Plan
Introduction
1 Biography
2 State duties
3 Policy impact (estimates)
4 Canonization

5.1 Letters, diaries, documents, photographs
5.2 Memories
5.3 Works of historians and publicists

Bibliography

Introduction

Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (Feodorovna) (nee Princess Alice Victoria Elena Louise Beatrice of Hesse-Darmstadt; May 25, 1872 - July 17, 1918) - wife of Nicholas II (since 1894). The fourth daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse and Rhine, Ludwig IV, and Duchess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria of England.

Name day (in Orthodoxy) - April 23 according to the Julian calendar, memory of the martyr Alexandra.

1. Biography

Born in Darmstadt (Germany) in 1872. She was baptized on July 1, 1872 according to the Lutheran rite. The name given to her consisted of her mother's name (Alice) and four names of her aunts. Godparents were: Edward, Prince of Wales (future King Edward VII), Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich (future Emperor Alexander III) with his wife, Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna, Queen Victoria's youngest daughter Princess Beatrice, Augusta von Hesse-Cassel, Duchess of Cambridge and Maria Anna, Princess Prussian.

In 1878, a diphtheria epidemic spread in Hesse. Alice's mother and her younger sister May died from it, after which Alice lived most of the time in the UK at Balmoral Castle and Osborne House on the Isle of Wight. Alice was considered the favorite granddaughter of Queen Victoria, who called her Sunny("Sun").

In June 1884, at age 12, Alice visited Russia for the first time when she elder sister Ella (in Orthodoxy - Elizaveta Fedorovna) married Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. She arrived in Russia for the second time in January 1889 at the invitation of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. After staying in the Sergius Palace (St. Petersburg) for six weeks, the princess met and attracted the special attention of the heir to Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich.

In the early 1890s, the latter’s parents, who hoped for his marriage to Helena Louise Henrietta, daughter of Louis-Philippe, Count of Paris, were against the marriage of Alice and Tsarevich Nicholas. A key role in the arrangement of Alice’s marriage with Nikolai Alexandrovich was played by the efforts of her sister, Grand Duchess Elizaveta Feodorovna, and the latter’s husband, through whom correspondence between the lovers was carried out. The position of Emperor Alexander and his wife changed due to the persistence of the crown prince and the deteriorating health of the emperor; On April 6, 1894, a manifesto announced the engagement of the Tsarevich and Alice of Hesse-Darmstadt. In the following months, Alice studied the basics of Orthodoxy under the guidance of the court protopresbyter John Yanyshev and the Russian language with teacher E. A. Schneider. On October 10 (22), 1894, she arrived in Crimea, in Livadia, where she stayed with the imperial family until the death of Emperor Alexander III - October 20. On October 21 (November 2), 1894, she accepted Orthodoxy through confirmation there with the name Alexandra and patronymic Fedorovna (Feodorovna).

November 14 (26), 1894 (on the birthday of Empress Maria Feodorovna, which allowed for a retreat from mourning) in the Great Church Winter Palace The wedding of Alexandra and Nicholas II took place. After the wedding, a thanksgiving prayer service was served by members of the Holy Synod, led by Metropolitan Palladius (Raev) of St. Petersburg; while singing “We praise you, God,” a 301-shot cannon salute was fired. Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich wrote in his emigrant memoirs about their first days of marriage:

The family lived most of the time in the Alexander Palace in Tsarskoe Selo. In 1896, Alexandra and Nikolai traveled to Nizhny Novgorod for the All-Russian Exhibition. And in August 1896 they made a trip to Vienna, and in September-October - to Germany, Denmark, England and France.

In subsequent years, the Empress gave birth to four daughters: Olga (November 3 (15), 1895), Tatiana (May 29 (June 10), 1897), Maria (June 14 (26), 1899) and Anastasia (June 5 (18), 1901 of the year). On July 30 (August 12), 1904, the fifth child and only son, Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich, appeared in Peterhof. Alexandra Feodorovna was a carrier of the hemophilia gene; the Tsarevich was born a hemophiliac.

In 1897 and 1899, the family traveled to Alexandra Feodorovna’s homeland in Darmstadt. During these years, the Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene was built in Darmstadt, which is still in operation today.

On July 17-20, 1903, the Empress took part in the celebrations of the glorification and opening of the relics St. Seraphim Sarovsky in the Sarov Desert.

For entertainment, Alexandra Feodorovna played the piano with the professor of the St. Petersburg Conservatory R.V. Kündinger. The Empress also took singing lessons from Conservatory professor N.A. Iretskaya. Sometimes she sang a duet with one of the court ladies: Anna Vyrubova, Alexandra Taneyeva, Emma Fredericks (daughter of V.B. Fredericks) or Maria Stackelberg.

In 1915, at the height of the First World War, the Tsarskoye Selo hospital was converted to receive wounded soldiers. Alexandra Feodorovna, together with her daughters Olga and Tatyana, were trained in nursing by Princess V.I. Gedroits, and then assisted her during operations as surgical nurses.

During the February Revolution, Alexandra Fedorovna was placed under house arrest in the Alexander Palace. Yu.A. remained with her. Den, who helped her look after the Grand Duchesses and A.A. Vyrubova. At the beginning of August 1917, the royal family was exiled to Tobolsk by decision of the Provisional Government. Later, by decision of the Bolsheviks, they were transported to Yekaterinburg.

Alexandra Fedorovna was shot along with her entire family on the night of July 17, 1918 in Yekaterinburg.

2. State duties

Empress Alexandra was the chief of the regiments: the Ulan Life Guards Named after Her Majesty, the 5th Hussars of Alexandria, the 21st East Siberian Rifle and Crimean Cavalry, and among the foreign ones - the Prussian 2nd Guards Dragoon Regiment.

The empress was also involved in charitable activities. By the beginning of 1909, under her patronage there were 33 charitable societies, communities of nurses, shelters, orphanages and similar institutions, among which: the Committee for finding places for military ranks who suffered in the war with Japan, the House of Charity for crippled soldiers, the Imperial Women's Patriotic Society , Trusteeship for labor assistance, Her Majesty's school of nannies in Tsarskoe Selo, Peterhof Society for Welfare of the Poor, Society for Assistance with Clothes to the Poor of St. Petersburg, Brotherhood in the Name of the Queen of Heaven for the charity of idiotic and epileptic children, Alexandria Shelter for Women and others.

Policy impact (estimates)

Count S. Yu. Witte, former Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Russian Empire (1905-1906), wrote that Nicholas II:

General A. A. Mosolov, who was from 1900 to 1916 the head of the chancellery of the Ministry of the Imperial Household, testified in his memoirs that the empress failed to become popular in her new fatherland, and from the very beginning the tone of this hostility was set by her mother-in-law, Empress Maria Feodorovna, who hated Germans; According to his testimony, the influential Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna was also opposed to her, which ultimately led to society’s aversion from the throne.

Senator V.I. Gurko, discussing the origins of the “mutual alienation that has grown over the years between society and the queen,” wrote in exile:

The Empress' chamberlain M. F. Zanotti showed investigator A. N. Sokolov:

Review of the Empress ballerina M. F. Kshesinskaya, the former mistress of Tsarevich Nicholas in 1892-1894, in her emigrant memoirs:

4. Canonization

In 1981, Alexandra Feodorovna and all members of the royal family were canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church abroad, in August 2000 - by the Russian Orthodox Church.

At canonization, Alexandra Feodorovna became Queen Alexandra the New, since Queen Alexandra was already among the saints.

Literature

5.1. Letters, diaries, documents, photographs

· August Sisters of Mercy. / Comp. N.K. Zvereva. - M.: Veche, 2006. - 464 p. - ISBN 5-9533-1529-5. (Excerpts from the diaries and letters of the queen and her daughters during World War I).

· Album of photographs of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, 1895-1911. // Russian Archive: History of the Fatherland in testimonies and documents of the 18th-20th centuries: Almanac.. - M.: Studio TRITE: Ros. Archive, 1992. - T. I-II.

· Empress Alexandra Feodorovna Romanova. Wonderful Light: Diary entries, correspondence, biography. / Comp. nun Nektaria (Mac Lees).- Moscow: Brotherhood of St. Herman of Alaska, Publishing House Russian Pilgrim, Valaam Society of America, 2005. - 656 p. - ISBN 5-98644-001-3.

· Reports on cash inflows and outflows. amounts received at the disposal of Her Majesty G.I. Alexandra Feodorovna for the needs of the war with Japan for 1904-1909.

· Report on the activities of Her Majesty's Warehouse in St. Petersburg. for the entire period of its existence, from February 1, 1904 to May 3, 1906.

· Report on the activities of Her Majesty's Central Warehouse in Harbin.

· Letters from Empress Alexandra Feodorovna to Emperor Nicholas II. - Berlin: Slovo, 1922. (In Russian and English).

· Platonov O. A. Russia's crown of thorns: Nicholas II in secret correspondence. - M.: Rodnik, 1996. - 800 p. (Correspondence of Nicholas II and his wife).

· The last diaries of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna Romanova: February 1917 - July 16, 1918 / Compiled, ed., preface, introduction. and comment. V. A. Kozlova and V. M. Khrustalev - Novosibirsk: Sibirsk. chronograph, 1999. - 341 p. - (Archive modern history Russia. Publications. Vol. 1 / Federal Archive Service of Russia, GARF).

