The Unmitigated Gall of King George V -- Tsar Nicholas Edition

OP, did you watch the fifth season of "The Crown"? They discuss in one episode why George V had to refuse help for the Romanovs. The british royal family was under severe criticism for their ties to the Germans (remember the dynastic name was Saxe-Coburg and Gotha... they had to change it during the war to "Windsor" to avoid seeming too German).

And it would have done no good to anyone today had the Romanovs survived, anyway (except to them). Almost none of the deposed dynasties of the early 20th century were successfully restored for any length of time to their thrones later. It is unthinkable that the Tsar's great- or great-greant-grandchild, had their been one, would have been restored to the throne in 1989.

*"had THERE been one," not "had their been one"

When Alexandra told her grandmother Queen Victoria she intended to marry the future Czar, Victoria supposedly said something along the lines of “Dont do it! Russia is awful.”

It still is.

Nicholas and Alexandra made their own graves. And they had multiple opportunities to send their children, at the very least the girls, to safety. They did not.

Thanks you guys!! I've been obsessing about the George V/Edward VIII/George VI era of British royalty lately. But I haven't watched The Crown. I have tremendous curiosity. I'm trying to connect a lot of dots right now.

I feel very sad for Nicholas and Alexandra and their children. And it must have been a terrible burden for George to carry, to know your cousin and homeboy was executed and all of the kids were killed, and he had begged for help...What a nightmare. I feel like WWI hastened George V's demise just like WWII hastened George VI's untimely passing. It's like they aged five years for every year of monarching during war time.

Glad Victoria wasn't around for all of that!

I have a huge crush on QEII's dad King George VI. He and his wife were so freaking adorable. Such good people, and good parents. I haven't seen The King's Speech either. Should I?

Edward VIII was mucho caliente when he was the Prince of Wales! Too bad about his series of really bad, douchey life decisions and the Nazi sympathies. I suppose you could say that he ended up with the wife, the life, and the face he deserved.

George V was a nasty fearful angry little man. Nick II was a far kinder fella. Better husband and father. Perhaps that's why he didn't make it. The Windsor's always put the Firm first. They'll throw anyone overboard to keep afloat. Look what they're are doing today. If they had to let Harry , Meghan and their children be shot in a cellar they would gladly do it. Windsor's are survivors baby and they always get the jewelry.

For what it's worth. There is no way Kerensky could have gotten the Romanov's out of St Petersburg even if George V had sent a battleship to fetch them at Murmansk. The revolutionaries had control of the railroads. They refused to couple the cars or fuel the locomotives for the Tsar's train. They were trapped in the palace until July when Kerensky could only send them east to Siberia away from the Bolsheviks in the cities. Of course the Bolsheviks caught up to them. It was only a matter of time. It's amazing Kerensky kept the family alive as long as he did,

R7 well that's why people said you were sweet, not smart. What a pile of shit.

Russia has always been ruled by ruthless, brutal despots. Due to its size and cultural make-up, it was and still is the only way to maintain control and order. And because of a history so much social anarchy, Russians care about a society that more or less functions and to that end, want a strong fist on their leash. Saving Nicky and his family wouldn't have made the slightest difference to who rules Russia today.

It wasn't up to George V to Nicholas and Alexandra from themselves.

Tossing a "save" to R11

Nicholas married for love and everyone paid the consequences

I've thought about that too. I don't think KGV had much of a choice though. Whenever I watch a documentary about Rasputin or the Tsar and his family, I'm still horrified about how they put them in that basement room and killed them all. They said some of the Royal jewels were sewed into the girls dresses and the bullets ricocheted off of them, so they kept shooting. I do resent that his cousin didn't help the Tsar, he was torn about though. They grew up together and were very close as young men. Photos of them together are haunting, especially because they looked a lot alike.

'If they had to let Harry , Meghan and their children be shot in a cellar they would gladly do it.'

And so would anybody on DL.

I believe it was suggested, sometime during WWI, that Nicholas send the girls abroad. They wouldn't DREAM of splitting up the family.

Nicholas and Alexandra were responsible for their children's horrible brutal slow deaths.

R14 Yes they look like identical twins!!! Brothers from another mother. As tough of a sonuvabitch as KGV was, I can't imagine it didn't haunt the guy, what happened to his cousin.

What feels most poignant to me about the situation is that parliament said yes to housing the tsar and his family. George overruled them.

R16 That is so very sad. My God. They should have gotten those girls out of there by any available means. Although I imagine it would have been nerve-racking to let the girls leave but then not know if they made it to freedom, or if it was all a ruse to rape and murder the girls, etc.

^^^^ OP ^^^^^

And thanks to you all for your input. I'm so into it.

There were discussions about removing the children before the family lost power R17. Sending them abroad with relatives. Safely. They fucked up

Nicholas was not a very bright man and Alexandra was a hysterical religious zealot with undue influence over him. A very bad mix.

Allix refused Nicky's original proposal because she didn't want to convert from her Lutheran beliefs to Russian Orthodoxy. Alix's sister Ella, married to Nicky's uncle Sergei and Duchess Marie of Mecklenberg-Schwerin, married to another of Nicky's uncles, ganged up on Alix to convince her that converting was not the end of the world. The second time Nicky proposed, Alix said "Oh what the fuck" and accepted his proposal.

If Lenin or Stalin had seen the Tsar in exile as any sort of serious threat to their rule, they would have had him assassinated like they did Trotsky.

Sometimes converts are the worst and take on an annoying piety. Queen Sofia of Spain comes to mind.

R7 The Windsor's what now?

Nicholas was a faithful husband , loving father and a true patriot but he was a lousy Tsar. He fell in love with and married a bat shit crazy diseased woman. He put his love for this woman and their family above his responsibility to his nation.It cost him, his family and 3 million Russians their lives.

^ But they did wear nice hats.

Historians believe there were only a few weeks in late August 1917 when the family had just arrived in Tobolsk Siberia when they possibly could have escaped. They were allowed to walk into the town. Tobolsk was a small backwater but they could have fled with the help of many loyal guards and officers that had accompanied them. They were also next to a very large navigable river and could have been speed away by boat. This window lasted only still September when new guards were sent. They were doomed.

As Tsar it may not have occurred to him to flee. He was aware of the mortal danger but also probably felt he had to be brave about it. Perhaps historians have told this tale? I don't know.

The Windsor’s are survivors because (at least since the Glorious Revolution) they have been constitutional monarchs. The acceptance if parliamentary authority and separation of powers is why George V remained on his throne while Nicholas II, Wilhelm II and Karl I of Austro-Hungary were ousted from theirs. In an absolutist system, the monarch carries the can for miltary/diplomatic losses, whereas constitutional monarchs can justifiably point to the fact that their country has gone to war at the will of parliament.

Even Queen Victoria, who loved to throw her considerable weight around, abhorred the idea of a monarchy like Russia’s which was so far above parliament and the masses of the population and which ostensibly gave the Tsar far greater powers over his peoples than the British monarch had enjoyed for centuries. Victoria (who was very fond of the future tsarina and tried to marry her off to her own grandson and heir, Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale) saw that this type of power was unsustainable and exposed the Russian royals to grave danger. She wrote “The more I think of sweet Alicky's marriage the more unhappy I am. Not as to the personality for I like [Nicholas] very much but on account of the country and the awful insecurity to which that poor child will be exposed.” She had made all the princesses of Darmstadt-Hesse (her grad-daughters promise that they would not marry into the Romanovs, but Alex and one of her sisters broke that promise. Both ended up dead at the bottom of Russian mineshafts.

There's still Romanovs kicking around and they haven't been asked back yet. Russia is an ignorant and ungovernable country.

All the speculation aside, there is/was the matter of all that Russian money.

The Russian royal family is eliminated leaving vast wealth in English banks.

King George or at least his advisors knew this.

"And the tales of wealth in the bank vaults? Clarke meticulously tracks down each lead, finding among other things that there are, probably, some Romanov accounts in a private bank in Switzerland. But it seems that, with some limited exceptions, the family did not move its money out of Russia when the revolution threatened. That may seem odd to us now, and certainly contrasts with the way in which the new rich of Russia today are squirreling money abroad. But if your family has run a country for 300 years it is hard to come to terms with the fact that that glittering era is about to close."

This has inevitably led to stories of hidden bank accounts, stocks of gold lying in some vault, or hoards of jewellery in private collections. William Clarke, a former financial journalist who made a second career in the City, has written a real-life detective story, piecing together what actually happened to each part of the fortune.

The starting point was to try to distinguish what was personal wealth of the Tsar and his family, and what belonged to the state. Any ambiguity of ownership was settled very simply after the revolution, for all the Romanov assets in Russia itself were seized by the Bolshevik government. It took over the physical assets which remained: the palaces, the art collections, the jewels. The palaces of course remain, as does a fair part of the art collection. But other assets, in particular the gold reserves, had within three or four years virtually disappeared. Why?

The basic answer seems to be that Communist economic mismanagement was just as spectacular in the 1920s as it was in the 1980s. The gold reserves were run down to buy essential imports; art treasures were sold at knock-down prices; state assets abroad were ravaged by (among other things) the great German inflation. Occasionally even today we are reminded of the country's pre-revolutionary wealth, as when some of that gold dug out of the Tsar's mine recently appeared on the international markets. But the bulk of the state's assets, including any funds taken from the family, were squandered.

And the family money outside Russia? The remaining 29 members of the Romanov family today, scattered around the globe, are well enough off, but they are not among the world's seriously rich."

The Lost Fortune of the Tsars - William Clarke

[post redacted because independent.co.uk thinks that links to their ridiculous rag are a bad thing. Somebody might want to tell them how the internet works. Or not. We don't really care. They do suck though. Our advice is that you should not click on the link and whatever you do, don't read their truly terrible articles.]

Nicholas’s younger sister ended up escaping Russia during the Revolution. She ended up living above a drugstore in Canada. I think a lot of the Romanovs were left with nothing

no aristocratic relative thought to give her a couple dollars?

I always found it fascinating that there were those (can’t cite the source) in royal circles who thought that Olga would have made a good dynastic match for David, the future Edward VIII and Duke of Windsor. It might have proved difficult for the government to then deny a convoy to their future queen’s family.

Additionally, there would probably not have been an abdication and Edward and Olga to have their own family, leaving the Yorks to become just another cadet branch, like today’s Kent’s and Gloucesters.

^^Badly written second paragraph, sorry.^^

Although, R36, the prevailing understanding is that Edward was rendered sterile either from contracting mumps as a child, or an STD as the Prince of Wales. Dear Olga dodged a bullet. Oh, wait....

I don't have a lot of patience for when people fantasize about "if Edward hadn't had to abdicate..." because had he not, we wouldn't have been gifted the wonderful, elegant, kindly George VI nor the glorious 70 year reign of Elizabeth II. My opinion is, thank GOD for Wallis Simpson.

R35, well if they had jewels, Queen Mary was happy to give them pennies on the dollar.

My “what could have been” was if Alexei had died of hemophilia before Rasputin got involved with the family, and Olga became the heir to the throne. Apparently when Alexei was first diagnosed there was discussion about it, despite the fact that Catherine the Great’s son made a law prohibiting women from inheriting the throne

I want my brother in laws cock and feet

Tsar Nick's youngest sis Xenia ended up living out her long life in England. After she coughed up the Romanov jewels to Queen Mary they let their now destitute relative live out her old age in a "grace and favor" home... wait for it.... Frogmore Cottage.

Xenia should have written a book…her son-in-law was the one who assassinated Rasputin

R36 All the Romanov daughters were rabid Russophiles. They wanted to stay in Russia and marry Russian men. There was talk of Olga marring Prince Carol or Rumania but she deliberately got a sun burn so he would not touch her. Alexandra was also a very processive mother it's doubtful she would have parted with her" girlies" WWI made it all academic. Lord Mountbatten claimed he "fell in love" with Marie the one time he met her in 1912. He had a picture of her on his nite stand his entire life. Since Dickie was a poof his declaration is questionable at best.

^ Marie was the saucy trollop.

If the British didn't pay for sending Lenin back to Russia, would Putin be in place?

Referring to the Romanov daughters as "Russophiles" is absurd and demonstrates cultural ignorance and bias.

They were Russian, and Russian princesses. It's not as though they had any reason not to love their mother country.

A person born in Scotland who likes living in Scotland and considers himself to be Scottish is not necessarily a "Caledoniaphile."

I have no sympathy for Nicholas and Alexandra. They were both awful, too stupid to live. They brought down a 300 year old dynasty. But it's a shame their children had to pay the price for their parent's stupidity.

Yeah something was very wrong with Alexandra, maybe borderline personality disorder? She was a hot mess and even her relatives saw it. Nicholas was just weak, he wanted to be a farmer not an emperor

The myth that Alexandra was driven round the bend with guilt because her only son and heir had acquired hemophilia due to her is rubbish. She was a loon from day one. Early diary entries show a young girl who was a prudish religious zealot. A scold and not very bright rigid authoritarian. Always telling her groom to "man up" Her high sex drive didn't help. Even before Alexi was born she was a drug dependent hypochondriac. Before the age of forty she was in a wheelchair bound invalid. She was either sick or in prayer. Her daughters never saw her for days. Apparently she was still a bobcat in the sack because Nicky couldn't get enough till his dying day. The Russian Orthodox Church have now made her Saint "Sunny". She wouldn't be the first batshit crazy divinity.

^ Bitch stole my act.

R48 One's nationality automatically determines ones patriotism? Who knew.

R47 Rubbish. The Brits needed Russia in the war. It was the Germans who paid to send Lenin back to Russia for the sole purpose of taking Russia out of the war. They later concluded a piece treaty (essentially a surrender) with Bolshevik Russia. The Kaiser later disowned his own action saying "the politicians" made him do it.

Piece=Peace

R41 Olga would never have been the heir. Unlike their British cousins, the Romanovs refused to give women any power after Catherine the Great. Nicholas' heirs were his brothers until he had a son. That's why she was so desperate for a boy.

[quote] They were Russian, and Russian princesses

Nicky's daughters were born in Russia. They were certainly Russian Grand Duchesses. How "Russian" they were is another matter. Nicky was born in Russia. Nicky's wife was German. Nicky's father was born in Russia. Nicky's mother was a Danish princess and sister of Queen Alexandra of the United Kingdom (making George V his first cousin). Nicky's grandfather was born in Russia. Nicky's grandmother was German. Nicky's great-grandfather was born in Russia. Nicky's great-grandmother was Prussian. Etc.

