Alapaev’s martyrs are eight people (six Romanovs and two of their close associates) who were murdered criminally by the Bolsheviks on July 18, 1918. These are brothers, princes of imperial blood Konstantinovich (John, Konstantin and Igor), Vladimir Paley, Sergey Vladimirovich, the sister of the empress Elizaveta Fedorovna, as well as the nun Varvara and the assistant to one of the princes Fedor Remez. All of them were deprived of life the next night after the execution of the royal family of Nicholas II.
Link of the Romanovs to the Urals
Immediately after coming to power, the Bolsheviks set about isolating the former royal family. The inhabitants are best known for the tragic fate of Nicholas II, his wife and children. However, even after the two revolutions in Russia, there were many Romanovs who, in addition to the family of the renounced crown bearer. In early 1918, the Soviet government was in turmoil. The war with Germany continued, and German units were already approaching the two capitals. In this alarming situation, the Bolshevik leaders decided to forcibly exile the Romanovs inland so that they could not rally the counter-revolution around themselves.
At the end of March 1918, almost all Alapaevsk martyrs were sent to Vyatka. These were the princes Konstantin, Igor and John Konstantinovich, Vladimir Pavlovich, as well as Sergei Mikhailovich. Soon all of them were transferred to Yekaterinburg. The fate of the exiles was controlled by the local Ural Bolsheviks, who received direct instructions from the government in Moscow and Petrograd.
The arrest of the Grand Duchess
In May 1918, Grand Duchess Elizaveta Fedorovna was arrested at the Mother See by order of Dzerzhinsky by a detachment of Latvian shooters and Chekists. The sister of Empress Alexandra was detained in the Martha-Mariinsky monastery founded by her. Elizaveta Fedorovna spent all her money on the creation of this monastery after in 1905 a terrorist killed her husband, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich.
The arrest came on the third day of Easter. Half an hour before the appearance of Latvian shooters, the monastery was visited by the newly elected Patriarch Tikhon. He tried to achieve the release of the Grand Duchess, however, in spite of everything, Elizaveta Fedorovna, together with her cellwoman Varvara Yakovleva, was sent to Yekaterinburg. She was the last free representative of the former reigning house. The concentration of the Romanovs in the Urals was a planned action. The Bolshevik leadership sought to send them to one place so that, if necessary, it was easier to control the fate of the members of the dynasty.
Way to Alapaevsk
On April 30, Nicholas II, his wife and one of her daughters, Maria, were brought to Yekaterinburg. Two weeks later, the remaining members of the monarch's family arrived in the city. The Bolsheviks feared too many Romanovs in the city and decided to resettle them. On May 20, the Alapaevsk martyrs arrived in Alapaevsk, located 146 kilometers from Yekaterinburg.
In 1918, it was a 10,000th town with 200 years of history. The settlement became one of the first-born of the Ural metallurgy of Peter I. Alapaevsk was even somewhat older than Yekaterinburg. Most of all he was known for the branded roofing iron produced at the local factory. The city was connected with Yekaterinburg and Nizhny Tagil by rail.
Telegrams to Moscow
The exiles were placed in a school on the outskirts of the city. At first, they enjoyed relative freedom - they could walk around Alapaevsk, go to church, correspond, and not worry about their safety. The Romanovs often rested in the garden, broken up near the school, where they liked to drink tea. The deeply religious Grand Duchess Elizabeth Fedorovna prayed a lot.
Men treated their position with a certain relaxation. Young princes Konstantinovich and Vladimir Paley were not particularly discouraged. The alarm was only struck by Sergei Mikhailovich. Before being expelled to Alapaevsk, he sent a disgruntled telegram addressed to Lenin and Sverdlov. In the message, the Grand Duke complained about his rheumatism and harsh climate, asking him to transfer him to Vyatka or Vologda. His telegram was ignored.
Check out Elena Petrovna
The last months of their lives, the Alapaevsk martyrs spent in the school building, which consisted of two small and four large rooms. They were connected by a common corridor. In addition to the Romanovs, the school housed duty guards from among the Red Army soldiers.
The corner room was occupied by John Konstantinovich and his wife Elena Petrovna. She was the daughter of the Serbian king Peter I. Since Elena Petrovna was not Romanova, the Bolsheviks did not arrest her. The wife voluntarily went into exile following her husband. Shortly before the end of the Alapaev tragedy, she went to Moscow to work on the release of the Romanovs.
On July 7, Elena Petrovna was arrested in Yekaterinburg. She did not share her husband’s fate only thanks to the Serbian embassy, ​​which connected diplomatic levers of pressure on the Soviet government. After the death of her husband, Elena Petrovna in a state of psychoneurosis was returned to Moscow. Soon she left Russia.
Tighter content
On the night of June 13, 1918, the Bolsheviks killed Mikhail Alexandrovich, who was serving a link to Perm. The reprisal was covered by the myth of the attempt of the younger brother of Nicholas II to flee. Soon the echo of Perm events reached the other Romanovs. Alapaevskie martyrs were under even greater supervision. The regime of their content was tightened an order of magnitude. The Romanovs confiscated all personal belongings: clothes, money, gold. The prisoners were left with only dresses, removable underwear sets and shoes. Correspondence and walks around the city were banned, the ration was significantly reduced.
Sudden searches became commonplace. The situation of the Romanovs in Alapaevsk developed according to the same scenario as in the last days of the life of Mikhail Alexandrovich and Nicholas II. If before the guard behaved quite correctly, now she has become harsh and rude. Until that moment, their lackeys were with the great princes, and nuns accompanied Elizabeth Fedorovna. This retinue was ordered to leave Alapaevsk.
