51 Kobylinsky testimony in Wilton, Last Days of the Romanovs, 202; Botkin, Real Romanovs, 194.
52 Kobylinsky testimony in Wilton, Last Days of the Romanovs, 202.
53 Botkin, Real Romanovs, 194.
54 Yakovlev, ‘On the Transfer of the Former Tsar’, in Fall, 255; Revolyutsiya, 266.
55 Thirteen Years, 258; Dnevniki, 2: 252.
56 Revolyutsiya, 265.
57 Murder, 222.
58 Klavdiya Bitner testimony in Ross, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 422.
59 Kobylinsky testimony in Wilton, Last Days of the Romanovs, 205.
60 Rappaport, Four Sisters, 359. See also Yakovlev’s account in Fall, 256; Thirteen Years, 259–61.
61 Thirteen Years, 260.
62 Neidgart, Ross.Arkhiv, 266; Krivoshein, Ross.Arkhiv, 271; Tsaritsa, 222–3.
63 Neidgart, Ross.Arkhiv, 266.
64 Ibid., 26. Krivoshein, Ross.Arkhiv, 272.
65 Ibid., 272, 265. For another version, see Murder, 221.
66 Ibid.
67 Krivoshein, Ross.Arkhiv, 273.
68 Jagow, ‘Die Schuld am Zarenmord’, 391.
69 Murder, 202, 219–20.
70 Krivoshein, in Ross.Arkhiv, 274; Neidgart, in Ross.Arkhiv, 265.
71 Krivoshein, in ibid., 272, 273.
72 Neidgart in ibid., 265.
73 Trepov, Ross.Arkhiv, 274.
74 Ibid., 274–5, 10.
75 Ibid., 275.
76 TNA GFM 6/139 PA, Ru 82, Nr 1, Bd 65; see also Baumgart, Deutsche Ostpolitik, note 13, 337.
77 Ibid.
78 Ibid.
79 Krivoshein, Ross.Arkhiv, 273; a variant form of this quote is in Murder, 227; see also Jagow, ‘Die Schuld am Zarenmord’, 391.
80 Mirbach to GFM in Berlin, 11 May 1918, TNA GFM 6/139 A 19964, quoted in Occleshaw, Romanov Conspiracies, 56. Although Occleshaw’s book claiming the miraculous escape of Grand Duchess Tatiana has been superseded by DNA proof to the contrary, his chapter 7, ‘The Kaiser’s Will’, contains valuable research in German Foreign Ministry documents for 1917–18, which are notoriously difficult to access and work with.
81 Zenzinov, ‘Ubiistvo Tsarskoy Semi’, Nicolaevsky Collection, Hoover Institution, 1; Jagow, ‘Die Schuld am Zarenmord’, 392–3.
82 Countess Alexandra Olsoufieff, ‘HIH Grand Duchess Elisabeth Feodorovna’, London: John Murray, 1923. Available online at http://www.alexanderpalace.org/palace/GDElisabeth.html
83 TNA FO 566/1201 ref. 78031 Petrograd no. 142, 26 April 1918.
Chapter 10: ‘The Baggage Will Be in Utter Danger at All Times’
1 Summers and Mangold argue in FOT, 257–62, that Yakovlev wanted to get the Romanovs to England, but the claim has no foundation in any British sources, any more than a similar one by Victor Alexandrov that Yakovlev was a British agent tasked with ‘watching over the Russian Imperial Family’; see Alexandrov, End of the Romanovs, 211.
2 For a discussion and adamant denial of the unlikely German rescue scenario, see Jagow, ‘Die Schuld am Zarenmord’, note 81, 391.
3 See Appendix Five: ‘Rescuing the Tsar’, in Andrew Cook, Ace of Spies: the True Story of Sidney Reilly, Stroud: Tempus, 2004, 281–4.
4 GARF documents ranging from February 1917 to the end of August 1918, and also including a selection of material relating to the subsequent Sokolov investigation, can be found online at http://statearchive.ru/docs.html. The best source for these documents in English remains Steinberg and Khrustalev’s excellent 1995 edition, Fall of the Romanovs, although it is selective.
