Two beloved wives of Emperor Alexander II

Emperor Alexander II entered Russian history as a reformer tsar who abolished serfdom and carried out judicial, financial, military, and zemstvo reforms. And although his reign is assessed ambiguously (the reforms were not completed, the Polish uprising was brutally suppressed, the use of the Ukrainian language was limited and prohibited), perhaps not a single Russian tsar did as much for his people as Alexander II did. A lot has been written about his actions and his tragic death at the hands of terrorists from Narodnaya Volya. Less is known about Alexander as a person, about his weaknesses and his passions.

Simply Maria

Alexander's first wife was a German princess. The future tsar, then still heir to the throne, met her in March 1839. Traveling around Europe, he visited the German city of Darmstadt and here, “by the will of fate,” as they wrote in ancient novels, he met Princess Maximiliana Wilhelmina Augusta Sophia Maria of Hesse-Darmstadt. This is her full name, but from the very beginning Alexander simply called her Maria. “I liked Princess Mary terribly from the very first moment I saw her,” he wrote from Darmstadt to his father Nicholas the First.

Princess of Hesse - Empress Maria

It truly was love at first sight, ardent and not wanting to know any barriers. “Dear mother, what do I care about the secrets of Princess Mary! - says another letter from Alexander, written to his mother-empress. “I will only marry her, that’s my decision!”

But there were “secrets,” which is why the crowned parents did not give their consent to the marriage at first, and Alexander even threatened to “abandon the throne” rather than the princess. The fact is that Maria’s parents had not lived with each other for a long time at the time of her birth. Each had their own passions, and there were persistent rumors that in fact the father of the princess was not the Grand Duke of Hesse, but his horsemaster, a certain Baron de Grancy. However, officially everything was as it should be, and the Duke was considered Mary’s legal father. Most likely, it was this, and not Alexander’s threats, that played the decisive role, and two years later the young people got married in St. Petersburg. Maria was 17 years old, Alexander was 23 years old.

The lady-in-waiting, Anna Tyutcheva, who knew the princess closely, left detailed memories of her. Maria looked younger than her years all her life and, according to her maid of honor, was “thin, fragile and unusually graceful.” Her mind, as Tyutcheva notes, “is similar to her soul: subtle, elegant, insightful, very ironic, but devoid of fervor, breadth and initiative...” For this “lack of initiative,” or, more precisely, for the lack of interest and activity in those areas , which Maria, already an empress, would have to deal with, she was criticized a lot. True, we owe her the creation of the Mariinsky Theater (which therefore bears her name), the flourishing of the activities of the Russian Red Cross, but here, perhaps, are all her outstanding public deeds. More was expected from empresses in Russia.

...And I went for a walk in the Summer Garden

However, one can hardly blame Maria. She simply did not have enough strength for active social activities. The wife of Alexander the Second bore the emperor eight children (the first two died early, and the third, who was called like his father, later became Emperor Alexander the Third). In addition, Mary of Hesse had weak lungs, and, in the end, it was tuberculosis that brought her to the grave in 1880. But, as many believe, there were two more reasons. One of them is constant fear for her husband, on whom several attempts were made on his life (Maria no longer lived to see the last one, which cost Alexander his life). Another reason is the emperor’s long-term affair with Ekaterina Dolgorukova, which everyone around the king knew about. He took her with him on trips abroad and even settled her in the Winter Palace.

Ekaterina Dolgorukova. Postcard from the late 1870s

Their love story is no less romantic than the story of Alexander and Mary of Hesse. In 1859, the emperor was supposed to take part in the festivities dedicated to the anniversary of the Battle of Poltava. Not far from Poltava, he stopped at the estate of Prince Mikhail Dolgorukov, where he met his daughter, who was then eleven years old. Later, the children of the bankrupt prince were taken into state care: the sons were sent to a military school, the daughters, including Katenka Dolgorukova, to the Smolny Institute.

