Alexandra Feodorovna (Alix of Hesse)
Alexandra Feodorovna (Russian: Александра Фёдоровна; 6 June [O.S. 25 May] 1872 – 17 July 1918), Princess Alix of Hesse and by Rhine at birth, was the last Empress of Russia as the consort of Emperor Nicholas II from their marriage on 26 November [O.S. 14 November] 1894 until his forced abdication on 15 March [O.S. 2 March] 1917. A favourite granddaughter of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, she was, like her grandmother, one of the most famous royal carriers of haemophilia and bore a haemophiliac heir, Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia. Her reputation for encouraging her husband's resistance to the surrender of autocratic authority and her known faith in the Russian mystic Grigori Rasputin severely damaged her popularity and that of the Romanov monarchy in its final years.[2] She and her immediate family were all murdered while in Bolshevik captivity in 1918, during the Russian Revolution. In 2000, the Russian Orthodox Church canonized her as Saint Alexandra the Passion Bearer.
This article is about the wife of Nicholas II of Russia. For Alexandra Feodorovna (1798–1860), the wife of Nicholas I, see Alexandra Feodorovna (Charlotte of Prussia).Alexandra Feodorovna
26 November 1894 – 15 March 1917
26 May 1896
Princess Alix of Hesse and by Rhine
6 June [O.S. 25 May] 1872
New Palace, Darmstadt, Grand Duchy of Hesse, German Empire
17 July 1918 (aged 46)
Ipatiev House, Yekaterinburg, Russian SFSR
17 July 1998
Russian Orthodox
prev. Lutheranism
Proposed matches[edit]
Queen Victoria greatly favored Alix and she wanted Alix to become the queen consort of the United Kingdom, which she considered "the greatest position there is."[15] On 2 March 1888, she wrote to Alix's oldest sister Victoria that "My heart and mind are bent on securing dear Alicky for either Eddy or Georgie",[16] respectively the second in line to the British throne and his brother, the future George V, both of whom were Alexandra's first cousins. In 1889, Victoria invited Alix and Eddy to Balmoral in hopes that they would fall in love. Eddy grew infatuated with her and proposed, but Alix was not interested in him and rejected his proposal. However, Victoria still persisted and tried to convince Alix of the benefits of the match. Victoria wrote to Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine, Alix's older sister, that Alix "should be made to reflect seriously on the folly of throwing away the chance of a very good husband, kind, affectionate and steady, and of entering a united happy family and a very good position which is second to none in the world!"[17] Alix's older sister Ella opposed the match because "he [Eddy] does not look over strong and is too stupid."[18] In May 1890, Alix wrote a letter to Eddy that although it "pained her to pain him,"[15] she only saw him as a cousin and could not marry him. She wrote to Victoria that she would marry Eddy if she were "forced" by the family but that both of them would be miserable. Victoria was disappointed, but she decided that Alix had shown "great strength of character" in refusing to acquiesce to such strong pressure.[15]
In 1891, Queen Victoria tried to arrange a match between Alix and Prince Maximilian of Baden. She asked Louis to invite the prince to Darmstadt as soon as possible. When he arrived in Darmstadt, Maximilian told Alix that he intended to propose to her. Alix was surprised and unhappy, and she later reflected that "I did not know him at all."[19] She asked her older sister Victoria to intervene and help her reject Maximilian politely.
Revolution (1917)[edit]
World War I put what proved to be an unbearable burden on Imperial Russia's government and economy, both of which were dangerously weak. Mass shortages and hunger became the daily situation for tens of millions of Russians owing to the disruptions of the war economy. Fifteen million men were diverted from agricultural production to fight in the war and the transport infrastructure (primarily railroads) was diverted towards war use, exacerbating food shortages in the cities since available agricultural products could not be brought to urban areas. Inflation was rampant. This, combined with the food shortages and the poor performance by the Russian military in the war, generated a great deal of anger and unrest among the people in Petrograd and other cities.[110]
The decision of the Tsar to take personal command of the military was disastrous, since he was blamed personally for all losses. His relocation to the front, leaving the Empress in charge of the government, helped undermine the Romanov dynasty. The poor performance of the military led to rumours, believed by the people, that the German-born Empress was part of a conspiracy to help Germany win the war. Moreover, within several months of taking personal command of the army, the Tsar replaced several capable ministers with less able men at the Empress’s and Rasputin's behest; most notable among these replacements was replacing N. B. Shcherbatov with Alexei Khvostov as minister of the interior.[111] The severe winter of 1916–17 essentially doomed Imperial Russia. Food shortages worsened and famine gripped the cities. The mismanagement and failures of the war turned the soldiers against the Tsar. By 1917 the Tsar had realized that Russia could not fight the war much longer, and as railroads carried troops to the front there was little capacity left to bring food to the cities.