5 Revolyutsiya, 269; Nicholas II, 162. Robert Service, an expert in Bolshevik politics of this period, provides an excellent summary of the Yakovlev mission in his Nicholas II, which cuts through a lot of the confusion about the story. See chapters 26–30. A useful map of the route that Yakovlev took can also be found in Nicholas II, xvi, and Fall, 247.
6 Fall, 186.
7 Ibid., 245.
8 Revolyutsiya, 269–70.
9 Fall, 246; Nicholas II, 174.
10 See Last Diary of Tsaritsa Alexandra, 112; Dnevniki, 2: 382–3.
11 Fall, 248; Nicholas II, 175.
12 Fall, 248; Nicholas II, 174.
13 Fall, 248.
14 Ibid., 246.
15 Ibid., 249; Revolyutsiya, 271.
16 Dnevniki, 2: 385.
17 Kozlov, Last Diary of Tsaritsa Alexandra, 116.
18 Revolyutsiya, 270–71.
19 Fall, 250.
20 Ibid., 251.
21 Ibid., 251, 252.
22 Ibid., 252.
23 Yakovlev’s statement ‘On the Transfer of the Former Tsar from Tobolsk to Yekaterinburg’, 16 May 1918, in Fall, 258.
24 For more on Yakovlev’s career, see Plotnikov, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 38–52, and Fall, 183–5.
25 Rappaport, Four Sisters, 363–4.
26 TNA FO 371/3938, 273.
27 3 May 1918, TNA FO 371/3329, 163.
28 TNA FO 371/3329/78031.
29 3 May 1918, TNA FO 371/3329/165.
30 Russia file, ‘The Imperial Family’, May 1918, TNA FO 371/3329/78031.
31 Harald Scavenius report of 14 May 1918, in Bent Jensen, Harald Scavenius’ Syn på Omvæltningerne i Rusland 1917–1918, Copenhagen, Eget Forlag, 1973, 188–9. Also in TNA GFM 6/139/99.
32 Ibid.
33 Ibid.
34 Thomas Preston, telegram of 10 May 1918, TNA FO 371/3325/422–3.
35 Note on Summers and Mangold documentary, October 1971, in TNA FCO 12/122.
36 Alexandrov, End of the Romanovs, 212.
37 See Occleshaw, Armour Against Fate, 256–7.
38 Clarke, Lost Fortune of the Tsars, 108.
39 A two-seater bomber such as the DH4 or the DH9 had a maximum flying distance of about 235 miles before it would need to land and refuel, although the recently introduced Handley Page V/1500 had a range of 1,300 miles, but none of these were based in Russia in 1918 and DH9s were not delivered to the anti-Bolshevik forces till 1919; information from Nick Forder and Andrew Pentland of Cross and Cockade International: The First World War Aviation Historical Society. Re. Fellowes: see Richard Palmer. ‘Royal Blog: Prince Michael bids to Clear George V’s name over Tsar’s death’, Sunday Express, 2 February 2010; information on Fellowes’s RNAS career from Phil Tomaselli and Nick Forder. Occleshaw’s claims re. Meinertzhagen and the mythical air rescue can be found in Romanov Conspiracies, 98–9, which quotes from Meinertzhagen’s diary of 18 August 1918, but does not mention Fellowes. Clarke, Lost Fortune of the Tsars, also quotes the diary on 107–9, but does not mention Fellowes, either. For Summers and Mangold’s now dubious claim that the Meinertzhagen account ‘is one more addition to the growing pile of evidence that the British did mount an operation to save the Romanovs’, see the 2002 edition of File on the Tsar, 366–7. Fifteen years on from this revised edition, this entirely unsubstantiated claim has still not been rescinded.
40 Information on Peregrine Fellowes from Lord Fellowes, by email to the author, 13 April 2017.
41 Information from Phil Tomaselli.
42 FOT, 2002 edn, 367.
43 See Smith, Rasputin, 631.
44 Information from Phil Tomaselli, based on his extensive research in TNA files. See also Andrew Cook, Murder of the Romanovs, 152–6, for a discussion of the Alley mission.
45 See TNA WO 157/1215 Intercepted Telegrams.
46 John Crossland, ‘British Spies in Plot to Save Tsar’, Sunday Times, 15 October 2006. UK readers can view the documentary, Three Kings at War, at http://www.channel4.com/programmes/three-kings-at-war/on-demand/41616–001.
