was American, American holidays were kept in American fashion. Many of their friends were Americans. Major Whistler was nominally consulting engineer to Colonel Melnikoff, but actually in charge of the construction and equipment of the line, and as the material was supplied by the firm of Winans of Baltimore, Mr. Winans and his partners, Messrs. Harrison and Eastwick, of Philadelphia, were in Russia with their families.
Mrs. Whistler's strictness did not mean opposition to pleasure. Yet at times she became afraid that her boys were not "keeping to the straight and narrow way." There were evenings of illuminations that put off bedtime; there were afternoons of skating and coasting; Christmas gaieties, with Christmas dinners of roast turkey and pumpkin pie; visits to American friends; parties at home, when the two boys "behaved like gentlemen, and their father commended them upon it"; there were presents of guns from the father, returning from long absences on the road; there were dancing lessons, which Jemmie would have done anything rather than miss.
Whistler as a boy was exactly what those who knew him as a man would expect; gay and bright, absorbed in his work when that work was art, brave and fearless, selfish if selfishness is another name for ambition, considerate and kindly, above all to his mother. The boy, like the man, was delightful to those who understood him; "startling," "alarming," to those who did not.
Mrs. Whistler's journal soon becomes extremely interesting:
March 29 (1844). "I must not omit recording our visiting the Gastinnoi to-day in anticipation of Palm Sunday. Our two boys were most excited, Jemmie's animation roused the wonder of many, for even in crowds here such decorum and gravity prevails that it must be surprising when there is any ebullition of joy."
April 22 (1844). "Jemmie is confined to his bed with a mustard plaster on his throat; he has been very poorly since the thawing season commenced, soon becoming overheated, takes cold; when he complained of pain first in his shoulder, then in his side, my fears of a return of last year's attack made me tremble, and when I gaze upon his pale face sleeping, contrasted to Willie's round cheeks, my heart is full; our dear James said to me the other day, so touchingly, 'Oh, I am sorry the Emperor ever asked father to come to Russia, but if I had the boys here, I should not feel so impatient to get back to Stonington,' yet I cannot think the climate here affects his health; Willie never was as stout in his native land, and James looks better than when we brought him here. At eight o'clock I am often at my reading or sewing without a candle, and I cannot persuade James to put up his drawing and go to bed while it is light."