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Our Reading Guide for I Was Anastasia by Ariel Lawhon includes Book Club Discussion Questions, Book Reviews, Plot Summary-Synopsis and Author Bio.

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I Was Anastasia has 5,806 ratings and 1,221 reviews. Crumb said: This book, for me, was mediocre. The history behind this story was fascinating, but the ...

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It's been almost 100 years since Russia's last royal family was brutally executed, bringing an end to the three-century-old Romanov dynasty, and the lives and deaths of the Romanov family still fascinate the world.

Thanks to the quick thinking of a friend, intimate family pictures were rescued after the family met their tragic end.

Many of the images, shot between 1915 and 1916, were taken by Tsar Nicholas II himself and coloured in by his third daughter, Maria.

Within a year of the most recent photos, the family were dead, murdered on Lenin's orders as the Russian revolution swept across the country.

Prince Alexei, seen here with his father Tsar Nicholas II, was the only male child and heir to the throne.

After 300 years of rule, the Romanov reign ended in 1917 following the Bolshevik revolution, when Tsar Nicholas II gave up his crown.

The family was exiled to the city of Yekaterinburg and held captive by the Ural Soviets.

Fearing a rescue from the family's supporters, Bolshevik executioners killed the tsar, his family, and four of his staff via firing squad on 17 July 1918.

The Romanov family, including Maria, Olga, Tatiana and Alexei, during a day at the beach

Though DNA testing confirmed the identities of the rest of the Romanov family in the mass grave, the mysterious second burial fuelled speculation that the two bodies did not belong to the missing children.

The public had a "romantic idea that someone perhaps survived and made their way out of Russia."

Empress Alexandra, grand-daughter of Queen Victoria, and Tatiana, her second-eldest child.

In 2009, DNA evidence showed that the remains of a boy and girl, found in 2007 in a grave in Yekaterinburg, Russia, belong to Crown Prince Alexei and one of his sisters.

The children were buried together a few kilometres from a mass grave where the bones of their three sisters and parents, Tsar Nicholas II Romanov and his wife, Tsarina Alexandra, were found in 1991.

Tsar Nicholas II and his youngest daughter, Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna, visit troops injured in World War I.

All images are from the Beinecke Library. More images from the photo albums can be viewed on Flickr.

Tsar Nicholas II and his four daughters (Maria, Anastasia, Olga and Tatiana)

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The Most Haunting Photos of the Romanovs

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It's been almost 100 years since Russia's last royal family was brutally executed, bringing an end to the three-century-old Romanov dynasty, and the lives and deaths of the Romanov family still fascinate the world. Thanks to the quick thinking of a friend, intimate family pictures were rescued after the family met their tragic end.

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1894- Tsar Alexander III dies, leaving the throne to his son, Nicholas II November 15, 1895- Olga is born 1896, May 14- Tsar Nicholas II and Tsarina Alexandra Foedorovna are coronated June 10,1897-...

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Genealogy of the Romanov Tsars and Emperors of Russia

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Did you know that during the reign of the Russian Czars, Russia had become a European superpower? Czar (also spelled as tsar) literally means an emperor or a male monarch. It was the imperial title of Russian rulers, who ruled Russia from 16th century until the Bolshevik revolution in 1917. The title Czar is derived from the Latin word Caesar, the title of Roman emperors. Czar also means a person having great power.

Last Updated: May 31, 2018

In earlier times, the rulers of Russian were known as Grand Princes of Moscow, Grand Princes of Vladimir, Grand Princes of Kiev, etc. The House of Romanov is the most popular dynasty in Russia. But, the use of the title, 'Czar' dates back to nearly 50 years before the Romanov emperors ascended the throne.

Ivan IV (popularly known as Ivan, the Terrible) was the first Russian ruler to assume the title of Czar in 1547. He belonged to the House of Rurik and reigned from 1547-1584. He was an authoritarian and a ruthless ruler. Ivan IV is infamous for killing his own son in a fit of rage. He died in 1584, leaving his worthless second son Feodor, as heir to the throne. The time of troubles began in Russia, after Ivan IVth's death. The country was torn by civil war, unrest and famines.

From 1721 onwards, the Russian Czar was proclaimed Emperor of All Russia. Czar Peter I became the first Emperor of All Russia. Czar Peter, popularly known as Peter the Great, was the founder of modern Russia. He transformed Russia into a great European empire. During the reign of Catherine the Great, the Russian empire expanded and improved in administration.

Czar Alexander II abolished serfdom in 1861. But, he was assassinated. His son Czar Alexander III, in order to avenge his father's murder, imposed strict and ruthless laws. The monarchy in Russia collapsed due to Czar Nicholas II failed to take action even in extreme conditions.

Timeline of Russian Czars

Reign Name of the Monarch (Czar)

1613-1645

Czar Mikhail Feodorovich, founder of the Romanov dynasty

1645-1676

Czar Alexei Mikhailovich

1676-1682

Czar Feodor Alexeevich

1682-1696

Czar Ivan V (joint ruler with Peter I, the Great)

1696-1725

Czar Peter I, the Great, Emperor of All Russia

1725-1727

Catherine I, Empress of All Russia

1727-1730

Peter II, Emperor of All Russia

1730-1740

Anna Ivanovna, Empress of All Russia

1740-1741

Ivan VI, Emperor of All Russia

1741-1761

Elizabeth, Empress of All Russia

1761-1762

Peter III, Emperor of All Russia

1762-1796

Catherine II, the Great, Empress of All Russia

1796-1801

Paul I, Emperor of All Russia

1801-1825

Alexander I, Emperor of All Russia

1825-1855

Nicholas I, Emperor of All Russia

1855-1881

Alexander II, Emperor of All Russia

1881-1894

Alexander III, Emperor of All Russia

1894-1917

Nicholas II, Emperor of All Russia

Nicholas II was the last Czar of Russia. He was not an able ruler due to inconsistency in his decisions and actions. He was under great influence of his wife Czarina Alexandra, and his corrupt ministers.