47 Thomas Preston report, 17 September 1918, TNA FO 371/3938/158859/274. Preston, Before the Curtain, 102.
48 Cook, Murder of the Romanovs, 152. This request was confirmed in a follow-up telegram from Alley in Murmansk on 29 May, asking for urgent sanction of the £1,000 he had requested.
49 Ibid., 153. Additional information on SIS agents from Phil Tomaselli.
50 Ibid., 154. This fragment of a memorandum from Alley is unfortunately undated and incomplete.
51 Preston, Before the Curtain, 111; see also McNeal, Secret Plot, 141.
52 Lindley to WO, 27 August 1918; Digby Jones’s ‘Claim for Travelling Expenses, Major-General Poole’s Military Mission Russia’, made posthumously in TNA WO 374/19738.
53 Alley telegram, 29 May 1918, TNA FO 371/3325/53740. Telegram to Lindley at Archangel, forwarding telegram from Irkutsk of 15 August.
54 Digby Jones’s tragic death does at least provide us with unexpectedly valuable detail, for afterwards a parsimonious British army tried to reclaim money from his estate that he had been given to fund his mission in Russia, as well as alleged overpayment of his salary. In order to prove their case, the War Office drew up a schedule of his journey, showing how long it would take an actual agent to make the trip to Archangel and then on to Ekaterinburg, and the likely way in which it was made. Information from Phil Tomaselli. See also Digby Jones’s file at TNA WO 374/19738.
55 Buxhoeveden, Life and Tragedy, 78; Wilton, Last Days of the Romanovs, 151.
56 William Black, The Platinum Group Metals Industry, Cambridge: Woodhead Publishing, 2000, Appendix 2.
57 Cook, Murder of the Romanovs, 168; A Collection of Reports on Bolshevism in Russia, HMSO: London, 1919, 43.
58 Preston, Before the Curtain, 68; see TNA FO 368/1970.
59 Occleshaw, Romanov Conspiracies, 128.
60 John Crossland, ‘British Spies in Plot to Save Tsar’, Sunday Times, 15 October 2006. See also Occleshaw, Romanov Conspiracies, 127–8.
61 Cook, Murder of the Romanovs, 156; Occleshaw, Armour Against Fate, 279–81.
62 Preston, Before the Curtain, 98.
Chapter 11: ‘Await the Whistle around Midnight’
1 Victoria Milford Haven, letter to Arthur Balfour, 23 May 1918, FO 371/3329/93852.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.
4 Ibid.
5 Ibid.
6 TNA FO 371/3329/93852.
7 TNA FO 371/3329/93852/171.
8 TNA FO 371/3329/93852.
9 Thomas Preston, ‘The Vigil’, TS, 1, Levine Papers, series 5, box 36/136. Thomas Preston affidavit, 22 January 1960, in Vorres, The Last Grand Duchess, 243.
10 Preston, ‘The Vigil’, 2.
11 Ibid., 3.
12 Ibid.
13 Last Days, 76.
14 Semchevskaya, ‘Vospominaniya o poslednykh dnyak Velikikh Knyazey’; Avdeev, ‘Nikolay Romanov’, 202.
15 Vorres, Last Grand Duchess, 243; Last Days, 76.
16 Wilson, ‘Memoirs of Princess Helena Petrovna’, 55.
17 Last Days, 776; Plotnikov, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 118–19.
18 Plotnikov, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 479; Last Days, 78; King and Wilson, ‘The Officer Letters’, 85.
19 Preston, Before the Curtain, 98.
20 Wilson, ‘Memoirs of Princess Helena Petrovna’, 58–9.
21 Preston, Before the Curtain, 99; Dnevniki, 2: 577.
22 Last Days, 79; Dnevniki, 2: 430. The plan, which is in GARF, can be seen in Vitalii Shitov, Dom Ipatieva, Ekaterinburg: Avto Graf, 2013, 161.
23 Buxhoeveden affidavit, 4, Bakhmeteff Archive.
24 Radzinsky, Last Tsar, 261; Rappaport, Ekaterinburg, 117.
25 GARF F. 601 Op. 2 D. 48 letter c 30 April 1918.
26 Thomas Preston affidavit, 22 January 1960, in Vorres, The Last Grand Duchess, 243.
27 Buxhoevden affidavit, 4. Buxhoeveden testified that the Tsar’s former valet, Chemodurov, who had been set free from the Ipatiev House, identified Dologrukov’s clothes.
