Why Mikhail Lomonosov married secretly, and How a German wife was looking for him in St. Petersburg

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

For a long time in St. Petersburg it was believed that Mikhail Lomonosov was a bachelor. Imagine the surprise of the public when it turned out that the scientist was married and had two children. Lomonosov's wife was a certain Elizaveta Zilch from Germany. Read in the material how this strange marriage was concluded between a young German woman and a great scientist, why Lomonosov hid from his wife in St. Petersburg, and who helped Elizabeth find her husband.

How Lomonosov settled in Marburg with the wife of the church headman, and then married her daughter

Mikhail Lomonosov studied not only in Russia, but also abroad. If you turn to the work of Artyomov "The Great Names of Russia", you can find information that in 1736 Mikhailo was sent to Germany on the initiative of the St. Petersburg Academy. There he was supposed to study mining and metallurgy.

The scientist settled in Marburg for five years. After searching for housing, Lomonosov chose the house of Heinrich Zilch, who was not only a famous brewer, but also a member of the city council and church head. True, at that time this person was no longer alive, and the widow took the Russian student to the post. The house was also home to Henry's daughter, whose name was Elizabeth-Christina. A sympathy arose between the young people, which soon grew into a passionate romance, and in 1740, in June, they were married in the Reformed Church of Marburg. This is confirmed by an entry in the church book.

There is another very interesting fact, which the author Molosov writes about in the publication "The Russian Empire in the 18th century" - at the time of the wedding, Elizabeth and Mikhail already had a little daughter, who was not even six months old. Lomonosov had to support his family on a meager salary due to the St. Petersburg Academy. Money was sorely lacking. Perhaps the point was that Mikhail Vasilyevich did not know how to measure income and expenses. It is difficult to judge this now, but at that moment Lomonosov got head over heels into debt and reached a state of poverty. The situation was critical, and there was even a chance of going to jail. Mikhail could not get out of this tangled labyrinth, and he just returned to his homeland. This happened in 1741. His wife Elizabeth was already pregnant with her second child.

How a scientist escaped to Petersburg and hid from his wife there

So Lomonosov fled to St. Petersburg. In Germany, Elizabeth-Christina remained, who in 1742 gave birth to a son. Unfortunately, the boy died before he was one year old. For two years the woman did not know anything about her husband and did not receive letters from him.

The most interesting thing is that in St. Petersburg no one knew about Lomonosov's marriage. In the book about the great scientist, which was written by Lvovich-Kostritsa, it is said that Mikhail kept his marital status secret and did not tell anyone about his wife. And a contemporary of the scientist Jacob Shtelin argued that during this period Lomonosov did not send a single message to his wife. Although the address in Germany was well known to him. The wife did not know where Lomonosov was. He did not give the woman his address. That is why the desperate Elizaveta-Khristina decided to start looking for her Russian husband. To this end, she turned to the Russian consul for help.

Elizaveta-Khristina, her search for the missing Russian husband and who helped the couple connect

So, the letter of Elizaveta-Khristina was handed over by the consul to Count Bestuzhev-Ryumin, and he, in turn, handed it over to Yakob Shtelin. When Mrs. Zilch's message reached Lomonosov, he, according to eyewitnesses, reacted very emotionally. Mikhail claimed that he was not going to leave his wife, and in the future he would be by her side. And that a woman can immediately take the child and come. Lomonosov promised to send his wife a hundred rubles and write a message, which was done.

Elizaveta-Khristina came with her little daughter to St. Petersburg in 1743. There are mentions that after this event Lomonosov ceased to be nervous, became calm, and his scientific activity began to develop even more fruitfully. After a while, another child was born. It was a girl named Elena.

Happy marriage: so why did Lomonosov hide his wife from everyone

Interestingly, despite the difficulties at the beginning of family life, Lomonosov and his wife lived happily ever after until their last days. Strange, why did Mikhail try to hide his marriage? It is believed that in this way the scientist wanted to absolve himself of responsibility. But the authors of The Other History of Russia adhere to a different point of view. It consists in the fact that before the wedding, Lomonosov needed to obtain official permission from the Russian Academy of Sciences. Unfortunately, he did not have such a paper. In addition, the scientist may have been ashamed of his inability to support his family. Most likely, this is how you can decipher the words of Mikhail Vasilyevich that he did not write and did not call his wife to him only because insurmountable circumstances prevented it.

In fact, Lomonosov really experienced financial difficulties, even after studying in Germany. There is information that since 1742 his salary was three hundred and sixty rubles annually. It seems that at that time this was a decent amount, because, for example, the price of a pound of beef was about 2 kopecks. But the point is that the Academy simply did not have such funds. Therefore, Lomonosov received money in installments both in Germany and then in St. Petersburg. According to the writer Lvovich-Kostritsa, for example, for the whole 1742 the scientist received only a third of the salary from the Academy. And Petersburg, as you know, has always been an expensive city in comparison with others. If you read the works of Minaeva, in which she refers to Shtelin (the book "Mikhail Lomonosov"), you can find the assertion that the Russian scientist did not announce his marriage and did not dare to support his family in St. Petersburg, a place dear.

His creative legacy is a huge number of works in various fields of knowledge, and this diversity cannot but surprise and arouse admiration. He distinguished himself in the field of fine arts. You can read about this in the review: Hundreds of square meters of mosaics and Mikhail Lomonosov's Theory of Colors of the “Universal Man”.