The shooting of the family of Nicholas II
The murder of Mikhail Alexandrovich was the first in a series of murders of the Romanovs organized by the Bolsheviks. Soon after the death of the Grand Duke, the day came for the execution of the royal family. Nicholas II and his relatives were kept in the house of Ipatiev. On the night of July 17, 1918, the crowned family was sent to the basement, where the firing squad opened fire on it. Before this, commandant Yakov Yurovsky managed to read out the death sentence. According to scattered memoirs of the participants of that scene, Nikolai only managed to ask: “What?” or "A?" The tsar did not understand what was happening, and the next second Yurovsky gave the command, and the shooters opened fire.
The Romanov children did not die immediately. It is believed that the last Tsarevich Alexei died. Employees of the Cheka for greater certainty finished off their victims with bayonets. Even before the execution, specially prepared trucks arrived at the Ipatiev’s house , into which the bodies were loaded. They were buried outside the city. That night, the Alapaevsk martyrs were still alive. The Bolsheviks made a decision about their fate the next day.
Mine killing
The Grand Dukes did not know about the murder of Mikhail Alexandrovich and his older brother. The day of the execution of the royal family in Alapaevsk passed, as usual. On the night of July 18, people arrived at the school building, where the Romanovs were kept, announcing the need to urgently go to a safe place because of the threat of an air raid (there was a Civil War). Women did everything that was demanded of them. Romanov tied his hands and blindfolded. For exiles prepared special carts. In the men's company, everything went not so smoothly. Prince Sergei Mikhailovich refused to obey. He was shot in the arm and forced to board the crew. The brothers Konstantinovich and Vladimir Paley showed no resistance.
The carts with the Romanovs went outside the city. The place of their fateful stop was the Lower Selimskaya mine. Bound prisoners led to a descent into one of the abandoned mines. Further interpretations of events diverge. According to one version, the Romanovs were killed and thrown into the slaughter already dead. On the other hand, the prisoners were stunned with the ax butt and only then pushed into the abyss. It is known for certain that the mine was thrown with grenades. After that, the hole was heaped up with logs and covered with earth.
Kolchak's investigation
The circumstances of the death of the Romanovs (both in the Alapaevsky mine and in the Ipatiev’s house) are known thanks to the whites who briefly established power in the Urals during the Civil War. In October 1918, the Bolsheviks lost control of Yekaterinburg. On the fact of the death of members of the royal family, a case was instituted. Admiral Alexander Kolchak took the investigation under his personal control.
Soon they managed to find the participants in the murder near Alapaevsk. One of them turned out to be the Bolshevik Vasily Ryabov, who gave valuable evidence for the investigation. They dug up the mine. The condition of the corpses showed that not all the martyrs of the Alapaev mine died right away. So, the body of Vladimir Paley was in a sitting position. Prince John Konstantinovich was bandaged by part of the Apostle Elizabeth Feodorovna. In addition, in the surrounding villages there were rumors for a long time that after the massacre in the area of ​​the abandoned mine, muffled sounds of prayers were heard.
The myth of the abduction of princes
The Ural Bolsheviks decided to cover up their crime by throwing misinformation. The day after Prince Konstantin Konstantinovich and the other Romanovs disappeared, the whole Alapaevsk was informed of the abduction of the exiled by the White Guards. The same version was defended in a telegram sent by the local executive committee to Yekaterinburg.
Based on this information, a message was built for Sverdlov, Uritsky and Zinoviev. Soon, the Bolshevik vertical formulated an official point of view about what happened. It was reported that the White Guards not only abducted the Romanovs, but also killed one of the guards. For a visual re-enactment, a corpse of an unknown was left near the school, who had been lying in the undead for some time. After the "disappearance" of the Romanovs, the Red Army, according to a pre-compiled plan, opened fire and raised the alarm, simulating an attack by the White Guards. A month later, the Soviet government conducted an investigation into this episode, which, of course, yielded no results.
The fate of the remains
In June 1919, the Red Army launched a counterattack on Yekaterinburg. The Russian Orthodox Church decided to send coffins with the remains of the Romanovs found in the Alapaevsky mine to the east. When it became clear that the Civil War was lost, they were transported to China. Coffins were buried in a Beijing temple. After the Second World War, the Communists came to power in the Middle Kingdom. The abbots of the temple walled up the remains so that their traces were finally lost. The Russian churches of the Russian Orthodox Church were soon destroyed. Already in the newest era, Russian experts came to Beijing specifically to find the remains of the Romanovs, but all attempts ended in nothing.
During her lifetime, Elizaveta Fedorovna said that she wanted to be buried in the Holy Land. Therefore, in 1920, her remains were transported from Beijing to Palestine. The assistant to the Grand Duchess - the venerable martyr nun Varvara - also found her last peace in Jerusalem.
Canonization
In 1981, those killed in a mine near Alapaevsk were canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church abroad. For a long time there was a question about a similar procedure in the homeland. The Russian Orthodox Church ranked only two Alapaevsk martyrs (Elizaveta Fedorovna and nun Varvara) as saints. Canonization occurred in 1992, after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Rehabilitation
The late official point of view of the USSR regarding the fate of the murdered Romanovs was that their death was the result of the arbitrariness of the Ural Bolsheviks and workers. Throughout its existence, the Soviet government refused to recognize the fact that the killings in Alapaevsk, Perm and Yekaterinburg were initiated at the very top of state power. Modern research and disclosed documents have shown that the Romanov issue was decided personally by Lenin and Sverdlov.
Prince Igor Konstantinovich and other victims near Alapaevsk were not rehabilitated for a long time. The process of returning their good name began when the head of the Romanov family, Maria Vladimirovna, filed a corresponding application with the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation. The official decision on rehabilitation was made by this department on June 8, 2009. In the message of the Prosecutor General’s Office, it was noted that the Romanovs and their entourage were victims of a Cheka crime.