Tsars

When you ask someone what he think when he ears Russia, there is a chance he answer Tsars. There were many Tsars in Russia, and we won't have the time to treat them all, but on off the well-known is the last one, Nicolas II.

Nicholas II, born on May 18, 1868 and murdered on July 17, 1918, was Tsar of Russia from 1894 to 1917. He was the son of Alexander III, Russian Tsar from 1881 to 1894, and Dagmar of Denmark (Empress under the name of Marie Fedorovna). It was the sister of Alexandra of Denmark, who married the King of the United Kingdom Edward VII, marriage from which George V, King of the United Kingdom during the First World War. Therefore, Nicholas II is the first cousin of King George V.

Nicholas II was crowned emperor and autocrat of all the Russias on May 26, 1896. The following day, festivities were organized on the field of Khodynka (vacant lot surrounded by huts and a ravine), very close to Moscow: the people had to receive free drinks and food, as well as a cup to remember the event. The enthusiasm of coronation and gratuitousness attracts a crowd of several hundred thousand people. The agitation causes an immense stampede: people fall in the ravine, others are trampled. This tragedy is 1389 victims. Nicolas II thinks then to cancel the ceremonies, but he still attends, on the advice of his uncles, at the ball organized by the French ambassador, the Count of Montebello, where people said he seems very sad.

Through Militza of Montenegro, Rasputin was introduced to the imperial family in 1905. He asked to see the Tsarevich Alexis, who suffers from hemophilia. Rasputin manages to stop the crisis, including stopping the prescription of aspirin, anticoagulant drug that aggravates hemophilia. Step by step, Rasputin becomes close to the Tsarina and becomes very influential. On the night of November 29-30, 1916, Rasputin was assassinated by Prince Felix Yusupov (who will own Keriolet Castle in Finistere, near Concarneau), Grand Duke Dimitri Pavlovich and Vladimir Purishkevich.

After the assassination of the archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria on 28 June 1914 by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip, Austria sent Serbia an ultimatum. Now, by the doctrine of Panslavism (alliance of Slav peoples), Serbia is the ally of Russia, itself being allied, by the Triple Entente, to France and Great Britain. On the other hand, Austria, Germany and Italy form the Triple Alliance. In order to avoid war, Nicholas II maintains a correspondence with the German Emperor Wilhelm II, in which the two sovereigns express their peaceful will: it is the famous correspondence Willy-Nicky. However, this correspondence could not avoid the real outbreak of the war. In 1915, after the Great Retreat and the loss of the Kingdom of Poland, Nicholas II personally assumed the role of Commander-in-Chief of the Armies, in place of his cousin Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolayevich of Russia. From now on, each military defeat must be assumed by Nicholas II. Huge human losses (aggravated by very damaged military installations) and the very cold winter of 1916-1917, which led to a near-famine in Russia, push a part of the people to revolt: it is the revolution of February. Nicolas II decides to abdicate in favor of his brother Michel, who refuses to reign, although his accession to the throne was accepted by the majority of the provisional government. With the Bolshevik revolution, it is the end of three centuries of Romanov rule in Russia. On July 17, 1918, Nicholas II and his family were murdered by the Bolsheviks in Yekaterinburg.

Today, you can see their sepulture in St pierre and St paul Cathedrale, the tomb of Tsars of Russie.