Gedroits, Vera Ignatievna

Vera Ignatievna Gedroits (April 7, 1870, the village of Slobodische, Oryol province - March 1932, Kyiv, USSR) - one of the first female surgeons in Russia, one of the first women in the world to receive the title of professor of surgery and head the surgical department, a member of the Russian Japanese war, prose writer and poetess of the Silver Age.

As a graduate of the surgical school of Professor Caesar Roux (University of Lausanne), Vera Gedroits became the author of a number of original scientific papers in the field of military, general and pediatric surgery. She also contributed to the development of the Kiev surgical school.

Considering the revolution inevitable and necessary, Vera Gedroits, however, was one of the closest people royal family. She personally taught nursing Empress Alexandra Feodorovna with the Grand Duchesses Olga and Tatyana, after which they worked in the infirmary under her leadership.

Family and early years

Coat of arms of Gedroitsev "Hypocentaur"

Vera Ignatievna belonged to the ancient and noble Lithuanian princely family Gedroits, who actively participated in the liberation movement against Russian rule. The grandfather of Vera Ignatievna was executed during the suppression of the uprising, and father Ignatius (Ignas) Ignatievich Gedroits and his brother, deprived of their noble rank, were forced to flee to the Samara province, to friends of their grandfather. There, Ignatius was educated and worked in local governments, then married the daughter of a Russified German landowner, Daria Konstantinovna Mikhau, a graduate of the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens. Immediately after the wedding, Ignatius Ignatievich, on duty, moved to the Bryansk district Oryol province, where he acquired an estate in the village of Slobodische, was engaged in agriculture and worked in the Council of Justices of the Peace.

Vera Gedroits was born on April 7 (19), 1870. In the family, besides her, there were three more sisters and two brothers. Mother, busying household, did not have time to take care of children, and the first teacher of little Vera

became her grandmother Natalya Tikhonovna Mikhau, who taught local children to read and write in her makeshift boarding house, French, music, singing and dancing. Already in childhood, Vera wore boyish clothes, was distinguished by her brisk behavior and was the ringleader of all the local children.

The desire to become a doctor appeared in Vera Gedroits after a series of illnesses and deaths of loved ones, including the death of her beloved brother Sergei, whose name she later began to sign all her literary works.

In 1877, all the property of the family burned down in a fire, which after that began to live extremely poorly. However, the decision of the Senate came from St. Petersburg, according to which the princely title was returned to Ignatius Gedroits with all his descendants.

In 1883, Vera met a teacher from the neighboring village of Lyubohna, the populist L.K. Lyubohna, who impressed her with her independence and determination. Gedroits first read the novel by N. G. Chernyshevsky “What is to be done?”. In the same year, Vera was sent to study at the Bryansk Women's Progymnasium, where she was immediately taken to the second grade. Among her teachers was V. V. Rozanov, who later became famous, who had a great influence on her. But soon Vera Ignatievna was expelled from the gymnasium for composing epigrams, issuing a handwritten satirical leaflet and a conflict with the teacher. After that, her father, in agreement with his friend industrialist S.I. Maltsev, sent her to Lyubohna to the factory paramedic for training in medicine. Later, under the patronage of Maltsev, Vera returned to the gymnasium, from which she graduated with honors in 1885.

Education in St. Petersburg and Lausanne

After graduating from the gymnasium, my father sent Vera Ignatievna to study in St. Petersburg. It was not without difficulty that she entered the medical courses of Professor P.F. Lesgaft, which he organized in his apartment on the Fontanka, house 18. After successful delivery exams, Lesgaft advised Vera Ignatievna to go abroad and enter the university, since at that time in Russia a woman did not have the right to receive a higher education.

During her stay in St. Petersburg, Vera Gedroits began to compose her first poems. During the courses, she met St. Petersburg students and began to attend revolutionary circles, where, together with everyone else, she read the works of the Social Democrat Lassalle, drew up leaflets and went to demonstrations. In 1891, the popular democratic ideologist N. V. Shelgunov died, his funeral turned into a rally with calls for revolution. The gathering was dispersed by the gendarmerie, and the next day mass arrests were carried out. Among the detainees was Vera Gedroits. After a search and interrogation, finding no serious evidence, she was sent to her father's estate under police supervision.

In 1894, Vera Ignatievna was able to receive the title of home teacher at the Oryol gymnasium. Being a lesbian, on September 5, 1894, Vera Gedroits entered into a fictitious marriage with her St. Petersburg friend, Captain Nikolai Afanasyevich Belozerov [approx. 4]. In the future, she practically did not see her husband, and she carefully concealed the fact of marriage. With the help of friends, having manipulated false passports, Vera Gedroits slipped out of police surveillance and went abroad to Switzerland, where she intended to get a higher medical education.

View of the old building of the University of Lausanne

Upon arrival in Lausanne, she met the girl Ricky Gudi, later they fell in love with each other and decided to leave for Russia together, but fate decreed otherwise. Vera Gedroits, with her false passport, was initially denied admission to the university. However, she met through S. M. Zhemanov, an associate of G. V. Plekhanov, a professor of physiology, A. A. Herzen (son of A. I. Herzen), and at his request she was admitted to Faculty of Medicine University of Lausanne. Since the family of Vera Gedroits barely made ends meet and could not help to earn a living, she had to give lessons and work as an assistant to Professor A. I. Skrebitsky.

There were only three women in the faculty. On the undergraduate Vera Gedroits was especially interested in anatomy. In her senior years, she was interested in surgery, taught by the famous professor Caesar Roux, a student of E. Kocher. Vera Gedroits also attracted the attention of psychiatry, the course in which was taught by Professor Siegfried Rabov. She actively worked in both departments, wrote reports, was on duty in clinics.

December 14, 1898 Vera Gedroits graduated with honors from the university. In winter, disturbing letters came from Russia from her mother, in which she asked her daughter to return, but on the advice of Professor Caesar Roux, Vera Gedroits applied for a competition and entered the assistantship at the Department of Surgical Diseases. She was present at the clinic every day for rounds, dressings, took part in six to ten operations a day, and was on duty at night. At the same time, she studied scientific literature. Under the guidance of Professor Roux, she wrote and defended her dissertation for the title of Doctor of Medicine. After that, she received an invitation to become a Privatdozent of the department. But soon a letter came from Russia from his father, in which he reported the death of his sister and the illness of his mother, and begged to return. At the same time, Ricky's mother died, leaving her daughter in the care of a minor brother and sister. In the spring of 1899, Vera Ignatievna was forced to return to Russia alone.

Return to Russia

"AT. I. Gedroits, the first female surgeon to speak at the congress with such a serious and interesting report, accompanied by a demonstration. The woman put on his feet a man who, before her operation, was crawling on his womb like a worm. I also remember the noisy ovation given to her by the Russian surgeons. In the history of surgery, it seems to me, such moments should be celebrated.

V. I. Razumovsky, III All-Russian Congress of Surgeons.

Returning to Russia, Vera Gedroits got a job as a factory doctor at the Maltsovsky Portland cement plants in Kaluga province. In May 1900, a factory hospital with fifteen beds was opened in Fokino, but it was unsuitable for treatment, and Vera Ignatievna, who was the only doctor, organized a complete re-equipment of the entrusted institution. In addition to serving the workers of the plant and their families, she soon also had to heal the inhabitants of the entire county. Vera Gedroits conducted an outpatient appointment, went to the homes of seriously ill patients, operated a lot, organized the sanitary and hygienic regime of factories, and trained doctors from neighboring hospitals. At the same time she was preparing scientific material and preparing for the exams to receive a Russian doctor's diploma. A lot of effort went into constant conflicts in the factory commission for determining the severity of injuries, where Vera Ignatievna defended the rights of workers to retire.

On February 27, 1903, Vera Gedroits, having successfully passed the gymnasium and university exams at Moscow University, received a diploma with a record of conferring the title of “woman doctor”. In the same year, Vera Gedroits made a presentation at the III All-Russian Congress of Surgeons, published a report on the work of the factory medical service in the journal "Surgery".

