Emperor of All Russia, the second son of Emperor Alexander II and Empress Maria Alexandrovna, Alexander III was born on February 26, 1845, ascended the royal throne on March 2, 1881, died on November 1, 1894)
He received his upbringing from his tutor, Adjutant General Perovsky and his immediate supervisor, the famous professor of the Moscow University economist Chivilev. In addition to general and special military education, political and legal sciences were presented to Alexander by the invited professors of St. Petersburg and Moscow universities.
After the untimely death of his elder brother, the heir-Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich on April 12, 1865, hotly mourned by the royal family and the entire Russian people, Alexander Alexandrovich, having become the heir-Tsarevich, proceeded to continue both theoretical studies and the performance of many duties in state affairs …
Marriage
1866, October 28 - Alexander was married to the daughter of the Danish King Christian IX and Queen Louise Sophia Frederica Dagmara, who was named Maria Feodorovna at the time of marriage. The happy family life of the heir sovereign bound the Russian people with the royal family with the bonds of good hopes. God blessed the concluded marriage: on May 6, 1868, Grand Duke Nikolai Alexandrovich was born. In addition to the heir-Tsarevich, their august children: Grand Duke Georgy Alexandrovich, born on April 27, 1871; Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna, born on March 25, 1875, Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich, born on November 22, 1878, Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna, born on June 1, 1882
Ascension to the throne
Promotional video:
The accession to the royal throne of Alexander III followed on March 2, 1881 after the martyrdom on March 1 of his father, Tsar-liberator, Emperor Alexander II.
Seventeenth Romanov was a man of strong will and extremely purposeful. He was remarkable for his amazing efficiency, he could calmly ponder every question, in his resolutions he was direct and sincere, did not tolerate deception. Being himself an unusually truthful person, he hated liars. “His word never diverged from his deed, and he was an outstanding person for nobility and purity of heart,” - this is how people who were in his service characterized Alexander III. Over the years, the philosophy of his life was formed: to be for his subjects a model of moral purity, honesty, justice and diligence.
The reign of Alexander III
Under Alexander III, military service was reduced to 5 years of active service, and the life of the soldiers improved significantly. He himself could not stand the military spirit, did not tolerate parades, and even was a bad rider.
Solving economic and social issues - this is what Alexander III saw as his main task. And he devoted himself primarily to the cause of state development.
To get acquainted with different regions of Russia, the tsar often made trips to cities and villages and could personally see the difficult life of the Russian people. In general, the emperor was distinguished by his commitment to everything Russian - in this he was not like the previous Romanovs. He was called a truly Russian tsar, not only in appearance, but also in spirit, forgetting that by blood he was rather a German.
During the reign of this tsar, the words "Russia for Russians" were first heard. A decree was issued prohibiting foreigners from buying real estate in the western regions of Russia, there was a newspaper clamor against the dependence of Russian industry on the Germans, the first Jewish pogroms began, and “provisional” rules for Jews were issued, which greatly infringed upon their rights. Jews were not accepted in gymnasiums, universities and other educational institutions. And in some provinces, they were simply forbidden to live or enter the public service.
Alexander III in his youth
This king, who was not capable of cunning or ingratiating himself, had his own definite attitude towards foreigners. First of all, he disliked the Germans and generally did not harbor any kindred feelings towards the German House. After all, his wife was not a German princess, but belonged to the royal house of Denmark, which was not on friendly terms with Germany. The mother of this first Danish woman on the Russian throne, the intelligent and intelligent wife of King Christian IX of Denmark, was nicknamed “the mother of all Europe”, as she was able to wonderfully accommodate her 4 children: Dagmara became the Russian queen; Alexandra, the eldest daughter, married the Prince of Wales, who played an active role in the state during Queen Victoria's lifetime and later became King of Great Britain; son Frederick after the death of his father ascended the Danish throne, the younger, George, became the Greek king;the grandchildren became related to each other in almost all the royal houses of Europe.
Alexander III was also distinguished by the fact that he did not like excessive luxury and was absolutely indifferent to etiquette. For almost all the years of his reign, he lived in Gatchina, 49 kilometers from St. Petersburg, in the beloved palace of his great-grandfather, Emperor Paul I, to whose personality he especially gravitated, keeping his office intact. And the state halls of the palace were empty. And although there were 900 rooms in the Gatchina Palace, the emperor's family housed not in luxurious apartments, but in the former premises for guests and servants.
