Sofka Skipwith

Sofka Skipwith (born Princess Sophia Dolgorouky, St. Petersburg, Russia, 23 October 1907 – 26 February 1994 in Bodmin Moor, Cornwall, England) was a Russian émigrée to England who became a well-known Communist after working for Laurence Olivier and being interned by the Nazis in France in World War II. During the war she worked to save Jews; she was honoured for her efforts by both Israel and the British government.

Skipwith was the only child of Prince Peter Dolgorouky and Countess Sophy Bobrinsky. On her father's side she was descended from Rurik, Prince of Novgorod, but also from a Greek slave-girl whom a Polish count won from an Austrian prince in a card game. On her mother's side she was descended from Catherine the Great's illegitimate son, Count Bobrinsky, and also from a foundling who was probably the child of the Tsar's brother. As a young girl in St. Petersburg, she occasionally played with the Tsarevich. Her mother studied medicine and became a respected surgeon, learned to fly in 1913 and was one of the first female bomber pilots, was the only female participant in a motor rally from St. Petersburg to Kiev in 1912, and also published satirical poetry under a pseudonym. In 1916 she returned from medical service in the Russian military with malaria and two St. George crosses, and after the October Revolution she re-entered Bolshevik Russia and secured the release of her second husband from prison, and subsequently supported him in Paris by driving a taxi. She gave her daughter a diminutive of her name. Skipwith's parents divorced when she was four, and she grew up mainly with her paternal grandmother and an English governess.

When the Revolution occurred, Skipwith's grandmother took her with her to the Crimea, where she was in attendance as lady-in-waiting to the Dowager Empress Marie, and in the spring of 1919 they were evacuated in a large party of aristocrats with the Empress to England. Skipwith was raised in Bath, London, Rome, Budapest (where her stepfather was representing the still recognised Russian Imperial government and where her mother decided she should be "out"), Nice, Paris and finally Dieppe. During her time in London she "thoroughly enjoyed" going to school at Queen's College, London, where she earned a School Certificate, and met the Duke and Duchess of Hamilton. She became close friends with Margaret Douglas-Hamilton, who was almost exactly the same age, visited them numerous times, and after Margaret was expelled from school was invited back from Rome to stay for six months and study with a governess with her; the two finally drove the governess to "throwing everything moveable" at them. In Nice she studied at the Lycée, managed to pass the Certificat d'Etudes Secondaires, but did not even try to pass the Baccalauréat. In Rome she had her first love affair and also read avidly, influenced by a Russian librarian at the English Library.

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