After graduating from college, Ekaterina Dolgorukova remained in St. Petersburg, where she lived with her older brother. In the Summer Garden, where the emperor also loved to go for a walk, they met, remembered the past and continued their walk together. It must be said that Alexander was, as they said then, “hungry for the female sex.” There was talk of his affairs with his ladies-in-waiting even before his marriage, and later, when their relationship with the empress cooled, he took favorites several times. But this time there was something different. He fell in love with Ekaterina Dolgorukova passionately, desperately, “dizzyingly,” as one of the tsar’s friends wrote in his memoirs.

Princess Yuryevskaya

For some time, their relationship remained platonic - until the night in July 1866 at Belvedere near Peterhof. Katya was 18 years old, Alexander was 48. Several of their letters to each other have been preserved, which are of an openly erotic nature, unexpected for those Puritan times. However, the passion of the aging emperor for a young girl alone cannot explain the fact that their romance lasted 15 years, until the tragic death of Alexander II.

Context

Love on the Russian throne: the “little bird” of the stern emperor

German princesses on the Russian throne are a common occurrence.
But there was still one exception, one marriage, which was unique not only for Russian-German dynastic ties. (01/16/2013) He even settled his beloved in the Winter Palace and for this purpose introduced Princess Dolgorukova into his wife’s personal retinue. Catherine's chambers, which occupied three large rooms, were located just above the emperor's chambers, and one could freely get from one to the other.

Ekaterina Dolgorukova gave birth to four children to Alexander. Their future, like that of their mother, was of great concern to the emperor, who well remembered how the problems of origin interfered with his first wife. And when she died, the emperor, without even waiting for the end of the period of official mourning, married Dolgorukova. This marriage was morganatic, that is, Catherine could not become the new empress. But she and her children were given the title of Most Serene Princes of Yuryevsky.

All this caused great discontent at court, especially among the heir to the throne, the future Alexander III. And when, after the death of his father (less than a year after his new marriage), he ascended the throne, Ekaterina Dolgorukova-Yuryevskaya had to leave Russia with her children. Later she wrote memoirs about Alexander, about their love. She kept his uniforms and even his dressing gown as relics under glass in her personal chapel. She died in her villa in Nice in 1922.

Many books have been written about her affair with the emperor and about herself (the author of one of which was herself, under a pseudonym), and several films have been made. The most famous of them is the 1959 French film “Katya, the Uncrowned Empress,” in which the magnificent Romy Schneider played the main role.

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  The film "Katya": the love of the king and his favorite

“Here comes my Goga!”

But this was not enough for the emperor. He intended to give his second wife the title of empress, and his children the titles of grand dukes and princesses, thereby completely equalizing their rights with the children from his first marriage.

Ekaterina Dolgorukova. Photo: Public Domain

Having remarried, Alexander II seemed to become younger. He doted on his youngest son, could play with him in the presence of dignitaries, allowed his young wife to call herself Sasha in public, which was actually a gross violation of court etiquette.

This is what Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich wrote about what was happening at that time in the Winter Palace in his memoirs: “And here is my Goga! - the Emperor exclaimed proudly, lifting the cheerful boy into the air and placing him on his shoulder. - Tell us, Goga, what is your name?

“My name is Prince Georgy Alexandrovich Yuryevsky,” answered Goga and began to fiddle with the Emperor’s sideburns, fiddling with his little hands.

- It’s very nice to meet you, Prince Yuryevsky! - the Emperor joked. “Don’t you, young man, want to become a Grand Duke?”

This family idyll infuriated Tsarevich Alexander, who, however, knew that it was useless to argue with his father on such a topic.

Little George was a cheerful and cheerful boy who tried to make friends with the younger representatives of the Romanov dynasty. George was especially drawn to Nicholas, the 13-year-old son of Tsarevich Alexander. Nicholas, the future Emperor Nicholas II, responded to George with mutual sympathy - he was very amused by the fact that his new younger friend was his uncle.

