Princess Olga Romanova. Is it easy to be a princess? An artist from the royal family: what was the fate of Nicholas II’s sister in exile

Olga Alexandrovna Romanova (June 13, 1882, Peterhof - November 24, 1960, near Toronto) - Grand Duchess from the House of Romanov, known as a talented artist, trustee and philanthropist.

The youngest child and youngest daughter of the Russian Emperor Alexander III and Empress Maria Feodorovna after Nicholas, Alexander, George, Xenia and Mikhail. In honor of her birth on June 13, 1882, 101 gun shots were fired from the bastion of the Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg and throughout Russia. The Byzantines called children like her crimson-born, and the Russians called them porphyritic. On earth you can count them on one hand, because they had to be born to the anointed of God, that is, to the reigning emperor.

Maria Fedorovna with Olga (pictured on the left) and with all the children (pictured on the right).


Empress Maria Feodorovna considered her daughter an ugly duckling with an intolerable character - the girl preferred to run around in games with her brothers rather than carry baby dolls in strollers. On the advice of her aunt, Alexandra of Denmark, Queen of Great Britain, Olga was raised by the English governess Elizabeth Franklin. “Throughout my entire childhood, Nana was a protector and adviser to me, and subsequently a faithful friend. I can’t even imagine what I would do without her. It was she who helped me survive the chaos that reigned during the revolution. She was an intelligent, brave, tactful woman; although she performed the duties of my nanny, both my brothers and sister felt her influence,” recalled Olga Alexandrovna.




Family of Emperor Alexander III. Olga is in the center with her father, Alexander III. From left to right: Grand Duke Mikhail, Empress Maria Feodorovna, Grand Duke Nicholas (Nicholas II), Grand Duchess Xenia and Grand Duke George. 1888
The imperial family was under threat of terrorist attack, so, for security reasons, Olga was raised in the Gatchina Palace, 80 kilometers west of St. Petersburg. Olga and her sister lived in a simple, austere environment. They slept on hard camp beds, got up at dawn and washed cold water, had breakfast with oatmeal.


Nikolai, Georgy, Maria Fedorovna, Olga, Mikhail, Ksenia and Emperor Alexander III.


Olga, Mikhail, Georgy and Maria Fedorovna./ Olga with her brother Mikhail.
The sisters received home education. They were taught history, geography, Russian, English and French languages, drawing and dancing. WITH early years they were taught equestrianism and became skilled riders. The imperial family was religious and strictly observed Lent. We spent the holidays in Peterhof and with my grandmother in Denmark. Olga's relationship with her mother was difficult. Her relationship with her father and the youngest of her brothers, Mikhail, was especially warm. They often spent time together, walking in the forests of Gatchina.


Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich and Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna on the deck of a ship at sea. 1887
Olga first left the Gatchina Palace in the early autumn of 1888 for a trip to the Caucasus. On October 29, on the way back, near the small Borki station, the royal train derailed. At this time, the royal family was in the dining room. The carriage was torn apart, the heavy iron roof bent dangerously inward. The emperor himself held the roof of the carriage so that his family would not be harmed, and this would affect his health; kidney complications would arise, which would lead to death. Little Olga was thrown out of the carriage by the explosion. She was so scared that she ran away from the train screaming: “Now they will come and kill us all.” The six-year-old child, of course, knew nothing about revolutionaries and terrorists, but by the word THEY Olga meant something terrible.


Imperial train wreck. October 29, 1888


In 1894, the emperor became seriously ill, and his trip to Denmark was cancelled. On November 13, at the age of 49, Alexander III died. Olga took the loss very hard. “My father was everything to me. No matter how busy he was with his work, he devoted half an hour to me every day... And one day dad showed me a very old album with delightful drawings depicting an imaginary city called Mopsopolis, in which Pugs live... He showed it to me secretly, and I was delighted with that my father shared with me the secrets of his childhood,” Olga Alexandrovna recalled.


Serov Valentin Alexandrovich. Portrait of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna Romanova. 1893
She, like her father, did not like balls, dresses, or jewelry. Her favorite dress was a linen sundress, in which she painted. The Empress taught Olga, as a royal daughter, to all these external attributes; Maria Feodorovna was most worried that the children would not violate etiquette. Olga was supposed to be published in the summer of 1899, but due to the death of her brother, Georgy Alexandrovich, the release was postponed for a year. Olga retained negative memories of this event. As she later admitted to her official biographer Ian Worres: “I felt like an animal on display in a cage for everyone to see.”


Grand Duke Georgy Alexandrovich with Olga.
In 1901, Olga was appointed honorary commander of the 12th Akhtyrsky Hussar Regiment. The regiment was famous for its victory over Napoleon at the Battle of Kulm; its members wore special brown dolmans.


Grand Duchess Olga with governess Mrs. Franklin (left), and in the uniform of the 12th Akhtyrsky Hussars (right).
In the imperial family, all the children studied painting, but only Olga began to study it professionally. Her teachers were teachers of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, in particular V. Makovsky, S. Zhukovsky, S. Vinogradov. In the 1900s, the Grand Duchess held art openings at the Gatchina Palace, at which not only her works were presented, but also paintings by young artists.


“Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna, among all the persons of the imperial family, was distinguished by her extraordinary simplicity, accessibility, and democracy. On her estate in the Voronezh province, she completely grew up: she walked around the village huts, nursed peasant children. In St. Petersburg, she often walked and rode in simple cabs, and she loved to talk with the latter,” said Protopresbyter Georgy Shavelsky.