The king and his wife, sons and two daughters lived in narrow small rooms with low ceilings, the windows of which overlooked a wonderful park. Big beautiful park - what could be better for children! Outdoor games, visits of numerous peers - relatives of the large Romanov family. Empress Maria, however, still preferred the city and every winter begged the emperor to move to the capital. Sometimes agreeing to the requests of his wife, the king, nevertheless, refused to live in the Winter Palace, finding it unfriendly and too luxurious. The imperial couple made their residence Anichkov Palace on Nevsky Prospekt.
The noisy court life and secular bustle quickly bored the tsar, and the family with the first spring days again moved to Gatchina. The emperor's enemies tried to assert that the tsar, frightened by the reprisal against his father, locked himself in Gatchina, as in a fortress, becoming, in fact, its prisoner.
The emperor did not really love and feared Petersburg. The shadow of his murdered father haunted him all his life, and he led a reclusive lifestyle, he rarely visited the capital and only on especially important occasions, preferring the lifestyle with his family, away from the “light”. And social life at the court really died out somehow. Only the wife of Grand Duke Vladimir, the brother of the tsar, the Duchess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, gave receptions and hosted balls in her luxurious St. Petersburg palace. Members of the government, the highest dignitaries of the court and the diplomatic corps willingly visited them. It is thanks to this that the Grand Duke Vladimir and his wife were considered, as it were, the representatives of the tsar in St. Petersburg, around them, in fact, the life of the court was concentrated.
And the emperor himself with his wife and children stayed in the distance, fearing attempts. Ministers had to come to Gatchina for a report, and sometimes foreign ambassadors could not see the emperor for months. And the visits of guests - crowned persons during the reign of Alexander III were extremely rare.
In reality, Gatchina was reliable: soldiers were on duty for several miles around day and night, and they stood at all the entrances and exits of the palace and park. There were sentries even at the door of the emperor's bedroom.
Personal life
In a marriage with the daughter of the Danish king, Alexander III was happy. He did not just "relax" with his family, but, in his words, "enjoyed family life." The emperor was a good family man, and his main motto was constancy. Unlike his father, he adhered to strict morality, he was not tempted by the pretty faces of the court ladies. From his Minnie, as he affectionately called his wife, he was inseparable. The Empress accompanied him at balls and trips to the theater or to concerts, on trips to holy places, at military parades, during visits to various institutions.
Over the years, he increasingly reckoned with her opinion, but Maria Fyodorovna did not use this, did not interfere in state affairs and did not attempt to influence her spouse in any way or contradict him in any way. She was an obedient wife and treated her husband with great respect. And it could not be otherwise.
The emperor held his family in unconditional obedience. The educator of his eldest sons, Madame Ollengren, Alexander, while still a crown prince, gave the following instruction: “Neither I nor the Grand Duchess want to make greenhouse flowers out of them. “They should pray well to God, study sciences, play ordinary children's games, and be naughty in moderation. Learn well, do not give indulgences, ask to the fullest extent, and most importantly, do not encourage laziness. If anything, please contact me directly, and I know what to do. I repeat that I don't need porcelain. I need normal Russian children. Fight - please. But the prover is the first whip. This is my very first requirement.
Emperor Alexander III and Empress Maria Feodorovna
Alexander, having become king, demanded obedience from all the great princes and princesses, although there were persons between them and much older than him. In this respect, he was in fact the head of all the Romanovs. He was not only revered, but also feared. The seventeenth Romanov on the Russian throne developed a special "family status" for the Russian reigning House. According to this status, only direct descendants of Russian tsars in the male line, as well as the tsar's brothers and sisters, were now entitled to the title of Grand Duke with the addition of the Imperial Highness. The great-grandchildren of the reigning emperor and their eldest sons were entitled only to the title of prince with the addition of highness.
Every morning the emperor got up at 7 o'clock in the morning, washed himself with cold water, dressed in simple comfortable clothes, made a cup of coffee for himself, ate a few slices of black bread and a couple of hard-boiled eggs. After a modest breakfast, he sat down at his desk. The whole family gathered for the second breakfast.
Hunting and fishing were one of the king's favorite types of recreation. Getting up before dawn and taking a gun, he went for the whole day to the marshes or the forest. For hours he could stand in high knee-deep boots in the water and fish with a line in the Gatchina pond. Sometimes this occupation pushed even state affairs into the background. The famous aphorism of Alexander: "Europe can wait while the Russian tsar is fishing" went around the newspapers of many countries. Sometimes in his Gatchina house the emperor gathered a small society to perform chamber music. He himself played the bassoon, and he played with feeling and very well. From time to time, amateur performances were staged, artists were invited.