Tsar

Emperor Alexander II was played by Curd Jürgens, a German-Austrian actor who was very popular in Europe at that time. He loved women, luxurious villas, whiskey, champagne, tobacco and expensive cars. Until the end of his days he did not change his motto: “It is better to give years more life than life - more years.”

Exile

Alexander II intended to give George the same education that his older children received. But all these plans were destroyed by the terrorist attack on March 1, 1881, as a result of which the emperor was mortally wounded and died a few hours later in the Winter Palace.

“The unconscious Princess Yuryevskaya was taken out of the deceased’s room into her chambers, and the doctors took care of the body of the late Emperor. Somewhere in the distance, little Goga was crying bitterly...” Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich recalled that day.

For young George, who was not even nine years old at the time of his father’s death, the world has changed forever.

Georgy Yuryevsky. Photo: Public Domain

The new Emperor Alexander III did not show nobility towards his stepmother and half-brothers and sisters. The widow of Alexander II and her children were actually forced to emigrate.

Georgy Aleksandrovich Yuryevsky spent his youth in France, where he first studied at the Condorcet Lyceum and then graduated from the Sorbonne with a bachelor's degree.

After graduating from the Sorbonne, the youngest son of Alexander II was able to return to Russia, where he attended a course of lectures at the Naval Cadet Corps. In March 1892, he was enlisted in the 5th naval crew of the Baltic Fleet, taking part in a two-year campaign on the armored corvette Rynda.

A beautiful couple

She, who was engrossed in love poetry and classic novels, still knew little about real men, wanted everything to be like the books: the young beauty melted the heart of the aging womanizer, they lived happily ever after... For him, the meeting with Romy became just one romantic story from very long list.

Policy

The priorities of Alexander II's European policy were the Eastern question and the revision of the results of the Crimean War, ensuring pan-European security. Alexander II focused on an alliance with the Central European powers - in 1873 the “Holy Alliance of the Three Emperors” was concluded, Austria-Hungary, Germany, and Russia.

During the reign of Alexander II, the Caucasian War of 1817–1864 was completed, a significant part of Turkestan was annexed (1865–1881), and borders with China were established along the Amur and Ussuri rivers (1858–1860).

Thanks to Russia's victory in the war with Turkey (1877–1878), in order to assist the Slavic peoples of the same faith in their liberation from the Turkish yoke, Bulgaria, Romania and Serbia gained independence and began their sovereign existence. The victory was won largely thanks to the will of Alexander II, who, during the most difficult period of the war, insisted on continuing the siege of Plevna, which contributed to its victorious completion. In Bulgaria, Alexander II was revered as the Liberator. The Cathedral of Sofia is the temple-monument of St. blgv. led book Alexander Nevsky, heavenly patron of Alexander II.

During the reign of Alexander II, Russia was going through a difficult period in its socio-political history. Militant nihilism, atheism and extreme social radicalism became the ideological foundation of political terrorism, which became especially dangerous by the end of the 70s. In the fight against the state, extremist conspirators set regicide as their main goal. From the 2nd half. 60s the life of Alexander II was in constant danger.

In total, five unsuccessful attempts were made on Alexander II’s life:

• April 4, 1866 - assassination attempt on D. Karakozov during the emperor’s walk in the Summer Garden. In memory of the rescue of Alexander II at the site of the incident in 1866-1867, the Alexander Nevsky Chapel was built into the fence of the Summer Garden according to the design of R. A. Kuzmin.
• May 25, 1867 - assassination attempt on the Pole A. Berezovsky during the emperor’s official visit to France.
• April 2, 1879 - assassination attempt of A. Solovyov, a member of the “Land and Freedom” society.
• November 19, 1879 - explosion of the royal train near Moscow.
• February 12, 1880 - explosion of the royal dining room in the Winter Palace.

Showing exceptional state. and personal courage, Alexander II continued the course of reforms, the implementation of which he considered a historical necessity and his life’s work.

