May was, as ever, uncritical: ‘I dined with Alix [Alicky] on Standart, nice little evening.’
Thursday 5th August
Georgie wrote in his diary: ‘Nicky and Alicky gave large lunch on board Standart to which all family came. We cheered them. They go straight to Russia.’
The last morning was spectacularly fine. Georgie reported: ‘Heavenly day very hot sun, practically a calm’. May echoed her husband: ‘Glorious day… sat out’, and Earl Spencer made a rueful note of the weather: ‘Another very hot day’. The Earl successfully gained leave to go ashore, but found it unrewarding: ‘Failed to get any photographs… mistook a launch, waited in the shade under a tree just behind club gardens. Pottered… in frock coat and yachting cap.’
The Tsar presented generous gifts to the various heads of security. Superintendent Quinn and Chief Constable Captain Adams Connor had helped, not least, with the rescue of the young Grand Duchesses from Cowes High Street. Both were now rewarded with gold cigarette cases with the imperial crest. Captain Adams Connor also received the Commander of the Order of St Stanislaus medal. A third officer involved in the girls’ debacle, Deputy Chief Constable J.H. Galloway, was given gold and enamel sleeve links, set with sapphires and diamonds. Inspectors Bignell and Salter received plainer gold sleeve links.
British sailors were awarded medals. On 16th August, Signalman Alfred H.E. Jenkins of HMS Bellerophon received an ornate letter from Buckingham Palace giving him permission to wear the Silver Medal of St Stanislas. The medal had been presented by ‘His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of Russia’ and the letter concluded with a flourish: ‘I am, Sir, your obedient servant, Knollys’.
The Russian Admiral Chagin and Captain Nikolai Sablin were presented with gold mementos of Cowes, decorated with British and Russian flags; partly in compensation for not having been allowed to go ashore. Another member of the British party was given a silver cigarette case with a depiction of the British and Russian naval flags intertwined. On the back was carved: ‘Alexandra Cowes 1909’.
The Tsar received deputations from the Corporation of the City of London, the Corporation of Portsmouth, the London Chamber of Commerce and the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce. In his diary, the Tsar reported receiving ‘a beautiful small chest’ from the department of commerce attached to the city of London. He presented £50 to the Royal Sailors’ Home in Portsmouth for the creation of two cabins ‘in the name of the Tsar and Tsarina’.
One thousand pounds (£80,000 in today’s money) was set aside for the island poor. The mayor of Newport received a cheque for £400, accompanied by a letter from the Ambassador, Count Benckendorff: ‘It is His Imperial Majesty’s desire that this sum should be distributed amongst the poor of the Isle of Wight, excluding those of East and West Cowes, which have been provided for separately.’
The chairman of the Cowes and East District Council, meanwhile, acknowledged its £600 share of the Tsar’s gift: ‘I am sure the two councils will distribute [the money] to the best advantage.’ In fact, the gift created some bad feeling, as representatives of East Cowes became anxious about being short-changed. There were heated exchanges during a council meeting the following week. A conciliatory Mr A.E. Marvin Junior pointed out several reasons why the council should be grateful: ‘His Imperial Majesty’s visit last week attracted thousands of people to Cowes who would not otherwise have come there and it very largely contributed to Cowes having experienced one of the best regatta weeks that could be remembered for a long time.’
The silver cigarette case gifted by the Tsarina to a member of the British party
But the councillors of East Cowes were not so easily pacified: ‘Mr Floyd said there was no doubt the population of East Cowes had greatly increased since the last census was taken. It was quite one third of that of Cowes and he thought East Cowes was entitled to at least £200 of the £600.’ Efforts were made to smooth troubled water: ‘The chairman hoped there would be no unpleasantness over the question of apportionment.’
The Tsar’s farewell message was unequivocal: ‘The Emperor is deeply impressed by his visit to this country. The affectionate welcome accorded to him and the Empress by the royal family, the reception given by the magnificent naval force which saluted him at Cowes, the attitude of British statesmen, people and press are all happy auguries for the future. It is the Emperor’s firm desire and belief that this all-too-brief visit can only bear the happiest fruit in promoting the friendliest feelings between the governments and people of the two countries.’ Quoting the message, the County Press concluded: ‘So may it be!’