28 Revolyutsiya, 334.
29 Ibid., 335.
30 Ibid.
31 Ibid., 336; Fall, 320.
32 Avdeev, ‘Nikolay Romanov’, 202.
33 Revolyutsiya, 331; Plotnikov, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 125.
34 King and Wilson, ‘The Officer Letters’, 79.
35 Last Days, 78; Zhuk, Ispoved Tsareubiits, 420–1. In her 2007 study of original documents connected with the Romanov murders, Sledstvie po delu ob ubiistve …, the Russian historian Lidiya Lykova discussed the bogus ‘officer letters’, concluding that they were all in Rodzinsky’s handwriting; see 271–5. See also Rodzinsky interview in Ogonek, no. 2, 1990, 27. For a full transcript of the original letters in French and the response to them, see Pipes, Russian Revolution, 766–70. The authorship of the original first letter is still disputed. For a discussion, see Pipes, footnote to 767.
36 Fall, 310.
37 Ibid.
38 Ibid., 315.
39 Ekaterinburg: Entsiklopediya, Ekaterinburg: Akademiya, 2002, 7.
40 Plotnikov, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 115; Ross, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 369.
41 Ibid.
42 Fall, 315–16.
43 Ibid., 316–17
44 Ibid., 317.
45 Dnevniki, 2: 497
46 Fall, 320.
47 Ibid.
48 Plotnikov, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 122.
49 Fall, 322.
50 Lykova, Sledstvie po delu …, 275. Lykova, ‘Neizvestnyi otvet tsarskoy semi na pismo “Ofitsera” Yul 1918g Ekaterinburg’, Otechestvennye arkhivy, 2006, at http://naukarus.com/neizvestnyy-otvet-tsar-skoy-semi-na-pismo-ofitsera-iyul-1918-g-ekaterinburg.
51 See Sudba, 266–8; Carl Ackerman, Trailing the Bolsheviki: 12,000 with the Allies in Siberia, New York: Scribner’s, 1919, 100; discussed in King and Wilson, ‘The Officer Letters’, 82–3.
52 Murder, 163–4.
53 A. Korneev, Russkiy vestnik, 28 May 2005.
54 Tsaritsa, 244.
55 Diterikhs quoted in Plotnikov, Gibel tsarskoy semi, 116–17.
56 Last Days, 76–7; see also Semchevskaya, ‘Vospominaniya’, 192.
57 Levine, Eyewitness to History, 142.
58 Ibid., 143. Levine gives the precise publication date of 23 August 1923, but fails to say where the article was published, though it would appear to have been in a New York journal or newspaper. He states that he sent the original document and the map to the publisher. They are nowhere to be found in his archive, despite a concerted search by the author, and are presumed lost.
59 Ibid., 144.
60 For more on the Agafurovs in Ekaterinburg, see http://www.1723.ru/read/dai2/dai-2–31.htm.
61 Levine, Eyewitness to History, 144–5.
62 Ibid., 145; Kozlov, Last Diary of Tsaritsa Alexandra, 184. There is no evidence confirming its contents or whether the Romanovs actually received the letter from Gorshkov’s group. The facts in the description of the mission have been checked, in so far as this is possible, and seem to correlate.
63 Levine, Eyewitness to History, 145.
64 Ibid., 146.
65 Tsaritsa, 252.
66 Ibid., 254; see also Revolyutsiya, 331.
67 Tsaritsa, 254–5.
68 Ibid., 245, 255.
Chapter 12: ‘It Is Too Horrible and Heartless’
1 TNA GFM 6/139 no. 664, 22 June 1918.
2 TNA GFM 6/139, no. 338, 21 June 1918; Ross.Arkhiv, 333–4.
3 Joffe to Lenin, 21 June 1918, Ross.Arkhiv, 380.
4 Zenzinov, ‘Ubiistvo tsarskoy semi’, Nicolae
vsky Collection, Hoover Institution, 2; Jagow, ‘Die Schuld am Zarenmord’, 395.
The Race to Save the Romanovs Page 37
