Nicholas 2 and his mother. "I don't believe my son is dead"
Exactly 170 years ago, on November 26, 1847, the Russian Empress Maria Feodorovna was born, who became the wife of Emperor Alexander III and was the mother of the last Russian Emperor Nicholas II. Danish by origin, she lived in Russia for 52 years of her more than 80-year life, becoming the penultimate Russian empress. The revolutionary turmoil of 1917 spared her, she was able to return back to Denmark, where she died in peace in 1928.
Maria Fedorovna was destined for a bright and full of dramatic life. A Danish princess, she was first betrothed to one, but married another to become empress of a country originally foreign to her. The happiness of love and a large number of losses fit in her life. She outlived not only her husband, but also her sons, grandchildren and even her country. At the end of her life, she returned back to Denmark, which remained one of the few corners of peace and prosperity in interwar Europe.
Maria Feodorovna, nee Maria Sofia Frederika Dagmar, was born on November 14 (November 26, according to the new style), 1847 in Copenhagen. She came from the ruling Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg dynasty in Denmark since the middle of the 15th century, belonging to the German Oldenburg family. To him - to the younger branches of the family - belonged to the rulers of neighboring Sweden, several German princes and, to some extent, Russian emperors. Peter III, the male ancestor of all subsequent Romanovs, came precisely from the Holstein-Gottorp line of the Oldenburg family.
Empress Maria Feodorovna in a Russian dress with a diadem and a necklace of 51 diamonds, 1883
Her father was the Danish king Christian IX, her mother was Louise of Hesse-Kassel. The family had six children: the heir to the throne, Frederick, Alexandra, Wilhelm, Dagmar, Tyra and Waldemar. It was a friendly Danish family, in which it was the second daughter Dagmar, or officially Maria-Sophia-Frederica-Dagmar, who enjoyed special love. Her kindness, sincerity and delicacy won her universal love among numerous relatives throughout Europe. Dagmar knew how to please everyone without exception - not because she put any special effort into it, but because of her innate charm. Not being a rare beauty, Princess Dagmar, nevertheless, stood out with a special charm that could not leave almost anyone indifferent.
Dagmar's sister, Alexandra of Denmark, became the future wife of the British King Edward VII, their son, George V, had a portrait resemblance to Nicholas II, the son of Dagmar and Emperor Alexander III. It is worth noting that Danish princesses were highly valued at the European “bride fair” for noble aristocratic families. Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the fact that the young Dagmar, who was famous for her wonderful character and charm, was also noticed in Russia. The Russian Emperor Alexander II and his wife Maria Alexandrovna (nee Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt) were just looking for a wife for their eldest son, heir to the throne Nikolai Alexandrovich.
In 1864, his father sent Nicholas to travel around Europe, in particular to visit Copenhagen, where he was advised to pay special attention to the young Dagmar, about whom the royal family heard a lot of good things. Marriage with a princess from Denmark was beneficial to Russia. So the empire wanted to strengthen its position on the Baltic Sea in defiance of Prussia and Germany. Also, this marriage would establish new family ties, including with Great Britain, relations with which were very strained for a long time. In addition, the invariable German brides in Russia are already tired, and the Dane (albeit from a German family by origin) would not irritate anyone either at court or among the people. Such a marriage was also beneficial for Denmark - a small Baltic state that would receive a strong ally.
Heir Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich with his bride, Princess Dagmar
Nikolai Alexandrovich came to Copenhagen just to get acquainted, but immediately fell in love with the young princess. Big-eyed, short, petite, she did not shine with special beauty, but conquered with her liveliness, charm and charm. Already on September 16, 1864, Nicholas made an offer to Princess Dagmar, and she accepted it. She fell in love with the Russian heir, agreeing to change her faith to Orthodoxy for his sake - this was a necessary condition for marriage. However, during a trip to Italy, the Tsarevich unexpectedly fell ill for everyone. Beginning October 20, 1864, he was treated in Nice. In the spring of 1865, his health deteriorated significantly. On April 10, Emperor Alexander II arrived in Nice, his brother Alexander and Princess Dagmar were also there. On the night of April 12, 1865, after many hours of agony, the 22-year-old heir to the Russian throne died, the cause of his death was tuberculous meningitis. Grief Dagmar then struck everyone, at the age of 18 she became a widow, and without having time to get married, she even lost weight from grief and shed tears. The unexpected death of the heir also shocked the entire Russian Empire and the Romanov family.
At the same time, the Russian Emperor Alexander III did not forget about Dagmar, appreciating her devotion and strong character. Now the Russian imperial house wanted her to marry the new heir Alexander Alexandrovich, it is worth noting that the affection between them arose even when they looked after the dying Tsarevich Nicholas together in Nice. Already on June 17, 1866, their engagement took place in Copenhagen, and three months later, on September 1, 1866, the Danish princess arrived in Kronstadt, where she was met by the entire imperial family. In October 1866, Dagmar converted to Orthodoxy under the name of Maria Fedorova - she was given a patronymic in honor of the icon of the Fedorovsky Mother of God, who was the patroness of the Romanov dynasty. On October 28, 1866, the wedding of Grand Duke Alexander Alexandrovich and Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna took place, the Anichkov Palace became the residence of the newlyweds.
Cheerful and life-loving in nature, Maria was warmly received by the capital and court society. Her marriage to Alexander, despite the fact that their relationship began under rather mournful circumstances (in addition, Alexander himself managed to defeat a strong cordial attachment to the maid of honor Maria Meshcherskaya before that), turned out to be extremely successful. For almost 30 years of marriage, the couple retained sincere affection for each other. The relationship between Alexander III and Maria Feodorovna was amazing for the Romanovs. Undoubted love and mutual tenderness throughout life is an incredible rarity in the royal family, where it was often considered the norm, having married for convenience, to have mistresses. Alexander II was no exception in this regard, but more on that later.
Grand Duke Alexander Alexandrovich and Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna
Everyone liked the charm of the young wife of the heir to the throne, having a truly magical effect on people. Despite her small stature, Maria Feodorovna was distinguished by such majestic manners that she could outshine everyone with her appearance. Extremely sociable, mobile, with a cheerful and lively character, she managed to restore to the Russian imperial house that brilliance that had been lost after the illness of Empress Maria Alexandrovna. At the same time, Maria Fedorovna loved painting and was fond of it, she even took lessons from the famous Russian artist A.P. Bogolyubov, she also loved horseback riding. And although the behavior of Maria Feodorovna gave many reasons to reproach the young princess for some frivolity and superficiality of her interests, she nevertheless enjoyed universal respect. There is nothing surprising in this, she possessed an integral and very strong character and, at the same time, an amazing sense of tact, which did not allow her to openly demonstrate her own influence on her husband.
The young princess had excellent relations with her mother-in-law and father-in-law. Alexander II treated her with undisguised sympathy, which somewhat smoothed out the cooling that grew from year to year in relations with his eldest son. The thing is that Tsarevich Alexander and his close circle by the beginning of the 1870s had become practically an opposition political circle. There was no talk of any criticism of the Tsar-Liberator and his activities, however, the undisguised attention to everything Russian, the opposition of aspirations and national feelings to the cosmopolitanism of the imperial court and the Russian aristocracy looked demonstratively. At the same time, the future emperor had a persistent dislike for Germany (especially for Prussia), in which he found the full support of his wife. To Prussia, which after the war of 1864 seized part of the lands from her native Denmark - Schleswig and Holstein (in fairness, inhabited mainly by Germans), Maria Fedorovna experienced a steady hostility. On the contrary, Emperor Alexander II adored his relative, the Prussian king and German emperor Wilhelm.
There was another problem that seriously complicated the relationship between father and son. For the last decade and a half before his death, Emperor Alexander II led a double life. His strongest passion for the young princess Ekaterina Dolgorukova became the reason that the emperor of the Russian Empire lived in two families, and after the death of his legal wife in 1880, after waiting for the minimum period of mourning, ignoring the opinion of his relatives, he married his longtime lover. This marriage was morganatic, which meant that the new wife and her descendants would not be able to claim the imperial throne. However, the already strained relations with the Tsarevich became even more aggravated. In addition, there were rumors in the capital that the emperor was going to crown "Katya". All this time, Maria Feodorovna remained on the side of her husband, sharing all his feelings, but also played the role of a “buffer”, trying, as far as she could, to soften and smooth out conflicts in the Romanov family.
Tsesarevna and Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna with children. From left to right: George, Xenia, Nikolai, 1879
For 14 years of marriage, Alexander Alexandrovich and Maria Feodorovna had six children. In 1868, the first-born was born - Nikolai - the future last Russian emperor Nicholas II, whom everyone in the family called Nicky, a year later appeared - Alexander (died before he was a year old, in April 1870), in 1871 - George (died in 1899), in 1875 - daughter Xenia (died in 1960 in London), and three years later - Mikhail (killed in 1918). Their last child, daughter Olga, was born in 1882 (she died in 1960 in Toronto), when Alexander was already Emperor of Russia.