Assassination attempts on the emperor
During his not so frequent trips, the emperor forbade the escort of his crew, considering this a measure absolutely unnecessary. But along the entire road, the soldiers stood in an unbreakable chain - surprisingly foreigners. Departures by rail - to Petersburg or to the Crimea - were also hedged with all sorts of precautions. Long before the passage of Alexander III, soldiers with rifles loaded with live ammunition were placed all along the way. The railway switches were jammed tightly. Passenger trains were diverted to sidings in advance.
No one knew which train the emperor would take. There was no one "royal" train at all, and there were several trains of "extreme importance." All of them were disguised as royal ones, and no one could know which train the emperor and his family were on. It was a mystery. Each such train was saluted by the soldiers in the chain.
But all this could not prevent the train wreck, which followed from Yalta to St. Petersburg. It was arranged by terrorists at the Borki station, not far from Kharkov, in 1888: the train derailed and almost all the cars crashed. The Emperor and his family were having lunch at this time in the dining car. The roof collapsed, but the king, thanks to his gigantic strength, was able to hold it on his shoulders with an incredible effort and held it until his wife and children got off the train. The emperor himself received several injuries, which, most likely, led to a fatal kidney disease for him. But, having got out from under the rubble, he, without losing his composure, ordered immediate aid to the wounded and those who were still under the rubble.
And what about the royal family?
The empress received only bruises and bruises, but the eldest daughter, Ksenia, injured her spine and remained hunchbacked - perhaps that is why she was married to a relative. Other family members received only minor injuries.
In official reports, this event was described as a train wreck for an unknown reason. Despite all their efforts, the police and gendarmes did not manage to solve this crime. As for the salvation of the emperor and his family, they talked about it as a miracle.
A year before the train crash, an attempt on the life of Alexander III was already being prepared, which fortunately did not take place. On Nevsky Prospekt, the street along which the tsar had to drive to attend the funeral service at the Peter and Paul Cathedral on the occasion of the sixth anniversary of the death of his father, young men were arrested holding bombs in the form of ordinary books. Reported to the emperor. He ordered to deal with the participants in the assassination attempt without unnecessary publicity. Among those arrested and then executed was Alexander Ulyanov, the elder brother of the future leader of the October Revolution of the Bolsheviks, Vladimir Ulyanov-Lenin, who already then set himself the goal of fighting against the autocracy, but not by terror, like his elder brother.
Alexander III himself, the father of the last Russian emperor, during all 13 years of his reign mercilessly crushed the opponents of autocracy. Hundreds of his political enemies were sent into exile. Ruthless censorship controlled the press. Powerful police curbed the zeal of the terrorists and kept the revolutionaries under surveillance.
Domestic and foreign policy
The situation in the state was sad and difficult. Already the first manifesto on accession to the throne, and especially the manifesto on April 29, 1881, expressed the exact program of both foreign and domestic policy: maintaining order and power, observing the strictest justice and economy, returning to the original Russian principles and ensuring Russian interests everywhere …
In foreign affairs, this calm firmness of the emperor immediately gave rise to convincing confidence in Europe that, with a complete reluctance to any conquests, Russian interests would be inexorably protected. This has largely ensured European peace. The firmness expressed by the government regarding Central Asia and Bulgaria, as well as the meetings of the sovereign with the emperors of Germany and Austria, served only to strengthen the conviction that had developed in Europe that the direction of Russian policy had been completely determined.
He entered into an alliance with France in order to obtain loans, which were necessary for the construction of railways in Russia, begun by his grandfather, Nicholas I. Not loving the Germans, the emperor began to support German industrialists in order to attract their capital for the development of the country's economy, in every possible way promote the expansion of trade ties. And during his reign, much has changed in Russia for the better.
Not wanting a war or any acquisitions, Emperor Alexander III had to increase the possessions of the Russian Empire during clashes in the east, and moreover without military action, since the victory of General A. V. Komarov over the Afghans at the Kushka River was an accidental, completely unforeseen clash.
But this brilliant victory had a tremendous impact on the peaceful annexation of the Turkmens, and then on the expansion of Russia's possessions in the south to the borders of Afghanistan when the border line was established in 1887 between the Murghab River and the Amu Darya River from Afghanistan, which has since become an Asian adjacent to Russia. the state.
A railway was built on this vast territory that recently entered Russia, which connected the eastern coast of the Caspian Sea with the center of Russian Central Asian possessions - Samarkand and the Amu Darya River.
Many new statutes were issued in internal affairs.
Alexander III with children and wife
The development of the great cause of the economic organization of the multimillion peasantry in Russia, as well as the increase in the number of peasants suffering from a shortage of land allotments as a result of the increasing population, caused the establishment of the government Peasant Land Bank with its branches. The bank was entrusted with an important mission - to assist in the issuance of loans for the purchase of land both to entire peasant societies and peasant associations and individual peasants. For the same purpose, to provide assistance to the noble landowners who were in difficult economic conditions, in 1885 a government Noble Bank was opened.
