Life and tragic death forever tied the family of the last Russian emperor and a very solid and faithful, as if carved from a single block, such a person as Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich. The House of Romanov, which has existed for four hundred years, perceives power as a heavy burden and serving national unity and is ready to work for the good of the Motherland.
The childhood of the Grand Duke
The father of Sergei Mikhailovich was the son of Emperor Nicholas I Mikhail Nikolaevich. He was appreciated as a major military leader and a very capable administrator. For 22 years he was the governor of the Caucasus. This post was both responsible and dangerous. But Mikhail Nikolaevich managed to conquer Chechnya, Dagestan, the Western Caucasus and put an end to the endless war. Mother, Olga Fedorovna, Princess of Baden, was the niece of Elizabeth I Alekseevna, who herself grew up in Spartan conditions. The family had 7 children.
In the photo Olga Fedorovna with her son Sergei. She raised children in unconditional admiration for her father. Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich was born on the estate of Borzh in 1869 and was baptized in honor of the Monk Sergius of Radonezh. Father and mother strictly treated the children, raising them with the ability to endure the hardships that could meet in the military service for which they had been trained since childhood. Their grandfather Nicholas I, who slept on a soldier’s bed and was covered with an overcoat, was clearly taken as a model. The sons had narrow iron beds, instead of spring mattresses there were boards on which the symbolic thinnest mattress was laid. The rise was at six in the morning. Tardiness was not allowed. Then read the prayers, kneeling, and a cold bath. Breakfast was the simplest - tea, bread, butter.
Study
Initially, Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, like his brothers, received home education for eight years. He studied the Law of God, the history of Orthodoxy and other faiths, the history of Russia, Western European countries, America and Asia. Mandatory classes were mathematics, geography, languages and music. Due to an error in a foreign word, a punishment followed - deprivation of sweets, in mathematics - an hour-long kneeling in a corner. In addition, Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich mastered the use of firearms, fencing and even a bayonet attack. Horseback riding was an integral part of training. From seven to fifteen, Sergei Mikhailovich and his brothers lived under Strelna in five rooms of the Grand Ducal Palace on the high bank of the Gulf of Finland. Such education and training determined the future direction of Sergei Mikhailovich - military service. Able to mathematics, loving everything in accuracy from an early age, he chose the Mikhailovsky Artillery School in 1885. In this he very pleased his father, who himself had the education of an artilleryman.
Journey
In the years 1890-1891, when Sergei Mikhailovich was a little over twenty years old, he, along with his brother Alexander Mikhailovich, a naval officer, traveled on the Tamara yacht to the Indian Ocean, visited Batavia and Bombay. It was in India that Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich learned about the sudden death of his mother from a heart attack. Even a young woman could not endure the morganatic marriage of her son Mikhail with Countess Merenberg, Pushkin’s granddaughter.
Service
In 1889, S. M. Romanov graduated from the artillery school with the rank of second lieutenant. The service quickly and successfully grew.
Almost every three years he was promoted for his zeal. In 1904, before us was Major General Sergei Mikhailovich. The Grand Duke at the same time as a new rank was enlisted in the retinue of His Majesty. Sergei Mikhailovich made a lot of efforts to create modern artillery, to upgrade it in the Russian army, to train young artillerymen, both lower and higher ranks. The quality of the gunners' training with him sharply increased.
Participation in coronation events
In May 1896, on a fine day, Sergei Mikhailovich took part in coronation ceremonies in Moscow. On the occasion of fine weather, the Grand Duke proceeded to the Khodynka field in an open carriage with the Grand Duchess.
Among the military ranks he greeted at the entrance to the church of St. Sergius of Radonezh, members of the imperial family.
Fiery passion
The prima ballerina of the Imperial Mariinsky Theater M.F. Kshesinskaya was an extremely purposeful and strong-willed woman. Flirty to the bone, she relied on sexuality. Manipulation of men, driving them crazy managed her easily.
In his youth, Sergei Mikhailovich Romanov fell in love with her. In 1894, the Grand Duke presented the twenty-two-year-old beauty with a summer house in Strelna, not far from his family estate Mikhailovskoye. At this summer cottage, Sergei Mikhailovich spent five years with his Malech, living in a family manner. But life with a notorious yoke was not easy. At the same time, she had an affair with Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich. She assigned roles in such a way that Sergey Mikhailovich paid all her bills and defended her interests in front of the theater authorities. If Matilda Feliksovna wanted to appear in diamonds and sapphires, although such jewelry did not fit the costume in the role, it was still done the way the incomparable ballerina wanted. She needed Vladimir Alexandrovich to ensure a solid position in society.
Birth of a son
In 1902, she gave birth to a son, who was named Vladimir in baptism, he received the patronymic of Sergeevich, and the surname Krasinsky and the title of a hereditary nobleman were granted to him by the emperor himself. Sergei Mikhailovich wanted to adopt a boy, although the child was completely different from him. However, Matilda Feliksovna pondered. She had other plans. In the meantime, Sergei Mikhailovich was happy to educate the little boy and did not complain about fate, although Matilda Feliksovna had already practically excommunicated him, carried away by the young prince Andrey.
And meanwhile, Sergei Mikhailovich was forbidden to look at other women, but allowed herself to make gifts. The Grand Duke changed character, he became withdrawn and did not attend social events. Twenty-five years of boundless love and forgiveness - is this not the true feeling that came to Sergei Mikhailovich. Volodya, whom he considered his son, on the day of sixteen, already being a prisoner in Alapaevsk, he sent a congratulatory telegram. And the young man sincerely loved him as a native.
After the abdication of the emperor
In the summer of 1917, Kshesinskaya, fleeing, escaped from the revolutionary Petrograd to Kislovodsk. S.M. Romanov remained in it to settle the affairs of the woman he loved.
He wanted to equip a hiding place in her mansion. Too late in the revolutionary city, trying to smuggle jewelry across the English embassy and put them in the name of Vladimir, which he failed, the Grand Duke was arrested in the spring of 1918.
Martyrdom
First, Romanov Sergey Mikhailovich, along with other great princes, was exiled to Vyatka. Then a month later they are sent to Yekaterinburg. Judging by the reviews, he was very democratic about the new government. This was reported by V.P. Anichkov, the bank manager who played with him in the evenings in preference.
At the end of May 1918, all the great princes were transferred to Alapaevsk. At first they were allowed to walk around the city, and the inhabitants communicated with them lovingly. But a month later tight control was established over everyone, and guards were placed. The number of products decreased, and Sergei Mikhailovich protested against such treatment. But secretly, on the night of July 18, they were loaded onto a train under the pretext that they would transport everyone to a safe place. However, they were brought to the mines. Sergei Mikhailovich, having felt the crime, began to resist and was killed. His last thought was about his beloved Male, whose
gold medallion he held in his hand. The rest were thrown alive into the mines, where they perished like true martyrs.
So, tragically, as a result of bloody terror, Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich Romanov ended his life. A biography that began with severe trials as a child, and continued with a half-split love for a windy coquette, ended at forty-eight. He was too young to die, but life decreed otherwise.