In March 1881, Emperor Alexander II died as a result of a terrorist attack. By coincidence, a successful attempt on the sovereign was made on the day when he was about to sign a draft of political reforms, called the “Loris-Melikov Constitution”. Even if this project outlined only the first timid steps towards the constitutional limitation of autocracy, it could become the beginning of the transformation of the whole country. But that did not happen. The new emperor, the eldest son of Alexander II, who became Alexander III, ascended the throne, in the same year Maria Feodorovna became the acting empress, and after the death of her husband in 1894, the dowager empress.
Alexander III, unlike his father, pursued a policy of counter-reforms, all possible constitutional reforms were canceled. At the same time, during the years of the reign of Alexander III, Russia did not wage a single war, for which the monarch received the official title of Tsar-Peacemaker. His thirteen-year reign was calm and unhurried, like the autocrat himself. At the same time, the personal life of the emperor, as before, was permeated with happiness. It wasn't carefree, but it really was. Outwardly, almost nothing has changed in the life of Alexander and Mary. The emperor, as before, remained emphasized, some noted that before asceticism, he was modest in everyday life, and there was no pose in his behavior. Maria and Alexander often yearned for each other, so they tried to part as rarely as possible, and when this happened, they wrote letters to each other every day. These letters published later preserved a lot of touching evidence of their love, which was not lost during all the years of their life together.
Maria Feodorovna with her son, Russian Emperor Nicholas II
Contemporaries noted that a surprisingly friendly atmosphere always reigned in the royal family, there were no conflicts. They raised their children in love, but they did not indulge. Parents who valued organization and order tried to instill in their children a love for everything Russian, ideals, traditions, and faith in God. At the same time, the English system of education was adopted at the imperial court, which included obligatory oatmeal for breakfast for children, plenty of fresh air and cold baths for hardening. The spouses themselves not only kept their children in strictness, but they themselves lived quite modestly, disapproving of luxury. For example, it was noted that for breakfast the emperor and empress had only boiled eggs and rye bread.
Their happy marriage lasted until the death of Emperor Alexander III in 1894, he died at a fairly young age, before reaching the age of 50. The son of Alexander and Mary Nicholas II ascended the Russian throne. During the years of his reign, the Empress Dowager patronized Sergei Witte and his policies. Maria Fedorovna paid much attention to social activities. She patronized the Water Rescue Society, the Women's Patriotic Society, headed the Departments of Empress Maria's institutions (various educational institutions, educational institutions, shelters for disadvantaged and defenseless children, almshouses), and paid great attention to the Russian Red Cross Society (ROKK). Thanks to the initiatives of Maria Feodorovna, the budget of this organization received duties for issuing foreign passports, as well as railway fees from first-class passengers. During the First World War, she ensured that the "tax collection" - 10 kopecks from each telegram was also sent to the needs of society, which significantly increased the budget of the ROCK and the amount of assistance provided to them.
In June 1915, the Empress Dowager traveled to Kyiv for a month, and in August of the same year she begged her son Nicholas II not to take over the supreme command, but to no avail. In 1916, she finally moved from St. Petersburg to Kyiv, settling in the Mariinsky Palace. During the war years, she organized the work of hospitals, as well as numerous ambulance trains, in which hundreds of thousands of wounded Russian soldiers and officers improved their health. Here in Kyiv, on October 19, 1916, she celebrated the half-century anniversary of her direct participation in the affairs of the Department of Institutions of Empress Maria.
Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna and her Cossack chamberlain Timothy Yashchik. Copenhagen, 1924
In Kyiv, Maria Fedorovna found out about the abdication of her son, after which she went to Mogilev to meet him. After that, with her youngest daughter Olga and the husband of her eldest daughter Xenia, Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich, she moved to the Crimea, from where she was evacuated in 1919 aboard the British battleship Marlboro. Already from the UK, she returned to her native Denmark, where she settled in the Villa Widøre, where she had previously lived with her sister Alexandra. In Denmark, she was accompanied by a Cossack cameraman, who throughout this time acted as her bodyguard. While in Denmark, Maria Feodorovna rejected all attempts by the Russian emigration to involve her in political activities.
Maria Fedorovna died on October 13, 1928 at the age of 81. After a funeral on October 19 at a local Orthodox church, her ashes were placed in a sarcophagus in the Royal Burial Vault of the Cathedral, located in the Danish city of Roskilde next to the ashes of her parents. Members of the Danish royal family are also buried here.
In 2004-2005, an agreement was reached between the Danish and Russian governments to transfer the remains of Empress Maria Feodorovna from Roskilde to St. Petersburg, where she bequeathed to be buried next to her husband. On September 26, on board the Danish ship Esbern Snare, the remains of Maria Feodorovna set off on her last journey to Russia. In Russian territorial waters, the Danes were met by the flagship of the Baltic Fleet Neustrashimy, which escorted the Danish ship to the port. Upon the arrival of the ships at the port, the Russian warship Smolny met them with 31 gun salvos, exactly the same number of cannon salvos that were fired upon the arrival of the Danish princess in Kronstadt in 1866. On September 28, 2006, the coffin with the remains of Empress Maria Feodorovna was buried in St. Petersburg in the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul on the territory of the Peter and Paul Fortress next to the grave of her husband Alexander III.
Based on materials from open sources
Widow of the Russian Empire
She was destined for a bright dramatic fate. A Danish princess, she was betrothed to one but married another to become empress of a foreign country. In her life there was both the happiness of love and many losses. She outlived not only her husband, sons and grandchildren, but her country itself. At the end of her life, she returned to her homeland. Maybe now she will return to Russia again ...
The Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg dynasty ruling in Denmark from the middle of the 15th century belonged to the German Oldenburg family; the rulers of Sweden, several German princes, and even, to some extent, Russian emperors belonged to the same family - to its younger branches. Peter III, the male ancestor of all subsequent Romanovs, came from the Holstein-Gottorp line of the Oldenburg family.
The Danish king Christian IX and his wife, Queen Louise, had six children: the heir to the throne, Frederik, Alexandra, Wilhelm, Dagmar, Tyra and Valdemar. It was a very friendly family, but the second daughter, Dagmar, or officially Marie-Louise-Sophia-Frederica-Dagmar, who was born on November 26, 1847, enjoyed special love in her. Her kindness, delicacy and sincerity earned her universal love among numerous relatives throughout Europe. She knew how to please everyone - not because she put any effort into this, but because of her innate charm. Not being a rare beauty, she nevertheless possessed that charm that could not leave anyone indifferent.
Emperor Alexander III with his wife, Empress Maria Feodorovna, and children: Nikolai, Xenia and George, Estland Governorate
Danish princesses have always been valued at the European "bride fair". An ancient family, a country that occupies not the last place in European politics - and at the same time not dominant in it (this guaranteed that the bride would behave modestly). In 1863, Alexandra, the eldest Danish princess, married Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, heir to the English crown - after the death of his mother, Queen Victoria, he became King Edward VII. And the following year, the Danish prince Wilhelm was elected king of Greece and crowned under the name of George I.
There is nothing surprising that the young Dagmar, famous for her charm and wonderful character, was noticed in Russia. Emperor Alexander II and his wife Maria Alexandrovna (nee Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt) were just looking after the wife of their eldest son, heir to the throne Nikolai Alexandrovich - in the family circle his name was Nike.
He was a handsome, very serious, although romantic, well-educated young man, with a strong character. In 1864, his father sent him on a trip to Europe - in particular to Copenhagen, where he especially advised him to pay attention to the young Dagmar, about whom he had heard a lot of good things. The imperial couple did not tire of praising her son.
The marriage with the Danish princess was beneficial for Russia. Russia wanted to gain a foothold in the Baltic Sea - in defiance of Prussia and Germany. This marriage established new family ties, including with England, with which relations had been very strained before (Queen Victoria did not like Russia - as they said, due to the fact that at one time the young Emperor Alexander II rejected her love). In addition, the constant German brides in Russia are already tired, and the Dane (albeit from a German by origin) will not annoy anyone. Of course, this marriage was also beneficial for Denmark - the small Baltic state needed a strong ally.
The last word remained with Nix. He liked the bride in the photo; but when he showed the portrait to his brother Alexander, he did not find anything special in it - a dear young lady, but there are better ones ... The brothers were always very close, but here they almost quarreled for the first time.
Nike came to Copenhagen just to get acquainted. But it turned out that he fell in love with the young princess at first sight. Not tall, petite, big-eyed, funny - yes, she did not shine with either beauty or intelligence; but her charm, charm, liveliness conquered immediately. Nike didn't resist either. A few days later - September 16, 1864 - he proposed to Dagmar; and she accepted it.
Dagmar also fell in love with the Russian heir. Handsome (beginning with Alexander I, all the Romanovs were famous for their beauty), soft and charming, he read poetry to her and told her about his country. For his sake, Dagmar even agreed to change her faith - this was a necessary condition for marriage. Nike promised her that at baptism they would leave her one of her names - Maria. And immediately began to call her Minnie.
Nicke flooded his parents and brother with letters about how happy he was to meet Dagmar. The parents approved of this union; Only Sasha was dissatisfied - in his opinion, it was a marriage of convenience, and such a union cannot bring joy to his beloved brother ...