Difficult working conditions, dirt and poverty, the hopeless situation of the factory workers, hard work in the hospital and villages, difficulties in the family, a letter from Switzerland from Rika, in which she said that she would not be able to come to Russia, plunged Vera Gedroits into a severe depression and drove before attempting suicide. However, the doctors who happened to be nearby, who came to the factory commission, saved her life.

Russo-Japanese War

Noble advanced hospital in Tavangouz. In the foreground on the right, surgeon V. I. Gedroits

In the spring of 1904, Vera Gedroits volunteered for the front of the Russo-Japanese War as a surgeon on an ambulance train. Russian Society Red Cross. At the end of September, a detachment of the medical service, headed by Vera Ignatievna, founded a hospital near the village of Xiaochintidzy in Manchuria, and the reception of the wounded began.

Soon she was elected chairman of the Society of Doctors of the Advanced Noble Detachments. In the war, Vera Ignatievna not only developed new methods of treatment in the new conditions of the war, but also organized medical work in the changing conditions of the combat situation. On January 11, 1905, the camp was relocated to the village of Gudzyaozi. Later, a specially designed operational car was placed at the disposal of the detachment, and Vera Gedroits took over to lead it. On February 16, during the battle of Mukden, the car was redeployed to the area of ​​the Fushinsky mines. Soon the first patients began to arrive, the hospital worked around the clock, Vera Gedroits personally performed more than a hundred operations.

On February 22, at the end of the Mukden battle, there was a threat of encirclement of the infirmaries, the medical council decided not to leave the wounded and try to evacuate them. The retreat was successful, the train under the leadership of Vera Ignatievna was the last to leave under enemy fire.

In March 1905, Vera Gedroits was assigned to treat Colonel V.I. Gurko. In the spring, her train went to the rear, she took away two awards from the war: gold medal"For diligence" on the Annensky ribbon, received on January 18, 1905 for activities during the battles at Shah, and the silver medal "For Courage" on the St. George ribbon, handed personally by General N. P. Linevich on March 11, 1905 for heroic actions to rescue the wounded during the battle of Mukden. On May 16, 1905, she was also awarded the Red Cross Silver Medal.

After the war

In May 1905, Vera Gedroits returned to her native land to her former place of work. On July 27, she presented the results of her work to the Bryansk Society of Physicians, summarizing her experience and making a number of important findings in military medicine. Her name as a female surgeon, as a war hero, became known throughout the country.

In 1905, as well as throughout Russia, unrest and unrest arose at the factories due to difficult working conditions and low wages. Vera Gedroits helped the workers' leaders. She met local Constitutional Democrats and then entered the leadership of the local branch of the party.

On December 22, 1905, the marriage she concealed from others with N. A. Belozerov, at the request of Gedroits, was terminated (in 1907 she would be returned the title of princess and allowed to return her maiden name).

In 1906, the police compiled a list of cadets, the first line of which was taken by Vera Ignatievna. However, unlike other persons on the list, she was not subjected to repression, but was loaded with work and transferred to the head of the Lyudinovsky hospital, which it was decided to make central in the Maltsovsky district. She made the decision to European level provision of medical care: new equipment, instruments, X-ray apparatus were purchased, and put into practice ether anesthesia, bacteriological diagnostics, a separate obstetric department was opened, a pathoanatomical museum was created.

Soon, Vera Ignatievna was appointed the chief surgeon of the Zhizdrinsky district, and then the chief surgeon of the factories of the Maltsovsky joint-stock company. In addition to practical surgery and organizational activities, she did not leave science, she collected material for her dissertation, and thought about writing a textbook. Gedroits worked out the issues of occupational traumatism, hernias of the abdominal wall, surgery thyroid gland, tumors various bodies, tuberculosis of bones, obstetrics. Vera Ignatievna published articles in medical journals, held discussions with local doctors on the diagnosis and treatment of various diseases.

Soon Vera Gedroits met the family of a professor at the St. Imperial Academy Art of Yu. Yu. Clover. Communication with creative people revived her craving for literary activity, she began to write poetry, ballads, plays, stories, fairy tales.

In the winter of 1909, Vera Gedroits received an invitation to St. Petersburg to open a children's clinic. Arriving in the capital, she met with a front-line friend, E. S. Botkin, who by that time was a privatdozent at the Military Medical Academy and the personal physician of the royal family. He invited Vera Ignatievna to be his assistant, since there were five women in the imperial family of seven, and he knew her as a first-class specialist, including women's diseases.

Tsarskoye Selo period

Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (left) and Princess Vera Gedroits in the dressing room of the Tsarskoye Selo hospital

In 1909, thanks to the recommendation of E. S. Botkin, as well as military glory Gedroits, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna invited her to take the position of senior intern at the Tsarskoye Selo Palace Hospital. Vera Ignatievna, together with her mother, came to Tsarskoe Selo, where she received an invitation to stay with the family of Yu. Yu. Klever.

The appointment of a woman to such a high position (VII rank) was extremely negatively perceived by the senior doctor of the hospital, N.M. Schrader, but he was forced to obey the will of the empress. Vera Ignatievna began to lead the surgical and obstetric-gynecological departments, being the second person of the hospital. She also treated the royal children and had a private practice in the city. However, the conflict with the senior doctor caused strained relations with colleagues and many frictions with superiors. N. M. Schrader even made a request to the police about the reliability of Gedroits, but for some reason the check did not reveal her connections with revolutionary circles.

To support Vera Ignatievna, Yu. Yu. Klever's daughter Maria invited her to publish her literary works and undertook to arrange the publication herself. Maria was entirely engaged in the preparation of the book, therefore, when Gedroits saw the already printed edition of Poems and Tales, she was upset because of the unsuccessful selection of material. But in the process of preparing the book for publication, Vera Ignatievna met R.V. Ivanov-Razumnik, who later became her close friend.

She also renewed her acquaintance with V. V. Rozanov, she was the first to diagnose his wife with multiple sclerosis and took up her further treatment. Vera Ignatievna also got to know N. S. Gumilyov closely, since she treated him for malaria, which he contracted during his first trip to Abyssinia. Subsequently, she gave him financial support at the release of the journal "Hyperborey". Thanks to these connections, Vera Ignatievna took part in various poetic circles and creative salons, where she met almost all well-known figures Silver Age.

Soon, Gedroits became part of the “Workshop of Poets” proclaimed by Gumilyov, which also included Akhmatova, Gorodetsky, Mandelstam, Zenkevich, Narbut, Kuzmina-Karavaeva, Lozinsky, Kuzmin, Pyast, Alexei Tolstoy, Viktor Tretyakov and others. Through R. V. Ivanov-Razumnik, Vera Ignatievna met N. A. Klyuev and S. A. Yesenin. In 1913, under the auspices of the Workshop, her second book of poems, Veg, was published. Vera Ignatievna also published in the journals Hyperborea, Testaments, New Journal for Everyone, Bulletin of Theosophy (in a number of poems, Gedroits focused on the esoteric revelations of E. Blavatsky), Northern Notes, Sovremennik and others.

At the same time, Vera Gedroits was also engaged in scientific research. She made presentations at the X and XI All-Russian Congresses of Surgeons. In 1912, she defended at Moscow University the second doctoral dissertation in her life, “Long-term results of inguinal hernia operations using the Roux method based on 268 operations,” written under the guidance of Professor P. I. Dyakonov. Professor N.I. Spizharsky greeted her after her defense as the first woman in Russia to receive a doctorate in medicine in surgery.

In the summer of 1914, the First World War. Vera Ignatievna, being an assistant to the Commissioner of the Russian Red Cross Society, proposed to organize an evacuation point for the wounded in Tsarskoe Selo. This idea received the support of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. The deployment of several dozen infirmaries began. Vera Ignatievna was appointed senior physician and leading surgeon of the newly organized infirmary in the building of the Palace Hospital, which received serial number three. Thus, she ceased to be a subordinate of N. M. Schrader. The total capacity of the infirmary was 30 officers and 200 soldiers. The imperial couple personally supervised the preparation of the hospital, which was equipped in accordance with advanced achievements medicine. Vera Ignatievna operated a lot, organized the treatment process, and collected scientific material.