A monk named Rasputin influenced the Czarina and manipulated most of the Czar's decisions. Russia faced military as well as economic losses during the First World War. There was rising discontent due to the Czar's reluctance to undertake immediate action.

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A Glance at the Troubled History and Timeline of Russian Czars

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Did you know that during the reign of the Russian Czars, Russia had become a European superpower? Czar (also spelled as tsar) literally means an emperor or a male monarch. It was the imperial title of Russian rulers, who ruled Russia from 16th century until the Bolshevik revolution in 1917.

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On July 17, 1918, after three centuries, the Romanov ruling dynasty fell, ending in the chaos of violence and cruelty. The Russian Tsar Nicholas II, his wife, Tsarina Alexandra, and their five children, Duchess Olga, Duchess Maria, Duchess Tatiana, Duchess Anastasia, and the young Tsarevitch Alexei, were brutally executed by a firing squad in a basement in Ekaterinburg.

Their bodies were immediately buried in the nearby forest, but it didn't take long before rumors started spreading that some of the Romanovs survived. Some of the stories centered on Alexei or Marie, but most of them suggested that Anastasia, the youngest of the tsar's daughters, might have somehow gotten away.

Two years later, in 1920, in Berlin, a woman was seen standing on the edge of a bridge and a few seconds later, she jumped into the river, attempting to take her own life. Her suicide attempt failed, as police officers pulled her from the Landwehr Canal and took her to Dalldorf Asylum.

The unknown woman had neither ID papers nor did she explain who she was. She refused to talk and remained silent in the asylum for the following six months. In the next two years of her stay, the patient was given the name Anna Anderson and was noted as being anti-social with peculiar scars on her body. On the few occasions that she spoke, she had a strange accent.

One day a fellow inmate told the woman that she thought she resembled Grand Duchess Anastasia. Later, when it was clear she was too short, other mental patients wondered if the mysterious woman was Anastasia.

At the same time, the European press had already been publishing stories about the strange case of the Romanov siblings and their possible survival. The word began spreading, motivating former Romanov friends and servants to visit the woman and confirm her identity.

A few of them were convinced that she was Anastasia, however key people said she was not. Nicholas's sister, the Grand Duchess Olga, visited the hospital and later said, "I was looking at a stranger." Her mouth appeared wider than Anastasia's and other facial features were different. She didn't seem to know any Russian, although gossip had it she spoke it in her sleep.

One day, Anna Anderson was visited by Captain Nicholas von Schwabe, a former personal guard of her grandmother who brought her pictures of the Romanov family. He gave her a list of the names of the Romanov's daughters. Was it possible to recognize her name and point at it? She signaled the name Anastasia.

The press' fascination with the story of Anna Anderson grew into a cult about Princess Anastasia. This brought forward a myriad of Romanov claimants who declared themselves to be the "true" Anastasia or the tsar's other daughters. When Anderson left the hospital, she was surrounded by a herd of supporters who validated her Romanov identity, although there were many who firmly refused to accept it. Her supporters, some of them sympathetic monarchists, housed her; she was under constant surveillance by both the Soviet counterintelligence and private investigators.

Anderson frequently expressed anger if she was questioned about her background, even by her small circle of confidants. When too many questions over the verification of her identity were posed, she gave cryptic answers or cried hysterically in order to escape giving any precise account over her past as a duchess. One person who probed further into Anderson's identity was Inspector Franz Grünberg, who contacted Anastasia's aunt, Princess Irene of Prussia, and scheduled dinner for her and Anderson at his home. Irene was reluctant and, by the end of the meeting, her doubts had been proven true. Irene was introduced to Anderson with a false name and sat opposite her at the dining table. She gave no sign of recognizing her, and left the table when questioned.

Anderson justified her rude and difficult behavior as caused by the questioning of her identity. She continued changing residences, traveling among the various castles and royal homes of her supporters. In 1927, she met the son of Dr. Yevgeny Botkin, who was murdered with the Romanovs in Ekaterinburg, Gleb Botkin, who became Anderson's greatest supporter and who later provided her with an attorney.

On the other hand, the true Anastasia's relatives kept their distance. Her grandmother never met her or publically commented on the controversy, despite films and plays to the contrary. Matters grew heated when the relatives of the dead royal family fought her legal claim upon the Romanov fortune in court, a fortune that no one has ever confirmed existed after World War I. Botkin hired the attorney Edward Fallows to prove that Anderson was the Grand Duchess Anastasia, commencing the longest legal case in German history.

The turning point of this royal identity saga came with the evidence that was most certainly not in Anderson's favor - in 1927, a Berlin newspaper had run an investigative report that Anna Anderson's real name was Franziska Schanzkowska and that she was a Polish factory worker.

According to this report, Schanzkowska was hurt in a factory explosion, after which she was declared missing. The timeline of this event coincided with Anderson's arrival in Berlin, and, moreover, Schanzkowska's brother, Felix, claimed that Anderson was her sister. Anderson refused all of these claims, calmly repeating that she was Anastasia Romanov.