· Tsesarevich: Documents, memories, photographs. - M.: Vagrius, 1998. - 190 pp.: ill.

5.2. Memories

· Gurko V.I. King and queen. - Paris, 1927. (And other publications)

· Den Yu. A. The real queen: Memoirs of a close friend of the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. - St. Petersburg: Tsarskoye Delo, 1999. - 241 p.

“The martyrdom of the royal family, and even more so the unspeakable moral torment it experienced, endured with such courage and high spirits, oblige us to treat the memory of the late Sovereign and his wife with special respect and caution.”

Gurko Vladimir Iosifovich

As you know, wife last emperor Nicholas II of Russia was the favorite granddaughter of the English Queen Victoria - Princess Victoria Alice Elena Louise Beatrice of Hesse-Darmstadt. She was the fourth daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse and Rhine, Ludwig IV, and Duchess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria of England.

In the history of Russia, the German princess Alice of Hesse is remembered as Alexandra Fedorovna - the last empress of Russia.

The magazine website has prepared 20 interesting and short facts about the life of one of the most powerful, noble, highly moral women of the 20th century - Empress Alexandra Feodorovna.

The name given to her consisted of her mother's name (Alice) and four names of her aunts. Alice was considered the favorite granddaughter of Queen Victoria, who called her Sunny("Sun"). Nicholas II very often called her Alix - a derivative of Alice and Alexander.

Kinship

Nicholas II and Princess Alice were distant relatives, being descendants of German dynasties; and their marriage, to put it mildly, “had no right to exist.” For example, on the side of her father, Alexandra Fedorovna was both a fourth cousin (common ancestor - Prussian king Frederick William II) and second cousin of Nicholas (common ancestor - Wilhelmina of Baden). In addition, the parents of Nicholas II were the godparents of Princess Alice.

Love story

The love story of the Russian Tsar and the granddaughter of the English Queen begins in 1884. He is a sixteen-year-old boy, slender, blue-eyed, with a modest and slightly sad smile. She is a twelve-year-old girl, like him, with blue eyes and beautiful golden hair. The meeting took place at the wedding of her older sister Elizabeth (the future great martyr) with Nicholas’s uncle, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. Both Nicholas and Alice (that was the name of the future Russian Tsarina) from the very beginning felt deep sympathy for each other. Nikolai gives her a precious brooch, and she, brought up in Puritan morality, in embarrassment and shyness does not dare take it and returns it to him.

Their second meeting occurs only five years later, when Alice comes to Russia to visit her older sister. But all this time Nikolai remembers her. “I have loved her for a long time, and since she stayed in St. Petersburg for six weeks in 1889, I love her even more deeply and heartily.” Nikolai's cherished dream is to marry Alice. However, Nikolai's parents have other plans.

Marriage

In 1889, when the heir to the crown prince turned twenty-one, he turned to his parents with a request to bless him for his marriage to Princess Alice. The answer of Emperor Alexander III was brief: “You are very young, there is still time for marriage, and, in addition, remember the following: you are the heir to the Russian throne, you are engaged to Russia, and we will still have time to find a wife.”

Queen Victoria and the latter’s parents were against the marriage of Alice and Tsarevich Nicholas, who hoped for his marriage with a more enviable bride - Helen of Orleans, daughter of Louis Philippe, Count of Paris. (Bourbon dynasty) However, Tsarevich Nicholas was soft and timid by nature, but in matters of the heart he was adamant, persistent and firm. Nikolai, always obedient to the will of his parents, in this case, with pain in his heart, does not agree with them, declaring that if he fails to marry Alice, he will never marry at all. In the end, the consent of the parents to be related to the English crown was obtained... True, this was more facilitated by other circumstances - the sudden serious illness of Emperor Alexander III, who died suddenly a month before the wedding of the lovers, and the full support of Princess Alice's sister - Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna and her husband Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich (5th son of Emperor Alexander II)

“I’m only happy when I’m surrounded by family and friends”

When the girl was 6 years old, a tragedy occurred in the family - her mother and sister fell ill with diphtheria and died. The girl remembered for the rest of her life how an oppressive silence reigned in the palace, which was broken by the cries of the nanny behind the wall of little Alice’s room. They took the girl’s toys and burned them - they were afraid that she might become infected. Of course, the next day they brought new toys. But it was no longer the same - something beloved and familiar was gone. The event associated with the death of his mother and sister left a fatal mark on the child’s character. Instead of openness, isolation and restraint began to prevail in her behavior, instead of sociability - shyness, instead of smiling - outward seriousness and even coldness. Only in the circle of her closest people, and there were only a few of them, did she become the same - joyful and open. These character traits remained with her forever and dominated even when she became the Empress. The Empress felt happy only among her own people.

"The Royal Disease"

Alice inherited the hemophilia gene from Queen Victoria.

Hemophilia, or “royal disease,” is a severe manifestation of genetic pathology that affected the royal houses of Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries. Thanks to dynastic marriages, this disease spread to Russia. The disease manifests itself in a decrease in blood clotting, so in patients any, even minor, bleeding is almost impossible to stop.

The difficulty of registering this disease is that it manifests itself only in men, and women, while remaining apparently healthy, transfer the affected gene to the next generation.

From Alexandra Feodorovna, the disease was passed on to her son, Grand Duke Alexei, who suffered from severe bleeding from early childhood, and who, even with a successful combination of circumstances, would never have been able to continue the great Romanov family.

Grandmother and granddaughter

Queen Victoria and her relatives. Coburg, April 1894. Her daughter Vicki sits next to the queen with her granddaughter Feo. Charlotte, Feo's mother, stands right of center, third to the right of her uncle the Prince of Wales (he is wearing a white tunic). To the left of Queen Victoria is her grandson Kaiser Wilhelm II, directly behind them are Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich and his bride, née Alice of Hesse-Darmstadt (six months later they will become the Russian Emperor and Empress)

The Queen of England loved her granddaughter very much and took every possible care of her upbringing. The castle of the Duke of Darmstadt was imbued with the “atmosphere of good old England.” English landscapes and portraits of relatives from Foggy Albion hung on the walls. Education was carried out by English mentors and mainly on English language. The Queen of England constantly sent her instructions and advice to her granddaughter. Puritan morality was brought up in the girl from the very first years. Even the kitchen was English - almost every day rice pudding with apples, and at Christmas, goose and, of course, plum pudding and traditional sweet pie.

Alice received the best education for those times. She knew literature, art, spoke several languages, and took a philosophy course at Oxford.

Beautiful and kind

Both in youth and in mature age The queen was very pretty. Everyone (even enemies) noted this. As one of the courtiers described her: “The Empress was very beautiful... tall, slender, with a superbly set head. But all this was nothing in comparison with the look of her gray-blue eyes, amazingly alive, reflecting all her excitement...” And here is a description of the Tsarina made by her closest friend Vyrubova: “Tall, with thick golden hair that reached her knees, she, like a girl, constantly blushed from shyness; Her eyes, huge and deep, became animated when talking and laughed. At home she was given the nickname “sunshine.” The Queen loved pearls most of all jewelry. She used it to decorate her hair, her hands, and her dresses.”

Kindness was the main character trait of the Queen, and her desire to help everyone around her was constant.

Her kindness towards her husband and children exudes from every line of her letter. She is ready to sacrifice everything to make her husband and children feel good.

If any of the Queen’s acquaintances, not to mention the Queen’s relatives, had difficulties or misfortunes, she immediately responded. She helped with warm, sympathetic words and financially. Sensitive to any suffering, she took other people's misfortune and pain to heart. If someone from the infirmary where she worked as a nurse died or became disabled, the Tsarina tried to help his family, sometimes continuing to do this even from Tobolsk. The queen constantly remembered the wounded who passed through her infirmary, not forgetting to regularly remember all the dead.

When a misfortune happened to Anna Vyrubova (the Empress’s closest friend, an admirer of Grigory Rasputin) (she was in a train accident), the Tsarina sat at her bedside all day and actually took care of her friend.

"White Rose", "Verbena" and "Atkinson"

The Empress, like any woman “of position and opportunity,” paid great attention to her appearance. At the same time, there were nuances. Thus, the empress practically did not use cosmetics and did not curl her hair. Only on the eve of big palace appearances did the hairdresser, with her permission, use curling irons. The Empress did not get her nails done, “because His Majesty could not stand manicured nails.” Of the perfumes, the Empress preferred “White Rose” from the Atkinson perfume company. They, according to her, are transparent, without any impurity and infinitely fragrant. As eau de toilette she used Verbena.

Sister of Mercy

During the First World War, Alexandra Feodorovna engaged in activities that were simply unthinkable for a person of her rank and position. She not only patronized sanitary detachments, established and looked after infirmaries, including in the Tsarskoye Selo palaces, but together with her eldest daughters she graduated from paramedic courses and began working as a nurse. The Empress washed wounds, bandaged them, and assisted in operations. She did this not to advertise herself (which was the case with many representatives of high society), but at the call of her heart. The “infirmary service” did not evoke understanding in aristocratic salons, where they believed that it “detracts from the prestige of the highest authority.”

