Coryne Hall — новинки

Despite their frequent visits to England, Queen Victoria never quite trusted the Romanovs. In her letters she referred to "horrid Russia" and was adamant that she did not wish her granddaughters to marry into that barbaric country. She distrusted Tsar Nicholas I but as a young woman she was bowled over by his son the future Alexander II, although there could be no question of a marriage. Political questions loomed large and the Crimean war did nothing to improve relations. This distrust started with the story of the Queen’s "Aunt Julie", Princess Juliane of Saxe-Coburg, and her disastrous Russian marriage. Starting with this marital catastrophe, Romanov expert Coryne Hall traces 60 years of family feuding that include outright war, inter-marriages, assassination, and the Great Game in Afghanistan. In the fateful year of 1894, Victoria must come to terms with the fact that her granddaughter has become the Tsar's wife, the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna of Russia. Eventually, distrust of the German Kaiser brings Victoria and the Tsar closer together. Permission has been granted by the Royal Archives at Windsor to use extracts from Queen Victoria's journals to to tell this fascinating story of family relations played out on the world stage.

The first study of queens and princesses in wartime nursing, from Queen Victoria to Queen Elizabeth II

Royal ladies have never been afraid to roll up their sleeves, work in wards and field hospitals, and help in the operating theater, despite their sheltered upbringing. Indeed, through wars and revolutions in Russia, Greece, Spain, Romania, Belgium, and Britain, their experiences were no different than those of thousands of other nurses. Beginning with two daughters of Queen Victoria, Princess Alice and Princess Helena, this book tells their stories and the difficulties queens and princesses faced while carving a worthwhile role in an age when the place of a well-born woman was considered to be in the home. From Empress Alexandra of Russia and Queen Marie of Romania to Princess Marina Duchess of Kent and Princess Alice of Greece (mother of the Duke of Edinburgh), all set an example of service and duty well beyond that considered necessary at the time. Here, their involvement in nursing and the lengths they went to is detailed for the first time.

An important new archive of material including letters, postcards, photographs, and other Romanov documents allows a biography of Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna of Russia (a member of the last Tsar family) to be produced. Sister of Nicholas II, Xenia was born in 1875 and brought up in the wealth of the Russian royal family, becoming a key witness to the tumultuous events within the Romanov empire. She saw her brother Nicholas' crowning as Emperor; the violent murder of Rasputin in which her son-in-law, Felix Youssoupov, was implicated; the "terrible horror" as the first rumours of the imperial family's capture and death began to circulate; and the exile of family members, herself among them, throughout Europe. After Nicholas' abdication and violent death, only the repeated pleas of relatives abroad finally persuaded her to leave Russia. In her later years, Xenia became involved in the Anastasia affair, there was a swindle over the sale of her jewels, and she made unsuccessful attempts to recover Romanov money and land as one of the heirs to the Tsars.

Empress Marie, born Princess Dagmar, was the daugher of King Christian IX of Denmark and sister of Queen Alexandra of Great Britain, Edward VII's wife. She was betrothed to Tsarevitch Nicholas of Russia, a love match on both sides, but tragically he died months before the wedding. A year later, out of duty she married his brother the new Tsarevich and sailed for Russia in 1866.