TRIGGER WARNING: VIOLENCE AND DEATH.
Source:
Richmond Times-Dispatch, published November 20, 1918
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045389/1918-11-10/ed-1/seq-37/#date1=1789&index=7&rows=20&words=Czarina&searchType=basic&sequence=0&state=&date2=1963&proxtext=Czarina&y=0&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=1
This article was published in the
Richmond Times-Dispatch newspaper on November 10, 1918, blaming Alexandra for betrayal via secretly communicating intelligence information to her cousin and Russia's enemy Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, for the fall of the Romanov dynasty and ultimately the deaths of Nicholas and Alexei, as well as on reporting news on what happened to Nicholas's body and the way Alexei died that we now of course know is fabricated, gets the ages of Maria and Anastasia not only mixed up but further wrong, and other such fabrications, half-truths and exaggerations. But at that time, it was only made public that Nicholas and Alexei had been assassinated, which was the official news released then, and the rumour spread around the world that Alexandra and her daughters were probably still alive and their whereabouts unknown — when in reality they had been killed with Nicholas and Alexei in the pre-dawn hours of July 17, 1918, almost four months before this article was published.
The article:
The Terrible Retribution which has Punished the Czarina
How Her Plotting with Her Cousin, the Kaiser, Betrayed Russia, Dethroned Her Husband, Led to His Murder and the Cruel Death of Her Idolized Son -- Her Own and Her Daughters' Fate a Mystery
UTTER mystery surrounded the fate of the widowed Czarina of Russia and her four pretty young daughters up to four weeks ago, but vague reports from chaotic Russia created a strong impression that they had all been killed.
Concerning the little Czarevitch, the Czarina's only son, the reports left little doubt that he had perished. In a country where the executioners are killing daily until they drop from exhaustion at their work of slaughter, there can be little hope for members of the former ruling class who are caught in the whirlpool of anarchy.
While the fate of the delicately nurtured Czarina and her family must fill us with horror, it is still more amazing and shocking to learn that the unfortunate woman by her treachery brought about the entire tragedy of Russia.
Evidence had long shown that there was constant communication between the Russian court and the German military command. Our knowledge of this subject has just taken a long step forward. Commissioner Henry W. Mapp, of the Salvation Army, a responsible American who had been sent to Russia to relieve distress, came back with positive information that the Czarina herself had sent direct communication by her private wire from Tsarskoe Selo to the German Kaiser giving information that the British War Minister, Lord Kitchener, had sailed for Russia. Kitchener's mission was to provide for better co-operation between the Russian and Allied armies and to check the disorganization of the Russian armies which had already begun.
Kitchener sailed for Russia on the cruiser Hampshire in April, 1917, and the ship was torpedoed by the Germans off the north of Scotland and lost with everybody on board. This tragedy was directly traceable to the information supplied by the Czarina.
The latest evidence indicates that the Czarina constantly furnished to the Kaiser intelligence concerning Russian military movements. She was a cousin of the Kaiser, the sister of a reigning German sovereign, the Grand Duke of Hesse, a German princess herself by birth, training and instinct. Like the Queen of Greece and other royalties, she was a devoted and unreasoning adherent of the Kaiser.
Right well did she work for her imperial master. Through her treachery she brought about the ruin of her adopted country, the defeat of its armies and the demoralization of its entire political structure, previously weakened by terrible losses and sufferings.
Her treachery, according to this view, was the main factor that caused not only the collapse of the empire, but the death of her husband and her son, and, it appears probable, of herself and all her daughters.
Never perhaps in all history has there been a more perfect case of retribution for treachery.
The last days of the Czarina and her family would surely make a drama of unsurpassed terror. Lost in the wilds of the most desolate part of Russia, at the mercy of half-crazed Bolsheviki politicians, Red Guards and unwashed peasants, the condition of this family of delicately bred women defies description. The wretched Czarina, once the wife of the most absolute monarch in the world, the possessor of jewels valued at $100,000,000, had not even the power to communicate with her relatives and friends.