Anna Anderson moved to the United States, married, and lived the rest of her life there until 1984, when she died of pneumonia. Seven years later, in a forest near Ekaterinburg, five bodies were found and matched to the Romanovs. For a moment, it seemed as though the rumors were true. After all, the bodies of the young Alexei and Anastasia were missing...
Read another story from us: The turbulent life of Cassie Chadwick - the impostor who claimed to be Carnegie's illegitimate daughter
But two other sets of remains were found in the forest later on, and researchers believe these are the bodies of the two youngest children. Thanks to new technology, the case was sealed by a DNA test. Using a small sample of Anderson's intestine removed during a prior surgery and kept in a Virginia hospital for years, scientists concluded that Anderson's blood didn't match the Romanovs. Reportedly the DNA of Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth, was donated for the Romanov tests, because his mother was closely related to Czarina Alexandra.

The DNA matched that of Franziska Schanzkowska.

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Anna Anderson, the impostor of Grand Duchess Anastasia Romanov for 63 years

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On July 17, 1918, after three centuries, the Romanov ruling dynasty fell, ending in the chaos of violence and cruelty. The Russian Tsar Nicholas II, his wife, Tsarina Alexandra, and their five children, Duchess Olga, Duchess Maria, Duchess Tatiana, Duchess Anastasia, and the young Tsarevitch Alexei, were brutally executed by a firing squad in a basement in Ekaterinburg.

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Quick Facts

Name

Anastasia Romanov

Birth Date

June 18, 1901

Death Date

July 16, 1918

Place of Birth

Petrodvorets, Russia

Place of Death

Yekaterinburg, Russia

AKA

Anastasiya Nikolayevna

Anastasia Nikolaevna

Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna

Grand Duchess Anastasia

Anastasia Nikolayevna

Anastasia

Full Name

Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova

Anastasia was the daughter of the last Russian tsar, Nicholas II. After she and her family were executed, rumors claimed that she might have survived.

Synopsis

On the night of July 16-17, 1918, Anastasia and her family were executed in Yekaterinburg, Russia. Speculation arose as to whether she and her brother, Alexei Nikolaevich, might have survived. In 1991, a forensic study identified the bodies of her family members and servants, but not hers or Alexei's. A 2007 DNA test of a second grave identified her and her brother's bodies.

Early Life

Anastasia was born Anastasia Nikolaevna (or Anastasiya Nikolayevna) in Petrodvorets, Russia - a town near St. Petersburg formerly called Peterhof - on June 18, 1901. Anastasia's mother was Princess Alix of Hesse-Darmstadt, also known as Alexandra Feodorovna, who became known as Empress Alexandra after her marriage. Her father, Nicholas II, was Russia's final tsar, and part of the Romanov dynasty that had ruled the country for three centuries. Anastasia's parents married in late 1894, shortly after her grandfather, Tsar Alexander III, died of kidney disease and her father inherited the throne.

Anastasia had four siblings: three older sisters named Olga, Tatiana and Maria, and a younger brother named Alexei, who was heir to the throne.

In her younger years, Anastasia received her education from her mother, who taught the girl spelling and prayers. As she grew older, Anastasia was assigned a Swiss tutor. Anastasia and Maria were looked after by a governess, while their older sisters were cared for by their mother's lady-in-waiting.

Family's Execution

The tight-knit Romanov family lived peacefully at Tsarskoe Palace until Nicholas II generated increasing public hostility during World War I. In March of 1917 as soldiers launched a mutiny and began seizing royal property, Nicholas II agreed to abdicate the throne in hopes of preventing a Russian civil war. Anastasia and her family were then exiled to the Ural Mountains and placed under house arrest.

Unfortunately, a civil war could not be prevented. On the night of July 16-17, 1918, as Bolsheviks led by Vladimir Lenin fought to replace the imperial rule with a new Communist regime, the Romanov family was awoken and told to get dressed. On orders of the Supreme Soviet Council of Russia, Yakov Yurovsky, commandant of the Special House of Purpose, led Anastasia and her family down to a basement under the pretext that they were being protected from the impending chaos of advancing counterrevolutionaries. The family was met by a group of executioners, who opened fire on Anastasia, her parents and siblings, a few of the family's remaining servants and Anastasia's pet dog. The Romanov legacy seemed to have been silenced forever in that cold basement in Yekaterinburg, Russia.

Mystery

In the years following the Romanovs' murders, speculation arose as to whether Anastasia and her brother might have survived the execution. Rumors circulated that they were shielded from the bullets by family jewels that had been sewn into their clothing for safekeeping.

Anastasia's fate was particularly prone to these conjectures, as a number of women claiming to be the grand duchess periodically surfaced. Among the best known of these women was Anna Anderson (aka Franziska Schanzkowska), who, beginning in the early 1920s fought to prove herself the rightful claimant of Anastasia's inheritance. Anderson's suit was rejected in 1970, and the mystery of the Grand Duchess Anastasia remained unsolved.

Anastasia's dubious whereabouts inspired books, plays and movies, including an Academy Award-winning film starring legendary actress Ingrid Bergman.

In the 1970s an amateur archaeologist found a shallow grave containing the well-aged skeletons of six adults and three children. He suppressed these findings from the public until the Soviet Union collapsed in the early 1990s. A forensic investigation in 1991 identified the nine bodies as belonging to Anastasia's family members and servants, but Anastasia and her brother's bodies still appeared to be missing.

In 2007 a new DNA analysis of another grave, discovered near the first, conclusively identified Anastasia and Alexei's bodies, closing the door on nearly 90 years of mystery and speculation.

Fact Check

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Name Anastasia Romanov Birth Date June 18, 1901 Death Date July 16, 1918 Place of Birth Petrodvorets, Russia Place of Death Yekaterinburg, Russia AKA Anastasiya Nikolayevna Anastasia Nikolaevna Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna Grand Duchess Anastasia Anastasia Nikolayevna Anastasia Full Name Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova Anastasia was the daughter of the last Russian tsar, Nicholas II.