Subsequently, this patriotic initiative entailed many bad rumors about the indecent behavior of the queen and two senior princesses. The Empress was proud of her activities; in photographs she and her daughters were depicted in the uniform of the Red Cross. Postcards appeared with a photograph of the queen assisting a surgeon during an operation. But, contrary to expectations, this caused condemnation. It was considered obscene for girls to court naked men. In the eyes of many monarchists, the queen, “washing the soldiers’ feet,” lost her royalty. Some court ladies stated: “The Empress was more suited to an ermine robe than to a nurse’s dress.”

Faith

According to contemporaries, the empress was deeply religious. The church was her main consolation, especially at a time when the heir’s illness worsened. The Empress held full services in the court churches, where she introduced the monastic (longer) liturgical regulations. Alexandra's room in the palace was a connection between the empress's bedroom and the nun's cell. The huge wall adjacent to the bed was completely covered with images and crosses.

Last will

Today it is reliably known that the royal family could have been saved through diplomatic efforts European countries. Nicholas II was laconic in his assessment of possible emigration: “In such difficult times, not a single Russian should leave Russia.” Alexandra Fedorovna’s sentiments were no less critical: “I prefer to die in Russia than to be saved by the Germans.” In 1981, Alexandra Feodorovna and all members of the royal family were canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, and in August 2000 by the Russian Orthodox Church.

"The intoxication of power"

Alexandra Feodorovna was full of initiative and thirsted for live action. Her mind constantly worked in the area of ​​those issues to which she was concerned, and she experienced an intoxication with power, which her royal husband did not have. Nicholas II forced himself to engage in state affairs, but essentially they did not capture him. The pathos of power was alien to him. Ministers' reports were a heavy burden for him.

The Empress had an excellent understanding of all specific issues accessible to her understanding, and her decisions were as businesslike as they were definite.
All persons who had business relations with her unanimously asserted that it was impossible to report any matter to her without first studying it. She posed to her speakers many specific and very practical questions concerning the very essence of the subject, and went into all the details and in conclusion gave instructions that were as authoritative as they were precise.

Unpopularity

Despite the sincere efforts of the empress in the matter of mercy, there were rumors among the people that Alexandra Feodorovna defended the interests of Germany. By personal order of the sovereign, a secret investigation was carried out into “slanderous rumors about the empress’s relations with the Germans and even about her betrayal of the Motherland.” It has been established that rumors about the desire for a separate peace with the Germans and the transfer of Russian military plans by the Empress to the Germans were spread by the German General Staff.

A contemporary woman who knew the queen personally wrote in her diary: “Rumor attributes all failures, all changes in appointments to the empress. The hair stands on end: no matter what they accuse her of, each layer of society from its own point of view, but the common, friendly impulse is dislike and distrust.”

Indeed, the “German Queen” was suspected of Germanophilism. Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich wrote: “It’s amazing how unpopular poor Alyx is. One can, of course, argue that she did absolutely nothing to give reason to suspect her of sympathizing with the Germans, but everyone is trying to claim that she sympathizes with them. The only thing she can be reproached for is that she failed to be popular.”

A rumor arose about a “German party” rallying around the Tsarina. In such a situation, the Russian general said to the British at the beginning of 1917: “What can we do? We have Germans everywhere. The Empress is German." These sentiments also affected members of the royal family. Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich wrote to the Tsar’s mother in September 1914: “I made a whole graphic where I noted the influences: Hessian, Prussian, Mecklenburg, Oldenburg, etc., and I recognize the Hessian influences as the most harmful of all on Alexandra Fedorovna, who remained German at heart , was against the war before last minute and tried in every possible way to delay the moment of rupture.”

The Tsarina could not help but know about such rumors: “Yes, I am more Russian than many others...” - she wrote to the Tsar. But nothing could prevent the spread of speculation. The noblewoman M.I. Baranovskaya said in the volost government: “Our empress cries when the Russians beat the Germans, and rejoices when the Germans win.”

After the abdication of the sovereign, the Extraordinary Commission of Inquiry under the Provisional Government tried and failed to establish the guilt of Nicholas II and Alexandra Feodorovna of any crimes.

Comparison with Catherine II

During the war years, the tsarina's interference in state affairs increased. This violated established traditions and undermined the authority of Nicholas II. But the rumors, of course, exaggerated the influence of the empress: “The emperor reigns, but the empress, inspired by Rasputin, rules,” the French ambassador M. Paleologue wrote in his diary in July 1916.

In post-revolutionary pamphlets she was called “All-Russian Autocrat Alice of Hesse.” Friends of the empress allegedly called her “the new Catherine the Great,” which was played out in satirical texts:

Ah, I made a series of plans,
To become “Catherine”,
And Hesse I am Petrograd
I dreamed of calling over time.

Comparison with Catherine II could give rise to other historical parallels. They said that the empress was preparing a coup in order to become regent for her young son: she “intends to play the same role in relation to her husband that Catherine played in relation to Peter III" Rumors about a regency (sometimes even about a joint regency between the empress and Rasputin) appear no later than September 1915. In the winter of 1917, there were rumors that the empress had already assumed some formal function of regent.

After February, statements about the omnipotence of the queen were confirmed by the assessments of authoritative contemporaries. stated: “All power was in the hands of Alexandra Feodorovna and her ardent supporters.<…>The Empress imagined that she was the second Catherine the Great and that the salvation and reconstruction of Russia depended on her.”

Family Life Lessons

In her diaries and letters, the empress reveals the secret of family happiness. Her lessons on family life are still popular today. In our time, when the most basic human concepts of duty, honor, conscience, responsibility, and loyalty are called into question and sometimes simply ridiculed, reading these records can be a real event of a spiritual order. Advice, warnings to spouses, thoughts about real and imaginary love, reflections on the relationships of immediate family, evidence of the decisive importance of the home atmosphere in the moral development of a child’s personality - this is the circle ethical problems, exciting the Queen.

Everyone is equal before God

Alexandra Fedorovna with her daughters

There is a lot of evidence that the tsar and queen were unusually simple in dealing with soldiers, peasants, orphans - in a word, with any person. It is also known that the Queen instilled in her children that everyone is equal before God, and they should not be proud of their position. Following these moral guidelines, she carefully monitored the upbringing of her children and made every effort to ensure their comprehensive development and strengthen the highest spiritual and moral principles in them.

Languages

As you know, before her marriage the Empress spoke two languages ​​- French and English; There is no information in the biography of the princess about her knowledge of the German language. Obviously this is due to the fact that Alix was raised personally by Queen Victoria, as the latter’s favorite granddaughter.

After her marriage, Princess Alix had to learn the language of her new homeland for a short time and get used to its way of life and customs. During the coronation in May 1896, after the disaster on the Khodynka Field, Alexandra Fedorovna went around the hospitals and “asked in Russian.” Baroness S.K. Buxhoeveden claimed (obviously exaggerating) that the Empress had mastered the Russian language perfectly and “could speak it without the slightest foreign accent, however, for many years she was afraid to conduct conversations in Russian, for fear of making some mistake.” Another memoirist, who also met Alexandra Fedorovna in 1907, recalled that “she speaks Russian with a noticeable English accent.” On the other hand, according to one of the people closest to the Empress, Captain 1st Rank N.P. Sablina, “she spoke Russian well, although with a noticeable German accent.”

Despite some discord among memoirists, we can confidently state that Alexandra Fedorovna coped with all the difficulties of the Russian language and confidently spoke it. Nicholas II contributed to this to a large extent; for many years he found time to read Russian classics aloud to her. This is how she acquired considerable knowledge in the field of Russian literature. Moreover, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna also mastered the Old Church Slavonic language. The pious Empress regularly attended church services, and the basis of her personal library in the Alexander Palace was made up of liturgical books.

Nevertheless, in most cases, the empress, for ease of communication with her husband, preferred English to the Russian language.

Charity

From the first days of her anointing, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna Romanova wanted to slightly change the life of high Russian society. Her first project was organizing a circle of needlewomen. Each of the court ladies in the circle had to sew three dresses a year and send them to the poor. True, the existence of the circle was short-lived.

Alexandra Fedorovna was an ascetic of charitable assistance. After all, she knew firsthand what love and pain were. In 1898, during the famine, she donated 50 thousand rubles from her personal funds for the hungry. She also provided all possible assistance to mothers in need. With the beginning of the First World War, the Empress donated all her funds to help the widows of soldiers, the wounded and orphans. At the height of the war, the Tsarskoye Selo hospital was converted to receive wounded soldiers. As mentioned above, Alexandra Fedorovna, together with her daughters Olga and Tatyana, were trained in nursing by Princess V.I. Gedrots, and then assisted her during operations as surgical nurses. On the initiative of the Empress, the Russian Empire created workhouses, schools for nurses, a school of folk art, orthopedic clinics for sick children.

By the beginning of 1909, 33 charitable societies were under her patronage., communities of sisters of mercy, shelters, orphanages and similar institutions, including: the Committee for finding places for military ranks who suffered in the war with Japan, the House of Charity for crippled soldiers, the Imperial Women's Patriotic Society, the Guardianship of Labor Assistance, Her Majesty's School of Nannies in Tsarskoe Selo, Peterhof Society for Relief of the Poor, Society for Helping the Poor with Clothes of St. Petersburg, Brotherhood in the Name of the Queen of Heaven for Charity of Idiots and Epileptics, Alexandria Shelter for Women and others.