Frustrated that by the age of eighteen, as is usual in fairy tales, Olga had not turned into a beautiful swan, and even demonstratively adhered to some special views on life, Maria Feodorovna considered it best to marry off her daughter. Most often, husbands for the royal daughters were found among other reigning royal houses, which actually meant separation from their homeland. But Olga categorically refused this option. This meant that the prince should be found in Russia. And such an option was found... The Russified branch of the German princes of Oldenburg lived in Russia since the time of Emperor Nicholas I and were relatives of the Romanovs. Empress Maria Feodorovna was friends with Princess Eugenia of Oldenburg (née Leuchtenberg). The only son of Princess Eugenie and her husband Alexander of Oldenburg, Prince Peter Alexandrovich of Oldenburg (1868-1924), was by no means an enviable groom (he was 14 years older than 18-year-old Olga). But that was not the most important thing. “Not a young groom” was far from a man, he was not at all interested in women, he loved cards, wine and... men.


Olga Alexandrovna with her first husband, the Duke of Oldenburg.
Secretary of State Alexander Alexandrovich Polovtsov wrote: “The Grand Duchess is not beautiful, her upturned nose and generally Mongolian type of face are redeemed only by her beautiful eyes, kind and intelligent eyes, looking straight at you. Wanting to live in Russia, she chose the son of Prince Alexander Petrovich of Oldenburg. Despite his high birth and significant financial fortune, the prince is mediocre in all respects, and in his appearance he is inferior to a mediocre person; Despite his years, he has almost no hair on his head and generally gives the impression of a frail person, far from breathing health and in no way promising numerous offspring. Obviously, considerations alien to the success of marital cohabitation were put in the foreground here, which will almost certainly be regretted over time.”


Olga Alexandrovna Romanova with Pyotr Alexandrovich of Oldenburg.
On July 27, 1901, Olga Alexandrovna’s marriage to Prince Peter Alexandrovich, Duke of Oldenburg, took place in the Gatchina Palace Church. In the evening after the engagement, she cried with her brother Mikhail. The couple lived in the Baryatinsky mansion (46-48 on Sergievskaya Street, now Tchaikovsky). Peter and Olga were each other's second and fourth cousins: Olga's father, Emperor Alexander III, was a cousin of Peter's mother and a second cousin of Peter's father. Thus, the couple had two common ancestors - two Russian emperors Paul I and Nicholas I.


Neradovsky Pyotr Ivanovich. Portrait of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna. 1905
The husband was quite pleased that in the eyes of the entire baptized and unbaptized world he was the husband of the sister of the sovereign of all Rus'. And in the shortest possible time he left a fabulous sum in the gambling houses - a million gold rubles belonging to his wife. But Olga remained a virgin. In April 1903, the 22-year-old Grand Duchess met the captain of the Life Guards Cuirassier Regiment, Nikolai Alexandrovich Kulikovsky. It was love at first sight, and she carried this love throughout her life. She asked her husband to give her a divorce, but he said that he would return to this conversation in 7 years. Peter made a compromise: he invited Kulikovsky to become his adjutant and move to their house on Sergievskaya. Olga and Nikolai waited 13 years. This love triangle was for a long time a secret to everyone. Olga Alexandrovna recalled the period of her marriage with the Prince of Oldenburg: “We lived with him under the same roof for 15 years, but we never became husband and wife.”


From 1904 to 1906, Duke Peter served at Tsarskoye Selo, a palace complex south of St. Petersburg. In Tsarskoe Selo, Olga became close to her brother Nikolai and his family. Olga valued her relationships with the royal daughters. From 1906 to 1914, she took her nieces to parties and balls in St. Petersburg. She especially loved Anastasia. Through her brother she met Rasputin, but did not recognize him, although she did not openly show her hostility.


Stember Viktor Karlovich. Portrait of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna. 1908
The course of the Russo-Japanese War and the population's dissatisfaction with the political course caused constant unrest and protests. On Annunciation Day 1905, a gang of terrorists opened fire on the Winter Palace. Shards of glass rained down on Olga and the Dowager Empress. Three weeks later, during Bloody Sunday, at least 92 people were killed by the Cossacks while suppressing the uprising. A month later, Olga Alexandrovna’s uncle, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, was killed. Constant public performances, the escape of Grand Duke Mikhail for the sake of a morganatic wedding and her own unsuccessful marriage affected Olga Alexandrovna’s health.




Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna. 1915
During the First World War, Olga was a nurse in the hospital she founded. Captain 2nd rank of the Guards crew Sablin Nikolai Vasilievich wrote: “A lovely woman, a real Russian person, amazing charm... Olga Alexandrovna is a warm comrade of our officers. How many secrets, secrets, sorrows, novels of our youth the princess knows!”


Olga Alexandrovna goes with her hospital to the front. Before that, she escorted Nikolai Kulikovsky there. She came to her husband and said that she was leaving him forever. In 1915, the couple separated; Olga had no children from her first marriage. On August 27, 1916, Emperor Nicholas II approved the resolution of the Holy Synod, which recognized her marriage with the Prince of Oldenburg as dissolved. Nicholas II came to inspect the hospital that Olga equipped in Kyiv at her own expense. At the end of the short stay, the Tsar gave his sister a photograph of himself and a handwritten letter in English, so that others could not read it, annulling her marriage to the Prince of Oldenburg and blessing her marriage to Colonel Kulikovsky.


