Celebrating Scotland in St Petersburg and commemorating links during the Leningrad Siege

Late January is always an important time for Scotland’s cultural relationship with Russia and in particular St Petersburg. Not only do we celebrate the birthday of Scotland’s national poet, Robert Burns, but we also welcome friends from the St Petersburg Forum who visit St Petersburg every year for Days of Scotland. Importantly, the Days of Scotland are planned to coincide with the annual commemoration of the end of the Leningrad Siege on 27 January. Stories from the siege highlight the very special relationship between the people of Scotland and St Petersburg.

Our week of events started on 25 January with a special event to celebrate the 258^th anniversary of the birth of Scotland’s most famous poet, Robert Burns. In previous blogs, I’ve told the story of the exchange of albums between ‘the women of Coatbridge and Airdrie’ in Scotland and the ‘women of Leningrad’ during the terrible days of the siege during World War Two. I was delighted to visit the State Museum of the History of St Petersburg at the Peter and Paul Fortress, where the original Scottish album is held, to view the album and read some Burns’ poetry which had been included in the album. The museum does an excellent job caring for a very special symbol of shared Scottish and St Petersburg history.

In recent years, a number of books have been written about the story of the first performance of Shostakovich’s 7^th symphony in Leningrad during the darkest days of the siege in 1942. The BBC produced an excellent documentary about this story which was first screened in the UK in early January 2016. In partnership with the British Council, we were delighted to arrange for a special screening of the documentary, ‘Leningrad and the Orchestra that Defied Hitler’ at the famous Lenfilm studios in St Petersburg on 26 January. The Director and Producer of the documentary attended, as did Shostakovich’s son and widow, and survivors of the siege. This was a very powerful, moving documentary, which was well received by the audience. There were many tears as we saw images, listened to firsthand accounts of the siege, and enjoyed the wonderful music.

The following morning I joined many thousands of residents of St Petersburg at Piskarevskoye Memorial Cemetery to commemorate the 73^rd anniversary of the end of the Leningrad Siege. This is always a very moving tribute to those who died during the siege and also to those who survived unimaginable hardship and conditions for almost 900 days. Our Naval Attaché, Captain Chris Connolly, accompanied me as I laid a wreath in their memory.

The weekend saw not one but two traditional Burns Suppers with plenty of haggis, poems and songs to ensure a festive and enjoyable appreciation of the works of Scotland’s national poet. Burns was of course very popular in the Soviet Union and his works remain popular today. Many of our guests impressed us with their recitals of some of his finest work in Russian.

Our Days of Scotland in St Petersburg ended with a reception at the consulate. This was an opportunity for me to thank all of those who do so much to maintain and develop people to people contact between Scotland and St Petersburg. In particular, Tom and Elizabeth Clark who for many years have been the driving force behind Days of Scotland through the St Petersburg Forum. Each year Tom and Elizabeth, along with people like Margarita Mudrak of the St Petersburg Association for International Cooperation, bring some of Scotland to St Petersburg with music, dance, art and historical lectures about Scotland. It’s always a hugely popular and enjoyable week. This year we were pleased to introduce a new commemorate medal of Robert Burns which has been created by the Russian sculptor Alexey Arkhipov.

My kilt will now return to the wardrobe for another year, or at least until St Andrews Day, but this has been a week we will never forget. A week filled with many powerful emotions. A week that underlined the strength and warmth of the people to people links between Scotland and St Petersburg, both old and new. For now we say farewell to our friends from the St Petersburg Forum for another year with the words of Robert Burns: ‘Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And never brought to mind?’Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And auld lang syne!’