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Anastasia Nikolavena Romanov

The Romanov family ruled Russia for more than 300 years. The last Russian czar, Nicholas II, had been in power for more than 23 years. However, in 1917, Russia's belief in a ruling czar was well on its way to oblivion. The Russian economy was in shambles, in part due to the country's involvement in World War I, which began in 1914 and had already claimed more than 1 million lives. The Bolshevik revolution, led by Lenin, had created a Red Army that was marching to seize power, while loyalists to the czar, called the White Army, were trying to fend off the coup.

Then a curse was put upon the royal family by Grigori Rasputin, the peasant confidant, mystic, and advisor to the czar. Many Russian people blamed Rasputin for their miseries because of his ill advice to the czar, which included getting their country involved in a bloody world conflict. Sensing danger was near, a paranoid Rasputin prophesized to Nicholas II: "Czar of the land of Russia, if you hear the sound of the bell which will tell you that Grigori has been killed, you must know this: If it was one of your relations who have wrought my death, then no one in the family, that is to say, none of your children or relations, will remain alive for more than two years. They will be killed by the Russian people."

Both of Rasputin's premonitions came true. Two weeks after his warning, Rasputin was murdered by Prince Felix Yusupov, who was married to a niece of the czar, and therefore it was a family relation responsible for his death, as he had alluded to. And, 1½ years later, the entire Romanov family was executed after the Bolshevik rebels seized power of the country, which was within the time frame that Rasputin predicted the event would occur. But were they all wiped out?
Did Anastasia Survive the Curse?
The entire royal family, along with their servants, were said to have been murdered and dumped in a mass grave. However, the grave wasn't discovered until some 60 years later. It was always assumed that 11 bodies of the Romanov family and their entourage would be in the same grave. But the remains of only 9 bodies were discovered and Anastasia's body couldn't be confirmed. Whispers that Anastasia had been whisked away with a stash of the royal family's jewels sewn into her clothes, before the Romanov family massacre occurred, ran rampant throughout Russia. Had she been in hiding all these decades, living a secret life?

Let's take a step back and look at the evolution of this mystery. Anastasia Nikolavena Romanov was born on June 18, 1901. Her birth greatly distressed her father because he already had 3 daughters (Olga, Tatiana, and Maria) and was hoping for a son to be heir to his throne. Nicholas II eventually sired a son, but the most famous of all the Romanov children was his youngest daughter, Anastasia.

Anastasia was raised in a royal family, but didn't always behave as prim and proper as one would assume a child bred into royalty would act. She was a spirited, mischievous child with a sweet sense of humor. Anastasia was engaging and an endlessly entertaining little girl. She would play pranks on her sisters and little brother and on her tutors. She did not enjoy the confines of the classroom; lessons at school bored her. Anastasia was rambunctious and active and preferred the outdoors, where she could frolic about, climb a tree, or play with her dog. She was prone to mischief, sometimes persuading her young brother, Alexei, to join her. But as the son of the court's physician (a man who was executed along with the Romanov family) once remarked, "She undoubtedly held the record for punishable deeds in her family, for in naughtiness she was a true genius." When she grew older, Anastasia took up smoking on the sly.

Anastasia had a close relationship with her father's advisor, Rasputin; she considered him a close friend and mentor and grieved mightily after his murder. Anastasia had a good heart. During World War I, a hospital was set up in an area of her palace. Anastasia and her sister Maria would regularly visit the wounded soldiers and try to cheer them up. The girls would play checkers or backgammon with the wounded to help them pass the time. Other times, they would read out loud letters the soldiers received from home or they'd help soldiers compose letters to be sent to loved ones.

But Anastasia's life would soon come crashing down with a thud heard round the world caused by insurgents opposed to the crown. The Lenin-led Bolshevik Revolution was winning the Russian civil war against the old-line forces loyal to the czar. Nicholas II was forced to abdicate. The Romanov family was put under house arrest by their Bolshevik captors. As the rebellion raged in its final stages, the family was moved to several different locations, they were told, in order to keep them safe and out of harm's way. Then, on July 17, 1918, the Romanov family was told they were going to be relocated once again. They were moved to a basement room along with their associates. An execution squad entered the room and massacred them all in a torrent of gunfire. The bodies were buried in a mass grave outside the city of Yekaterinburg.

Here's where it gets confusing. Because the Romanovs were of German descent, Germany had gotten indirectly involved in the conflict and demanded that the Bolsheviks ensure "the safety of the princesses of German blood." The Bolsheviks indicated that the 2 youngest Romanov children had survived the massacre because they somehow escaped beforehand. Was it true? Or was it said to placate the Germans?

Speculation about Anastasia's survival had started to circulate throughout Russia. The exact location of the mass grave where the Romanov family was dumped was never really known, except by the rebels who buried them there. It wasn't until 1991 that the Romanov family grave site was discovered near Yekaterinburg by an amateur Soviet archeologist. It was always assumed that Anastasia was slaughtered with her family and close associates, which would have resulted in 11 bodies, but there were only the remains of 9 bodies found in the gruesome grave. Scientists identified the 2 missing members of the Romanov family as Alexei and either Maria or Anastasia. The fact that Anastasia's body could not be confirmed conclusively only fueled speculation that she did indeed disappear and not die.

Rumors of the missing bodies bolstered the escape theory, which then led to at least 5 imposters crawling out of the woodwork claiming that they were the Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanov, daughter of the last czar of Russia.

Other imposters appeared and claimed to be a sister of Anastasia (Maria, Olga, or Tatiana), but none captured the imagination of the Anastasia imposters.

Then, in 2007, a Russian archeologist discovered 2 bodies in another grave in close proximity to the burial site where the slaughtered Romanov family was found. The Russians reported that the human remains were that of a boy who was about 10 to 13 years old and a girl who was about 18 to 23 years old. Anastasia would have been 17 years old at the time of her death.

