Table of Contents
TSAR NICHOLAS II
- Nicholas II or Nikolai II Alexandrovich Romanov was the last Emperor of Russia, ruling from 1 November 1894 until his forced abdication on 15 March 1917.
- His reign saw the fall of the Russian Empire from one of the foremost great powers of the world to economic and military collapse.
- He was ridiculed as Nicholas the Bloody by his enemies due to the Khodynka Tragedy, anti-Semitic pogroms, Bloody Sunday.
BACKGROUND
- On 22 March 1917, Nicholas, no longer a monarch.He was placed under house arrest with his family by the Provisional Government, surrounded by guards and confined to their quarters.
- In August 1917, Alexander Kerensky’s provisional government evacuated the Romanovs to Tobolsk, allegedly to protect them from the rising tide of revolution.
- After the Bolsheviks came to power in October 1917, the conditions of their imprisonment grew stricter, and talk of putting Nicholas on trial grew more frequent.
BACKGROUND
- On 1 March 1918, the family was placed on soldier’s In the 15 months from his abdication to his death, royal relations still in power debated if and how they should grant the family asylum, with many of the Romanov descendants believing King George V of England, the czar’s cousin and grandfather of Queen Elizabeth II, could have saved them.
- Still in St. Petersburg, Nicholas’ wife and children were urged by the government to flee as the riots unfolded. Alexandra refused to leave without Nicholas, who was at the front fighting against the revolutionaries. He eventually succumbed to pressure and abdicated
PLACES WHERE TSAR KEPT
LAST DAYS
- They moved to the remote Siberian city of Tobolsk in August 1917 and, as reality set in, the family began sending hidden messages about their situation in capitivty to the outside world in hopes of reaching pro-monarchist groups.
- When the Bolsheviks seized power in November 1917, even the most ardent Romanov supporters began to lose hope. While the Provisional Government seemed somewhat sympathetic to the family, the Bolsheviks wanted their heads.
EXECUTION
- At about 1 a.m. on July 17, 1918, in a fortified mansion in the town of Ekaterinburg, in the Ural Mountains, the Romanovs—ex-tsar Nicholas II, ex-tsarina Alexandra, their five children, and their four remaining servants, including the loyal family doctor, Eugene Botkin—were awoken by their Bolshevik captors and told they must dress and gather their belongings for a swift nocturnal
- The White armies, which supported the tsar, were approaching; the prisoners could already hear the boom of the big guns. They waited there until, suddenly, 11 or 12 heavily armed men filed ominously into the room.
EXECUTION
- What happened next—the slaughter of the family and servants—was one of the seminal events of the 20th century, a wanton massacre that shocked the world and still inspires a terrible fascination today.
- A 300-year-old imperial dynasty, one marked by periods of glorious achievement as well as staggering hubris and ineptitude, was swiftly brought to an end. But while the Romanovs’ political reign was over, the story of the line’s last ruler and his family was most certainly
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