SWETCHINE, ANNE-SOPHIE. - Russian convert, born in Moscow on 22 Nov. 1782, died in Paris on 9 Sept. 1857. Of the noble Sojmonoff family, lady-in-waiting to the tsarina Maria, wife of Paul I.
Married to General S., she moved to St. Petersburg, where her husband was governor, and soon entered into relations with the French émigrés and especially with Joseph De Maistre; through them she came to know the Catholic religion, to which she converted on 8 Nov. 1815. When the Jesuits were expelled from Russia (1818), she moved with her family to Paris, where her house became a gathering center for the most distinguished Catholics and for men of action intent on a Catholic restoration of France. Mme S. was its soul and its instigator; in 1834 she contributed effectively to saving Montalembert, Lacordaire and Guéranger from the danger of shipwrecking their faith along with their master, La Mennais; in 1835 she promoted Fr. Lacordaire's conferences at Notre-Dame; and she always showed herself most active in the field of charitable works and in the assiduous work of conversions; moving to tears when she discussed the Catholic religion (cf. the Examen religieux, reported by Fr. Rouët de J., [op. cit. in bibl., pp. 385-93], where she speaks of the pros and cons of the decisive step she took under the guidance of Fr. J. L. Rozaven in 1815).
Her works appeared posthumously under the editorship of A. F. P. de Falloux, were joyfully received and exercised a strong influence on minds both for their vivid, delicate style, dense with the supernatural, and for the loftiness of their thought: Lettres (2 vols., Paris 1862); Journal de sa conversion (ibid. 1863); Correspondance du R. p. Lacordaire et M.me S. (1864); Nouvelles lettres (1875).
Bibliography3 works
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