The Tsar's daughter Anastasia. Anastasia Romanova - Grand Duchess

Legends about the royal children miraculously escaping death are one of the most common stories among many peoples. Sometimes such legends became a convenient cover for impostors, sometimes the last hope that the dynasty was not interrupted and that the descendants of an ancient and glorious family were still alive somewhere. The circumstances of the death of the Romanovs are so complicated that the appearance of stories about children who escaped execution is not surprising. It is also not surprising that many “doubles” appeared, calling themselves direct descendants of the last Russian emperor.

In the almost hundred years that have passed since the execution of the royal family in Yekaterinburg, so many impostors have appeared that it is difficult to count them.

There are many versions about the miraculous salvation of the children of the last Russian Emperor Nicholas II - from naive folk tales that the Mother of God averted the eyes of the executioners, and angels on wings carried them to a safe place, to well-thought-out stories that amaze with the abundance of details and details. Although storytellers rarely agree on who exactly managed to survive, as well as on the circumstances of salvation.

As you know, on the night of July 16-17, 1918 in the city of Yekaterinburg, in the basement of the house of mining engineer Nikolai Ipatiev, Russian Emperor Nicholas II, his wife Empress Alexandra Fedorovna, and their children - Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria, Anastasia - were shot , heir to the throne Tsarevich Alexei, as well as physician Botkin, valet Alexei Trupp, maid Anna Demidova and cook Ivan Kharitonov.

It is officially believed that the decision to execute the royal family was finally made by the Ural Council of Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers' Deputies on July 16 in connection with the possibility of surrendering the city to the White Guard troops and the alleged discovery of a conspiracy to escape the Romanovs. On the night of July 16-17 at 11:30 p.m., two special representatives from the Urals Council handed a written order to execute the commander of the security detachment P. Z. Ermakov and the commandant of the house, Commissioner of the Extraordinary Investigative Commission, Ya. M. Yurovsky. After a brief dispute about the method of execution, the royal family was woken up and, having been told about a possible shootout and the danger of being killed by bullets ricocheting off the walls, they were offered to go down to the corner semi-basement room.

According to the report of Yakov Yurovsky, the Romanovs did not suspect anything until the very last moment, when the volleys rang out. It is known that after the first salvo, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia remained alive - they were saved by jewelry sewn into the corsets of their dresses. Later, witnesses interrogated by investigator Sokolov testified that of the royal daughters, Anastasia resisted death the longest; she, already wounded, “had” to be finished off with bayonets and rifle butts. According to materials discovered by historian Edward Radzinsky, Anna Demidova, Alexandra’s maid, who managed to protect herself with a pillow with jewelry sewn into it, remained alive the longest.

A murder committed under mysterious circumstances always gives rise to rumors, especially if the victims are famous people, especially royalty. Therefore, it is not surprising that the secret reprisal carried out by the Bolsheviks against the royal family gave rise to versions that the Romanovs miraculously survived. “Rumors that one of the Grand Duchesses was able to escape were extremely strong,” wrote the publicist K. Savich, who until October 1917 served as chairman of the Petrograd Jury Court. At first, when only a few knew about the events in the Ipatiev House, people simply hoped that at least one of the Romanovs had survived - and wished for reality. Then, when the remains of members of the royal family were discovered, it turned out that among the skeletons found near Yekaterinburg, there were no remains of Anastasia and Tsarevich Alexei. This gave rise to new legends about salvation. Is it any wonder that the tragic events in Yekaterinburg gave rise to a new wave of imposture, comparable to the one that swept through the first Russian Troubles.

The “Romanovs who escaped execution” and their descendants, who began to appear immediately after the execution of the royal family in 1918, became the largest category of impostors in modern history. The children of some of them today continue to seek the return of their “legitimate name” or even the Russian imperial crown. In various parts of the planet there were either Tsarevich Alexei, Princess Anastasia, Princess Maria or Nicholas II. There were the most self-proclaimed Alekseevs - 81, slightly less than the Maris - 53. There were about 33 false Anastasies, the same number of self-proclaimed Tatyanas, and the fewest among the modern false Romanovs were adventurers posing as Olga - 28.

With enviable regularity they declared themselves in Germany, France, Spain, the United States of America and Russia. So, for example, in mid-1919, a young man of 15-16 years old appeared in Siberia, looking like Tsarevich Alexei. As eyewitnesses testify, the people received him with enthusiasm. Schools even collected money in favor of the “saved heir to the throne.” A telegram about the appearance of the “prince” was immediately sent to the ruler of Siberia, Admiral A.V. Kolchak, by whose order the young man was taken to Omsk. According to the claimant, he managed to escape by jumping out of the train on which the royal family was being taken into exile and hiding with “devoted people.” However, Pierre Gillard, the former teacher of Tsarevich Alexei, who came to check the truth of his testimony, asked the impostor several questions in French. “Tsarevich Alexei” could not answer them, but stated that he perfectly understood what he was being asked about, but did not want to answer and would only talk with Admiral Kolchak. The deception of Alexey Putsyato, as the young swindler was really called, was revealed very quickly...

A few months later, the tsar’s son Alexei Romanov, who had “miraculously escaped,” showed up in Poland. Some time later, Grand Duchess Olga appeared there. She said that she lost her memory from a strong blow with a butt, which she allegedly received from executioners in Yekaterinburg, and then was saved by some soldier. In the 1920s, another enterprising person toured the south of France under the name of Olga Nikolaevna, who was busy collecting money from sentimental, gullible people for the “redemption of the imperial family’s jewelry pawned in a pawnshop.” So she managed to enrich herself by almost a million francs! Then came the turn of the “children and grandchildren of the Tsar’s children”: for example, a certain playmaker who introduced himself as “the grandson of Tsarevich Alexei” was a regular at the Madrid bullfight for many years...

At one time there was a legend in emigrant circles that in fact the tsar and his family were not shot, but were secretly kept under the vigilant supervision of the Cheka-OGPU at one of the resorts in Georgia. And Nicholas II himself allegedly lived until 1957 and was buried in Sukhumi. Despite the skepticism of wide circles of the world community towards these and similar rumors, one of the myths concerning the Romanov family has existed for many decades and even today continues to excite people’s consciousness. The story of the “miraculously saved Anastasia” in question has several interpretations. Several novels and a feature film released in the West are dedicated to the “miraculous rescue” and the further fate of Nicholas II’s daughter Anastasia, who allegedly survived the execution of the royal family in 1918. How was this myth born, and does it have any basis?

Grand Duchess Anastasia Romanova, the fourth daughter of Emperor Nicholas II and Alexandra Feodorovna, was born on June 5 (18), 1901 in Peterhof. The full title of Anastasia Nikolaevna sounded like this: Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess of Russia Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova. However, they did not use it at court, in official speech they called her by her first name and patronymic, and at home they called her “little, Nastaska, Nastya, little egg” - for her small height (157 cm) and round figure. Princess Anastasia was only 17 years old when, along with her entire family, she was shot in the basement of the Ipatiev House. Her death was proven by eyewitnesses, including one of the main participants in the execution, Yakov Yurovsky. The remains of the princess were found in the early 1990s, identified and buried in 1998 in the Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg. But immediately after the execution, of course, there were witnesses who said that Anastasia still managed to escape: she either ran away from Ipatiev’s house, or was replaced by one of the servants even before the revolution.

Less than two years had passed since the execution, when the first false Anastasia appeared, who managed to maintain her legend for the longest time. Her name was Anna Anderson, and later, after her husband, a professor at the University of Virginia, who decided to help her in the fight for the royal title, Anna Anderson - Manahan.

This most famous of the falsehoods, Anastasy, claimed that she owed her salvation to a soldier named Tchaikovsky, who managed to pull her out wounded from the basement of Ipatiev’s house after he saw that she was still alive. In the future, her story looked like this: together with the entire family of Alexander Tchaikovsky (mother, sister and younger brother), Anastasia came to Bucharest and remained there until 1920. She gave birth to a child from Tchaikovsky. In 1920, when Alexander Tchaikovsky was killed in a street shootout, she fled Bucharest without saying a word to anyone and reached Berlin. “I was with everyone on the night of the murder and, when the massacre began, I hid behind the back of my sister Tatyana, who was killed by a shot,” this is how A. Anderson, who was held for about a year and a half, told the Russian emigrant Baron von Kleist about herself on June 20, 1922 in a psychiatric hospital in Daldorf near Berlin under the name “Mrs. Tchaikovsky.” “I lost consciousness from several blows.” When I came to my senses, I discovered that I was in the house of some soldier who saved me... I was afraid of persecution and therefore decided not to open up to anyone..."

Another version of the same story was told by former Austrian prisoner of war Franz Svoboda at his trial, at which Anderson tried to defend her right to be called a Grand Duchess and gain access to her “father’s” hypothetical inheritance. F. Svoboda proclaimed himself the savior of Anderson, and, according to his version, the wounded princess was transported to the house of “a neighbor in love with her, a certain X.” This version, however, contained many clearly implausible details, for example, Svoboda spoke about violating the curfew, which was unthinkable at that moment, about posters announcing the escape of the Grand Duchess, allegedly posted throughout the city, and about general searches, which, according to Fortunately, they didn’t give anything. Thomas Hildebrand Preston, who was at that time the British Consul General in Yekaterinburg, completely rejected such fabrications.

Despite the fact that everyone who knew Grand Duchess Anastasia found absolutely nothing in common between her and “Frau Anna Anderson”, who wandered from one German clinic to another, there were influential forces that supported the claims of the impostor. It got to the point that in 1938 this lady demanded legal recognition of the “fact”: she is the daughter of the Russian Emperor! (By this time, “Frau Anderson” had already moved to America, having married professor of medicine John Manahan.)

In February 1984, Anna Andersen-Manahan died in Charlottesville, Virginia. But the urn with her ashes was buried in Germany, in the family crypt of the Dukes of Leuchtenberg, close relatives of the Romanov family! Why? According to Russian historian Andrei Nizovsky, who studied the circumstances of this case, during the life of “Frau Anderson-Manahan” the family of the Dukes of Leuchtenberg was on her side. This is all the more amazing since many representatives of this German aristocratic family knew the real Anastasia well.