Nicholas II, Olga Alexandrovna in the hospital. Kyiv. 1916


Maria Feodorovna, Nicholas II, Olga Nikolaevna, Olga Alexandrovna, Tatyana Nikolaevna, Ksenia Alexandrovna with Vasily. Kyiv, 1916


Olga with her husband, Nikolai Alexandrovich Kulikovsky, and her mother, Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna.
On November 4, 1916, in the Church of St. Nicholas in Kyiv, Olga Alexandrovna’s wedding took place with Nikolai Alexandrovich Kulikovsky, who became her husband and friend until the end of her days.


Olga Alexandrovna and N.A. Kulikovsky after the wedding. Kyiv, 1916
After Nicholas II abdicated the throne in 1917, many members of the imperial family, including the emperor himself and his closest relatives, were placed under house arrest. The Dowager Empress, Grand Duke Alexander and Olga Alexandrovna moved to Crimea to join Ksenia Alexandrovna. They lived on the Alexandria estate, about 12 kilometers from Yalta.


Olga Alexandrovna with her second husband Nikolai Kulikovsky.
On August 12, 1917, Olga gave birth to her first child, who was named in honor of Tikhon of Zadonsk, a saint revered in Olga Alexandrovna’s estate. Empress Maria Feodorovna wrote about it this way: “At times, when it seems that it is no longer possible to bear all this, the Lord sends us something like a ray of light. My dear Olga gave birth to a baby, a little son, who, of course, brought such unexpected joy to my heart...”


Father and son (N. A. Kulikovsky with his first-born Tikhon). Watercolor by Olga Alexandrovna.
Back in 1905, General Alexei Nikolaevich Kuropatkin, who knew Olga’s simplicity and democratic taste, jokingly commented that she was “a little red-faced”: “My next meeting was with the leader. Princess Olga Alexandrovna was born on November 12, 1918 in Crimea, where she lived with her second husband, captain of the hussar regiment Kulikovsky. Here she became even more at ease. It would be difficult for anyone who did not know her to believe that this was the Grand Duchess. They occupied a small, very poorly furnished house. The Grand Duchess herself nursed her baby, cooked and even washed the clothes. I found her in the garden, where she was pushing her child in a stroller. She immediately invited me into the house and there treated me to tea and her own products: jam and cookies. The simplicity of the situation, bordering on squalor, made it even more sweet and attractive.”


The Romanovs were isolated from the world and knew virtually nothing about the fate of the Emperor. In February 1918, most of the imperial family moved from Ai-Todor to Dulber, where Grand Dukes Nicholas and Peter were already under house arrest. Olga Alexandrovna and her husband stayed in Ai-Todor. The Yalta Revolutionary Council “sentenced” the entire Romanov family to death, but the execution of the sentence was delayed due to rivalry between the revolutionary councils.


Olga Alexandrovna with her son Tikhon.
By April 1918, the Central Powers invaded Crimea and the revolutionary guards were replaced by German ones, but the regime became looser. In November 1918, after the surrender in the First World War, German troops left the occupied territories of the former Russian Empire. The territory temporarily came under the control of allies loyal to the white movement, and members of the Imperial family were able to leave the country. The Empress Dowager left with her family and friends on the British ship Marlborough. By that time, Nicholas II had already been killed, and the family rightly believed that his wife and children were killed along with him. Mikhail, his beloved brother, was killed in the Perm region in June 1918.


Self-portrait of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna.
At the beginning of 1919, when Ukraine was captured by the Bolsheviks, and the Don and Kuban by the Whites, Olga Alexandrovna and her husband decided to leave Crimea and go to Rostov, where General Denikin’s headquarters was located. The family was accompanied by the empress's personal bodyguard, Kuban Cossack Timofey Ksenofontovich Yashchik, a native of the village of Novominskaya. Denikin did not accept them. Timofey Yashchik did not know what to do next and brought them to Novominskaya. Here in 1919 the couple had their second son, Gury. The child was named in honor of Guriy Panaev, an officer of the Akhtyrsky regiment who was killed during the First World War. Olga Alexandrovna's children, although they were grandchildren of the emperor, did not belong to royal blood, since their father was a simple nobleman.


In the late autumn of 1919, the Cossacks reported that a red crossing had appeared not far from Novominskaya. The Kulikovskys gathered in half an hour, wrapped the children in blankets, collected belongings that they could take with them, and left the village. Only in February 20, the Romanov-Kulikovskys managed to board an English ship and leave their homeland forever. The ship was packed with refugees; they, along with other passengers, occupied a cramped cabin. “I couldn’t believe that I was leaving my homeland forever. I was sure that I would return again,” Olga Alexandrovna recalled. “I had a feeling that my flight was a cowardly act, although I came to this decision for the sake of my young children. And yet I was constantly tormented by shame.” Via Constantinople, Belgrade and Vienna, they finally reached Denmark in 1920.


Gury in a stroller. Watercolor by Olga Alexandrovna.


Self-portrait of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna. 1920
The Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna lived in one of the wings of the royal Amalienborg Palace in close proximity to her own nephew, King Christian X, who did not hide his hostility towards his dispossessed relatives. The financial situation of the fugitives was in disarray. Things got worse thanks to the thoughtless generosity of Maria Feodorovna. Thousands of Russian emigrants wrote to her from all over the world and asked for help, and the Empress considered it her duty to satisfy all their requests. During this period, Olga Alexandrovna’s family lived with Maria Feodorovna.