In most of the world, being born in a country does not make one ethnically from that country. Such as the late Prince Philip, consort of the late Queen Elizabeth II. He and his father were born in Greece, yet there is not a drop of Greek blood in them, all descended from the Danish royal house and having married women from the Russian, German and British royal houses.

[quote] the Romanovs refused to give women any power after Catherine the Great.

Who was not Russian, but a minor Prussian princess, who hit the royal jackpot marrying Peter III.

The Romanov's of Nicholas generation were more Danish then Russian.

R56 Yet Alexandra wrote in a letter to her sister that "With Nicky at the front I have more say then any empress since Catherine the Great."

George V's first duty was to his country then family. Besides the love fest over Nicholas II, his wife and children along with rest of Romanov family did not begin until well after IF were murdered.

During Nicholas II's life time right up through WWI he was seen as a bloody tyrant and Russia a backward nation largely still running along lines of feudalism. Last thing George V needed during those unsettled times was to be seen giving succor to Nicholas II and his family.

Besides it wasn't as if George V/UK was alone in turning down Nicholas II's asylum requests. France and USA also refused to have them. Again largely based upon reputation; Nicholas II was a tyrant and Alexandra a hysteric. Only Spain via Alfonso XIII tried desperately to get Romanovs out of Russia.

Early on under Kerensky while life had changed for the Romanovs most assumed at some point there might be a trail or something, but eventually Nicholas II and his family would be allowed to emigrate.

Then all hell broke lose. Krenesky's Russian Provisional Government fell and Lenin along with his Bolshevik rabble took charge. That sealed fate of the Romanovs and many others for that matter.

By this time there was nothing that could be done. Krenesky (who barely escaped Russia with his life) was largely and harshly criticized by many for failing to move the IF sooner and to the Crimea where rest of Romanovs were holed up or making their way. Once Bolsheviks intercepted train that was carrying the IF they were all doomed. Lenin had no intention of the world ever seeing Nicholas II and his family alive ever again.

Another player, though minor, in this drama was Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. Alix held a confab with Willie - her first cousin via her and Willie's mums, who were both daughters of Queen Victoria - agonizing over the should I shouldn't I convert issue. Willie encouraged the match, hoping that shipping Alix off to Russia would vastly improve German/Russian relations. However, having his first cousin in Russia did not prevent Willie from declaring war on Russia in 1914. Some "improved relations".

R60 I'll say it more slowly for you. Catherine's son Paul hated her guts and passed laws barring women from the throne.

Nicholas was a pussywhipped bitch who did whatever his wife wanted.

Their daughters had no succession rights.

Elizabeth's family has made a huge mess of it r39. Perhaps things would have been different.

I recall reading many years ago that George V was ready to sign the document allowing Nicholas and family to come to London. His person secretary of many years disagreed with the move and hounded George about it until George gave up trying.

From Simon Sebag Montefiore's The Romanovs: 1613-1918:

[quote] The new provisional Russian government wanted the family out of the country after Nicholas’s abdication, fearful that his allies could rally and restore the monarch. They approved a suggestion by Russia’s foreign minister to send them away. Their immediate choice was Britain. In March 1917, the British ambassador to Russia (Note: Sir George Buchanan) spoke to George V’s private secretary Lord Stanfordham who then shared the plan with Prime Minister David Lloyd George. Not wanting to upset Russia and their new government—their allies during WW I—the idea was tentatively approved. Montefiore found that the British royal family even discussed the Romanovs heading to Balmoral in Scotland.

[quote] However, George V soon backtracked. He had been receiving angry letters from his subjects, many of whom not only supported the ideals of the Russian Revolution but were opposed to the British monarchy itself. He also became concerned with the realities of having two major imperial families in the United Kingdom. It didn’t help, either, that Alexandra, the tsar’s wife, was German—the very country the United Kingdom was then at war with. “The king has a strong personal friendship for the emperor (Note: They were first cousins. Willie's mum (Victoria, the Princess Royal) was the older sister of George V's father, Edward VII) and would be glad to do anything to help him,” Stanfordham wrote to the British foreign secretary. “But His Majesty cannot help doubting, not only on account of the dangers of the voyage, but on general grounds of expediency, whether it is advisable that the imperial family take up residence in this country.” George asked them to withdraw the offer. The government also grew nervous amid all the controversial sentiment.

[quote] Months later, in November, the Bolsheviks seized power. A Russian civil war began between the Red Army and the White Army. The window for the Romanovs's safe escape had passed.

R66 Ooops, my mistake. The "Emperor" in quoted Paragraph Two is Czar Nicholas, not Kaiser Wilhelm. The "Note" is therefore erroneous.

Australia or South Africa might have been safe and distant enough for all.

Tsar Nicholas was hawt.

Right after the first revolution when the children became healthy again, they were ill when the revolution broke out, they could have been sent via Finland Sweden and Norway to Scotland or to Kiev to their grand mother’s palace and then to Crimea.

If the Tsar wasn’t killed we wouldn’t have Putin is probably one of the weirdest and frankly dumbest historical hypotheticals I have ever heard.

Maybe “If the US declared war on the USSR immediately after WW2, would we have Putin” would be a more realistic question. At the time, Russia was extremely weakened by the war. The various Stans would have willingly rebelled if they had American support. And only the US had nukes (that would soon change).

Maybe if the US did that, installed a democracy, and treated Russia the same way we treated Germany, then we wouldn’t have the kind of situation we had today. I am doubtful because there is something in Russian culture that wants to be great and would rather suffer with pride than succeed with humiliation ala Germany and Japan. But, then again, one could have said the same thing after WW2 about both of those nations.

Ultimately the biggest mistake of the US post WW2 was not to nuke Russia and China before they had a chance to develop nukes.

R49 declares her judgment on who is and isn't too stupid to live.

And at the DL.

You'd think she'd be banned out of posters' self-protection.

Questionable weather if even offered asylum the Romanovs would have voluntarily left Russia. The daughters are quoted as telling their guards they did not want to leave Russia. They actual seemed to thrive in the small town atmosphere of Tobolsk. They developed romances with some of their guards. One girl is quoted as saying they would rather go deeper into Siberia then leave the country. Stockholm syndrome? Perhaps the family was just patriotic?

R73 Even the bigger pair, Olga and Tatjana, were childlike. They wanted to stay. There are rumors Maria had feelings to one of communist guards in Ekaterinburg and they has a birthday cake. Needless to say Alexandra was furious and so were guards. Many guards fell sad for the children who were nice honest and lovely. Even Nicholas was seen differently. Only icy cold Alexandra was seen as she was, unstable ex tsarina.

Interesting that Maria (the trollop) was the only girl who did not have jewels sown into her garments. Perhaps mummy didn't trust the saucy baggage and feared she'd exchange them for khuli?

The oldest two girls should have been married long before the Revolution happened: Princesses of that period married in their teens. There was a lot of interest in them from other Royal families due to their beauty and impeccable bloodlines, but borderline Alix didn't want to split up the family. So she got her wish, and they all died together in that basement.

The girls didn't have much exposure to their peers, right? More so than royal children in other countries due to Alexandra's tight control and isolation from the aristocracy who really disliked her, to put it mildly. She was initially viewed with suspicion because she was not Russian and she had an off-putting imperious manner that sealed the deal. The isolation led to their developmental/social lags and childlike natures.

Wimpy, not-so-bright guy and shrewish not-so-bright gal = disaster.

Well, they weren't saved, so that's that.

Millions and millions more innocents also died in the Russian Revolution.

I read a book about their final months when I was a teenager and was disturbed when I read that one of the Communists had touched Alexandra's vagina after she was murdered, and boasted of touching "the royal cunt". For a favoured granddaughter of Queen Victoria to end up like that - I just couldn't wrap my head around it.

And yet, R78, I get what you're saying, and obviously "blue blood" is not more important, though their unique circumstances and connections would perhaps mean that they had more of a chance of escape than your average peasant.

This thread is triggering me.

[quote]The Windsor's always put the Firm first.

[quote]There is no way Kerensky could have gotten the Romanov's out of St Petersburg

[quote]The Windsor’s are survivors

[quote] like today’s Kent’s

[quote]The Romanov's of Nicholas generation

(double "oh, dear" for that last one)

This thread is giving me a sick headache. Stop using apostrophes to make plurals!

The Tsar was free to flee at any time, up to the point of capture. He chose to stay, just like the naive Louis XVI. When the nobles skip town, perhaps it’s a sign that the King should consider doing the same. The Tsar, like Louis, couldn’t see the danger they faced. He had plenty of places to go outside of the UK. Hell, modern day Alaska was actually floated as an idea.

I don’t know the answer to your query, but Tsar Nicholas & King Edward V’s resemblance was uncanny. Of course this is due to consanguinity. Other photos reflect this even better.

I'd like a George and Nicky sandwich please

At the time, no one seriously believed the whole family would be gunned down in a basement cellar. Most believed they would be exiled to an estate in Finland to live out their days. Denmark was also another country that could have sheltered the family, the Tsar’s mother was a Danish princess. After they died so violently, I imagine KGV suffered from a lot of private guilt.

[quote] The girls didn't have much exposure to their peers, right?

That was anothe pathological thing about Alexandra. She kept the girls sheltered from other people; they were like little fairy princesses, perpetually dressing in white. flitting around at royal functions. She wanted to keep them away from people. Ann they had were their parents and brother; they never socialized with others their own age. Aside from immediate family, the only other person they seemed to have any friendship with was Anna Vyrubova, their mother's best friend, a fat, stupid blob of a woman who was described this way by Felix Yussupov, who later murdered Rasputin:

[quote] Anna the eldest Taneev girl, was tall and stout with a puffy, shiny face, and no charm whatsoever. Although she was not at all intelligent, she was extremely crafty and rather sly. It was quite a problem to find partners for her. No one could have foreseen that this unattractive girl would one day become the intimate friend and evil genius of the Tsarina. It was largely due to her that Rasputin owed his amazing rise to favour.

Keeping women "sweet" and ignorant is a long-used tool by Max Schlapp's et al. who probably violate the Mann Act as a regular "tool in the box" measure for trafficking not only young girls, but the "younger men Schlapp preferred. "

Nicholas and Alexandra becoming Russia's rulers was a perfect storm of disasters. He saw his grandfather die right in front of him, after anarchists threw pipe bombs at his carriage, one of his legs torn off. His father Alexander the III rolled back all his father's (Alexander the II's) reforms and made Russia a police state (although he was an effective Tsar, and IIRC his was the only Romanov rule not marred by war). Alex 3 was overbearing, thought of Nicholas as passive and incompetent yet he did nothing to prepare Nicholas for becoming Tsar. So when he died prematurely Nicky was totally unready for the job.

The one time during his father's lifetime that he put his foot down with his parents was insisting on marrying Alexandra. She was more intelligent than Nicholas but she had so much baggage herself (seeing several siblings and then her mother dying (diphtheria, I think?) by the age of 6, and of course Queen Victoria's fetishizing of mourning only intensified the girl's grief. She had been known as Sunny when very young, but after these tragedies she became withdrawn and painfully shy (bad qualities for a future Empress).

AND he inherited an empire whose satellite countries were straining to break free. As much as the Russian government suppressed their languages, religions and cultures and people, they were angry and determined to break free. Revolts and uprisings marked almost every year of his reign.

Neither of them learned a thing from the revolution of 1905. Although N allowed the creation of a Duma, he had nothing but contempt for representative government, and he dismissed several Dumas just because he thought they were too demanding. Although it's safe to say they both sincerely believed they were serving Russia, they both had that autocratic view that he "owned" Russia, for most intents and purposes.

When WWI broke out Nicholas made the disastrous decision to dismiss his uncle as commander of the army (not sure if that's the right term, anyway, his uncle was a brilliant leader, and Nicholas...was not) and then even more disastrously, he put Alexandra in charge of the government. She was clueless, hiring and firing ministers just on Rasputin's say-so. Like Nicholas, she may have had the best intentions, but she was hopelessly inept. They both made the revolution inevitable.

They did love each other passionately, so it's right that at least they died together, but they had no right to take their children with them. How incredibly stupid and obstinate. Those children died in terror and agony, and it should not have happened like that.

Had they escaped to Denmark or England they would have attracted unwanted attention and the ire of liberals, as well as being targets for the Soviet Union. His sister Olga in fact DID live in Denmark after the revolution, but after WWII the soviets caused so much trouble for her and her family that the royal family quietly suggested she move to Canada. Maybe N&A and their children could have gone to Canada as well, but being much more high profile than his sisters he and his family would still have been at high risk.

Yes, indeed. But it doesn't preclude Trump getting his ass ducked out by any or every circling vulture, right?

R83 "Tsar Nicholas & King Edward V’s resemblance was uncanny"

Oh Dear!

I told you I wasn't buried in the Tower

R79 Much of the "sexual " abuse of the girls and Alexandra was trumped up by the Whites to outrage monarchists and drum up recruitment during the civil war. The Soviet archives held a complete report made to Lenin by the head of the execution squad.Years later he wrote a more candid account. He wrote many of the squad were drunk and had hoped to "have their way" with the girls before they were shot. They were disappointed that all they got were corpses and to rummage through the clothes looking for jewels. No royal nookie. The bodies were a bloody mess and once stripped in the middle of the night it was hard to tell who was who. The next day they had to go back and pull all the bodies out of a shallow well. It had cold water which had rinsed the corpses clean. The guards commented on how Nicholas was so fit and his arse was muscular. No mention of his khuli being exceptional so Nick's dick musta been average uncut of course.

R90 George V by Jove! I stand humbly corrected! - Best, R83

George couldn't accept the Tsar and Tsarina, that would have meant involving the UK in Russia's Civil War, and dooming himself to being constantly importuned by his cousin to invade Russia and take the country back.