Officially launched in 1938, the court case on the claim of an impostor to recognize her as Grand Duchess Romanova is the longest in the history of world jurisprudence. It has not yet been resolved, despite the fact that back in 1961 the Hamburg court issued an unequivocal verdict: the plaintiff, for a number of reasons, cannot lay claim to the name and title of Grand Duchess.

The Hamburg court indicated the reasons for its decision that “Mrs. Anna Anderson” does not have the right to call herself Anastasia Nikolaevna. Firstly, she flatly refused medical and linguistic examinations, without which such identification would be impossible, and the graphological and anthropological examinations that took place gave a negative result. Secondly, the judicial assistant, who knows Russian, testified that the applicant never spoke it; finally, none of the witnesses who personally knew Anastasia saw even a remote resemblance to her in the plaintiff.

However, in the late 1970s, the case of the recognition of “Anastasia” received a new scandalous twist: a police examination in Frankfurt am Main found some similarity between the shape of the ears of “Frau Anderson-Manahan” and the real princess. In the criminal legislation of West Germany, this method of personal identification was given the same importance as in our country - fingerprints. The matter did not reach a tragicomic ending only because the applicant had by that time become completely insane.

A genetic analysis should have put an end to the protracted dispute. The preliminary conclusions of geneticists left no doubt: Anna Anderson, who for 64 years claimed that she was the daughter of Nicholas II, is none other than an impostor. However, this needed to be documented by studies of her tissues, samples of which were stored in a hospital in the American city of Charlottesville. But for unknown reasons, this was stubbornly opposed by the authoritative Association of Russian Nobles in the USA, which legally blocked any attempts to conduct such a study. Finally, a group of British scientists led by the famous criminologist Peter Gill received fragments of “Anastasia’s” intestines, removed from her during a long-standing operation in the United States. It turned out that the genetic code of this Frau is very far from the characteristics of the code of the Duke of Edinburgh Philip, the husband of Queen Elizabeth II of England, who is related by ties of kinship to the Romanov family. But it almost completely coincides with the genetic data of the living relatives of a certain Franciszka Schanskowska - a German woman of Polish origin, who in 1916 worked at an ammunition factory near Berlin and ended up in a psychiatric clinic after an accidental explosion of gunpowder charges, which resulted in insanity. So, despite the fact that Anna Anderson defended her “royal” origin until the end of her life, wrote the book “I, Anastasia” and fought legal battles for several decades, no final decision was made about her belonging to the Romanov family during her lifetime.

But Anna Anderson, as already mentioned, was not the only, although the most persistent, contender for the name of the daughter of Nicholas II. The next impostor in the endless series of “saved Anastasias” was Eleonora Albertovna Kruger, whose story leads to the Bulgarian village of Gabarevo. It was there that, in the early 20s of the last century, a mysterious young woman “with an aristocratic bearing” appeared, who, upon meeting, introduced herself as Nora Kruger. A year later, she was joined by a tall, sickly-looking young man, Georgy Zhudin. There were rumors in the village that they were brother and sister and belonged to the royal family. However, neither Eleanor nor Georgy ever even tried to claim their right to the Romanov surname. This was done for them by people interested in the mystery of the royal family. In particular, the Bulgarian researcher Blagoy Emmanuilov said that he managed to find evidence that Eleanor and George are the children of the Russian emperor. “A lot of information reliably known about Anastasia’s life coincides with Nora from Gabarevo’s stories about herself,” the researcher said in one of his interviews for Radio Bulgaria. “Towards the end of her life, she herself recalled that the servants bathed her in a golden trough, combed her hair and dressed her. She talked about her own royal room, and about her children's drawings drawn in it. There is another interesting piece of evidence. In the early 1950s, in the Bulgarian Black Sea city of Balchik, a Russian White Guard, describing in detail the life of the executed imperial family, mentioned Nora and Georges from Gabarevo. In front of witnesses, he said that Nicholas II ordered him to personally take Anastasia and Alexei out of the palace and hide them in the provinces. After long wanderings, they reached Odessa and boarded the ship, where, in the general turmoil, Anastasia was overtaken by the bullets of the red cavalrymen. All three went ashore at the Turkish Tekerdag pier. Further, the White Guard claimed that by the will of fate, the royal children ended up in a village near the city of Kazanlak. In addition, comparing photographs of 17-year-old Anastasia and 35-year-old Eleanor Kruger from Gabarevo, experts have established significant similarities between them. The years of their birth also coincide. George's contemporaries claim that he was ill with tuberculosis and describe him as a tall, weak and pale young man. Russian authors also describe the hemophiliac Prince Alexei in a similar way. According to doctors, the external manifestations of both diseases are the same.”

Of course, most of the evidence that Blagoy Emmanuilov cites does not stand up to criticism. But the main thing is why did the brother and sister settle in a godforsaken Bulgarian village instead of turning to their relatives? Why didn't you tell them that you were still alive? After all, after fleeing Russia they had nothing to fear. In 1995, the remains of Eleanor Kruger and Georgy Zhudin were exhumed in the presence of a forensic doctor and an anthropologist. In George's coffin they found an amulet - an icon with the face of Christ - one of those with which only representatives of the upper strata of the Russian aristocracy were buried. The mystery of the mysterious couple from Gabarevo remains unsolved...

Meanwhile, Anastasia’s “miraculously escaped” continued to make themselves known in different parts of the globe. So, in 1980, a certain Alexandra Peregudova, a resident of the Volgograd region, died in the USSR. After her death, her children declared her royal origin. They claimed that before her death, their mother told them that it was not members of the royal family who were shot in the Ipatiev House, but their doubles. The substitution took place in 1917 near Perm, and the driver of the train that carried Nicholas II and his family helped the Romanovs. After the liberation, the emperor's family was divided. Anastasia moved to the Volgograd region, where she lived under the name Alexandra Peregudova until her death. No examination was carried out to determine whether Alexandra Peregudova belonged to the Romanov family.

The next contender for the role of the Tsar's daughter was a certain Anastasia Karpenko from Omsk. According to the story of the writer Vladimir Kashits, in September 1988 he received a call from a woman who identified herself as the daughter of Anastasia Romanova. She said that her mother died in Omsk in 1976 under the name of Anastasia Spiridonovna Karpenko. Before her death, she told her children about her origins. According to her, in 1920 in Primorye she was adopted by a local resident, Spiridon Miroshnichenko. Then she married a certain Fyodor Karpenko and moved to Omsk. Mrs. Karpenko described her salvation to the children as follows: “They were transporting me on a cart, and when the riders began to catch up, I jumped off and climbed up to my neck into the swamp. And they, ours, fought with sabers with those! And when everything calmed down, I got out, and we moved on again...”

Another contender for the name of the Tsar’s daughter lived in Ryazan. She called herself Elena Kharkina, did not advertise her origin, but neighbors noted that she was very similar to the youngest daughter of Nicholas II. According to their version, Elena-Anastasia managed to escape thanks to the same doubles who were allegedly shot instead of the real Romanovs. The date of death of Elena Kharkina is unknown; no examinations were carried out to confirm her relationship with the family of the last Russian emperor.

In the Sverdlovsk region, in the cemetery of the village of Koshuki, an inscription is carved on the granite stone of one of the tombstones: “Here lies the maiden Anastasia Romanova.” According to the legend that exists in these places, when the Bolsheviks transported the family of the Russian emperor to Tobolsk, supposedly in this very village his youngest daughter Anastasia died, having fallen ill on the way. According to some evidence, the Romanov family actually passed through Koshuki after the abdication of the emperor.

Another self-proclaimed Anastasia, Nadezhda Vladimirovna Ivanova-Vasilieva, stood out among other applicants in that she mentioned many details that she could not read about anywhere. For example, that during the execution in the Ipatiev House all the women were sitting and the men were standing. Or that the cousin of Nicholas II, the British king George V, received from Kolchak floor boards from the basement in which the royal family was shot. According to Nadezhda, she owes her salvation to the Austrian prisoner of war Franz Svoboda and fellow chairman of the Yekaterinburg Extraordinary Investigative Commission Valentin Sakharov. They allegedly took the girl to the apartment of Ipatiev House security guard Ivan Kleshcheev and hid her there. In the future, Anastasia had a hard time. She was hiding from anyone who could identify her. But one day, when a Red Army patrol beat her and took her to the Cheka, the doctor who treated the princess managed to identify her. True, the very next day he was informed that the patient had died, but in fact she was once again helped to escape. Anastasia's further life turned out to be even more difficult. According to the story

N.V. Ivanova-Vasilieva, she was detained in Irkutsk and, for a reason that she does not mention, was sentenced to death, later replacing the sentence with imprisonment in solitary confinement. Almost this woman’s entire life was spent in prisons, camps and exile. In 1929, in Yalta, she was summoned to the GPU and charged with impersonating the Tsar's daughter. Anastasia - by that time, using the passport Nadezhda Vladimirovna Ivanova-Vasilieva had purchased and filled out in her own hand - denied her guilt, and she was released. Later, Nadezhda Vladimirovna was diagnosed with schizophrenia and died in the Sviyazhsk psychiatric clinic. The grave of this Anastasia has been lost, so identification is no longer possible...

It would seem that the appearances of the miraculously saved Anastasia should have ended over the years, but no - in 2000 another contender for this name appeared. At that time she was almost 101 years old. Oddly enough, it was the age of this woman that made many researchers believe in her: after all, those who appeared earlier could count on power, fame, and money. But is there any point in hunting for illusory wealth at 101 years old? According to representatives of the “Interregional Public Charitable Christian Foundation of Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova,” Natalia Petrovna Bilikhodze, who claimed to be considered Grand Duchess Anastasia, of course, counted on the monetary inheritance of the royal family, but only in order to return it to Russia. According to their version, on the eve of the terrible night in Yekaterinburg, Anastasia was allegedly taken away from the Ipatiev House by someone Pyotr Verkhovtsev, who at one time was an employee of Stolypin and was the godfather of the Grand Duchess. After several years of wandering around Russia, they ended up in Tbilisi. Here Anastasia married citizen Bilikhodze, who was shot in 1937. True, no archival data about Bilikhodze and his marriage has been preserved.