About 6 months later, in 2008, Russian forensic scientists claimed that DNA recovered from the bodies matched that of Anastasia and Alexei. But the validity of their claim is unclear. Perhaps political propaganda played a role. Russia has always strived to be a secretive society. Maybe the Russians wanted to forever put to rest the rumors that Anastasia and Alexei survived. Perhaps the Russians didn't want to have their history tainted; that is to say, maybe they didn't want the world to think that the Bolsheviks, who ultimately became the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, led by the beloved Vladimir Lenin, didn't get the job done completely. We'll never know for sure. The disappearance of Anastasia is one of those mysteries that might remain a mystery until the end of time.

The media has been fascinated with the story of Anastasia. Books have been written about her. A Broadway play about her was produced, as well as a musical. And several films have also tackled her tale, with the 1997 animated feature Anastasia, released by Warner Bros, being the most popular.

Reference

1. Anastasia. Biography website. http://www.biography.com/people/anastasia-9184008#awesm=~oI2AXPRBf8eOdd.

2. Anastasia Romanov body found. History of Russia website. November 16, 2011. http://historyofrussia.org/anastasia-romanov-body-found/.

3. Anastasia Romanov. History of Russia website. March 26, 2013. http://historyofrussia.org/anastasia-romanov/.

4. Anastasia Romanov. History and Women website. June 18, 2012. http://www.historyandwomen.com/2012/06/anastasia-romanov.html.

5. Did Grand Duchess Anastasia survive the Bolshevik bullets? Explosive new book claims fresh evidence shows the Russian princess really DID escape to the West. Daily Mail website. March 2, 2014. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2571437/Explosive-new-book-claims-Princess-Anastasia-DID-escape-West.html.

6. The Greatest Unsolved Mysteries of All Time. Life Books. 2014:38-43.

7. Romanov massacre. History of Russia website. November 3, 2010. http://historyofrussia.org/romanov-massacre/.

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Unsolved Mysteries: Did Anastasia Escape the Firing Squad That Annihilated Her Entire Family?

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The Romanov family ruled Russia for more than 300 years. The last Russian czar, Nicholas II, had been in power for more than 23 years. However, in 1917, Russias belief in a ruling czar was well on its way to oblivion.

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I want people to look and see me, Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova, not the caboose on a train of grand duchesses. Someday, I promise myself, no one will be able to hear my name or look at my picture and suppose they know all about me. Someday I will do something bigger than what I am." ― Sarah Miller, The Lost Crown

Anastasia Romanov was born in 1901 and was the youngest daughter of Tsar Nicholas II and Alexandra, and the second youngest of the five Romanov children. Anastasia was murdered along with her family in 1918, but for years rumors of her survival persisted due to a lack of a known burial site. Since her death, she has been the subject of plays, movies, and books, and she continues to be a subject of fascination 100 years after her death. Below are 42 imperial facts about the Grand Duchess.

42. Hollywood Comeback

Ingrid Bergman's turn as Anastasia imposter Anna Anderson was dubbed her comeback role after being blacklisted for having an affair and a child out of wedlock with Roberto Rossellini. At the time of filming, the producers didn't know that Anna Anderson was still alive, but when they found out, they promptly secured her permission to use her name.

41. Not What He'd Hoped

Tsar Nicholas loved all of his children, but since having a male heir was crucially important, he was just a tad bit upset to discover that his fourth child was also a girl. When he learned the news, he was rumored to have taken a walk to collect himself and get over his disappointment.

40. Full of Mischief

Anastasia was reportedly a naughty child, and often got into trouble for her conduct. She was known to kick and scratch her playmates, pull pranks on household staff, and even to climb trees. Definitely not the behavior of a Duchess.

39. Symbolic Meaning

The name "Anastasia" derives from the Greek word meaning resurrection (fitting considering all of the rumors about her survival), but she was actually named for the 4th century martyr St. Anastasia. St. Anastasia was known as "the breaker of chains," and she was given the name because of her father's release of imprisoned Russian students in honor of her birth.

38. Don't Cut Yourself

Despite her being an energetic and vivacious child, Anastasia suffered from a few health problems. She had bunions on her feet, a weak back muscle, and was believed to have inherited the hemophilia gene from her mother.

37. The Little Imp

One of Anastasia's nicknames was "imp." The nickname was reflective of her mischievous personality and her delight in making people laugh. Not a bad talent to have.

36. I Won't Come Down!

Schoolwork in general was not one of Anastasia's favorite activities, and she especially hated being stuck in a classroom (who can blame her?). To get out of lessons, she would climb up a tree and refuse to come down. I wonder how well that worked.

35. Raise My Mark, Please?

Not being the studious kind, Anastasia reportedly resorted to other methods to keep her grades up, including bribery. She once offered her English teacher flowers in exchange for a better grade, and when he refused, she gave them to her Russian teacher instead.

34. Little Pair

Anastasia and her sister Maria (the second-youngest daughter) were known as the "Little Pair" by members of their family. They shared a room, dressed almost alike, and spent a lot of their time together. The elder two sisters Olga and Tatiana were known as "The Big Pair," and also shared a room. No word on whether or not they also dressed alike.

33. No More Talk of Them

When the Soviet Union was formed, any and all discussion of the Romanovs was banned by the communist party. Some older Russians couldn't abide by the newly ordered state atheism and still held onto their Russian Orthodox faith, continuing to pray to Nicholas in private.

32. Keeping It a Secret

By the time the Romanov grave was discovered in the late 1970s, the Russian government was pretty fed up with the fact that people were still privately worshiping the Romanovs, and they decided to take drastic steps to destroy any remaining connection to the family. Obviously, making the discovery of the bodies known would have undermined their efforts to erase them from the conversation, so the bodies were left where they were and the findings suppressed.