So great was the uncertainty about the Czarina's fate that His Holiness the Pope sent an inquiry about a month ago to the Austrian Ambassador at Petrograd, asking if he could find out what had happened to her and her daughters. The Austrians having nominally made peace with the Bolsheviki, it was supposed that they could obtain some information from them. The Ambassador answered His Holiness that their death had been reported and denied, and that no reliable information could be obtained.
The Pope then sent an ecclesiastic of high rank to Russia with instructions to find out definitely what happened to them and to remove them to a place of safety, if possible. As the place where the family were last heard from, Ekaterinburg, is nearly a thousand miles from Petrograd, and as railway travel is almost at an end, no one can say when the envoy will complete his mission.
One of the latest and most circumstantial reports declared that the Czarina and her four daughters had been murdered at a village near Ekaterinburg. A former court servant returned to Petrograd, who declared that he had seen certain details of the tragedy.
According to this man, there had arisen a violent quarrel in the local Soviet as to what should be done with the Czarina and her daughters. The six most bloodthirsty members of the Soviet, a butcher, an innkeeper and four peasants, then went to the house in which the poor women were imprisoned and shot them all.
After this the murderers burned down the house with all the bodies. The servant who brought this news declared that he had seen the charred bodies and some fragments of jewelry the princess had worn.
Russia now groans under a condition of anarchy in which local councils called "Soviets" exercise tyrannous power in their vicinity, while the central bodies at Moscow and Petrograd have little or no authority.
After the circumstantial report about the murder had been received, Lenine, the Bolshevist Prime Minister, announced that he had received a denial of it from Ekaterinburg and that the women were safe.
When the execution of ex-Czar Nicholas was decided on, his wife and children were separated from him in order that pity for them should not lead to any action that might save the fallen monarch. The whole family up to that time had been imprisoned at Tobolsk in Siberia. They were then taken to Ekaterinburg in European Russia, but while the ex-Czar was imprisoned in the town, the rest of the family were taken outside.
The Czar's execution has been reported in many ways from various sources. One report stated that he had faced the firing squad with bravery and steadiness, while another described him as collapsing in terror. The reports generally agreed that his last thoughts had been for his family and that his last words were:
"Have mercy on my wife and children!"
After the Czar's execution his body underwent a strange series of experiences, which suggest his own treatment of the fanatic Rasputin's remains. It will be recalled that the Czar recovered Rasputin's body from the Neva and buried it at midnight in a silver coffin with solemn ceremonies in the grounds of his palace at Tsarskoe Selo, from which it was dug up and carted away to Siberia by the revolutionists.
The Bolsheviki deliberately planned to treat Nicholas's body with the greatest possible indignity. They buried it in the "Suicides' Corner" of the local cemetery. In the eyes of the old-fashioned Russian peasants a suicide is the most hopeless of lost souls, worse even than a murderer, and the spot where such creatures are buried is passed with shuddering and loathing.
The body had not lain here many weeks, however, when a force of the Czecho-Slovak army, the released Austro-Hungarian soldiers who support the Allies, passed this way. They considered that the monarch who had supported the cause they believe in deserved better treatment. They therefore unearthed his body and buried it in consecrated ground with simple religious services.
But the body was not yet to rest. The "People's Army" consisting of Cossacks, obtained possession of the grave, and, being imbued with the old, deep, religious sentiment of Russia, they thought that the Soviet's treatment of the Czar's body was wicked and would bring divine anger on the country. They therefore exhumed the body again with much ceremony and prepared to give it solemn burial according to the rites of the Russian Orthodox Church.
It was enclosed in a zinc coffin with an outer case of Siberian cedar and placed in the Cathedral at Ekaterinburg under a guard composed of commanders of the People's Army. After that the body was carried away to be buried in a special sarcophagus at Omsk.
These details concerning the two burials were furnished by the newspaper Izvestia of Moscow.
