Peter Ustinov great family, acting, writing.

Peter Ustinov's great-grandfather Moritz Hall was Jewish refugee from Kra­ków and later a Christian colleague of German miss­ion­ar­ies in Ethiopia. Peter’s pat­ernal grand-father was a Ru­s­s­ian nobleman Baron Plato von Ustinov, a WW1 German Air Force pilot. Grandmother was Magd­alena Hall of mixed Ger­man-Ethiopian and Jewish descent.

In 1919 father Jona von Ustinow joined his family in St Petersburg. There he met Peter's mother artist Nadia Ben­ois who worked for the Imperial Mariin­sky Ballet and Opera House as a painter and bal­l­et desig­ner. Nadia was half Russian plus French, German and Ital­ian descent; her fa­t­­h­er Leon Be­n­ois was an Imperial Rus­sian architect. Leon's br­other Al­ex­an­dre Ben­ois was a stage designer with Stra­v­insky & Dia­g­hilev. What a cultured family!

Jona and Nadia married in St Pe­t­ersburg’s Russian-German church in 1920, after the Communist Revolution. In Feb 1921, when she was 7 months pregnant with Peter, the couple left Russia for UK. So Peter was brought up in a mu­lti­ling­ual family fluent in English, Russian, French, Italian and German. Dad was a respected British journalist and mum an ac­c­omplished painter.

Jona became a press officer at the German embassy in London in the 1930s and a reporter for a German news agency. Aft­er Hitler came to power in Ger­m­any, Jona be­gan work­ing for the British intell­igence se­rvice MI5 and became a British subject, avoiding int­er­nment. He was the con­t­r­ol­ler of an MI5 spy in the German embassy who gave information on Hitler's WW2 plans.

Peter Ustinov as Nero in Quo Vadis, 1951

Armchair Travel

Ustinov, wife and 4 children, 1963

The Guardian

Terence Stamp, Peter Ustinov, Robert Ryan

promoting Billy Budd, London, 1961

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We saw Peter had ancest­ral connections to nobility. So he was aptly educated at Westminster School (1934-7), having a diff­icult ch­ild­hood with his parents. After sch­ool, he took drama and acting classes under Michel St Denis at the London Theatre Studio (1937-9). And made his stage debut in 1938 at the Stage Theatre Club Surrey, playing an old man in Chekhov's The Wood Demon. His London stage début later that year at the Players' Theatre in Covent Garden, becom­ing quickly established. In 1939, Peter made his London stage debut in a revue sketch, then did regular performances with the Aylesbury Repertory Co.

Then he made his film debut in Hullo, Fame! 1940. His acting was now ch­ar­acterised by many roles wh­ere he displayed his talents for vocal mimicry and age artifice. After a few small parts in British films, he landed his first major screen role in The Goose Steps Out (1942).

From 1942-6, Ustinov served in the British Army's Royal Sussex Regiment. He was batman for Officer David Niven, where the two became lifelong friends. Ustinov spent most of his service working with the Army Cinema Unit making recruitment films, wrote plays and appeared in 3 films as an actor. He co-wrote and acted in The Way Ahead (1944).

Ustinov, 1986        

Wiki

He received his first Academy Award nomination for his role as Roman Emper­or­ Nero in Quo Vadis (1951) and won Best Supporting Act­or Oscars for Spartacus (1960) and Topkapi (1964). His drama, Photo Finish, was st­aged in N.Y, London and St Peter­s­burg, where Ustinov was dir­ector. He was a co­mic convict partner to Humphrey Bogart in We’re No Ang­els 1955, Capt Vere in the film version of Her­man Melv­il­le’s Billy Budd (1961), a modern Mexican general determ­ined to recl­aim the Al­amo in Viva Max! (1969), and Agatha Christ­ie’s sleuth Hercule Poir­ot in 6 films of the 1970s-80s.