The wedding was scheduled for next summer. In October, the bride and groom broke up - Nikolai was supposed to meet his mother in Nice, where Maria Alexandrovna, suffering from weak lungs, was going to spend the winter.
And then the unexpected happened. During a trip to Italy, the heir became ill. The illness sometimes let go, then again put Nix to bed ... In March, brother Alexander urgently left for him, Dagmar rushed from Denmark to her fiancé, Emperor Alexander Nikolaevich arrived by urgent train. They arrived when Nike was already dying. Almost all the time he was in oblivion, delirious ...
On the night of April 11, Nikolai Alexandrovich came to his senses and asked to call his brother and Dagmar. They were in the room together. According to legend, he joined their hands, placing them on his chest, and said to Alexander: “I leave you heavy duties, a glorious throne, a father and a bride who will ease this burden for you ...” The next night he died.
Dagmar's grief struck everyone. At the age of eighteen she became a widow, never getting married. Small, fragile, she was completely emaciated from tears. In the end, she was taken to Denmark ...
But the Russian emperor did not forget about her. These days, he appreciated Dagmar, noting her strong character and devotion. And, leaving, he even spoke in the sense that it would be nice to leave Dagmar at home. Alexander II liked this idea more and more: after all, his second son would also have to get married - why look for someone when there is already Dagmar! And the emperor wrote to her, hinting at such a possibility. Dagmar was confused: she had just lost her beloved fiancé and so far could not even think about a new marriage. But, having fallen in love with Nix, she also fell in love with Russia; and the future of Russia was now with Alexander Alexandrovich ... Gradually, Dagmar began to get used to this idea.
Alexander Nikolaevich and his wife did not forget about her. They constantly wrote letters to her, where they called their daughter. The Emperor's youngest son Alexei Alexandrovich named his new yacht "Dagmar". But the heir Alexander himself did not show much attention to the princess; a couple of letters and that's it. When she sent him the promised portrait—she and Nike—he barely found time to reply. The Danish court waited in vain for news from Russia...
In fact, Alexander was thinking about Dagmar: he liked her very much in Nice, and he even envied his brother a little - after all, he still found his love, although he did not have time to enjoy it. But his own heart was occupied - just at that time Alexander fell in love with Princess Maria Meshcherskaya, the maid of honor of the Empress. Not a beauty, Marie Meshcherskaya conquered the heir with her mind and liveliness of character. And she conquered so much that Alexander even decided to marry her - which he directly declared to his father, knowing full well that for the sake of this marriage he would have to give up his rights to the throne. The emperor was furious. Meshcherskaya was immediately sent abroad (in a year she would marry the incredibly rich Pavel Demidov, and a year later she would die in childbirth), and Alexander was sent to Copenhagen.
The charm of the Danish princess turned out to be stronger than the spell of the Russian princess. In Dagmar, Alexander found everything that he considered necessary to see in his wife and future empress. On the tenth day of his stay at Fredensborg Palace, he proposed to Dagmar, and then asked: “Can you still love after my dear brother?” She replied, "No one but his dear brother!"
Alexander bore little resemblance to Nyx. Tall, strong, he loved not poetry, like Nike, but blacksmithing. Instead of the charm of an older brother - isolation and thoughtfulness. But Alexander exuded reliability and strength, which every woman dreams of ...
The wedding was scheduled for May next year. But Alexander was so in love that he persuaded his father to get married six months earlier.
On September 1, 1866, Princess Dagmar left Denmark on the Danish ship Schleswig, accompanied by the royal yacht Standard. Among the mourners was the famous fairy tale writer Hans Christian Andersen, who wrote about this: “Poor child! Almighty, be merciful and merciful to her! They say that in St. Petersburg there is a brilliant court and a beautiful royal family, but she is going to a foreign country, where there is a different people and religion, and no one who surrounded her before will be with her.
On September 14, she was greeted with incredible solemnity in Kronstadt by the entire imperial family. In October, Dagmar converted to Orthodoxy under the name of Maria Feodorovna - she was given a patronymic in honor of the icon of the Fedorov Mother of God, the patroness of the Romanov family. And on October 28, 1866, the wedding of Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna with Grand Duke Alexander Alexandrovich took place. The Anichkov Palace became the residence of the newlyweds.
The young wife of the heir came to court. Her charm had a truly magical effect on everyone. Despite her small stature, Maria Fedorovna was distinguished by such majestic manners that she overshadowed everyone with her appearance. Extremely mobile, sociable, with a lively and cheerful character, she was able to restore to the imperial house that brilliance that had been lost with the illness of Empress Maria Alexandrovna. She loved painting (she even took lessons from the famous painter A.P. Bogolyubov), she loved horseback riding. And although her behavior gave rise to many to reproach the young princess for some frivolity and superficiality of interests, she nevertheless enjoyed universal respect. After all, she had a very strong, integral character - and at the same time a sense of tact, which did not allow her to openly demonstrate her influence on her husband.
Maria Feodorovna during a visit to her father, King Christian IX of Denmark
Their relationship was amazing for the Romanov family. Mutual tenderness and undoubted love throughout their entire life together - it was an incredible rarity in the royal family, where it was considered the norm, having married by calculation, to have mistresses. Alexander II himself was no exception to this rule - although he married for love, he was nevertheless famous for his many love affairs. And just at that time, his loudest romance began - with Princess Ekaterina Mikhailovna Dolgoruky, who became his official favorite for many years, and then - his morganatic wife. This connection of the emperor worsened the already poor health of Empress Maria Alexandrovna, and in 1880 she died. Having barely waited forty days, the emperor married Dolgoruky, who received the title of Princess Yuryevskaya, legitimizing all the children living with her. All this further complicated the already difficult relations in the imperial family: Ekaterina Mikhailovna, who did not love the first family of the emperor, dreamed of making her eldest son George the heir to the throne - bypassing all existing laws.
Alexander Alexandrovich sharply condemned this behavior of his father, considering it completely unacceptable for the emperor: after all, his life is an example for all subjects. For the heir himself, the main thing in the family was love and mutual trust. And of course, children. For 14 years, Alexander Alexandrovich and Maria Feodorovna had six of them: in 1868, the first-born Nikolai - the future Emperor Nicholas II (his family name was Nicky), a year later - Alexander, in 1871 - George, in 1875 - Xenia, after another three year - Michael. The last daughter, Olga, was born in 1882, when Alexander had already become emperor.
Contemporaries noted that a surprisingly friendly atmosphere reigned in this family. Children were brought up in love, although they were not spoiled - parents who valued order and organization tried to instill in children faith in God and love for everything Russian, for traditions and ideals. Then the English system of education, introduced by Maria Alexandrovna, was adopted at the court: oatmeal for breakfast, cold baths and plenty of fresh air. In such severity, they not only kept children, but also lived themselves: ostentatious luxury at home was not approved. For example, for breakfast, the emperor himself and his wife had only boiled eggs and rye bread.
Maria Feodorovna with her father and sister Alexandra, Princess of Wales
Minnie was no stranger to it. Indeed, in Denmark, the rules were the same: a small, poor country did not allow its kings to live in luxury. In Russia, Maria Feodorovna felt happy. Her marriage, concluded out of mutual love, turned out to be extremely successful: everyone loved her ...
But the family was in trouble. The second son of the heir, named after his grandfather and father Alexander, died at the age of one. Six unsuccessful attempts on the emperor - because of them, all the Romanovs lived as if under siege. Finally, the last, successful - March 13, 1881.
The attempt was made in broad daylight, on the embankment of the St. Petersburg Catherine's Canal. The explosion of a bomb thrown into the emperor's carriage decapitated the boy-peddler; several passers-by and the Cossacks of the convoy suffered. The carriage of Alexander II was blown to pieces, but he himself was unharmed - and, not caring for himself, began to help the wounded. At that moment, Ignaty Grinevitsky threw a second bomb - this explosion killed ten and maimed fourteen people. The emperor was mortally wounded. He was carried in his arms to the Winter Palace, where he died in the presence of his entire family.
Maria Fedorovna was in a terrible state. Trying to somehow entertain her, the new Emperor Alexander III ordered the court jeweler Carl Faberge an unusual gift for the approaching Easter. It was an amazing Easter egg: it opened, a golden hen was sitting inside, and in it was a miniature ruby egg and a golden crown. The empress liked the gift so much that they began to order an egg every year. When Nicholas took the throne, he continued the tradition, ordering two eggs already: for his mother and for his wife. It is believed that a total of 54 eggs were made, each of which is a real masterpiece of jewelry art.
Alexander Alexandrovich and Maria Feodorovna were hereditary couple for 15 years. Their coronation took place in Moscow in 1883. During the coronation festivities, the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was solemnly consecrated and the Historical Museum was opened.
Having become Empress, Maria Fedorovna refused to move to the Winter Palace, with which many painful memories were associated. The imperial family continued to live in the Anichkov Palace, moving to Gatchina for the summer. Annual trips to the Caucasus and Denmark were also accepted, where the whole huge family gathered in the summer - the Prince and Princess of Wales, the Emperor of Russia, the Greek king (who married in 1867 the cousin of Alexander III Olga Konstantinovna), many sovereign persons from Austria, Sweden and Germany. It was said that it was at such gatherings in Fredensborg that European politics was made.
