The Diary of Olga Romanov (23 page)

3 May. Thursday.

The day was gray but warm. One could feel the dampness in the rooms especially our two [rooms]; the air entering the window vent was warmer than inside. I taught Maria to play trick-track.

Sednev's fever is better, but he stayed in bed all day. Walked for exactly an hour. The guard order significantly increased, there were no more loiterers in the garden with us.

During the day we got coffee, Easter eggs and chocolate from Ella in Perm. We lost electricity in the dining room, had supper with two candles in jars. In the hall not everything had electricity either. Took a bath after Maria at 7 1/2 o'cl.

4 May. Friday.

It rained all day. Found out that the children left Tobolsk, but Avdeyev didn't tell us when. He also opened the door to the locked room which was intended by us for Aleksei. It turned out to be large and brighter than we expected since it has two windows; our stove heats it well.

Walked for a half hour due to rain. There was plenty of food as usual, and [it] came in time. The commandant, his assistant, the head guard and the electricians ran around all the rooms, fixing wires, despite which we [still] supped in the dark.

6 May. Sunday.

I have lived to 50 years old, it even feels strange to myself!

The weather was great, as if on order. At 11 1/2 the same priest with the deacon did a
moleben
service, which was very nice.

Took a walk with Maria before dinner. During the day sat in the garden for an hour and a quarter, warming in the sun.

We are not getting any news from the children and started to doubt, did they really leave Tobolsk?

8 May. Tuesday.

Heard thunder in the morning; [a storm] passed outside the city, but we had a few downpours. Read before dinner, the 4th part of
War and Peace
, which [I] never knew before.

Walked for an hour with Maria. Avdeyev offered us to look at two rooms next to the dining room; the guards are now located in the cellar. Waited for dinner and supper for more than half hour. Received a congratulatory telegram from Olga for 6th May [his birthday].

10 May. Thursday.

In the morning they intermittently announced to us that the children are a few hours from the city, then that they have arrived at the station, and finally that they have arrived at the house, although their train was already standing here since 2 o'cl. in the morning! What enormous joy it was to see them again and to hug them after four weeks of being apart and the uncertainty.

There was no end to the mutual questions and answers. Very few letters got to them and from them. They went through a lot of emotional suffering in Tobolsk, the poor things, and during the three-day trip.

It snowed overnight and [snow] was on the ground all day. From everyone who arrived with them they only allowed in the cook Kharitonov and Sednev's nephew.

During the day we went out to the garden for about 20 minutes—it was cold and terribly dirty. Waited for the arrival of the beds from the train station until nighttime, but in vain, and all the daughters were forced to sleep on the floor.

Aleksei spent the night on Maria's bed. In the evening, to make things even worse, he bruised his knee and suffered all night and did not let us sleep.

11 May. Friday.

Waited for our people from Tobolsk to be allowed in since morning and the arrival of the rest of the baggage. Decided to let my old man Chermodurov off for a rest and instead of him take in Trupp temporarily.

They let him and Nagorny come in only in the evening, and for an hour and a half they questioned and searched them in the commandant's room.

Although we were all sitting together in the bedroom, I read a lot; started Apukhtin's
The Unfinished Novel.

12 May. Saturday.

Everyone slept well, except Aleksei, who was moved to his own room yesterday. He continues to have terrible pains, which are alleviated periodically.

The weather was completely appropriate for our mood, wet snow with 3° of warmth. We conducted talks though Evg.[eni] S.[ergeyevich]
²⁰
with the head of the Regional Soviet about allowing M. Gilliard to us.

The children unpacked some of their things after an unbelievably long search of them in the commandant's room. Walked for about 20 minutes.

13 May. Sunday.

Slept wonderfully, except Aleksei. His pains persist, but with long breaks. He stayed in bed in our room. There was no [religious] service.