Finney, Murder on the Orient Express, 1974

Outspoken & Freckled

David Niven, Peter Ustinov, Maggie Smith

Death on the Nile, 1978

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Peter also wrote most of the films he directed, especially noteworthy was the brilliant Billy Budd. Lady L (1965) with Sophia Lo­r­en and Paul New­m­an was probably his best-received directorial ef­fort. And in 1969 he earned an Oscar nomination for his screenplay, Hot Millions.

Acting was only one of Peter’s many crea­tive outlets. A notable pl­ay­wright, equa­l­ly appreciated in NY and in Lon­don, Ustinov wrote The Love of Four Colonels (1951), Romanoff and Juliet (1956; filmed 1961), Halfway up the Tree (1967), The Unknown Soldier and His Wife (1967), in which he also starred. Beet­hoven’s 10th (1983) was a comedy in which he himself starred as the great composer. His credits as a film direc­t­or in­cluded the scr­een adaptation of Roman­off and Juliet, and the darkly comic Hamm­ersmith Is Out (1972) with El­izabeth Taylor & Richard Burton.

He was Hercule Poirot in Death on the Nile (1978) by director John Guillermin. In the 1980s, Ustinov recreated Poirot in some tv and cinema films including Evil Under the Sun (1982) and Appointment with Death (1988), while his cinema work in the 1990s also includes his superb role as Prof Gus Nikolais in George Miller's dramatic film, Lorenzo's Oil (1992).

He was a master of the English lang­uage. Note some of his books: eg the autobiographical works Dear Me (1977), Ustinov at Large (1991) and Ustinov Still at Large (1993). In My Russia (1996), Peter gave his views on life, career and his multi­cul­tural his­­tory.

Most pleasurable was his act as a witty raconteur. Peter was acclaimed for his fluent, humorous one-man shows where every foreign accent he used in Eng­l­ish was perfect! I was convinced that Presidents Nixon and Reagan were actually talking on stage with Ustinov! His expertise in comedy made him a regular guest of talk show hosts and tv comedians.

He was also an acclaim­ed TV journ­al­ist. Ustinov visited 30+ Russian cities in the making of his well-received BBC tv series, Russia 1986. He won the Royal Soc­iety of Arts’ Benjamin Franklin Medal, but his efforts as a humanitarian were seen best when he became a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF from 1969 on. He was made Commander, Order of British Empire 1975, knighted 1990 and won UNICEF’s Medal for Distinguished Service, 1993.

Ustinov had made 70+ films in Rome, London and Hollywood during a career of nearly 60 years. But from 1971, his permanent home was a château in Vaud Sw­itzerland. He died of heart failure in 2004, the funeral being at Geneva's historic St Pierre Cath­edral. This British actor, author, director, playwright, screen­writer, novelist, raconteur and human­itarian was survived by 4 children.

Ustinov's modest grave, Vaud

Wiki

Feodor Ruckert Faberge silver, cloisonné enamel

Ruckert, coloured tea service, 1887-96, Alamy

Early medieval Russian silver often included calm niello work and ornamental lines with black enamel. But under Tsar Peter the Great (1682-1725), who west­ernised the Russ­ian Empire, local silversm­iths began explor­ing modern forms. The Imperial family and weal­thy cl­asses dined from fash­ionable, solid-silver Baroque, Rococo, then Neoclassic-style gob­lets, plat­ters, caviar dishes and bas­kets. Showy gilt-silver cigar­ette cas­es, cigar cas­es and tankards sat on shelves. Silver mirrors, per­fume bott­l­es, powder boxes and jewel­l­ery caskets went onto ladies dressers.

Cloisonné: an enamelling technique made from soldering de­licate metal strips bent to the outline of a des­ign, and filling the result­ing cellular compartments with vitreous enam­el paste. The ob­j­ect then was fired, ground smooth & polished. The strips were made from gold, brass or silver. Eventually bright co­lourful clois­onné-enamel florals were popular. Many ob­jects featured bolder champlevé-enamel des­ig­ns, the recesses fil­led with vitreous enamel before firing.