Alexandra Novaya

In 1981, Alexandra Feodorovna and all members of the royal family were canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, and in August 2000 by the Russian Orthodox Church.

During the canonization, Alexandra Feodorovna became Queen Alexandra Nova, since among the saints there was already a Christian saint with the same name, revered as the martyr Queen Alexandra of Rome...

WIFE OF NICHOLAS II

ALEXANDRA Fedorovna (wife of Nicholas II)
ALEXA;NDRA Feodorovna (May 25 (June 6), 1872 - July 16 (29), 1918, Yekaterinburg), Russian empress, wife of Nicholas II Alexandrovich (see NICHOLAY II Alexandrovich) (from November 14, 1894); daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse-Darmstadt Louis IV, granddaughter of the English Queen Victoria (see VICTORIA (queen)).
Before her marriage she was named Alice Victoria Elena Louise Beatrice. The imperious and hysterical Alexandra Feodorovna had great influence on Nicholas II, was an ardent supporter of unlimited autocracy, and the head of the Germanophile group at court. She was extremely superstitious and had unlimited faith in G.E. Rasputin (see RASPUTIN Grigory Efimovich), who used the queen’s location in deciding political issues. During the First World War, Alexandra Feodorovna was a supporter of concluding a separate peace with Germany. After the February Revolution, in March 1917 she was arrested along with the entire royal family, exiled to Tobolsk, and then to Yekaterinburg, where, by order of the Ural Regional Council, she was shot along with her family in July 1918.

Biography

Relations with society

<…>

In culture

Maria Fedorovna
Children
Alexander I
Konstantin Pavlovich
Alexandra Pavlovna
Ekaterina Pavlovna
Elena Pavlovna
Maria Pavlovna
Olga Pavlovna
Anna Pavlovna
Nicholas I
Mikhail Pavlovich
Alexander I
Elizaveta Alekseevna
Nicholas I
Alexandra Fedorovna
Children
Alexander II
Maria Nikolaevna
Olga Nikolaevna
Alexandra Nikolaevna
Konstantin Nikolaevich
Nikolai Nikolaevich
Mikhail Nikolaevich
Alexander II
Maria Alexandrovna
Children
Alexandra Alexandrovna
Nikolai Alexandrovich
Alexander III
Maria Alexandrovna (Grand Duchess)
Vladimir Alexandrovich
Aleksey Aleksandrovich
Sergey Aleksandrovich
Pavel Alexandrovich
Alexander III
Maria Fedorovna
Children
Nicholas II
Alexander Alexandrovich
Georgy Alexandrovich
Ksenia Alexandrovna
Mikhail Alexandrovich
Olga Alexandrovna
Nicholas II
Alexandra Fedorovna
Children
Olga Nikolaevna
Tatyana Nikolaevna
Maria Nikolaevna
Anastasia Nikolaevna
Alexey Nikolaevich

Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna with her family, Livadia, Crimea, 1913
Grand Duchess Elizaveta Feodorovna with her sister Tsarina Alexandra and son-in-law Tsar Nicholas II

Interesting Facts

According to diplomat M.V. Mayorov, Alexandra Fedorovna not only did not seek, out of pro-German sympathies, to persuade her husband to a separate peace with Germany, as is usually attributed to her, but, on the contrary, played “a detrimental role in Nicholas II’s intention to wage a “war to a victorious end” “, while even “not paying attention to the colossal human losses of the Russian army.”

Biography

The fourth daughter (and sixth child) of the Grand Duke of Hesse and Rhine Ludwig IV and Duchess Alice, granddaughter of Queen Victoria of England.

She was born in Darmstadt (Hesse), on the day of the third discovery of the head of the Forerunner and Baptist of the Lord, John.

In 1884, she came to visit her sister, Grand Duchess Elizaveta Feodorovna, wife of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. Here she met the heir to the Russian throne, Nikolai Alexandrovich.

On November 2, 1894 (the day after the death of Emperor Alexander III) she converted from Lutheranism to Orthodoxy, accepting Russian name, and already on November 26 she married the new Emperor of Russia Nicholas II.

She considered the Siberian peasant G. E. Rasputin-Novy an elder and friend of her family.

She was killed along with her entire family in 1918 in Yekaterinburg. In 1981 she was canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, and in 2000 by the Moscow Patriarchate.

When she was canonized, she became Queen Alexandra the New, since Queen Alexandra was already among the saints.
Relations with society

During her lifetime, Alexandra Feodorovna failed to become popular in her new homeland, especially in high society. Empress-mother Maria Feodorovna was fundamentally against her son’s marriage to a German princess, and this, along with a number of other external circumstances, coupled with the young empress’s painful shyness, immediately affected the attitude of the entire Russian court towards her.

As A. A. Mosolov, who was the head of the office of the Minister of the Court in 1916, believed, Maria Feodorovna, being a devout Dane, hated the Germans, not forgiving them for the annexation of Schleswig and Holstein in 1864.

The French ambassador M. Paleologue, however, noted in 1915:

Several times now I have heard the empress reproached for maintaining sympathy, preference, and deep tenderness for Germany on the throne. The unfortunate woman in no way deserves this accusation, which she knows and which drives her into despair.

Alexandra Feodorovna, born a German, was never her in mind or heart.<…>Her upbringing, her training, her mental and moral education were also entirely English. And now she is also English in her appearance, in her posture, in some inflexibility and puritanism, in the irreconcilable and militant severity of her conscience, and finally, in many of her intimate habits. This, however, is the extent of everything that stems from its Western origin.

The basis of her nature became completely Russian. Above all, and despite the hostile legend that I see springing up around her, I have no doubt about her patriotism. She loves Russia with a passionate love. And how can she not be tied to this adopted homeland, which for her summarizes and personifies all her interests as a woman, wife, empress, mother?

When she ascended the throne in 1894, it was already known that she did not like Germany and especially Prussia.

According to the testimony of the daughter of life physician E. S. Botkin, after the emperor read out the manifesto on the war with Germany, Alexandra Feodorovna cried with joy. And during the second Anglo-Boer War, Empress Alexandra, like Russian society, was on the side of the Boers (although she was horrified by the losses among the British officers).

In addition to the Empress-Mother, other relatives of Nicholas II did not like the young Empress. If you believe the testimony of her maid of honor A.A. Vyrubova, then the reason for this was, in particular, the following:

...In recent years, little cadets have come to play with the Heir. They were all told to handle Alexei Nikolaevich carefully. The Empress was afraid for him and rarely invited his cousins, frisky and rude boys, to see him. Of course, my family was angry about this.

In a difficult time for Russia, when the world war was going on, high society amused itself with a new and very interesting activity - spreading all kinds of gossip about Alexandra Feodorovna. If you believe A.A. Vyrubova, then around the winter of 1915/1916, the excited Mrs. Marianne von Derfelden (her sister-in-law) somehow ran to her sister Alexandra Pistolkors, the wife of a chamber cadet of the Highest Court, with the words:

Today we are spreading rumors in factories that the Empress is getting the Tsar drunk, and everyone believes it.

Other enemies of Alexandra Fedorovna did not hesitate to express their innermost thoughts on paper. Thus, her “namesake” A.F. Kerensky wrote in his memoirs:

...who could have predicted that the sparkling joy of the princess, the “Windsor ray of sunshine,” as Nicholas II affectionately called her, was destined to become a gloomy Russian queen, a fanatical adherent of the Orthodox Church.

The reason for the enmity towards the empress was not a mystery to N. N. Tikhanovich-Savitsky (leader of the Astrakhan People's Monarchist Party), who wrote to Nicholas II:

Sovereign! The plan of the intrigue is clear: by defaming the Tsarina and pointing out that everything bad comes from her, they inspire the population that You are weak, which means that it is necessary to take control of the country from You and transfer it to the Duma.

“If we allow our Friend to be persecuted, then we and our country will suffer for it” (about G. Rasputin and Russia, from a letter to my husband dated June 22, 1915)
“I want to beat off almost all the ministers...” (from a letter to my husband dated August 29, 1915)
“Big brutes, I cannot call them anything else” (about the Holy Synod, from a letter to my husband dated September 12, 1915)
“...a country where a man of God helps the sovereign will never perish. This is true" (about G. Rasputin and Russia, from a letter to my husband dated December 5, 1915)
“Yes, I am more Russian than many others, and I will not sit quietly” (from a letter to my husband dated September 20, 1916)
“Why do they hate me? Because they know that I have a strong will and that when I am convinced of the rightness of something (and if Gregory blessed me), then I do not change my mind, and this is unbearable for them" (about his enemies and about G. Rasputin, from a letter to his husband dated December 4, 1916)
“Why don’t the generals allow you to send R. to the army? Banner" (small patriotic newspaper)? Dubrovin thinks that this is a shame (I agree) - but can they read all sorts of proclamations? Our bosses, really, are idiots” (about the newspaper “Russian Banner” and its Black Hundred publisher, from a letter to my husband dated December 15, 1916)
“I can’t understand people who are afraid to die. I have always looked at death as a deliverance from earthly suffering” (from a conversation with friend Julia Den on December 18, 1916)
“I prefer to die in Russia than to be saved by the Germans” (from a conversation in prison, March 1918)

In culture

The singer Zhanna Bichevskaya has a song “Queen Alexandra” on the album “We are Russians” (2002):

She lived by love simply, prayerfully and modestly -
I'm not afraid to say in front of the whole world -
Queen Alexandra is like the archangels,
That Rus' is begging for the last times...

