Queen Victoria’s grandchildren
Nicholas II of Russia
Born 1868, executed 1918
Ruled from 1894 until abdicating in 1917
Nikolay Aleksandrovich Romanov was born in St Petersburg on 18 May 1868, the eldest son and heir of the Russian tsar Alexander III and Maria Fyodorovna, formerly Princess Dagmar of Denmark, sister of Alexandra, the princess of Wales. This made Nicholas the first cousin of the future British king George V.
He was, by both nature and lack of training, ineffectual and easily influenced
Nicholas was bullied by his father, who failed to appreciate his sensitive nature, calling him a ‘girly girl’. Alexander also gave him little insight into the affairs of state, so when the 49-year-old tsar unexpectedly died in 1894 and Nicholas ascended the imperial throne at the age of only 26, he was, by both nature and lack of training, ineffectual and easily influenced. In addition, he decided to continue with his father’s ultra-conservative policies, ignoring the tide of reform sweeping across Europe.
Marrying Alexandra
Shortly after his father’s death, Nicholas married Alix of Hesse, who became Tsaritsa Alexandra Fyodorovna. It was a small act of rebellion, as Alexander had been opposed to the marriage. Nicholas did not endear himself to the Russian people by always consulting his strong-willed, domineering wife. Not only was she a granddaughter of Queen Victoria, but, worse, she was German (which she always denied, claiming instead to be English).
Nicholas and Alexandra had five children: four daughters and then the much-desired male heir Grand Duke Tsarevich Alexei, born on 12 August 1904. Unfortunately, he inherited haemophilia – a blood disorder that causes uncontrolled bleeding – from his mother who was a genetic carrier of the disease like her grandmother Victoria. The guilt that Alexandra felt about this eventually made her agree to see the peasant ‘holy man’ Rasputin and come under his malign influence.
Bloody Sunday
Russia’s involvement in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05 led to the strikes and outbreaks of violence that culminated in the Revolution of 1905. On Sunday, 22 January, some 120,000 protestors – peasants, workers, liberals, minority groups – marched in St Petersburg to deliver a petition to Nicholas urging him to improve workers’ conditions and to hold democratic elections. As they approached the Winter Palace, the army fired on them, killing 150 and wounding 200.
Nicholas wrote in his diary:
A painful day. There have been serious disorders in St Petersburg because workmen wanted to come up to the Winter Palace. Troops had to open fire in several places in the city; there were many killed and wounded. God, how painful and sad.
What came to be known as ‘Bloody Sunday’ was blamed on the tsar – perhaps unfairly, as he hadn’t even been in St Petersburg at the time. Peasant disorders and industrial strikes increased as a consequence, and in October, Nicholas was more or less forced to sign the October Manifesto, which allowed the formation of political parties, extended the franchise and established the Duma as the central legislative body.
Nicholas wasn’t happy, saying that he felt ‘sick with shame at this betrayal of the dynasty’. However, by April 1906 he had been confirmed as despot, with total control of the armed forces, Church, foreign policy and other aspects of the executive, and the Duma had been relegated to second position after the tsar-appointed State Council. With the addition of a programme of trials for ‘terrorists’ that led to the hanging of more than 1,000 people in eight months, the radicals were thrown into disarray until the outbreak of World War I gave them a focus.
World War I
Nicholas tried to avoid war almost to the last moment. For example, in an exchange of (English-language) telegrams between him and his cousin Wilhelm II, the German Kaiser, on 29 July 1914, he wrote:
I foresee that very soon I shall be overwhelmed by the pressure forced upon me and be forced to take extreme measures which will lead to war. To try and avoid such a calamity as a European war I beg you in the name of our old friendship to do what you can to stop your allies from going too far.
Nicky
But in the last telegram, the German leader was implacable:
Immediate affirmative clear and unmistakable answer from your government is the only way to avoid endless misery. Until I have received this answer alas, I am unable to discuss the subject of your telegram. As a matter of fact I must request you to immediatly [sic] order your troops on no account to commit the slightest act of trespassing over our frontiers.
Willy
A disaster in peacetime, Nicholas delivered little better in war. As an ally against the German-led Central Powers, his vast Russian forces were of small use. As his country lurched into famine and chaos, he turned to his one trusted adviser: Alexandra. She urged him to become ‘more like Ivan the Terrible’ and lead the Russian army himself. This he did in September 1915, taking the command from his cousin Grand Duke Nicholas, and leaving Alexandra in virtual control of the government. This, in turn, led to a constant stream of resignations by ministers, whom she replaced with her own sycophantic reactionaries.