The Late Imperial Era saw prolific prod­uction. Friedrich Ruckert (1840-1917) was born in South Germ­any. At 14 he emigrated to Russia to work for a princely family, now re­named Feodor Ruckert. He spent most of his life in his bel­oved Moscow, where he had his art work­sh­ops. Eventually he had 14 craftsmen working for him, having full control over the creat­ive and prod­uct­ion proc­esses.

Ruckert, by Alamy 

                                                                              

Rückert was the most talented craftsman of enamelled silver objects in Imperial Russia. In Moscow, the cen­t­re of Russ­ian silver prod­uc­tion, he became an enamel master in 1886, working with every enamelling tech­n­ique (cloisonné, champlevé, en plein, guilloche and plique-à-jour).

Fol­lowing the Russian Revival style in the arts, Ruckert started producing traditional Russian des­igns, incorpor­ating foliage in de­l­icately shaded hues. Gradually his exper­im­ents with a more mod­ern colour palette and more intricate design el­ements develop­ed into a recognis­ab­le original style, while still tradit­ionally Slavic.

Rückert collaborated with some of the most resp­ected firms of his time. In 1886 he opened his own, new work­shop in Mos­cow and in 1887 he signed a cont­ract with Fab­ergé. In fact for 30 years Ruckert was the main supp­lier of clois­onné enamel for Fab­er­gé. Still, Ruck­ert supplied ot­h­­er important Rus­s­ian retailers eg Bolin.

Unlike other Europeans, Imperial Russians drank their tea at home and not in public tearooms. So the samovar was placed in the cent­re of the dining table and the accompanying tea sets had to be at­tractive. The tea sets included caddies, tea glass holders, sugar-cube boxes and cr­eam jugs. And to save the expense of sugar, some tea sets included a jam basket.

Rückert’s silver-gilt and cloisonné enamel tea service, Moscow, 1899-1908 a teapot, tea caddy and cr­eamer  with tiers of lobed teardrop panels with varicoloured stylised flowers and foliage (35,000 - 45,000 GBP Sotheby’s)

See Ruck­ert’s solid silver and cloisonné enamel salt, decorated with foliate enamels on gilded matted ground, set with cab­o­ch­­on emeralds. Moscow, 1908-17.

Enameled sugar bowl

Invaluable

Craftsmen in Moscow, especially those supervised by master Feodor Rück­ert, became known for their work in the pan-Slavic or neo-Russian style, referring back to C17th motifs of folk art. See, for example, silver-gilt and enamel kovshs-wine ladles retailed by Faber­gé, which inc­or­­porated enamel reproductions by Russ­ian artists.

The opulent lifestyle of Russia’s upper classes ended with the political upheavals of the early C20th. Heaps of pre­cious silver pieces seized from silversmiths, jewellers, weal­thy merch­ants, aristocrats and the Russian Imperial Family were melt­ed. Some were sold internationally for cash, or smug­gled out by westerners. Of­­ten on con­vent­­ional shapes, Rückert and his silver­sm­iths created an explos­ion of col­our, attained through the historic use of cl­oisonné enamel in which tiny metal lines were soldered to the surface then filled with glass powders in various colours and fired to a high gl­oss fin­ish. The result was a sp­ectacular ev­ocation of the C17th or­ig­inals. But far from mere copies, Rück­erts designs employed natural­is­t­ic or abst­r­act motifs in a modern adaptation of an earlier era.

Until 1908, Rückert’s work drew on Russian historical design preced­ents especially C17th Russian ornament. But after 1908 his work re­f­lected the influence of the emerging Neo-Russian style, which combin­ed Art Nouveau with Russian vernacular forms. Promoted by Stroganov Institute Design School, this Russian visual voc­­abulary spread across the decorative arts. He often com­bin­ed min­iatures based on Russian history th­emes with new arab­esque motifs.