He offered only the sparest account of the farewell lunch on the Standart: ‘At 1pm the entire family and invited guests arrived for lunch. They wrote their names endlessly in books.’ The Standart left sharply at 3.30pm, with bands playing and a salute of 21 guns. She was escorted, once more, by the three British destroyers, Indomitable, Inflexible and Invincible. The Polar Star followed, with the unfortunate cruiser, Rurik, over-compensating for her earlier difficulties. As the Tsar reported: ‘The Rurik overtook us at full speed and stole away from us in order to sail around Skalen and Kiel.’
The King and Queen stood, with Georgie and May, on the forebridge of the Victoria and Albert to see them off. Thousands of spectators had gathered to watch the departure, but a haze soon engulfed the Standart. May wrote to her ailing son, Bertie: ‘They left to our GREAT regret at 3pm.’ The Romanovs, waving goodbye, were soon lost from sight.
By that evening the Tsar was thoroughly enjoying his respite from social pressures: ‘The sea was ideal – completely still. After dinner I played a little at dominoes.’
May offered a cheery summing up of the visit to her son Bertie: ‘Gone off very well. Both Uncle Nicky and Aunt Alix seemed to enjoy being here…’ ‘The visit was a great success,’ she wrote to her Aunt Augusta on 6th August, ‘and went off very well in every way. Both Nicky and Alix were charming and pleased to be here again.’
The County Press was exuberant: ‘The rapprochement which has taken place between Britain and Russia is the most real contribution which has been made in our day to the cause of European peace and at the same time one of the most wonderful events that have marked the relations of powers to one another.’ These sentiments were echoed in a journal in St Petersburg: ‘No visit of the Tsar has ever been so full of significance as the one to Cowes and never have toasts proposed by chiefs of state been of such political import.’
Back at Tsarskoe Selo, the imperial family resumed their various routines. The Tsarina was laid low by the rigours of the trip, and shared her troubles, once again, with her long-suffering brother, Ernie. Her facial neuralgia was superseded by a range of other symptoms, including her old leg pains: ‘How I am paying for the fatigues of my visits, a week already in bed, as had such strong heart, back, leg aches and its [sic] a tiny bit better now, only sleepy pulse and very weak, strong anaemie [sic], lie all day. From 5 on get on my sopha [sic] – either on balconey [sic] or next room. After dinner N reads to me… I mostly lie with closed eyes, so tired, a little reading or looking at things gives headache, managed to sow [sic] a little yesterday – now my left kidney runs all over the place.’ Three months later, she was still dwelling on her travails to a friend, in a letter written from the Crimea, in German: ‘Ich bin recht krank wieder gewesen in Peterhof nach der Reise ins Ausland.’ (‘I’ve been really ill again in Peterhof following the trip abroad.’)
Within weeks of their return, the Tsar had seen Rasputin at Peterhof. He wrote in his diary, 15th August: ‘Went for a walk just before tea. Read until dinner. In the evening had a long talk with Grigory.’ The Tsarina wrote to her husband from the Crimea: ‘Sweet treasure mine, my huzy, dearly beloved one, God bless and keep you. G’s [Grigory’s] prayers watch over you on your journey, into his keeping I give you over.’
The girls had begun to share their most intimate secrets with Rasputin. In December, Olga wrote about a boy, called Nikolai, on whom she had developed a crush: ‘My precious frien
d… It’s hard without you: I have no one to turn to about my worries, and there are so very many of them. Here is my torment. Nikolai is driving me crazy. I only have to go to the Sophia Cathedral and I see him and could climb the wall, my whole body shakes… I kiss your hand. Your loving Olga.’ Grigory advised an almost equally love-struck Maria, aged just ten, ‘not to dwell on him’.
