The last emperor of Russia, Tsar Nicholas II, was customarily called "Bloody" in official Soviet historiography. There were two main reasons for this. Firstly, Bloody Sunday of January 1905, when a procession to the Winter Palace was misunderstood or provoked by gunshots. The second reason is the Khodynka disaster of 1896. This tragedy remained in popular memory in the form of a common verbal cliché, although not everyone knows its circumstances. “Khodynka” - even today they sometimes talk about an inconceivable crowd and a crush.
Coronation
The Khodynka disaster occurred during celebrations dedicated to the wedding of Nikolai Alexandrovich Romanov to the kingdom. The ceremony itself took place on May 14 and was accompanied by a certain ominous sign. The scene was the Assumption Cathedral in the Moscow Kremlin. The autocrat was young, but the service for him was very tiring. The day turned out to be hot, the temple was stuffy, and the robes adopted in such cases differ from everyday ones in special splendor. In general, according to the memoirs of Hegumen Seraphim, the 28-year-old monarch simply became ill, he stumbled, almost fell, even lost consciousness for a short while. This can happen to everyone, but in this context, this fact, which was subsequently compared with the circumstances of the reign, was perceived as cliché.
The crowned couple went to Ilyinskoye to spend the night after the exhausting ritual of coronation, to the Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich and his wife Elizaveta Fedorovna, and when they woke up, the couple were glad that all the ceremonies were left behind, and now you can live peacefully, doing government affairs. The celebrations were to take place for a long time, until May 26, but the tsar did not need to participate directly in them. However, the joy turned out to be premature: only three days later there was a disaster on the Khodynka field.
Celebration Plan
Nikolai Alexandrovich sincerely dreamed of becoming a people's king, from the very beginning of his reign he wanted to make life easier for ordinary people and increase their well-being. The beginning of his reign was traditionally preceded by a manifesto, which outlined the principles of domestic and foreign policy. The people were promised (and at that time it was tantamount to fulfillment) a reduction in the tax burden, forgiveness of arrears and other favorable measures of an economic nature. In particular, at the expense of the budget, debts of subjects of one hundred billion rubles were paid. Given the then purchasing power of the Russian currency, you can see that it was a lot of money, comparable to the sum of the annual national product of a large developed country. And on my own behalf, Romanov added a lot for general needs - a five-digit figure in gold rubles.
Fateful nodule
Large-scale tax reforms, which subsequently led to the acceleration of economic growth in the empire, did not exclude simple joys. “For dessert”, it was planned to give out four hundred thousand beautiful gift knots in which gingerbread, lollipops, nuts, sausage, polar cod and a beautiful mug made using the latest technology of the time were put. It was iron (and therefore unbreakable, eternal) and covered with hardened enamel, decorated with a double-headed eagle and a royal monogram.
Who could have imagined that because of this pleasant gift set in all respects, which no one would have refused today, a real tragedy will happen, the Khodynka catastrophe?
Preparing for the holiday and breaking the plan
Later, analyzing the causes of deaths, many historians claimed that the celebrations were poorly prepared and organized. In a sense, this is true, because the mournful outcome speaks for itself. The Khodynka catastrophe led to the fact that in just a quarter of an hour 1389 people were crushed and trampled to death, another 2690 were injured of varying severity. But there were circumstances mitigating the guilt of the organizers. They cannot be convicted of complete inaction, and the transience of the tragedy precluded the possibility of interference. Established fences and dug trenches had to limit the movement of people; police were enough to monitor order in the city. True, there were no troops. The experience of holding such events that took place thirteen years ago (then Alexander III was crowned) did not indicate any special dangers, then everything went quietly and peacefully, people stood in line, received gifts and parted.
The Khodynka disaster of 1896 occurred due to an absurd combination of circumstances. One of the managers of one of the one hundred and fifty distribution tents began to distribute sets to their friends, without waiting for the indicated hour, and even several in one hand. People (some of them were drinking), gathered on the Khodynsky field since the evening, noticed this and were indignant. Then the perpetrators tried to correct the mistake and began to issue sets ahead of time. The order was broken, the crush began.
Effects
The Khodynka disaster threw the newly crowned monarch into confusion. The situation was aggravated by the fact that just that day an important foreign policy meeting was scheduled with the Ambassador of France, it was being prepared in advance, and its cancellation could cause diplomatic complications. The king and his wife had to go to Montebello and attend the ball after the reception. In the future, the liberal press inflated this fact as a manifestation of a kind of “fun” of the monarch’s couple at the time of people's grief. No, Nicholas II did not forget about people, but placed Russian interests above personal emotions. Of course, the Khodynka catastrophe was perceived by him as a personal tragedy, and immediately after the execution of diplomatic protocols he went to investigate its circumstances. The trial was righteous and quick. Here are its results:
- The chief of police is dismissed, the responsible persons are held accountable. The circumstances were unforeseen, but everything should have been foreseen.
- Families of the victims received a thousand rubles.
- The funeral in individual graves was made at public expense.
- Orphaned children are placed in the royal shelter.
- All circumstances of the case are made public.
The survivors themselves deserve special words. None of them blamed the authorities for what happened. They only blamed themselves and their greed.