Nicholas and Alexandra would never let their son leave their custody, for a million reasons, but they really should have send their daughters away to the courts of royal relatives across Europe, even though the girls didn't want to go. Any of the girls who went abroad would have been spared a horrible death, and even if their lives hadn't been in peril, they had absolutely no life outside the family. The older girls were in their twenties and weren't dating and hadn't entered Society, they went out to nurse wounded soldiers and then they came home to have tea with mother and Rasputin. That wasn't a healthy life, they were at an age when they should have been discovering the world and seeing what their options in life were, and well. Leaving Russia as things went bad would have given then a life... in every possible way.

Alexandra is a fascinating person because she was unstable stubborn difficult yet Nicholas called her Sunny. She never took advices and kept her family isolated. Both Victoria and Nicholas’ mother were totally against the marriage. They knew she was all wrong for the position. R94 I don’t think those girls saw Rasputin very often. Nicholas forbidden Rasputin to meet them at their bedrooms and he was rarely in the palace. Alix and Nicky met him at Anna Virybova’s place. Anna was stupid silly and had no knowledge of anything, perfect friend for Alix.

According to Mathilde Kschessinska "Nicky was a Tsarevich on the streets, but a Cossack in the sheets!"

[quote]George couldn't accept the Tsar and Tsarina, that would have meant involving the UK in Russia's Civil War, and dooming himself to being constantly importuned by his cousin to invade Russia and take the country back.

George V was a constitutional monarch and did not have the power to invade Russia.

R92, I don't think you can have read my post at R79 as I clearly said that any claimed touching was AFTER Alexandra was murdered. If you think the accounts are false, take it up with Helen Rappaport, who wrote the book to which I was referring.

Perhaps the greatest flaw of Nicholas and Alexandra was that they both would not listen to anyone who was trying to talk sense to them. They absolutely would not. Their stubbornness and stupidity did them in.

"George V was a constitutional monarch and did not have the power to invade Russia."

He didn't have the armies or money to invade a country the size of Russia either, but that wouldn't have stopped an exiled Nicholas from demanding armies be unleashed on his behalf. Nicholas was all about the power of the Autocracy, thought it was God's will that a Romanov should will, if he'd have lived he'd have spent the rest of his life trying to make Russia back into the kind of absolute monarchy that nobody wanted but him.

^ Would he have wanted Russia back though? When it was all said and done, while the family was in exile, Nicholas was happy because he stupidly thought he’d end up being a farmer in the Russian countryside.

And of course, in a complete lack of karma, Nicholas and Alexandra died almost instantly. While the children suffered for however many minutes (which must've felt like hours to them).

I think it was the girls in the back that suffered longer.Between the jewels in their clothes and being behind their parents,they didnt seem to die in the initial volley but passed out. When they awoke is when the real horror began. IIRC Anastasia was the one who suffered the longest.She ended up being bayoneted many times . As an aside,Ive often wondered just how much treasure is still hidden from that time. Im sure many wealthy people hid what they couldnt carry,and of course could never return to reclaim it. A few years ago was a story about someone redoing someones mansion and finding all manners of silver and the like hidden during the revolution. I know when my grandma escaped from Cuba after Castro took over you couldnt smuggle anything out.They searched you and your luggage thoroughly. Im sure lots of wealthy Cubans also secreted their treasures away.

Hindsight is 20/20. All the talk of "sending the daughters away" is totally absurd. It was in the middle of a World War. Nicholas & Alexandra may have been delusional but they thought they could with the allies help defeat Germany. They had every reason to keep the royal family together. Events spun out of control rapidly after the murder of Rasputin. The revolution erupted in the middle of an awful winter. There was a 24 hour period where the chief of security told Alexandra she needed to get the family out of St Petersberg pronto while the train was still available to her. She had to refuse as all the children were sick with measles plus she was separated from Nicholas who was trapped at the front. The Romanovs were anything but lucky.

R98 Cue Miss Prisspot.

R104 but as outlined several times above, Nicholas and Alexandra made every possible bad decision from the time they got married

This 1966 thesis paper on Nicholas’s personal diaries is interesting. It contains some stuff I didn’t previously know:

- Nicholas fathered two illegitimate sons with a ballerina before his marriage to Alix. So somewhere out there Nicholas’s great grandkids might be floating around today.

- Nicholas and Apexandra got engaged at Windsor Castle, and both Queen Victoria and Kaiser Wilhelm were there when it happened. Sounds like bad fan fiction. Wilelm pushed his cousin Alix to marry Nicholas.

- Nicholas was so weak willed because his father was so domineering. He was so unprepared to assume the throne that at one point he hired a medium and conducted a seance to try to talk to his dead father and find out what he should do. The ghost of his dad essentially said “this will end in tears.”

Many Romanovs chose to stay in Russia weather out of patriotism or naivete. They thought the Provisional Government could control the situation. Grand Duke Michael the Tsar's brother and technically the last Tsar of Russia was one. He had six months to get out but chose to stay. He bet on Kerensky. It was a fatal mistake..

R107 - Nicholas fathered two illegitimate sons with a ballerina before his marriage to Alix. So somewhere out there Nicholas’s great grandkids might be floating around today.

Absolute rubbish. But that's what happens when one thinks a thesis paper is actual history.

R101 Many of the closest family members knew Nicholas never wanted to be Tsar. After the abdication he was perfectly content to shovel snow and chop wood.He was a compulsive exerciser.The guards marveled how a man who ruled 1/6 of the world could be so sanguine. His family was his no 1 priority. Which was why he was an awful Tsar. Alexandra was power mad and took their fall far more severely. Her health declined even more, she lost a lot weight was in pain "down there" and stopped walking. Meanwhile Nicholas thrived . This last know photo of the couple shows Alexandra at 50 looked 70 all skin and bones . Nicky looks fab. Ex-Tsarhood agreed with him.

R110 look at my hot wife!

There was a moment in time, when Alexandria and the kids could have gone on a "visit" to see her cousins in the UK, or even Greece or WTF ever, and stayed there when things got bad. Yes, they'd kill them Czar,inevitably, at least the girls and Alexi would have lived and no one in the world would have challenged a mother trying to save her children.

After the Romanovs were killed all kinds of imposters came out of the woodwork claiming to members of the Royal family. They always claimed to be one of the Grand Duchesses or Alexei, the heir to the Russian throne. The ones pretending to be Alexei were especially ridiculous, because the poor boy was almost dead from hemophilia even before he and his family were all shot.

Anthony Summers, a tabloid style "reporter" put out a book called "The File On The Tsar" which claimed that only the Czar and Alexei were killed and Alexandra and all the Grand Duchesse escaped. He includes a chapter on the infamous Anna Anderson, who claimed to Anastasia. He offers two photos of "proof" she was who she said she was: a photo of a teenage Anastasia with her face scrunched up like she'd making a face at someone and an elderly Anna Anderson, whose wrinkled, aged face sort of kind of looks like an elderly version of Anastasis. Well, many years later the bodies of all the girls and Alexandra were found and definitively identified. So much for his "superlative investigative reporting that makes Woodward and Bernstein seem like beginners", as one stupid critic put it.

Two crazy queens put out books that were supposed to be proof Anna Anderson was Anastasia: "Anastasia: The Riddle of Anna Anderson" by Peter Kurth and "Anastasia: The Lost Princess" by James Blair Lovell. Both of them knew Anderson and were apparently the biggest suckers in the world because they believed everything she said.

I read some of Lovell's book. It's pretty pathetic because he falls for her crazy shit hook, line and sinker. She told him the the Royal family had been gang raped by Bolsheviks, all of them except Alexei. Although no evidence exists that that ever happened he believed it. She told him all of the Royal family escaped and that their "exact doubles" were the ones that were killed. He gently admonishes her for that; that was the only one of her tales he didn't believe. He and Anderson and her equally loony husband John Manahan were out at a restaurant And Anderson barked "I want coffee!" and her dope husband says "no, Anastasia, you know you can't have coffee, it will keep you up all night." And she barks again "I WANT COFFEE!" Lovell settled the matter by saying "If the Grand Duchess wants coffee, then she shall have it" and he gets her her damned coffee. The woman was a lunatic and apparently Lovell was, too.

I read Peter Kurth's book. Kurth puts forth the notion that Anderson was Anastasia by quoting people who said things like "It IS Anastasia" and "I could tell it was the Grand Duchess Anastasia." He also makes the claim that Anderson was definitely identified as Anastasia because they had identical ears. I've heard hear of a lot of ways to identify someone (dental records, fingerprints, tattoos) but I never heard of anyone identified by their ears. At any rate, after it was proven she was a fraud Kurth would not accept it. He wanted the fairytale: "I was involved in her story for nearly thirty years. For me, just because of some tests, I cannot say one day say "Oh, I was wrong.: It isn't that simple. I think it's a shame that a great legend, a wonderful adventure, an astonishing story, that inspired so many people, including myself, should suddenly be reduced to a little glass dish." Well, it WAS "that simple." DNA doesn't lie. As for Kurth, he put forth conspiracy theories, saying that it was highly possible the DNA was tampered with or faked. He's a nutjob like Lovell was.

[quote] Alexandra is a fascinating person because she was unstable stubborn difficult yet Nicholas called her Sunny.

"Sunny" was Alix's family name, given to her by her mother, Princess Alice, Queen Victoria's daughter, due to her cheerful disposition, a name later adopted later by Nicky. Her British relatives nicknamed her "Alicky", to distinguish her from her aunt-by-marriage, Alexandra, Princess of Wales (wife of George V), who was known within the family as Alix.

^ Ironical considering there only about six photos of the neurotic bitch smiling.

Nicholas skull showed he had rotten teeth. Apparently he was terrified of the dentist. All the children had the "Romanov gap" between there two front teeth which they inherited from Nicholas. It is theorized that the fraudulent con artist Anna Anderson aka fake Anastasia always held a fan in front her mouth and later went so far as to have her front pulled because she obviously did not have the famous gap.

[quote] The older girls were in their twenties and weren't dating

Grand Duchesses/Royal Princesses didn't "date". When the time came, a suitable match was found for them by their parents from among cousins and the royal houses of Europe, and they became engaged.

Queen Victoria was a champion matchmaker, strategically marrying off her children and grandchildren throughout the royal houses of Europe, getting it right far more often than wrong. One of Queen Victoria's colossal fuck-ups in the matchmaking game was enthusiastically encouraging the match between her granddaughter Victoria Melita ("Ducky"), her son Prince Alfred's daughter, and Grand Duke Ernest Louis, Alix/Sunny/Alicky's brother and Ducky's paternal first cousin. They had nothing in common, hated each other, had one daughter who died of typhoid and called it quits after seven years of marriage. Ducky went on to marry the love of her life, another first cousin, Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich, whom she wanted to marry before Ernest Louis was foisted on her but was discouraged from doing so due to his Russian Orthodox belief. Ernest Louis went on to marry Princess Eleonore of Solms-Hohensolms-Lich. Their son, George Donatus, eventually married the late Prince Philip's sister, Cecilie. They did keep it in the family. As it were.

R102 Yes tragically. The whole execution was a grotesque farce lasting 20 minutes. To the painfully wounded children screaming in terror and agony it didn't seem like hours but probably days.

Royals of that era didn’t date like we understand it today, but they should have had a wider circle of acquaintances. For marriage, it wasn’t so cut and dried as being told who you would marry, but there would be a very small pool of acceptable mates. A very small pool.

Nicholas met Alexandra in 1884 (wedding of Sergei Alexandrovich, and Alexandra’s older sister, Elizabeth of Hesse and by Rhine.). Though both were still young teens it was love at first sight. As things developed it sent off warning bells across courts of Europe in particular among the intermarried royal families of GB, Germany and Russia.

People felt Alix of Hesse Darmstadt of and by Rhine for a host of reasons simply was not cut out to be future empress of Russia (boy were they right). She was too sensitive, highly strung, and so forth.

Nicholas's parents and rest of Romanov clan were against match as well. They also felt Alix was unsuitable for host of reasons. Nicholas was firm however, if he couldn't marry Alix at once he would wait until after becoming tsar when no one could stop him.

By the by Nicholas wasn't so firmly in love with Alix not to have that dalliance with said dancer , but lads will be lads. Besides such dalliances were common enough then, young men in particular heirs to royal thrones or noble titles needed to be shown their way around so to speak.

I digress...

Issue with Princess Alix was after the horrible death of her mother and sibling the girl had largely been brought up (at a distance and or in person) by her grandmother Victoria I. That tutelage produced a fine enough young woman who was bit of a prig and everything else attributed to a great English lady. Problem is imperial court of St. Petersburg was no place nor had any use for "ladies" English or otherwise.

Faced with Nicholas's ultimatum permission was granted for him to propose marriage to Alix. Having turned down her cousin, Prince Albert Victor Alix dodged a bullet there since HRH subsequently died but not before proposing to Princess Mary of Teck (lucky her).

"In 1889, Albert Victor's grandmother Queen Victoria expressed her wish that he marry his paternal cousin Princess Alix of Hesse and by Rhine, who was one of her favorite granddaughters. In Balmoral Castle, he proposed to Alix, but she did not return his affections and refused his offer of engagement.[68][69] He persisted in trying to convince Alix to marry him, but he finally gave up in 1890 when she sent him a letter in which she told him "how it grieves her to pain him, but that she cannot marry him, much as she likes him as a Cousin."[70] In 1894, she married Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, another of Albert Victor's cousins."

That dancer to took Nicholas's virginity. Yes, she did become with child, but lost it after a carriage accident.

For all the supposed hate towards Nicholas II and Romanovs in Russia there was widespread shock, indignation and outright fury over story of said dancer and last Tsar of all the Russias.

Russian media point of view..

[quote] The Unmitigated Gall of King George V

'gall' = bold and impudent behaviour.

R36 Edward (David) had no children so Elizabeth would still have become Queen had he not abdicated.

[quote] if he couldn't marry Alix at once he would wait until after becoming tsar when no one could stop him.

Both of Nicky's parents were vehemently anti-German and were against the match with Alix. They tried foisting Willie's (Kaiser Wilhelm II) sister Princess Margaret of Prussia on Nicky, who responded to the proposed match "I'd would rather become a monk than marry Margaret". Margaret was not keen on the match because she was yet another fervent Lutheran who had no desire to convert to Russian Orthodox.

Nicky might have been head over heels with Alix, but Nicky's family and the Imperial court most certainly weren't. They disliked that she was German and her priggish attitudes to Russian behavior and dress, which she had no qualms expressing publicly. No doubt the mutual dislike on both sides exacerbated Alix's fragile emotional issues.