Through the early months of 1910, the imperial couple were seeing Rasputin every couple of days. The Tsar wrote in his diary on 27th January: ‘After dinner I saw Grigory for half an hour’… On 3rd February: ‘We talked for a long time with Grigory.’ On 8th February: ‘We saw Grigory.’ On February 12: ‘After dinner we saw Grigory.’ On 14th February: ‘I saw Grigory.’ The following month the Tsar’s sister, Xenia, wrote exasperatedly in her diary: ‘He’s always there, goes into the nursery, visits Olga and Tatiana while they are getting ready for bed, sits there talking to them and CARESSING them.’
The fragile new alliance between Russia and Britain would soon be rattled. With all the Tsar’s talk, at the Isle of Wight, of ‘happy auguries’, the British remained distinctly unhappy about the political turmoil still plaguing the Romanovs in Russia. Georgie received intermittent news; his letter to Nicky, written in early 1910, sounds tentative and slightly condescending: ‘I am glad to see that the Duma is getting on much better now and I hope in time that it will cease to give you trouble and anxiety.’ Then, months later, on 6th May, King Edward VII died. Bertie, who had echoed his nephew with his allusions to ‘the bonds that unite the people of our two countries’, died surrounded by his wife; the Tsar’s aunt, Alexandra; his daughter, Princess Victoria; and Mrs Keppel.
The Tsar sent an almost overly effusive letter to his cousin Georgie: ‘I assure you that the sad death of your father has provoked throughout the whole of Russia a feeling of sincere grief and of warmest sympathy towards your people. God bless you, my dear old Georgie! My thoughts are always near you.’ Georgie replied warmly: ‘Yes, dearest Nicky, I hope we shall always continue our old friendship to one another, you know I never change and I have always been very fond of you.’
The cousins both paid tribute to the late King’s efforts to create links between Britain and Russia. Georgie wrote: ‘Yes indeed I know how, from the first, my dear father tried to do all he could to bring our two countries together and you may be sure that I shall show the same interest in Russia that he did.’ Benckendorff remained unconvinced by the pronouncements of the new King and was so upset by Bertie’s death that he had to go on leave. ‘There is one thing a sovereign cannot bequeath to his successor – his personal prestige,’ he wrote sorrowfully to a relation.
Other Russians shared Benckendorff’s view, not least Stolypin, who had been so impressed by Bertie at Reval. But Stolypin would see only a few months of the new King’s reign before being murdered, in a theatre in Kiev. Shortly after the murder, Lenin gave a talk, entitled ‘Stolypin and the revolution’ at the New Kings Hall, Commercial Road. The lecture marked Lenin’s last visit to London.
The Russian Foreign Minister, Izvolsky, who had enjoyed such good relations with Bertie, soon had other preoccupations. On 10th October 1910, he wrote to Lady Savile from the Hotel Mirabeau in Paris: ‘I got both your kind notes and I hope you received mine which I sent to Rufford Abbey. I intend to be in London (Hotel Ritz) on Friday next, and it will be such a pleasure to dine with you on Saturday and go to the play afterwards. I shall let you know as soon as I arrive in lond [sic]. Yours ever sincerely Izvolsky.’
Georgie and Nicky met, for one last time, in June 1913 at the wedding of the Kaiser’s daughter Victoria. Nicky journeyed to Berlin by train, accompanied by 100 policemen. Georgie wrote a fond note in his diary: ‘I had a long and satisfactory talk with dear Nicky, he was just the same as always.’ The cousins’ closeness remained a cause of consternation to the Kaiser, who was still convinced that they were plotting against him. ‘William’s ear was glued to the keyhole,’ observed Georgie.
A year later, just before the outbreak of the First World War, the British Admiral, David Beatty, anchored on HMS Lion, at Kronstadt, alongside the Standart. The imperial family came on board for lunch. ‘Never have I seen happier faces than those of the young Grand Duchesses, escorted over Lion by a band of middies especially told off for their amusement,’ wrote the Ambassador Sir George Buchanan. ‘When I think of them as I saw them that day, the tragic story of their deaths seems like some hideous nightmare.’ By chance the imperial family were on board the Standart when the news came through that Franz Ferdinand had been murdered in Sarajevo.
