Wrestling Heritage

By Ajasha Grave

Wrestling Heritage welcomes memories, further information and corrections.

This is a short story of my grandfather Nikolai Grave a young officer in the Russian army, who fled his home country because of the communist revolution.

Upon arriving in Batavia (Dutch Indies), Nikolai tried his luck by immediately challenging the reigning wrestling champion, Limutkin. He competed in several cities in the Dutch East Indies, including Bandung and Semarang. Here, Nikolai hid his identity and used an alias, Masque Noire (Black Mask). He was embarrassed if people knew he was making money through wrestling. Limutkin performed  at various venues, such as Pasar Baru in Batavia (now: Jakarta), and Bandung City Square, and he always won.  

Limutkin boasted that if his opponent could last 10 minutes in the ring, he would be awarded a gold medal. Nikolai tried to take advantage of this opportunity. It is possible that he had no other income besides being a Greco-Roman wrestler and professional wrestler, so he needed to be a winner.  

Nikolai won the match and received a gold medal. Limutkin wanted revenge and performed a wrestling “show” with ‘Black Mask’ six times. According to the Bataviaasche Nieuwsblad newspaper, dated March 14, 1922, during a match on February 27, 1922 Nikolai suffered an accident after Limutkin jumped and landed on his leg. This incident caused Nikolai to be rushed to the  hospital and since then he has been unable to wrestle again. Because this incident was reported in the newspaper, help and donations for Nikolai poured in and a considerable amount of money  was collected. With the money from the donations and contributions, Nikolai decided to buy a plantation concession on the outskirts of Kabupaten Bandung from the Dutch East Indies government. 

Page added 04/01/2026

22565