By March 1917 conditions had become even worse. Steelworkers went on strike on 7 March and the following day crowds hungry for bread began rioting on the streets of Petrograd to protest against food shortages and the war. After two days of rioting the Tsar ordered the army to restore order and on 11 March they fired on the crowd. That very same day the Duma, the elected legislature, urged the Tsar to take action to ameliorate the concerns of the people. The Tsar responded by dissolving the Duma.[112]
On 12 March soldiers sent to suppress the rioting crowds mutinied and joined the rebellion, thus providing the spark to ignite the February Revolution. (Like the later October Revolution of November 1917, the Russian Revolutions of 1917 are named according to the Old-Style calendar.) Soldiers and workers set up the ‘Petrograd Soviet" of 2,500 elected deputies whilst the Duma declared a Provisional Government on 13 March. Alexander Kerensky was a key player in the new regime. The Duma informed the Tsar that day that he must abdicate.
In an effort to put an end to the uprising in the capital, Nicholas tried to get to Petrograd by train from army headquarters at Mogilev. The route was blocked so he tried another way. His train was stopped at Pskov where, after receiving advice from his generals, he first abdicated the throne for himself and later, on seeking medical advice, for himself and his son, the Tsarevich Alexei.[113]
Alexandra was now in a perilous position as the wife of the deposed Tsar, hated by the Russian people. Attempts were made by the mutinous Tsarskoye Selo garrison to storm the Alexander Palace but it was successfully defended by the palace guards.[114] The palace guards and other troops gradually left for the capital after being informed about the abdication and Alexandra asked the Duma to put in place security measures for her and her household in view of the riots and violence in the nearby capital.[115] On 18 March Mikhail Rodzianko sent the newly appointed Minister of War, Alexander Guchkov, and General Lavr Kornilov to Alexandra to inspect the security of the palace, which resulted in an officer being appointed to maintain the security of the palace as well as to act as a channel of communication between the palace and the Duma.[115] After this Alexandra noticed that the guards defending the palace gradually began to wear handkerchiefs around their wrists, signalling that they supported the Duma, which also meant that she and her children, while being defended from immediate harm, were nevertheless under de facto house arrest from that moment on.[114] Alexandra and her children and household were not molested in any way and the household was left to continue its everyday life as before, with the exception of occasional power cuts.[116] On 21 March Kornilov informed Alexandra that she was formally under house arrest and the members of the household were informed that they were free to leave if they wished but if they chose to stay they would have to obey the same rules as pertained to the house arrest of Alexandra.[115]
The following day, on 22 March, Nicholas was finally allowed to return to the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoe Selo, where he was placed under arrest with his family. Alexandra told him that "the husband and father was of more value in her eyes than the Emperor whose throne she had shared."[117]
Saint Alexandra Romanova of Russia
- 1981 by Russian Orthodox Church Abroad
- 2000 by the Russian Orthodox Church
Church on Blood, Yekaterinburg, Russia
17 July
Archives[edit]
Alexandra Feodorovna's letters to Anna Vyrubova and Lili Dehn, written in the years 1916–1918, are preserved in the ‘Romanov collection’ in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University (New Haven, Connecticut, USA).[170]
Documents about Alexandra and her family (including photographs and correspondence) can also be found in the Archive of the House of Hesse, which is kept in Fasanerie Palace in Eichenzell, Germany.[171]