Who would be interested in some kind of princess Dolgorukova (how many princesses were there in Russia?), If not for the great love that intertwined her fate with the life of Emperor Alexander II? Not a favorite who would turn the Emperor as she wanted, Ekaterina Mikhailovna became his only love, created a family for him, which he passionately loved and protected.
First meeting
Princess E. M. Dolgorukova was born in 1847 in the Poltava region. There, in the estate of her parents, when she was not yet twelve years old, she first saw the emperor. Not only that, he honored the girl with a walk and a long conversation.
And the forty-year-old adult did not get bored in the company of a child, but he was entertained by the ease of communication. Later, two years later, learning about the distressing financial situation of Prince Dolgorukov, he helped to ensure that both sons of the prince were educated by the military, and that both princes were assigned to the Smolny Institute.
Second meeting
Ekaterina Mikhailovna, Princess Dolgorukova, while studying in Smolny, received a good education. The Institute of Noble Maidens taught languages, secular manners, home economics, music, dancing, drawing, and very little time was devoted to history, geography, and literature. On the eve of Easter in 1865, the emperor visited Smolny, and when he was introduced to the seventeen-year-old princess, he remembered her, oddly enough, but even more strange that he did not forget her in the future.
And the girl was in the prime of her youthful and innocent beauty.
Third meeting
After graduating from the Institute of Noble Maidens, Ekaterina Mikhailovna lived in the house of her brother Mikhail. She loved to walk around the Summer Garden and dream that she would meet Alexander II in it. And her dream came true. They met by chance, and the emperor gave her a lot of compliments. She, of course, was embarrassed, but from that time they began to walk together. And there it was not far from the words of love. While the novel was developing platonically, Ekaterina Mikhailovna more deeply comprehended her position and flatly refused to get married: every young woman seemed uninteresting to her.
And the girl decided her fate herself. She wanted to make a lonely person happy, like the Sovereign.
Family of Alexander II
Empress Maria Alexandrovna was a cold and dry person at home. Alexander Nikolaevich did not have a warm family hearth. Everything was strictly regulated. He had not a wife, but the Sovereign, not children - but the Grand Dukes. Etiquette was strictly observed in the family, and liberties were not allowed. The case of the eldest son Tsesarevich Nikolay dying of tuberculosis in Nice is terrifying. The patient's time for daytime sleep changed, and Maria Fyodorovna stopped visiting him, since during his wakefulness she had walks on schedule. Was such a family needed for a middle-aged man who wanted warmth? The death of the heir, with whom he was close, was a huge blow for the emperor.
Secret family
Open and challenging public opinion, which later developed not in her favor, Ekaterina Mikhailovna Dolgorukova surrounded the aging but still full of strength and ideas of the Sovereign with warmth and affection. When their relationship began, she was eighteen, and her lover was thirty years older.
But nothing but the need to hide from others did not overshadow their relationship. Maria Fedorovna, a patient with tuberculosis, did not get up, and the whole Romanov family expressed an extremely negative attitude towards the young woman, especially the heir, Tsesarevich Alexander. He himself had a very strong and friendly family, and he refused to accept and understand his father's behavior. He so clearly expressed his dislike that Alexander II sent his wife, for whom he considered Ekaterina Dolgorukaya, first to Naples, and then to Paris. It was in Paris in 1867 that their meetings continued. But not a single step of the emperor went unnoticed. He was watched by the
French police. Their extensive correspondence, full of genuine passion, has survived to this day. Ekaterina Mikhailovna Dolgorukova was an ardent lover and did not skimp on gentle words. Apparently, all this was missing from Alexander Nikolaevich in his frozen and shackled official family.
Ekaterina Mikhailovna Dolgorukova and Alexander the 2nd
The one that the Tsar immediately promised at the first opportunity to make his married wife had to show female patience and wisdom. She humbly waited for this happy day for her fourteen years. He and Alexander had four children during this time, but one of his sons, Boris, died as a baby. The rest grew up, and the daughters got married, and the son George became a soldier, but died at the age of forty-one, having outlived his crowned father for many years.
Morganatic Wedding
The empress had not yet died when Alexander Nikolaevich moved his family to Zimny and settled right above Maria Fedorovna’s chambers. They whispered in the palace. When Maria Fyodorovna died in 1880, before the official mourning ended, after less than three months, a modest, almost secret wedding took place. Five months later, Ekaterina Mikhailovna was granted the title of Most Serene Princess Yuryevskaya, their children also began to bear this name. Alexander Nikolaevich was distinguished by fearlessness, but he was afraid of attempted life, for he did not know how this would affect the Yurievsky family. Over 3 million rubles were put in the name of the princess and her children, and five months later he was killed by the Volunteers. Ekaterina Mikhailovna, completely heartbroken, took his last breath.
Nice existence
She was recommended to leave the country, and she and her children went to the south coast of France.
At the villa, the Most Serene Princess lived with memories. She kept all the clothes of her beloved, right down to her housecoat, wrote a book of memoirs and died in 1922, forty-one years after the death of her beloved husband and lover. At 33, she lost her husband, and for the rest of her life was true to his memory.
This concludes the description of the life spent by Ekaterina Mikhailovna Dolgorukova. Her biography is both happy and bitter at the same time.