According to representatives of the fund, they have at their disposal data from “22 examinations conducted by commission and judicial procedure in three states - Georgia, Russia and Latvia, the results of which were not refuted by any of the structures.” Based on these data, members of the Foundation stated, Georgian citizen Natalya Petrovna Bilikhodze and Princess Anastasia have “a number of matching features that can only occur in one out of 700 billion cases.”

The book by N.P. Bilikhodze was published: “I am Anastasia Romanova,” containing memories of life and relationships in the royal family. It would seem that the solution is close: they even said that Natalia Petrovna was going to come to Moscow and speak in the State Duma, despite her age. However, the “sensation” burst as suddenly as it appeared. Newspapers reported that Natalia Petrovna Bilikhodze died in December 2000 in the Central Clinical Hospital, where doctors discovered she had left-sided pneumonia and cardiac arrhythmia. At the insistence of a specially created working group under the Administration of the President of Russia, a molecular genetic study of Bilikhodze’s remains was carried out and the following conclusion was given: “The DNA profile of N.P. Bilikhodze does not coincide with the DNA profile (mitotype) of the Russian Empress A.F. Romanova. The origin of N.P. Bilikhodze from the maternal genetic line of the English Queen Victoria the First is not confirmed. On this basis, consanguinity on the maternal side in any capacity of Bilikhodze N.P. and Alexandra Fedorovna Romanova is excluded ... "

Of no less interest is the story of another double, this time Tsarevich Alexei. In January 1949, a prisoner from one of the correctional colonies, 45-year-old Philip Grigorievich Semenov, who was in a state of acute psychosis, was brought to the Republican Psychiatric Clinic of Karelia. Doctors, who have seen a lot over the years of practice, have rarely encountered such strange patients. What was interesting was not the clinical case in itself, but Semenov’s personality. It turned out that he was a well-educated man who knew several foreign languages ​​perfectly and read a lot, especially the classics. His manners, tone, and beliefs indicated that the patient was familiar with the life of pre-revolutionary high society. One day a patient admitted that he was the son of Emperor Nicholas II. Of course, the doctors just nodded their heads - whoever crazy people seem to be. But the strange patient was too different from ordinary crazy people. Doctors Yu. Sologub and D. Kaufman spent a long time talking with the unusual patient at the clinic. As they later said, he was a highly educated man, a real “walking encyclopedia.” The patient did not force his revelations on anyone, and besides, this did not in any way affect his behavior, as is usually the case. Philip Grigorievich behaved calmly, did not strive at all costs to convince others of his belonging to the Romanov family. His story also did not look like an attempt to feign paranoia in order to stay in the hospital longer. All this baffled doctors.

Perhaps, over time, Philip Semenov would simply become a local landmark. But fate would have it that in the same hospital there would be a person who could verify the patient’s story - the Leningrad professor S.I. Gendelevich, who knew the life of the royal court to its subtleties. Interested in Semenov’s story, Gendelevich gave him a real exam. If the patient had learned the information in advance, he would still answer with some hesitation. And an experienced doctor could easily recognize a lie. However, Philip Semenov answered questions instantly, never mixed up anything or got lost. “Gradually we began to look at him with different eyes,” Delilah Kaufman recalled. - Persistent hematuria (the presence of blood or red blood cells in the urine), from which he suffered, also found an explanation. The heir had hemophilia. The patient had an old cross-shaped scar on his buttock. And finally we realized that the patient’s appearance reminded us of the famous portraits of Emperor Nicholas, only not the Second, but the First.”

What did the presumptive heir to the Russian throne tell about himself? According to Semenov, during the execution in Yekaterinburg, his father hugged him and pressed his face to him so that the boy would not see the guns pointed at him. He was wounded in the buttock, lost consciousness and fell into a common pile of bodies. He was saved and treated for a long time by some devoted person, perhaps a monk. A few months later, strangers came and announced that from now on he would bear the surname Irin (an abbreviation for the words “the name of the Romanovs is the name of the nation”). Then the boy was brought to Petrograd, to some mansion on Millionnaya Street, where he accidentally heard that he was going to be used as a symbol of the unification of forces hostile to the new system. He did not want such a fate for himself and therefore left these people. On Fontanka they were just enlisting in the Red Army. Having added two years, he joined the cavalry, then studied at the institute. Then everything changed. The same man who picked him up in 1918 somehow managed to find Irin and began to blackmail him. At that time, the Tsarevich managed to start a family. In an effort to confuse the blackmailer, he took the name of Philip Grigorievich Semenov, a deceased relative of his wife. But just changing the name was not enough. Semyonov decided to change his lifestyle. An economist by training, he began to travel around construction sites, not staying anywhere for long. But the scammer was on his trail again. To pay him off, Semenov had to give up government money. For this he was sentenced to 10 years in the camps. Philip Grigorievich Semenov was released from the camp in 1951, and he died in 1979 - the same year when the remains of the royal family were discovered in the Urals. His widow Ekaterina Mikhailovna was convinced that her husband was the emperor’s heir. As Semenov’s adopted son recalled, his stepfather loved to wander around the city; he could spend hours in the Winter Palace; he preferred antiques. He spoke reluctantly about his secret, only with his closest people. He had no abnormalities, and after the camp he never went to a psychiatric hospital. And we note that this seemingly ordinary person was fluent in German, French, English and Italian, and wrote in ancient Greek. Philip Semyonov has long been dead, but his secret remains. Was he a mentally ill person or was he still the heir to the royal throne, the only son of Nicholas II?

There is no answer to this question, but the story of the mysterious patient of the Karelian clinic had a continuation. The English newspaper "Daily Express", becoming interested in F. Semenov, found his son Yuri and asked him to donate blood for genetic examination. It was carried out at the Aldermasten laboratory (England) by genetic research specialist Dr. Peter Gil. The DNA of the “grandson” of Nicholas II, Yuri Filippovich Semenov, and the English Prince Philip, a relative of the Romanovs through the English Queen Victoria, were compared. A total of three tests were carried out. Two of them coincided, and the third turned out to be neutral. Of course, this cannot be considered 100% proof that Yuri’s father was indeed Tsarevich Alexei, but the likelihood of this is quite high...

In conclusion, it is worth noting that none of the “doubles” of the imperial children had a happy fate. At best, they lived out their lives peacefully. Perhaps the evil fate of the Romanov family cast its ominous shadow on those who sought to prove their involvement in the famous family...

V. M. Sklyarenko, I. A. Rudycheva, V. V. Syadro. 50 famous mysteries of the history of the 20th century

Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna

The youngest of the Grand Duchesses, Anastasia Nikolaevna, seemed to be made of mercury, and not of flesh and blood. She was very, extremely witty and had an undeniable gift for mime. She knew how to find the funny side in everything.

During the revolution, Anastasia turned only sixteen - after all, not such an old age! She was pretty, but her face was intelligent, and her eyes sparkled with remarkable intelligence.

The “tomboy” girl, “Schwibz,” as Her family called her, might have wanted to live up to the Domostroevsky ideal of a girl, but she couldn’t. But, most likely, She simply did not think about it, because the main feature of Her not fully developed character was cheerful childishness.

Anastasia Nikolaevna was... a big naughty girl, and not without guile. She quickly grasped the funny side of everything; It was difficult to fight against Her attacks. She was a spoiled person - a flaw from which She corrected herself over the years. Very lazy, as sometimes happens with very capable children, She had an excellent pronunciation of French and acted out small theatrical scenes with real talent. She was so cheerful and so able to dispel the wrinkles of anyone who was out of sorts, that some of those around her began, remembering the nickname given to Her Mother at the English court, to call Her “Sunbeam”

Birth.

Born on June 5, 1901 in Peterhof. By the time of her appearance, the royal couple already had three daughters - Olga, Tatyana and Maria. The absence of an heir aggravated the political situation: according to the Act of Succession to the Throne, adopted by Paul I, a woman could not ascend to the throne, therefore the younger brother of Nicholas II, Mikhail Alexandrovich, was considered the heir, which did not suit many, and first of all, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. In an attempt to beg Providence for a son, at this time she becomes more and more immersed in mysticism. With the assistance of the Montenegrin princesses Militsa Nikolaevna and Anastasia Nikolaevna, a certain Philip, a Frenchman by nationality, arrived at the court, declaring himself a hypnotist and a specialist in nervous diseases. Philip predicted the birth of a son to Alexandra Fedorovna, however, a girl was born - Anastasia.

Nicholas II, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna with daughters Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia

Nikolai wrote in his diary: “About 3 o’clock Alix began to have severe pain. At 4 o'clock I got up and went to my room and got dressed. At exactly 6 am, daughter Anastasia was born. Everything happened quickly under excellent conditions and, thank God, without complications. Thanks to the fact that it all started and ended while everyone was still sleeping, we both had a sense of peace and privacy! After that, I sat down to write telegrams and notify relatives in all corners of the world. Fortunately, Alix is ​​feeling well. The baby weighs 11½ pounds and is 55 cm tall.”

The Grand Duchess was named after the Montenegrin princess Anastasia Nikolaevna, a close friend of the Empress. The “hypnotist” Philip, not at a loss after the failed prophecy, immediately predicted her “an amazing life and a special destiny.” Margaret Eager, author of the memoir “Six Years at the Russian Imperial Court,” recalled that Anastasia was named in honor of the fact that the emperor pardoned and restored the rights of students of St. Petersburg University who took part in the recent unrest, since the very name “Anastasia” means “returned to life”; the image of this saint usually shows chains torn in half.

Childhood.

Olga, Tatyana, Maria and Anastasia Nikolaevna in 1902

The full title of Anastasia Nikolaevna sounded like Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess of Russia Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova, but it was not used, in official speech they called her by her first name and patronymic, and at home they called her “little, Nastaska, Nastya, little egg” - for her small height (157 cm .) and a round figure and a “shvybzik” - for his mobility and inexhaustibility in inventing pranks and pranks.