Vera Gedroits, among other things, created training courses for sisters of mercy. For them, she wrote a textbook "Conversations on Surgery for Nurses and Doctors", where she summarized her experience gained during the Russo-Japanese War. Empress Alexandra Feodorovna with the Grand Duchesses Olga and Tatiana asked Vera Ignatievna to teach them the same course. After graduation, they began to work in a hospital headed by Princess Gedroits. The Empress and her daughters, like ordinary sisters of mercy, personally looked after the sick, made dressings, and assisted in operations.

Vera Gedroits became a close friend in the royal family and a friend of Alexandra Feodorovna. According to V. I. Chebotareva, Emperor Nicholas II, placing his wife to work in the infirmary, hoped to reduce the influence of Rasputin on her.

On January 2, 1915, a train traveling from St. Petersburg to Tsarskoe Selo crashed. Among the victims was close girlfriend Empress Anna Vyrubova. Her extremely serious condition was taken to the infirmary, Vera Ignatievna made an unfavorable diagnosis. Upon learning of what had happened, Grigory Rasputin, whose passionate admirer was Vyrubova, urgently came to her infirmary, burst into a clean ward straight from the street in dirty boots and a fur coat. Seeing this, Vera Gedroits lost her temper, grabbed the "old man" by the collar and threw him out of the hospital. The royal couple, who were present during the conflict, did not utter a word. Contrary to the forecast, the patient recovered, but even more tense relations developed between Vera Ignatievna and the imperial favorites Rasputin and Vyrubova. Despite this, Alexandra Feodorovna retained her goodwill towards Gedroits and even awarded her with a gold watch with the state emblem.

The February Revolution took place in 1917. Although the princess sympathized with the revolution, considering it inevitable and necessary, she greeted the news of the emperor's abdication with tears. Soon royal family arrested, the Red Cross was reorganized, infirmary No. 3, which was headed by Vera Ignatievna, was abolished. The senior doctor of the Palace Hospital N. M. Schreider, taking advantage of the moment, stopped paying Princess Gedroits a salary, citing the fact that she formally left the hospital to work, and he refused to return to her. It became dangerous for Vera Ignatievna to remain in Petrograd as a close imperial family. Princess Gedroits decided to volunteer for the front again.

On the Southwestern Front

In April 1917, Vera Ignatievna arrived at the Southwestern Front. She was assigned as a junior doctor to the dressing detachment of the 6th Siberian rifle division. However, thanks to highly qualified, great capacity for work and her fame in medical circles, she quickly went on promotion. A month later, Gedroits became the senior doctor and head of the division's disinfection service, and soon she was elected to the Sanitary Council and appointed a corps surgeon, which was an extremely high position for a woman (lieutenant colonel level). In January 1918, Vera Ignatievna was wounded and was evacuated to Kyiv. The Galician Tales, published in the spring of 1918 in the Znamya Truda newspaper in St. Petersburg, are based on the impressions of this period.

Kyiv period

Some biographers suggest that in 1918, Princess Gedroits, being wounded, survived in one of the monastery hospitals (possibly at the Intercession Monastery), where she became close friends with the nurse Maria Dmitrievna Nirod (1879-1965), the widow of Count F. M. Nirod, with whom I knew each other in Tsarskoye Selo. Together with her and her two children, she settled in an apartment in apartment building No. 7 on Kruglouniversitetskaya Street, living as one family and being in a “virtual marriage”. At the new place, Vera Ignatievna struck up a friendship with the artists I. D. Avdiyeva and L. S. Povolotsky, who lived on the floor below, with whom they created an impromptu “creative salon”. In this apartment, fragments of the St. Petersburg aristocracy and intelligentsia gathered for modest dinners.

After recovering, Gedroits worked in a children's clinic. Since 1919, she actively participated in the activities of the Kiev surgical services, organizing, in particular, the clinic of maxillofacial surgery. In 1921, at the invitation of Professor E. G. Chernyakhovsky, Vera Ignatievna began working at the Faculty Surgical Clinic of the Kiev Medical Institute, where, as a Privatdozent of the department, she taught a course in pediatric surgery for the first time.

Gedroits also published articles in medical journals on general and pediatric surgery, cardiac surgery, oncology, endocrinology, took part in the work of surgical congresses, wrote a textbook on pediatric surgery, developed methods for teaching students, and gave lectures. In 1923 she was elected professor of medicine. Professor V. A. Oppel spoke of her as "a real surgeon who is good with a knife."

AT Kyiv period Vera Ignatievna worked on a series of stories based on autobiographical material under the general code name "Life". Five stories are known: "Kaftanchik", "Lakh", "Separation", "Shaman" and "Smerch"; three of them were published in 1930-1931.

In 1929, Vera Gedroits was elected head of the department of faculty surgery in place of E. G. Chernyakhovsky, dismissed during the repressions against the Ukrainian scientific intelligentsia (the famous Case of the "Union for the Liberation of Ukraine"). However, in 1930 she was also dismissed from the university without the right to a pension. With the money saved and royalties from publications, Vera Ignatievna bought a house in the suburbs of Kyiv. She almost left the surgical activity, but continued to operate in the hospital of the Intercession Monastery.

In 1931, Vera Ignatievna fell ill with cancer, she was operated on, her uterus was removed. In 1932, the tumor recurred and she died in March. Shortly before her death, Gedroits gave her archives to I. D. Avdiyeva and L. S. Povolotsky. Among them was a letter from Professor Caesar Roux, in which he bequeathed his chair of surgery to her. In the 1930s, L. S. Povolotsky was arrested on charges of espionage, and the letter itself, confiscated as "evidence", was lost. After the death of Gedroits, M. D. Nirod moved to live in a monastery. Vera Ignatievna was buried in Kyiv at the Spaso-Preobrazhensky (now the Korchevatsky cemetery). In the same fence with the modest grave of Gedroits are the graves of Archbishop Hermogen and his relative: saved by Vera Ignatievna, he looked after her grave and bequeathed to bury himself next to her.

Scientific activity

Working at the Maltsovsky factories, Vera Ignatievna faced a "professional epidemic": many workers had hernias. This made it possible to collect extensive material not only for practical, but also for scientific activities, especially since the problem of hernias was actively developed by her teacher, Professor Caesar Roux. She wrote several scientific papers and articles, and then defended a doctoral dissertation at Moscow University on the topic of separated results of inguinal hernia repair. Positive reviews of the dissertation were given by V. A. Oppel, P. I. Tikhov, Tsezar Ru, N. N. Petrov, it was translated into several languages.

During the Russo-Japanese War, Vera Ignatievna developed the technique of a number of abdominal operations, for the first time in the world using such methods of treatment in the theater of operations, she also expressed the opinion that any penetrating wound should be subject to surgical treatment. These ideas were a serious innovation not only in domestic but also in world science. This contributed to a change in future views on the standards of medical care for wounds in the stomach. Vera Ignatievna also developed N. P. Pirogov’s teaching on “evacuation in stages” and the division of the streams of the wounded, supplementing it with the provision that the closer the hospital is to the battlefield, the more productive its activities.

Vera Gedroits also dealt with the problem of surgical treatment of cancer. She denied the viral theory of its origin, leaning towards the embryonic one, and declared an ablastic approach to operations. Vera Ignatievna also dealt with issues of military field surgery, traumatology, orthopedics, extrapulmonary tuberculosis surgery, cardiac surgery, surgery of the endocrine organs (thyroid and pancreas), maxillofacial surgery, and so on. In total, Vera Gedroits wrote more than 60 scientific papers.

Princess Vera Ignatievna Gedroits is perhaps the most unexpected character in this glorious Kiev gallery, literally a “lawless comet” among the calculated luminaries of Kiev medicine.

Giedroytsy is an ancient Lithuanian princely family, according to legend they come from legendary prince Gedrus, on the coat of arms of the Giedroytsy Hippocentaur, in their family there were holy healers and enlighteners, from this family and Jerzy Giedroyts, the creator of the Polish "Culture". Grandfather of Princess Vera was executed after the suppression Polish uprising in 1863, his father was deprived of the title of nobility (the princely title was returned in 1877 by the decision of the Senate), fled, and Vera Gedroits was born in 1870 in the village of Slobodische near Bryansk. Then she preferred to indicate in the questionnaires that she was born in Kyiv - it's hard to say why, but she spent the second half of her life in Kyiv and she died in Kiev.