Regarding the influence of Maria Feodorovna herself on Russian politics, there are many different opinions. Count Sergei Witte, for example, believed that the empress's diplomatic abilities were the main asset of the empire. It was she who persuaded the emperor to sign an alliance with France, a longtime ally of Denmark. Others felt that Minnie was more interested in balls. A real woman, she loved social life, receptions - unlike her husband, who could hardly endure them. When the ball, in his opinion, dragged on too long, Alexander slowly drove the musicians out one by one; and if the guests did not disperse, then he simply turned off the light. But they were a wonderful couple, perfectly complementing each other: after all, official receptions were a necessary part of the life of the imperial court.
What, however, no one ever doubted was the enormous merits of the Empress in the field of charity. All Russian empresses, starting with the second wife of Paul I, also Maria Feodorovna, were engaged in charitable deeds. This was part of the unwritten responsibilities of the wife of the emperor. And the second Maria Fedorovna felt the need to live up to her name and position. Already in 1882 - immediately after the actual accession to the throne - Maria Feodorovna organized women's schools for poorly educated girls from poor families. She was an honorary member of Kazan University, took charge of the Women's Patriotic Society, helped the Water Rescue Society and the Society for the Protection of Animals. She was the permanent head of the Department of Institutions of Empress Maria (named after the first Maria Feodorovna, their founder), which included a variety of educational institutions, orphanages, educational homes and almshouses. During the wars - Russian-Turkish, Russian-Japanese, World War I - Maria Fedorovna was a sister of mercy. The Empress was the chief of several army regiments, including the Cavalier Guard and Cuirassier regiments, and everyone, from senior officers to privates, adored her.
The Empress enjoyed the love and respect of Alexander. Her tact and political intuition greatly helped the emperor. Highly secular (her own daughter said that Maria Feodorovna remained empress even in the nursery), she could resolve any conflicts in the large Romanov family, of which there were many. Alexander's brother, Vladimir, or rather, his power-hungry wife Maria Pavlovna, was a potential hotbed of opposition in the family. But the emperor, who attached great importance to family ties, kept the whole family in his fist.
However, not everything was subject to his will. Chance has always played a significant role in history. And the death of the emperor was also largely the result of an unfortunate accident.
On October 17, 1888, the train, in which the entire imperial family was, crashed on the stretch between the Borki and Taranovka stations of the Kursk-Kharkov-Azov railway. At the time of the crash, almost the entire royal family was in the dining car. From the impact, the carriage jumped off the carts - the floor was on the ground, the walls collapsed, killing the lackeys standing at the windows. The roof began to sag, threatening to fall, and one corner caught on the metal of the wheels, lingering for a second. This saved the Romanovs: the emperor managed to grab the roof and hold it until everyone crawled out. Then he helped save the others; Maria Feodorovna, although her arms and legs were wounded by glass, provided first aid to the wounded. She cut her underwear into bandages.
In total, twenty-one people died in the disaster, more than two hundred were injured. It is still unclear whether it was a crash or an assassination attempt. But it was precisely from that monstrous tension, as contemporaries believed, that Alexander III developed kidney disease.
His seemingly indestructible health literally collapsed in 1892. Due to illness, the annual trip to Denmark was canceled; instead, they decided to take the sick king to the hunting palace in Bialowieza. But two weeks later he got worse, and the family moved to Spala, a hunting estate near Warsaw. A doctor was called there and diagnosed with dropsy; no hope of recovery. But staying in a warm climate can help.
The Greek Queen Olga Konstantinovna offered her villa on the island of Corfu. We went there through the Crimean estate of Livadia, but on the way Alexander became so worse that the further road was impossible.
The whole family gathered in Livadia. Princess Alice Victoria, the bride of the heir Nicholas, was summoned from Darmstadt - Alexander wanted to bless their marriage. On October 20, 1894, the emperor died in the arms of Maria Feodorovna.
Maria Fedorovna was heartbroken. She was unable to even speak. All the necessary orders were given by the Prince of Wales - he arrived in Livadia together with the sister of Maria Feodorovna, Princess Alexandra, two days after the death of Alexander III. The emperor's body was delivered by cruiser from Yalta to Sevastopol, from there by train to St. Petersburg. He was buried on November 19 in the Peter and Paul Cathedral - the family burial vault of all the Romanovs, starting with Peter I. The funeral was attended by the rulers of almost all European states.
Just a week later, on November 26, Emperor Nicholas II married the Hesse-Darmstadt princess Alice-Victoria-Helena-Brigitta-Louise-Beatrice, who adopted the name Alexandra Feodorovna in Orthodoxy. It was Maria Feodorovna's namesake day, and therefore a slight easing of mourning became possible. On May 14 (26), 1896, Nikolai and Alexandra Feodorovna were crowned in the Assumption Cathedral in Moscow.
Nikolai and Alix met in St. Petersburg in 1884 - during the marriage of her older sister Elizabeth and his uncle Sergei Alexandrovich. They fell in love at first sight, but Alyx rejected Nikolai's offer for a long time, not agreeing to convert to Orthodoxy. The heir's parents were also against it: Alexander did not want to increase the influence of England (Alik was the favorite granddaughter of Queen Victoria and was brought up at the English court), his wife did not like the princess's isolation and restraint. However, in the end, their consent was obtained, and in the spring of 1894 in Coburg, immediately after the wedding of Princess Victoria of Edinburgh and Grand Duke Ernst of Hesse, they became engaged. But the relationship between the two empresses, which did not work out from the very beginning, only deteriorated further.
The young people settled with the Dowager Empress in the Anichkov Palace. Nikolai did not want to leave his mother at such a difficult time for her. It took her a long time to recover from her loss; she wore mourning for her husband for a very long time. Nicholas left many privileges for the dowager empress: she was the hostess in the palace, the first - arm in arm with Nicholas - speaking at all receptions (while Alyx followed them, accompanied by one of the Grand Dukes); all the jewels of the crown remained at her disposal, she still led the Office of Empress Maria's institutions and the Red Cross Society, she had the right to appoint ladies-in-waiting and state ladies both for herself and for the young empress. She also took care of Alexandra Feodorovna's wardrobe, ordering her dresses to her liking. Maria Fedorovna liked bright dresses with various trimmings. She had excellent taste, which made it possible to make even court outfits strictly regulated by protocol interesting and individual. Her favorite tailors were first the Parisian fashion designer Charles Worth, then the Petersburger August Brissac (Brizac), and from the mid-1890s the famous Moscow fashion designer Nadezhda Lamanova. Alyx, on the other hand, loved more strict styles, and preferred pearls to all jewelry.
Having recovered from the loss of her husband, Maria Fedorovna seemed to have found a second wind. She became openly interested in politics - to some extent this was a necessity caused by the inexperience of the new emperor. Alexander left behind a strong, influential state, but one had to be able to hold it in his hands. The realization that the heir was not ready for the role of ruler greatly depressed Maria Feodorovna, and she did her best to compensate for his weakness. She worked hard, tiring the secretaries and impressing the courtiers with her efficiency and ability to delve into complex political issues.
The young empress endured her position of "second violin" with difficulty. But Maria Feodorovna had everything that Alika lacked: secularity, courtesy, sociability, the ability to please and the charm of the old empress left no chance for the closed, unsociable and cold Alexandra Feodorovna. Over the years, their opposition only deepened. Since the spring of 1895, when the emperor and his wife moved from Anichkov to the Alexander Palace, Maria Feodorovna's influence on her son noticeably weakened, although she still continued to play a prominent role in state politics.
And the troubles in the family continued. In 1899, the third son of Maria Fedorovna, Georgy, died - he had already suffered from tuberculosis for seven years and therefore lived permanently in the Caucasus, on the estate of Abbas-Tuman. While riding a motorcycle, he rolled over and died of a pulmonary hemorrhage. George was the heir to the throne - after all, there was no son in the family of Nicholas yet. In May 1901, the Emperor's younger sister Olga married the Prince of Oldenburg, the son of Maria Feodorovna's close friend, but the marriage was extremely unsuccessful. The groom was a homosexual, besides a gambler and a spendthrift, and in fact the marriage never took place. Olga fell in love with her husband's adjutant Nikolai Kulikovsky, but she could marry him only in 1916, when her first marriage was declared invalid.
It seemed that after the death of Alexander III, the Romanovs went into all serious trouble. Several high-profile scandals, morganatic marriages - concluded, in violation of all laws, against the will of the emperor. The prestige of the monarchy was falling before our eyes. The last blow was dealt by Nikolai's younger brother Mikhail - he entered into a relationship with the twice-divorced Natalya Sheremetyevskaya-Wulfert (who later received the title of Countess Brasova), whom he secretly married, contrary to his brother's direct ban. It is not surprising that the monarchy has ceased to be respected.
On January 6, 1905, during the water blessing ceremony, an assassination attempt was made on Nicholas - the conspirators loaded guns with live shells that fired the traditional salute. And less than a month later, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich was blown up in Moscow. Russia was entering the most difficult period of its history.