According to the memoirs of contemporaries, the emperor’s children were not spoiled with luxury. Anastasia shared a room with her older sister Maria. The walls of the room were gray, the ceiling was decorated with images of butterflies. There are icons and photographs on the walls. The furniture is in white and green tones, the furnishings are simple, almost spartan, a couch with embroidered pillows, and an army cot on which the Grand Duchess slept all year round. This cot moved around the room in order to end up in a more illuminated and warmer part of the room in winter, and in summer it was sometimes even pulled out onto the balcony so that one could take a break from the stuffiness and heat. They took this same bed with them on vacation to the Livadia Palace, and the Grand Duchess slept on it during her Siberian exile. One large room next door, divided in half by a curtain, served the Grand Duchesses as a common boudoir and bathroom.

Princesses Maria and Anastasia

The life of the grand duchesses was quite monotonous. Breakfast at 9 o'clock, second breakfast at 13.00 or 12.30 on Sundays. At five o'clock there was tea, at eight there was a general dinner, and the food was quite simple and unpretentious. In the evenings, the girls solved charades and did embroidery while their father read aloud to them.

Princesses Maria and Anastasia

Early in the morning it was supposed to take a cold bath, in the evening - a warm one, to which a few drops of perfume were added, and Anastasia preferred Koti perfume with the smell of violets. This tradition has been preserved since the time of Catherine I. When the girls were small, servants carried buckets of water to the bathroom; when they grew up, this was their responsibility. There were two baths - the first large one, left over from the reign of Nicholas I (according to the surviving tradition, everyone who washed in it left their autograph on the side), the other, smaller, was intended for children.

Grand Duchess Anastasia

Like other children of the emperor, Anastasia was educated at home. Education began at the age of eight, the program included French, English and German, history, geography, the law of God, natural sciences, drawing, grammar, arithmetic, as well as dance and music. Anastasia was not known for her diligence in her studies; she hated grammar, wrote with horrific errors, and with childish spontaneity called arithmetic “sinishness.” English teacher Sydney Gibbs recalled that she once tried to bribe him with a bouquet of flowers to improve his grade, and after he refused, she gave these flowers to the Russian language teacher, Petrov.

Grand Duchess Anastasia

Grand Duchesses Maria and Anastasia

In mid-June, the family went on trips on the imperial yacht “Standart”, usually along the Finnish skerries, landing from time to time on the islands for short excursions. The imperial family especially fell in love with the small bay, which was dubbed Standard Bay. They had picnics there, or played tennis on the court, which the emperor built with his own hands.

Nicholas II with his daughters -. Olga, Tatiana, Maria, Anastasia

We also rested at the Livadia Palace. The main premises housed the imperial family, and the annexes housed several courtiers, guards and servants. They swam in the warm sea, built fortresses and towers out of sand, and sometimes went into the city to ride a stroller through the streets or visit shops. It was not possible to do this in St. Petersburg, since any appearance of the royal family in public created a crowd and excitement.

Visit to Germany

They sometimes visited Polish estates belonging to the royal family, where Nicholas loved to hunt.

Anastasia with her sisters Tatyana and Olga.

World War I

According to the memoirs of contemporaries, following her mother and older sisters, Anastasia sobbed bitterly on the day war was declared.

On the day of their fourteenth birthday, according to tradition, each of the emperor’s daughters became an honorary commander of one of the Russian regiments.

In 1901, after her birth, the name of St. The Caspian 148th Infantry Regiment received Anastasia the Pattern-Resolver in honor of the princess. He began to celebrate his regimental holiday on December 22, the holy day. The regimental church was erected in Peterhof by the architect Mikhail Fedorovich Verzhbitsky. At 14, she became his honorary commander (colonel), about which Nikolai made a corresponding entry in his diary. From now on, the regiment became officially known as the 148th Caspian Infantry Regiment of Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Anastasia.

During the war, the empress gave many of the palace rooms for hospital premises. The older sisters Olga and Tatyana, together with their mother, became sisters of mercy; Maria and Anastasia, being too young for such hard work, became patronesses of the hospital. Both sisters gave their own money to buy medicine, read aloud to the wounded, knitted things for them, played cards and checkers, wrote letters home under their dictation, and entertained them with telephone conversations in the evenings, sewed linen, prepared bandages and lint.

Maria and Anastasia gave concerts to the wounded and tried their best to distract them from difficult thoughts. They spent days on end in the hospital, reluctantly taking time off from work for lessons. Anastasia recalled these days until the end of her life:

Under house arrest.

According to the memoirs of Lily Den (Yulia Alexandrovna von Den), a close friend of Alexandra Feodorovna, in February 1917, at the very height of the revolution, the children fell ill with measles one after another. Anastasia was the last to fall ill, when the Tsarskoe Selo palace was already surrounded by rebel troops. At that time the Tsar was at the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief in Mogilev; only the Empress and her children remained in the palace. .

Grand Duchesses Maria and Anastasia look at photographs

On the night of March 2, 1917, Lily Den stayed overnight in the palace, in the Raspberry Room, with Grand Duchess Anastasia. So that they would not worry, they explained to the children that the troops surrounding the palace and the distant shots were the result of ongoing exercises. Alexandra Feodorovna intended to “hide the truth from them for as long as possible.” At 9 o'clock on March 2 they learned of the Tsar's abdication.

On Wednesday, March 8, Count Pavel Benckendorff appeared at the palace with the message that the Provisional Government had decided to subject the imperial family to house arrest in Tsarskoe Selo. It was suggested that they make a list of people who wanted to stay with them. Lily Dehn immediately offered her services.

A.A.Vyrubova, Alexandra Fedorovna, Yu.A.Den.

On March 9, the children were informed about their father’s abdication. A few days later Nikolai returned. Life under house arrest turned out to be quite bearable. It was necessary to reduce the number of dishes during lunch, since the menu of the royal family was announced publicly from time to time, and it was not worth giving another reason to provoke the already angry crowd. Curious people often watched through the bars of the fence as the family walked in the park and sometimes greeted her with whistling and swearing, so the walks had to be shortened.

On June 22, 1917, it was decided to shave the girls’ heads, since their hair was falling out due to persistent fever and strong medications. Alexei insisted that he be shaved too, thereby causing extreme displeasure in his mother.

Grand Duchesses Tatiana and Anastasia

Despite everything, the children's education continued. The entire process was led by Gillard, a French teacher; Nikolai himself taught the children geography and history; Baroness Buxhoeveden took over English and music lessons; Mademoiselle Schneider taught arithmetic; Countess Gendrikova - drawing; Alexandra taught Orthodoxy.

The eldest, Olga, despite the fact that her education was completed, was often present in lessons and read a lot, improving on what she had already learned.

Grand Duchesses Olga and Anastasia

At this time, there was still hope for the family of the former king to go abroad; but George V, whose popularity among his subjects was rapidly falling, decided not to take risks and chose to sacrifice the royal family, thereby causing shock in his own cabinet.

Nicholas II and George V

Ultimately, the Provisional Government decided to transfer the family of the former tsar to Tobolsk. On the last day before leaving, they managed to say goodbye to the servants and visit their favorite places in the park, ponds, and islands for the last time. Alexei wrote in his diary that on that day he managed to push his older sister Olga into the water. On August 12, 1917, a train flying the flag of the Japanese Red Cross mission departed from a siding in the strictest secrecy.

Tobolsk

On August 26, the imperial family arrived in Tobolsk on the steamship Rus. The house intended for them was not yet completely ready, so they spent the first eight days on the ship.

Arrival of the Royal Family in Tobolsk

Finally, under escort, the imperial family was taken to the two-story governor's mansion, where they were henceforth to live. The girls were given a corner bedroom on the second floor, where they were accommodated in the same army beds captured from the Alexander Palace. Anastasia additionally decorated her corner with her favorite photographs and drawings.

Life in the governor's mansion was quite monotonous; The main entertainment is watching passers-by from the window. From 9.00 to 11.00 - lessons. An hour break for a walk with my father. Lessons again from 12.00 to 13.00. Dinner. From 14.00 to 16.00 there are walks and simple entertainment such as home performances, or in winter - skiing down a slide built with one’s own hands. Anastasia, in her own words, enthusiastically prepared firewood and sewed. Next on the schedule was the evening service and going to bed.

In September they were allowed to go to the nearest church for morning services. Again, the soldiers formed a living corridor right up to the church doors. The attitude of local residents towards the royal family was rather favorable.

The news that Nicholas II, exiled to Tobolsk, and the royal family were going to see the monument to Ermak, spread not only throughout the city, but also throughout the region. Tobolsk photographer Ilya Efimovich Kondrakhin, passionate about photography, with his bulky cameras - a great rarity in those days - hastened to capture this moment. And here we have a photograph showing several dozen people climbing the slope of the hill on which the monument stands so as not to miss the arrival of the last Russian Tsar. Vladimir Vasilievich Kondrakhin (grandson of the photographer) took a photo from the original photograph

Tobolsk

Suddenly, Anastasia began to gain weight, and the process proceeded at a fairly rapid pace, so that even the empress, worried, wrote to her friend:

“Anastasia, to her despair, has gained weight and her appearance exactly resembles Maria a few years ago - the same huge waist and short legs... Let's hope this will go away with age...”

From a letter to sister Maria.

“The iconostasis was set up terribly well for Easter, everything is in the Christmas tree, as it should be here, and flowers. We were filming, I hope it comes out. I continue to draw, they say it’s not bad, it’s very pleasant. We were swinging on a swing, and when I fell, it was such a wonderful fall!.. yeah! I told my sisters so many times yesterday that they were already tired, but I can tell them a lot more times, although there is no one else. In general, I have a lot of things to tell you and you. My Jimmy woke up and coughs, so he sits at home, bows to his helmet. That was the weather! You could literally scream from pleasure. I was the most tanned, oddly enough, like an acrobat! And these days are boring and ugly, it’s cold, and we were freezing this morning, although of course we didn’t go home... I’m very sorry, I forgot to congratulate all my loved ones on the holidays, I kiss you not three, but a lot of times to everyone. Everyone, darling, thanks you very much for your letter."