The weather was the same, snow on the roofs. As in all the recent days, V. N. Derevenko came to examine Aleksei; today a dark gentleman was accompanying him, in whom we recognized a doctor.
²¹

After a short walk we entered a barn with commandant Avdeyev, where our large baggage was dropped off. The search of some unopened chests continued.

Started to read the works of Saltykov [Shedrin] from the bookcase of the owner of the house. In the evening played bezique.

15 May. Tuesday.

Today is a month since our arrival here. Aleksei feels the same—only the rest breaks were longer. The weather was hot, stuffy, but cool inside. Had dinner at 2 o'clock. Walked and sat in the garden an hour and 1/4. Alix cut my hair successfully.

25 May. Friday.

Spent dear Alix's birthday in bed with bad pains in my legs and other places.
²²
The next two days were better, was able to eat sitting up in a chair.

27 May. Sunday.

Finally got up and left the bed. The day was summery. Took turns walking: Alix, Aleksei, Olga and Maria before dinner; I, Tatiana and Anastasia before tea.

The greenery is nice and succulent, smells nice. Reading Saltykov's 12th volume with interest: “Pshekhonskaya Starina.” [The Elders from Psekohn]

28 May. Monday.

A very warm day. They are constantly opening boxes in the barn where our things are located and taking out various objects and provisions from Tobolsk. And that, with no explanation of the reasons. All this makes one think that
things that are liked can easily be taken to [someone's] homes, which means gone for us! Disgusting!

The external relations have also changed in the past few weeks: the jailers are trying not to talk to us, as if they feel guilty, and it feels like they have some anxiety or are afraid of something. Confusing!

29 May. Tuesday.

Dear Tatiana turned 21! From last night a strong wind was blowing right into the window vent, thanks to which the air in our bedroom finally became clean and rather cool. Read a lot. Again took turns walking.

5 June. Tuesday.

Dear Anastasia turned 17 already. The heat outside and inside was great. Continue reading 3rd volume of Saltykov—engaging and intelligent.

The entire family walked before tea. Since yesterday Kharitonov has been cooking our food, they bring provisions every two days.

The daughters are learning to cook from him and are kneading dough in the evenings, and bake the bread in the morning! Not bad!

14 June. Thursday.

Our dear Maria turned 19. The weather was still tropical, 26° in the shade, and 24° inside the rooms, so difficult to tolerate! Spent a disturbing night and stayed up, dressed….

This all happened because the other day we received two letters, one after the other, where they notified us to be ready to be kidnapped by some loyal people! But the days passed and nothing happened, while the waiting and the uncertainty were very grueling.

21 June. Thursday.
²³

There was a change of commandants today—during dinner Beloborodov and others came in and announced that instead of Avdeyev, the one whom we mistook for a doctor has been appointed—Yurovsky.

During the day before tea, he and his assistants catalogued the gold jewelry—ours and the children's; the majority (rings, bracelets, etc.) they took with them. They explained that it was because there was an unpleasant incident in our house, mentioned our missing things. So the conviction about which I wrote on 28 May had been confirmed.

I feel sorry for Avdeyev, it is not his fault that he was not able to hold back his people from stealing from the chests in the barn.

1
. Evening prayer service.

2
. Military overcoat.

3
. Rita's younger sister.

4
. Possibly Olga's one-time crush.

5
. The last known letter Olga wrote.

6
. Nicholas is using both the old and new style calendars.

7
.
Protocols of the Elders of Zion
, an anti-Semitic forgery, first published in Russia in 1903, purporting to detail a Jewish conspiracy to dominate the world.

8
. Yet another example of rampant anti-Semitism among the aristocracy in Russia at the time.

9
. The new commandant in Tobolsk.

10
. Type of flat sleigh.

11
. All three servants mentioned here were murdered along with the imperial family in July 1918.

12
. About seventy feet; one sazhen equals seven feet.

13
. Rasputin's hometown.

14
. Their luggage.