Rückert’s designs were rooted in the C19th fas­­cination with national identity and culminating in the 1913 anniversary celeb­rat­ions of the Romanov Dyn­asty. But when WWI started in 1914, the Rückert family was being persecuted as a Foreign Enemy. Although the family st­rongly split from Germany and wrote to Nicholas II pl­eading for protection, they were treated as prison­ers of war and exiled. From 1915 any mention of Rüc­k­ert’s workshop in the Mos­cow Dir­­­­ec­t­­ory of Trade ended. Rückert died in Moscow in 1917.

 silver and cloisonné enamel bowl with bear heads handles, Moscow, 1908-17. 

Invaluable

Modern Russia
The 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union and then the rise of a weal­thy oligarchy inspired growing national­ism, an interest in art his­tory and a new generation of col­l­ectors. Fortunately Rückert’s timeless, Neo-Russian style withstood the chaos of the Russian Revol­ution and his works remained popular in the mod­ern mark­et. A record was established Nov 2018: an enamelled kovsh, £490,000.

Kovsh by Rückert, 1899–1908,

Khalili Collection of Enamels of the World

And see the parcel-gilt silver and cloisonné enamel bowl (above), cast with handles shaped as bear heads Moscow. It sold for $43,750.

Medieval sexual abuse & clerical crimes

From the late 1980s, allegations of sexual abuse of children as­s­ociated with Catholic institutions and clerics in several countries started to be the subject of formal investigations. In Ireland, in the 1990s, a series of criminal cases and Irish gov­ernment enquir­ies established that hundreds of priests had abused thousands of children over the decades.

Catholic sexual abuse cases in Australia have involved convictions, trials and ongoing investigations into allegations of sex crimes committed by Catholic priests and teachers that have come to light in recent decades, along with the growing awareness of sexual abuse within other religious and secular institutions.

A USA grand jury report recorded dozens of Penn priests accused of molesting 1,000 minors in 70 years. Now 12 other American states have announ­ced their own formal investig­ations into Catholic clerical child sexual abuse.

The German Catholic church presented the results of an investig­at­ion into decades of sexual abuse of children in 2018. The report detailed the cases of 3,677 mostly male children in 27 dioceses who were sexually abused since 1946. 1,670 cl­er­ics were implicated. The report detailed how 60% of abusive priests eluded punishment, or were moved to other German parishes to conceal their crimes.

Promiscuous Monks: Monastic Sexual Misconduct in Late Medieval England

Medievalist.net

After the Vatican investigators found crime conceal­ment in Chile, Pope Francis accepted the resignation of five of their bishops. Now special Chilean prosecutors are invest­igating 150 clerics across Chile’s 15 regions. The prosecutors are examining the offences that took place from 1960 on.

But was sexual abuse in the Catholic Church a C20th phenom­enon, ignored because no church had ever investigated its own clerical wrongdoings before 1980? No!

I have cited Emma Wells' paper, Monks behaving badly, as closely as possible. Monastic morality tales displayed a familiar and long lasting cul­t­ural stereo­type: promiscuous and corrupt cleric. Medieval bis­hops, monks, vicars and nuns got and get a bad press in literat­ure – because of their appetite for las­civ­ious­ness, greed and drinking.

Errant Catholic clergymen were a feature of mediev­al life, probably because of the nature of their profession: a] the decision to put boys into the priesthood was made by parents; b] the men lived celibate lives and c] the priests visited families in the privacy of their homes or schools. [Jewish and Islamic clergy were never celibate, so I have excluded them from this post. No doubt they were charged with other wrongdoings].

The problem wasn’t a product of the bishops’ indifference. On the contrary, ensuring that the clergy remained on their pedestal was paramount to the medieval church. In fact the ecclesiastical auth­orities were eager to uphold the highest of standards, and protect themselves from the wrath of God. They established mechanisms for disciplinary action in the case of failure. Across Christendom, monasteries, parishes and colleges were subject to assessments run by their own diocesan bishops.