She studied at the Bryansk gymnasium and her teacher was Vasily Rozanov, which probably played a role. In general, she seems to have been one of those resolute girls who, having once read Chernyshevsky's What to Do, discovered a new heaven for themselves and new land. Princess Vera entered the medical courses of Lesgaft in St. Petersburg, then she went headlong into the so-called "revolutionary circles", at the funeral of Nikolai Shelgunov, which turned into a rally, she was detained and sent to the Bryansk estate under police supervision.

This is followed by her secret marriage with Captain Belozerov (fictitious - she was an open lesbian, which was also an incredible step for her time) and escape abroad. She enters Switzerland on a false passport and, at the request of A.A. Herzen (the son of the writer), enters the medical faculty of the University of Lausanne. She is engaged in the departments of psychiatry and surgery, her teacher was the great surgeon Caesar Roux. She became a doctor of medicine and the first in Russia (in her case, probably the first - she spoke of herself in the masculine gender) female surgeon.

She returns to Russia, works in factory and village hospitals, there was a moment when she tried to commit suicide. Then she volunteers for the war (Russian-Japanese), operates on an ambulance train, takes him out of the encirclement, receives a medal "For Courage" on the St. George's Ribbon. For the first time in the history of medicine, she began to perform abdominal operations in the field.

After the war, she becomes a senior intern at the Tsarskoye Selo Palace Hospital and at the same time begins the biography of the poet Sergei Gedroits (she writes poetry under the name of her brother who died early). With writing, she is not developing as brilliantly as with surgery, they say that Sergei Gedroits was accepted into the Workshop of Poets only because Princess Vera treated Gumilyov for malaria and sponsored Hyperborea.

During the First World War, Vera Gedroits headed the Tsarskoye Selo hospital; famous story when she pushed the “holy old man” Grigory Rasputin out of the Vyrubov’s chamber. She was at the front until 1918 and ended up in Kyiv, presumably because of a wound, according to one version, to the hospital of the Intercession Monastery, according to another, to the Pechersk military hospital. Here she remains, and since 1919 she has been working in a hospital, then in a children's polyclinic, creating a clinic for maxillofacial surgery, and in 1922 at the newly created Kiev Medical Institute she teaches a course in pediatric surgery. She becomes the director of the institute's surgical clinics, then heads the department of surgery.

Kiev addresses

All her 14 years in Kiev, Vera Gedroits lived with Countess Maria Nirod and her children in house number 7 on Kruglouniversitetskaya Street. She became extremely friendly with her neighbors - the artist and actress of the Les Kurbas theater Irina Avdiyeva and her husband Leonid Povolotsky.

Irina Avdieva: “I myself know that, loving Vera Ignatievna Gedroits, I learned from her to love everything that raises life above the level of narrow-mindedness, that brightens everyday life on holidays. Her whole life was a fascinating romance ... Big, a little overweight, she dressed like a man. She wore a jacket and tie, men's hats, a fur coat with a beaver collar. She cut her hair short. For her height, her arms and legs were small, but surprisingly beautiful. Facial features - dryish and too thin for an overweight figure - with a smile they look younger.<…>She spoke about herself in the masculine form: I went, I operated, I said.

She worked until 1929, before the so-called “SVU trial”, according to which the leading Kiev doctors were arrested, Vera Gedroits was then simply “cleaned out” - without explanation and ... without a pension. She lived on literary fees, bought a house near Kiev. Until her death, she continued to operate in the hospital of the Intercession Monastery. She died of cancer in 1932 and was buried at the Transfiguration Cemetery in Korchevatoy. In the same fence is the grave of Archbishop Hermogenes, who bequeathed to bury himself next to Gedroits.

Sergei Gedroits

I drank vodka from the infusion,
From the roots of spoken words,
Steamed in the bath - empty,
No escape from blacks
There is no rest. Into the deaf night
When the thief crawls around the world,
I'm not hiding, but conjuring
Let's conjure this flour
Destroy, destroy
Exasperate, exasperate
I'm trying to. The heart is gnawing
Goblin drives a thought with a thought,
Do not see to know happiness more,
The witch's share was tortured
Do not meet on that field
Where we spent the night.
The day will come, the enemy force
Get under the gate.
To know you have drunk with love,
Before drinking lapel. (1910-1913)

The Chekist again muttered the questions "who is", "place of residence", "occupation" and other biographical husks.

Since he crossed the threshold of a damp room, Povolotsky has already answered a hundred times that his name is Leonid Povolotsky, that he lives with his wife in Kyiv, that he considers himself an artist.

With each new entry into the old circle of questions, with each cigarette smoked by the Chekist, and with each hour (how long has he been here?), Povolotsky's answers became more and more chaotic. He forgot names and faces, confused dates and events. Perhaps this was the first time in Povolotsky's life when he regretted that he had such an extensive circle of acquaintances.

Gedroits Sergei? Familiar name? Who is he to you?

Povolotsky tilted his head to the right and felt his neck numb.

This is the pseudonym of Vera Ignatievna Gedroits. Her brother Sergei died when they were young, and she often used his name when publishing her work.

Lesbian or what?

I am not aware of the personal life of Vera Ignatievna, - Povolotsky answered dryly. He has no desire to share with this comrade that they did not even discuss with his wife. Although, what really, both knew that their neighbors actually live in marriage.

I understand, people of subtle matters ... - the Chekist continued to delve into the papers. Yeah, she's been dead for five years. Why didn't your Gedroits cure herself? It is written here - the famous surgeon, the royal favorite, I suppose, treated the entire royal family. By the way, she could not even try - they still banged.

Povolotsky felt nausea added to his dizziness.

Princess Vera Ignatievna Gedroits

All right, comrade artist, tell me what you know about Princess Gedroits.

It took Povolotsky a few seconds to collect his thoughts.

Vera Ignatievna was honest man and a brilliant surgeon. She did her job excellently. By definition, she could not be a royal favorite: the royal authorities executed her grandfather, her father was deprived of the title for the anti-imperial movement. She didn't care about politics. Most of all, she wanted to be allowed to do her job.

There was a knock at the door. The Chekist left and returned a minute later.

Come to the table, comrade artist.

Povolotsky got up with difficulty (the room swirled before his eyes), on weakened legs he approached the table. All previous pieces of paper had disappeared somewhere, on the table lay only a sheet of faded paper, spotted with small, hasty handwriting.

We know that Gedroits handed this leaflet to you before her death. Can you decipher it yourself or will you add more work to our specialists?

Even despite the horror of his situation, Povolotsky could not help smiling.

It's not a cipher. This is French.

Stop! - the cry of the Chekist shattered into smithereens around the room. Povolotsky turned pale.

You're kidding, you bastard! Now it's our turn to joke! Yes, such as you have long been needed ...

And the letter was indeed in French. It was written in 1926 by the famous Swiss surgeon Caesar Roux.

In the letter, Professor Roux formulated his last will: he wants, after his resignation, the department of surgery in Lausanne - one of the best in the world - to be headed by his beloved student Vera Gedroits.

Childhood, adolescence, escape

Already in childhood, Vera preferred the company of boys. With them one could be direct, frank, even rude. You could also pick with a stick in the pond or climb trees with them - such pleasures were not allowed for girls.

When little Vera was especially played out, her parents called her up and pulled her in a stern whisper: “How are you behaving, you are a princess!” In full voice about the lost title was not spoken.

Princely coat of arms of the Gedroits familyPhoto: State Public historical library Russia

It was a gloomy story for the Gedroits family. Representatives of the ancient Lithuanian family fought for years against Russian rule. After the suppression of another uprising, Vera's grandfather was deprived of his princely title and executed, and his father fled to the Samara province. There he turned from Ignas into Ignatius and met Vera's mother, the daughter of a local landowner, a sophisticated graduate of the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens Daria Mikhau.

Former princes barely made ends meet. The situation worsened after a fire, during which their house in the Oryol province burned down with all their property. The news that the princely title was returned to the Gedroites looked like a mockery against the background of their poverty.

When Vera turned 13, she was expelled from the gymnasium for writing epigrams - in such an unfortunate way her literary talent first manifested itself. Other educational institutions there was none in the district, and Ignaty Gedroits arranged for the girl to be trained by a local paramedic. So unexpectedly, medicine entered the life of Vera.