Tikhon and Gury. Watercolors by Olga Alexandrovna.
For some time, many wealthy friends of Empress Maria Feodorovna provided her with financial support, but the situation worsened every day. To reduce expenses, Maria Fedorovna, together with her yard,
the unspeakable joy of King Christian X, moved to the Videre Palace. Gury and his brother attended a regular Danish school. But in addition to the Danish education, the sons of the Grand Duchess studied at a Russian school in Paris, at the Church of St. Alexander Nevsky.


Tikhon and Guriy Kulikovsky on the veranda of the Videre Palace.


Olga Alexandrovna with her sons in Denmark.
In 1925, Olga Alexandrovna left her family for 4 days in order to go to Berlin. Anna Andersen had been in a hospital there for several years, posing as Anastasia, the youngest daughter of Nicholas II. Everyone tried to dissuade Olga Alexandrovna from the trip, but she decided to put an end to this story. She so wanted to believe that her beloved niece and goddaughter was alive. But when she arrived in Berlin, she saw the impostor and realized that she was being forced to play the role of Anastasia.


Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna with her beloved niece Anastasia.
After the death of Maria Feodorovna in October 1928, Christian sent his cousin, Prince Axel, with an urgent request to the Grand Duchess and her household to immediately leave the palace. A Danish millionaire, Mr. Rasmussen, came to Olga Alexandrovna’s aid. He had a large estate near Wiedøre, and he hired Colonel Kulikovsky, an excellent horse expert, to manage his stables. The Grand Duchess and her husband happily moved to the estate.


Olga Alexandrovna with her husband Nikolai Kulikovsky.


Olga Alexandrovna with her sons Tikhon and Gury.
Soon confirmed legal rights Grand Duchess to the Videre Palace. She was able to sell it and purchase an estate with the proceeds. But all this took almost four years. It was not until 1932 that she and her family became the owners of the large Knudsminne farm in a town called Ballerup, about fifteen miles northwest of Copenhagen. The happiest period of her life began. Olga Alexandrovna was able to return to painting again. People started buying her paintings. The Grand Duchess was friends with the outstanding Danish artist, landscape master P. Mensted, with whom she went to sketches. Works from the 1930s and 1940s depict scenes of peaceful and prosperous rural life. Olga often gave her paintings to relatives and friends from both the Romanov family and other royal families.


Olga Alexandrovna with her husband N.A. Kulikovsky and sons Tikhon and Gury.


Watercolor by Olga Alexandrovna. Portrait of son Tikhon. 1940


Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna with her sons Tikhon and Gury (officers of the Danish army).
Both of her sons, Tikhon (1917-1993) and Gury (1919-1984), having completed their education, entered service in the Danish Royal Guard. Soon both of them married Danish girls.
On May 10, 1940, Guriy Nikolaevich married Ruth Schwartz (02/06/1921 - 07/22/2015), the daughter of a small merchant in Ballerup. The couple had a daughter, Ksenia (07/29/1941) and two sons - Leonid (05/2/1943 - 09/27/2015) and Alexander (born 11/29/1949). In 1956, Gury and Ruth Kulikovsky divorced. A few years later he married Aza Gagarina (b. 1924).
Tikhon Nikolaevich married Agnet Petersen (1920-2007) in 1942. Divorced in 1955, there were no children from the marriage. On September 21, 1959, in Ottawa, he married Livia Sebastian (June 11, 1922 - June 12, 1982), and had one daughter from the marriage, Olga Tikhonovna (b. January 9, 1964). On June 8, 1986, in Toronto, he married Olga Nikolaevna Pupynina (b. September 20, 1926).


Olga Alexandrovna with her husband N.A. Kulikovsky.


The Kulikovsky family having breakfast on the veranda of their house in Ballerup.


Portrait of granddaughter Ksenia. Watercolor by Olga Alexandrovna.
The Nazi invasion of Russia led to terrible complications in the life of the Grand Duchess. Having refrained from participating in politics all her life, Olga Alexandrovna found herself drawn into a dangerous cycle of intrigue. She was Russian and felt she had an obligation to help her compatriots who had donned German uniforms in the hope that Hitler's victory in Russia would end communism. After Hitler's defeat, many Russians who fought on his side came to Kundsminne, hoping to gain asylum. The communists repeatedly demanded that the Danish authorities hand over the Grand Duchess, accusing her of helping her fellow countrymen take refuge in the West, and the Danish government at that time would hardly have been able to resist the Kremlin’s demands.


The Kulikovsky family before leaving for Canada. 1948
A threat loomed over the life of the Grand Duchess and her loved ones. The atmosphere in Ballerup became increasingly tense, and it became obvious that the days of Olga Alexandrovna’s family in Denmark were numbered. The Grand Duchess, who was sixty-six years old, did not find it very easy to leave her settled place. In the spring of 1948, with great difficulty, the Romanov-Kulikovskys sold their estate and were able to move to Canada, settling in the village of Cooksville, now merged with the city of Mississauga, near Toronto, where Tikhon Nikolaevich worked for many years in the Ontario Highway Department. Guriy Nikolaevich became a talented teacher, teaching Slavic languages ​​and culture in Ottawa. He also taught Russian to Canadian pilots, believing that during the Cold War, a Canadian soldier should know Russian.