In April 1918, the Presidium of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the fourth convocation decided to transfer the former tsar to Moscow for the purpose of his trial. After much hesitation, Alexandra decided to accompany her husband; Maria was supposed to go with her “to help.”

The rest had to wait for them in Tobolsk; Olga’s duties were to take care of her sick brother, Tatyana’s was to run the household, and Anastasia’s was to “entertain everyone.” However, at the beginning things were difficult with entertainment, on the last night before departure no one slept a wink, and when finally in the morning, peasant carts were brought to the threshold for the Tsar, Tsarina and those accompanying them, three girls - “three figures in gray” saw off those leaving with tears right up to the gate.

In the courtyard of the governor's house

In the empty house, life continued slowly and sadly. We told fortunes from books, read aloud to each other, and walked. Anastasia was still swinging on the swing, drawing and playing with her sick brother. According to the memoirs of Gleb Botkin, the son of a life physician who died along with the royal family, one day he saw Anastasia in the window and bowed to her, but the guards immediately drove him away, threatening to shoot if he dared to come so close again.

Vel. Princesses Olga, Tatiana, Anastasia () and Tsarevich Alexei at tea. Tobolsk, governor's house. April-May 1918

On May 3, 1918, it became clear that for some reason, the former Tsar's departure to Moscow was canceled and instead Nicholas, Alexandra and Maria were forced to stay in the house of engineer Ipatiev in Yekaterinburg, requisitioned by the new government specifically to house the Tsar's family . In a letter marked with this date, the empress instructed her daughters to “properly dispose of medicines” - this word meant the jewelry that they managed to hide and take with them. Under the guidance of her older sister Tatyana, Anastasia sewed the remaining jewelry she had into the corset of her dress - with a successful combination of circumstances, it was supposed to be used to buy her way to salvation.

On May 19, it was finally decided that the remaining daughters and Alexey, who was by then quite strong, would join their parents and Maria at Ipatiev’s house in Yekaterinburg. The next day, May 20, all four boarded the ship “Rus” again, which took them to Tyumen. According to the recollections of eyewitnesses, the girls were transported in locked cabins; Alexey was traveling with his orderly named Nagorny; access to their cabin was prohibited even for a doctor.

"My dear friend,

I'll tell you how we drove. We left early in the morning, then got on the train and I fell asleep, followed by everyone else. We were all very tired because we hadn't slept the whole night before. The first day it was very stuffy and dusty, and we had to close the curtains at each station so that no one could see us. One evening I looked out when we stopped at a small house, there was no station there, and you could look outside. A little boy came up to me and asked: “Uncle, give me a newspaper if you have one.” I said: “I’m not an uncle, but an aunt, and I don’t have a newspaper.” At first I didn’t understand why he decided that I was “uncle,” and then I remembered that my hair was cut short and, together with the soldiers who accompanied us, we laughed for a long time at this story. In general, there were a lot of funny things along the way, and if there is time, I will tell you about the journey from beginning to end. Goodbye, don't forget me. Everyone kisses you.

Yours, Anastasia."

On May 23 at 9 a.m. the train arrived in Yekaterinburg. Here, the French teacher Gillard, the sailor Nagorny and the ladies-in-waiting, who had arrived with them, were removed from the children. Crews were brought to the train and at 11 o'clock in the morning Olga, Tatyana, Anastasia and Alexey were finally taken to the house of engineer Ipatiev.

Ipatiev House

Life in the “special purpose house” was monotonous and boring - but nothing more. Rise at 9 o'clock, breakfast. At 2.30 - lunch, at 5 - afternoon tea and dinner at 8. The family went to bed at 10.30 pm. Anastasia sewed with her sisters, walked in the garden, played cards and read spiritual publications aloud to her mother. A little later, the girls were taught to bake bread and they enthusiastically devoted themselves to this activity.

The dining room, the door visible in the picture leads to the Princesses' room.

Room of the Sovereign, Empress and Heir.

On Tuesday, June 18, 1918, Anastasia celebrated her last, 17th birthday. The weather that day was excellent, only in the evening a small thunderstorm broke out. Lilacs and lungwort were blooming. The girls baked bread, then Alexei was taken out to the garden, and the whole family joined him. At 8 pm we had dinner and played several games of cards. We went to bed at the usual time, 10.30 pm.

Execution

It is officially believed that the decision to execute the royal family was finally made by the Ural Council on July 16 in connection with the possibility of surrendering the city to the White Guard troops and the alleged discovery of a conspiracy to save the royal family. On the night of July 16-17, at 11:30 p.m., two special representatives from the Urals Council handed a written order to execute the commander of the security detachment, P.Z. Ermakov, and the commandant of the house, Commissioner of the Extraordinary Investigative Commission, Ya.M. Yurovsky. After a brief dispute about the method of execution, the royal family was woken up and, under the pretext of a possible shootout and the danger of being killed by bullets ricocheting off the walls, they were offered to go down to the corner semi-basement room.

According to the report of Yakov Yurovsky, the Romanovs did not suspect anything until the last moment. At the empress’s request, chairs were brought to the basement, on which she and Nicholas sat with their son in her arms. Anastasia stood behind with her sisters. The sisters brought several handbags with them, Anastasia also took her beloved dog Jimmy, who accompanied her throughout her exile.

Anastasia holding Jimmy the dog

There is information that after the first salvo, Tatyana, Maria and Anastasia remained alive; they were saved by jewelry sewn into the corsets of their dresses. Later, witnesses interrogated by investigator Sokolov testified that of the royal daughters, Anastasia resisted death the longest; already wounded, she “had” to be finished off with bayonets and rifle butts. According to materials discovered by historian Edward Radzinsky, Anna Demidova, Alexandra's servant, who managed to protect herself with a pillow filled with jewelry, remained alive the longest.

Together with the corpses of her relatives, Anastasia’s body was wrapped in sheets taken from the beds of the Grand Duchesses and taken to the Four Brothers tract for burial. There the corpses, disfigured beyond recognition by blows from rifle butts and sulfuric acid, were thrown into one of the old mines. Later, investigator Sokolov discovered the body of Ortino’s dog here.

Grand Duchess Anastasia, Grand Duchess Tatiana holding the dog Ortino

After the execution, the last drawing made by Anastasia’s hand was found in the room of the Grand Duchesses - a swing between two birch trees.

Drawings of Grand Duchess Anastasia

Anastasia over Ganina Yama

Discovery of remains

The “Four Brothers” tract is located a few kilometers from the village of Koptyaki, not far from Yekaterinburg. One of its pits was chosen by Yurovsky's team to bury the remains of the royal family and servants.

It was not possible to keep the place a secret from the very beginning, due to the fact that literally next to the tract there was a road to Yekaterinburg; early in the morning the procession was seen by a peasant from the village of Koptyaki, Natalya Zykova, and then several more people. The Red Army soldiers, threatening with weapons, drove them away.

Later that same day, grenade explosions were heard in the area. Interested in the strange incident, local residents, a few days later, when the cordon had already been lifted, came to the tract and managed to discover several valuables (apparently belonging to the royal family) in a hurry, not noticed by the executioners.

From May 23 to June 17, 1919, investigator Sokolov conducted reconnaissance of the area and interviewed village residents.

Photo by Gilliard: Nikolai Sokolov in 1919 near Yekaterinburg.

From June 6 to July 10, by order of Admiral Kolchak, excavations of the Ganina Pit began, which were interrupted due to the retreat of the Whites from the city.

On July 11, 1991, remains identified as the bodies of the royal family and servants were found in the Ganina Pit at a depth of just over one meter. The body, which probably belonged to Anastasia, was marked with number 5. Doubts arose about it - the entire left side of the face was broken into pieces; Russian anthropologists tried to connect the found fragments together and put together the missing part. The result of the rather painstaking work was in doubt. Russian researchers tried to proceed from the height of the found skeleton, however, the measurements were made from photographs and were questioned by American experts.

American scientists believed that the missing body was Anastasia's because none of the female skeletons showed evidence of immaturity, such as an immature collarbone, immature wisdom teeth or immature vertebrae in the back, which they expected to find in the body of a seventeen-year-old girl.

In 1998, when the remains of the imperial family were finally interred, the 5'7" body was buried under Anastasia's name. Photos of the girl standing next to her sisters, taken six months before the murder, show that Anastasia was several inches shorter than them Her mother, commenting on the figure of her sixteen-year-old daughter, wrote in a letter to a friend seven months before the murder: “Anastasia, to her despair, has gained weight and her appearance exactly resembles Maria several years ago - the same huge waist and short legs... Let's hope with it will go away with age..." Scientists believe it is unlikely that she grew much in the last months of her life. Her actual height was approximately 5'2".

The doubts were finally resolved in 2007, after the discovery in the so-called Porosenkovsky ravine of the remains of a young girl and boy, later identified as Tsarevich Alexei and Maria. Genetic testing confirmed the initial findings. In July 2008, this information was officially confirmed by the Investigative Committee under the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation, reporting that an examination of the remains found in 2007 on the old Koptyakovskaya road established that the discovered remains belonged to Grand Duchess Maria and Tsarevich Alexei, who was the emperor's heir.

Fire pit with “charred wooden parts”

Another version of the same story was told by the former Austrian prisoner of war Franz Svoboda at the trial, at which Anderson tried to defend her right to be called a Grand Duchess and gain access to the hypothetical inheritance of her “father.” Svoboda proclaimed himself the savior of Anderson, and, according to his version, the wounded princess was transported to the house of “a neighbor in love with her, a certain X.” This version, however, contained quite a lot of clearly implausible details, for example, about violating the curfew, which was unthinkable at that moment, about posters announcing the escape of the Grand Duchess, allegedly posted all over the city, and about general searches, which, fortunately , they didn’t give anything. Thomas Hildebrand Preston, who was the British Consul General in Yekaterinburg at that time, rejected such fabrications. Despite the fact that Anderson defended her “royal” origin until the end of her life, wrote the book “I, Anastasia” and fought legal battles for several decades, no final decision was made during her lifetime.

