Chapter
Fourteen
1913-1914
1913-1914
In 1913 the Imperial family
celebrated 300 years of the Romanov dynasty's reign in Russia. In
Moscow people showed little enthusiasm, but in St. Petersburg the
celebration succeeded. Huge crowds - workers and students - flooded
the city to cheer the Imperial processions. In the villages peasants
flocked to catch a glimpse of the Tsar as he passed by. No-one then
dreamed that this was the sunset of Imperial Russia, that no Tsar
would ever pass that way again.
To celebrate the occasion, a
ball was given in the Winter Palace. Thousands of guests attended
it. The women of the Imperial family displayed magnificent dresses
and jewels. For one ball the Tsarina wore a blue velvet dress, with
diamond necklace and tiara. For another ball she wore white with
pearls and emeralds. As a reminder of the past, sometimes she wore
an oriental gown of brocade with a tall cone-shaped kokushnik.
Her four daughters appeared in
shimmering white gowns, with a red ribbon blazing with diamonds.
For Easter that year, Nicholas
presented Alexandra with a Faberge egg, which bore miniature
portraits of all the Romanov tsars and empresses. Inside the egg,
were two maps of the Russian Empire inset in gold, one of the year
1613, the other of 1913.
In May the Imperial family set
off on a journey to trace the route taken by Michael Romanov, first
Romanov tsar, from his birthplace to the throne. They boarded a
steamer to sail to the ancient Romanov seat of Kostroma, where in
March 1613, sixteen year-old Michael was elected to the throne.
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