The last Russian empress... is the closest to us in time, but perhaps also the least known in her authentic appearance, untouched by the pen of interpreters. Even during her lifetime, not to mention the decades that followed the tragic 1918, speculation and slander, and often outright slander, began to cling to her name. No one will know the truth now.
Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (nee Princess Alice Victoria Elena Louise Beatrice of Hesse-Darmstadt; May 25 (June 6), 1872 - July 17, 1918) - wife of Nicholas II (since 1894). The fourth daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse and Rhine, Ludwig IV, and Duchess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria of England. She was born in Germany, in Darmstadt. The fourth daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse and Rhine, Ludwig IV, and Duchess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria of England.

When little Alex was six years old, a diphtheria epidemic spread in Hesse in 1878. Alice's mother and her younger sister May died from it.
father Alex (280x403, 32Kb)mother Alex (280x401, 26Kb)
Ludwig IV of Hesse and Duchess Alice (second daughter of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert) are Alex's parents

And then the girl is taken in by her English grandmother. Alice was considered the favorite granddaughter of Queen Victoria, who called her Sunny. So Alix spent most of her childhood and adolescence in England, where she was raised. Queen Victoria, by the way, did not like the Germans and had a special dislike for Emperor William II, which was passed on to her granddaughter. All her life, Alexandra Fedorovna felt more drawn to her homeland on her mother’s side, to her relatives and friends there. Maurice Paleologue, the French ambassador to Russia, wrote about her: “Alexandra Fedorovna is not German either in mind or in heart and never has been. Of course, she is one by birth. Her upbringing, education, formation of consciousness and morality have become completely English. And now she is still English in her appearance, demeanor, a certain tension and puritanical character, intransigence and militant severity of conscience. Finally, in many of her habits."
2Alexandra Fedorovna (374x600, 102Kb)

In June 1884, at the age of 12, Alice visited Russia for the first time, when her older sister Ella (in Orthodoxy - Elizaveta Fedorovna) married Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. In 1886, she came to visit her sister, Grand Duchess Elizaveta Feodorovna (Ella), the wife of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. Then she met the heir, Nikolai Alexandrovich. The young people, who were also quite closely related (they were second cousins ​​through the princess’s father), immediately fell in love with each other.
Sergey Alexander., brother Nick 11 (200x263, 52Kb) Eliz. Fedor.-sister (200x261, 43Kb)
Sergei Alexandrovich and Elizaveta Fedorovna (Ella)

While visiting her sister Ella in St. Petersburg, Alix was invited to social events. The verdict handed down by high society was cruel: “Uncharming. It holds on as if it had swallowed an arshin.” What does high society care about the problems of little Princess Alix? Who cares that she grows up without a mother, suffers greatly from loneliness, shyness, and terrible pain in the facial nerve? And only the blue-eyed heir was completely absorbed and delighted with the guest - he fell in love! Not knowing what to do in such cases, Nikolai asked his mother for an elegant brooch with diamonds and quietly placed it in the hand of his twelve-year-old lover. Out of confusion, she did not answer. The next day, the guests were leaving, a farewell ball was given, and Alix, taking a moment, quickly approached the Heir and just as silently returned the brooch to his hand. Nobody noticed anything. Only now there was a secret between them: why did she return her?

The childish naive flirtation of the heir to the throne and Princess Alice on the girl’s next visit to Russia three years later began to acquire the serious nature of a strong feeling.

However, the visiting princess did not please the parents of the crown prince: Empress Maria Feodorovna, like a true Dane, hated the Germans and was against the marriage with the daughter of Ludwig of Hesse of Darmstadt. His parents hoped until the very end for his marriage to Elena Louise Henrietta, daughter of Louis Philippe, Count of Paris.

Alice herself had reason to believe that the beginning of an affair with the heir to the Russian throne could have favorable consequences for her. Returning to England, the princess begins to study the Russian language, gets acquainted with Russian literature, and even has long conversations with the priest of the Russian embassy church in London. Queen Victoria, who loves her dearly, of course, wants to help her granddaughter and writes a letter to Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna. The grandmother asks to find out in more detail about the intentions of the Russian imperial house in order to decide whether Alice should be confirmed according to the rules of the Anglican Church, because according to tradition, members of the royal family in Russia had the right to marry only women of the Orthodox faith.

Another four years passed, and blind chance helped decide the fates of the two lovers. As if an evil fate hovering over Russia, unfortunately, young people of royal blood united. Truly this union turned out to be tragic for the fatherland. But who thought about it then...

In 1893, Alexander III became seriously ill. Here a dangerous question for the succession to the throne arose - the future sovereign is not married. Nikolai Alexandrovich categorically stated that he would choose a bride only for love, and not for dynastic reasons. Through the mediation of Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich, the emperor's consent to his son's marriage to Princess Alice was obtained. However, Maria Feodorovna poorly concealed her dissatisfaction with the unsuccessful, in her opinion, choice of an heir. The fact that the Princess of Hesse joined the Russian imperial family during the mournful days of the suffering of the dying Alexander III probably set Maria Feodorovna even more against the new empress.
April 3, 1894, Coburg-Alex agreed to become Nicholas's wife (486x581, 92Kb)
April 1894, Coburg, Alex agreed to become Nikolai's wife

(in the center is Queen Victoria, Alex's grandmother)

And why, having received the long-awaited parental blessing, Nikolai could not persuade Alix to become his wife? After all, she loved him - he saw it, felt it. What it took for him to persuade his powerful and authoritarian parents to agree to this marriage! He fought for his love and now, the long-awaited permission has been received!

Nicholas goes to the wedding of Alix's brother at Coburg Castle, where everything is already prepared for the Heir to the Russian Throne to propose to Alix of Hesse. The wedding went on as usual, only Alix... was crying.

“We were left alone, and then that conversation began between us, which I had long and strongly desired and, at the same time, was very afraid of. They talked until 12 o'clock, but to no avail, she still resists the change of religion. She, poor thing, cried a lot.” But is it just one religion? In general, if you look at portraits of Alix from any period of her life, it is impossible not to notice the stamp of tragic pain that this face carries. It seems like she always KNEW... She had a presentiment. Cruel fate, the basement of the Ipatiev House, terrible death... She was afraid and tossed about. But the love was too strong! And she agreed.

In April 1894, Nikolai Alexandrovich, accompanied by a brilliant retinue, went to Germany. Having gotten engaged in Darmstadt, the newlyweds spend some time at the English court. From that moment on, the Tsarevich’s diary, which he kept throughout his life, became available to Alex.

Already at that time, even before her accession to the throne, Alex had a special influence on Nicholas. Her entry appears in his diary: “Be persistent... don’t let others be first and bypass you... Reveal your personal will and don’t let others forget who you are.”

Subsequently, Alexandra Feodorovna’s influence on the emperor often took increasingly decisive, sometimes excessive, forms. This can be judged from the published letters from the Empress Nicholas to the front. It was not without her pressure that Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, popular among the troops, resigned. Alexandra Fedorovna was always worried about her husband’s reputation. And she more than once pointed out to him the need for firmness in relations with the courtiers.

Alix the bride was present during the agony of the groom's father, Alexander III. She accompanied his coffin from Livadia across the country with her family. On a sad November day, the body of the emperor was transferred from the Nikolaevsky station to the Peter and Paul Cathedral. A huge crowd crowded along the path of the funeral procession, moving along the pavements dirty with wet snow. The commoners whispered, pointing to the young princess: “She came to us behind the coffin, she brings misfortune with her.”

