Unknown facts from the life of the imperial family.
The ordinary, casual life of tsars still remains largely a secret behind seven seals. And yet it can surprise many today. Doctor of Historical Sciences, author of books from the series "Everyday Life of the Russian Imperial Court" Igor Zimin opened the veil of this secret.
Igor Zimin.
Nicholas II - an enemy of dogs and cats
Igor Viktorovich, did the Russian emperors lead an idle lifestyle or did they work a lot?
- None of them shied away from work. Perhaps the most ardent workaholic was Nicholas I. He even called himself a convict of the Winter Palace. I delved into all the little things, even when it was not necessary. After all, it's not a tsar job to decide what color to paint the beds in the soldiers' barracks. Alexander II was the first to separate work from private hours. If he was resting, none of his relatives could approach him with a discussion of business issues. This tradition was later followed by other emperors. The tsars did not have a full vacation. For example, when Nicholas II was vacationing in Livadia, three times a week they brought him briefcases with documents. More or less free time for the emperors began at 20:00, when the royal family sat down to dinner. After that, Nicholas II read books to his wife Alexandra Fedorovna (she knew Russian literature mainly thanks to these evenings),pasted photographs into an album or played billiards and dominoes. He was also a passionate hunter, and he shot not only bears, deer and wolves, but also dogs and cats. In huge numbers! For 27 years (from 1884 to 1911) he killed about 12 thousand dogs and almost 19 thousand cats. That is, an average of 36 dogs per month. It is difficult to understand why he needed it.
Nicholas II did not like animals?
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- Well no. When he was a child, they had many animals in their family. Children of Alexander III were given bears, rabbits, wolf cubs, hares, even elks and lynxes. Of course, they were then given to the zoological gardens of St. Petersburg and Moscow. Alexander III himself almost never parted with the husky Kamchatka. But in October 1888, the royal family, returning from the Crimea, got into a train accident and miraculously survived. But Kamchatka died. He was buried in Gatchina, in His Imperial Majesty's own garden, under the windows of Alexander III's rooms. Four years later, he wrote to his wife: “I recall with such despair my faithful, dear Kamchatka, who never left me and was with me everywhere; I will never forget this wonderful and unique dog! Do I have at least one disinterested friend among people; no and cannot be, and Kamchatka was like that!"
Obaka, brought from Kamchatka, became the favorite of the royal family.
They kept animals in the family of Nicholas II. For example, Tsarevich Alexei is depicted in many photographs with the spaniel Joey. By the way, he accompanied Alexei into exile in Tobolsk and Yekaterinburg in 1917-1918. After the execution of the royal family, the dog survived. She was picked up and taken to England. Joy lived at Buckingham Palace until his death.
Tsarevich Alexey with spaniel Joey.
Pranks and punishments of the princes
Tell us how you brought up the royal children?
- Under Catherine II, children were usually deprived of sweets for misconduct. There was no physical punishment. But they again began to be actively used under Paul I, with the knowledge of his wife Maria Feodorovna. For example, General Lamsdorf - the educator of Nicholas (the future Emperor Nicholas I. - Ed.) And Mikhail - butchered them as sidor goats, because the boys had complex characters. Once Lamsdorf flared up and hit 7-year-old Nikolai with the back of his head against the wall. Can you imagine what a scandal would be all over the country now if a teacher treated a first grader like that? When Nicholas I himself had children, they were punished differently. Either they were forbidden to meet with their parents, or they were limited in food. So, in March 1829, for apathy at a history lesson, Nicholas I did not allow the Tsarevich, the future Emperor Alexander II, to approach him at parting in the evening. Another time, for an unlearned poem, the boy "ate one soup at dinner." Although a couple of times Nicholas I still beat his children. Once the second son of the tsar - Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich - during a card game of parents and their guests, quietly pulled out a chair from under the general who was about to sit down. He naturally fell to the floor. Nicholas I turned white with anger, asked his wife Alexandra Fedorovna to get up and turned to the general: "I beg your pardon that we raised our son so badly!" I'm sure Konstantin got it well afterwards. Nicholas I turned white with anger, asked his wife Alexandra Fedorovna to get up and turned to the general: "I beg your pardon that we raised our son so badly!" I'm sure Konstantin got it well afterwards. Nicholas I turned white with anger, asked his wife Alexandra Fedorovna to get up and turned to the general: "I beg your pardon that we raised our son so badly!" I'm sure Konstantin got it well afterwards.
Nicholas II could spank his daughters. Once during lunch, five-year-old Anastasia crawled under the table and began to pinch guests there. The emperor then pulled his daughter out by the hair. But no one touched Tsarevich Alexei, because he was sick with hemophilia. Of course, he grew up as a spoiled child. In 1915, the following episode occurred: Nicholas II, the grand dukes and representatives of the Entente were sitting at the table. 11-year-old Aleksey quietly entered and put half of a watermelon hollowed out from the inside on the head of one of the great dukes. The juice dripped slowly down his face. Everyone was quiet. And Nicholas II just calmly said something like: "Well, what are you doing, do not need this."
Toilet humor
What was the level of comfort in the palaces? What miracles of technology were used in them?
- A lot of technical know-how was first tested in the Winter Palace. For example, under Nicholas I, an elevator appeared. It was powered by two "machinists" who manually turned a special flywheel. There were no big claims to this mechanism until 1895, when Empress Maria Feodorovna, going up the elevator, hit the wall with her heel and tore the ligaments of the joint. In 1904, the elevator completely fell and crushed one of the drivers to death.
Under Alexander II, ventilation appeared in the imperial residence. On especially frosty days, fog formed under the ceiling of some rooms of the Winter Palace. To overclock it, a fan was needed. Three guardsmen manually turned special flywheels, which set it in motion.