After several years of studying with a paramedic, Vera began to independently prepare for admission to Lesgaft's medical courses in St. Petersburg. The young princess left her home.

They couldn't even call her beautiful. loving parents: too tall and overweight, Vera was completely devoid of grace and elegance. But she had correct features faces and surprisingly beautiful hands. Vera was hardworking, bold, straightforward. It was easy to believe that she would succeed even in such an unfeminine business as medicine.

On a sunny September day in 1894, the Gedroits received a letter from their daughter with startling news. First, Vera got married. Did this mysterious captain Nikolai Belozerov manage to tame Vera?

The second news was even more incredible: the daughter wrote that she was going to study in Switzerland at the medical faculty of the University of Lausanne.

Like all children at all times, Vera told her parents far from the whole truth.

Her marriage to the dearest captain Belozerov was fictitious. Immediately after signing the documents, the newlyweds parted ways so as not to meet again. In parallel with Lesgaft's courses, Vera attended revolutionary circles and came under police surveillance. New last name gave her the opportunity to make documents to go abroad. Freedom is a great reason to get married.

What was the benefit of this marriage for Belozerov is unknown. She and Vera remained in correspondence for several more years and remained good friends. When later, in 1905, Vera asked her "spouse" to terminate the union - she wanted to return her maiden name - he agreed without talking.

female doctor

Professor Caesar RouxPhoto: State Public Historical Library of Russia

Life can change in one day - Vera was convinced of this in 1898. The girl graduated from the medical faculty with the most highly rated. Professor Ru himself singled her out among his students and persuaded her to stay at the university. In fact, this is exactly what she wanted. And not only she, but also her close friend Ricky Gudi, with whom they had lived together for several years.

But ambitious plans and personal idyll were destroyed by one letter from his father.

"Sasha ( Vera's sister - approx. TD) died of pneumonia, nervous mother, come! I never called you, but it's necessary. Finish your service and go home. A new plant is being built seven versts from us, a surgeon is needed, I gave my word for you. I can't write - it's hard!

Selfless Faith hastily began to gather. I said goodbye to Ricky, taking a promise from her that they would soon meet in Russia.

At home, Gedroits was expected by habitual poverty, a tired father, a mother with a broken heart. mental health. The only way to change something seemed to be work, and Vera disappeared from morning to night at the Maltsovsky cement plant.

Due to the features hard work at the factory main problem workers had a hernia - Vera quickly established this. And since her mentor, Professor Roux, was specialized in hernias, her treatments proved to be very effective.

The rumor about a new talented doctor quickly spread around the neighborhood, and Vera's work increased. Well, after she put the artisan’s son on his feet, who, due to a disease of the hip joint, spent his whole life in a half-sitting position, Gedroits became a local celebrity.

V.I. Gedroits lived in one of these factory housesPhoto: State Public Historical Library of Russia

32-year-old Vera Ignatievna was invited to take part in the Third All-Russian Congress of Surgeons. “The first woman surgeon who spoke at the congress with such a serious and interesting report, accompanied by a demonstration ... I also remember the noisy ovation given to her by Russian surgeons. In the history of surgery, it seems to me, such moments should be noted, ”wrote Gedroits' colleague, surgeon Razumovsky.

It is at this moment - recognition and triumph - that Vera picks up a Browning.

The bullet pierced the heart sac. Vera was saved solely thanks to the skill of her colleagues, who tactfully did not ask questions. And even if they did, what could she tell them?

Vera believed her experiences only on paper. So, indignant at the social injustice prevailing in Russia, she wrote in her diary: “It’s like two lives go in parallel: some carelessly have fun, arrange amateur performances, not hearing the groans of others, crushed by need and hunger.” But not one social injustice brought Faith. She received a letter from Ricky from Switzerland. “Don’t wait, I’m torn to you, but I can’t leave the children and the business ...”.

Gedroits took a long time to come to her senses after a suicide attempt. Strange as it may seem, the war finally brought her back to life.

From the battlefield to Tsarskoye Selo

“Among those who went to the front as a Red Cross surgeon was Princess Gedroits, the chief surgeon of the ambulance train,” the report on the Russo-Japanese War said.

For the first time in history, serious operations were carried out right on the battlefield, under enemy fire - European powers would begin to use operational wagons only ten years later. And an innovator in this dangerous business became a woman - surgeon Gedroits.

The doctors had no more than three or four hours a day to rest - in the first week of operation of the operating car, Gedroits performed 56 operations.

She even operated on a Japanese prince. Years later, the prince sent Vera Ignatievna thank you letter, in which he called her "the giver of life and the owner of healing hands." As well as precious souvenirs - hand-embroidered silk panels and several ivory netsuke figurines.

The glory of the first female surgeon reached the Empress, and Alexandra Feodorovna expressed a desire to get a curiosity in her hospital at Tsarskoye Selo.

Left: Medical staff of the Palace Infirmary. V.I. Gedroits in the center. Right: report on the appointment of GedroitsPhoto: State Public Historical Library of Russia

Gedroits made a shocking impression on the royal family. The princess cut her hair short, preferred a man's suit with a tie, constantly smoked, and spoke of herself in a man's face, "I operated on", "I examined."

Nevertheless, the empress insisted on Gedroits being sent to the hospital. In addition, Vera Ignatievna became the doctor of the Grand Duchesses, who were more comfortable being observed by a woman.

The lull between the wars was a fruitful time - Gedroits, who was entitled to an unheard-of salary of 900 rubles, almost for the first time in her life could not worry about money. And also devote free time to literature.

In the ward of the officer department of the infirmary No. 3. 1914Photo: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, Romanov Family Album

A close friend of Vera Ignatievna, the artist Klever introduced her to the literary circles of St. Petersburg. The extraordinary princess charmed the motley bohemian society: she even became a member of the first convocation of the "Poets' Guild". Moreover, Nikolai Gumilyov helped out, giving him half the necessary amount for the publication of the "monthly book of poems and criticism" of the acmeists "Hyperborea".

The poems of Sergei Gedroits (pseudonym of Vera) were published on a par with the works of Akhmatova, Mandelstam, Mayakovsky. True, contemporaries found the personality of the princess much more fascinating than poetry.

World War I paused literary activity Vera Ignatievna, but strengthened her medical authority with the Romanovs.

But the authority royal power in the eyes of Gedroits, everything fell. She understood that even if confusion was going on in Tsarskoye Selo, then what kind of hell was going on in other hospitals: “The hospital is always overcrowded, and considering that the lower basement floor is occupied by unfortunate old men and old women, then it simply needs to be said that the people in it stuffed like a herring in a barrel."

Tsarskoye Selo. A soldier with a shrapnel wound (before surgery) in a military hospital. Vera Gedroits makes a dressing Photo: TASS

Sometimes Vera Ignatievna clothed her impressions in poetic form.

The square is cold and sad

Among the scattered alleys,

Where is the east and far north

He sent pieces of people from the battlefield.

Under the guidance of Gedroits, Alexandra Fedorovna and her daughters mastered the work of sisters of mercy. The Empress, Olga and Tatyana Romanovs did not shun dirty work and obediently assisted in operations. Fascinated by her work, Vera Ignatievna could have shouted at Alexandra Fedorovna, but she did not pay attention.

Empress Alexandra Feodorovna gives instruments during the operation. Behind are the Grand Duchesses Olga and Tatyana. Operates V.I.GedroytsPhoto: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Romanov Family Album

One episode nevertheless cooled relations between the empress and the princess - Vera Ignatievna put Rasputin out of the ward, where he went to visit a friend. He walked in with a sweeping step from the street in dirty boots. Rasputin was used to the fact that all the doors of the empire were open to him, and Gedroits was used to the fact that cleanliness reigned in her chambers, and there were no strangers. The sisters of mercy giggled for a long time, remembering how their surgeon almost threw the almighty old man out of the ward almost by the scruff of the neck.

Outcast

Gedroits came to the idea of ​​the need for a revolution while still a student at Lesgaft's courses. The princely title did not separate her from the people, because Gedroits lived in simplicity, bordering on poverty. All the more surprising for Vera Ignatievna was the hostile attitude of the new world towards her.