In Catholic England, records first appeared in late C13th. In the 1430s, in an investigation by Canons Ashby Priory in North­amps, the Bishop’s Commissary found that the monks were indulging in feast­ing and games, frequenting the village inn, skipping choir services and not wearing their monastic habit. In the late Middle Ages, these results were serious: neglected parishioners, damage to the Catholic church’s reputation and some outbreaks of violence. Monk John Shrewesbury from Dorchester Abbey app­arently abducted a woman in 1441 and smuggled her into the mon­ast­ery bell tower in a trunk, where he had carnal relations with her.

In 1500 William Bell, Nottingham’s Greyfriars warden was accused of incontinence/homosexuality against another man. By the 1530s, King Henry VIII was already agitating for the diss­olution of the Catholic monasteries. So if clergymen did drink too much, if they did fornic­ate with prostitutes and if they did gamble with dice, their future was shaky. By the time Henry VIII wielded the axe in 1536, it was all over.

Clergy enjoying sex with each other

Patheos

Investigators exposed the extent of indisc­ret­ions eg from sexual misbehaviour down to inapp­ropriate clothing. The authorities investigated community gossip, documented indis­cret­ions and swiftly punished those found guilty. Wrong doers could expect shaming sentences, ranging from enforced silence, fasting, prison time, floggings, barefoot pilgrimages and excommunication. 

Medieval clergymen also had a bad record of frequenting brothels aka stews. The most notorious were situated in Bankside South London, on land owned and controlled by the bishop of Winchester. 

Although monks and nuns technically led cloistered lives, they were also an important part of wider society. They regularly left cloisters to visit family, conduct business, teach children and enter politics! Most of the secular deacons were members of a non-cloistered rel­ig­ious institution, and many of them lived lives similar to their flocks. They often travelled to other parishes, to administer to the spirit­ual, social and medical needs of the poorest families, but they also lodged in local alehouses!

In the Priory, a medieval monk seduced a nun, who became pregnant and had an illegitimate baby. 

She desperately disposed of the baby in the privy.
From the Miracles de Notre Dame, in Ancient Origins.

In 1531, Bishop of Lincoln John Longland went to the August­inian abbey of Missenden in Bucks. He convened a special tribunal to in­vestigate monastic bad behaviour - drinking, gambling and fornic­ating with prostitutes. A local canon, Robert Palmer, was accused of carnal relations with a married woman. But Palmer claim­ed that it was Abbot John Fox who had shared the woman’s bed. The Abbot was accused of many offences - nepotism, financial misconduct and of ignoring Palmer’s affair with the married woman. After investigat­ions, Longland passed judgment on both Palmer and Fox; Palmer was imprisoned indefinitely and Abbot Fox was suspended from office.

In early C16th, anti-monastic pamphlets were filled with vivid descript­ions of clerical misdemeanours. But this does not mean that late med­ieval clergymen were more tempted by bad behaviour than their predecessors. Rather it shows that the authorities made insp­ections of churches and monasteries specifically to unearth cler­ical failings!

Mercy Ships, lifesaving surgery in Africa

Don Stephens founded Mercy Ships in 1978, as a Christian charity headquartered in Texas, with the purchase of the SS Anastasis. During his time as President of Mercy Ships, Don directed and led thousands of volunteers from 60+ nations, plus employees in 16 countries.

Don Stephens and wife Deyon

Global Mercy at dock

Mercy Ships

Don pioneered The Mercy Minute, a daily radio broadcast on 840+ stations for decades. He handed over the programme to Mercy Ships spokeswoman Raeanne Newquist while Stephens wrote 3 books: Trial by Trial (1985), Mandate for Mercy (1995) and Ships of Mercy (2005). Then he won an International Humanitarian of the Year Award.

Surgical staff

Mercy Ships focused public attention on providing surgery, and strengthening the healthcare infrastructure in the nations served. Thanks to family support, children and adults suffering from painful, disfiguring and ?preventable diseases were able to find the healing they so desperately needed.

