Some of later historians doubt many of the assertions of Pushkin, holding that, great as the poet was, he nevertheless was subject to the common human weakness of exaggerating one's forefathers' merits. The important facts of his career, however, have been learned. In the year 1705, as for many years before and after, thousands of Negroes were made prisoners and brought from the interior to the coasts of the dark continent to be shipped to the slave markets of America and Asia. Among others there was a little boy, barely eight years of age, whom Arabs, his masters, called Ibrahim. He was sold to the Turks and, the same year, brought to Constantinople. His fate could be easily guessed. He was wanted for a slave in a rich Turkish home, or perhaps an overseer in a harem. He became the latter after being brutally handled.
But at that time Savva Ragusinsky, a Russian nobleman, after a short stay in Turkey was preparing to leave for his home country. He wanted to bring a present of some kind to his Czar Peter, the stern reformer of Russia, afterwards called "the Great." Ragusinsky knew the Czar's love for curious objects and thought nothing better than two live black boys could win him Peter's favor. The Czar had at his court many servants of different races, brought to St. Petersburg from all over the world, but only a few Negroes were among them.
Ragusinsky bought or, according to some documents, simply stole several Negro boys, who only a few months before were brought to the slave-shacks of Sultan Selim II. One of these, who started on a long trip to their new Northern home, was the little Ibrahim. The Czar liked the rare present and almost from the beginning distinguished Ibrahim from other slaves. The boy was unusually bright for his age. He quickly picked up the Russian language and alphabet, and before long began to feel that the court of St. Petersburg was his home. Peter kept Ibrahim in his apartments, and Ibrahim accompanied the Czar in latter's journeys through Russia and foreign countries, not as a servant but rather as one of the family. When because of the war of Russia with Sweden, Peter had to be constantly with his army, Ibrahim shared with his friend-master all the dangers and privations of bivouac-life.
In 1707, while in Vilno, Ibrahim was christened in Orthodox faith. His father-in-Christ was the Czar himself, who was assisted in this task by the Polish queen, the wife of King Augustus. The little Negro was given a new name of Peter, but he cried and refused to answer it, preferring his old Arab name. The Russians, however, could not get used to the strange Oriental sound and called him Abram instead of Ibrahim. His surname—Hannibal—was given to him by the Czar in memory of the famous Carthaginian.
In 1716 Peter went on his second tour of Western Europe with Hannibal as usual accompanying him. Among other countries they visited France, and here Hannibal was left to begin his studies more seriously. Hannibal, then 19 years old, showed fair capacity for mathematics and physics. Supplied by the Czar with money and other means of assistance, he entered a military engineering academy in Paris, where he remained for about 2 years. He joined the French army afterwards, which was then engaged in the war against Spain, and participated in many battles. He proved to be an able engineer and a good commander. In one of the battles—"an underground combat," as it is related in an eighteenth century document—Hannibal was wounded in the head, but not dangerously, and was brought back to Paris.
Hannibal stayed in Paris till 1723, communicating with the Czar by letters which are preserved in St. Petersburg state archives. Hannibal complained in them that the Russian treasury and Peter himself almost completely forgot about him, compelling him to live in great poverty on the verge of starvation. If he could obtain no allowance, Hannibal wrote, he would have to walk from Paris to Moscow, begging alms on the way.
Pushkin, however, asserts that his great-grandfather while in Paris was well provided for by Peter with money and had an unlimited opportunity to mingle in the French society circles. His appearance aroused curiosity; his wits, education and war record respect. His black curls with a bandage over them—his wound did not heal completely for a long time—could be frequently seen amid white wigs of the French aristocrats. He was well received in the best salons of Paris, being everywhere known as "le nègre du Czar." The Duke of Orleans, who as a regent ruled over France at that time, favored Hannibal with his attention and when in 1723 Peter asked Abram to come back to Russia, the regent tried to persuade Hannibal to remain in France, promising him a brilliant military and court career. Although the Czar permitted Hannibal to take his own choice between France and Russia, the young man decided to return to St. Petersburg.
Thus, contradicting Hannibal's complaining letters, Pushkin describes his great-grandfather's sojourn in Paris. He evidently based his testimony on the family accounts, which as almost any such narratives contain perhaps more fiction than history. But, on the other hand, the historians, who contradict Pushkin, have no other proof of their infallibility than these Paris letters of Hannibal.
Reliable information concerning Hannibal after his return to Russia, however, is not so scarce. Immediately upon his arrival in St. Petersburg, Hannibal was appointed an officer in the Preobrajensky Guard-regiment. He became an "engineer-lieutenant" in the "Bombardir-company," of which the Czar himself was the captain. But another crisis was reached when, according to Pushkin, it appeared about that time that Hannibal was a son of a Negro king, and his elder brother came from Africa to St. Petersburg with an offer of a rich ransom for Hannibal. He met with no success, as Hannibal himself did not want to return to the village on the banks of Niger.
The situation did not seem so favorable for Hannibal, moreover, when in 1725 Peter the Great died. Menshikov, former pie-peddler and life-long favorite of the late Czar, elevated himself to the position of sole adviser to Peter's widow, Catherine I. He alone virtually ruled Russia for several years. When Catherine I died and young Peter II sat on the throne, Menshikov wanted the boy Emperor to marry his younger daughter. He feared, however, his numerous enemies at the court, among whom he counted Hannibal, the young Czar's instructor in mathematics. Consequently Hannibal was exiled to Siberia in 1727. Officially he was neither arrested nor deprived of his rank and property. He was sent to the borders of China with orders to "transfer from the town of Selenginsk into another location" and to "take an exact measure of the Great Chinese Wall." Menshikov evidently thought that the severe Siberian frosts would sooner or later kill the young African. But Hannibal being strong and healthy and accustomed from childhood to cold climate withstood the hardships of the Siberian wilderness.