R94 another lesion from the French Revolution that’s just not have made it to the Tsar’s history lesson, send princess far away when danger looms. King Louis XVI was lucky his daughter wasn’t raped and could remain with her mother till Marie Antoinette’s death. But, she had to endure the separation of her young brother and listen as he cried out from neglect and abuse, meanwhile her mother was a nervous wreck. Then after the death of her parents she was luckily released, again I raped, to live in a nearly poverty like exile with her uncle, the new (unofficial) king.

She made it to adulthood but was forever tucked up from the experience. The Tsar and all royals knew the history and should have known better than to kee the girls in Russia.

To the posters above, trust me, being shot to death beats a gate many women faced in history when men are out for blood.

Edward VIII had not married and bred children before becoming monarch, chances of him doing so afterward were slim.

First and foremost unless HM gave up Mrs. Simpson it wasn't gong to happen. Having been married twice before and failed to produce children doesn't exactly inspire confidence. More to point Wallis Simpson was aging out of baby making stage of her life. It could still have happened but again odds are against.

With that said there may have been women willing to become wife of the king if for nothing else than being queen. Any of the various princesses from now deposed European royal houses littered about might do but even there choice would be limited.

Anyone German would automatically scratched. High born ladies or anyone else from Le Train Bleu society then Prince of Wales now monarch ran with knew all about him and his various mistresses. Not even being queen consort might be enough to cope with specter of Wallis Simpson haunting about.

Finally it was known knives were out for Edward VIII long before he became monarch. The Grey Men and others not only felt then Prince of Wales wasn't up to (or even wanted) the job, but that as king they were going to have problems with him.

Edward VIII as monarch during WWII would have been a disaster for the nation and world for that matter.

All you going on about Nicholas II and or his wife and children fleeing just don't have a clue.

Reason why Louis XVI ( Marie Antoinette for that matter) didn't flee is because there is something ignoble about a monarch running away from his country.

Besides history tells us things haven't gone well for monarchs who flee their countries. Sorry example of the Stuarts is case in point.

Mary, Queen of Scots and James II fled and look what happened to them.

As for sending their wives and or families away, how could Nicholas II tell a his country at war that everyone should be doing their bit, while he turned around and shipped his wife and children out of the country? Besides where would they go? Only logical bolt hole for Alexandra (and maybe her daughters) would be Germany. Russia was at war with that country so can imagine how that would play if word got out.

Even dowager Empress Marie refused to board a military ship sent by her nephew George V to rescue what was left of the Romanovs holed up in Crimea. Her Imperial Majesty further delayed things by refusing to board ship until everyone who wanted to leave Russia did so first.

All this was going on while Red Army was not far away and things going very badly.

Dowager *still* refused to leave Russia until commander of rescue mission spoke to her quite plainly and severely. He told her "Ma'am they're going to kill you!" With that Empress Marie finally boarded ship and orders were given to set sail.

Battleships that were acting as escorts had their guns drawn towards port and were given orders to fire if necessary.

[quote] Dowager *still* refused to leave Russia until commander of rescue mission spoke to her quite plainly and severely. He told her "Ma'am they're going to kill you!" With that Empress Marie finally boarded ship and orders were given to set sail.

And then there's the alternate version. Dagmar/Dowager Empress Marie didn't "refuse to leave" out of loyalty or altruism, but because they hadn't trucked all of her possessions down to where HMS Marlborough was berthed. There were 36 family members, servants and aides on the Marlborough when it finally shoved off, including several tonnes of possessions.

It is ironic all of the emphasis that her enemies and detractors placed on Alix being German. Her outlook and upbringing was more English than anything else . Queen Victoria was by far her strongest influence, all nannies and governesses sent to Hesse were handpicked by QV. Alix and the Hesse Darmstadt family loathed Prussia, Kaiser Wilhelm and Bismarck .

R119 is correct, royals of that era weren't typically pushed into arranged marriages. Instead, they were introduced to the very small pool of single persons of the correct rank, and told to find one to marry.

Queen Victoria set the tone in moving away from arranged marriages, as she ad married for love... although I don't know that her husband did.

George V told all his children they could marry where they liked, this included commoners from nobility down to dead common.

Victoria I and Prince Albert strongly pointed the Prince of Wales in directions he should go. This included Princess Alexandra of Denmark.

As noted above royal parents drew up a short list and things were sort of arranged. Prince of Wales knew he was being manoeuvred into meeting Princess Alix, but the princess did not.

By the by for anyone interested vintage British television drama "Edward VII" is one of the best out there regarding QV, Prince Albert, Prince of Wales (later Edward VII), and Princess (later queen) Alexandra along with other members of BRF and times.

Even among nobility arranged marriages had fallen out of favor by Victorian era if not bit sooner. Royal and high born girls were free to choose but often within limits.

As it relates to UK Parliament and British people were getting fed up with endless often penniless German princes and princesses marrying into BRF. This was one reason Prince Albert was given such a very difficult time. Victoria pushed hard for her husband to be given crown matrimonial but her PM and government put their feet down.

Most of Queen Victoria's brood made dynastic marriages. However Princess Louise was allowed to marry for "love" John Campbell, 9th Duke of Argyll. Most of BRF were not happy with this match and neither were a few royal houses both as matter of family relations and being snubbed by their sons being passed over for a commoner. Prince Albert in particular was not happy (Germans have a thing about blood purity ya know). QV explained that her people were fed up with dynastic marriages, especially when the bride or groom brought little more than they stood up in. HM further went on that it was better if Princess Louise married for love as arranged or whatever other marriages often simply did not work out.

R131, good point but Alexandra's aloofness, shyness with strangers, anxious behaviour when at court, lack of worldliness, dogmatic religious beliefs (first Lutheran then Russion Orthodox), and strongly held view that her husband had a divine right to rule, made her unpopular from the first. Then her later fanaticism in faith healing and mystics, most prominently Rasputin, didn't help. It was easy to just ascribe her difficult nature as being "German" and "foreign", especially as Prussia/Germany's ambitions became apparent. That Hesse-Darmstadt was one of many German entities unwilling to become part of the German Empire dominated by Prussia mattered not.

That she was married and introduced to the country around the time Alexander III died was seen as a very bad omen: "the bride behind the coffin". There was also an unfortunate mass tragedy at a public celebration for the wedding where many died and the newly-wed couple were unaware at first and unknowingly missed their most appropriate chance to pay their respects to the dead. This caused many in the population to hate them and wish them ill.

Several things went wrong at the coronation which were also considered a sign of bad times ahead. Interestingly, several things went awry at QVI's coronation but they were glossed over.

Alexei was unlikely to make it to adulthood. In that era, that knowledge would have weakened the Tsar had it been made public, hence the strategic difficulty in rolling back Paul I's decree that no woman would rule Russia again. It was probably also true that N & A couldn't face reality about their son and "take away" his right to rule and hand it to Olga: clearly the most practical solution but a difficult emotional one.

Of course felt sorry for the murder of their children. Not much sympathy for their parents. The aborted revolution of 1905 was Nicky's chance to bail out on a job he loathed. They had the yacht ready to evacuate the Romanov family from Peterhof palace and flee into exile in Finland. They were 24hours away from boarding. Unfortunately for Russia the army got control of the cities at the 11th hour. Instead of seeing the handwriting on the wall crazy Sunny got weak willed Nicky to double down. Granting minimal civil rights and a rigged but elected Duma. Too little too late. Imagine how different it would have been for Romanovs and Russia if the revolution had been successful in 1905 before WWI tore the infrastructure apart and slaughtered the bourgeoisie officer corps. They had their chances. Nicky and Sunny got what they deserved.

What makes Nicholas and especially Alexandra so despicable is they knew from 1905 their son and heir was fatally ill and would never rule as Tsar. Yet they continued to gayly re-arrange the deck chairs on their Titanicski for all Russia to see. Nicky's brother Michael was another dimwit but a least he was reasonable and had a healthy son.They could have abdicated on the grounds of Alexi's health which is inevitably what Nicky did 12 years and 3 million dead Russians later. Royals compulsively cling to power. We continue to perform our obsolete kubuki long after the audience has left the theatre.

R129, the king’s younger brothers were both handed the crown after Napoleon’s fall. So, based on the way things went, it’s not out of the question tot him that Louis XVI would have been placed back on the throne if he lived long enough, he was a fat ass after all.

Though I agree, Kings fleeing isn’t a good look, but there is never an excuse for leaving your heirs or daughters around when danger lurks.

King Louis should have order Marie Antionette and the children to leave for Vienna. Her brother would have kept his family safe till Napoleon took power and they needed to be on the run.

[quote] Louis XVI ( Marie Antoinette for that matter) didn't flee is because there is something ignoble about a monarch running away from his country.

As for "A king fleeing or sending his family away is a bad look"...

NICHOLAS' ENTIRE REIGN WAS A BAD LOOK. The man was addicted to stupid decisions and didn't care what The People thought. Sending his children away would've been just another choice he made, although one that would've kept his family alive.

How can gall be "mitigated" or "unmitigated"? I think I'm going to have to issue an OH DEAR on stylistic grounds.

Oh, God, this again. It was the UK government that refused to let GV do any more than he did. The new Russia was considered a powerful new player on the European and world stage. Allowing the Romanovs into Britain would have set them up as a core around which a large cult would gather that aimed to restore the monarchy.

It was the government.

R141 is right. This would be like the British letting Bin Laden into the UK right after 9/11. It would ah e cause major issues for the British as the powerful Americans pressure the hell out of them.

The Tsar would have been seen like a terrorist or enemy number one for the new Russian government.

Yeah, R136, that's the really stupid thing about Nicholas and Alexandria, the fact that they were never willing to be realistic about the inheritance problem. It was unlikely that Alexei would live to adulthood and the chances of him being fertile were zero (the hematomas he constantly suffered would have damaged his testes and ducts), so he HAD to give up on the dream of leaving his empire to his son and grandsons. He HAD to bring his brother and nephew into his political life whether he liked it or not, do his best to fit them into the roles that at least one of them would inevitably have to fulfill.

But he didn't. He doubled down on isolating his family, and pushed his brothers away instead of bringing them closer. He was a fool.

R123, R140 I don't think gall is the appropriate word for George's situation.

George wasn't in a situation; George was under no obligation to appease distant relations.

Remember that King George and the Queen Mother refused to send Elizabeth and Margaret away while London was being bombed. They felt it was their role to rally the population around the war effort.

R141 You royalist Windsor lickspittle never stop spinning. The Achieves have the bloody letters and telegrams.Both British and Russian With weeks of the Tsar abdicating the PM Lloyd George's government agreed to provide asylum in England for Nicholas and his family. Its a matter of historical record dolt. The PM felt to keep Russia in the war he had to support the new Provisional Government's request .It was your beloved George V & Queen Mary who reading the papers and seeing the bad publicity it would give his "unpopular and alien dynasty of Saxe Coburg Gotha" who dispatched his "grey man: Lord Stamfordham in a panic to No. 10 not once but three time in a week. To insist that and we quote " His Majesty MUST BEG YOU to represent to the Prime Minister that from all he hears and reads in the press, the residence in this country of the ex-Emperor and Empress would be strongly resented by the public, and would undoubtedly COMPROMISE THE POSITION of the King and Queen from whom it would generally be assumed the invitation had emanated…” Lloyd George put the true story in his memories but was pressured to remove it and take the responsibility for withdrawing the offer, which he did as his patriotic duty. So it wasn't the '"Government" it was the Windsors. Why do royalist toadies insist on being apologist for this vile family even 105 years after the fact. God Pathetic .Fail yet again R141.

R145 and yet the girls did leave London for a time. They were sent out in the country. They were evacuees sent to Windsor Castle. King George VI felt it was safer for them.

Dear Nicky I remain always your devoted friend and cousin (until you put me in a compromising situation) Georgie

There is no such thing as honor amongst thieves or kings.

There's nothing dishonourable about refusing asylum for a brutal dictator.

Say what you will about nutty Alexandra she truely loved and took care of her son Alexi till the bitter end. Unlike the cold cunt Queen Mary who sent her epileptic on the spectrum youngest son Prince John into exile at age 6. Out of site out of mind. When the poor little tyke died his loving bro Edward wrote " good riddance he was really an animal" Mummy May and Papa Georgie never mentioned Johnny again. Windsor family values.

[quote] Windsor lickspittle

Dear, R151, I hope you're exercising your maternal value and High Indignation at your local animal shelter.

R150 Not at all .What is dishonorable is for 80 years blaming it on other people and refusing to accept responsibility for your decision. It's called Noblesse Oblige. Google it dear.

R154 When didn't he accept responsibility for his decision?

You don't dispense Noblesse Oblige to non-taxpaying foreigners.

What makes George V an unmitigated bastard is not only was Nicholas his blood relative he was his wartime ALLY. When the French and Brutish armies were getting the shit kicked out of them by the Bosch .Nicholas ordered ( despite his generals advise) an offensive on the eastern front to take the pressure off the Allied armies in the west. 68,000 Russian soldiers died in one battle. Paris was saved. Yet just 26 months later Georgie seems to have forgotten all about it. Soap opera memory indeed.

R155 Are you thick?. What part of R146 post did you not get?. Is English your second language? Once more . Slowly. For 85 years the Windsors blamed the liberal government of David Lloyd George for pulling the asylum offer for the Romanovs. History books for 85 years had George V saying with tears in his eyes " Simply because the poor man (Nicholas) was an Emperor, if he had been one of them (a politician) they would have helped him soon enough." This is not just a lie it's fucking lie. The talent of this rotten family lies not in noblesse oblige but dissembling.

R138

Flight to Varennes was poorly planned and badly executed. Much of this again could be laid at feet of Louis XVI whose indecisiveness caused numerous delays. It took some prodding from Marie-Antoinette to finally light a fire under the king's behind, but it was all too bad. It's worth nothing the king's brother also fled Paris that night but via a different route and reached safety.

In any event the aborted escape attempt proved a decisive turning point in the French revolution and for the lives of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette.