The first Russian revolution, the unsuccessful war with Japan, the growing discord in the country - all this Maria Fedorovna suffered very hard. She, in fact, remained the only guardian of family and dynastic values, but Nicholas no longer listened to her opinion. She urged her son to introduce a constitutional monarchy in Russia, while his wife was an ardent supporter of autocracy. The conflict between the two empresses grew deeper: Maria Fedorovna strongly disapproved of Rasputin, took offense at Alik for trying to limit her communication with her son and grandchildren. The World War brought them closer - all the women of the imperial family worked in the hospital, helping the wounded - but the rapprochement was short-lived. Alika was especially annoyed by the way the Empress Dowager looked: she herself, from constant worries about her sick son, for her husband, aged noticeably, and Maria Feodorovna continued to look very young, fresh, without a single gray hair.
In 1916, the Empress Dowager left for Kyiv, where she learned about the abdication of Nicholas. This struck her incredibly - what collapsed was what Maria Fedorovna gave her whole life, a part of which she became ... She could neither understand nor forgive. She was advised to leave, but she refused, although life became difficult - revolutionary-minded people laughed at her right on the streets. In February 1918, right in front of the elderly former empress, the door of the hospital where she worked was slammed, saying that her services were no longer needed.
The very next day, Maria Feodorovna left for the Crimea, on a train that one of the Grand Dukes miraculously got. Her daughters ended up in the Crimea: Xenia with her husband, Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich, and the pregnant Olga, with a morganatic husband, Colonel Kulikovsky, - two months later she gave birth to a son, Tikhon. Several more grand dukes lived on neighboring estates. After some time, all of them were gathered at the Dulber estate, where they actually ended up under house arrest. They were going to shoot all the Romanovs - but, oddly enough, Trotsky saved Maria Fedorovna: in a telegram, he called her "an old reactionary that no one needs" and ordered her to be released. But still, one night, the Bolsheviks were about to storm Dulber - the Romanovs were saved only by the arrival of German troops, who, according to the terms of the Brest peace, began the occupation of Crimea that very night.
Crimean prisoners received news of the sad fate of their relatives - the execution of Nikolai and his family, the death of the Grand Dukes in the mine near Alapaevsky, the execution in the Peter and Paul Fortress ... Maria Fedorovna did not want to believe in the death of her sons - until her death, she believed that Nikolai and his family and Mikhail escaped, and did not allow funeral services to be served for them.
The fate of the Romanovs, oddly enough, little worried about their relatives in Europe. Neither the Windsors, nor the Danish king, nor any of the German relatives tried to save the members of the Russian imperial family. George V, cousin and close friend of Nicholas, did nothing to alleviate his plight, fearing possible political complications. However, his mother, Queen Alexandra, the sister of Maria Feodorovna, was very worried about her sister and persuaded her son to save "unfortunate Minnie." But only at the end of 1918, the commander of the British squadron stationed in Istanbul, received an order to take the empress and her two daughters out of the Crimea. Maria Fedorovna refused: she did not want to leave Russia at all, and even more so she was not going to leave her relatives and close associates in the Crimea, who were not mentioned in the order. Permission to take them on board was received only at the end of March 1919. On April 4, the queen, her relatives and retinue boarded the dreadnought Marlboro.
At the time of the Marlboro's departure from the Yalta Bay, Russian officers lined up on the deck saluted the Empress Dowager and sang "God save the Tsar." Maria Fedorovna was crying - she was leaving the country where she had lived for more than fifty years. She was 72 years old.
Through Constantinople, Malta and London, the former Danish princess returned to her homeland. She was accompanied by her youngest daughter Olga and her husband (Ksenia Aleksandrovna remained in England). They settled with the nephew of Maria Feodorovna, King Christian X - first in the wing of the royal palace, then in the Videre palace, which belonged to Minnie and her sisters. Christian was impossibly stingy, and this became the occasion for an undeclared war between aunt and nephew. Once he ordered the bright lights in her palace to be turned off, as the electricity bills were ruining him, but Maria Fedorovna only grinned and ordered to turn on all the lamps that were. He was terribly indignant at Maria Feodorovna's manner of “spilling money”: she helped Russian emigrants, giving away almost all the money she had; by the way, many of them came to her in Denmark, making up a kind of "court" of the Dowager Empress.
The position of a poor relative greatly oppressed the former empress. She, the former sovereign of the richest country, lived on welfare from her nephew, King George of England. The legendary million-dollar accounts of the Romanovs in European banks did not actually exist: almost everything that was, the Romanovs withdrew from the accounts and donated to the needs of the First World War; funds remained only in German banks, but inflation ate them without a trace ...
As they said, Georg appointed a pension to his aunt not at all out of the kindness of his soul, but hoping to receive in return a box with coronation jewels, which Maria Feodorovna managed to take out of the Crimea.
Time has shown that this was true. The Empress died on September 30 (October 13), 1928. She had not yet had time to bury, as the box was demanded to be sent to England. Many of those fantastically beautiful and costly jewelry are now in the collection of the English royal house.
Maria Feodorovna was buried in the tomb of the Danish kings - the Cathedral of St. Jorgen - in the city of Roskilde near Copenhagen. At her funeral, representatives of all the royal houses of Europe gathered, who did not lose respect and love for this outstanding woman.
Several years ago, representatives of the Romanov family made a request for the reburial of the ashes of Empress Maria Feodorovna in the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg, next to her husband. Time will tell whether this most loving couple in the history of the Russian imperial house will be able to reunite...
The future Empress Maria Alexandrovna was born in 1824 in Darmstadt, the capital of Hesse. The baby was named Maximilian Wilhemina Augusta Sophia Maria.
Origin
Her father was the German Ludwig II (1777-1848) - the Grand Duke of Hesse and the Rhine. He came to power after the July Revolution.
The girl's mother was Wilhelmina of Baden (1788-1836). She was from the Baden house of Zähringen. There were rumors at court that her younger children, including Maximilian, were born from a relationship with one of the local barons. Ludwig II - the official husband - recognized her as his daughter in order to avoid a shameful scandal. Nevertheless, the girl with her brother Alexander began to live separately from her father and his residence in Darmstadt. This place of "exile" was Heiligenberg, which was the property of Wilhelmina's mother.
Meeting with Alexander II
Dynastic marriages with German princesses were popular among the Romanovs. For example, Maria's predecessor, Alexandra Feodorovna (wife of Nicholas I), was the daughter of the Prussian king. And the wife of the last Russian emperor was also from the Hessian house. So against this background, the decision of Alexander II to marry a German from a small principality does not seem strange.
Empress Maria Alexandrovna met her future husband in March 1839, when she was 14 years old and he was 18. At this time, Alexander, as heir to the throne, made a traditional European tour to get acquainted with the local ruling houses. He met the daughter of the Duke of Hesse at the play Vestal.
How was the marriage arranged?
After they met, Alexander began to persuade his parents in letters to give permission to marry a German woman. However, the mother was against such a connection of the crown prince. She was embarrassed by rumors about the illegal origin of the girl. Emperor Nicholas, on the contrary, decided not to chop off his shoulder, but to consider the issue more carefully.
The fact is that his son Alexander already had a bad experience in his personal life. He fell in love with the maid of honor of the court. Parents were sharply against such a relationship for two fundamental reasons. First, this girl was of simple origin. Secondly, she was also a Catholic. So Alexander was forcibly separated from her and sent to Europe, just so that he could find a suitable match for himself.
So Nikolai decided not to take risks and not break his son's heart again. Instead, he began to ask in detail about the girl of the trustee Alexander Kavelin and the poet Vasily Zhukovsky, who accompanied the heir on his journey. When the emperor received positive reviews, an order immediately followed throughout the court that it was no longer allowed to spread any rumors about the Hessian princess.
Even Empress Alexandra Feodorovna had to obey this command. Then she decided to go to Darmstadt herself in order to get to know her daughter-in-law in advance. It was an unheard of event - nothing like it had ever happened in Russian history.
Appearance and interests
The future Empress Maria Alexandrovna made an excellent impression on her predecessor. After a face-to-face meeting, consent to marriage was obtained.
What so attracted others in this German girl? The most detailed description of her appearance was left in her memoirs by her maid of honor Anna Tyutcheva (daughter of the famous poet). According to her, Empress Maria Alexandrovna had a delicate complexion, wonderful hair and a meek gaze of large blue eyes. Against this background, her thin lips looked a little strange, which often depicted an ironic smile.
The girl had a deep knowledge of music and European literature. Her education and breadth of interests impressed everyone around her, and many people later left their rave reviews in the form of memoirs. For example, the writer Alexei Konstantinovich Tolstoy said that the Empress, with her knowledge, not only stands out from the rest of the women, but even noticeably beats many men.
Appearance at court and wedding
The wedding took place shortly after all the formalities were settled. The bride arrived in St. Petersburg in 1840 and was most of all shocked by the splendor and beauty of the Russian capital. In December, she converted to Orthodoxy and was baptized with the name Maria Alexandrovna. The very next day there was an engagement between her and the heir to the throne. The wedding took place a year later, in 1841. It was held in the Cathedral Church, located in the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. Now it is one of the premises of the Hermitage, where regular exhibitions are held.
