The Romanov Bride

Chapter 3 ELLA

I suppose I first began to realize that things were beginning to pull apart in that autumn of 1904.

It was widely said that the mood of society had not been so bad in several decades, which I did not doubt. We were in that horrible war with Japan and as a consequence I was busy with my workrooms, organizing so many hundreds of women to roll bandages and pack medicaments. Determined to reach out to those in need, I even had my own ambulance trains to see after as well. However, this was Russia, a country ever so slow in awakening, which is to say I was shocked by the confusion, how poorly my instructions were obeyed and how such carelessness caused our help to arrive so slowly in the far east of the Empire. Heavens, there was such terrible, terrible waste as well.

Early that December, Kostya-Grand Duke Konstantin-came to us for dinner. He was so distressed, as were we all, at the strikes and upheavals throughout the nation, and he went on and on.

“Good Lord in Heaven,” said the stately man, who was widely known for his wonderful poetry, “it’s as if a dam has suddenly broken, flooding our Holy Mother Russia with the utmost turmoil.”

“You speak the truth,” agreed my Sergei. “ Russia has been seized with an incredible thirst for change!”

I looked upon my husband, so tall and thin, his narrow face so tight. It’s quite true, Sergei had a very severe belief of the way things should be, an opinion with which I didn’t necessarily agree. But of course I said nothing, for in Russia it was said that a husband was the head of a wife as Christ was head of the church. Upon politics I was therefore not allowed to comment, particularly amongst mixed company.

“Everything is being talked about with such squabble,” continued Kostya. “The cities of Kaluga, Moscow, and Peterburg have unanimously adopted motions asking for every freedom. It’s just absolutely awful. Revolution is banging on the door. Even a constitution is being openly discussed… how shameful, how terrifying.”

Sergei nodded. “A constitution would be madness, sheer madness. I’m afraid our Russia is too backward for such reforms, that our people are neither ready nor mature enough for such things. The so-called parable of equality is just that-a simple story. Freedom and equality would only make the masses drunk and sick, and it would be the ruin of the nation, of that I’m quite sure.”

“Absolutely,” said Kostya enthusiastically. “Democracy is practical only in small countries like France or Britain, not in our huge Russia with our multitudes of different peoples, from Great Russians to Mohammedans.”

Given Sergei’s firm belief in the autocratic principle, it was small wonder that he did not approve of Nicky’s steps, however tentative, to introduce reforms as the most stable course for Russia. But perhaps Sergei was right, perhaps it was as they said: God was Autocrat of All the Universe, and the Tsar was Autocrat of All the Russias. This was, of course, all quite contrary to what I’d been taught by my mother, who believed that liberalism was the best antidote to violence. Then again, this was Russia, an Empire ever so much more Oriental than Occidental.

With all this weighing on Sergei’s mind, and fearful, too, that the government had lost its way, it came as no surprise that after fourteen years of service my husband submitted his resignation as Governor-General of Moscow. The two of us quite looked forward to retiring to our country estate, Ilyinskoye, where I planned to paint and read and host entertainments such as concerts and tableaux vivants.

Then we were hit by a terrible lightning bolt, two bolts, actually. First came the horrible news of the surrender of Port Arthur to the Japanese-imagine, and we had all firmly believed that Russians never surrendered!-and then in January came the awful strikes in Peterburg, which grew and grew by the moment, spreading all the way down to us in Moscow.

Lord, how painful it all was.