31. Pretty and Charming

Anastasia was a short and chubby child with strawberry blonde hair and blue eyes. According to her governess, someone once called her the most charming child he had ever seen, and her mother's friend Lili Dehn said her face was clever and her eyes extremely intelligent.

30. Fatal Lie

On July 17, 1918, the Romanov family and servants were woken by their Bolshevik captors, told to get dressed and ready themselves to flee. They gathered in the cellar and waited, not knowing that not only had the local authorities been ordered not to rescue them, but they had been sentenced to death in a secret meeting.

29. Brutal Execution

The execution of the Romanovs was violent and messy. The family was lined up as if to have their portrait taken, only to have a firing squad of men come into the room and gun them down. At the end of it all, anyone who was still breathing was stabbed. While I'm sure it felt longer to the Romanovs, the entire event lasted only about 20 minutes.

28. Furry Friends

All of the Romanovs were pet lovers, and each of the children had at least one pet. Anastasia's pet was a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel named Jimmy, and he was believed to have been in his mistress's arms when she was executed, and was also killed. Tatiana's dog was also killed later on. But Joy, Alexei's dog, survived, and was eventually taken to the UK and given to Nicholas' cousin King George, where it lived out the rest of its life at court.

27. Totally Disconnected

Nicholas and Alexandra were highly flawed individuals who, aside from being generally unfit to rule, were completely disconnected from the common folk. They enjoyed tremendous wealth and power, but when it came to their people, they were pretty obtuse. Unhappiness with the Romanovs led at least in part to the revolutions, and in 1917 Nicholas was forced to abdicate.

26. Rigorous Regime

One would think that growing up a princess means beautiful clothes, jewels, and a completely luxurious lifestyle, but that wasn't how Alexandra raised her daughters. She followed the same strict upbringing that her mother and her grandmother Queen Victoria had imposed, handing down clothes from daughter to daughter, making them sleep on iron beds, and forcing them to take daily cold baths. Would a soft pillow have really killed them?

25. Just Pretty Faces

The Romanov daughters were fortunate (or unfortunate depending on how you look at it) to live a fairly secluded life away from the prying eyes of the press and the public while they were growing up. Due partly to the volatile political climate in Russia, and partly to the fact that they were girls, and therefore not important to the survival of the dynasty, their individuality was hardly considered or known, and all the public saw of them were the pictures released by the palace.

24. No Prince for Her

When the eldest two daughters were of marriageable age, everyone from the press to Queen Victoria started considering who the girls might marry. As hard as her parents tried to find Olga a match, she refused to marry a foreign prince and leave Russia, and her parents refused to force any of the girls into a marriage they didn't want. Not smart politically, but a pretty cool move as parents.

23. Wartime Effort

At the onset of WWI, all of the Romanov women did their part to contribute to the war effort. Olga and Tatiana trained as Red Cross nurses and worked in the military hospital set up by their mother, while Maria and Anastasia, too young to be nurses, visited the wounded and played games with them to improve morale.

22. Last Alive

On the night of the brutal executions of the Romanov family, Anastasia Romanov was the last one left alive.

21. The Great Pretender

Anastasia wasn't the only Romanov who had imposters claiming to be a surviving member of the royal family. Michael Goleniewski was a spy who ended up working for the CIA and MI5. After defecting to the United States, he started making claims that he was Alexei Romanov, and that the family was still alive in Europe. He even managed to have a reunion with a fake Anastasia in Rhode Island. Unfortunately for Goleniewski, it was proven that he was a total fake. He was a full 18 years younger than the real Alexei, he likely didn't have hemophilia, and he was born and raised in Poland. The CIA was understandably ticked at being duped and fired him, but Goleniewski never gave up the charade, and claimed to be the murdered boy until his death.

20. Are You, or Aren't You?

While Anna Anderson and Eugenia Smith are the most famous of the Anastasia claimants, one imposter, Nadezhda Vasilyeva, seemed to have some difficulty deciding who she actually was. She wrote letters to King George V of England asking for help by first claiming to be Anastasia, then a merchant's daughter, and then back to Anastasia. She was ultimately institutionalized for her bizarre claims, and died in a mental hospital in Kazan.

19. Losing Their Hair

While under house arrest in 1917, the Romanov sisters contracted measles and started losing their hair. As a result, Alexandra decided to shave their heads. I hope they had a good selection of hats.

18. Revisionist Remake

With the 100th anniversary of the Romanov execution bringing their story back to the public eye, a new live-action fantasy adventure version of Anastasia is set to be released. However, it's an entirely new story, with young Anastasia escaping through a portal and landing in 1988.

17. On Broadway

The music for the 1997 animated Anastasia film was written by musical theatre veterans Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty, so it seemed only natural that the film should be adapted into a full-fledged Broadway musical. Much to the delight of the movie's fans, the musical debuted on Broadway in 2017. While critical reviews have been mixed, that hasn't stopped the fans from seeing the show.

16. Anastasia on Amazon

In 2018, Amazon Studios announced a new series called The Romanoffs that is scheduled to air in Fall 2018. Based on the few details that have been released about the show, it appears to focus on modern people who claim to be descendants of the Romanovs, and presumably at least one of the women will claim to be the youngest Romanov daughter.

15. Animated Anastasia

In 1997, Fox animation released the animated musical film Anastasia, based on Anna Anderson, the infamous and now debunked Anastasia imposter. Though the film was full of historical inaccuracies, the animated Anastasia became nearly as iconic as Disney princesses Belle, Snow White, and Cinderella.