Getting rid of the German
Out of touch, Nicholas was unaware of how suspicious his subjects were of his unpopular German wife. Her brother Ernest was in quite a senior position under Wilhelm, and there was speculation during the spring and summer of 1916 that secret letters had been exchanged between Germany and Russia about concluding a separate peace while the war was at its height.
Like George V in Britain, Nicholas decreed that all German references in his empire were to be got rid of – for instance, the name ‘St Petersburg’ was changed to the more Russian-sounding ‘Petrograd’ – but his German wife remained a liability. Because he had, oddly enough, refused to allow press censorship, the newspapers were now full of scandalous stories about Alexandra and her dependence on Rasputin. Distrust and hatred of the ‘mad monk’ finally led to his murder by a group of aristocrats in December 1916.
Abdication and arrest
In the early months of 1917, strikes were breaking out, particularly in Petrograd. In addition, increasing numbers of soldiers were deserting from the front line, going home – where the threat of famine loomed – and, in many cases, joining the strikers. Matters came to a head on 1 March when the army chiefs all suggested that Nicholas abdicate, which he did the following day. At the same time, he abdicated on behalf of his son Alexei and nominated his younger brother, the Grand Duke Michael, to succeed him. However, the grand duke refused this dubious honour, and the provisional government took over the reins of power. The rule of the Romanov dynasty was now at an end.
The imperial family was placed under house arrest at the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoe Selo, about 15 miles south of Petrograd. Nicholas had never had the support of his people, and now, he didn’t even have a throne. But what he desperately needed was a country to take in him and his family. The obvious destination was England, ruled over by cousin George. All they had to do was to approach the British ambassador and everything would fall into place.
Nicholas was so sure of this that, when he was under house arrest, he instructed the few servants he had left to pack his ceremonial uniforms. He obviously thought, when he got to Britain, nothing would have changed. He would still be emperor of all the Russias, appearing at great military parades.
But things didn’t work out as planned.
Betrayal
On 22 March 1917, a meeting was convened between the British prime minister David Lloyd George and George V’s private secretary Lord Stamfordham. The decision was made that Britain would indeed offer the tsar asylum. The good news went at once to the provisional Russian government holding Nicholas and his family under arrest.
The imperial family waited, fully expecting a signal to head for the port at Petrograd and board a ship to Britain. But then the tsar’s children contracted measles and were under doctor’s orders not to travel. And while the young Romanovs were recovering, the British king had a change of heart, and on 13 April, the asylum offer was officially withdrawn.
Meanwhile, in Petrograd, the tsar’s children were over their illness, and the family was again ready to move at a moment’s notice. Then, on 31 July 1917, Nicholas and his family were moved without warning, their destination the village of Tobolsk, deep in Siberia. As Petrograd disappeared from view, so did hope of an easy escape.
An 11th-hour rescue attempt
A second wave of revolution broke in Russia when the Bolsheviks seized power in November 1917, and it soon became evident that the lives of the imperial family were now very much in danger. To make matters worse, Nicholas and his family were again moved, to the industrial town of Bolshevik-held Yekaterinburg in central Russia, where they were taken to a fortified compound named by the Bolsheviks ‘the House of Special Purpose’. At the 11th hour, George had another change of mind and decided to try and save his cousin. But he would have to act fast. He contacted his friend Sir Mansfield Cumming, the ‘C’ of the Secret Intelligence Service, who concocted a rescue plan.
As the Romanovs waited in captivity at the beginning of July 1918, British spy Stephen Alley was scouting the perimeter of their compound. What he found was deeply worrying. The building was surrounded by machine-gun towers and nests, and there were also sharp shooters located at key parts of the structure. The House of Special Purpose had become a fortress and, thus, a major military challenge.
Alley concluded that any rescue attempt would be suicide for those British officers attempting it, and that, significantly, it would also be suicide for the family themselves.
Death and canonisation
For Nicholas and Alexandra, their daughters Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia, their son Alexei and their remaining servants, their fate was sealed.
In the late afternoon of 16 July 1918, a telegram was sent from Moscow to Yekaterinburg. Written in guarded language, it stated that the time had come to ‘annihilate the luggage’ – code for the imperial family. At 2.33am the following morning – after more than a year of house arrest – all of the Romanovs and their servants were shot by their captors. Their bodies were soaked in acid and burned, deposited in a mineshaft, then finally removed to a pit located down an obscure cart track.
In 1991, after the fall of the Soviet Union, the remains were discovered and, following a state funeral, reburied. In August 2000, the Russian Orthodox Church canonised Nicholas and his immediate family as ‘passion bearers’.