In 1918, as a surgeon in the Sixth Siberian Rifle Division, Gedroits was wounded at the front and was evacuated to Kyiv. I got on my feet, got stronger, got ready for work and ... did not get it.

Rejection after rejection awaited one of the nation's most talented surgeons as she applied for a job. The princely brand was for Soviet power more important than merit in medicine. It didn’t fit in my head: how are those who compose songs about the well-being of the people, the same people deprived of worthy treatment? And in general - what does medicine have to do with politics? The doctor does not look who to treat - he is doing his duty.

But the worst thing in this new world was the arrests - there were several of them. Unexpected, often in the middle of the night, they usually lasted less than a day. Gedroits was always released without consequences: an order came from Moscow, from a certain prominent official, to whom, back in 1914, Vera Ignatievna made the most complicated operation on the knee.

Finally, a job was found for a first-class world-class surgeon - in a children's clinic.

One thing pleased Gedroits during this period - rapprochement with the widow of Count Nirod Maria. In Kyiv, the princess and the countess settled together in an apartment in a house on Kruglouniversitetskaya street. They made acquaintance with bohemian neighbors: a married couple of artists Irina Avdiyeva and Leonid Povolotsky.

V.I. Gedroits lived in this house in KyivPhoto: State Public Historical Library of Russia

The couples regularly held joint literary and musical evenings. “Gedroyts played the violin, I accompanied her on the piano,” Avdieva recalled, “Sometimes we diverged for three or four measures, but this did not bother us. We played without noticing that the listeners huddled in the farthest room so as not to hear the cacophony.

In 1921, when Vera Ignatievna had already ceased to hope, a job offer was received from the Kiev Medical Institute. Gradually prejudice against Gedroits - by at least, in medical circles - dissipated.

Articles by Vera Ignatievna devoted to oncology, endocrinology and, of course, surgery began to appear in the press. In 1923, Gedroits received the title of professor of medicine, six years later - an offer to head the department of surgery.

Even her autobiographical stories under the pseudonym "Sergei Gedroits" were published in St. Petersburg. It seemed like life was getting better.

Kyiv, 1931

Povolotsky opened the door. Vera Ignatievna stood on the threshold - incredibly thinner, haggard, almost unrecognizable.

I have a meeting with your wife, Leonid, under a pear tree, - and smiled.

It is amazing how a smile instantly made her stern features softer, more feminine.

Books by V.I. GedroitsPhoto: State Public Historical Library of Russia

Povolotsky gestured his neighbor into the apartment. She already said:

There is, Leonid, such a sharp little grass - it grows almost everywhere, dogs and cats eat it. I have a plan for Irina to insist on this weed for alcohol all week, and then the day of rest will come, and we will celebrate this culinary success. As you can see, the day has come.

Avdiyeva came out of the kitchen - in her hands she held a bottle with a suspicious bright green liquid. At the bottom of the bottle floated scraps of weed. Povolotsky grimaced.

Darlings, I'm sorry to pry into my own business, but are you sure you want to drink this rubbish?

Irochka, let's go quickly, your husband coveted our exquisite liquor.

“Under the pear” means under the old sprawling pear tree in the courtyard of the house. Vera Ignatyevna poured the poisonous green tincture into glasses in a businesslike way and, clinking glasses with Avdiyeva, drank in one gulp. The taste was disgusting.

What a horror, - grimacing, muttered Irina.

It's nothing, it's an experiment, - Vera Ignatyevna stated with the same frown and poured one more.

After the third glass, the conversation became freer. Gedroits recited her poems, reciting "The Tsarskoe Selo Palace" with particular poignancy:

Deserted, white, lonely

With the beauty of spread porches,

In the darkness of the cruel winter night,

As before, the palace rises.

As of old, the lattice along the fence

The peace of the past guards

Frost is a generous reward,

A snowdrift of snow lies around.

Avdieva and Gedroits often got drunk together (they just said “let's get drunk”), but Irina knew for sure that this time would be the last.

The disease was getting stronger and stronger. A year ago, Vera had her uterus removed, but the cancer had already metastasized to her liver. The same cancer that Gedroits dedicated to fighting last years medical practice in Kyiv.

Yes, they are getting drunk for the last time - so Avdieva asked what she did not dare to ask before. For example, about the relationship between Gedroits and Gumilyov - usually Vera Ignatievna did not touch on this topic, but then she opened up.

Dream! - exclaimed Avdiyeva, who was pretty tipsy.

How to say - in essence, he accused me of rejecting the entire masculine gender. He called the poem "Cruel". I remember these lines: "You want on your lunar body / Follow the touch of only female hands." What is it? But the last quatrain is absolutely amazing. Here, listen, Irochka.

Eagle Sappho at the White Cliff

solemnly soared, and beauty

The shadowless vineyards of Lesvos

She closed her blasphemous lips.

So, while talking, they drank all the green liquid under the sprawling pear. When it got really bad, Vera Ignatyevna confessed, and in her voice one could hear a complaint and even resentment:

I thought that this green grass will kill the cancer in myself, it's useless to cut it - it's everywhere. But I'm afraid it won't work...

Vera Ignatievna died in March 1932. Before her death, she gave her neighbor and friend, the artist Povolotsky, a letter written by Professor Ru. “Lenya, save this letter. This is an honor for Russian surgery, you understand? The time will come, and you will give it to someone who needs it.

Awards V.I.Gedroyts

Photo: State Public Historical Library of Russia

The letter fell into the wrong place and served as the main evidence in the case against Povolotsky, who was accused of espionage. The artist was repressed.

The last words of Vera Ignatievna concerned work: “When cancer is operated on, you must avoid the needle - but they do not understand this. You can’t pierce a diseased cell!”

Gedroits remained a doctor not only under all regimens, but also in the face of death.

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Doctor of Medicine, professor, the first female surgeon in Russia, one of the first female professors of surgery in the world, poetess and prose writer.

V. I. Gedroits was born in 1870 in the village of Slobodische, Bryansk district, Oryol province. She belonged to the well-known Lithuanian princely family Gedroits. She studied first at the Bryansk progymnasium, where one of her teachers was V.V. Rozanov, who later became famous, and then entered the gymnasium in Orel, from where she was expelled for satirical poem. After that, in St. Petersburg, V. I. Gedroits listened to lectures at medical courses P. F. Lesgaft. She attended a revolutionary student circle, came to the attention of the police, and in 1892 was sent to her father's estate under police supervision.

In 1894, she entered into a fictitious marriage with Nikolai Afanasyevich Belozerov and, with a new passport, fled abroad to Switzerland, where she entered the medical faculty of the University of Lausanne. In 1898 she graduated with honors from the university with a doctorate in medicine and surgery. She studied with the famous surgeon Caesar Roux, after which she worked as his assistant for several years, then taught a special course as a Privatdozent.

The illness of his parents and the death of his sister forced V. I. Gedroits to return to Russia in 1900. In 1902, she confirms her diploma by passing an exam at Moscow University, and gets a job as a surgeon in the hospital of the Maltsovsky Portland cement plants in the Kaluga province, and three years later she holds the position of chief physician of the Lyudinovsky district hospital. V. I. Gedroits actively operates, takes part in the work of medical societies, places work in Russian and foreign scientific journals. She managed to expand and refurbish a small hospital, equipping it with new surgical instruments and equipment, turning it into a multidisciplinary surgical center for the first time in provincial Russia.

In 1905, the marriage she concealed from others with N. A. Belozerov, at the request of Gedroits, was terminated (in 1907 she would be returned the title of princess and allowed to return to her maiden name).

In 1905, during the Russo-Japanese War, she voluntarily went to the front as a surgeon on the Red Cross ambulance train. V. I. Gedroits was one of the first in the history of medicine to start performing independently developed abdominal operations in the field, having operated on hundreds of patients. Until that moment, soldiers wounded in the stomach were left to die, since such wounds were considered hopeless. For her labors and courage, she is awarded the gold medal "For Diligence" on the Annenskaya Ribbon, and after the battles at Mukden, for heroic actions to save the wounded, the army commander, Infantry General N. P. Linevich personally presents the female doctor with the silver medal "For Courage" on Georgievskaya tape. Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, taking care of the wounded in Manchuria, marks her with three Red Cross insignia "for assistance in alleviating the plight of the sick and wounded military ranks and for the labors incurred by the Russian Red Cross Society.