In 1880, despite attempts by extremists to destabilize life in Russia, a Supreme Administrative Commission was created with broad powers to deepen government reforms designed to strengthen the union of state and society; at the end of his reign, Alexander II was inclined to the need to introduce limited public representation in Russia under the State council.

However, the reform plans of Alexander II were not destined to be fully realized. On March 1, 1881, on the banks of the Catherine Canal in St. Petersburg, Alexander II was mortally wounded by a member of the terrorist organization "People's Will" I. I. Grinevitsky.

Terrorists from the Narodnaya Volya party hunted him for many years - they dug a tunnel to blow up the pavement, planted explosives on the rails in front of the train, etc. Making an attempt on the life of the Tsar, the Narodnaya Volya members even managed to set off an explosion in the Winter Palace, where the Russian autocrat lived.

In February 1881, Prime Minister Loris-Melikov reported to the Tsar that, according to police information, the executive committee of Narodnaya Volya was preparing another assassination attempt on him, but the plan for this assassination could not be revealed.

On the morning of March 1, Loris-Melikov once again warned Alexander II of the impending danger. He earnestly asked the Tsar not to go to the parade in the arena that day, which was traditionally held on Sundays. The king did not listen.

On the way back, when the crew and escort were following along the Neva embankment, the Narodnaya Volya member Rysakov threw a bomb under the tsar’s carriage, which was fortified by a dugout. The carriage was damaged, and several Circassians from the convoy were wounded by shrapnel, but Alexander II was not injured. The coachman convinced the king not to get out of the carriage; he swore that even in the damaged carriage he would take the emperor to the palace. And yet Alexander came out. As the anarchist revolutionary Prince Kropotkin wrote, “he felt that military dignity required him to look at the wounded Circassians and say a few words to them. This is what he did during the Russian-Turkish war, when on his name day there was a mad assault on Plevna, which ended in a terrible disaster.”

Meanwhile, the terrorist Rysakov, who threw a bomb under the carriage, was captured. Several people grabbed onto him at once. The king, staggering, approached him, looked at him for a minute and asked in a hoarse voice:

-Did you throw a bomb?

- Yes I.

- Who it?

“Glazov is a tradesman,” Rysakov answered, trying not to look away.

Alexander II paused and after a pause said:

- Good.

The Tsar was severely stunned by the explosion, and, obviously, his head was not working properly.

“Un joli Monsieur!” said Alexander II quietly.

Dvorzhitsky asked him in a breathless voice:

- Your Majesty, are you not injured?

The king still had time to think that he needed to take care of himself and not say anything unnecessary. After being silent for a few seconds, the king slowly and deliberately answered, pointing to the wounded boy writhing in the snow:

- I don’t... Thank God... But here...

– It is not yet known, thank God! – Rysakov said defiantly.

Indeed, as soon as the tsar moved further, another terrorist, Grinevitsky, who was standing on the embankment with a package in which a bomb was hidden, approached him and threw it between himself and the tsar so that both were killed.

The second explosion sounded louder than the first. Alexander II and his assassin, both mortally wounded, sat almost side by side in the snow, leaning their hands on the ground, their backs on the canal grate. The confusion of those around led to the fact that no help was provided to the king on the spot. For some time there was no one near the king at all! Then the cadets returning from the parade, the gendarmerie captain Kolyubakin and... the third terrorist Emelyanov ran up to him! At the same time, Emelyanov was holding a package with a bomb under his arm. Those who ran up helped carry the king into the sleigh. Someone suggested bringing the monarch into the first house. Alexander II heard this and whispered (perhaps he was thinking at that time about Princess Yuryevskaya, his morganatic wife):

- To the palace... To die there...

His clothes were burned or torn off by the explosion, the king was half naked. His right leg was torn off, his left leg was crushed and almost separated from his body. His face and head were wounded; Captain Kolyubakin supported the Tsar in a tiny sleigh. On the way, Alexander opened his eyes and asked: “Are you wounded, Kolyubakin?”