Tsarevich Alexander and Princess Alice of Hesse

On November 14 (26), 1894 (on the birthday of Empress Maria Feodorovna, which allowed for a retreat from mourning), the wedding of Alexandra and Nicholas II took place in the Great Church of the Winter Palace. After the wedding, a thanksgiving prayer service was served by members of the Holy Synod, led by Metropolitan Palladius (Raev) of St. Petersburg; While singing “We praise You, God,” a cannon salute of 301 shots was fired. Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich wrote in his emigrant memoirs about their first days of marriage: “The wedding of the young Tsar took place less than a week after the funeral of Alexander III. Their honeymoon passed in an atmosphere of funeral services and mourning visits. The most deliberate dramatization could not have invented a more suitable prologue for the historical tragedy of the last Russian Tsar.”
5coronation (528x700, 73Kb)

Typically, the wives of Russian heirs to the throne were in secondary roles for a long time. Thus, they had time to carefully study the mores of the society they would have to manage, had time to navigate their likes and dislikes, and most importantly, had time to acquire the necessary friends and helpers. Alexandra Fedorovna was unlucky in this sense. She ascended the throne, as they say, having fallen from a ship to a ball: not understanding the life that was alien to her, not being able to understand the complex intrigues of the imperial court.
9-Wedding of Nick 11 and Grand Duchess Alex.Fedor. (700x554, 142Kb)

In truth, her very inner nature was not adapted for the vain royal craft. Painfully withdrawn, Alexandra Feodorovna seemed to be the opposite example of a friendly dowager empress - our heroine, on the contrary, gave the impression of an arrogant, cold German woman who treated her subjects with disdain. The embarrassment that invariably engulfs the queen when communicating with strangers, prevented the establishment of simple, relaxed relationships with representatives of high society, which were vital for her.
19-alex.fedor-tsarina (320x461, 74Kb)

Alexandra Fedorovna did not know how to win the hearts of her subjects at all; even those who were ready to bow to members of the imperial family did not receive food for this. So, for example, in women's institutes, Alexandra Fedorovna could not squeeze out a single friendly word. This was all the more striking, since the former Empress Maria Fedorovna knew how to evoke in college students a relaxed attitude toward herself, which turned into enthusiastic love for the bearers of royal power. The consequences of the mutual alienation that grew over the years between society and the queen, sometimes taking on the character of antipathy, were very diverse and even tragic. Alexandra Fedorovna’s excessive pride played a fatal role in this.
6tsaritsa-al.fed. (525x700, 83Kb)

The first years of married life turned out to be tense: the unexpected death of Alexander III made Niki emperor, although he was completely unprepared for this. He was bombarded with advice from his mother and five respectable uncles, who taught him to rule the state. Being a very delicate, self-possessed and well-mannered young man, Nikolai at first obeyed everyone. Nothing good came of this: on the advice of their uncles, after the tragedy on Khodynka Field, Niki and Alix attended a ball at the French ambassador - the world called them insensitive and cruel. Uncle Vladimir decided to pacify the crowd in front of the Winter Palace on his own, while the Tsar’s family lived in Tsarskoe - Bloody Sunday ensued... Only over time will Niki learn to say a firm “no” to both uncles and brothers, but... never to HER.
7nikolai 11 with his wife photo (560x700, 63Kb)

Immediately after the wedding, he returned her diamond brooch - a gift from an inexperienced sixteen-year-old boy. And the Empress will not part with her throughout her entire life together - after all, this is a symbol of their love. They always celebrated the day of their engagement - April 8th. In 1915, the forty-two-year-old empress wrote a short letter to her beloved at the front: “For the first time in 21 years we are not spending this day together, but how vividly I remember everything! My dear boy, what happiness and what love you have given me over all these years... How time flies - 21 years have already passed! You know, I saved that “princess dress” I was wearing that morning, and I’ll wear your favorite brooch...”

The queen's intervention in the affairs of government did not appear immediately after her wedding. Alexandra Feodorovna was quite happy with the traditional role of guardian hearth and home, the role of a woman next to a man engaged in difficult, serious business. She is, first of all, a mother, busy with her four daughters: taking care of their upbringing, checking their assignments, protecting them. She is the center, as always subsequently, of her closely knit family, and for the emperor, she is the only beloved wife for life.

Her daughters adored her. From the initial letters of their names they made up a common name: “OTMA” (Olga, Tatyana, Maria, Anastasia) - and under this signature they sometimes gave gifts to their mother and sent letters. There was an unspoken rule among the Grand Duchesses: every day one of them seemed to be on duty with her mother, without leaving her a single step. It is curious that Alexandra Fedorovna spoke English to the children, and Nicholas II spoke only Russian. The empress communicated with those around her mostly in French. She also mastered Russian quite well, but spoke it only to those who did not know other languages. And only German speech was not present in their everyday life. By the way, the Tsarevich was not taught this.
8 al.fed. with daughters (700x432, 171Kb)
Alexandra Fedorovna with her daughters

Nicholas II, a domestic man by nature, for whom power seemed more like a burden than a way of self-realization, rejoiced at any opportunity to forget about his state concerns in a family setting and gladly indulged in those petty domestic interests for which he generally had a natural inclination. Perhaps, if this couple had not been so highly elevated by fate above mere mortals, she would have calmly and blissfully lived until her death hour, raising beautiful children and resting in God, surrounded by numerous grandchildren. But the mission of monarchs is too restless, the lot is too difficult to allow them to hide behind the walls of their own well-being.

Anxiety and confusion gripped the reigning couple even when the empress, with some fatal sequence, began to give birth to girls. Nothing could be done against this obsession, but Alexandra Feodorovna, who had learned with her mother’s milk her destiny as a queen of a woman, perceived the absence of an heir as a kind of heavenly punishment. On this basis, she, an extremely impressionable and nervous person, developed pathological mysticism. Gradually, the entire rhythm of the palace obeyed the tossing of the unfortunate woman. Now every step of Nikolai Alexandrovich himself was checked against one or another heavenly sign, and state policy was imperceptibly intertwined with childbirth. The queen's influence on her husband intensified, and the more significant it became, the further the date for the appearance of the heir moved forward.
10Alex.Fedoroo (361x700, 95Kb)

The French charlatan Philip was invited to the court, who managed to convince Alexandra Feodorovna that he was able to provide her, through suggestion, with male offspring, and she imagined herself to be pregnant and felt all the physical symptoms of this condition. Only after several months of the so-called false pregnancy, which was very rarely observed, the empress agreed to be examined by a doctor, who established the truth. But the most important misfortune was not in the false pregnancy or in the hysterical nature of Alexandra Fedorovna, but in the fact that the charlatan received, through the queen, the opportunity to influence state affairs. One of Nicholas II’s closest assistants wrote in his diary in 1902: “Philip inspires the sovereign that he does not need any other advisers except representatives of the highest spiritual, heavenly powers, with whom he, Philip, puts him in contact. Hence the intolerance of any contradiction and complete absolutism, sometimes expressed as absurdity. If at the report the minister defends his opinion and does not agree with the opinion of the sovereign, then a few days later he receives a note with a categorical order to carry out what he was told.”

Philip was still able to be expelled from the palace, because the Police Department, through its agent in Paris, found indisputable evidence of the French subject’s fraud.
Alex.fedor (527x700, 63Kb)

With the outbreak of the war, the couple were forced to separate. And then they wrote letters to each other... “Oh, my love! It’s so hard to say goodbye to you and see your lonely pale face with big sad eyes in the train window - my heart is breaking, take me with you... I kiss your pillow at night and passionately wish you were next to me... We have been through so much over these 20 years, we understand each other without words...” “I must thank you for your arrival with the girls, for bringing me life and sunshine, despite the rainy weather. Of course, as always, I didn’t have time to tell you even half of what I was going to, because when I meet you after a long separation, I always become shy. I just sit and look at you - this in itself is a great joy for me...”

And soon the long-awaited miracle followed - the heir Alexei was born.

The four daughters of Nikolai and Alexandra were born beautiful, healthy, real princesses: father's favorite romantic Olga, serious beyond her years Tatyana, generous Maria and funny little Anastasia. It seemed that their love could conquer everything. But love cannot defeat Fate. Their only son turned out to be sick with hemophilia, in which the walls of blood vessels burst from weakness and lead to difficult-to-stop bleeding.

12-Tsar and Family (237x300, 18Kb)The illness of the heir played a fatal role - they had to keep it secret, they painfully searched for a way out and could not find it. At the beginning of the last century, hemophilia remained incurable and patients could only hope for 20-25 years of life. Alexey, who was born a surprisingly handsome and intelligent boy, was ill almost all his life. And his parents suffered with him. Sometimes, when the pain was very severe, the boy asked for death. “When I die, will it hurt me anymore?” - he asked his mother during indescribable attacks of pain. Only morphine could save him from them, but the Tsar did not dare to have as heir to the throne not just a sick young man, but also a morphine addict. Alexei's salvation was loss of consciousness. From pain. He went through several serious crises, when no one believed in his recovery, when he rushed about in delirium, repeating one single word: “Mom.”
Alexey Nikol.-Tsesarevich (379x600, 145Kb)
Tsarevich Alexey

Having turned gray and aged several decades at once, my mother was nearby. She stroked his head, kissed his forehead, as if this could help the unfortunate boy... The only, inexplicable thing that saved Alexei was Rasputin’s prayers. But Rasputin brought an end to their power.
13-Rasputin and the Emperor (299x300, 22Kb)

Thousands of pages have been written about this major adventurer of the 20th century, so it is difficult to add anything to the multi-volume research in a small essay. Let's just say: of course, possessing the secrets of unconventional methods of treatment, being an extraordinary person, Rasputin was able to inspire the empress with the idea that he, a person sent by God to the family, had a special mission - to save and preserve the heir to the Russian throne. And Alexandra Feodorovna’s friend, Anna Vyrubova, brought the elder into the palace. This gray, unremarkable woman had such a huge influence on the queen that it is worth special mention about her.

14-Taneeva-Vyrubova (225x500, 70Kb) She was the daughter of the outstanding musician Alexander Sergeevich Taneyev, an intelligent and dexterous man who held the position of chief manager of His Majesty’s office at court. It was he who recommended Anna to the queen as a partner for playing the piano four hands. Taneyeva pretended to be an extraordinary simpleton to such an extent that she was initially declared unfit for court service. But this prompted the queen to intensively promote her wedding with naval officer Vyrubov. But Anna’s marriage turned out to be very unsuccessful, and Alexandra Fedorovna, as an extremely decent woman, considered herself to some extent guilty. In view of this, Vyrubova was often invited to the court, and the empress tried to console her. Apparently, nothing strengthens female friendship, as confidential compassion in amorous affairs.