14. Welcome to the Fold

At the time of the animated Anastasia's film release by Fox, Anastasia was not part of the Disney princess canon, but with the merger between Fox and Disney, this Disney-like princess will officially become a full-fledged Disney princess. Look out Elsa, there's a new princess in town!

13. Roots in Reality

The famous yellow dress worn by Anastasia in the animated film is modeled on a dress worn by the real-life Anastasia. The grand Duchess was seen wearing the dress in one of the last photographs taken of her before her execution.

12. Creating Costumes

The Romanov daughters were taught to sew, knit, and make dresses for their dolls at a young age. Their mother was not a believer in leisure time, and thought that little girls should always be busy.

11. Something in Common

Although Anastasia and Olga were the youngest and eldest of the four sisters, with more than 5 years between them, they were actually quite close. Their letters and diary entries frequently mention each other separately from the other sisters, and they both enjoyed doing physical activities together such as cycling, skiing, and boating.

10. Poetic Names

When the second Romanov daughter was born, her father named her Tatiana after the character in the famous Pushkin novel in verse Eugene Onegin. According to a diary entry, Nicholas liked the idea of having daughters named after Pushkin's famous literary sisters Olga and Tatiana.

9. Rightful Claimant

Over the years, more than 100 women have surfaced claiming to be the youngest Romanov daughter.

8. She Could Pass

One of the reasons that Anna Anderson was so readily believed was her resemblance (real or imagined) to the real Anastasia. When she turned up in a German mental hospital, members of the Romanov extended family and former servants showed up, some of whom said she had the same eyes and mannerisms as the Duchess.

7. Honorary Commander

A Romanov tradition was to make each of the imperial daughters an honorary commander of a Russian regiment on her 14th birthday. In 1915, Anastasia was made the honorary commander of the Kaspiysky regiment, making its official name "The 148th Kaspiysky Infantry Regiment of Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna." Unfortunately, with WWI beginning, she never got to be photographed in her uniform or review her regiment as her sisters had.

6. Imposter!

Not everybody who visited Anna Anderson believed that she was Anastasia. For one thing, she didn't recognize people she should have known. Her tutor Pierre Gilliard said Anderson was a "vulgar adventuress," and Anastasia's grandmother, the Dowager Empress Marie, refused to even meet with her. Anastasia's aunt Olga did visit, but stated that she was "looking at a stranger." Everyone wanted so deeply to believe the girl had been saved, but ultimately they could find nothing to cling to. In 1994, 10 years after her death, her tissue was compared with a sample from Prince Philip, but there was no match, disproving her claim once and for all. It's now widely believed that Anderson was actually Franziska Schanzkowska, a mentally-ill Polish factory worker.

5. Hidden Gems

Alexandra Romanov must have had a hint at what was coming, and before their execution she had the girls sew jewels into their clothes to potentially finance a rescue. On the night of their deaths, perhaps believing rescue was imminent, the girls dressed in their special clothing, which in the end only prolonged their gruesome fate. The initial hail of bullets likely immediately killed her mother and her sisters, but not Anastasia, perhaps because the jewels sewn into her clothing made the bullets ricochet. However, the guards finished her off.

4. Tragic Hope

When Anastasia's grandmother the Dowager Empress Marie heard that her family had been murdered, she didn't believe it. She hadn't been there that night, already having escaped to Crimea with other refugees, and she was certain that they got out of Russia and that the Bolsheviks were keeping the truth from her. While Marie's daughter believes that in her heart of hearts she did eventually accept their deaths, Marie appeared to hold on to the belief that they had somehow escaped until the day she died.

3. Still Not Buying It

Recently a respected Russian historian released a new book claiming once again that Anastasia Romanov survived her family's execution and most likely escaped. In his book he stated that the DNA testing proving Anna Anderson to be a fraud was wrong, and that she was truly the lost princess. His assertions were backed up by supposed documents that apparently confirm that Alexandra and her four daughters were saved. Is the whole story truly part of a Russian conspiracy? I've got my doubts, but who can truly know what happened that night?

2. Friend and Confidant

Because of their secluded lifestyle, the Romanov children did not have peers to play with, but they did have their mother's holy man and counselor Grigori Rasputin. The girls were taught to view Rasputin as their friend and confidant, and it was revealed after their deaths that the girls all wore amulets containing Rasputin's picture.

1. Mystery Solved?

When the mass grave of the Romanov family was discovered, Alexei and Anastasia's bodies weren't with the rest of them, leading to questions about what might have happened to her and if she had indeed survived. In 2007, an amateur archaeology group discovered two sets of remains under a mound close to where the rest of the bodies were buried. The bones are believed to belong to Anastasia and Alexei, perhaps closing the book on her tragic story once and for all.

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42 Tragic Facts About Anastasia Romanov, The Lost Princess

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I want people to look and see me, Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova, not the caboose on a train of grand duchesses. Someday, I promise myself, no one will be able to hear my name or look at my picture and suppose they know all about me. Someday I will do something bigger than what I am."

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In 1917, the House of Romanov had been ruling Russia continuously for more than 300 years when the family was overthrown by the Bolsheviks and Vladimir Lenin. On this date (or possibly yesterday -there's a debate about exactly when it happened) in 1918, Tsar Nicholas II, along with his wife Alexandra and their five children, met a brutal end: they were shot and stabbed in the basement of the house where they were being held by the Bolsheviks, and the Romanovs' extended family were either killed or exiled. Nicholas and his family were the last to hold the throne, and their deaths signified a permanent end to the royal family.

Over the years, a number of people have come forward pretending to be exiled members of the Romanov family. Some merely wanted to be famous, while others were convinced that they truly had royal blood coursing through their veins. Today, all members of the immediate family have been identified through DNA evidence as having been killed.