It was hard for the girl to wedge herself into a new life because of her lack of knowledge of the language and the fear of not being liked by her father-in-law and mother-in-law. As she herself later admitted, every day Maria spent on pins and needles, she felt like a “volunteer”, ready to rush anywhere on a sudden command, for example, to an unexpected reception. in general was a burden for the princess, and then the empress. First of all, she was attached to her husband and children, she tried only to help them, and not waste time on formalities.
The coronation of the spouses took place in 1856 after the death of Nicholas I. Thirty-year-old Maria Alexandrovna received a new status that frightened her all the time that she was the daughter-in-law of the emperor.
Character
Contemporaries noted the numerous virtues possessed by the Empress Maria Alexandrovna. This is kindness, attention to people, sincerity in words and deeds. But the most important and noticeable was the sense of duty with which she stayed at court and carried the title throughout her life. Each of her actions corresponded to the imperial status.
She always observed religious dogmas and was extremely pious. This feature stood out so strongly in the character of the empress that it was much easier to imagine her as a nun than a reigning person. For example, Louis II (King of Bavaria) noted that Maria Alexandrovna was surrounded by the halo of a saint. Such behavior in many respects did not agree with her status, since in many state (even formal) affairs her presence was required, despite her behavior removed from worldly fuss.
Charity
Most of all, Empress Maria Alexandrovna - the wife of Alexander 2 - was known for her wide charity. Throughout the country, at her expense, hospitals, shelters and gymnasiums were opened, which received the epithet "Mariinsky". In total, she opened and monitored 5 hospitals, 36 shelters, 12 almshouses, 5 charitable societies. The Empress did not deprive the Empress of her attention to the sphere of education: 2 institutes, four dozen gymnasiums, hundreds of small schools for artisans and workers, etc. were built. Maria Alexandrovna spent both state and own funds on this (she was given 50 thousand silver rubles a year for personal expenses).
Health care has become a special area of activity, which Empress Maria Alexandrovna was engaged in. The Red Cross appeared in Russia precisely on her initiative. Its volunteers helped wounded soldiers during the war in Bulgaria against Turkey in 1877-1878.
Death of daughter and son
A great tragedy for the royal family was the death of the heir to the throne. Empress Maria Alexandrovna - the wife of Alexander 2 - gave her husband eight children. The eldest son Nikolai was born in 1843, two years after the wedding, when his namesake grandfather was still the king.
The child was distinguished by a sharp mind and a pleasant character, for which he was loved by all family members. He was already engaged and educated when he injured his back in an accident. There are several versions of what happened. Either Nikolai fell off his horse, or hit a marble table during a comic struggle with his comrade. At first, the injury was invisible, but over time, the heir became increasingly pale and felt worse. In addition, doctors treated him incorrectly - they prescribed medicines for rheumatism, which did not bring any benefit, because the true cause of the disease was not identified. Soon Nikolai was chained to a wheelchair. This became a terrible stress that Empress Maria Alexandrovna endured. The son's illness followed the death of Alexandra's first daughter, who died of meningitis. His mother was constantly with Nicholas, even when it was decided to send him to Nice for treatment for spinal tuberculosis, where he died at the age of 22.
Cooling relationship with her husband
Both Alexander and Maria, in their own way, struggled with this loss. The emperor blamed himself for forcing his son to do a lot of physical training, partly because of which the accident occurred. One way or another, but the tragedy alienated the spouses from each other.
The trouble was that all their further life together consisted of the same rituals. In the mornings it was a kiss on duty and ordinary conversations about dynastic affairs. In the afternoon, the couple met another parade. The empress spent the evening with the children, and her husband constantly disappeared on public affairs. He loved his family, but his time was simply not enough for relatives, which Maria Alexandrovna could not help but notice. The empress tried to help Alexander in business, especially in the early years.
Then (at the beginning of his reign) the king gladly consulted with his wife about many decisions. She was always up to date with the latest ministerial reports. Most often, her advice concerned the education system. This was largely due to the charitable activities that Empress Maria Alexandrovna was engaged in. And the development of education in these years received a natural impetus forward. Schools were opened, access to them appeared among the peasants, who, among other things, were also freed from serfdom under Alexander.
The empress herself had the most liberal opinion on this matter, which she shared, for example, with Kavelin, telling him that she ardently supported her husband in his desire to give freedom to the largest estate in Russia.
However, with the advent of the Manifesto (1861), the Empress was less and less concerned with state affairs due to some cooling of relations with her husband. This was also due to the wayward character of Romanov. The king was increasingly overtaken by whispers in the palace that he too often looks back at the opinion of his wife, that is, he is under her heel. This annoyed the freedom-loving Alexander. In addition, the very title of autocrat obliged him to make decisions only by his own will, without advice from anyone. This concerned the very nature of power in Russia, which, it was believed, was given by God to a single anointed one. But the real gap between the spouses was yet to come.
Ekaterina Dolgorukova
In 1859, Alexander II carried out maneuvers in the southern part of the empire (the territory of present-day Ukraine) - the 150th anniversary of the battle of Poltava was celebrated. The sovereign stopped for a visit to the estate of the famous Dolgorukovs' house. This family was a branch from the Rurik princes. That is, its representatives were distant relatives of the Romanovs. But in the middle of the 19th century, there was a well-born family, and its head, Prince Mikhail, had only one estate left - Teplovka.
The emperor stepped in and helped Dolgorukov, in particular, he got his sons into the guards, and sent his daughters to the Smolny Institute, promising to pay the expenses from the royal purse. Then he met a thirteen-year-old girl who surprised him with her curiosity and love of life.
In 1865, according to tradition, the autocrat paid a visit to the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens. Then, after a long break, he again saw Catherine, who was already 18 years old. The girl was amazingly beautiful.
The emperor, who had an amorous disposition, began to send her gifts through his assistants. He even began to visit the institute incognito, but it was decided that this was too much, and the girl was expelled under the pretext of poor health. Now she lived in Petersburg and saw the tsar in the Summer Garden. She was even made a maid of honor to the hostess of the Winter Palace, who was Empress Maria Alexandrovna. The wife of Alexander II was very upset by the rumors swarming around the young girl. Finally, Catherine left for Italy so as not to cause a scandal.
But Alexander was serious. He even promised the favorite that he would marry her as soon as the opportunity presented itself. In the summer of 1867 he arrived in Paris at the invitation of Napoleon III. Dolgorukova went there from Italy.
In the end, the emperor tried to explain himself to his family, wishing that Maria Alexandrovna would hear him first. The Empress, wife of Alexander II and mistress of the Winter Palace, tried to keep up appearances and did not allow the conflict to go beyond the residence. However, her eldest son and heir to the throne rebelled. This was not surprising. The future was distinguished by a sharp disposition, even at a very young age. He scolded his father, and he, in turn, became furious.
As a result, Catherine nevertheless moved to the Winter Palace and gave birth to four children from the king, who later received princely titles and were legalized. This happened after the death of Alexander's legal wife. The funeral of Empress Maria Alexandrovna made it possible for the Tsar to marry Catherine. She received the title of the Most Serene Princess and the surname Yuryevskaya (like her children). However, the emperor was not happy in this marriage for long.
Illness and death
Maria Alexandrovna's health was undermined for many reasons. These are frequent childbirth, the betrayal of her husband, the death of her son, as well as the damp climate of St. Petersburg, for which the native German woman was not ready in the first years of the move. Because of this, she developed consumption, as well as nervous exhaustion. According to the recommendation of a personal doctor, every summer the woman went south to the Crimea, whose climate was supposed to help her overcome illnesses. Over time, the woman almost retired. One of the last episodes of her participation in public life was visiting military councils during the confrontation with Turkey in 1878.
During these years, assassination attempts were constantly made on Alexander II by revolutionaries and bombers. Once an explosion occurred in the dining room of the Winter Palace, but the empress was so sick that she did not even notice it, lying in her chambers. And her husband survived only because he lingered in his office, contrary to his habit of having lunch at a set time. Constant fear for the life of her beloved husband ate the remnants of health, which Maria Alexandrovna still owned. The Empress, whose photos at that time show a clear change in her appearance, became extremely thin and looked more like her shadow than a person in the body.
In the spring of 1880, she finally fell ill, while her husband moved to Tsarskoye Selo with Dolgorukova. He paid his wife short visits, but could not do anything to somehow improve her well-being. Tuberculosis was the reason why Empress Maria Alexandrovna died. The biography of this woman says that her life was cut short in the same year, on June 3, according to the new style.
According to dynastic tradition, the wife of Alexander II found her last refuge in the Peter and Paul Cathedral. The funeral of Empress Maria Alexandrovna became a mourning event for the whole country, which sincerely loved her.
Alexander briefly survived his first wife. In 1881, he died after being wounded by a bomb thrown at his feet by a terrorist. The emperor was buried next to Maria Alexandrovna.