Soon, Alexandra Fedorovna already called Vyrubova her “personal friend,” especially emphasizing that the latter did not have an official position at court, which means that her loyalty and devotion to the royal family were completely selfless. The empress was far from thinking that the position of a friend of the queen was more enviable than the position of a person belonging by position to her entourage. In general, it is difficult to fully appreciate the enormous role played by A. Vyrubova in the last period of the reign of Nicholas II. Without her active participation, Rasputin, despite all the power of his personality, would not have been able to achieve anything, since direct relations between the notorious old man and the queen were extremely rare.

Apparently, he did not strive to see her often, realizing that this could only weaken his authority. On the contrary, Vyrubova entered the queen’s chambers every day and did not part with her on trips. Having fallen entirely under the influence of Rasputin, Anna became the best conductor of the elder’s ideas in the imperial palace. In essence, in the stunning drama that the country experienced two years before the collapse of the monarchy, the roles of Rasputin and Vyrubova were so closely intertwined that there is no way to find out the degree of significance of each of them separately.

Anna Vyrubova on a walk in a wheelchair with Grand Duke Olga Nikolaevna, 1915-1916.

The last years of Alexandra Feodorovna's reign were full of bitterness and despair. The public at first transparently hinted at the pro-German interests of the empress, and soon began to openly vilify the “hated German woman.” Meanwhile, Alexandra Fedorovna sincerely tried to help her husband, she was sincerely devoted to the country, which had become her only home, the home of her closest people. She turned out to be an exemplary mother and raised her four daughters with modesty and decency. The girls, despite their high origins, were distinguished by their hard work, many skills, did not know luxury and even assisted during operations in military hospitals. This, oddly enough, was also blamed on the empress, they say, she allows her young ladies too much.

Tsarevich Alexei and Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia. Livadia, 1914

When a rioting revolutionary crowd overran Petrograd, and the Tsar's train was stopped at Dno station for the abdication to be drafted, Alix was left alone. The children had measles, lay with high temperature. The courtiers fled, leaving only a handful of loyal people. The electricity was turned off, there was no water - we had to go to the pond, break off the ice and heat it on the stove. The palace with defenseless children remained under the protection of the Empress.

18-alex (280x385, 23Kb) She alone did not lose heart and did not believe in renunciation until the last. Alix supported the handful of loyal soldiers who remained to stand guard around the palace - now this was her entire Army. On the day when the ex-Sovereign, who had abdicated the Throne, returned to the palace, her friend, Anna Vyrubova, wrote in her diary: “Like a fifteen-year-old girl, she ran along the endless stairs and corridors of the palace towards him. Having met, they hugged, and when left alone, they burst into tears...” While in exile, anticipating an imminent execution, in a letter to Anna Vyrubova, the Empress summed up her life: “Dear, my dear... Yes, the past is over. I thank God for everything that happened, that I received - and I will live with memories that no one will take away from me... How old I have become, but I feel like the mother of the country, and I suffer as if for my child and I love my Motherland, despite all the horrors now ... You know that it is IMPOSSIBLE to tear LOVE OUT OF MY HEART, and Russia too... Despite the black ingratitude to the Emperor, which tears my heart... Lord, have mercy and save Russia.”

The abdication of Nicholas II from the throne brought the royal family to Tobolsk, where they, along with the remnants of their former servants, lived under house arrest. With his selfless act, the former king wanted only one thing - to save his beloved wife and children. However, the miracle did not happen; life turned out to be worse: in July 1918, the couple went down to the basement of the Ipatiev mansion. Nikolai carried his sick son in his arms... Following, walking heavily and holding her head high, was Alexandra Feodorovna...

On that last day of their lives, which is now celebrated by the church as Saints' Day of Remembrance Royal Martyrs, Alix did not forget to wear “his favorite brooch.” Having become material evidence No. 52 for the investigation, for us this brooch remains one of the many evidence of that Great Love. The shooting in Yekaterinburg ended the 300-year reign of the House of Romanov in Russia.

On the night of July 16-17, 1918, after the execution, the remains of Emperor Nicholas II, his family and associates were taken to this place and thrown into the mine. Nowadays on Ganina Yama there is a monastery in honor of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers.
male monastery (700x365, 115Kb)

In the marriage of Nikolai Alexandrovich with Alexandra Feodorovna, five children were born:

Olga (1895-1918);

Tatiana (1897-1918);

Maria (1899-1918);

Anastasia (1901-1918);

Alexey (1904-1918).

Alexandra Fedorovna (wife of Nicholas II)

Alexandra Feodorovna, née Princess Victoria Alice Helena Louise Beatrice of Hesse-Darmstadt (German: Victoria Alix Helena Louise Beatrice von Hessen und bei Rhein). Born on June 6, 1872 in Darmstadt - shot on July 17, 1918 in Yekaterinburg. Russian Empress, wife of Nicholas II. The fourth daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse and Rhine, Ludwig IV, and Duchess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria of England.

Victoria Alice Elena Louise Beatrice was born in Darmstadt (German Empire) on June 6, 1872.

The name given to her consisted of her mother's name (Alice) and four names of her aunts.

The godparents were: Edward, Prince of Wales (future King Edward VII), Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich (future Emperor) with his wife, Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna, Queen Victoria's youngest daughter Princess Beatrice, Augusta of Hesse-Kassel, Duchess of Cambridge and Maria Anna, Princess of Prussia .

Alice inherited the hemophilia gene from Queen Victoria.

In 1878, a diphtheria epidemic spread in Hesse. Alice's mother and her younger sister May died from it, after which Alice lived most of the time in the UK at Balmoral Castle and Osborne House on the Isle of Wight. Alice was considered the favorite granddaughter of Queen Victoria, who called her Sunny.

In June 1884, at the age of twelve, Alice visited Russia for the first time when her older sister Ella (in Orthodoxy - Elizaveta Feodorovna) married Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich.

The second time she arrived in Russia in January 1889 at the invitation of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. After staying in the Sergius Palace (St. Petersburg) for six weeks, the princess met and attracted the special attention of the heir to the Tsarevich.

In the early 1890s, the latter’s parents, who hoped for his marriage to Helena Louise Henrietta, daughter of Louis-Philippe, Count of Paris, were against the marriage of Alice and Tsarevich Nicholas. A key role in the arrangement of Alice’s marriage with Nikolai Alexandrovich was played by the efforts of her sister, Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna, and the latter’s husband, through whom correspondence between the lovers was carried out.

The position of Emperor Alexander and his wife changed due to the persistence of the crown prince and the deteriorating health of the emperor. On April 6, 1894, a manifesto announced the engagement of the Tsarevich and Alice of Hesse-Darmstadt.

In the following months, Alice studied the basics of Orthodoxy under the guidance of the court protopresbyter John Yanyshev and the Russian language with teacher E. A. Schneider.

On October 10 (22), 1894, she arrived in Crimea, in Livadia, where she stayed with the imperial family until the death of Emperor Alexander III - October 20.

On October 21 (November 2), 1894, she accepted Orthodoxy through confirmation there with the name Alexandra and patronymic Fedorovna (Feodorovna). Nicholas and Alexandra were distant relatives of each other, being descendants of German dynasties. For example, on the side of her father, Alexandra Fedorovna was both a fourth cousin (common ancestor - Prussian king Frederick William II) and second cousin of Nicholas (common ancestor - Wilhelmina of Baden).

Alexandra Fedorovna's height: 167 centimeters.

Personal life of Alexandra Fedorovna:

On November 14 (26), 1894, on the birthday of Empress Maria Feodorovna, which allowed for a retreat from mourning, the wedding of Alexandra and Nicholas II took place in the Great Church of the Winter Palace. After the marriage the members Holy Synod led by Metropolitan Palladius of St. Petersburg, they served a thanksgiving prayer service. While singing “We Praise You, O God,” a 301-shot cannon salute was fired.

Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich wrote in his emigrant memoirs about the first days of their marriage: “The wedding of the young tsar took place less than a week after the funeral of Alexander III. Their honeymoon passed in an atmosphere of funeral services and mourning visits. The most deliberate dramatization could not have invented a more suitable prologue for the historical tragedy of the last Russian Tsar.”.

The family lived most of the time in the Alexander Palace in Tsarskoe Selo.

In 1896, shortly after the coronation, Alexandra and Nikolai traveled to Nizhny Novgorod to the All-Russian Exhibition. In August 1896 they traveled to Vienna, and in September - October - to Germany, Denmark, England and France.

In subsequent years, the empress gave birth to four daughters in a row:

Olga(3 (15) November 1895;
Tatiana(29 May (10 June) 1897);
Maria(14 (26) June 1899);
Anastasia(5 (18) June 1901).

In the imperial family, the question of a son - the heir to the throne - became very acute. Finally, on July 30 (August 12), 1904, the fifth child and only son, the Tsarevich, appeared in Peterhof Alexey Nikolaevich, born with a hereditary disease - hemophilia.

