The photograph from the Museum of Intelligence Officer Nikolai Kuznetsov shows his parents — Ivan Pavlovich and Anna Petrovna — as well as his sisters, Agafya and Lydia. The original photo was taken in 1911.
The village of Zyryanka, Nikolai Kuznetsov’s birthplace, lay along the small Berezovka River, which formed three small ponds thanks to a series of dams. Opposite the middle pond stood the Kuznetsovs’ house.
Ivan Kuznetsov possessed a sharp mind and keen economic sense. Hardworking, inquisitive, and inclined to innovate in farming, he exemplified the kind of independent peasant whom contemporaries called “experimentalist”. Unlike those content with centuries-old traditions, he eagerly introduced new methods — ideas gleaned from books and magazines, observations from other regions, or even insights of his own devising.
The Kuznetsovs’ third child was born on July 27, 1911, and named Nikanor; at home, he was affectionately called Nika or Nikosha. It should be noted that Nikolai Kuznetsov’s biography remains clouded by ambiguities — beginning with his very date of birth. Ivan Kuznetsov was an Old Believer (referred to as “schismatics” in official documents of the era) and rejected many rites of the Orthodox Church. Unlike his devout wife Anna Petrovna, he was nearly non-religious and chose not to baptize his children.
When the family eventually decided to have all the children baptized, the poorly educated local priest made such a confused entry in the parish register that both the day and even the year of Nikanor’s birth became open to interpretation. As a result, some of Kuznetsov’s official documents — written as late as twenty years afterward — listed his birth year as 1912, and discrepancies persist even in his personal letters to family and friends.
Nika’s first teacher was his older sister, Agafya (“Gasia”). Thanks to her, the bright, gray-eyed boy learned to read fluently — and soon after to write — by the age of six. From that moment on, he was captivated by reading. His father kept a small collection of books in the house. They were all treated with special reverence: cherished, handled only with clean hands, and opened with a certain solemnity. On long winter evenings, the family would read aloud slowly, ensuring that every page was deeply imprinted on the boy’s memory.
Reading was not the only tradition in the Kuznetsov home. Fairy tales and ancient legends were also passed down through storytelling. Ivan Kuznetsov especially loved tales of Russia’s military glory — from epic byliny about legendary heroes to soldiers’ accounts of the defenders of Sevastopol.
According to his relatives, the first poem the young Nika Kuznetsov memorized (his phenomenal memory was then already evident) was “Ivan Susanin”, a heroic verse by Kondraty Ryleyev, a patriot and revolutionary.
It is surely no coincidence that, thirty years later, deep behind enemy lines, the thirty-year-old Kuznetsov would repeatedly recite both “Ivan Susanin” and Lermontov’s “Borodino” to his comrades near the campfire.
