Nikolay Vasilyevich Ulyanov

Ульянов ← Ульянин, Николай Васильевич — Ulyanov ← Ulyanin, Nikolay Vasilyevich

• * c. 1765, 1768
• † c. 1838, 1836

"In 1811 Nikolai married Anna Alexeevna Smirnova, a baptised Kalmyk, nineteen years younger than himself. The couple had four children, Ilya, Lenin’s father, being the youngest. Although Nikolai’s earnings were extremely modest, the family were able to acquire a two-storey house of their own, albeit in the poorest district of Astrakhan. Perhaps in keeping with his new status as a homeowner, Nikolai began to have his name entered on official documents no longer as ‘Ulyanin’, but as the more solid-sounding ‘Ulyanov’, the form subsequently used by the family." (White 2001: 14)

"Originally their name, it seems, was not Ulyanov but Ulyanin; such a shift in ortography was not uncommon in those years." [%E2%80%A6] "Another piece of guesswork is even more peculiar. This is that Nikolai Ulyanov already shared a surname with his bride Alexandra. The suspicion has been aired that Nikolai and Alexandra were related by blood, even quite closly related. Nothing has been proven and, in the absence of documents, probably never will be. The only fair conclusion is that Lenin could not claim a wholly Russian ancestry on his father's side; indeed it is possible, but by no means certain, that he lacked Russian 'blood' on both sides of his family." (Service 2000:21-23)

"Writing in 1927, Lenin’s sister Anna recalled that when she was four years old or thereabouts, in 1868 or 1869, her parents took her and her little brother Alexander on a steamer trip down the Volga from Nizhnii Novgorod to Astrakhan, the home of her father’s relations. She remembered the small two-storey house in which her grandmother and her uncle Vasilii lived, the warm welcome they received there, and the great fuss made over Alexander and herself. The trip stood out in Anna’s memory because it was the first and last visit ever paid by the Ulyanovs to the Astrakhan branch of the family. When Anna visited Astrakhan her grandfather Nikolai Vasilevich Ulyanov (1768–1836) had been dead for over thirty years. He had started life called not Ulyanov but Ulyanin and as a serf in the village of Androsovo in the Nizhnii Novgorod province. It is possible that, while Nikolai belonged to the Orthodox faith, he might have been not a Russian but a Mordvinian or a Chuvash." (White 2001: 13)

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References

• Service, Robert. Lenin: a biography. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2000. ISBN 0-674-00828-6
• White, James D. Lenin: The Practice and Theory of Revolution (European History in Perspective). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001. ISBN 0333721578

В Астраханском архиве хранится документ - «Списки именные ожидаемых к причислению зашедших беглых из разных губерний помещичьих крестьян», где под номером 223 записан «Николай Васильев сын Ульянин... Нижегородской губернии, Сергачской округи, села Андросова, помещика Степана Михайловича Брехова крестьянин. Отлучился в 1791 году». Беглым он был или отпущенным на оброк и выкупившимся - точно неизвестно, но в 1799 году в Астрахани Николая Васильевича перевели в разряд государственных крестьян, а в 1808 году приняли в мещанское сословие, в цех ремесленников-портных. Сохранились и его приметы: «Ростом 2-х аршин и 6 вершков (168,9 см. - В. Л.), волосы на голове, усы и борода светло-русые, лицом бел, чист, глаза карие...» Сопоставьте эти приметы с полицейской справкой о Ленине, и вы увидите - «в кого пошел» внук. Избавившись от крепостной зависимости и став свободным человеком, Николай Васильевич сменил фамилию «Ульянин» на «Ульянинов», а затем «Ульянов». Вскоре он женился на дочери астраханского мещанина Алексея Лукьяновича Смирнова - Анне Алексеевне, которая родилась в 1788 году и была моложе мужа на 18 лет.