Years in Copenhagen in the family of the future king of Denmark, Christian IX, later called the "father-in-law" of Europe. Her siblings included the future King Frederik VIII of Denmark, the future King George I of Greece, and the future Queen Alexandra of England. Princess Minnie, as Marie Sophie Frederike Dagmar was called as a child, was the fourth of six children of the royal couple.
She was almost from infancy betrothed to Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich, the eldest son of Alexander II, but on April 12, the Tsarevich died in Nice. On his deathbed, he asked his brother Grand Duke Alexander and his bride to marry after his death.
After his death, affection developed between Dagmara and Grand Duke Alexander Alexandrovich, who together nursed the dying Tsarevich.
Alexander Alexandrovich wrote in his diary:
“I feel that I can and even love dear Minnie (that was the name of Dagmar in the Romanov family), especially since she is so dear to us. God grant that everything will be arranged as I wish. I really don't know what dear Minnie will say to all this; I don't know her feelings for me, and it really torments me. I'm sure we can be so happy together. I earnestly pray to God to bless me and arrange my happiness.”
“I was already going to talk to her several times, but I didn’t dare, although we were together several times. When we looked at the photographic album together, my thoughts were not in the pictures at all; I only thought about how to proceed with my request. Finally, I made up my mind and did not even have time to say everything I wanted to. Minnie threw herself on my neck and cried. Of course, I couldn't stop myself from crying too. I told her that our dear Nike was praying a lot for us and, of course, at that moment he was rejoicing with us. Tears were flowing from me. I asked her if she could love anyone else besides sweet Nyx. She answered me that no one but his brother, and again we hugged tightly. Much was said and remembered about Niks, about the last days of his life in Nice and his death. Then the queen, the king and the brothers came, everyone hugged us and congratulated us. Everyone had tears in their eyes."
As historians testify, Maria Feodorovna was a very lively, active woman who loved secular amusements, kept her youth for a long time and was distinguished by impeccable taste.
The news of the abdication of Nicholas II found Maria Feodorovna in Kyiv. She immediately left for Petrograd to see and provide moral support to her son. The Petrograd Soviet demanded the arrest of all members of the Russian Imperial House, however, the Provisional Government allowed Maria Feodorovna to leave for the Crimea. In April, the Yalta Council insisted on the execution of all members of the Imperial House living in the Crimea, but this was not allowed by the Sevastopol Council.
Despite a warm welcome at home, in the future, the mother of the last Russian tsar experienced serious difficulties in Denmark, both political and material. Due to lack of funds, she even had to temporarily come back to the UK in November. The Danes even organized a collection of donations in her favor.
In exile, she remained for many a Symbol not only of the "gone Russia" forever, but also of an unbending presence of mind and willpower! She founded numerous charitable foundations to support needy migrants.
Until the end of her life, she did not believe in the death of her sons Nikolai and Mikhail, daughter-in-law and grandchildren. From time to time she was tormented by swindlers of all kinds, posing as her supposedly saved grandchildren: Olga, Maria, Anastasia, Alexei, demanding recognition of her identity and inheritance rights. At a personal meeting with one of the false Anastasias (historians are not entirely sure where and when it took place), Maria Fedorovna allegedly firmly said: “Darling, I don’t know who you are and what goal you are pursuing. Leave me alone. If you need money, I will give it to you. But money is nothing! You are happier than me, you are young, you have your whole life ahead of you. I, unlike you, have lost everything: my husband, family, position, homeland. I only have memories. And they belong only to me. You have no right to them!”
Empress Maria Feodorovna died on October 13. an agreement was reached between the Russian and Danish governments to transfer the remains of Maria Feodorovna from Peterhof. Under the ringing of bells, accompanied by a military escort, the coffin was taken to the church of St. Alexander Nevsky in Peterhof - during the reign of Alexander III, it was the court church of Empress Maria. A memorial service for the Empress was held in the Gothic chapel of the Church of St. Alexander Nevsky in Peterhof. Access to the coffin was open for worship until the evening of September 27th.
On September 28, the sarcophagus with the remains of the Dowager Empress of Russia was installed in the Cathedral of Sts. Peter and Paul next to the sarcophagus of her husband - Alexander III.
Used materials
- Empress Maria Feodorovna - return to Russia // Week.RU
- Ashes of Empress Maria Feodorovna delivered to Russia // Weekly.RU
The mother of the last Russian emperor until the last did not believe in the death of Nicholas II. To a telegram of condolences received from her nephew, the Danish king Christian X, the ruler replied that all this was nothing more than a rumor. She outlived her son by 10 years and all the time she was waiting for Nicky to arrive now. On October 13, 1928, Maria Feodorovna died. Who was this woman, how did she get to Russia and how could she escape from it after 50 years.
Tales of Andersen
Princess Minnie - that was the name of the future Empress Maria Feodorovna in childhood - was born in 1847 in Copenhagen in the family of the future King Christian IX. There were six children in the family - three sons and three daughters. Father loved to characterize each princess in one word. So, he called his daughters "the most beautiful", "the smartest" and "the kindest" (Alexandra, Maria and Tyra).
Education Dagmar, her sisters and brothers received at home. The main subject that all children had to know was foreign languages, primarily French and English. In addition, the boys were taught military affairs, and the girls were taught how to run a household. For example, the future Russian Empress knew how to sew at the age of 13.
She spent her childhood and youth in the "yellow castle", where the famous writer Hans Christian Andersen was admitted. The fact that we have his fairy tales, we partly owe to Minnie.
Marry in Russia
Initially, Maria was supposed to marry another son of Alexander II - Grand Duke Nikolai Alexandrovich.
At the urging of his own father, the 20-year-old young man came to Denmark to meet his own potential bride in the summer of 1864. The 17-year-old girl made such a strong impression on the young man that he almost immediately wrote to his mother.
If you knew how happy I am: I fell in love with Dagmar. Do not be afraid that it is so soon, I remember your advice and cannot decide soon. But how can I not be happy when my heart tells me that I love her, I love her passionately. She is so pretty, simple, smart, cheerful and shy at the same time,” Nikolai wrote.
The heir to the Russian throne went to Darmstadt, where by that time his parents were. They decided to transport the bride to Russia in the near future, and play the wedding as soon as she turns 18 years old.
After that, he again went to Denmark. Historians point out that young people made horse rides, rode a boat and talked a lot. The Danish court exhaled, and the Russian one too: there was a need to connect countries in this way, and it’s nice when children marry for love. Young people announced their engagement. By the way, the residents of St. Petersburg learned that the heir was going to get married, after 101 salutes.
As it turned out, it was too early to rejoice. From the bride's house, the young man set off on a journey to Nice in the autumn of 1864. Here, the heir to the Russian throne began to have back pain, but he did not attach any importance to them, attributing everything to fatigue.
God willing, I will rest and strengthen myself in the winter in Italy (where I was going to go), then a wedding, and then a new life - a family hearth, service and work, he said.
However, the plans of the prince were not destined to come true. In the spring of 1865, the Danish court received an alarming message from Nice. The prince got worse. By the time the bride arrived, the young man's condition was so bad that the doctors said: it's time to say goodbye.
On April 24, 1865, the Tsarevich died. His body was sent to St. Petersburg on the Alexander Nevsky frigate. The most common reason why an heir died is considered to be an incorrect diagnosis. He had cerebrospinal tuberculous meningitis, and was being treated for both the common cold and rheumatism.
"Sasha"
Shortly thereafter, the princess began a correspondence with Alexander II. The emperor insists on her coming to Russia and marrying another son, the future sovereign Alexander III.
I am very pleased to hear that you repeat about your desire to leave me near you. But my loss is so recent that now I'm just afraid to show my non-devotion to her. On the other hand, I would like to hear from Sasha himself whether he really wants to be with me, she writes in response.
As it turned out, Alexander had long been in love with Mary.
I wanted to propose to Dagmar, but I did not dare, although we were together, - he later wrote in his diary.
In the spring of 1866, he proposes marriage to the princess; in June, the engagement took place. Already in October she moves to Russia. On October 13, she was baptized under the name of Maria Feodorovna, and on October 28 the wedding took place. On the occasion of the celebration, all faulty debtors were written off their debts, and an amnesty was announced for a number of prisoners.
Despite the fact that noisy St. Petersburg was radically different from quiet and calm Copenhagen, Maria quickly understood how to act. She actively learned dances that were popular at court, studied all the turns of the Russian language that many foreigners would not understand. Historians indicate that she knew how to charm people and quickly won over most of the courtiers. And at receptions, she devoted several minutes to almost every guest.
Nicholas II and other children
The birth of the heir to the throne was not only a joy for Maria Feodorovna, but also a completely logical way to gain a foothold on the throne. About a year of painful waiting - and in 1867, doctors say that she is expecting a baby.
The boy was born on May 6, 1868. Named Nicholas. According to one version, the name was given in honor of the great-grandfather, Nicholas I. The more common one says that the child received the name in honor of the deceased uncle. Rumors instantly spread among the people that an unfortunate fate awaited the boy: it was believed that naming the same as a suddenly deceased relative was a bad omen.
