Alexandra Smirnova

Alexandra Osipovna Smirnova (Russian: Александра Осиповна Смирнова, née Rosset, known also as Smirnova-Rosset, Russian: Смирнова-Россет; was a Russian Imperial court lady-in-waiting who served first widow Empress Maria Fyodorovna, then, after her death in 1828, Empress Alexandra Fyodorovna. Alexandra Rosset, was an elitist Saint Petersburg salon hostess and a friend of Alexander Pushkin, Vasily Zhukovsky, Pyotr Vyazemsky, Nikolai Gogol and Mikhail Lermontov. She is best remembered for her memoirs, unusually frank, occasionally caustic, and, as it was argued decades later, not necessarily accurate.