The Tsar's Travels: Home and Abroad 1881-1903 The Romanov

70 Pages·2005·1.39 MB·English

by  Banks

The Tsar’s Travels
Copyright Notice
Published in 2013 by the author
using SilverWood Books Empowered Publishing®
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www.silverwoodbooks.co.uk
Copyright © ECS Banks 2013
The right of ECS Banks to be identified as the author of this work
has been asserted by ECS Banks in accordance with
the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means,
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review purposes, without prior permission of the copyright holder.
All photos, postcards and images are from the author’s own collection.
ISBN 978-1-78132-140-9 (paperback) ISBN 978-1-78132-138-6 (Road to Revolution ebook) ISBN 978-1-
78132139-3 (The Tsar’s Travels ebook)
Introduction
The third part of my work on the lives of the Grand Duchesses is mainly
concerned with their father, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. The girls all worshipped
their father and in their eyes he could do no wrong. His daughter Olga was
particularly close to him. To understand the characters of the four Grand
Duchesses, it is important to understand their father. Each generation is
influenced by the previous generation and that is why my books go backwards
rather than forwards, profoundly influenced by Wagner’s Ring Cycle opera.
Nicholas was himself influenced profoundly by his late grandfather, Emperor
Alexander II of Russia, particularly by his actions shortly before his murder in
1881. Alexander’s bravery in the face of danger was to influence Nicholas for
the remainder of his life and explains why he appeared to be unmoved no matter
what fate threw at him.
Nicholas’s early introduction to assassination was swiftly followed by an
attempt on the lives of the entire Imperial family (whether by accident or design,
the consequence would have been the same) during the ill fated train journey
through Borki in 1888. On a tour of the Far East in 1891, Nicholas narrowly
escaped death when an off duty Japanese policeman attempted to kill him with a
huge sword. The tour of the Far East came at a time when Nicholas was pining
for the beautiful Princess Alix of Hesse and as a result he failed to appreciate the
journey as he would have done in normal circumstances.
Nicholas spent his early years in the army, where he was at his happiest. The
routine of the army suited his submissive character perfectly and even when he
became Tsar he preferred to adhere to a strict routine. When Nicholas finally
won the hand (in matrimony) of Princess Alix, he no longer needed to make
decisions. He had come to the throne shortly before his marriage and as Tsar he
was able to instruct others to make the decisions on his behalf if he so wished
and with Alix by his side, he was content to let her make any necessary domestic
changes. In later years, when asked his opinion he would simply state that one
should ask his wife, as her wishes were his. Unfortunately it meant that Nicholas
could never stand up to Alix when it came to Rasputin. Despite the fact that he
disliked the peasant (his sister Olga Alexandrovna claimed that Nicholas merely
put up with Rasputin for his wife’s sake) he did little to rid the court of the man
who would ultimately be a major cause of the rapid downfall of the House of
Romanov.
Nicholas as Tsarevich travelled far more widely than most royals of the era
and for the first time I have attempted to provide an accurate account of his
travels abroad and throughout Russia. The book naturally includes the birth and
early childhood of his four daughters (his son was not born until 1904) and
concludes shortly after the trip to Sarov in 1903. (The Tsar and Tsarina visited
Sarov, where Saint Seraphim hailed from. Monsieur Philippe, Rasputin’s
predecessor, who had a similar though less catastrophic effect on the Imperial
couple had claimed that if the Tsarina prayed to St Seraphim she would have the
son that she craved. Seraphim had not yet achieved sainthood but the Tsar
obligingly rushed through his canonisation.) The story ends where the previous
volume (the second) began – with the wedding of Princess Alice of Battenberg,
the Tsarina’s niece, where the young Grand Duchesses and their cousin, Princess
Elisabeth of Hesse, watched as the ceremonies progressed. The Tsar’s second
daughter, the young Grand Duchess Tatiana, could not understand why anyone
would ever want to leave their mother. She never did.
Photographs
Gatchina Palace in Russia where Nicholas lived as a boy
Marlborough House, London
The tomb of Princess Alice Duchess of Hesse at Frogmore House,
Windsor