Later, five more children were born in the family. The second son, named after his grandfather Alexander, did not live even two years. The third son - Georges (George), born in 1871, at the age of 19 fell ill with pulmonary tuberculosis. By that time, the world did not know how to fully cope with a terrible disease. Doctors advised to send the boy away from the bustling Petersburg, in special climatic conditions. The royal couple ordered to build a castle for him in the mountains near the village of Abastumani (now Georgia), where he lived until his death in 1899.
In 1875, the first daughter, Xenia, was born to the royal couple. The princess migrated with her mother in 1919, and after the death of Maria Feodorovna, she left for Great Britain. Xenia lived 85 years. The youngest daughter of the royal couple, Olga, also migrated from Russia. But unlike her older sister, after the death of her mother, she chose to stay in Denmark. She was forced to flee to Canada only in 1948, fearing persecution by the Soviet Union, where she was considered an enemy of the people.
Neshal Empress
Maria Feodorovna was able to maintain good relations with her father-in-law (Alexander II) and not quarrel with her husband when a huge scandal broke out between the emperor and his son. The fact is that a few years before his death, the tsar-liberator finally stopped hiding his relationship with his mistress Ekaterina Dolgorukova. The son repeatedly quarreled with his father about this, but this did not change anything.
After the death of his wife in 1880, Alexander II married altogether. The couple had four children. True, this marriage lasted only a year: in 1881, the liberator king was killed.
Alexander III inherits the throne, Mary becomes Empress. As historians point out, she was the sovereign's wife in the very "canonical" concept: she was engaged in charity work, devoted a lot of time to her family. Her husband did not allow her to any political affairs, and she did not aspire.
About once a year they went to the homeland of the Empress - to Denmark. As General Nikolai Yepanchin wrote, the emperor liked the modest (relative to St. Petersburg) life of the Danes, and especially of the royal family. Alexander III walked a lot on foot, went to shops, examined the surroundings.
In October 1888, a terrible accident occurred: the tsar's train coming from the south crashed near the Borki station, 50 kilometers from Kharkov. No one from the imperial family was hurt. At the carriage where Alexander III, his wife and children were, the roof collapsed, and the emperor was forced to hold it on his shoulders for several hours until help arrived.
After that, he began to complain of back pain. As it turned out, during the crash, the emperor fell and hit hard, but was able to quickly get up. However, this was enough, according to the doctors, to start developing kidney disease.
The emperor increasingly felt unwell. His complexion became earthy, his appetite disappeared, and his heart began to ache. After a hunt in 1894, the condition worsened even more. As it turned out, the king has nephritis - an acute kidney disease. It was decided to transport him to Livadia (Crimea). The emperor lost a lot of weight in a month, became haggard and practically could not talk. He hardly slept because of the terrible pain. On October 20, 1894, he died sitting in a chair. Maria Fedorovna, who had been nearby all this time, fainted.
Nicholas II became Russian emperor. As it turned out a few years later, the last.
Nicky the king and the daughter-in-law scandal
Contemporaries wrote about Maria Feodorovna as a loving mother, always ready to support her children in almost any endeavor. However, with the daughter-in-law - the wife of Tsar Nicholas II - the relationship somehow did not work out right away. You can read more about how the relationship between Alix and Nicky developed.
Contemporaries of the Empress indicate that the mother of Nicholas II disliked her daughter-in-law because she thought for too long whether to agree to marry Nicky. The fact is that it was almost the only royal marriage in the entire Russian history that was not based on mutually beneficial relations between the two countries. Nicholas really married for love. But Alix was frightened by the transition to another faith, which was mandatory.
A very trusting relationship developed between Nicholas II and his mother, so the son said that he was worried. But the reaction was unexpected.
“After all, this is the most idiotic story that one could imagine,” the ruler wrote to her son George what she thinks about the relationship between Alix and Nike.
Alice of Hesse-Darmstadt was baptized the day after the death of Alexander III under the name of Alexandra Feodorovna. Beloved wanted to marry on the day when Nicholas II ascended the throne. The fact is that this date was the day after the death of his father. As a result, relatives and courtiers dissuaded the young people from "marrying when the coffin is nearby," postponing the wedding for three weeks.
The strained relationship between the dowager mother-empress and her daughter-in-law drew attention at court in the early days of Alexandra Feodorovna in Russia. Soon after the funeral of Alexander III, another reception was held in the palace. By tradition, Maria Fedorovna approached many people and talked for 2-3 minutes. With her daughter-in-law, she exchanged a couple of phrases.
In addition, in the palace, the empress demanded to leave the daily routine that was under Alexander III. And the new emperor did not dare to argue with his mother, which infuriated his wife.
Grigory Rasputin, in whose "healing gift" Alice was sure, the Empress simply hated. She was sure that the "hypnotist" would destroy Nikolai. Historians are still arguing whether Maria Feodorovna was aware of the preparations for the murder of Rasputin, because one of those who dealt with him is her relative.
The execution of the royal family
The last months before the February Revolution, Maria Fedorovna spent in Kyiv, supervised the repair of the hospital and was engaged in charity work. It was whispered at court that she had specially “escaped” from St. Petersburg, since in the dispute for the attention of Nikolai and influence on him, she began to finally lose to her daughter-in-law after the murder of Rasputin.
Here, on March 2, 1917, she was caught by the news of her son's abdication from the throne. She rushes to Mogilev, where the headquarters of the Supreme Commander is located. Here the woman sees her eldest son for the last time.
Ksenia and Olga Romanov later recalled that their mother blamed Alix for everything.
Maria Feodorovna, together with her daughters Xenia and Olga and their husbands, then moved to the Crimea. Until the spring of 1918, she notes in her diary that she sent letters to her son and daughter-in-law and even received replies. However, by March, there are no more such records.
Staying in the Crimea for her was actually an arrest. Denmark, Britain and Germany discussed with St. Petersburg the possibility of saving that part of the Romanov family that remained alive.
Then, in the spring, the situation in the Crimea sharply escalated. The Yalta council demanded the immediate execution of all the Romanovs, and the Sevastopol council was waiting for an order from Petrograd, since the hostages could be taken there for public execution. On behalf of the Sevastopol Council, the Romanovs were moved to a safer palace so that they would not become victims of the "Yalta".
The fate of everyone who was in the Crimea hung in the balance. By the beginning of summer, Yalta was occupied by the Germans, who began the occupation of the Crimea. For Maria Feodorovna, this turned out to be a salvation. Meanwhile, she begins to receive conflicting information from relatives from abroad. Some claim that Nicholas was killed with his entire family, others talk about their salvation, others report that only the former emperor was killed.
Terrible rumors are spreading about the fate of our beloved Nicky. I can’t and don’t want to believe them, but I just can’t imagine how I can endure such stress, ”Maria Fedorovna wrote in her diary at the end of July 1918 (Nicholas II and members of the royal family were shot on the night of July 18-19).
Since the empress dowager was sure that her son was alive, she did not flee to Denmark in September 1918, when a ship was sent for her, on which there was a nurse, "specially to examine the empress." She also did not believe Princess Lydia Vasilchikova, who managed to escape from Petrograd.
When Pavel Bulygin, an officer of the Russian Imperial Army, arrived in Crimea at the end of September 1918 and reported that Nikolai was indeed dead, Maria Fedorovna hesitated. Bulygin became the head of the guards of the surviving members of the royal family. In January 1919, Maria Fedorovna comes to terms with the idea that her beloved Nicky could have been killed.
Evacuation
The Danish king Christian X several times appeals to England on the issue of evacuating the royal prisoners from the Crimea. On April 7, 1919, the commander of the British naval forces in Sevastopol, Admiral Kalsorp, visits the family. He conveys information that the English King George V, Maria Feodorovna's nephew, puts the Marlboro ship at her disposal for departure, but it is necessary to leave immediately.
The Empress asked the British to evacuate everyone whose lives are in danger due to the new government. Already on April 11, English ships entered the port of Yalta to pick up refugees.
Through Constantinople and Malta, Maria Feodorovna arrived in England, where she stayed all summer. In August, she boards the ship "Fionia" and departs with her daughters for Denmark, in Copenhagen.
Maria Feodorovna was financially supported by the English royal house. At the direction of George V, the Empress Dowager received an annual pension of ten thousand pounds sterling.
And his own nephew, the king of Denmark, was not very hospitable to his relatives. For example, once a servant from Christian X came to the Romanovs and asked them to turn off some of the lamps in order to save money. In addition, the nephew repeatedly offered Maria Feodorovna to sell or pawn the jewelry brought from Russia. But she kept them in a box under her bed until her death.
She still forbade serving memorial services for Nicholas. At the sight of the ships passing by, she was sure that Nicky was on each of them. Well, at worst Alix.
Maria Fedorovna died on October 13, 1928 in Wider near Copenhagen. Hundreds of Russian emigrants from Paris, London, Stockholm, and Brussels saw her off on her last journey.
Most of the newspapers wrote about the funeral, shedding tears of tenderness, that this was the funeral of old Russia, - wrote the plenipotentiary representative of the Land of Soviets in Denmark, Milail Kobetsky.