On July 27, 1905, V. I. Gedroits presented the results of her work to the society of military doctors, making important for military medicine findings. The name of V. I. Gedroits as a female surgeon, as a war hero, becomes known throughout the country. After the war, she returns to the Bryansk region.

In 1909, at the invitation of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, he took the position of senior intern at the Tsarskoye Selo Palace Hospital. This appointment is perceived by the director of the hospital with hostility, but he was forced to submit to the royal will. V. I. Gedroits becomes a close person in the imperial family and a family doctor for the children of the king. At the same time, she had tense relations with G. Rasputin and A. A. Vyrubova.

Once in Tsarskoye Selo, she met N. S. Gumilyov, R. V. Ivanov-Razumnik, A. M. Remizov, renewed her acquaintance with V. V. Rozanov, and later met S. A. Yesenin. Since 1910, V. I. Gedroits has acted as a writer under the allonym (name of the late brother) Sergei Gedroits. But her first book - the collection "Poems and Tales" - caused negative reviews by N. S. Gumilyov and S. M. Gorodetsky. However, soon V. I. Gedroits took part in the activities of the “Workshop of Poets” headed by Gumilyov, under the auspices of which her book of poems “Veg” (1913) was published; the name is in German “path” and at the same time the initials V. G.). She was published in the journals Hyperborea, Testaments, New Journal for All, Bulletin of Theosophy (in a number of poems, Gedroits focused on the esoteric revelations of E. Blavatsky), Sovremennik and others.

In 1912, she defended her doctoral dissertation at Moscow University “Long-term results of inguinal hernia operations using the Roux method based on 268 operations” under the guidance of Caesar Roux and P.I. Dyakonov. In 1914, she published the book "Conversations on Surgery for Nurses and Doctors", where she summarizes her experience gained during the Russo-Japanese War.

The beginning of the First World War in 1914 was caught by V. I. Gedroits in the position of chief physician. She is reequipping the Tsarskoye Selo hospital to receive the wounded. The scale of the work of surgeons has increased many times over. V. I. Gedroits trained Empress Alexandra Feodorovna and her daughters Olga and Tatiana in the work of sisters of mercy, who then assisted her in operations as ordinary surgical nurses.

In 1915, she was entrusted with the treatment of A. A. Vyrubova, who was seriously injured in a railway accident. According to the memoirs of A. I. Spiridovich: “Gedroits enjoyed the great sympathy of the Empress, but her reputation as a doctor was far from important. And later, when Vyrubova remained a cripple for the rest of her life - she limped - she herself, and many others said that it was solely Mrs. Gedroits who was to blame.

After the February Revolution, pressure began on her, as an entourage of the royal family, and she had to leave Tsarskoye Selo. In May 1917, V. I. Gedroits went to the front, where he became the chief physician of the dressing detachment in the 6th Siberian Rifle Division, and then a corps surgeon. In January 1918, she was wounded and evacuated to Kyiv, where, after her recovery, she works in a children's clinic. Since 1919, she has been actively working in the Kiev surgical services, organizing, in particular, a clinic for maxillofacial surgery.

Since 1921, at the invitation of Professor E.G. Chernyakhovsky worked at the faculty surgical clinic of the Kiev Medical Institute, where, as a privat-docent of the department, she for the first time reads a course in pediatric surgery in Kyiv. V. I. Gedroits publishes articles in medical journals on general and pediatric surgery, cardiac surgery, oncology, endocrinology, takes part in the work of surgical congresses, writes a textbook. In 1923 she was elected professor of medicine. V. A. Oppel speaks of her as “a real surgeon who knows a knife well,” she writes a textbook on pediatric surgery. In 1929, V. I. Gedroits was elected head of the Department of Faculty Surgery.

In 1930, during the arrests and purges against the scientific intelligentsia of the famous "SVU process", they were fired from the university without the right to a pension.

Vera Ignatievna bought a house in the suburbs of Kyiv, almost left the surgical activity and began to write, having conceived the publication of a cycle of semi-autobiographical stories under common name"A life". The publishing house released three of them: Kaftanchik (L., 1930), Lyakh (L., 1931), Separation (L., b.g.).

The last years she lived in Kyiv with Countess Maria Dmitrievna Nirod (1879-1965), standing with her in an actual marriage. Maria Dmitrievna knew Vera Ignatievna from the Tsarskoye Selo hospital, where she worked as a nurse.

V. I. Gedroits died of cancer in 1932. She was buried in Kyiv at the Spaso-Preobrazhensky (now Korchevatsky) cemetery. In the same fence with the modest grave of Gedroits - the graves of Archbishop Hermogen and his relative - saved by Vera Ignatievna, he looked after her grave and bequeathed to bury himself next to her.

Shortly before his death, Gedroits gives his friends - the artist I. D. Avdiyeva and her husband L. S. Povolotsky - his archives. Among them was a letter to Professor Caesar Roux, in which he bequeathed to her, a Russian surgeon, the Department of Surgery at the University of Geneva. In the 1930s, L. S. Polovetsky was arrested on charges of espionage and killed, and the letter itself was lost.

The colorful figure of Vera Gedroits, a surgeon and lyric poet, who maintained emphatically “masculine” habits in clothing and everyday life, “George Sand Tsarskoye Selo”- is captured in many memoirs, including the fictionalized memoirs “Petersburg Winters” by Georgy Ivanov.

Fokino city hospital named after Vera Gedroits Bryansk region where she started her medical career.

(1870-1932)

“Work, its ebb and flow. The thrill of operations. Burning postoperative experiences, when you merge into one with the barely flickering life of the operated. You do not sleep at night to facilitate, understand, understand. It is difficult to say how dear the patient you operated on, who trusted you. Your energy, will, are merged with him not only before he leaves the clinic, but also later, and always, you will forget his face and you will never forget the scar.

Vera Ignatievna Gedroits.

Vera Ignatievna Gedroits was born in 1870 in the village of Slobodische, Bryansk district, Oryol province - family estate father. Descended from the old Lithuanian princely family Gedroits, who gave a lot to the culture of Russia, Poland and Lithuania. Studied in Bryansk female gymnasium, where, it turns out, it was in those years that Vasily Rozanov, who later became a famous philosopher, taught. And the passion for his ideas, the doctor of medicine Vera Gedroits carried through her whole life.

Vera became interested in medicine at an early age and entered the courses of the St. Petersburg anatomist Lesgaft. However, she was soon exiled to her family estate for participation in people's will activities. And then the princess, having entered into a fictitious marriage and changing her surname, managed to escape to Switzerland, where she entered the University of Lausanne. Interestingly, the guarantor was the professor of this educational institution P. A. Herzen, grandson of a revolutionary democrat, founder of once popular publications " polar Star” and “Bell”. Vera Ignatievna had a chance to learn the art of surgery from the famous professor Caesar Roux, who later invited her to work in his clinic. However, fate wanted Vera Ignatievna to return to Russia for family reasons.

Returning to Russia, Gedroits passed the exam at Moscow University - she needed to confirm a foreign diploma. Somewhat earlier, she received a position as a surgeon in the hospital of the Maltsev Plants of Portland Cement in the Kaluga province. The talent of Vera Ignatievna finds the deepest practical application here and unfolds in full force. Vera Gedroits literally bites into her work, and in addition, she publishes the most serious articles in scientific journals.

“At the beginning of 1904, the news of the war with Japan reached all corners of Russia. Gedroits submits a report on enrollment in the forward detachment, formed from medical volunteers by the Russian Red Cross, and is sent to the active army. She renders medical care in the hottest battlefields. For her labors and courage, she is awarded the gold medal “For Diligence” on the Annenskaya Ribbon, and after the battles at Mukden, for heroic actions to save the wounded, the army commander, Infantry General N.P. Linevich personally presents the female doctor Princess Gedroits with the St. George silver medal “For Courage” ". Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, taking care of the wounded in Manchuria, also notes the merits of Vera Ignatievna, and "for her assistance in alleviating the plight of the sick and wounded military ranks and for the work suffered by the Russian society in the Red Cross" notes her threeme insignia, including a silver neck medal on the Vladimir ribbon, and the united All-Russian nobility - a nominal badge. A year later, Vera Ignatievna returns to her native place to her beloved work.

