The boy was caughtand sold to be a galley slave.
In 2008 he said he worked like a "galley slave" to run Russia.
Lew Wallace's book Ben-Hur tells the story of a Jewish aristocrat betrayed by his best friend and condemned to serve as a galley slave in the Roman navy.
The use of crutches had made his torso and arms as broad as a galley slave's, but his defenseless legs looked like an orphan's.