In the same state of panic, they carried him from the sleigh into the palace, not on a stretcher, not even on a chair, but in their arms. People rolled up their sleeves, stained with blood, like butchers at a slaughterhouse. It was difficult for the crowd to squeeze into the door of the palace. They broke down the door, still holding a half-naked, burned, dying man in their arms. The king was carried along the marble steps of the stairs, then along the corridor to his office. The Emperor was lying in his office on a sofa that had been moved from the wall to the desk. He was unconscious.

The confused paramedic Kogan pressed the artery on the king’s left thigh. Dr. Marcus looked into the slowly opening bloody left eye of the dying man and fell into a chair, fainting. Someone poured water on the forehead of Alexander II.

Quick, heavy footsteps were heard outside the door. The life physician, the famous doctor Botkin, entered the room. But his art was also useless here.

One after another, members of the royal family, future tsars - Alexander III and Nicholas II, the confessor, and the main dignitaries of the state entered the office. Suddenly the half-dressed Princess Yuryevskaya ran in. She fell backwards on the body of Alexander II and, covering his hands with kisses, began to sob: “Sasha! Sasha!" Looking at this, the grand duchesses began to cry. Princess Yuryevskaya's pink peignoir with a white pattern was soaked in blood.

The king's agony lasted three quarters of an hour. At this time, the mayor arrived and reported in detail about what had happened. The heir to the throne approached the physician and carefully asked:

– Is there hope?

Botkin shook his head negatively and said:

- Quiet! The sovereign ends.

Those gathered in the office approached the dying man. The king's eyes looked into space without any expression. Botkin, listening to the tsar’s pulse, nodded his head and lowered his bloody hand.

“The Emperor has died,” he announced in a firm voice.

Princess Yuryevskaya, turning pale, screamed and collapsed on the floor. The others knelt.

At the site of the assassination of the emperor in 1883, the Church of the Resurrection of Christ (“Savior on Spilled Blood”) was erected - an outstanding architectural monument, one of the main shrines of St. Petersburg.

In life and on screen

The romance between the king and his favorite lasted much longer. Dolgorukova gave birth to four children from Alexander II. After the death of the empress, even before the end of the period of mourning, the wedding of the princess and the emperor took place. In 1880, Catherine was granted the title of Princess Yuryevskaya, and the children (all born out of wedlock, but retroactively legalized) received the surname Yuryevsky.

Reign of Alexander II

Being a direct heir, Alexander from an early age prepared for the role of a state ruler. He received an excellent education without leaving the royal chambers. Among his teachers were such well-known names as Speransky, Zhukovsky, Kankrin and others.

The coronation of Alexander II took place on August 26 (September 7), 1856 in Moscow. Along with the rights to the throne, he also inherited the unresolved problems of the Crimean War, as well as society dissatisfied with the Decembrist exile of 1825.

Remembering the past and living in the present

After Karina achieved certain success, the musician began to post information about her on his pages on social networks. He was proud of his daughter and shared her achievements. But this did not help improve Karina’s relationship with her father. They, as before, do not communicate.

A year after the divorce, the musician married for the second time. The wedding of Alexander and Svetlana took place in 2008. A year later, there was an addition to the family. A son was born, who was named after his father. After 6 years, the couple became parents again. Svetlana gave birth to a daughter, who was decided to be named the same as her mother.

After 12 years of marriage, Svetlana says that she has learned to completely trust her husband. Alexander Ivanov’s wife Svetlana Fedorovskaya knows that information about mistresses on tour is just the fabrication of journalists. The woman says that they have reached the age when trust is the most important thing in a family. I no longer want any adventures or intrigues. Now she and Alexander are enjoying quiet family happiness and raising children.