Olga Alexandrovna, Leonid Kulikovsky, Ruth Kulikovskaya and Guriy Kulikovsky.
Olga Alexandrovna lived in Canada under the surname Kulikovsky (Olga Alexandrovna Kulikovsky), nevertheless continuing Russian traditions, celebrating all Orthodox holidays. A neighbor’s child once asked if it was true that she was a princess, to which Olga Alexandrovna replied: “Well, of course, I’m not a princess. I am the Russian Grand Duchess." Olga Alexandrovna was close to virtually every royal family in Europe. In 1959, Queen Elizabeth II of England and her husband Prince Philip visited Toronto; only 50 people were invited to dinner, including Olga Alexandrovna, who was now called the last Grand Duchess.


Olga Alexandrovna often heard the banal accusation that the Romanovs were Russians only by name, to which she invariably answered: “How much English blood flows in the veins of George VI? It's not about the blood. It’s about the soil in which you grew up, the faith in which you were raised, the language you speak.” During these years, the idea arose to proclaim Olga Empress. It goes without saying that the unambitious and very modest Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna flatly refused such an offer.


She died in 1960, at the age of 78, 2 years after her husband. There was a burial service in the Orthodox church of Toronto, where officers of the 12th Akhtyrsky E.I.V. Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna regiment, whose chief she became back in 1901, stood guard at the coffin. She is buried in York Cemetery, Toronto.


Family grave of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna at the North York cemetery in Toronto.


Memorial plaque on the grave of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna.
Guriy Nikolaevich Kulikovsky died on September 11, 1984 in Brookville and was buried in Oakland cemetery. His widow, Aza Gagarina, lives in Brookville. None of Guriy Nikolaevich’s children remained in Canada; all of them, together with their mother, returned to Denmark after their parents’ divorce.
Tikhon Nikolaevich Kulikovsky died on April 8, 1993, after a second heart operation. The funeral service took place on April 15 at Holy Trinity Church in Toronto. Burial took place on the same day at York Cemetery, north of Toronto, next to his parents. Samples of his blood taken during the operation were preserved and became a compelling argument in identifying the remains of the Imperial Family.
**Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna left memoirs, the literary recording of which was made by Jan Worres.
**In the Danish city of Bollerup (Danish), where she lived with her husband and children from 1930 to 1948, the Olga Alexandrovna Museum was created.
**In 2003, filmed jointly by Russia, Denmark and Canada documentary“Olga - the last Grand Duchess” (dir. Sonya Westerholt)
**In Vladivostok on Okeansky Avenue there is a 35th hospital named after Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna, opened in 1901 and built with the money of the merchant Skidelsky.
**In January 2011, a unique exhibition of watercolors by Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna was held at the Romanov Museum in Kostroma.

Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna Romanova was the youngest daughter of Emperor Alexander III and sister of Emperor Nicholas II. However, she is known not only for her noble origin, but also for her active charitable activities and artistic talent. She managed to avoid the terrible fate that befell her brother and his family - after the revolution she remained alive and went abroad. However, life in exile was far from cloudless: for some time paintings were her only means of livelihood.

Olga Alexandrovna Romanova was born in 1882. She was the youngest daughter of Emperor Alexander III and his wife Maria Feodorovna, as well as younger sister the last tsar, Nicholas II.

Daddy's girl

Little Olga was brought up in simplicity and severity, like all the children of Alexander III. At first she grew up at the court of her father, and in her adolescence already at the court of her older brother Nicholas.

Until 1888, Olga did not travel outside the Gatchina Palace, and her very first trip to the Caucasus was marked by tragedy: at the Borki station, the royal train derailed and her father tore himself while holding the mangled roof of the carriage so that all family members could get out.

The emperor undermined his health and 12-year-old Olga was left an orphan. Her father was the closest person to her. It was to him that Olga confided her childhood secrets, and tried to spend her free time with him.

But relations with his mother Maria Feodorovna remained more than cool all his life. What is the reason for this misunderstanding? Unknown. Either the mother was jealous of the youngest daughter, who devoted so much time to her father, or there was a simple dissimilarity of characters.

Contemporaries described Olga as follows:

On her estate she walked around the village huts and nursed peasant children. In St. Petersburg, she often walked and rode in simple cabs, and she loved to talk with the latter. A lovely woman, a real Russian person, of amazing charm...

Unsuccessful marriage

In 1900, Olga Alexandrovna first appeared in public as an adult girl.

And her mother began to actively arrange her marriage with Prince Peter Alexandrovich of Oldenburg, which took place just a year later, in 1901. The groom was 14 years older than the bride. Moreover, the spouses were blood relatives to each other: fourth cousins ​​on one side, and second cousins ​​on the other.

The prince considered his wife ugly. They said that he would consider any woman ugly, as there were persistent rumors about his gay orientation.

Did the mother know about this? Certainly. Maria Fedorovna believed that with such a marriage she would finally force her youngest daughter to pay more attention to herself.

The marriage lasted 15 long years. All these years Olga Alexandrovna remained a virgin; she would later write about this in her memoirs.

In 1916, Olga obtained from the Holy Synod the dissolution of her ill-fated marriage. Brother Nicholas II approved this decision, although he opposed this event for several years in a row.

The happiness of motherhood against the backdrop of a dying Empire

The second husband of the Tsar's daughter was officer Nikolai Kulikovsky. In August 1917, 35-year-old Olga gave birth to a son, Tikhon. And 2 years later another son was born, named Gury.

