Faithful readers know we’re obsessed with Houdini’s trip to Russia in 1903. There’s a perfectly good reason: this web weekly began as a fact-based companion to our forthcoming novel, Houdini UNBOUND - a historical fiction about Harry’s trip to Russia.
In our book he performs for, and becomes friends with, the royal family. He said that he did so; knowledgeable others have said the same. But did he really? Does anyone say so except himself and his pals?
| Click to enlarge. |
That’s why it’s so much easier to be a novelist than a historian.
Andrey Fedorov is chief historian of the Society of Russian Magicians. Like us, he’s obsessed with discovering the truth about Houdini in Russia. He has the benefit of first hand access to Russian libraries and news media. He gave a presentation in London recently debunking some of Houdini's claims about his adventures in Russia.
| Andrey Fedorov at The Magic Circle, London, 2017 |
As many of our readers know, Harry claims to have made his first big splash in Russia in May 1903, when he escaped from a Russian kareta, the “Black Maria,” the iron van used to transport prisoners.
As Harry told the story, the escape took place in the courtyard of one of Moscow’s notorious prisons - there is dispute as to whether it was the Butyrka or the Lubyanka. This poster, commissioned by Houdini, depicts his version, and it appears to be the Lubyanka, judging from the yellowish color of the walls.
Fedorov is not so sure. At first he doubted that the van escape took place at all. In this he had an unlikely supporter: Kenneth Silverman, Houdini’s Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer. Silverman had serious doubts about the van escape because “no photographs of it exist, nor even any accounts in the Moscow press."
But now Mr. Fedorov has discovered such an account, in the Moscow Daily News dated May 3:
"Harry Houdini, who has demonstrated his abilities to many prison officials in Western Europe, showed them at a prison here. He was searched, and there was no doubt about him hiding any key or tool. Then he was shackled and locked in a convict coach, carrying prisoners. The carriage was locked with all its latches and locks, and two minutes later, to general astonishment, he escaped the carriage without breaking the locks."
Two minutes? Houdini himself said the escape took him 45 minutes! C'est la vie for Houdini investigators! And now we have also discovered another contemporary, hitherto ignored mention in the “Vaudeville Jottings” column in the NY Dramatic Mirror dated June 27, 1903:
“...[Houdini] dumfounded the Russian police by escaping from their famous Siberian transportation cell after having been stripped and securely locked in.”
And our friend Mr. Fedorov has discovered something even more astonishing: a SECOND escape from the prison wagon!
According to publications in the Russian press, on July 29, a performance by Houdini took place at the Hermitage Summer Theater, during which he demonstrated the release of prison wagons.
-- letter to The Houdini File
Coming up: Houdini and the Russian royal family.
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HOUDINI IN RUSSIA, 1913
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HOUDINI IN RUSSIA, REVISITED
WHO WAS AQUAMARINE?
AT THE RUSSIAN CIRCUS
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HOUDINI, RUSSIA, 1912
HOUDINI IN RUSSIA, 1913
HOUDINI'S RUSSIAN ENEMY
HOUDINI & ORSON WELLES
HOUDINI AT THE YAR
HOUDINI IN MOSCOW
HOUDINI THE SPY
