Personal possessions of the Imperial family found at the Ipatiev House by the White Army after the execution: 1918.
1.The remains of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna in Jerusalem.
2. Personal effects found on the body of Grand Duchess Ella
3. Grand Duchess Ella’s right arm in the Church of Our Lady of the Sign in New York City.
The Illustrated London News: Sept. 21, 1918
Left: The grand duchesses and their mother, 1916
Right: 1914 Formal of the grand duchesses
Although the Soviet government took pains to spread misinformation regarding the fate of the tsar’s family after the assassination, people around the world already suspected what had really happened. Lenin’s government in Moscow was on shaky ground at the time of the Romanov murders and did not want to be seen as the murderers of innocent women and children. Some of the rumors concerning the survival of some or all of the Romanov women were actually started by the government to hide what they had done. They may have even gone as far as to install a group of five women in a house in Perm, where some believed the tsar’s wife and daughters had been taken, and force them to pose as the Imperial women. The average Russian peasant would have been unlikely to have ever seen the tsar’s family, so it would have been relatively easy to convince them that they had “seen the grand duchesses alive” in Perm. On the other hand, many of the executioners were quite open about the fact that the entire family was dead. This marked disparity in testimony caused just enough confusion so that most Russians were genuinely unsure of what had happened to the Romanovs.
Source: The File on the Tsar by Summers and Mangold
(note: this book is extremely outdated as far as the information about what we now KNOW really happened to the Romanovs, but it does include some interesting information like the deliberate spread of confusion after the murders by the government and some of the evidence from the Sokolov Report.)
Grand Duchess Olga, Nicholas II, Grand Duchess Tatiana and Grand Duchess Anastasia on top of the green house roof in Tobolsk: late 1917-early 1918.
This is an early brassiere, the kind which would have been worn by the Grand Duchesses at the time of their deaths. These were what was altered to conceal their jewels. Here is Shura’s testimony on the concealment of the jewels:“They put the jewels in wadding, covered it with two brassieres of heavy linen, and then sewed these together and covered them with wadding on both sides. The Empress’ jewels were hidden in two pairs of double brassieres, each weighing four and a half pounds in all and each containing brilliants, emeralds, and amethysts. The Grand Duchess Tatiana wore one and the Grand Duchess Anastasia the other.” Another brassiere was made for the Grand Duchessses’ jewels and was worn by Olga. As you can tell from the earlier post showing the corset, the jewels could NOT have possibly been in the corsets, as they would not have protected the girls’ bust and chest area from bullets or bayonets.
Did you know?
Out of eighteen Romanov sovereigns, five were assassinated.
Peter III in 1762
Ivan VI (who ruled as a baby for less than a year before Empress Elizabeth)in 1764
Paul I in 1801
Alexander II in 1881
Nicholas II in 1918
The first three were most likely killed with the clandestine approval of their own family.
Edit:
Peter was notorious for his love of Prussia, not Poland. He was an ardent admirer of Frederick the Great.
According to most historians, most notably Robert K. Massie in his latest book on Catherine II, Catherine did not directly order her husband’s murder. It seems that she was pleased that she would no longer have to deal with him, but that the Orlovs took it upon themselves to carry out the deed on her behalf. After her death, when her son Paul went through her papers, he was satisfied that his mother had not had prior knowledge of the murder of his (maybe) father. As Paul I was notoriously suspicious of everyone, his mother in particular, this suggests that Catherine was presented with a fait accomplit after the murder of Peter III and was not in fact the architect of the plot.
Some pictures of Grand Duchess Victoria Feodorovna (Ducky), Grand Duke Kyril Vladimirovich and their children Maria, Kyra, and Vladimir.
According to Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich (Sandro, Xenia’s husband), Kyril quite heroically carried a very pregnant Ducky across the frozen Gulf of Finland to escape Russia in 1917. (As I have said before, I am not overly fond of them, but I have to admit that is pretty bad-ass).
Anastasia’s Marital Prospects
I saw that someone who reblogged my Anastasia post earlier today wondered if Anastasia may have gotten married young if the war had not intervened, in response to my statement that she had no specific romantic interest that we know of.
So, here is what I think:
As far as I know, Anastasia’s marital prospects were never seriously considered. She was the youngest of four daughters, and consequently behind her sisters in priority of marriage. Even in the early twentieth century, many royals did marry in their late teens. However, Nicholas’ nuclear family was a notable exception. By the time Alexandra agreed to marry Nicholas in 1894, he was twenty-six and she was twenty-two (almost an old maid by the standards of the day). They married for love and had a successful, lasting marriage unlike many of their relatives. Nicholas and Alexandra wanted their children to be happy in their marriages like they were and would not push them into unwanted dynastic matches.
This is quite obvious based on the failed match between Olga (then 19) and Carol of Romania in 1914. It is clear that Olga had the ultimate veto on the match, as she told Pierre Gilliard “Papa has promised not to force me, and I don’t want it so it won’t happen.”
A year later, Carol asked for Maria, who was then just sixteen. Nicholas laughed at the proposal and told Carol that Maria was only a school girl.
Anastasia turned sixteen in June of 1917. Her parents still considered her very much a child (as they really did all of their children, who were very sheltered). In addition, Alexandra was a very doting mother who was dependent on her daughters. She was reluctant to let them leave the nest.
Based on the fact that the tsar deemed sixteen far too young for marriage and Anastasia’s eldest sister was still unmarried at the age of twenty-one, Anastasia would probably not have married for at least another five years, if at all. She may not have wanted to get married, and her parents certainly would not have forced her.
Even in the best of circumstances, Anastasia would not have been married until after her sisters and certainly not by 1917-1918. If the family had lived, I would say Anastasia would have been considered to be at an acceptable marriageable age around 1923.