The country in which her father and brother ruled has already ceased to exist. Mother, Maria Fedorovna, left Russia, and Olga initially refused to leave. She remained in the Caucasus, cleared of the Bolsheviks, until 1920.

By this time, her brother Nikolai and his entire family had already died, and the Bolsheviks also shot her brother Mikhail.

And yet Olga and her family had to leave. They escaped by sea, through Constantinople, and went to Denmark. She lived with her unkind mother for several years. She helped Russian emigrants a lot.

Bitter bread of a foreign land

It was because of Olga Alexandrovna that the USSR made claims against Denmark. Their essence was that Olga Romanova was helping “enemies of the people.”

Fleeing from possible persecution by Stalin, in 1948 Olga Alexandrovna left with her family for Canada. There she lives under the name of her second husband, Kulikovsky.

She was active among emigrants until the very last day of her life and left memoirs.

In 1960, Olga died, outliving her beloved second husband by 2 years. By the way, she was the last Grand Duchess of the Romanov dynasty, who received this title during the existence of autocracy in Russia.

Oldenburg - German dukes and duchesses of the Holstein-Gottorp dynasty, immediate direct heirs of the Russian imperial family.

TO 19th century in Western Europe, the dynasties of all the major states (with the exception of the Austrian Habsburgs, the German Hohenzollerns and the Italian Savoy dynasty) were foreign.

Dynasties of German origin ruled in Great Britain, Belgium, Portugal, and Bulgaria.

Representatives of the German Oldenburg dynasty belonged to the thrones in Denmark and Greece, Norway and Sweden, and in 1761 in Russia.

For the first time, the Oldenburg family became related to the House of Romanov during the time of Peter I, when his daughter Anna Petrovna married Duke Karl-Friedrich of Holstein - the nephew of the Swedish king Charles XII on the side of Sophia Hedwig's mother. This dynastic marriage forever linked with family ties the former worst enemies of Peter I and Charles XII, the dynasty of the Russian Romanov tsars and one of the branches of the Oldenburg family - the dynasty of Holstein-Gottorp dukes and duchesses.

From the marriage a son was born - Karl Peter Ulrich (Peter III), who was simultaneously the heir to the Swedish and Russian thrones, who was prepared from early childhood to inherit the Swedish throne, without paying due attention to becoming familiar with the language and customs of Russia.

In 1761, the Holstein-Gottorps, represented by Peter III, reigned in Russia and began to bear the name of the dynasty of Russian Romanov tsars and marry exclusively German princesses. But a year later they lost the throne.

From 1762 to 1796, Russia was ruled by the wife of Peter III, Catherine II (Princess Sophia-Frederica-Augustina of Zerbskaya), a representative of the Anhalt-Zerbian line of the ancient German Askani dynasty.

His Imperial Highness the Prince of Oldenburg - great-grandson of Emperor Paul I, member State Council, infantry general (adjutant general). On his birthday, he was enlisted as a warrant officer in the Preobrazhensky Regiment, in which he began military service in 1864. Awarded golden weapons and the Order of St. George. The son of Prince Peter Georgievich of Oldenburg, a well-known public and statesman in Russia, the grandson of Prince George Petrovich, who moved to Russia in connection with his marriage to the daughter of Paul I, Ekaterina Pavlovna. In 1868, he repeated the story of his grandfather, again becoming related to the Romanovs, marrying Grand Duchess Evgenia Maximilyanovna, granddaughter of Nicholas I.

According to contemporaries, Alexander Petrovich was an active and energetic person. Busy with his military and state affairs, he spent most of his life in the capital and military campaigns, and Eugenia managed the affairs of the vast Ramon estate. In this his role was insignificant. With the name A.P. Oldenburgsky is associated with the founding of the Gagrinskaya climate station and the activities of the scientific and medical society. During the first imperialist war he was appointed Supreme Commander of the sanitary and evacuation unit of the Russian army. His residence was located on a special railway train, which traveled around the rear of the front.

He was a trustee of the St. Petersburg Imperial School of Law, the shelter of Prince Peter Georgievich of Oldenburg. In 1890, he opened the Imperial Institute of Experimental Medicine (now the I.P. Pavlov Institute). He was buried in Barritsa on the Atlantic coast.

The Grand Duchess is the youngest "porphyry" daughter of Emperor Alexander III, born of all 7 children during her father's reign, the sister of the last Russian Emperor Nicholas II. Since 1901, she has been married to Prince Peter of Oldenburg, the son of Princess Eugenie. After marriage, she lived on her Ramon estate “Olgino” (now the territory of a hospital). In 1902 -1908. improved the estate. She built a “palace” (now a maternity hospital), new houses, and outbuildings.

In 1902, she bought an estate in Starozhivotinny (former estate of the Olenins) in her name. She was the chief and honorary colonel of the 12th Tsar's Akhtyrsky Regiment, whose property warehouse was located in Ramon.

With the outbreak of the war with Germany, Prince Peter's adjutant, captain Nikolai Aleksandrovich Kulikovsky (1881-1959), was in the active army as part of the Akhtyrsky regiment. Olg; followed him and went to the front as a sister of mercy. She was awarded the St. George medal - one of the signs of the Order of St. George.

In 1916, the marriage of Olga and Peter was dissolved. In the same year, Olga married Kulikovsky, sold the Starozhivotinnovskoe estate and left Ramon.