Currently, genetic analysis has confirmed already existing assumptions that Anna Anderson was in fact Franziska Schanzkovskaya, a worker in a Berlin factory that manufactured explosives. As a result of an industrial accident, she was seriously injured and suffered mental shock, the consequences of which she could not get rid of for the rest of her life.

Another false Anastasia was Eugenia Smith (Evgenia Smetisko), an artist who published “memoirs” in the USA about her life and miraculous salvation. She managed to attract significant attention to her person and seriously improve her financial situation, capitalizing on the public's interest.

Eugenia Smith. photo

Rumors about Anastasia's rescue were fueled by news of trains and houses that the Bolsheviks were searching in search of the missing princess. During a brief imprisonment in Perm in 1918, Princess Elena Petrovna, the wife of Anastasia's distant relative, Prince Ivan Konstantinovich, reported that guards brought a girl into her cell who called herself Anastasia Romanova and asked if the girl was the Tsar's daughter. Elena Petrovna replied that she did not recognize the girl, and the guards took her away. Another account is given more credibility by one historian. Eight witnesses reported the return of a young woman after an apparent rescue attempt in September 1918 at the railway station at Siding 37, northwest of Perm. These witnesses were Maxim Grigoriev, Tatyana Sytnikova and her son Fyodor Sytnikov, Ivan Kuklin and Marina Kuklina, Vasily Ryabov, Ustina Varankina and Dr. Pavel Utkin, the doctor who examined the girl after the incident. Some witnesses identified the girl as Anastasia when they were shown photographs of the Grand Duchess by White Army investigators. Utkin also told them that the injured girl he examined at the Cheka headquarters in Perm told him: “I am the daughter of the ruler, Anastasia.”

At the same time, in mid-1918, there were several reports of young people in Russia posing as escaped Romanovs. Boris Solovyov, the husband of Rasputin's daughter Maria, deceitfully begged money from noble Russian families for the supposedly saved Romanov, in fact wanting to use the money to go to China. Solovyov also found women who agreed to pose as grand duchesses and thereby contributed to the deception.

However, there is a possibility that one or more guards could actually save one of the surviving Romanovs. Yakov Yurovsky demanded that the guards come to his office and review the things they stole after the murder. Accordingly, there was a period of time when the bodies of the victims were left unattended in the truck, in the basement and in the hallway of the house. Some guards who did not participate in the murders and sympathized with the grand duchesses, according to some sources, remained in the basement with the bodies.

In 1964-1967, during the Anna Anderson case, Viennese tailor Heinrich Kleibenzetl testified that he allegedly saw the wounded Anastasia shortly after the murder in Yekaterinburg on July 17, 1918. The girl was looked after by his landlady, Anna Baoudin, in a building directly opposite Ipatiev's house.

“Her lower body was covered in blood, her eyes were closed and she was white as a sheet,” he testified. “We washed her chin, Frau Annuschka and I, then she moaned. The bones must have been broken... Then she opened her eyes for a minute.” Kleibenzetl claimed that the injured girl remained in his landlady's house for three days. The Red Army soldiers allegedly came to the house, but knew its landlady too well and did not actually search the house. “They said something like this: Anastasia has disappeared, but she’s not here, that’s for sure.” Finally, a Red Army soldier, the same man who brought her, arrived to take the girl away. Kleibenzetl knew nothing more about her future fate.

Rumors were revived again after the release of Sergo Beria’s book “My Father - Lavrentiy Beria,” where the author casually recalls a meeting in the lobby of the Bolshoi Theater with Anastasia, who allegedly survived, and became the abbess of an unnamed Bulgarian monastery.

Rumors of a “miraculous rescue,” which seemed to have died down after the royal remains were subjected to scientific study in 1991, resumed with renewed vigor when publications appeared in the press that one of the grand duchesses was missing from the bodies found (it was assumed that it was Maria) and Tsarevich Alexei. However, according to another version, among the remains there might not have been Anastasia, who was slightly younger than her sister and almost the same build, so a mistake in identification seemed likely. This time, Nadezhda Ivanova-Vasilieva, who spent most of her life in the Kazan psychiatric hospital, where she was assigned by the Soviet authorities, allegedly fearing the surviving princess, was claiming the role of the rescued Anastasia.

Prince Dmitry Romanovich Romanov, great-great-grandson of Nicholas, summed up the long-term epic of impostors:

In my memory, the self-proclaimed Anastasias ranged from 12 to 19. In the conditions of the post-war depression, many went crazy. We, the Romanovs, would be happy if Anastasia, even in the person of this very Anna Anderson, turned out to be alive. But alas, it was not her.

The last dot was put to rest by the discovery of the bodies of Alexei and Maria in the same tract in 2007 and anthropological and genetic examinations, which finally confirmed that there could not have been any rescued among the royal family

Grand Duchess Anastasia, the youngest daughter of Emperor Nicholas II and Alexandra Feodorovna, can be considered the most famous of the royal daughters. After her death, about 30 women declared themselves to be the miraculously saved Grand Duchess.

Why "Anastasia"?

Why was the youngest daughter of the royal family named Anastasia? There are two versions on this matter. According to the first, the girl was named in honor of a close friend of the Russian Empress Anastasia (Stana) Nikolaevna, a Montenegrin princess.

The Montenegrin princesses, who were disliked at the imperial court for their passion for mysticism and were called “Montenegrin spiders,” had a great influence on Alexandra Fedorovna.

It was they who introduced the royal family to Grigory Rasputin.

The second version of the choice of name was outlined by Margaret Eager, who wrote the memoir “Six Years at the Russian Imperial Court.” She claimed that Anastasia was named in honor of the pardon granted by Nicholas II in honor of the birth of his daughter to students of St. Petersburg University who participated in anti-government unrest. The name "Anastasia" means "returned to life", and the image of this saint usually shows chains torn in half.

Unexpected daughter

When Anastasia was born, the royal couple already had three daughters. Everyone was waiting for the boy-heir. According to the Act of Succession to the Throne, a woman could take the throne only after the termination of all male lines of the ruling dynasty, so the heir to the throne (in the absence of a prince) was the younger brother of Nicholas II, Mikhail Alexandrovich, which did not suit many.

Dreaming of a son, Alexandra Feodorovna, with the assistance of the already mentioned “Montenegros,” meets a certain Philip, who introduces himself as a hypnotist and promises to provide the royal family with the birth of a boy.

As you know, a boy will be born into the imperial family three years later. Now, on June 5, 1901, a girl was born.

Her birth caused a mixed reaction in court circles. Some, for example, Princess Ksenia, sister of Nicholas II, wrote: “What a disappointment! 4th girl! They named her Anastasia. Mom telegraphed me about the same thing and writes: “Alix gave birth to a daughter again!”

The emperor himself wrote the following in his diary about the birth of his fourth daughter: “At about 3 o’clock Alix began to have severe pain. At 4 o'clock I got up and went to my room and got dressed. At exactly 6 am, daughter Anastasia was born. Everything happened quickly under excellent conditions and, thank God, without complications. Because it all started and ended while everyone was still asleep, we both had a sense of peace and privacy.”

"Schwibs"

Since childhood, Anastasia has had a difficult character. At home, for her cheerful, irrepressible childishness, she even received the nickname “Schwibs.” She had undoubted talent as a comic actress. General Mikhail Diterikhs wrote: “Her distinctive feature was to notice the weaknesses of people and skillfully imitate them. He was a natural, gifted comedian. She always used to make everyone laugh, maintaining an artificially serious appearance.”

Anastasia was very playful. Despite her physique (short, dense), for which her sisters called her “little egg,” she deftly climbed trees and often refused to climb down out of mischief, loved to play hide and seek, rounders and other games, played the balalaika and guitar, introduced It is fashionable among her sisters to weave flowers and ribbons into their hair.

Anastasia was not particularly diligent in her studies, she wrote with errors, and called arithmetic “disgusting.”

English teacher Sydney Gibbs recalled that the younger princess once tried to “bribe” him with a bouquet of flowers, then gave the bouquet to the Russian teacher Petrov.

The Empress's maid of honor Anna Vyrubova recalled in her memoirs how once, during a reception in Kronstadt, a very little three-year-old Anastasia climbed on all fours under the table and began to bite those present on the legs, pretending to be a dog. For which she immediately received a reprimand from her father.

Of course she loved animals. She had a Spitz, Shvibzik. When he died in 1915, the Grand Duchess was inconsolable for several weeks. Later she got another dog - Jimmy. He accompanied her during her exile.

Army bunk

Despite her playful disposition, Anastasia still tried to comply with the customs of the royal family. As you know, the emperor and empress tried not to spoil their children, so in some matters the discipline in the family was almost Spartan. So, Anastasia slept on an army bed. What is significant is that the princess took this same bed with her to the Livadia Palace when she went on vacation. She slept on the same army bed during her exile.

The daily routine of the princesses was quite monotonous. In the morning it was supposed to take a cold bath, in the evening a warm one, to which a few drops of perfume were added.

The younger princess preferred Kitty's perfume with the scent of violets. This “bathroom tradition” has been observed in the royal dynasty since the time of Catherine the First. When the girls grew up, the responsibility of carrying buckets of water to the bath began to fall on them; before that, servants were responsible for this.

The first Russian "selfie"

Anastasia was not only fond of pranks, but was also partial to newfangled trends. So, she was seriously interested in photography. Many unofficial photographs of the royal family were taken by the hand of the younger Grand Duchess.
One of the first “selfies” in world history and probably the first Russian “selfie” was taken by her in 1914 with a Kodak Brownie camera. A note to her father dated October 28 that she included with the photo read: “I took this photo looking at myself in the mirror. It wasn’t easy because my hands were shaking.” To stabilize the image, Anastasia placed the camera on a chair.