The Russians and the British were allies during the Great War. But there were those at the Russian court who continued to harbour resentments. The Tsar’s sister, Grand Duchess Olga, was convinced that, if the British had been less inept, the war could have been avoided altogether: ‘If the British government had made it clear from the outset that England would join Russia and France if Germany made trouble, Willy would never have dared to make a single move. But I can tell you that Count Portales, Willy’s Ambassador, told us in my own drawing room that he was convinced Britain would never enter the war.’
However, the alliance was fervently celebrated elsewhere. In December 1914, Mr Epps wrote a heartfelt letter of thanks to his former pupil, Olga, then 19, after she sent him a photograph of herself: ‘As an Englishman the gift is, if possible, more acceptable at this time, when the Russian and English people are fighting together, as allies, against a common foe. Allow me to assure Your Imperial Highness that this gift will be treasured up for all time.’
During the first years of fighting, Georgie and Nicky exchanged a series of encouraging letters. On 27th December 1915, the King wrote from Buckingham Palace with news of yet another honour for the Tsar: ‘I am anxious to appoint you a Field Marshal in my army as a mark of my affection for you…’ Nicky replied from his military headquarters at Mogilev: ‘I accept this distinction with much pleasure.’
On 5th June 1916, Nicky wrote: ‘Everybody in Russia admires the magnificent way in which the English ships fought and tackled the whole German fleet in the North Sea [the Battle of Jutland]… My best love to dear May… God bless you, my dear Georgie… ever your most loving cousin and true friend, Nicky.’ Georgie responded from Buckingham Palace: ‘I am overjoyed at the splendid advance your gallant troops are making in Galicia and in your Western Provinces; it is wonderful the number of prisoners they have taken (nearly 300,000) and many guns and machine guns… Ever your most devoted cousin and true friend, Georgie’.
But Nicky’s hold on power was slipping by the day, and revolution struck in March 1917. Civil unrest in St Petersburg could no longer be contained and the Tsar was persuaded by his advisers that he had no choice but to abdicate. Georgie sent a telegram on 6th March: ‘Events of last week have deeply depressed me. My thoughts are constantly with you. And I shall always remain your true and devoted friend as you know I have been in the past.’ It was never delivered. Later it emerged that the King had been obliged to reveal the telegram’s content to the Prime Minister, Lloyd George. At a time when the new Provisional government in Russia was questioning the King’s commitment to fighting the Germans it was judged too politically sensitive for Britain to be seen to be openly supporting the former Tsar; and the British embassy in St Petersburg was ordered to make sure it never reached the palace.
Objections had also been raised on the Russian side, with the Foreign Minister insisting that the telegram would be misinterpreted as part of a ruse to help the Romanovs escape.
At that early stage, the King did certainly appear to be broadly behind the idea of the deposed Tsar and his family seeking refuge in Britain. He wrote in his diary, on 10th March: ‘Went over to Marlborough House and had a talk with mother dear [Queen Alexandra, who was also, of course, the Tsar’s aunt] about Russia and Nicky; she is very much upset about it all.’ The next day he wrote: ‘Michael [the Russian Grand Duke Michael Mikhailovich] came and we discussed the idea of poor Nicky comin
g to England.’
The British government issued a formal offer of asylum towards the end of March, and there was a period when the Romanovs could have left Russia and come to Britain. The Tsar’s nephew, Prince Dmitri, certainly believed that the new provisional government would have been happy to let them go, writing in an unpublished memoir: ‘Alexander Kerensky [the provisional government leader] was willing to allow them to leave and in fact keen that they should. A British cruiser was standing ready at Murmansk, but at the last minute Lloyd George decided against the evacuation.’
In fact, in the end, it was not Lloyd George but the Tsar’s ‘true friend’ and dear cousin, Georgie, who took the fateful decision. The King had fallen under the influence of his jittery private secretary, Lord Stamfordham, becoming increasingly anxious about a growing republican movement. In his former incarnation as Sir Arthur Bigge, it had been Stamfordham, who had been so put out by the ‘Russian occupation’ of Balmoral in 1896. Now, in 1917, he took it upon himself to keep the deposed Tsar at bay, judging him a threat to the stability of the British nation.
The Imperial Tea Party Page 17