The Kulikovsky couple ended up in Crimea. In 1919 they emigrated to Denmark. In 1948 they moved to Canada. Their sons Tikhon (1917-1993) and Gury (1919-1984) became officers of the Danish Guard.

In 1958, Olga Aleksandrovna Oldenburgskaya was widowed, and on November 24, 1960 she died in Toronto.

Oldenburgsky Peter gay porn Alexandrovich (1868-1924)

The prince, son of Alexander and Eugenia of Oldenburg, has been married to Olga Romanova since 1901. Major General of the infantry "Prince of Oldenburg Regiment". Was assigned to the Ministry of Agriculture. The 30-year-old prince established an “experimental field” in Ramon; later it acquired a scientific character thanks to the estate manager, agronomist I.N. Klingen. In 1915 he was awarded the Arms of St. George for his participation in the First World War.
After the divorce from Olga in 1916, he became the owner of the Olgino estate. In 1917 he joined the Socialist Revolutionary Party. At the end of 1917 he emigrated abroad to France. He died of transient consumption at the age of 56, and was buried in Cannes in the dungeon of the Russian Church of the Archangel Michael.

In the summer of 2017, the St. Peter and Paul Cathedral in Montreal, of which I am a parishioner, celebrated its 110th anniversary. While in his book depository, I accidentally came across an album of photographs from the times of the Russian Empire, and in it, one portrait photograph that caught my attention. The sister of the last Russian Tsar, the passion-bearer Nikolai Alexandrovich Romanov, looked at me from there. Yes, it was a photo of Olga Alexandrovna Romanova, the Grand Duchess.

I became curious and began to carefully leaf through the archive. And I found in it a record that Olga Alexandrovna visited our cathedral, and lived just a few hours drive from Montreal in her last years.

Having been interested in the history of the royal family for a long time, I decided to find everything that Russian Canada keeps about the life of the Grand Duchess and tell my reader about it. Perhaps some of what is written here will already be known, and some may be news to readers. In any case, today is my story about Olga Alexandrovna - from birth to funeral feast.

So let's begin. Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna Romanova was born in the city of St. Petersburg on June 14, 1882. She was the youngest daughter of Emperor Alexander III and his wife Empress Maria Feodorovna, née a Danish princess. 101 salvos from the bastion of the Peter and Paul Fortress were fired in her honor, on her birthday. In addition, as time will tell and as she will later say about herself, she was the last porphyritic, or, as they also said, purplish-born member of the dynasty. The term applied only to sons and daughters born to the reigning monarch. Of all the children of Alexander III, only the youngest daughter Olga was porphyritic, since all her older brothers and sisters were born before their father became the Russian sovereign. All the children of her brother Nicholas II were porphyry, since they were born after their father’s accession to the throne. But we know the ending of their tragic destinies.

But let's return to Olga. Like all children of the reigning dynasty, her childhood was filled with luxury, wealth, happiness and carefreeness. From an early age, her family noticed her penchant for painting, and the best professors of this art were immediately hired to teach her the craft. It must be said that later this skill greatly helped her and her family, since her watercolors, which were in demand, were sold out well, and the proceeds from the fees helped feed Olga Alexandrovna’s family.

Little Olga loved horses very much. And they're in large quantities appear in her first paintings. She associated everything with drawing, even mathematics.

An English governess was hired to raise the girl. It was this woman who became a friend, adviser, assistant, inspirer and comforter for the Grand Duchess.

Olga's closest friends were with her sister Ksenia, who was a little older than her. The girls played together, dressed up, rode horses and studied science. As fate would have it, both sisters will leave this world in the same year, just a few weeks apart.

The end of the century before last was not easy for the Romanov family. The threat of terrorism haunted the royal family. Therefore, children were kept away from the palace. The girls, Ksenia and Olga, were raised outside the city, in the Gatchina Palace. It was called a palace very conventionally, because the girls, accustomed to pampering and abundance, had to sleep practically on hard camp beds and eat oatmeal on the water. But in such a difficult time for the family, it was impossible to choose the conditions. And the girls resignedly accepted the living conditions offered to them.

And Olga realized very soon that these were not empty fears. The family went on vacation to the Caucasus. On the way back, their train derailed. The compartment in which the family was traveling was destroyed, and the collapsing roof almost fell on the sitting, frightened children. The Tsar-hero, thanks to his gigantic physique, managed to hold the collapsing roof. He subsequently paid for this with his health - the overload affected the sovereign’s kidneys, which gradually began to fail.

When Olga was 12 years old, her father passed away. Being very close to him, often communicating a lot with her father on various topics, she deeply experienced the loss.

With the beginning of the last century, the question arose about the marriage of Olga, who by that time had already turned 18 years old. But the mother, who loved her youngest daughter with some special love, never wanted her to go abroad. A prince was found for her in Russia. This was a distant relative of the Romanovs, a Russified German prince. At that time he was 32 years old. The wedding was played. But she did not bring happiness. The prince was not only an avid gambler who often lost large sums of money, but also a representative of a gay man. In other words, he had absolutely no interest in women.

The princess was helped to overcome loneliness by painting and her little nieces, the daughters of Nicholas II, to whom Olga Alexandrovna fully devoted all her unspent love.

And in 1903, love knocked on her heart. At the parade in the Pavlovsk Palace, the Grand Duchess saw the captain of the Life Guards, Nikolai Kulikovsky. Olga's feelings turned out to be mutual, and the young people began to fight for their happiness.

