Xenia Denikina
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2 April 1892
Xenia Denikina | |
|---|---|
Ксения Деникина | |
 Xenia Denikina and Anton Denikin, 1930s. | |
| Born | Xenia Vasilievna Chizn 2 April 1892 |
| Died | 3 March 1973 (aged 80) Louviers, France |
| Other names | Ksenia Chizh, Ksenia Denikina, K. V. Denikina |
| Occupations | College professor, writer |
| Spouse | Anton Denikin |
| Children | Marina Denikina |
Xenia Vasilievna Denikina[a] (née Chizh;[b] 2 April [O.S. 21 March] 1892 – 3 March 1973) was a Russian writer. From 1918 until his death in 1947, she was married to Anton Denikin.
Xenia Chizh[c] was born in Biała Podlaska, then part of Congress Poland in the Russian Empire. Her father was Vassili Ivanovitch Chizn, an artillery officer and local official, and her mother was Elisaveta Alexandrovna Toumskaya. She graduated from the Institute for Young Ladies in Warsaw, and was training to be a teacher when she started a relationship with Anton Denikin.[1]
Career
Denikina and her family went into exile in 1920, living eventually in France and Belgium, where she helped her husband write his memoirs.[2] The couple took refuge in Mimizan in World War II,[3] and she was briefly arrested and imprisoned by the Germans. She acted as an interpreter between the German occupiers and the Russian, Polish, and Ukrainian exiles there. Denikina kept a hidden journal from 1940 to 1945, totalling 28 school notebooks by the end.[1][4] The Denikins moved to New York City after the war. Her husband died in Ann Arbor, Michigan in 1947.[5]
Denikina was chair of the Russian Institutes Alumnae Association when it was founded in 1954. She assisted Russian history scholars, organized her husband's papers, and hosted cultural events for the Russian émigré community in New York.[6][7]