As posted above previously things were not going that bad for the king, there was still a very good chance France would emerge a constitutional monarchy with Louis XVI as its king. Flight to Varennes changed all that; much if the goodwill left to the king and his family soon vanished. Indeed it was this escape attempt that turned events against the king which lead pretty much directly to his trial and execution with Marie-Antionette not far behind. It also lead to removal of the Dauphin and .his sister from their mother which hurt Marie-Antoinette terribly.

Nepo Baby vs. Nepo Baby

From British television drama "The Lost Prince"

Though piece played fast and lose with historical accuracy following scene as seen in clip was how world then and many today viewed Nicholas II, Alexandra and their family.

From same program how George V and Queen Mary were told their imperial cousins along with family had been murdered.

The Duke of Windsor use to tell the story of when he was at breakfast with his father George V and his mother Queen Mary. A lackey brought a dispatch saying the Russian government had requested asylum for the Tsar and his family. Edward said his father read the dispatch and passed it to his mother. Queen Mary glanced at it ,gave it back to her husband and simply said "No".

I see posts about how shitty George V was, etc. but they overlook one of the things that was also part of their thinking in the British Royal Family. For them, it was inconceivable that the Russian People would ever assassinate the Czar much less murder his entire family. For some reason everyone in that privileged class believed there was some aura protecting them and no one would dare harm them.

Have mentioned this in previous DL threads on Romonavs, anyone interested in history of that family should pick up "The Romanovs: 1613-1918", Simon Sebag Montefiore.

Read it in French ( hardcover) years ago when it first came out, now it's available in paperback and other formats.

In an attempt to flee, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette procured a huge green and yellow carriage, outfitted with luxurious accoutrements, and driven by six horses. They weren't just gong to flee, they were going to flee in style. Needless to say, their means of transportation stood out like a turd in a punchbowl and they were of course captured. Talk about stupid! They were as dumb as Nicky and Sunny.

[quote] Unlike the cold cunt Queen Mary who sent her epileptic on the spectrum youngest son Prince John into exile at age 6.

Prince John spent much of his short life isolated at Wood Farm on the Sandringham Estate, where he died age 13. I wonder if Prince Philip, who spent his last few years living at Wood Farm, met up with Johnny's ghost.

R164 Have you ever read a Russian history book? Well you can bet George V had:

Nicholas I ( four assassination attempts) Alexander II ( six assassination attempts) assassinated 1881 Alexander III ( three assasination attemps) final one 1888 contributes to his death 1891 Grand Duke Sergei assassinated 1905 Nicholas II three assasination attemps wounded in Japan. 1891

George V had many reservations about giving Nicholas II and his family aslyum in UK, chief among them was how dangerous or at least difficult things would be travel wise.

Even in peacetime getting from St. Petersburg or other parts of Russia to Europe and UK wasn't exactly quick nor easy. But this was war time.

Going by rail (then presumably boat train from France) would mean traveling through Germany, a country Russia was current at war with, so that wasn't going to happen.

From St. Petersburg by ship (via Baltic Sea) making way about Denmark to North Sea thus onto UK would work. But again world was at war and without a British naval escort getting past Germany could prove tricky.

Of course once out of Russia the Romanovs could have parked themselves in Denmark (Empress Marie's homeland), but again all sorts of dynastic issues could crop up. Denmark had neither forgotten nor wholly forgave and memories of Second Schleswig War were still fresh in some minds. Alexandra being German.....

R169 Travel safety? Really ? That's the best you can do.? Another disingenuous royalist apologist. The Kaiser had said he would give orders to let a warship carrying the Romanovs leave Murmansk unharmed. What part of : "His Majesty MUST BEG YOU to represent to the Prime Minister that from all he hears and reads in the press, the residence in this country of the ex-Emperor and Empress would be strongly resented by the public, and would undoubtedly COMPROMISE THE POSITION of the King and Queen from whom it would generally be assumed the invitation had emanated…” Do you pretend not to get. Another lickspittle fail.

R168

Romamovs simply wouldn't listen; age of feudalism was over and more to point forces unleashed by French revolution and Napoleon's wars were catching up on rest of Europe.

Both Austria-Hungry and Russia had pretty much same basic problems; their empires were cobbled together with various peoples who often had nothing in common with each other. They wanted to be free and not under yoke of some emperor's government.

Russian empire in particular was so vast that when sun set on one part it was rising on another. More to point Nicholas II was one of the last remaining absolute monarchs in Europe long after such governments were gone.

Towards end Romanovs did begin various schemes to bring Russia out of the dark ages so to speak. But more needed to be done in terms of "industrial revolution" as it were including building up a large educated middle class.

Many of the Romanovs saw that days of absolute monarchy were past it and urged Nicholas II accept ideas and other things put forward by ministers who sought to move Russia along those lines. Empress Alexandra would have none of it; she got at Nicholas II day in and out about how it was his duty to preserve things as they were to pass onto his heir Alexi. Oh yes, those same members of Romanov family were urging Nicholas II to put his wife away, even if that meant packing her off back to Germany. That obviously didn't happen either.

Nicholas II and Alexandra simply felt what was dominate theory in some quarters; Russia was simply too big an empire to be governed by anything else than an absolute monarch who could put boots on necks when required. Each time any reforms were enacted by this or that Tsar things quickly backtracked after another assassination attempt or success.

Pity of thing is Russians never got half the freedoms promised by revolution. Between them Lenin and Stalin killed (directly or indirectly), imprisoned or put away more Russians than the Romanovs ever did.

Recent events in Russia prove Putin is just as bad or worse than Lenin or Stalin and certainly Nicholas II.

R162 Thank you for posting that clip (it's heartbreaking). I've been intending to watch The Lost Prince for some time. I've been learning about Prince John, another rather sad story. They did such a great job using King George futzing with his stupid stamps as the perfect counterpoint to scenes of the Romanovs in captivity and the servant relaying the news of their brutal murders.

R170

Whatever institution you are confined to needs to look at their staffing; as it's obvious you are not being medicated appropriately and on time.

This delusion you have of being able to accurately identify every single poster on DL must stop. You are frequently if not always wrong.

As saying goes; when we want you to make noise will rattle your cage.

Perhaps George V thought he was making up for not rescuing Nicky, Alix et al when in 1919 he sent HMS Marlborough to Yalta to rescue his aunt (Nicky's mum Dagmar, the sister of George's mum Alexandra), cousins (several of Dagmar's children/grandchildren), Grand Duchess Olga Konstantinovna (also Queen Olga of Greece and the late Prince Philip's paternal grandmother) and a whole passal of Romanovs, descendants of Nicholas I and Alexander III Of course, none of them were political mindfields.

R151 Yeah I actually just went online last night and bought a couple of photos of the young forgotten Prince John, so that I can honor him in my home. I know -- fucking MARY!!!! But as I've been going down the rabbit hole of the King George V - Edward VIII - King George VI eras, the plight of the young prince really got me in the feels. It's very sad and I just wanted to sort of rally and give the little cheeky monkey a "home" on my photo wall.

^^^^^ OP ^^^^^^

He was adorable. Looked a lot like his big brother David.

[quote] Of course once out of Russia the Romanovs could have parked themselves in Denmark

Which is exactly what Nicky's mum Dagmar (Empress Maria Feodorovna) did. After escaping Russia on the HMS Marlborough, and spending time with her sister Alexandra in England - which she hated because she went from Empress of All Russias to a virtual nobody - she moved in briefly with her nephew King Christian X at Amalianborg Palace before finally settling down at her holiday villa Hvidøre near Copenhagen. She died there in 1928, age 80.

Correction R174 p a s s E l

R173 Miss Prisspot as the saying goes:

Big winds come from empty caves.

The only Romanov who is worthy of admiration of Nicholas surviving family is his sister Olga. Unlike his other sister Xenia who hawked her mothers jewels for a roof over her head from the Windsors . Olga was independent and forged her own way. She was down to earth ,not at all a stereotypical "royal princess". She saw the handwriting on the wall for the dynasty. Divorced her gay royal arranged marriage hubby and married the man she loved . He was a non royal officer in the guards. She escaped on her own by hiking with her husband and newborn son over the boarder to Finland. Lived in the woods for several months. Tried to live with her dominating mother but said "to hell with this" took her family and moved to a farm in Sweden She was a talented artist . Preferred the company of animals to people. Olga was very much in temperament like her brother Nicholas . A simple lady, she had all in all a happy life on her own terms. Much to respect and admire. Something you can't say about many Romanovs

The Tsar’s sister Xenia made it out of Russia and was sheltered by her cousin George V. He provided her with a small pension and a home in Frogmore Cottage. Yup, that Frogmore cottage.

Pretty cunty even for a big cunt like me.

R182 It's the least the lil prick could do, of course May got all her bling.

Back to OP's original question: .Do you think we'd be dealing with Putin today?

Yes. Russians are by history and temperament a servile people. Since they have no tradition of democratic rule they feel most comfortable under despots. Ivan the Terrible,Peter the Great, Catherine the Great,Lenin, Stalin. These leaders were revered. Relative softies like Nicholas II, Gorby,Yeltsin are held in contempt. So yes, if not Putin a Putinesque leader. Alexandra was wrong about almost everything to do with Russia but she nailed it when she advised her hubby "Russia loves to feel the whip.' That is their nature!”

[quote] She escaped on her own by hiking with her husband and newborn son over the boarder to Finland.

Say what????

[quote] In November 1919, the family (Olga, hubby and two sons) set out on what would be their last journey through Russia. Just ahead of revolutionary troops, they escaped to Novorossiysk and took refuge in the residence of the Danish consul, Thomas Schytte, who informed them of the Dowager Empress's safe arrival in Denmark. After a brief stay with the consul, the family was shipped to a refugee camp on the island of Büyükada in the Dardanelles Strait near Istanbul, Turkey, where Olga, her husband and children shared three rooms with eleven other adults. After two weeks, they were evacuated to Belgrade in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes where she was visited by Prince Regent Alexander. Alexander offered the Grand Duchess and her family a permanent home, but Olga was summoned to Denmark by her mother. On Good Friday 1920, Olga and her family arrived in Copenhagen. They lived with the Dowager Empress, at first at the Amalienborg Palace and then at the royal estate of Hvidøre, where Olga acted as her mother's secretary and companion. In 1948 she, her husband and sons emigrated to Canada.

R185 Thank you. That makes perfect sense, and sums it up very nicely.

One Romanov who did make it out of Russia was Grand Duchess Vladimir.

Incredibly the Grand Duchess got most if not all her jewels out of Russia as well, but they did so after their owner had fled to Venice.

Queen Mary got her mitts on good part of GdV's jewels after her death, their royal cousin's misfortune was happy hunting for the Windsor family. Then again never ones to let a good disaster go to waste then BRF and monarch bought up tons of furniture and furnishings that formerly belonged to Kings of France at various sales run by revolutionary government.

George V and Queen Mary did it to the Romanov family after Empress Marie's death.

"According to The Flight of the Romanovs, in 1928, as Maria lay dying, the British sent over an agent to convince her daughter Xenia to give them the box for safekeeping. Dependent upon the British crown for support, she agreed. After Maria’s death, an emissary named Sir Peter Bark convinced Xenia that the jewels would be safest in England in the care of George V. There, the British royal family would sell the jewels on behalf of Xenia and her sister, Olga. "

"The box included some 76 exquisite pieces, according to Perry, which British historian William Clarke said London experts appraised at approximately 159,000 pounds. Strange events followed; the box was opened in Buckingham Palace, and no proper inventory was taken. The jewels were eventually sold, some to Queen Mary. Perry writes:

Members of the Romanov family believe that Buckingham Palace commissioned Clarke’s research. Clarke argues that Queen Mary is documented as having paid fair prices for everything she bought, but certainly the circumstances of the sale raise questions of conflict of interest. The amazing feature of all this…is that the House of Windsor allowed the whole matter to fester for so many years and never told Olga, Xenia and their heirs what precisely had happened. Therefore, we do not know for sure how much money the jewels yielded, nor do we know where all the money went. The facts we know are that Olga received nothing, Xenia sixty thousand pounds, and Queen Mary some magnificent jewels."

Romanov jewels...

We know governments of Lenin and Stalin sold off tons of jewels and other valuables confiscated from the Romanovs and others. However much is still unaccounted for and likely never will be found.

Alexandra Feodorvna was too stupid to live

They are heartless. I know.

R146 bombing is different than invasion. The girls were in bomb shelters, just like the king and queen, when things got rough. Do people really think BP and Windsor didn’t have bomb shelters built?

We know there was a plan to get the royal family out of town ASAP if an invasion was imminent. The situations are just different because during WWII the British government was 100% in support of the monarchy so they had loads of escape options thanks to the government/military/navy.

The Tsar and French Kings lost support of a section of their go members and more importantly their militaries which is how they ended up dead or exiled. When that happens, you should be taking every jewel in site and getting the kids out of harm’s way.

Also, the British and their PR will always make the King and Queen out to be heros. They do partially deserve credit for being the royal leaders needed during WWII.

R159 Louis’ brothers left from Versailles, along with any remaining nobles left at court. Slowly people could see the tide turning and were trickling off to their country estates, if smart, or Paris if dumb. Then when the Bastille was stormed and the mob was headed to Versailles the royal family left town towards the Austrian border, thanks to close ties to the emperor, Queen MA’s brother.

The queen knew she was hated and was almost always criticized since coming to France. She wanted to get the hell out of town with the rest of the royal family, but Louis for once was strong (good intentions, terrible timing) and decided to stay. MA would not leave her husband (they liked each other) and the children would not be left without their mother. So the royal family stayed. Louis should have order them to go with his brothers, who all fled Versailles. No one Royal was willing heading to Paris where the King was just kidnapped.

A smart king might have talked their way into a smooth constitutional monarchy. Louis was too young, too indecisive, and too caught in his conservatism (Devine right of kings) to bend enough. He was also too scared to flee because he knew it would mark the end of his dynasty. THIS is why his son should have been sent away.

Also, no one knew what the mob with guns would do when they reached Versailles, but we know that the king’s ministers wanted all royals to move the government to the east for safety. So Louis was warned, MA knew she was in danger, but she couldn’t leave her husband so the rest is history.

But Louis smarter brothers dipped and were rewarded with the crown of France about 15-20 years later.

But neither Louis XVIII or Charles X had particularly distinguished reigns and Charles got booted.

