If you have read the previous post then this is the reason why we gazed wistfully across the sea.
When we realised how close the Island of Barra was to the island of Eriskay, it was a huge disappointment to us that sadly our schedule did not allow time for us to visit.
SS Arandora Star shown on a Waddingtons Playing Card c 1935
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As a young newly married couple living in Glasgow, Scotland we were introduced to a 'white' Russian lady called Vera Fisanotti (maiden name Maschova) - she was a friend of our 85 year old landlady.
She was a widow but explained to us that her husband had been an Italian internee during World War II, and that he had been shipwrecked following deportation from Britain. His body was washed up on the shores of the Isle of Barra in the Outer Hebrides.
During 2012 I had watched a TV programme called Island Parish which was filmed on Barra. The programme vividly brought back memories of Vera and her sad contact with the island.
I decided to do some research on the internet, and surprisingly quickly came across Vera's husband's name. I found Oreste Fisanotti on a website about the SS Arandora Star, a ship carrying refugees & internees to Canada from Liverpool.
The boat set sail from Liverpool on the 1st July 1940 and was torpedoed off the north-west coast of Ireland by a German U-boat the following morning. Oreste was among more than 800 people who lost their lives. I also discovered that, subsequently, and following her own death in 1975, Vera had been taken back to Barra and was buried on a hilltop beside him.
Vera's life was a sad one. She escaped from Petrograd (St. Petersburg) during the 1917 Revolution, where she was studying to become a doctor.
Because of his contacts, her father, a sea captain, smuggled her on to a boat in Odessa bound for Constantinople (Istanbul). He gave her a small leather pouch containing precious stones. As a young women arriving alone in Turkey, and unable to speak the language, she found it very frightening and confusing, so she decided to try and make her way to London. Eventually she arrived and found work in an hotel as a chambermaid. It was in London that she met and fell in love with Oreste Fisanotti, who was also working at the hotel as a waiter, and they married.
From the day she left Russia to the day she died she had no idea what had happened to her family. She tried to find out information about them from the Red Cross, but she was very wary of giving away too much about herself as she still had a great fear of being found by the Russians. When we met her Russia was still a closed society.
When Oreste, her only friend in all the world and her beloved husband died, heartbroken, she left London to live on the remote island of Barra to be close to his body. She lived alone on the island for over twenty years until her health deteriorated, and the doctors told her that the island was not a suitable place for her to reside anymore. She was suffering from rheumatism and respiratory problems, so very reluctantly she left the Island of Barra and moved to Glasgow.
Our Landlady in Glasgow had befriended Vera at her church and that is how we came to meet her. When we first moved into the apartment Vera was introduced to us but she was very cold towards us both. As time passed she opened up and became friendly. Later she confided that she was, understandably, jealous and anxious that we would take our landlady's friendship and love away from her.
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At last together, Vera & Oreste's hilltop graves on the remote Island of Barra - on her gravestone Vera finally had the courage to publicly acknowledge her Russian origins.
Her tragic life made a deep and lasting impression on us both.