Screening day used to be the biggest day of the year for Mercy Ships. Sometimes 4,000 children and adults were waiting, hoping to be accepted onboard as patients. Recent steps in the building process included 16 months of detailed design work, construction of new machinery systems, installation of new medical equipment, and outfitting the hospital and recovery units. The vision to transform lives by bringing healing has guided Mercy Ships for decades. But the need is ongoing and growing.

Potential patients waiting on screening day in Guinea, 2012

Tertius - jpg

Still, many more children and families are waiting. So together with the nations served, hopefully the Mercy Ships will be able to make a difference in the lives of thousands. With the arrival of our new custom-built hospital ship, the Global Mercy, our capacity to provide free surgery and medical training will more than double.

This newest ship is the world’s largest purpose-built hospital ship, capable of more than doubling its surgical and training capacity. Over the 50 year expected lifespan, 150,000+ lives should be saved through surgery alone. Recent steps in the building process included 16 months of detailed design work, construction of new machinery systems, installation of new medical equipment, and outfitting the hospital and recovery units. The vision to transform lives by bringing healing has guided Mercy Ships since 1978. But the need is growing.

Previously Global Mercy spent Feb-July 2023 in Dakar, helping patients from both Senegal and The Gambia from the one port. In 2023, the Africa Mercy underwent an extensive refit in Durban Sth Africa, to prepare her for years of future service. Its hospital deck will carry out a wide range of surgeries eg cataract removal, plastic surgery to address tumour removal and debilitating burn contractures, cleft lip-palate repair, orthopaedics and obstetric fistula repair . This expansion and growth will allow surgeries for those in need; more health professionals trained and mentored; more local lives changed.

Africa Mercy’s hospital on 2 decks contains: supply services; 6 operating theatres; 102 acute care beds; 7 ICU beds; and 90 self-care beds. All pre-operative and post-operative work can be done aboard rather than ashore on busy ports. The new ship will more than double the annual medical capacity and is designed to carry out a wide range of surgeries.

recovery ward

 

In addition to the surgeries performed on board, ship-based teams serve in local villages providing a wide array of health facilities which include: dental and medical clinics, community health education and agricultural training. Plus there are conference rooms aboard for lectures and training.

It is estimated that 70% of the global population lacks access to safe surgical care, a 1/3 of them children. This burden is most heavily felt in sub-Saharan Africa, where nearly half are under 18. A 2021 study in four sub-Saharan African nations found that 60-90% of patients in need of surgery would face awful outcomes if there was no operation. Eg Senegalese parents who could not afford surgery to correct their children’s bowed legs. In any case, those parents could not be able find a surgeon near home to operate.

But in 2023, those parents received free surgery aboard the Global Mercy. The operation that finally straightened the children’s legs was the result of a partnership between Mercy Ships and Senegal, powered by the passion of African leaders, healthcare professionals from 71 countries, and 1,382 very skilled volunteers.

She is waiting for the surgeons to deal with a muscle contracture, 

especially when her knee hyperextended backwards.

The ships provided 3,513 surgeries in 2023, 1,400+ of them aboard the Global Mercy in Freetown, Sierra Leone and Dakar, Senegal. From those ports, the ship served patients from 3 countries: Senegal, Gambia and Sierra Leone. And apart from those field services, Mercy Ships’ work in Africa had partnerships with 8 countries; 3,513 surgeries; training in nutritional agriculture for 93 farmers; and training for 56 dentists. The volunteers provided 105,000+ hours of training for 1,522 professional healthcare workers. Via mentoring and training, Mercy Ships continue to partner local professionals and governments to build up a work-force of skilled surgeons and healthcare workers in the African countries.

Two Mercy Ships and the host nations made an even greater effort in 2024 when double the number of volunteers joined. Global Mercy is now serving in Sierra Leone until 2025, and the newly renovated Africa Mercy is in Madagascar.

Enjoy reading the book Ships of Mercy, written by Mercy founder Don Stephens. It tells about the remarkable hospital ships that dramatically changes the lives of millions of people in the most impoverished and diseased corners of the world. Or see the excellent Surgery Ship tv series (2017)