I watched three movies I felt accurately depicted a lot of what was going on. For the French Revolution, Farewell, My Queen. Excellent film. Shows how clueless the royal family was. And of course Nicholas and Alexandra, and Doctor Zhivago did a good job of showing how events unfolded. I haven't seen The Lost Prince, but I will try to find it and watch it now I've seen the clip at R162.

Former People is fascinating book on what happened to two of the richest families in Russia post revolution. Spans several generations. Quite depressing yet inspirational. Gives me hope the American 1% may yet get what they so richly deserve.

R189 Sooner or later we always get the goods.

You think you know it all, but you keep writing "Windsor's!" Enough with the apostrophic madness!

"Windsor's"!

Yes, I have my own madness. Do not judge me.

Just finished watching The Lost Prince on Amazon Prime. What an exquisite little film. When he had his recital, playing the trumpet I was practically sobbing. So well done.

Sorry r199, I’ll be more careful using apostrophies when I discuss the Wind’sors in future.

R199 Fuck You's

Just finished The Lost Prince just now, R201.

Sobbing my eyes out!

,.6"She wanted to get the hell out of town with the rest of the royal family, but Louis for once was strong (good intentions, terrible timing) and decided to stay. MA would not leave her husband (they liked each other)"

R194, if Louis had had any sense, he would have ordered Marie A. to get the kids to safety in Austria or Sweden while he tried to hold onto his crown, and told her with perfect sincerity that he couldn't trust the task to anyone else.

But for all the difficulties in their marriage, Louis and Marie were both fond of each other, and loyal to each other. I read a few biographies of Marie when I was younger, and one of the many tragic things that doomed them was that each of them turned down a chance to escape, because it'd mean leaving the other.

Pull yourself together r204. No-one likes a cry-baby. Most unseemly.

Tagging onto R186

Dowager Empress Marie detested Grand Duchess Olga's commoner husband. Empress Marie would barely tolerate his presence on few occasions he was allowed anywhere near.

Denmark was invaded and occupied by German military during WWII. GD Olga and her family managed to get through that ordeal, but things did not end after Denmark was liberated.

Soviet Union had not forgotten about remaining Romanovs who escaped Lenin's henchmen, they were well aware of the remaining Romanov in Denmark (GD Olga) and set out a smear campaign in aid of perhaps having HIH expelled or perhaps even turned over to Soviet government.

GD Olga was accused of providing succor to "war criminals" (Soviet military who either deserted or for various reasons were still in Denmark). Danish LE at time conducted their own secret investigations at into matter and found claims by Soviet Union baseless. However GD Olga well aware of what happened to her brothers and other members of Romanov family wasn't going to stick around in Denmark. Olga, her husband and children emigrated to Canada.

With Louis and Marie A, all he had to do was to tell people Marie was taking the kids to visit Grandma for a few weeks. and got her and the kids out sooner. He waited too long and those assholes were not very good at hiding their identity.

Edward VIII was not as badly afflicted as poor Prince John but he was definitely mentally challenged. One observer said for some reason his maturity and mental growth stopped dead at adolescence.

I think Edward VIII was a closet case.

[quote] Then when the Bastille was stormed and the mob was headed to Versailles the royal family left town towards the Austrian border, thanks to close ties to the emperor, Queen MA’s brother.

You're mangling three big events together into one nonexistent event.

[quote] I think Edward VIII was a closet case.

If he was, r210, then he was extremely far into the closet. In upper class circles, he was notorious for his sexual appetite for married women. He not only had a succession of mistresses, but also enjoyed seducing the wives of British officials who he met while on royal visits. His own private Secretary (who came to despise him) recalled one notorious occasion when Edward remained firmly in pursuit of the wife of a British ambassador at a diplomatic gathering, despite having been told that George V was at death’s door.

I think he saw sex as a power game though, and really only became emotionally attached to women who could dominate him.

Edward VIII...ugh. He was called "the golden haired Prince Charming" but that was a crock of shit. He was by no means "charming"; he behaved like a spoiled child. He was no handsome Prince; he had that pinched face and he always looked sickly and soft in appearance. He had nothing in the way of intelligence. And he LIKED Hitler. He and his ball busting lady love Wallis both did. They were both deserving of every bit of anger and disgust that was thrown their way.

The sad truth is a disturbing number of upper class Brits liked Hitler. Edward and Wallis did suck and may have behaved worse than most, but I suspect there was more than a little "let's blame it all on them" from people who knew they'd been pretty shitty during the 1930s as well.

Herr Hitler was wonderful!

I quite agree....

[quote] "I have a huge crush on QEII's dad King George VI."

I prefer her uncle George, R6. Anyway, carry on.

If you've seen Jeeves and Wooster on television or read the excellent books you'll recall Sir Roderick Spode of "Black Shorts" movement, a character somewhat based on Sir Oswald Mosley, 1930's leader of the British Union of Fascists.

R209

To some extent all of George V's children suffered life long effects from their upbringing.

Poor things were up against some pretty stiff odds. Their father was a tyrant who bullied and tormented his children, while their mother was the original ice princess seemingly devoid of maternal warmth or affection.

The Lost Prince, Part 1.

'‘King George V appointed Peter Bark as trustee of the Estate in England, King Christian X appointed Vice Admiral Amdrup and Esbern Trolle, Solicitor of the Supreme Court, as executors for the Danish estate. Everything was left to Xenia and Olga. There was nothing for Michael’s widow or his son George, though Dagmar had made provision for her servants and Cossack bodyguards. King George was still paying pensions to the Russian suite and servants the following year. Her faithful bodyguard Yachik…received GBP 8 a month from the British Court until 1938….Even before the funeral they had been spirited out of Denmark, in the wake of reports that they would be claimed by the Bolshevik’s. King George was anxious that Xenia’s experience [with the swindle of her money from the sale of her jewels] should not be repeated. ..Now, aware that other relatives had their eyes on the jewels and alered to rumors that a gang of international jewel thieves palnned to steal them, the King sent Bark to Copenhagen. The jewel box was sealed in Xenia’s presence and taken to Buckingham Palace while arrangements were made for the sale. In November 1928 King George was taken seriously ill [the illness that almost killed him and took months to recover from] and it was not until 22 May 1929 that the box was finally opened at Windsor….A week later Mr Hardy of Hennell & Sons, the Bond Street jewelers, was aksed to price every item provisionally and take as long as he needed to sell the jewels discreetly. Xenia withdrew items totally GBP 11,415 but, because of the slump, the remainder were not disposed of until 1933. A few were returned unsold. The final sale price of GBP 135,624 15s 0d was put in trust for Xenia and Olga….Hvidore was sold. On 28 February 1929 Sir Frederick Ponsonby informed Hugh Cassells, the British Consul in Copenhagen, who held Power of Attorney for Queen Alexandra’s heirs, that ‘Princess Brasova’ wished to claim a share of the proceeds for her son George, the Empress’s grandson. King George V and his 3 sisters had agreed to give up their half share in favour of Olga and Xenia. The Estate would therefore be divided between Olga, Xenia and George Brasov….On 22 November 1929 the Executors paid the sum of GBP 11,704 16s 3d to Peter Bark to be invested on behalf of Xenia and Olga. Olga bought a farm…”

The main crux of the problem seems to be that Olga believed that the jewels had sold for more, based on Ponsonby’s recollections in his memoirs of what they were appraised for—about GBP 350,000. They only sold for less than GBP 150,000 so it would seem that there was a large sum missing. This isn’t the case—it’s based on a discrepancy which didn’t exist. Not to mention what would’ve been the gain of ‘swindling’ Olga on the part of the British royals since they paid a pension (out of their own pocket) to Xenia and Marie, among others, as well as signing over their share of Hvidore—which they didn’t have to do. They had also been advanced money before the will was settled.From Little Mother of Russia

Fucking their cousins, ripping of their relatives, drinking, smoking and hunting. The royal family are the ultimate hillwilliams

Nicky's mum the Dowager Empress Marie was quite an influence on him early in his reign. Nicky was her favorite son, he was small and slight taking after her Danish side of the family. Marie and Alexandra detested each other so much so Grand Mama could very rarely see her son or her grand daughters. It is believed Marie was in on the "palace conspiracy" to kill Rasputin . Marie in last ditch effort to save her dynasty conspired in a coup to have Alexandra sent to a convent and Nicholas replaced with his younger brother Misha.. The secret police intercepted the telegrams and as a result Marie was driven out of St Petersburg to Kiev. Till her dying day the Dowager Empress blamed Alix for "everything". In 2006 her body was returned to Russia from Denmark and she was laid to rest next to her husband Tsar Alexander III in the Fortress of St Peter & Paul and next to Nicholas II her son .

The Windsors/Windsor's are truly a vile family.

^ We kinda like em!

r195 Louis XVIII reign was distinctive. He was born the third oldest son of the heir to an absolute monarchy. His father and oldest brother died, leaving him to do nothing but enjoy the fruits of being the new king's (Louis XVI) brother. During exile and his return to power, he humbled himself and made a great show of turning slightly away from the "Devine Right of Kings" mentality that he hammered into him most of his life. He clashed with the nobles who wanted a swift return to the ways of the old regime, spearheaded by his foolish younger brother (Charles X) and nephew. He also negotiated with the liberals and found peace and balance within France. Something everyone desperately needed. Like a Joe Biden, he was an old dog from the old system that came in and brought a polarized and chaotic nation into a brief period of calm.

It's a real shame he didn't have an heir and that took back the thrown so late in life because he was a really was the best of his generation (Louis XVI, Louis XVIII, and Charles X). He was the first to really adopt a constitutional monarchy in France. If his brother was like him, there may still be a French royal family today.

I find Louis XVIII to be a fascinating character. As he feared, his brother strict conservatism and extremism would topple their dynasty. Soon after the King died, his brother lost the crown all because a solder didn't remove his hat in deference to the King during a review of the troops. Oh, and Charles X thought it would be smart to stop paying the pensions to veterans of Napoleons old army. Piss of the military and you are done for as a leader. Louis XVIII learned from the French Revolution. His spoiled younger brother learned nothing.

r196 the royal family weren't clueless. Don't forget they hosted the National Assembly. A pretty big fucking deal at the time because France was at the brink of some serious financial problems. The issue for the royal family is that despite having "absolute power" power in name, they were stuck between a rock and a hard place. The corrupt church sided with the nobles to oppose much needed tax reforms. This meant that only the poor would be left with additional tax burdens as the nation's finances were in a terrible state. The king even tried to convince the nobility to heed his advisor's warning but the king was literarily drowned out by noise during his speech. He lost their respect and he saw how powerless he was against the monied class. Just like Presidents today.

I'm not defending Louis as some liberal reformer, but the royal family knew things were bad. With the clergy joining forces with the nobility, the third group of the national assembly, the poor and middle class, were powerless to obtain any reforms. From their perspective, the people around the King represented all of the rot in the system. This is why he was taken back to Paris to preside over the demand for a constitution. They still respected the king as their natural God-given leader, but tried to get him away from the gilded cage of Versailles to meet the people's demands.

Once he attempted to flee, after months of failed negotiations regarding the nature of the constitution, the wheels of bad PR were in motion and his family's fate was sealed. But the royals weren't as blind to the situation as many may think.

Look. Compared to Nicky, Louis was woke.

[quote] The issue for the royal family is that despite having "absolute power" power in name, they were stuck between a rock and a hard place. The corrupt church sided with the nobles to oppose much needed tax reforms.

To be fair, the corrupt Bishops, who of course were nobles, sided with their families and their class. Part of the dynamic of that first National Assembly was the poor clergy who were technically "First Estate" as part of The Church, but who were much more aligned with the Third Estate of peasants and the poor because they basically were poor peasants with maybe just a little more to keep from starvation. When delegates were allowed to vote as individuals, that's when "all hell broke loose" from the nobles' perspective.

I agree with r226. Louis XVIII has never really had his story told in any popular way, at least in Anglo-America, maybe there's some great French movie or TV series out there, but nothing in the U.S. or Britain. It actually irritates me that this new PBS Marie Antoinette folds Provence and Artois into the same person, but then again, they've pretty much thrown reality out the palace window and are just running with plucky little Marie versus the evil scheming Madame du Barry, secret mastermind (basically turning her into Madame de Pompadour).

Messieurs R230/R239 Le titre de ce fil n'est pas : Le Fiel Absolu des Connards Qui Postent sur la Révolution Française sur un fil de la Révolution Russe

Let's be Unmitigated Gall.

Found my drag name...

R223 WAS SHE WRONG?

I can’t imagine Alexandra adjusting to life as an Empress in Exile.

[quote] The Bourbon's

The Bourbon's what?

I was fascinated with Rasputin's control over the whole family. I think he was fucking all of them.

R235

Oh I don't know.

It has often been said of Nicholas II and Alexandra they were more like landed gentry (or gentleman farmer in case of Nicholas II). They were perfectly happy being holed up in smaller quarters with their children even before the revolution. Indeed Nicholas II seemed to be relieved after his abdication and spoke (or wrote in his diary) about retiring to some country estate or dacha and farm or whatever.

Left to their own devices one assumes like Grand Duchess Olga both Nicholas and Alexandra would have been content enough in exile living on a farm or small estate. Small mind you something like a villa or country home with a small staff.

WWII - A bunch of straight white men acting out their daddy issues and mama drama.

Kaiser Wilhelm's birth-injured arm and rejection by his mother, Vicky - chronic hunger for a mother's love, unmet until love turned to hatred.

Hitler's alcoholic dad, rejecting his artistic aspirations - the need for love, unmet, turned to pathological murderousness.

King George VI's stutter, caused by living in constant fear of the recriminations of his rageaholic father, the titular King George V.

Tsar Nicholas II, a good guy who's mother smothered him and left him totally unprepared to be an adult with his own thoughts, ideas, opinions. Forever dependent upon a woman to tell him what to do.

The traitorous Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Carl Eduard, who was cast out of Britain and forced to take over a dukedom at age 15 in Germany, and then punished and shunned for it later. Came to be a loyal instrument of Hitler, because though he loved his sister, Princess Alice, and longed for Mother England, it "feels so good just to be needed, to be appreciated, again."

What a shit show.