Patroness Anastasia

During the First World War, Anastasia was only fourteen. Due to her young age, she could not, like her older sisters and mother, be a sister of mercy. Then she became the patroness of the hospital, donated her own money to buy medicine for the wounded, read aloud to them, gave concerts, wrote letters from dictation to their loved ones, played with them, sewed linen for them, prepared bandages and lint. Their photographs were then kept at her home; she remembered the wounded by their first and last names. She taught some illiterate soldiers to read and write.

False Anastasia

After the execution of the royal family, three dozen women appeared in Europe, declaring that they were miraculously saved by Anastasia. One of the most famous impostors was Anna Anderson, she claimed that the soldier Tchaikovsky managed to pull her out wounded from the basement of Ipatiev’s house after he saw that she was still alive.

At the same time, Anna Anderson, according to Duke Dimitri of Leuchtenberg, with whom she visited in 1927, did not know Russian, English, or French. She spoke only German with a North German accent. I didn’t know Orthodox worship. Also, Dimitri Leuchtenbergsky wrote: “Doctor Kostritsky, the dentist of the Imperial Family, testified in writing that the teeth of Mrs. Tchaikovsky, a cast of which we sent to him, made by our family dentist in 1927, have nothing in common with the teeth of Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna.”

In 1995 and 2011, genetic analysis confirmed already existing assumptions that Anna Anderson was in fact Franziska Shantskovskaya, a Berlin factory worker who suffered mental shock during an explosion at the factory, from which she could not recover for the rest of her life.

Russian scientists have collected the most complete archive of documents about the life of the notorious Anna Tchaikovskaya and came to the conclusion that she could be the daughter of Nicholas II Anastasia, who survived the night of her execution in the basement of the Ipatiev House in Yekaterinburg in 1918

On March 27, in Yekaterinburg, the Basko publishing house published the book “Who are you, Mrs. Tchaikovskaya? On the question of the fate of the Tsar’s daughter Anastasia Romanova.” This work, which will obviously force the audience to be divided into two camps, was prepared by scientists from the Institute of History and Archeology of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences under the leadership of Academician Veniamin Alekseev.

Under one cover are collected for the first time published documents dating back to the 20s of the last century and capable of shedding light on a mystery that still haunts the minds of people interested in Russian history. Did Nicholas II’s daughter Anastasia really survive the night of her execution in the basement of the Ipatiev House in Yekaterinburg in 1918? Did she really flee abroad? Or was the crowned family, after all, shot and burned in its entirety in Porosenkovo ​​Log, and a certain Mrs. Tchaikovskaya, posing as the surviving Anastasia, was just a poor, out-of-mind worker at a Berlin factory?

In a conversation with the compiler of the book, candidate of historical sciences Georgy Shumkin, RG tried to lift the veil of secrecy over the fate of the “most famous impostor.”

They say that your book can cause, if not a scandal, then at least controversy in the circles of interested people. Why?

Georgy Shumkin: The thing is that it contains documents that cast doubt on the truth of the official point of view existing today, which states that the entire family of Nicholas II was shot on the night of July 16-17, 1918 in the house of engineer Ipatiev in Yekaterinburg, and later burned and buried in Porosenkovy Log not far from the city. In 1991, amateur archaeologist Avdonin announced that he had discovered the remains of the last Russian Tsar and his relatives. An investigation was carried out, as a result of which the remains were recognized as genuine. Subsequently, they were transferred to the Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg, where they were reburied with all honors. Academician Alekseev, who was also one of the members of the government commission, did not sign the conclusion adopted by the majority of votes, remaining unconvinced. In short, it boils down to the fact that the commission’s conclusions were hasty, since a historical examination was not carried out on the basis of archival documents that were already available at that time.

That is, Alekseev already found something in the archives that made him doubt the truth of his colleagues’ conclusion?

Georgy Shumkin: Yes, in particular, in the nineties, he published the testimony of the waitress Ekaterina Tomilova, which he discovered in the state archives of the Russian Federation, where she says that she brought food to Ipatiev’s house on July 19, that is, the day after the execution, and saw women of the imperial family, alive and healthy. Thus, a contradiction arises, which in itself requires additional research.

What kind of documents were included in the book about Anastasia Tchaikovskaya? Are there any unique, newly discovered specimens among them?

Georgy Shumkin: These are documents from the personal archive of Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich Romanov. In the mid-nineties of the last century, they were transferred from Paris to the State Archive of the Russian Federation, where they are still stored. We made only the first inventory of this fund, which included exclusively those papers that Prince Andrei collected in the case of Anastasia Tchaikovskaya. This woman is today called “the most famous impostor” who tried to pass herself off as the miraculously saved daughter of Nicholas II. Since the documents were preserved in very good condition, and at one time they were drawn up according to all the rules of office correspondence, their attribution seems to be quite accurate.

What exactly do they contain?

Georgy Shumkin: These are mainly letters about how the case of Tchaikovskaya’s personality was investigated. The story is truly detective. Anastasia Tchaikovskaya, also known as Anna Anderson, claimed to be the daughter of Nicholas II. According to her, with the help of soldier Alexander Tchaikovsky, she managed to escape from the house of the merchant Ipatiev. For six months they traveled on carts to the Romanian border, where they later got married and where she had a son, named Alexei. Tchaikovskaya also claimed that after Alexander's death she fled with his brother Sergei to Berlin. A reasonable question arises here: why did she, if it really was Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova, while in Bucharest, not appear to her relative, her mother’s cousin Queen Mary? We don't have an answer to this question. Be that as it may, in Berlin Tchaikovskaya tried to meet with Princess Irene, the sister of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, but she was not received. Then she despaired and tried to commit suicide by throwing herself into the canal. She was rescued and, under the name “unknown Russian,” was placed in a hospital for the mentally ill. The woman refused to talk about herself. Later, a certain Maria Poutert, who had previously served as a laundress in St. Petersburg and, by coincidence, ended up in the same ward with her, recognized her neighbor as the daughter of the deposed Russian Tsar, Tatyana Nikolaevna Romanova.

Could it really be Tatiana?

Georgy Shumkin: Hardly. The woman’s face at that time was indeed somewhat similar to Tatyanino, but her height and build were different. The figure of the “unknown Russian” really more closely resembled Anastasia. And she was about the same age as the fourth daughter of the emperor. But the main similarity is that Tchaikovskaya and Grand Duchess Anastasia had the same leg defect - bursitis of the big toe, which is very rarely congenital. In addition, Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova had a mole on her back, and Anastasia Tchaikovskaya had a gaping scar in the same place, which could have remained after the mole was burned out. As for appearance, there really is little in common between the girl in the photograph of 1914 and the lady photographed in the 20s. But we must take into account that Tchaikovskaya’s teeth were knocked out: a dozen teeth were missing in the upper jaw, and three teeth in the lower jaw, that is, the bite had completely changed. In addition, her nose was broken. But all these are just clues that cast doubt on the official version. They still do not allow us to say with 100% certainty that Tchaikovskaya and Grand Duchess Anastasia are the same person.

Opponents of the hypothesis about the identity of Anastasia Tchaikovskaya and Princess Anastasia Nikolaevna have one compelling argument. They claim, citing data from certain studies, that no Tchaikovsky soldier existed in nature.

Georgy Shumkin: Unfortunately, I personally did not work with the regiment’s documents. In 1926 and 1927, two investigations were actually carried out in Romania, on the initiative of Queen Mary herself. Then they looked for traces of the Tchaikovskys’ presence in Budapest, but did not find them. Not a single church had a record of a couple with that last name getting married or having a child. But it could well be that Tchaikovskaya was taken out of Russia using someone else’s documents, and they were married using them.

Another argument against the identity of the two Anastasias is that Tchaikovskaya did not speak Russian, preferring to communicate with everyone in German.

Georgy Shumkin: She spoke German poorly, with a Russian accent. I actually tried not to speak Russian, but I understood the speech. Sometimes people addressed her in Russian, but she answered in German. Without knowing the language, you won’t be able to respond to cues, right? Moreover, while recovering from an operation for bone tuberculosis, Tchaikovskaya raved in English, in which, as is known, members of the imperial family communicated with each other. Later, moving to New York and stepping off the Berengaria onto American soil, she instantly began to speak English without an accent.

There is also a version that the “imposter” Anastasia Tchaikovskaya is actually a worker at the Berlin factory, Franziska Shantskovskaya. How viable do you think it is?

Georgy Shumkin: We have an interesting document in our book, a comparative table of the anthropometric data of Tchaikovskaya and Shantskovskaya. By all parameters, it turns out that Shantskovskaya is larger: taller, shoe size 39 versus 36. In addition, Shantskovskaya does not have any injuries on her body, but Tchaikovskaya is literally all chopped up. Shantskovskaya worked at a military plant during the war in Germany, and had to speak German perfectly, without an accent, and our heroine, as I already said, spoke poorly. While working at the factory, Francis was concussed in an accident and after that suffered mental damage and was hospitalized in various psychiatric clinics. Anastasia was also observed by a number of psychiatrists, including luminaries of that time, for example, Karl Bonhoeffer. But he unequivocally admitted that this woman is absolutely mentally healthy, although she is susceptible to neuroses.

On the other hand, among some of your colleagues there is an opinion that not only Anastasia, but all the women of the imperial family were saved. What is it based on?

Georgy Shumkin: This line is consistently pursued by Mark Ferro, a major specialist in the history of Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century. How does he justify his version? If you remember, Russia emerged from the First World War in 1918 as a result of the conclusion of the “obscene” Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany, where at that time Emperor Wilhelm II, the closest relative of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, still reigned. So, under the terms of the peace treaty, all German citizens who were in Russia at that moment were to be released and sent home. Alexandra Feodorovna, Princess of Hesse by birth, fell completely under this rule. If she had been shot, this could have become a reason for the termination of the peace treaty and the resumption of the war, but with Soviet Russia, where at that time the internal crisis was gaining momentum. So, according to Ferro, the empress and her daughters were handed over to the Germans out of harm's way. After this, Olga Nikolaevna was allegedly under the protection of the Vatican, Maria Nikolaevna married one of the former princes, and Alexandra Feodorovna herself, together with her daughter Tatyana, lived in a monastery in Lvov, from where they were transported to Italy in the 30s. Ferro is also inclined to think that Tchaikovskaya is Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna, whom her relatives chose to disown because she once blurted out too much. The fact is that when she arrived at Princess Irene of Prussia, she said that she had seen her brother Ernest of Hesse during the war in Russia, and that he was secretly negotiating a separate peace. If this information were leaked, it would put an end to the political career of both Gessensky himself and, possibly, his entire family. So, by mutual family agreement, Tchaikovskaya was recognized as an impostor.