Significant reforms took place in the field of public education.
In the military department - military gymnasiums were transformed into cadet corps.
Another great desire overwhelmed Alexander: to strengthen the religious education of the people. After all, what were the majority of Orthodox Christians like? In their souls, many were still pagans, and if they worshiped Christ, they did it, rather, out of habit, and as a rule because it had become so in Russia from ancient times. And what a disappointment it was for a commoner believer to learn that Jesus was, it turns out, a Jew … By the decree of the king, who himself was deeply religious, three-year parish schools began to open in churches, where parishioners studied not only the Law of God, but also studied literacy. And this was extremely important for Russia, where only 2.5% of the population were literate.
The Holy Governing Synod has been instructed to provide assistance to the Ministry of Public Education in the field of public schools by opening parish schools at churches.
The general university charter of 1863 was replaced by a new charter on August 1, 1884, which completely changed the position of universities: the direct management of universities and the direct authorities over a wide-ranging inspection were entrusted to the trustee of the educational district, rectors were elected by the minister and approved by the highest authority, the appointment of professors was given to the minister, the candidate's degree and the title of valid student have been destroyed, why the final examinations in universities have been abolished and replaced by examinations in government commissions.
At the same time, they began to revise the regulations on gymnasiums and the highest order was to take care of the expansion of vocational education.
The court area was also not ignored. The procedure for sending a court with a jury was supplemented by new rules of 1889, and in the same year the judicial reform spread to the Baltic provinces, in relation to which a firm decision was made to implement in the case of local government the general principles of administration that are in the whole of Russia, with the introduction Russian language.
Death of the emperor
It seemed that the king-peacemaker, this hero, would reign for a long time. A month before the death of the tsar, no one imagined that his body was already "worn out." Alexander III died unexpectedly for everyone, not having lived one year to be 50 years old. The cause of his premature death was kidney disease, which was aggravated by the dampness of the premises in Gatchina. The sovereign did not like to be treated and in general almost never spoke about his illness.
Summer 1894 - hunting among the swamps further weakened his health: headaches, insomnia and weakness in the legs appeared. He had to go to doctors. He was advised to rest, preferably in the warm climate of Crimea. But the emperor was not the kind of person who is able to disrupt his plans just because he feels bad. Indeed, at the beginning of the year, a trip was planned in September with my family to Poland to spend a couple of weeks in a hunting lodge in Spala.
The state of the sovereign remained unimportant. From Vienna, the largest specialist in renal diseases, Professor Leiden, was urgently called. Having carefully examined the patient, he diagnosed nephritis. At his insistence, the family immediately left for the Crimea, to the summer Livadia Palace. The dry warm Crimean air had a beneficial effect on the king. His appetite improved, his legs were so strong that he could go ashore, enjoy the sea surf, take sun baths. Surrounded by the care of the best Russian and foreign doctors, as well as his loved ones, the tsar began to feel much better. However, the improvement was only temporary. A change for the worse came abruptly, forces began to fade away quickly …
On the morning of the first day of November, the emperor insisted that he be allowed to get out of bed and sit in the chair by the window. He told his wife: “I think my time has come. Don't be sad for me. I'm completely calm. " A little later, the children and the bride of the eldest son were called. The king did not want to be put to bed. With a smile, he looked at his wife, kneeling in front of his chair, his lips whispering: "I am not dead yet, but I have already seen an angel …" Immediately after noon, the hero-king died, bowing his head on the shoulder of his beloved wife.
It was the most peaceful death in the last century of the Romanov rule. Paul was brutally killed, his son Alexander passed away, leaving behind a still unsolved mystery, another son, Nikolai, in despair and disillusionment, most likely, of his own free will ceased to exist on earth, but Alexander II - the father of the peacefully deceased giant - became a victim of terrorists who called themselves opponents of autocracy and executors of the people's will.
Alexander III died, having reigned for only 13 years. He fell asleep in eternal sleep on a wonderful autumn day, sitting in a huge "Voltaire" armchair.
Two days before his death, Alexander III told his eldest son, the heir to the throne, the future Emperor Nicholas II: “You have to take the heavy burden of state power from my shoulders and carry it to the grave just as I carried it and as our ancestors carried it … Autocracy created the historical individuality of Russia. The autocracy will collapse, God forbid, then Russia will collapse with it. The fall of the primordial Russian power will open an endless era of turmoil and bloody civil strife … Be firm and courageous, never show weakness."
Yes! Seventeenth Romanov turned out to be a great visionary. His prophecy came true a little less than a quarter of a century …