15
. Valya Dolgoruky was executed by the Bolsheviks in 1918.

16
. On this page of the diary there was a hand-drawn plan of the house marked “The Ipatiev House in Ekaterinburg” in Nicholas II's hand.

17
. Easter bread.

18
. Special Easter cake.

19
. The imperial family's cook who voluntarily went into exile with them and was also executed.

20
. Dr. Evgeni Botkin.

21
. In fact, this was Yakov Yurovsky (1878–1938), a Bolshevik commissar in charge of the “House of Special Purpose” in Ekaterinburg. He was the chief executioner of Nicholas II and his family.

22
. Nicholas suffered from severe hemorrhoids.

23
. This was Nicholas II's last diary entry.

EPILOGUE

T
he sweltering night of July 16–17, 1918, marked the end for Olga and her family and for the Romanov dynasty. That night all the members of Olga's immediate family, as well as their “people”—those who voluntarily chose to share their fate in exile—perished in a hail of bullets in a small cellar room of the Ipatiev house in Ekaterinburg. Known as “The House of Special Purpose,” it was the last residence of the last Russian tsar and his family. It was also their place of execution. No one was spared.

The family all died at almost the same moment. Their bodies were then scorched with sulfuric acid, broken down with bayonets, and dumped in a common shallow grave just outside of Ekaterinburg. The location of the burial site remained unknown for sixty-one years, until their skeletal remains were found by a dedicated team of people who wanted to get answers and give them to the world.

Much has been written and said about that cruel July night through the years. Those few hours in Russian history became some of the most controversial. Prior to the discovery and identification of the imperial remains, many attempts were made to accurately re-create the events in the cellar of the House of Special Purpose; and most important,
to figure out what exactly happened to the bodies of the last Russian imperial family.

After the first set of remains was identified using DNA testing, the scientific community and the majority of the world were convinced that the Grand Duchess Olga, her parents, and two of her three sisters were finally found. However, until just a few years ago, a nagging question remained as to what actually happened to the two missing bodies, Olga's fourteen-year-old brother, Aleksei, and one of her two younger sisters, either Maria or Anastasia.

That last piece of the puzzle was solved in 2007 when the remains of a teenage boy and girl were finally discovered in the Urals, not far from the shallow grave where the original skeletal remains were found. The former were positively identified as Aleksei and one of the younger sisters.

The remains of Nicholas, Alexandra, and their three daughters were interred at the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg alongside of their royal ancestors. At the time of this book's writing the remains of the other two children have not been reburied, but the entire Romanov family is now accounted for. A bleak chapter of Russian history can be closed.

THE RUSSIAN IMPERIAL FAMILY AND THEIR CIRCLE

Aleksei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich (1904–1918). Heir to the Russian throne. Olga's brother.

Alexander II, Emperor. “Great-grandpa” (1818–1881). Nicholas II's grandfather. Assassinated by a terrorist.

Alexander III, Emperor. “Grandpa” (1845–1894). Nicholas's father.

Alexander Mikhailovich, Grand Duke. “Uncle Sandro” (1866–1933). Husband of Grand Duchess Ksenia Aleksandrovna.

Alexandra Fedorovna, Empress of Nicholas II (1872–1918). Former Princess Alix of Hesse. Olga's mother.

Anastasia Nikolaevna, Grand Duchess. “Shvybz,” “Nastasia.” (1901–1918). Olga's youngest sister.

Andrei Vladimirovich, Grand Duke (1879–1956). Son of Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich. Nicholas's first cousin.

Battenberg, Victoria, Princess of Battenburg. “Aunt Victoria.” Empress Alexandra's sister.

Boris Vladimirovich, Grand Duke.

Botkin, Evgeni Sergeyevich (1865–1918). Court physician. Went into exile with the imperial family and was murdered along with them.

Buxhoeveden, Sophia, Baroness. “Isa” (1884–1956). Lady-in-waiting to Alexandra.