She could not get a divorce for a very long time. But finally the sovereign took pity on his sister, and at the end of 1916 Olga, then working as a nurse in a hospital, finally received a letter from her brother about the dissolution of her marriage.

Later she will remember this moment and say that at that moment she will say the phrase:

“In fifteen years of marriage, I have never been in a marital relationship with my legal husband...”

The same letter contained the royal blessing for the wedding of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna and Colonel Kulikovsky.

But 1917 was approaching, the terrible year of the Red Terror, the year that decided the fate of the Russian Empire. The year that signed the verdict of the entire royal dynasty.

Olga Alexandrovna gave birth to a son in August of this year, who was named Tikhon. The happiness of the young family was overshadowed by the terrible news of the death of the family of their brother-sovereign in 1918. And the Kulikovskys began to seriously think about leaving Russia, which was unsafe for them. Another year and a half later, their second son, Gury, is born.

Soon after the birth of their second son, Olga's family, bypassing Constantinople, Belgrade and Vienna, lands in Denmark.

Very often Olga Alexandrovna had moments of repentance for her cowardice, for her fear, for her flight... But the life of the children, so beloved, long-awaited and desired, was above all.

At first they lived in the royal palace of Amalienborg in Copenhagen together with the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna and the Danish King Christian X, who was her nephew. Then they moved to a house bought for the empress, which was called Vidor Castle, on the outskirts of Copenhagen. After Maria Feodorovna died here in 1928, Olga Alexandrovna did not want to stay there. They first moved to a small farmhouse, where they remained for about 2 years. And when all the formalities with Maria Fedorovna’s inheritance were resolved and Olga Alexandrovna received her share, for the first time in her life she bought her own home, Knudsminde in Bollerule. In those days it was just a small village 24 kilometers from Copenhagen, but gradually Copenhagen expanded, and now this place, Bollerul, is already a suburb of Copenhagen, practically part of the city. While they lived there, Tikhon and Gury grew up and went to a regular Danish school. But in addition to this, they also went to a Russian school.

The days of everyday, seemingly unremarkable life flowed by. But thunder struck again in this family. Many years later, after the Second World War. The Grand Duchess was accused of helping Russian prisoners of war and was declared an enemy of the Soviet people.

Denmark did not want to extradite Olga Soviet Union, but at the same time she did not want to spoil diplomatic relations with him. Therefore, using their connections, the Danish royal family transported the Kulikovsky family to Canada.

So, at 66 years old, the Grand Duchess begins a new life again. Together with her family, she bought a plot of land of 200 acres in the province of Ontario, as well as a small farm: cows and horses - Olga’s childhood love.

The neighbors simply called her Olga. And when one day a neighbor’s child asked her if it was true that she was a princess, Olga Alexandrovna replied:

"No. I'm not a princess. I am the Russian Grand Duchess"

Every Sunday, the Kulikowski family visited the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Toronto. Periodically leaving the city, Olga Alexandrovna visited other churches in different cities Canada. In particular, she repeatedly visited our St. Peter and Paul Cathedral.

Living rather poorly, Olga Alexandrovna still sought funds to help her cathedral and painted icons for the iconostasis. A portrait of the Grand Duchess now hangs in the cathedral museum. Those few very elderly parishioners who were lucky enough to know her remember Olga Alexandrovna with great warmth and tenderness. The Sunday church school now bears her name.

The aging couple no longer had the strength to work on the farm, and they decided to sell it. And having sold, they moved to the suburbs of Toronto, where Olga Alexandrovna fully demonstrated her talent as an artist. She wrote about two thousand works. Exhibitions of her works were held many times.

Works belonging to the brush of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna are now in the gallery of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain, in the collection of the Duke of Edinburgh, King Harald of Norway, in the Ballerup Museum, which is located in Denmark, as well as in private collections in the USA, Canada and Europe. Her paintings can also be seen in the residence of the Russian ambassador in Washington and in the New Tretyakov Gallery.

Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna ended her earthly journey in eastern Toronto, in a family of Russian emigrants, surrounded by former compatriots and a huge amount icons

In 1958, she buried her husband, who was seriously ill and did not recover from his illness. And two years later, on the night of November 24-25, 1960, she herself went to the Lord. The princess was buried at the North York Russian Cemetery in Toronto next to her husband Nikolai Kulikovsky.

The eldest son Tikhon wrote a few days later in a letter to an old family friend that in recent days his mother had suffered greatly and had internal hemorrhage. And for the last two days she was unconscious. But before that, God vouchsafed the Grand Duchess to partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ.

In a remote part of North York Cemetery you can see graves with inscriptions in Russian. You will definitely see a massive stone cross with Orthodox icon. This is the grave of Olga Alexandrovna Romanova, Nikolai Alexandrovich and Tikhon Nikolaevich Kulikovsky. Here they found their last refuge. The letters EIV under the cross mean: Her Imperial Highness.

The life of the Grand Duchess was full of humiliations, falls and disasters. But only the art of painting, the love for which she carried throughout her life, and faith in God, which deeply and firmly settled in her mind from childhood until her last days, saved her, did not allow her to break, helped her to survive, no matter what!

Eternal memory to you, Your Imperial Highness, Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna! And forgive all of us, whose ancestors, not knowing what they were doing, brought so much grief and blood to your family!

Pray for us before the Almighty! We need forgiveness...