1. Marga Boodts // Claimed to be Olga

After Marga Boodts married a German officer in 1926, she shared a shocking secret: That she was actually Grand Duchess Olga of the Romanovs. Olga was the first daughter of Nicholas and Alexandra, and her hand in marriage was considered very valuable.

Boodts claimed she'd kept the secret because she wasn't allowed to tell anyone. She said that she was being supported by her uncle, Kaiser Wilhelm II, until his death, and she promised him she wouldn't tell anyone for " the protection of [her] own life."

She went public with her claims when Anna Anderson (see below) decided to come out with her own claims of Romanov ancestry. Boodts wanted to destroy Anderson's credibility while supporting her own. She even wrote a book about everything she had supposedly gone through as a run-away Romanov, but it was never published.

Boodts died in 1976 and was buried under the name "Olga Nikolaevna"; the grave was supposedly ruined in 1995.

2. Larissa Tudor // Rumored to be Tatiana

Larissa Tudor married Owen Frederick Morton Tudor in 1923 and lived a very uneventful life with her husband until she died three years later, when she was just 28. Larissa never claimed to be Tatiana, the second daughter in the Romanov family, but rumors arose after her death.

When Larissa died, she left Owen with a large inheritance; its origins were unknown. More than 60 years later, author Michael Occleshaw discovered some inconsistencies in Larissa's story. He found that she was buried under the name "Larissa Feodorovna," even though her marriage certificate said "Haouk." She looked similar to Tatiana and some neighbors, when seeing portraits of Tatiana, said the woman was Larissa.

Occleshaw wrote a book detailing the events and how Tatianawould have escaped and how she could have come to be known as Larissa, although his theory was later disproven.

3 and 4. "Granny" Alina and Ceclava Czapska // Said to be Maria by their grandsons

Alina and Ceclava never publicly claimed to be the third daughter of the tsar, Maria, themselves, but both of their grandsons later said they were without a doubt the Grand Duchess.

Granny Alina, according to her grandson, mysteriously showed up in South Africa andsupposedly told her family there that she was a princess, but couldn't tell anyone else out of fear of being shipped back to Russia. She died in 1969, and, in 2004, her grandson took her claims public. George Negus Tonight, an Australian program that focused on current events in the early 2000s,ran a show on it, and while the family was still investigating, the story was more or less closed.

Alexis Brimeyer also claimed that his grandmother was Maria, but his claims were taken significantly less seriously because he had a history of faking noble titles. He started with "His Serene Highness Prince Khevenhüller-Abensberg," which he quickly gave up after he was sued by the actual Princess Khevenhüller.

After the legal dust settled, he took on several other names before claiming that his grandmother was actually Maria and that made him a Romanov as well. Brimeyer died in 1995, but not before he also laid claim to the Serbian throne. Until 2007, these conspiracies didn't seem especially farfetched, because there were a son and daughter missing from the skeletons discovered. But that year, the missing Romanovs were discovered, proving both Brimeyer's and Alina's claims false.

5. Anna Anderson, a.k.a. Franziska Shanzkowska // Claimed to be Anastasia

Since 1918, dozens of women have claimed to be Anastasia, the fourth and youngest daughter in the Romanov family, but Anderson is by far the most famous imposter. Her story begins when she tried to commit suicide in Berlin in 1920 and refused to tell anyone her name. Two years later, she began telling people that she was the Grand Duchess.

Some people who knew the Grand Duchess backed up her claims, including family friends and Russian officials. But when relatives of the tsar investigated Anderson's claims, they discovered that she was actually Franziska Shanzkowska, a woman who had suffered a series of tragic events and had not been heard from since around the time Anderson was found in the canal. Her family later denied her when Nazis threatened to throw her in jail if she was found to be Shanzkowska.

In 1928, she came to live in the United States at the expense of Xenia Leeds, a Russian princess who was dista ntly related to the Romanovs and living with her American husband. After a failed attempt to claim the Romanov estate, she moved from place to place before ending up in Germany. Once there, she again tried to get ahold of the estate and failed. She returned to the United States in 1968, where she married a wealthy man, and spent her final years in an institutional care facility.

Anderson claimed she was Anastasia until her death in 1984, but DNA evidence proved otherwise in the '90s.

6. Michael Goleniewski // Claimed to be Alexei

Alexei was the youngest child and only son of Nicholas II, and a real problem for the communist regime in Russia. Like Anastasia, Alexeihad quite a few claims to his name.

Michael Goleniewski lived a much less exciting life than Anderson, likely because so few believed his claims. He was born in Poland, and worked as a spy for the Soviet Union while employed for the Polish Secret Service, but he ended up working for the CIA and MI5.

Goleniewski defected to America in 1961 and was made a citizen by a private bill passed by both houses of Congress. Once in the States, he began to claim that he was Tsarevich Alexei and that the rest of the family was alive and in hiding somewhere in Europe. In 1963, Goleniewski had a reunion with another "Anastasia," a Rhode Island imposter named Eugenia Smith.

Unfortunately for Goleniewski, documents proved he was born and raised in Poland and 18 years younger than Alexei. The tsarevich also had hemophilia, a blood disorder that makes clotting difficult, which was never confirmed in Goleniewski.

The CIA was not happy with Goleniewski for faking something so hugeand ended his employment. Still, the wannabe Romanov claimed to know about the tsar's money and even managed to spark an investigation. Like Anderson, he claimed to be Alexei until his death.

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6 People Who Claimed to Have Been Romanovs

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In 1917, the House of Romanov had been ruling Russia continuously for more than 300 years when the family was overthrown by the Bolsheviks and Vladimir Lenin.

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Enjoy :) put your Commentt please... (intentare ponerle subtitulos en español)