R239 Uhhhhh . . . it was WWI

Louis XVI suffered from premature ejaculation he was unable to consummate his marriage to Marie Antoinette. Apparently Louis thought he had to simply insert his bite into Marie and wait for something to happen. Both of them would doze off before anything did. This went on for seven years. Nicholas did not have this problem as Sunny was a veritable bobcat in the sack unless of course Mrs Becker was in town.

R240 I'm conflating WWI and WWII!! Fuck. I'm so tired tonight. But my point stands, I think? In general. Attachment wounds = world wars

It's crazy that many of the players in WWI were cousins.

R242 Europe has been ruled by family/cousins at war with one another for almost two millennia. At least WWI finally brought an end to the familial in-fighting.

branch water has more personality then R236

[quote] branch water has more personality then [R236]

R244 t h A n

R238 he was content. She definitely was not.

R237 Nicholas tolerated him because of Alix. His mother moved to Kiev after ultimatum, either she or Rasputin will leave the capital. Nicholas couldn’t let him go because if something happened to his son Alix would blame Nicholas for the rest of her life.

"Left to their own devices one assumes like Grand Duchess Olga both Nicholas and Alexandra would have been content enough in exile living on a farm or small estate."

As individuals, Nicholas and Alexandra probably would have been happy as country gentry, isolating their children on a family estate somewhere obscure. But if they'd survived to go into exile, they would not have lived quietly, they would have felt it was their duty to stage a counter-revolution and restore the monarchy in the name of God Almighty!

Which is why no European monarch wanted to offer them refuge, even if they were related.

"they would have felt it was their duty to stage a counter-revolution and restore the monarchy in the name of God Almighty!"

No, I don't think so.

Nicholas II abdicated quietly and without much fuss. HIM also did so for his son and heir (an usual, unheard of and some say illegal act). Nicholas was done.

Had they lived Nicholas and Alexandra would have lived out their lives as one or both wanted from start; as "English" country gentry.

R245 Wrest my case.

R248 N & A thought if they had to leave Russia they would prefer to go to England but it would only be temporary .After the war the could return to live "quietly " in the Crimea. Totally deluded as most "royals" are.

You remember in that episode of The Crown when the newish Queen Elizabeth was having lunch with the Duke of Windsor and she asked him if hev ever though of apologizing to her? She said he never considered how happy she might have been with a simpler life, in the country

"Louis XVI suffered from premature ejaculation he was unable to consummate his marriage"

Women always get the definition of p.e. wrong. He cums when he cums, sorry. It has nothing to do with your 2-hr. build-up to an ooh-ooh.

Well he must have figured something out because they had 2 kids.

Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette actually had 4 kids, two boys and two girls, one of whom died in infancy. But yeah, their marriage apparently went unconsummated for 7 or 8 years, and there were two old rumors about that: 1) Louis had phimosis and couldn't get it up until his foreskin was surgically removed, and 2) nobody ever bothered to explain the facts of life to Louis, until Marie's brother came to town and had a private chat with the poor sap.

Since Louis's hobby was going up to the attic and building locks and keys by hand, I'm inclined to believe the latter.

R247

One cannot underestimate the stress Alexandra and by extension Nicholas II were under due to Alexi's medical condition.

Primary job and duty if you will of all royal consorts or wives of nobles is to produce heirs. Life for those who do not accomplish that task can be difficult with their position jeopardized. Henry VIII went through several wives in want of getting an heir; in process broke with Rome and establishing C of E among other upheavals.

After producing a few girls Alexandra finally gave her husband an heir. Joy of Romanov family and nation would be short lived as it soon became apparent that Alexi was not a well child. Worse for Alexandra it was she who introduced the disease (hemophilia) into Romanov family.

Alexandra's baby making days were over either by her being worn out, choice or fear of even if she produced another male child it too would be ill. We know N & A continued having relations up until their murder because packets of condoms were found among Nicholas II's possessions when their murderers went through the now dead family's trunks and other luggage.

Faced with their situation Nicholas and Alexandra tried to manage things as best could. Obvious goal was to hope and pray Alexi lived into adulthood, married and produced heirs. Second goal was to limit outside knowledge that heir to Russian throne was a sickly.

In aid of above the Nicholas and Alexandra closed ranks. They increasingly spent more time holed up "en famillie" at their various palaces. Even travel abroad to visit other members of "the royal mob" were curtailed. This isolation and withdrawal compounded calumny that had been hurled at Alix from day one of her arrival in Russia.

Alexandra of Hesse-Darmstadt of and by the Rhine was quite shy and tended to avoid large pubic gatherings period. This was easy as a princess of a minor German royal house, but as future then indeed soon empress of Russia it was not.

Alix tended to avoid large public gatherings and or receptions from day one. Whenever she was obliged by her position to attend (both as wife of heir then empress) Alexandra would be seen looking down line of persons to be received counting the numbers. She just couldn't wait to get away.

Imperial court of St. Petersburg and others in Russia took Alexandra's shyness for being aloof. There was a bit of "who does she think she is?".

In consequence of her shyness or whatever nearly from time they were married Nicholas and Alexandra spent much time alone. This increased as their family grew and especially after Alexi arrived.

Romanov clan was large and close. Nicholas's mother, siblings, uncles, aunts, etc.. blamed Alexandra for keeping the Tsar from them.

As happens even today when parents find their child has a serious illness N & A tried and or consulted everything possible regarding Alexi's hemophilia. For good or bad only person who seemed to have any ability to stem the kid's bleeding fits was Rasputin. Alexandra of course greeted this with relief but also in her way embraced the holy man in over drive. She wouldn't be told about Rasputin and blindly ignored the growing scandal. Nicholas II whipped as ever didn't have balls to put an end to things; that fell to others...

Dowager Empress Marie was out going and fun. Maria Feodorovna was vivacious and apparently fun to be around, this quite unlike her dour DIL, Alexandra.

In normal course of events as widowed empress Marie would have taken a back seat while Alexandra as empress ruled over Russian society. That didn't happen for a host of reasons. Most largely due to Alix's retiring and shy nature. Into that social vacuum dowager empress stepped in, filling it with gusto.

Empress Marie had planned one of her famous balls when word arrived on short notice that some royal relation had died and court went into mourning. Not wishing to cancel event Marie sent word around that the ladies were to wear black gowns. Marie's "black ball" was huge success! Against the background of black the fabulous jewels of ladies sparkled and shone brightly.

Alexandra comprised her company/court of like minded (some would say dour) ladies who were rather like the empress herself.

During outbreak of war (not sure which) Empress Alexandra suggested starting a knitting/sewing circle as her grandmother Queen Victoria and her ladies had done to make socks and other things for soldiers. The great ladies of the Court of St. Petersburg shot back they had better things to do with their time, so that was that.

Early on after her arrival in St. Petersburg a ball was given in honor of N & A engagement. Princess Alix was shocked and aghast at Russian society ladies especially their ball gowns which featured what Alexandra considered scandalously low décolletage.

Spying one particular egregious offender Alix dispatched one of her ladies with this message:

"Her royal highness wishes me to inform you that at Hesse-Darmstadt we do not wear our gowns that way"

Russian lady shot back "Tell her royal highness that in Russia we *do*!" With that the lady yanked down her bodice even lower and continued dancing.

Alexandra was true grand-daughter of Queen Victoria. Very much an up tight prude in public. Yet very romantic and sensual in private. She could not get enough of Nicky's dicky. One of the major worries of their last months in Ekaterinberg was that the Bolshevik guards had broken into the trunks where all Alexandra and Nicholas risqué love letters were stored. Alexandra was mortified that they were being read by the rabble and might even be published in the newspapers. Lèse-majesté! Quelle horreur!

As an aside, on hemophilia, it passes from mother to son, right? So who else among Victoria's heirs had the disease?

Probably been said but the Dowager was the sister of the UK's Dowager Queen Alexandra, widow of Edward VII. They were daughters of the King of Denmark. Sort of royal, olden days Kate and Pippas.

Two bad bitches!!!

Dowager Empress and Dowager Queen of the UK.

R259

Hemophilia has not appeared in BRF of over four generations. Neither Charles or William have it.

A geneticist analyzed the royal families of Europe, and concluded that the faulty gene that introduced hemophilia into the inbred royal families of Europe arose in... Queen Victoria herself. Her genes were defective, probably as a result of previous inbreeding, and she had nine children by a first cousin and married them into all the royal houses of Europe, bringing the faulty gene with them.

I don't believe any royals have admitted to hemophilia in the later half of the 20th century, but would they??? Seriously, hemophilia was a hopeless death sentence in Alexei's day, but it's been treated with transfusions for decades, and now there are treatments that can alleviate symptoms. So who knows, maybe some prince or duke somewhere is a secret hemophiliac...

Obviously the Windsors are genetically defective lot.

I think there were concerns in the Windsor family. When you consider Prince John with his epilepsy and probably autism, and then in Elizabeth Bowes Lyon's family weren't there those retarded cousins? In The Crown Helena Bonham Carter discovers them? And then of course Prince Phillip's mother Princess Alice, but more importantly, Phillip and Elizabeth were both directly descended from Victoria. So marrying commoners was probably something not frowned upon since it brought new blood into the family.

The hemophilia mutation is common among older fathers. Victoria’s father was in his 50s

We all here know something world didn't at the time; that in about twenty some odd years Europe and rest or world would once again be plunged into war. This one perhaps more horrible than the previous.

There isn't a single male member of Romanov family (assuming things turned out differently with Nicholas and others living instead of murdered), capable of leading Russia through WWII.

Stalin may have had his faults heaven only knows; be he was far better choice to be in charge than Nicholas II or any of his brothers, uncles, etc....

Nicholas II by that time would have been a double loser as Russia lost both war with Japan and most certainly would have lost or caused Russia to pull out of WWI (again if he had lived and remained in charge). Thus just cannot see things being any better for the Romanovs or Russia for that matter when WWII rolled around.

It's interesting (to me, anyway) to think about how ambitious that cunt Marie Pavlovna was for her litter, to the point of trying to marry one of her sons to Nicky's oldest daughter Olga, yet at the same time she did nothing to make any of her children fit to be rulers (or consorts to rulers). MP may actually have made a great Empress (she was smart, cunning, wily, ruthless and could be extremely charming, despite her unfortunate face and figure). Yet she raised louche, degenerate and extremely spoiled, stupid and indolent children.

Also interesting to think of what might have happened had Nicholas' brother Michael not abdicated. It was already over for the Romanov dynasty at that point, but he could have made a fine Emperor. Although he had a weakness for the ladies (maybe weakness is the wrong word, because he stood his ground and ultimately refused to give up the woman he finally fell in love with) but he was a renowned commander in the Russian army during WWI, his division (whatever the word is) was famed for their ferocity and success in battle. When told his brother Nicholas had abdicated the throne to him, his response was that he would accept the title, but only if the Russian people wanted him to have it. And since it rapidly became clear that the revolution was making the whole question moot, he simply refused, and the Romanov dynasty was swept away into history. His murder was another awful, unnecessary death, because he'd already refused the throne.

Sadly, r269, even if the White Army had gathered behind whoever was after Michael in line to the throne, he was too much of a risk to have exist. Especially given his skill at commanding men in the armed forces. The revolutionaries wouldn't have believed anything he said about renouncing power. And even if they had let him live, Stalin would have had him snuffed out later.

I remember reading the testimony of one of the men who was involved in recovering/identifying the remains of Nicholas and Alexander in the early 90s. He was staggered that the communist regime he'd always lived in had been built on the back of lies and such callous murders.

Those revolutionaries were taking no chances: killing any potential figureheads tied to the tsarist regime, negotiating a peace that gave up so much territory. The latter eventually being clawed back.

If Gwyneth Paltrow had been concemned for the ski crash of the century, we wouldn't have had Epstein in a quantum reality

I want to thank King George V for this incredible honour

It was Victoria, at least upon even a cursory look at the family tree and who got the Bad X-H chromosome, who began spreading it about. What is even more interesting, though, is how few males got it given the immense spread of Victoria's children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren through her daughters, who would naturally be the carriers.

It looks like a high rate because of its rarity (this form of the disease is allegedly a rare one), but out of dozens of children and grandchildren, I think perhaps I saw three men within two generations of Victoria and Albert who got it.

As for the Queen Mother's cousins, mental retardation occurs in millions of births, why would an aristocrat's family be any exception?

A little known fact, for example, with Down's Syndrome, is that more babies with it are born to women under 35 than over 35. Eighty percent (yes, 80%) of babies with Down's Syndrome are born to mother's under thirty-five, despite the chances of having one rising so much after thirty-five.

Shit happens - conception and birth are dangerous passages.

As I understood it there were so many factions and splinter g roups vying for power, leading up to the Tsar's murder, it's a miracle any of the leaders like Lenin survived. They were all killing one another off.

R226, there are some really interesting parallels between Louis XVIII and Charles the II of England. Charles saw his father executed and spent his formative years in poverty. When he was finally back on the throne, he trod very carefully with Parliament and mostly concentrated on having a good time. Parliament was fine with this, and the people loved him. However, he and his Queen had no children (though he had a dozen with his mistresses), and the throne went to his younger brother, James II. That idiot converted to Catholicism, which pissed off Parliament and the people, and he tried authoritarian tactics that got him summarily hustled off the throne in favor of his daughter Mary and her cousin-husband William. James and his son spent their lives trying to get back on the throne to no avail, and the Stuart dynasty ended with his daughter Anne.

You mean William and Mary who started a diploma mill in the states?

"What is even more interesting, though, is how few males got it given the immense spread of Victoria's children"

Only three admitted to it! There are less deadly forms of hemophilia than the one Alexei had, in the early 20th century is was possible for some hemophiliacs to live fairly normal lives in spite of their disability, but I'm not enough of an expert on genetic to say whether that was possible with that particular gene.

But I wonder if the hemophilia thing ever made any European ruler of the early 20th century decide it was time for royals to quit with the inbreeding? Of course other societal forces were also pushing against royal cousins marrying: the decline in royal power and the vanishing of absolute monarchies, which meant that alliances could no longer be cemented with marriages, arranged marriages becoming unpopular or illegal, the growing understanding of genetics, the diminshing usefulness of spares, the unification of Germany and Italy, etc. But did anyone ever decide that they just needed to broaden the royal gene pool, just for the sake of the family's health?

