Pavel Pavlovich Demidov, 2nd Prince of San Donato

Paul Demidoff, Prince of San Donato (Gustave Ricard, 1859)

His parents were Aurora Karamzina and her husband Pavel Nikolaievich Demidov.

His first marriage was on 1 June 1867 to Princess Maria Elimovna Meshcherskaya (Saint Petersburg, 28 February 1844 - San Donato (or Vienna, per Ferrand), 8 August 1868). She died two days after giving birth to a son, Elim Pavlovich Demidov, 3rd Prince of San Donato, at Hietzing in the suburbs of Vienna on 6 August 1868. Her loss had a lasting effect on Pavel, who remained inconsolable for a long time, spending a long while in the room in the Villa San Donato where his wife's dresses were kept to try to recover her presence.

Princess Demidoff (Helene Petrovna Demidova, Princess of San Donato), John Singer Sargent, 1895-1896

In Saint Petersburg on 2 June 1871 he remarried to Princess Elena Petrovna Trubetskaya (Saint Petersburg, 25 September 1853 - Odessa, 28 July 1917), with whom he had six children:

• Prince and Count Nikita Pavlovich Demidov (17 March 1872 - 25 March 1874)
• Princess and Countess Aurora Pavlovna Demidova (Kiev, 2 November 1873 - Bussolino Torinese, Torino, 16 June 1904), mother of Prince Paul of Yugoslavia
• Anatoly Pavlovich Demidov, 4th Prince of San Donato (San Donato 12/31 Nov 1874-Marseille 27 Oct 1943)
• Princess and Countess Maria Pavlovna Demidova (Kiev, 3 February 1877 - Pratolino, 25 July 1955), married in Helsingfors (now better known by its Finnish name Helsinki), 30 April (OS) / 13 May 1897 Prince Semyon Semyonovich Abamelik-Lazarev (Saint Petersburg, 7 October 1857 - Narsan, Caucasus, 1 September 1916)
• Prince and Count Pavel Pavlovich Demidov (San Donato, 4 February 1879 - Paris, 30 April 1909), unmarried and without issue
• Princess and Countess Elena Pavlovna Demidova (Saint Petersburg, 10 June 1884 - Sesto Fiorentino, 4 April 1959), married firstly in Saint Petersburg on 29 January 1903 (divorced in 1907) Count Alexander Pavlovich Shuvalov (Vartemiagui, 7 September 1881 - London, 13 August 1935) and married secondly in Dresden in June 1907 Nikolai Alexeievich Pavlov (Tambov, 9 May 1866 - Vanves, 31 January 1934))

Pavel (1879–1909), Avrora (1873–1904), Maria (1876–1955) and Anatoli (1874–1943). (Alexei Harlamov, 1883)

They decided San Donato was too full of memories of his first wife and so moved to Villa Pratolino (now known as Villa Demidoff). They ended up selling San Donato, and it was ceded on 5 November 1881 to Gaston Mestayer (a French business magnate), with the gardens sold separately to Nemesio Papucci and Rosselli Del Turco. A large part of the enormous Demidov collection of artworks housed in 14 rooms at San Donato were thus dispersed in several sales and memorable public auctions, even the works gathered in the "musée napoléonien" created on Elba by his uncle Anatoly Nikolaievich Demidov, 1st Prince of San Donato and the souvenirs that had (mostly) been ceded to Anatole by his father-in-law Jérôme Bonaparte.

Arms of Pavel Demidov

Owning hundreds of factories in Russia, millions of square kilometres of land and palaces in Russia, France and Italy, Pavel was considered as one of the richest men in Europe. He developed the family fortunes and inherited Anatole's title of Prince of San Donato after the latter's death without legitimate issue in 1870 (with the title recognised by king Victor Emmanuel II of Italy two years later). He served with the Red Cross rather than the Russian military forces during the Russo-Turkish War and in 1883 he published the pro-Jewish "The Jewish Question in Russia".

• Princedom of San Donato
• Jewish Encyclopedia
• http://jssgallery.org/Essay/Italy/Demidoff/Demidoff_2nd.htm