What about the sewerage system?
- In Peterhof at the time of Peter the Great, there was always a nightstand next to the bed, inside which a chamber pot was kept. According to legend, Catherine II used for intimate needs the national shrine of Poland - the throne of the Polish kings, taken from Warsaw by Suvorov. Allegedly, by order of the empress, a hole was punched in the center of the throne. And Tsarevich Alexei had an exclusive chamber pot. When he sat on it, the Marseillaise, the anthem of the Great French Revolution, began to play. The Winter Palace was equipped with a sewerage system in 1838-1839. Few people know that it was developed by the architect Auguste Montferrand, the creator of the Alexander Column. At that time, there were already standard toilets with a water seal. Although under Maria Feodorovna, the wife of Paul I, there was also a kind of sewage system. Water carriers brought water to the 3rd floor. After using it, it went through lead pipes to the 1st floor and drained into a separate tank with sewage. And from there all this was poured into the Neva. But Nicholas II lived with all the comforts. In the Alexander Palace of Tsarskoye Selo, the emperor's toilet was equipped with the latest plumbing of that time. Among other things, drawings and photographs hung on its walls: a portrait of Alexandra Feodorovna, a caricature of Nicholas II sitting in a car.
Nicholas II near his Mercedes-Knicht-Wagen 16-40 PS car.
Two bathrooms for all maids of honor
Who, besides the imperial family, had the right to live in the palace?
- The entire court staff received free apartments in the Winter Palace. In the middle of the 19th century, about three thousand people lived there! The first floor was occupied by workers of economic services. The second housed the imperial chambers, and the third - the apartments of the maids of honor. Even the attic was densely populated. For example, in 1837 there was a fire company barracks. Moreover, the firefighters lived with their families. By the way, after the explosion staged in the basement of the Winter Palace in 1880 by the revolutionary Stepan Khalturin, a big "cleaning" was started in the palace and a cow was found in the attic! The surprised gendarmes were told that the animal "supplied" the courtiers' children with fresh milk.
In 1880, a cow was discovered in the attic of the Winter Palace.
How comfortable were the apartments of the court staff?
- They were different, ranging from one-room about 30 square meters and ending with a fairly spacious 4-room apartment. But without much convenience. For example, only two bathrooms were provided for all maids of honor. But they had the right to invite guests to their place and set the table for them at the expense of the imperial court. I once saw a statement in which it was stated that a certain lady-in-waiting had drunk 18 bottles of wine, 4 vodka and 5 beer in two weeks.
The entire court staff received free apartments in the Winter Palace. Among them were maids of honor (1), floor polishers (2), janitors (3), stokers (4), glaziers (5) and many others.
For theft - to the monastery
Since the Winter Palace was inhabited by thousands of people, it means that thefts must have happened there too …
“They were very rare. For example, once a favorite snuffbox was stolen from Catherine II. The page was guilty - the son of a poor nobleman from the Smolensk province. There was no severe punishment: the page was only expelled from the palace, and then 500 rubles were also sent to him. Judging by the stories of the memoirists, Catherine the Great looked at thefts with a grain of irony, as an inevitable evil. One day she saw an old woman catching a chicken in front of the palace. The Empress ordered to help the poor woman. But it turned out that the bird was stolen. Then Catherine ordered to give the old woman a chicken every day, but only "not alive, but with a bat." Nicholas I brought order in the palace much more severely. The courtiers who had made a mistake were publicly punished with rods (a rod made of willow bushes. - Ed.). But more often the emperor simply frightened them. In January 1827, he first ordered that the stoker Alexander Vinogradov be sold as a soldier for some offense, and then ordered him to return to his former position.
In October 1843, almost 15 kilograms of silver dishes were taken from the Service Storeroom of the Winter Palace. Then it turned out that on the night of the theft, the internal iron shutters on the windows of the storeroom were open. The thieves climbed inside by simply holding a ladder to the window. And all this happened just opposite the palace guardhouse. 110 people were on guard that night, and none of them saw the stairs or intruders! The thieves were found. They turned out to be two privates of the Third Invalid Company. They sold the silver to a non-commissioned officer and two soldiers. In 1851, one chambermaid was imprisoned in a monastery for life for stealing eight pearls from Maria Alexandrovna's necklace.
Author: Katerina Kuznetsova
It is interesting:
Family nicknames of the Romanovs
- Nicholas I called his wife Alexandra Feodorovna the Bird for the fragility of the figure and the ease of walking. Sometimes he called Madame Nicolas. He called his son, the future Alexander II, Moscow kalach - he was born in Moscow. Alexander II himself in intimate correspondence called himself Munka, and his mistress, and since 1880 his wife Catherine Dolgoruky - Dusya.
Alexander II - Munka.
- The daughter of Alexander II, Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, was called Duck at home, the son of Grand Duke Vladimir was called Tolstyak, and the son of Sergei was Sizhik.
- Alexander III was called Bulldog, Pug or Maka for his strong physique. And his wife Maria Feodorovna was called Wrathful for her explosive character.
Alexander III - Bulldog.
- His uncle, Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, called Nicholas II "our fool Niki" behind his back. Alexandra Fedorovna called her husband Koko, but the nickname did not take root. As a child, she herself signed letters “M. K. No. III, "this is short for Little Queen No. III. Sometimes, under her letters to her husband, there was "Your old chicken."
- The daughter of Nicholas II, Princess Anastasia, for her restless character, was called Shvibzd, and Tsarevich Alexei was called Baby, Kroshka or Sunbeam.
Anastasia - Schwibzd.