Personal assessments of contemporaries who knew her

The nanny of the royal children, A. A. Tegleva, who served in the family for seventeen years, spoke about Empress Alexandra after the revolution:

Archimandrite Nicholas (Gibbs) spoke about the empress:

According to Baroness S. K. Buxhoeveden:

A. A. Taneyeva (Vyrubova), maid of honor and closest friend of the empress, recalled:

Yu. A. Den, a friend of the empress, gave her the following description:

Biography

Friederike Charlotte Wilhelmina was born on July 13, 1798, the third child and first daughter of Prussian King Frederick William III and his wife Queen Louise. She was the sister of the Prussian kings Frederick William IV and William I, the first German emperor. Lost her mother at age 12.

After Napoleon's army entered Berlin, the king's family took refuge in East Prussia, under the protection of the Russian Emperor Alexander I. In 1814, Charlotte met his brother Nikolai Pavlovich. The young fell in love with each other at first sight and already on November 14, 1815, the princess and the Grand Duke became engaged.

The marriage was necessary in order to strengthen the alliance between Russia and Prussia. Nicholas was not expected to inherit the Russian throne, since his older brother Constantine was the heir, and Charlotte was glad to become a Grand Duchess and live away from palace intrigue. Due to the tender age of the bride, it was decided to postpone the wedding for two years.

Charlotte of Prussia at the age of 12

The princess arrived in Russia in June 1817, on June 24 (July 6), 1817, she converted to Orthodoxy with the name Alexandra Feodorovna, and on June 25 (July 7, 1817) she became engaged to Nikolai Pavlovich[1]. Upon anointing, she received the title of Grand Duchess and the Order of St. Catherine. The wedding took place on the princess's birthday - July 1 (13), 1817 in the Church of the Winter Palace[2][3]. Before the wedding, the future Grand Duchess wrote: “I cried a lot at the thought that I would have to meet the Dowager Empress, the stories about whom frightened me.” And yet, subsequently, quite good relations developed between Maria Feodorovna and her daughter-in-law (which cannot be said about her relationship with Empress Elizaveta Alekseevna). After the wedding she received the title of Grand Duchess.

Nicholas and Alexandra after their wedding in 1817

At the Russian court, the new Grand Duchess was received kindly. “We remember her majestic and austere figure, representing the complete type of German beauty,” wrote a contemporary[4]. Alexandra Fedorovna was distinguished by her grace, courtesy and cheerfulness. She was accompanied by her close childhood friend, Countess Cecilia Gurovskaya, who became the wife of the Russian officer Fredericks. Although Alexandra learned Russian (under the guidance of the poet Zhukovsky), she preferred to express herself in German all her life.

The marriage of Nicholas and Alexandra turned out to be a large one; nine months after the wedding, the Grand Duchess gave birth to her first child, son Alexander, named after her uncle, Emperor Alexander I. Here is what Alexandra Feodorovna wrote after the birth:

The future empress, who moved to Peterhof in 1825, was painfully going through a period of uncertainty associated with the abdication of Tsarevich Constantine. Upon receiving news of the Decembrist uprising, she rushed to the court church to pray for the well-being of her family. From the excitement she experienced, she developed a facial tic and a nervous illness, due to which she had to postpone the coronation several times. The day after the uprising she wrote in her diary:

Alexandra Feodorovna with her daughter Maria on the shores of the Black Sea (1829)
Having heard that the wives of the Decembrists followed their husbands to hard labor, Alexandra Fedorovna wrote in her diary: “Oh, if I were in their place, I would have done the same!”[6].

In her youth, Alexandra Fedorovna was quite a coquette, squandered money at the best resorts in Europe, and traveled with her husband to Germany almost every year. She is mentioned in the brilliant stanza of “Eugene Onegin”, which was not included in the final edition of the novel, under the name of Lalla-Ruk. This was the empress's court nickname ( nom de société

). In the era of romanticism, when all the poets and artists sang the beauty of Italy, the empress passionately wanted to visit this country. To quench this thirst, Nicholas ordered a pavilion in the “Pompeian” style to be built for her in Peterhof. In Moscow, the Alexandria Palace received her name.

Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko depicted a satirical portrait of the empress:

...The queen of no god, Mov the stump of drying, Thin, long-legged, That one, dashingly, heartily Hit with her head. So this is the goddess![7]

According to the memoirs of contemporaries, “when Nicholas I read T. Shevchenko’s libel against the empress, he became very angry, and here are his own words: “ Let’s say he had reasons to be dissatisfied with me and hate me, but why should she?

“”[8] After her husband’s accession to the Russian throne, she received the title of empress. The coronation of Nicholas I and Alexandra Fedorovna took place on August 22, 1826 in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin[9][10]. During the coronation, the Empress was awarded the Order of St. Andrew the First-Called[11].

Emperor Nicholas I had for his wife, this fragile, irresponsible and graceful creature, a passionate and despotic adoration of a strong nature for a weak being, whose only ruler and legislator he felt. For him, this was a lovely bird, which he kept locked in a golden and jeweled cage, which he fed with nectar and ambrosia, lulled with melodies and scents, but whose wings he would not regret to cut if she wanted to escape from the gilded bars of her cage .

— maid of honor Anna Tyutcheva

On May 12 (24), 1829, in the Senatorial Hall of the Royal Castle, the coronation of Nicholas I and Alexandra Feodorovna to the Kingdom of Poland took place - a unique event in the history of Russia and Poland.

During the fire of the Winter Palace, the emperor ordered, first of all, to save the letters that Alexandrine wrote to him from Germany during the period of their engagement. Family happiness was overshadowed by her poor health (she bore eight children) and the inability to adapt to the climate of St. Petersburg. Due to frequent illnesses, she was forced to go to European resorts for treatment. Her husband’s fleeting hobbies brought her mental pain, especially his relationship with Varvara Nelidova, which arose after doctors assured the empress of the danger of a new pregnancy for her life and advised her to stop having sexual relations with her husband.

At the same time, Alexandra Fedorovna’s own circle of male friends in the 1830s consisted of the young cavalry guards Skaryatin, Kurakin, Dantes, Betancourt and Alexander Trubetskoy, whom the empress affectionately called “Velvet” in letters to her friend Sophie Bobrinskaya[12]. Like her husband, she could not stand the smell of tobacco and subsequently forced her first-born to give up this addiction. The Empress's daily routine, according to a contemporary[13], was as follows:

Dowager Empress Alexandra Feodorovna.
Portrait by Winterhalter (1856). Alexandra Fedorovna knew how to control herself, hide her grievances and tears under the mask of cloudless happiness, and tried to appear healthy and cheerful when she was tormented by a fever. The Marquis de Custine noted in 1839 that the Empress not only danced all the polonaises in the open air with her head open and neck bare, but also “will dance until she has no strength to stand on her feet.” At the same time, he did not fail to note that at forty years old, the empress looks much older than her age:

Photograph of the Dowager Empress Alexandra Feodorovna a year before her death in 1860.

In 1845, when doctors ordered Alexandra Feodorovna to go south to Palermo to improve her health, the seemingly inflexible emperor begged them with tears: “Leave me my wife!” Unable to bear the separation, he traveled to Sicily (accompanied by his maid of honor Nelidova, with whom the Empress had by that time been able to establish relations). In 1837, he began the construction of a seaside palace for her in Oreanda, but Alexandra Fedorovna, who sincerely loved Crimea, visited there only once. Over the years, she preferred to spend more and more time on the Cote d'Azur.

In 1854, Alexandra Feodorovna was closer than ever to death. A year later, after the death of Nicholas I, she secluded herself in the Alexander Palace and for five years bore the title of Dowager Empress. She was surrounded by a select circle of her favorite ladies-in-waiting, who read Schiller and Goethe to her at night; Among them was Varvara Nelidova. During these years, the Empress was increasingly ill, was treated in Switzerland, Nice and Rome, and after returning from a trip abroad in July 1860, she never stopped getting sick. Alexandra Fedorovna died on October 20, 1860 in Tsarskoe Selo, she was sixty-two years old. The funeral service took place on November 5[14]; buried in the Peter and Paul Cathedral.