Are there any documents included in your book that still cast doubt on the identity of the two Anastasias?

Georgy Shumkin: Of course, even despite the fact that Prince Andrei Vladimirovich himself tried to prove that Tchaikovskaya was his niece. Thus, we have published the testimony of Alexandra Fedorovna Volkov’s footman, who came to Berlin to identify Anastasia, but refused to recognize her as his young mistress. There are testimonies from other people close to the royal family. Most of them had a negative attitude towards Tchaikovsky. Of the entire family, only two people recognized her as Anastasia Nikolaevna - Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich and Grand Duchess Ksenia, married to Leeds.

How did the life of the “most famous impostor” end?

Georgy Shumkin: She went to America and there became known as Anna Anderson. She married her admirer, the historian Manahan, and died a widow at the age of 84. She had no children, except for Alexei, who was born in Romania, who, by the way, was never found. Her body was cremated and her ashes were buried in a castle in Bavaria, where she lived for a time.

And yet, what do you personally think, is Anastasia Tchaikovskaya an impostor or not?

Georgy Shumkin: We categorically refused to express our own opinion in our book, citing only documents that everyone can interpret in their own way. But the question is spinning in my head: if Tchaikovskaya is not Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna, then who is she? How could she identify herself with Anastasia Romanova, where could she get the most subtle details about the life of the royal family, intimate details that only people from her closest circle knew about? No matter who she is, in any case she is a phenomenal, unique person.

What argument do you think could firmly put an end to history, prove once and for all whether it is her or not?

Georgy Shumkin: There can be many arguments here. For example, during one of the trials in Hamburg, they looked for an advertisement about the search for the escaped Anastasia. A number of Germans who were held captive in Yekaterinburg in 1918 claimed that they had seen leaflets that said that Anastasia was being sought after the execution of the Tsar. Where did they go? Was every single one of them destroyed? If at least one was found, this would be a weighty argument in favor of the fact that Anastasia Nikolaevna really escaped. But it is extremely difficult to find an absolutely “iron” argument in this story. Even if this is a document indicating that Anastasia Nikolaevna really was in Romania, there will be people among skeptics who will doubt its authenticity. Therefore, it is unlikely that this mysterious story will be put to rest in the near future.

By the way

Academician Veniamin Alekseev in the preface to the book “Who are you, Mrs. Tchaikovskaya” writes that today the Royal Archives of Copenhagen contains a multi-volume dossier from the official trial of Anastasia Tchaikovskaya, which took place in Germany from 1938 to 1967 and became the longest in the history of this countries. There is also a report by the Danish diplomat Tsaale on the personality of Anastasia, dated 1919. The documents are marked with strict secrecy for 100 years, that is, it is possible that after 2018 at least part of them will fall into the hands of historians, and the data contained therein will be able to shed light on the secret of Anna-Anastasia.

Anastasia, Olga, Alexey, Maria and Tatyana after measles. June 1917. Photo: www.freewebs.com

Russian Emperor Nicholas II, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria, Anastasia, Tsarevich Alexei.
Photo: RIA Novosti www.ria.ru

Nadezhda Gavrilova

Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna, daughter of the last Russian emperor, would have turned 105 years old on June 18, 2006. Or is it still turned? This question haunts historians, researchers, and... swindlers.

The life of the youngest daughter of Nicholas II ended at 17 years old. On the night of July 16-17, 1918, she and her relatives were shot in Yekaterinburg. From the memoirs of contemporaries it is known that Anastasia was well educated, as befits the daughter of an emperor, she knew how to dance, knew foreign languages, participated in home performances... She had a funny nickname in her family: “Shvibzik” for her playfulness. In addition, from an early age she took care of her brother, Tsarevich Alexei, who was sick with hemophilia.

In Russian history, there have been cases of “miraculous salvation” of murdered heirs before: just remember the numerous False Dmitrys who appeared after the death of the young son of Tsar Ivan the Terrible. In the case of the royal family, there are serious reasons to believe that one of the heirs survived: members of the Yekaterinburg District Court Nametkin and Sergeev, who investigated the case of the death of the imperial family, came to the conclusion that the royal family was at some point replaced by a family of doubles . It is known that Nicholas II had seven such twin families. The version of the doubles was soon rejected; a little later, researchers returned to it again - after the memoirs of those who participated in the massacre in the Ipatiev House in July 1918 were published.

In the early 90s, the burial of the royal family near Yekaterinburg was discovered, but the remains of Anastasia and Tsarevich Alexei were not found. However, another skeleton, “number 6,” was later found and buried as belonging to the Grand Duchess. Only one small detail casts doubt on its authenticity - Anastasia had a height of 158 cm, and the buried skeleton was 171 cm... Moreover, two judicial determinations in Germany, based on DNA examinations of the Yekaterinburg remains, showed that they completely correspond to the Filatov family - doubles of the family of Nicholas II...

In addition, there is little factual material left about the Grand Duchess; perhaps this also provoked the “heiresses.”

Two years after the execution of the royal family, the first contender appeared. On one of the streets of Berlin in 1920, a young woman Anna Anderson was found unconscious, who, when she came to her senses, called herself Anastasia Romanova. According to her version, the miraculous rescue looked like this: along with all the murdered family members, she was taken to the burial place, but on the way the half-dead Anastasia was hidden by some soldier. She reached Romania with him, they got married there, but what happened next was a failure...

The strangest thing in this story is that Anastasia was recognized in it by some foreign relatives, as well as Tatyana Botkina-Melnik, the widow of Dr. Botkin, who died in Yekaterinburg. For 50 years, talk and court cases continued, but Anna Anderson was never recognized as the “real” Anastasia Romanova.

Another story leads to the Bulgarian village of Grabarevo. “A young woman with an aristocratic bearing” appeared there in the early 20s and introduced herself as Eleanor Albertovna Kruger. A Russian doctor was with her, and a year later a tall, sickly-looking young man appeared in their house, who was registered in the community under the name Georgy Zhudin.

Rumors that Eleanor and George were brother and sister and belonged to the Russian royal family circulated in the community. However, they did not make any statements or claims about anything. George died in 1930, and Eleanor died in 1954. However, Bulgarian researcher Blagoy Emmanuilov claims that he has found evidence that Eleanor is the missing daughter of Nicholas II, and George is Tsarevich Alexei, citing some evidence:

“A lot of information reliably known about Anastasia’s life coincides with Nora from Gabarevo’s stories about herself.” - researcher Blagoy Emmanuilov told Radio Bulgaria.

“Towards the end of her life, she herself recalled that the servants bathed her in a golden trough, combed her hair and dressed her. She talked about her own royal room, and about her children’s drawings drawn in it. There is another interesting piece of evidence. At the beginning of the 50- In the 1980s, in the Bulgarian Black Sea city of Balchik, a Russian White Guard, describing in detail the life of the executed imperial family, mentioned Nora and Georges from Gabarevo... In front of witnesses, he said that Nicholas II ordered him to personally take Anastasia and Alexei out of the palace and hide them in the provinces. After long wanderings, they reached Odessa and boarded the ship, where, in the general turmoil, Anastasia was overtaken by bullets from red cavalrymen. All three went ashore at the Turkish pier of Tegerdag. Further, the White Guard claimed that by the will of fate, the royal children ended up in a village near the city of Kazanlak.

In addition, comparing photographs of 17-year-old Anastasia and 35-year-old Eleanor Kruger from Gabarevo, experts have established significant similarities between them. The years of their birth also coincide. Contemporaries of George claim that he was sick with tuberculosis and talk about him as a tall, weak and pale young man. Russian authors also describe the hemophiliac Prince Alexei in a similar way. According to doctors, the external manifestations of both diseases are the same."

The website Inosmi.ru cites a report from Radio Bulgaria, which notes that in 1995 the remains of Eleonora and George were exhumed from their graves in an old rural cemetery, in the presence of a forensic doctor and an anthropologist. In the coffin of George they found an amulet - an icon with the face of Christ - one of those with which only representatives of the highest strata of the Russian aristocracy were buried.

It would seem that the appearance of the miraculously saved Anastasia should have ended after so many years, but no - in 2002 another contender was presented. At that time she was almost 101 years old. Oddly enough, it was her age that made many researchers believe in this story: those who appeared earlier could count, for example, on power, fame, money. But is there any point in chasing wealth at 101?

Natalia Petrovna Bilikhodze, who claimed to be considered Grand Duchess Anastasia, of course, counted on the monetary inheritance of the royal family, but only in order to return it to Russia. According to representatives of the Interregional Public Charitable Christian Foundation of Grand Duchess Anastasia Romanova, they had data from “22 examinations carried out by commission and judicial procedure in three states - Georgia, Russia and Latvia, the results of which were not refuted by any of the structures.” According to these data, Georgian citizen Natalya Petrovna Bilikhodze and Princess Anastasia have “a number of matching features that can only occur in one out of 700 billion cases,” stated members of the Foundation. A book by N.P. was published. Bilikhodze: “I am Anastasia Romanova,” containing memories of life and relationships in the royal family.

It would seem that the solution is close: they even said that Natalia Petrovna was going to come to Moscow and speak in the State Duma, despite her age, but later it turned out that “Anastasia” died two years before she was declared the heir.

In total, since the murder of the royal family in Yekaterinburg, about 30 pseudo-Anastasius have appeared in the world, writes NewsRu.Com. Some of them did not even speak Russian, explaining that the stress they experienced in the Ipatiev House made them forget their native speech. A special service was created at the Geneva Bank to “identify” them, an exam which none of the former candidates could pass.