Baroness Gembruk

A Sakhalin resident of reduced, exiled circumstance whom Chekhov visited, sitting in her kitchen -- described as a "former" baroness, implying a title lost along with her freedom and former social position. No independent documentary identification beyond this letter has been located; the epithet "former" (бывшая) is itself doing biographical work, marking the gap between her prior rank and her present Sakhalin household, of a piece with Landsberg's case in the same sentence as another instance of formerly privileged figures living out sentences on the island.