Ryazan Governorate
Boris was born in a village of Gladkie Vyselki, Mikhailovsk uyezd (county), Ryazan Governorate in a peasant family of Russian Orthodox Old Believers. After finishing at village school Donskoy went to Saint Petersburg to seek employment at age 15. In 1915, during the First World War, he was mobilized into the Imperial Russian Army and Donskoy was placed onto a transport ship "Asia" in the Baltic Fleet.