Only scraps of information and rumors can be obtained concerning what happened to the Czarina and her children between their removal from Tobolsk and their reported reappearance at Ekaterinburg. This information has come through Russian Bolsheviki and peasants notorious for their untruthfulness and wild imaginations.
The circumstantial report has it that the Red Guards deliberately kept the delicate little Czarewitch out in a public square at Perm day and night for three days without food or shelter. At the end of this time the poor child died of pneumonia brought on by cold and starvation.
The child, whose birth Russia and the rest of the world awaited with anxiety for ten years, is now supposed to be in an unknown grave. Everybody will recall how the Czar and Czarina of Russia longed and prayed for the birth of a son for years. Four daughters in succession were born to the couple, and the Czarina nearly lost her mind through disappointment at her failure to bear the desired heir.
When, at last, in 1904, the little Czarevitch Alexis came, the Imperial couple were transported with joy. The entire thoughts of Russia's ruler were concentrated on this child. As he began to grow he received increased devotion from the Czar. The entire world was ransacked to gratify his wishes. From the strongly guarded precincts of the Russian Court came many reports of attempts by revolutionists on the boy's life. It was very positively stated that one attack had resulted in injury to his leg.
On public occasions after that the Czarevitch was observed to have a permanently stiffened right leg. Though of delicate health, he was a handsome and attractive boy.
How the late Czar spoiled his child is shown by an incident related by Dr. E.L. Dillon, the well-known English writer on Balkan affairs. Not long before the Czar's downfall a special British envoy, General Sir Arthur Paget, was sent to Petrograd to discuss closer cooperation between British and Russians. While he was talking with the Czar, the young Czarevitch got hold of the General's cap and placed it on the head of a female statue. When the Czar saw this he laughed so heartily that the conference was seriously interrupted.
Now, this spoiled heir of the world's greatest autocracy may have been put to death by a band of unwashed ruffians in an obscure village.
It was assumed that the report of the Czarevitch's death must be correct, because no mention was made of him when the rest of the Romanoff family reappeared at Ekaterinburg.
The four daughters of the Czarina were the Grand Duchess Olga, aged twenty-three; Grand Duchess Tatiana, aged twenty-one; Grand Duchess Anastasia, aged nineteen, and Grand Duchess Marie, aged fourteen. Their photographs prove that they were very handsome young girls and all accounts agree that they were charming and sweet.
After the Czar's downfall and a brief period of imprisonment in the palace at Tsarskoe Selo, they were removed to Tobolsk in Siberia. The whole family was forced to occupy the upper floor of a humble house that had belonged to a local tax collector. Revolutionary guards occupied the ground floor.
At first the fallen imperial family was treated with leniency, although subject to considerable privations. They had only one servant and the Czarina was obliged to do much of her own cooking. The deposed monarch and his wife were not allowed to go out except to church, and Nicholas tried to maintain his health by carrying pails of water upstairs. The little Czarevitch was only permitted to go into the public park for a few hours a day under an armed guard.
The young Grand Duchesses, however, were allowed considerable liberty at this stage. They mingled freely with the townspeople and travelled about the country. All signs of rank were discarded in their social relations and the young women were known simply as the Misses Romanoff. The Grand Duchess Olga learnt stenography and typewriting and fitted herself to earn her living in business. The second daughter, Grand Duchess Tatiana, began to train as a nurse. All the girls, in fact, were learning to live in a normal way under a democratic system.
The quarters in the private house were so cramped that the imperial family was removed after three months to the monastery of Tobolsk.
That was before the Russian revolution began to turn toward Bolshevism and terrorism. The anti-Bolshevist sentiments of the Siberians settled the fate of the fallen imperial family. They were removed from Tobolsk hastily by the Red Guards lest the Siberians or Czecho-Slovaks should reach them and liberate them. Then began the terrible journey toward European Russia in which Czar Nicholas lost his life, while the fate of the women was left in uncertainty.