V. G. Khokhlov. "Vera Ignatievna Gedroits - chief surgeong Maltsov factories "

“Princess Vera operated in a specially equippedrailway car and in tents lined with clay to protect from the cold. In the first 6 days of the medical train's operation alone, she performed 56 complex operations. vyda practicing surgeon, she successfully operated on the legendary General Gurko and the captive Japanese crown prince, who subsequently sent gifts to the Russian monarchs and called her "princess of mercy with hands, yesnewspapers wrote about the extraordinary courage of the operations that the princess did literally under enemy fire, but these reports were not about scientific courage, but about the human prowess of the surgeon - really outstanding. But it was during the Russo-Japanese war that she was the first in the history of medicine, she began to perform abdominal operations, which she developed on her own, without outside help - and not in the silence of hospital operating rooms, but right in the theater of operations. At that time in Europe, people wounded in the stomach were simply left without any help. "

Jonathan Moldavanov. "Princess Vera Gedroj: scalpeland pen"

Somewhat earlier, she received a position as a surgeon in the hospital of the Maltsev Plants of Portland Cement in the Kaluga province. The talent of Vera Ignatievna finds the deepest practical application here and unfolds in full force. Gedroits literally bites into her work, she literally works tirelessly, and besides, she publishes the most serious articles in scientific journals. The fame of the first and only female surgeon from the provinces in Russia instantly reaches the imperial palace.

She is invited by the 3rd Congress of Surgeons, held in 1902. Here is what V.I. Razumovsky, an outstanding professor of medicine, wrote about her:

"...IN AND. Gedroits, the first female surgeon to speak at the congress with such a serious and interesting report, accompanied by a demonstration. The woman put on his feet a man who, before her operation, was crawling on his womb like a worm. I also remember the noisy ovation given to her by the Russian surgeons. In the history of surgery, it seems to me, such moments should be celebrated».

We are talking about the son of a craftsman Anton, 26 years old, who for 12 years seriously suffered from a disease of the hip joints, could neither stand nor lie down. On October 10, 1901, Vera Gedroits performed a most complicated operation, as a result of which Anton forgot about crutches after three months. This case was considered in the report of Gedroits, bringing her a long applause from the luminaries of domestic surgery.

The fame of the first and only female surgeon from the provinces in Russia instantly reaches the imperial palace.

The appearance in the Tsarskoye Selo Palace Hospital of Princess V. I. Gedroits was facilitated by Botkin. Even during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, Evgeny SergeevichBotkinwas the chief commissioner of the Russian Red Cross Society (ROKK), responsible for the work of infirmaries and flying units. Vera Ignatievna served as a surgeon on the ROKK ambulance train. In 1909, thanks to the recommendation of E. S. Botkin, who had by that time become a life physician, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna invited Princess V. I. Gedroits to take the position of senior intern in Her hospital.
In Tsarskoye Selo, Vera Ignatievna had a new hobby: she took up versification. Worthy of attention is the fact that many of her poemsVera Ignatievnawere published in a very specific "Herald of Theosophy", which, we note, is not surprising, since, as noted, they were consonant with the revelations of the famous occultist Blavatsky. The poet S. M. Gorodetsky, in a review of a collection of poems published in 1913 by V. I. Gedroits, emphasized that her works gravitate toward “Vedic, dark, terrible.”

Since the beginning great war Vera Ignatievna became the senior physician and leading surgeon of Her Majesty's Own Infirmary in Tsarskoe Selo.

In Tsarskoye SeloVera Ignatievnameets Gumilyov, Ivanov-Razumnik, Remizov, renews acquaintance with Rozanov, later meets Yesenin. Since 1910, Gedroits has acted as a writer under the name of her late brother "Sergey Gedroits". But her first book - the collection "Poems and Tales" - caused negative reviews.. In 1910, Nikolai Gumilyov, in the Apollo magazine, called Gedroits "not a poet". A little later, she was nevertheless accepted into the "Workshop of Poets". Perhaps this was helped by the fact that Vera Ignatievna promised to pay half of the considerable amount that was needed to create the Hyperborea magazine, in which her poems began to be published periodically.A book of poems "Veg" was published (1913; the title is in German "path" and at the same time the initials V. G.). Published in the journals Hyperborea, Testaments, New Journal for All, Bulletin of Theosophy, "Contemporary".In a number of poems, Gedroits was guided by the esoteric revelations of Blavatsky.

In 1912, Vera Ignatievna Gedroits defended her doctoral dissertation at Moscow University “Long-term results of inguinal hernia operations using the Roux method based on 268 operations” under the guidance of Caesar Roux and P.I. Dyakonov. In 1914, she published the book Talks on Surgery for Nurses and Doctors, in which she summarized the experience gained during the Russo-Japanese War.

The staff of the Tsarskoye Selo hospital. In the center - V. I. Gedroits

The beginning in 1914, V. I. Gedroits found in the position of chief physician. She is reequipping the Tsarskoye Selo hospital to receive the wounded. The scale of the work of surgeons has increased many times over. Gedroits trained Empress Alexandra Feodorovna and her daughters Olga and Tatiana in the work of sisters of mercy, who then assisted her during operations as ordinary surgical nurses.

In 1915princesseseGedroitstreatment was orderedclosest friend of the EmpressAnna AlexandrovnaVyrubova, who fell on January 2, 1915 in a railway accident. As a result of treatment, Vyrubova remained semi-invalid. V. I. Gedroits, while A. A. Vyrubova was in the infirmary, contributed to the emergence and then fanning of a public scandal in connection with G. E. Rasputin, who visited his spiritual daughter. She literally emanated anger at the sight of the Tsar's Friend.

After the February Revolution, pressure began on her, as an entourage of the royal family, and she had to leave Tsarskoye Selo. In May 1917, V. I. Gedroits went to the front, where he became the chief physician of the dressing detachment in the 6th Siberian Rifle Division, and then a corps surgeon. In January 1918 she was wounded and evacuated to Kyiv, where after her recovery she worked in a children's clinic. Since 1919, she has been actively working in the Kiev surgical services, organizing, in particular, a clinic for maxillofacial surgery.

Since 1921, at the invitation of Professor Chernyakhovsky, Vera Ignatievna Gedroits worked at the Faculty Surgical Clinic of the Kiev Medical Institute, where, as a Privatdozent of the department, she taught a course in pediatric surgery for the first time in Kyiv. Gedroits publishes articles in medical journals on general and pediatric surgery, cardiac surgery, oncology, endocrinology, takes part in the work of surgical congresses, writes a textbookin Pediatric Surgery. In 1923 she was elected professor of medicine.

In 1929, Professor Chernyakhovsky was forced to leave the leadership of the clinic of faculty surgery: he named Gedroits as his successor. Vera Ignatievna became the first female professor of surgery in our country, and for two years she successfully headed this leading clinic of the Kiev Medical Institute.In 1930, during the arrests and purges against the scientific intelligentsia, she was fired from the university without the right to a pension.

Vera Ignatievna bought a house in the suburbs of Kyiv, almost left the surgical activity and began to engage in writing, having conceived the publication of a cycle of semi-autobiographical stories under the general title "Life". The publishing house released three of them: Kaftanchik (1930), Lyakh (1931), and Separation.
Shortly before his death, Gedroits gives his friends - the artist I. D. Avdiyeva and her husband L. S. Povolotsky - his archives. Among them was a letter to Professor Caesar Roux, in which he bequeathed to her, a Russian surgeon, the Department of Surgery at the University of Geneva. In the 1930s, Polovetsky was arrested on charges of espionage and killed, and the letter itself was lost.

The colorful figure of Vera Gedroits, a surgeon and lyricist, who maintained emphatically “masculine” habits in clothing and everyday life, “Georges Sand of Tsarskoye Selo” is captured in many memoirs, including the fictionalized memoirs “Petersburg Winters” by Georgy Ivanov.

In honor of Vera Gedroits, a hospital in the city of Fokino, Bryansk Region, is named, where she began her medical career.

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