In 1905 imperial family met . He managed to help Alexei fight attacks of illness, against which medicine was powerless, as a result of which he acquired great influence on Alexandra Fedorovna, and through her on Nikolai.

In 1897 and 1899, the family traveled to Alexandra Feodorovna’s homeland in Darmstadt. During these years, on the orders of Alexandra Feodorovna and Nicholas II, the Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene was built in Darmstadt, which is still in operation today.

On July 17-20, 1903, the Empress took part in the celebrations of the glorification and discovery of the relics of St. Seraphim of Sarov in the Sarov Hermitage.

For entertainment, Alexandra Feodorovna played the piano with Rudolf Kündinger, a professor at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. The Empress also took singing lessons from conservatory professor Natalia Iretskaya. Sometimes she sang a duet with one of the court ladies: Anna Vyrubova, Emma Fredericks (daughter of Vladimir Fredericks) or Maria Stackelberg.

Of the ladies-in-waiting, they were close to the empress: at the beginning of the reign - Princess M.V. Baryatinskaya, then Countess Anastasia Gendrikova (Nastenka) and Baroness Sofia Buxhoeveden (Iza). For a long time, the closest person to her was Anna Vyrubova. Vyrubova had a huge influence on the empress. The empress's communication with Grigory Rasputin mainly took place through Vyrubova.

In 1915, at the height of the First World War, the Tsarskoye Selo hospital was converted to receive wounded soldiers. Alexandra Feodorovna, together with her daughters Olga and Tatyana, were trained in nursing by Princess Vera Gedroits, and then assisted her during operations as surgical nurses. The Empress personally financed several ambulance trains.

Empress Alexandra was the chief of the regiments: the Ulan Life Guards Named after Her Majesty, the 5th Hussars of Alexandria, the 21st East Siberian Rifle and Crimean Cavalry, and among the foreign ones - the Prussian 2nd Guards Dragoon Regiment.

The empress was also involved in charitable activities. By the beginning of 1909, under her patronage there were 33 charitable societies, communities of sisters of mercy, shelters, orphanages and similar institutions, among which: the Committee for finding places for military ranks who suffered in the war with Japan, the House of Charity for crippled soldiers, the Imperial Women's Patriotic Society , Trusteeship for labor assistance, Her Majesty's school of nannies in Tsarskoe Selo, Peterhof Society for Welfare of the Poor, Society for Assistance with Clothes to the Poor of St. Petersburg, Brotherhood in the Name of the Queen of Heaven for the charity of idiotic and epileptic children, Alexandria Shelter for Women and others.

On March 8 (21), 1917, after the February Revolution, in accordance with the decree of the Provisional Government, Alexandra Feodorovna, together with her daughters, was placed under house arrest in the Alexander Palace by General Lavr Kornilov. Julia Den remained with her, who helped her look after the Grand Duchesses and Anna Vyrubova. At the beginning of August 1917, the royal family was exiled to Tobolsk by decision of the Provisional Government, and in April 1918, by decision of the Bolsheviks, they were transported to Yekaterinburg.

Alexandra Fedorovna was killed along with her entire family and associates on the night of July 17, 1918 in Yekaterinburg. She was buried along with others executed on July 17, 1998 in the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg. The remains of Alexandra Fedorovna and her husband were exhumed for investigative actions as part of establishing the identities of the remains of their children - Alexei and Maria.

In 1981, Alexandra Feodorovna and all members of the royal family were canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, and in August 2000 by the Russian Orthodox Church.

During canonization, Alexandra Feodorovna became Queen Alexandra the New, since Queen Alexandra was already among the saints.

145 years ago, on June 6, 1872, a fourth daughter was born into the family of the Grand Duke of Hesse and Rhine. She was named Victoria Alice Elena Louise Beatrice of Hesse-Darmstadt. Her grandmother, the Queen of England, called her Sunny. Pets - Alix. In Russia, where she was destined to become last empress, at baptism in Orthodox faith got a name Alexandra Fedorovna. Behind the scenes - the nickname “Hessian fly”.

The perception of rulers among the people, or, as is commonly expressed in the scientific community, the representation of power, is an important point in understanding certain historical periods. This is especially true for great upheavals such as revolutions or the era of reforms. Just now the power was exclusively from God and did not raise doubts about its legitimacy among the people. But then something happens, and people immediately begin to produce stories and legends about their leaders. Peter the Great becomes not only the king-carpenter, but also the Antichrist, and Ivan groznyj turns into “Ivashka, the bloody king.” The last Russian emperor was awarded the same nickname. Nicholas II. Something similar happened to his wife, Alexandra Fedorovna. With only one difference. If at first some hopes were still pinned on Nicholas, then we immediately and completely disliked the empress.

Voice of the people

After the family the last Romanov canonized, they are trying to obscure the memory of how exactly the people perceived Alexandra Feodorovna with leafy memories. For example, like this: “The Empress organized 4 large bazaars in favor of tuberculosis patients in 1911, 1912, 1913 and 1914; they brought in a ton of money. She worked herself, painted and embroidered for the bazaar and, despite her poor health, stood at the kiosk all day, surrounded by a huge crowd of people. Small Alexey Nikolaevich stood next to her on the counter, holding out his hands with things to the enthusiastic crowd. The delight of the population knew no bounds.” However, literally a few lines later, the author of these memoirs, maid of honor and closest friend of the Empress Anna Vyrubova, makes a revealing disclaimer: “The people, at that time untouched by revolutionary propaganda, adored Their Majesties, and this can never be forgotten.”

Princess Vera Gedroits (right) and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna in the dressing room of the Tsarskoye Selo hospital. 1915 Source: Public Domain

Interesting thing. In 1911, the people, according to the court, turned out to be full of enthusiasm for their queen. The blindness is amazing. Because the people themselves, past and shame Russo-Japanese War, and the Revolution of 1905-1907, has a completely different opinion. Here is a fragment of one Ural tale: “After nine hundred and five, the queen could not see the red-colored stone. Either she was imagining red flags here, or something else was triggering her memory, but only from the age of five, if you didn’t approach the queen with a red stone, she would scream at the top of her lungs, lose all her Russian words and swear in German.”

There is no smell of delight here. More like sarcasm. AND similar attitude Alexandra Fedorovna had to watch over her person literally from the first day. Moreover, she herself, willingly or unwillingly, gave rise to this. Here is what the same Anna Vyrubova says about this: “When Alexandra Fedorovna had just arrived in Russia, she wrote countess Rantzau, maid of honor to his sister, Princess Irene: “My husband is surrounded by hypocrisy and deceit from everywhere. I feel that there is no one here who could be his real support. Few love him and their Fatherland.”

For some reason, this is seen as an exclusively highly spiritual message, full of grief and sadness. In fact, it is full of arrogance and conceit. Having barely arrived in a foreign country and not yet having learned the language, the sovereign’s wife immediately begins to insult her subjects. According to her authoritative opinion, Russians do not love their Motherland and, in general, everyone is a potential traitor.

The wedding of Nicholas II and Alexandra Fedorovna. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org

The reverse side of “adoration”

The word is not a sparrow, and you cannot hide an awl in a sack. What was the property of the highest spheres, after a couple of days, through servants, stokers and coachmen, becomes the property of the general public. And it’s no wonder that after such a sparkling speech by the new queen, the police begin to register more and more cases classified as “lese majeste.”

Alexandra Fedorovna remembered everything. Even things that weren't her fault. Thus, the wedding of Nicholas and Alexandra, and their entire honeymoon, coincided with mourning for Nicholas’s recently deceased father, the emperor Alexander III . The people's conclusion was immediate. And partly prophetic: “This German woman, just like that, rode to us on her coffin, will bring misfortune.”

Subsequently, everything that came from Alexandra Feodorovna was ridiculed. All her endeavors—at times truly good and necessary—became the target of bullying. Sometimes - in an extremely cynical form. It is curious that the tsar himself was not touched upon and was even pitied. Here is a fragment of the protocol of one of the cases of “lese majeste”: “Vasily L., a tradesman from Kazan, 31 years old, pointing to a portrait of the royal family, said: “This is the first b... And her daughters b... And everyone goes to them... And it’s a pity for our sovereign - they, b... Germans, are deceiving him, because the son is not his, but a replacement!”

It will not be possible to attribute this “beauty” to the machinations of Freemasons or Bolsheviks. If only for the reason that 80% of convictions in such cases were handed down to peasants, among whom the same Bolsheviks will not begin agitation very soon - when the peasants are drafted and become soldiers.

However, even then there was no need to campaign specifically against the empress. From the very beginning of the war, she was already declared a German spy and traitor. This popular opinion was so widespread that it reached ears that were not intended for it. This is what he writes British Vice Consul in Moscow Bruce Lockhart: “There are several walking good stories, concerning the Germanophile tendencies of the empress. Here's one of the best. The prince is crying. The nanny says: “Baby, why are you crying?” - “Well, when they beat our people, dad cries, when they beat the Germans, mom cries, and when should I cry?”

It was during the war years that “Hessian Fly” appeared among Alexandra Fedorovna’s other nicknames. There really is such an insect - it is a serious pest that attacks rye and wheat, capable of killing almost the entire crop. Considering that February Revolution began precisely with the shortage of bread, you inevitably think that sometimes the voice of the people is really the voice of God.