I wonder if there was any risk to Elizabeth and Phillip marrying. Both of them were descendants of Victoria's.

Romanov Russia had been coming apart at the seems for a hundred years prior to 1918. That the 1% under dimwit Nicky thought they were capable of fighting a 21st century World War shows you why they deserved to be thrown on the ash can of history.

^ Nicky had zero drones and absolutely no stealth fighters. Suicidal!

Re. R278 As Elizabeth was a male-line descendant of Victoria and there were no haemophiliacs in her branch of the family (Victoria-Edward VII-George V-George VI-Elizabeth II), it was almost impossible for her to be a carrier (it is theoretically possible, because children can get it from their fathers if the fathers live long enough, but the three kings who are the link between Victoria and Elizabeth all lived to ages that were impossible for haemophiliacs of that period).

Philip was a female-line descendant but it was fairly evident by the time he married Elizabeth that his grandmother (unlike her sister, Alix) was not a carrier and thus he didn't have it. Prince Philip was a very robust person, anyway, and had a very physical education at Gordonstoun, so there was no doubt that he was healthy.

Incidentally, that female-line ancestry is also why Prince Philip's DNA was of particular use in verifying the Romanov remains. Philip's grandmother and the tsarina were sisters and shared mitochondrial DNA that they had inherited from their mother and maternal grandmother (Victoria) and this mitochondrial DNA was then passed on to, and shared by, their children (Alexei and the Grand Duchesses) and female-line grandchildren (like Philip).

Always wondered why there were so few bones of Alexi and Marie discovered in 2007?. Understand their bodies were taken and burned separate from the rest. They weren't small children. This was a 19 yo girl. and 13 yo boy. It was proven it would take days of constant burning at high temperature to totally cremate their bodies. The killers only had hours. Yet they found just a handful of bones . Scraps really. Just 4 teeth out of a total of 64 teeth total. Teeth are almost indestructible. Always thought something didn't add up with Alexi and Marie's remains. Nevertheless they still should be interred with their family. Don't see why they haven't. Been 16 years.

Cousins all dressed up.

^ With no palace to go.

Another armchair historian who's just seen the latest season of The Crown.

Riveting and original.

Who, R285?

The latest season of the Crown covered 1985-1992. Which means you're posting out of your arse R285

R287 there’s literally an episode this season called The Ipatiev House

Few royal or noble families elsewhere in Europe could match the collection of jewels of the Romanovs and Russian nobility.

While those Romanovs and others who managed to get out of Russian took a good amount with them, more, so much, much more ended up confiscated by Lenin and his mob of murderous hoodlums.

Russia (or now Soviet Union) was essentially bankrupt. So Lenin and Stalin took a page from French Revolution and began selling off tons of jewels, art, furnishings and anything else of value confiscated not just from Romanovs, but nobles and other wealthy persons now known as "Former People".

Advice from various European and American collectors (IIRC) about what should be kept in Russia. Certain jewels became part of Russia's state diamond collection. Art and furnishings went to the Hermitage and other museums. But still all and all it was happy hunting for wealthy Europeans and Americans.

Marjorie Merriweather Post would tell of being taken (with blessings of Stalin apparently) of being taken to rooms over flowing with valubales that once belong to Romanovs or wealthy Russians and "climbing over things" to pick and choose.

As wont to happen good amount of jewels and other bits such as art work went astray never to be seen again.

Oh and many of the robes, dresses, ceremonial gowns and other textiles (happily) were preserved and kept, so that's something anyway.

After the revolution many of the seamstresses, embroiders and others skilled in needlework fled Russia and found homes and work elsewhere in Europe, largely France. The haute couture fashion houses in particular welcomed those skilled fingers.

While some of Marjorie Merriweather's haul is at the Smithsonian, good amount of it remains under control of the Post estate.

Fate of the regicides.. What happened to the men who murdered Nicholas II, his wife and family along with servants.

[quote]I've heard hear of a lot of ways to identify someone (dental records, fingerprints, tattoos) but I never heard of anyone identified by their ears.

R113, it's long been known that identification via photography often focuses on the ears. Just because you never heard of it doesn't mean it's not real.

[quote]another lesion from the French Revolution that’s just not have made it to the Tsar’s history lesson

Interesting thread, but the guy who cannot write worth shit is giving me a headache.

[quote] it's long been known that identification via photography often focuses on the ears. Just because you never heard of it doesn't mean it's not real.

Ear identification must be a crock, because Anna Anderson's ears were supposedly an exact match of Anastasia's. And of course Anna Anderson was a complete fraud.

I remember a very old episode of "60 Minutes", where they interviewed the pretender "Anna Anderson". They said that ear photography indicated that she actually was the Princess Anastasia, as she claimed.

Well, DNA analysis later proved that she wasn't. And BTW anyone with eyes could see that Anna Anderson had much fuller lips than the late Princess, something they totally ignored during their interview.

Romanovs didn't need DNA; their investigations proved decades before that Anna Andersen was some demented Polish peasant woman (factory worker IIRC).

Franziska Schanzkowska got away with things long as she did for several reasons.

First was fact the nature of Nicholas II and Alexandra to keep themselves and family holed up in Russia meant their children didn't have frequent contact with rest of their extended family or other royal courts in general. Those who did (Romanovs and others who managed to escape revolutionary Russia alive), largely weren't taken in by Anna Anderson. Some German and other royals were apparently, but still.

Then there was what happens whenever a child or young teen goes missing or something; people want to believe what they want to believe. Surviving members of the Romanov family wanted to believe that the "rumors" of the Tsar and his family being murdered where just that. This or at least Alexandra and her children were spared.

Anna Andersen spoked the Romanovs with her story of having an illegitimate child with some solider who saved her from the carnage.

First off there was the horror that a daughter of the Tsar would give herself to any man before marriage.

There had been rumors that Alix and or her daughters had been criminally interfered with in the most intimate nature by their captures. Such behaviour was going on across Russia as revolutionaries and others exacted revenge on "Former People" and pretty much anyone else they liked. So why would the young daughters of the Tsar be any different?

It was having a child that AA conveniently could not produce which really set Romanovs off. That a grand child of the Tsar (no matter which side of blanket it was born) was simply left behind like luggage was beyond the pale. AA's story had to be investigated if for no other reason to sort out if there was such a child.

Obviously AA was fed information about lives of Romanov family that she knew enough to fool some people. For what reasons who knows; there long were persistent claims that the Tsar has stashed huge fortune away in European banks. If AA was Nicholas II she would be first in line to claim such funds and any other property that belonged to her family that was rapidly flowing out of Russia.

AA knew the jig was up, which is likely whey she or that husband had her remains cremated thinking that would be end of things. Were it not for that bit of tissue stashed in some lab it may very well have been..

Claimed to be the Tsarevich Alexis..

Recall an interview with Anna Anderson when she was in her 80's living in a very Grey Gardens like home in Bumfuck. The flaming queen who was interviewing her did everything but curtsey to the crazy old hag. She obviously still had her cunning because she told the faygelah some preposterous story about the guards sodomizing the Tsar in front of his family. This got nancy-boy all hot and bothered . Apparently this convinced him that the loony crone could not be a Polish peasant. Think it's still on YouTube.

[quote] Recall an interview with Anna Anderson when she was in her 80's living in a very Grey Gardens like home in Bumfuck.

They weren't living in "Bumfuck." They were living in Charlottesville, VA, near UVA. He's been a professor there. The property and house were quite nice until Anna Anderson moved in. She and her husband were both crazy. They lived in complete filth and squalor. They were hoarders, not only of trash, but of animals. They had dozens of cats around; whenever one would die Anderson would cremate it in the fireplace. When asked why they existed in such ghastly living conditions Manahan would only say "that's the way Anastasia wants to live." Periodically neighbors would bring them to court because of the terrible stench emanating from the place, but nothing much was ever done about it. How in the name of God could anyone believe this psycho woman was Anastasia? The stupidity of her followers boggles the mind.

R298 what a pair!!

[quote]R299 They were living in Charlottesville, VA, near UVA.

Is the house still standing, or did it have to be razed after she died, for sanitation reasons?

I think the couple grew a wilderness of hedges around the house, too.

John E. Manahan took up with some young fancy woman after Anna Manahan's death. She also was no better than she should be and got Mr. Manahan to change is will. Family began legal proceedings after Jon Manahan's death and got the will overturned.

Ken Oder has his say:

R301

John and Anna Manahan lived at 7631 Fairview Farm Rd., which is located just north of Scottsville off Rt. 20. To best of one's knowledge house still stands.

[quote]R303: he valued bloodline above all else and reminded me every chance he got that he was the son-in-law of the Tsar of Russia

Her husband sounds like he'd fit right in around here.

Because I just love this gal!

Pay no attention to the Tsar's skull beneath my bed.. lets fuck.

^ Lets skull fuck !

These are not two skeletons of 19 Marie and 13yo Alexis. They're a handful of bone scraps. 4 teeth out of 64! Really? Beyond dubious at best.

^ 80 years of bears dear

[quote] These are not two skeletons of 19 Marie and 13yo Alexis. They're a handful of bone scraps. 4 teeth out of 64! Really? Beyond dubious at best.

It's all that was left of them. Considering how they were killed and how much time passed before the bones were unearthed I'm surprised any of their remains were discovered.

Teeth contain DNA. But after acid, fire and years of rotting in the ground, it was a miracle they were found at all.

I thought they were thrown down a well or something?

'I thought they were thrown down a well or something?"

Bodies of Nicholas II, Empress Alexandra and two of their four children along with servants were all thrown down that mineshaft. However two bodies were buried elsewhere.

Russian Orthodox Church (still ever powerful) made various stinks about Romanov funerals and other things. This included even initially accepting remains found were that of the last Tsar and his family.

Then they kicked about fact remains of servants found with Romanovs were going to be interred with the family. It was an outrage according to Moscow Patriarchate that servants were to be buried with their masters. Never mind fact they had been brutally murdered, butchered, dumped down mineshaft and left "buried" together with Tsar Nicholas II and his family for decades until remains were exhumed.

More

Good enough to follow them into exile and slaughter, but internment? NEVAH!!

Interment. No "n"

R312 Wrong. The oldest teeth on earth are almost 10 million years old and were found by researchers in Germany1. Imagine the environmental conditions these teeth must have survived over so many years. Teeth contain enamelThe outer, visible part of a tooth and the hardest substance in the human body., which is the hardest substance in the human body. They can survive extreme heat, up to 1,600°C (=2,912°F), and they do not mind being under water for a long time. After a person dies, the teeth will be there long after most other body parts have vanished.

So where are the missing 60 teeth of Alexi and Marie?

The rumors about my jewelry are not true.

Nicholas sister Olga was also Anastasia’s godmother and she met Anna Andersson and knew right away she wasn’t Anastasia. Olga thought Anna was too old and her face didn’t look Anastasia even though there had been several years since Olga hed seen Anastasia.

Clara Peuthert, another inmate at asylum were "Anna Anderson" was confined first claimed her to be Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna. Various former servants and others close to the Romanovs were paraded into see "Unknown Woman" and most said "yes" she bore a resemblance to GD Tatiana. Then came Baroness Sophie Buxhoeveden, a former lady-in-waiting to the Tsarina. The baroness took one look at "Unknown Woman" and she was too tall to be GD Tatiana. soon after "Unknown Woman" and her supporters latched onto GD Anastasia instead.

Clara Peuthert and Captain von Schwabe (another early Anna Anderson supporter) after that visit from baroness realized they had to find another Romanov daughter and again Anastasia was settled upon.

L.A Times review of book " Frances Welch’s “A Romanov Fantasy."

Anna Anderson's lack of the Romanov tooth gap ( she always held something over her mouth when speaking,) He inability to speak , write or understand her native Russian. He arrogant "imperious" nature ( Anastasia was down to earth unaffected clown of a teenager) all made it immediately obvious this woman was a Polish factory worker. This was known in 1922 when the Romanovs hired a private detective and she was ID's as Franziska Schanzkowska. That this charade lasted for nearly 60 years shows how people believe what they want to believe. Especially if it's profitable to believe it.

[quote] Nicholas sister Olga was also Anastasia’s godmother and she met Anna Andersson and knew right away she wasn’t Anastasia.

She was her aunt, not her godmother. She was a very nice, passive woman. When Anna Anderson turned up claiming to be Anastasia she corresponded with Olga, who was very nice to her, calling her "Little One" in her letters and telling her to take care of her health ("Eat a lot and drink cream."). She also gave her a shawl as a gift. Anderson's supporters said that Olga's concern and her gifting Anderson with a shawl were proof that Olga knew Anderson was Anastasia. But later Olga declined any further contact with her and publicly said she was false. Anderson's supporters said of course gentle Olga was forced by do that by conspirators who wanted to keep Anderson from getting the mythical millions of dollars Nicholas supposedly stashed away in the Bank of England to be sues as "dowries" for his daughters. In his book on Anderson a nutcase named Peter Kurth who was one of her supporters there was a scene where Olga, deeply regretting her decision to reject Anderson, is wringing her hands and moaning "What have I done to my niece? What have I done to my niece>" But I really don't think that happened. Anderson's supporters would say anything and believe anything to bolster her claim.

Anna Anderson had a bad jaw and many missing teeth. Eventually she had all teeth removed and was fitted with dentures which she didn't wear often IIRC

That might have been deliberate, R327, a way of disguising her mouth.

Anastasia had a tiny pouty mouth, Anna had a wide mouth with very full lips. Anyone with eyes could see she was an impostor, unless Anna wasn't wearing her dentures and you couldn't see the shape of her mouth at all.

She tried to hide her mouth because he mouth looked nothing like Anastasia's. She was a crafty psychopath.

Anastasia had the Romanov gap which Schanzkowska. did not have . She claimed her teeth were damaged during the shooting and later had them all yanked. Got a bridge in Brooklyn she wants to sell ya.

^ If the teeth don't fit you must acquit.

Alexandra's brother Ernst Ludwig was a hunky homo who had a thing for stable boys. Considering the pics I've seen of his wife Victoria Melita, I can't blame him for straying.

Ernst Ludwig Grand Duke of Hesse und bei Rhein, now there's a story worth telling.

[quote]When the poor little tyke died his loving bro Edward wrote " good riddance he was really an animal"

I know just how he feels