Thirteen Years at the Russian Court

Thirteen Years at the Russian Court

Author: Pierre Gilliard

Publisher: Pickle Partners Publishing

Published: 2018-12-02

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 1789127688

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Nicholas II (1868-1918) was the last Emperor of Russia, ruling from November 1, 1894 until his forced abdication on March 15, 1917. His reign saw the fall of the Russian Empire from one of the foremost great powers of the world to economic and military collapse. He was given the nickname Nicholas the Bloody or Vile Nicholas by his political adversaries due to the Khodynka Tragedy, anti-Semitic pogroms, Bloody Sunday, the violent suppression of the 1905 Russian Revolution, the execution of political opponents, and his perceived responsibility for the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905). Soviet historians portrayed Nicholas as a weak and incompetent leader whose decisions led to military defeats and the deaths of millions. Following author Pierre Gilliard’s return to Europe in September 1920, having been “cut off from communication with the rest of the world for many months,” he was dismayed to read of the recent publications on the subject of the Czar Nicholas II. and his family. Upon realizing that the general public appeared to have accepted the reports as gospel, his indignation grew—and he immediately set out to “rehabilitate the moral character of the Russian sovereigns.” Thirteen Years at the Russian Court, which was first published in 1921, is the result. With 59 illustrations, including portraits. “In this book I have endeavoured to bring Nicholas II. and his family back to life. My aim is to be absolutely impartial and to preserve complete independence of mind in describing the events of which I have been an eyewitness. It may be that in my search for truth I have presented their political enemies with new weapons against them, but I greatly hope that this book will reveal them as they really were, for it was not the glamour of their Imperial dignity which drew me to them, but their nobility of mind and the wonderful moral grandeur they displayed through all their sufferings.”—Pierre Gilliard, Introduction


Thirteen Years at the Russian Court - A Personal Record of the Last Years and Death of the Czar Nicholas II. and his Family

Thirteen Years at the Russian Court - A Personal Record of the Last Years and Death of the Czar Nicholas II. and his Family

Author: Pierre Gilliard

Publisher: Read Books Ltd

Published: 2020-07-14

Total Pages: 300

ISBN-13: 152876675X

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First published in 1921, this book contains the memoirs of Pierre Gilliard. Pierre Gilliard (1879 – 1962) was a Swiss author and academic famous for being the French language tutor of Russian Emperor Nicholas II's children between 1905 and 1918. Within these pages, Gilliard describes Tsarina Alexandra's sadness relating to her son's haemophilia and her belief in Grigori Rasputin's ability to help the boy. This volume constitutes a must-read for those with an interest in Russian history, and it would make for a fantastic addition to collections of related literature. Contents include: “My First Lessons at the Court (Autumn, 1905)”, “Alexis Nicolaievitch—Visits to the Crimea”, “I Begin my Duties as Tutor—The Czarevitch's Illness”, “The Czarina, Alexandra Feodorovna”, “Rasputin”, “Life at the Tsarskoie-Selo—My Pupils (The Winter of 1913-14)”, “Journeys to the Crimea and Rumania”, etc. Many vintage books such as this are increasingly scarce and expensive. It is with this in mind that we are republishing this volume now in an affordable, modern, high-quality edition complete with the original text and artwork.


From Splendor to Revolution

From Splendor to Revolution

Author: Julia P. Gelardi

Publisher: Macmillan + ORM

Published: 2011-02-15

Total Pages: 557

ISBN-13: 1429990945

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This sweeping saga recreates the extraordinary opulence and violence of Tsarist Russia as the shadow of revolution fell over the land, and destroyed a way of life for these Imperial women The early 1850s until the late 1920s marked a turbulent and significant era for Russia. During that time the country underwent a massive transformation, taking it from days of grandeur under the tsars to the chaos of revolution and the beginnings of the Soviet Union. At the center of all this tumult were four women of the Romanov dynasty. Marie Alexandrovna and Olga Constantinovna were born into the family, Russian Grand Duchesses at birth. Marie Feodorovna and Marie Pavlovna married into the dynasty, the former born a Princess of Denmark, the latter a Duchess of the German duchy of Mecklendburg-Schwerin. In From Splendor to Revolution, we watch these pampered aristocratic women fight for their lives as the cataclysm of war engulfs them. In a matter of a few short years, they fell from the pinnacle of wealth and power to the depths of danger, poverty, and exile. It is an unforgettable epic story.


The Family Romanov: Murder, Rebellion, and the Fall of Imperial Russia

The Family Romanov: Murder, Rebellion, and the Fall of Imperial Russia

Author: Candace Fleming

Publisher: Anne Schwartz Books

Published: 2014-07-08

Total Pages: 338

ISBN-13: 0375867821

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“[A] superb history.... In these thrilling, highly readable pages, we meet Rasputin, the shaggy, lecherous mystic...; we visit the gilded ballrooms of the doomed aristocracy; and we pause in the sickroom of little Alexei, the hemophiliac heir who, with his parents and four sisters, would be murdered by the Bolsheviks in 1918.” —The Wall Street Journal Here is the tumultuous, heartrending, true story of the Romanovs—at once an intimate portrait of Russia's last royal family and a gripping account of its undoing. Using captivating photos and compelling first person accounts, award-winning author Candace Fleming (Amelia Lost; The Lincolns) deftly maneuvers between the imperial family’s extravagant lives and the plight of Russia's poor masses, making this an utterly mesmerizing read as well as a perfect resource for meeting Common Core standards. "An exhilarating narrative history of a doomed and clueless family and empire." —Jim Murphy, author of Newbery Honor Books An American Plague and The Great Fire "For readers who regard history as dull, Fleming’s extraordinary book is proof positive that, on the contrary, it is endlessly fascinating, absorbing as any novel, and the stuff of an altogether memorable reading experience." —Booklist, Starred "Marrying the intimate family portrait of Heiligman’s Charles and Emma with the politics and intrigue of Sheinkin’s Bomb, Fleming has outdone herself with this riveting work of narrative nonfiction that appeals to the imagination as much as the intellect." —The Horn Book, Starred Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Young Adult Literature Winner of the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award for Nonfiction A Robert F. Sibert Honor Book A YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Award Finalist Winner of the Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction


The Spectator

The Spectator

Author:

Publisher:

Published: 1838

Total Pages: 1240

ISBN-13:

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A weekly review of politics, literature, theology, and art.


The Last Diary of Tsaritsa Alexandra

The Last Diary of Tsaritsa Alexandra

Author: Empress Alexandra (consort of Nicholas II, Emperor of Russia)

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 1997-01-01

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 0300072120

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The recently declassified diary reveals the Empress's thoughts up until her execution


Rasputin: Essential Biographies

Rasputin: Essential Biographies

Author: Harold Shukman

Publisher: The History Press

Published: 2011-09-16

Total Pages: 80

ISBN-13: 0752470736

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Gregory Rasputin features in Russian history as a malign and destructive force, a man with an unhealthy influence on the Empress Alexandra and undue power in Russian politics. Yet his purposes were ostensibly beneficent. An uneducated peasant, he left Siberia to become a wandering 'holy man' and soon acquired a reputation as a healer. The empress was desperate to find a cure for haemophilia from which her son Alexei suffered, and in 1905 Rasputin was presented at court. His positive effect on the heir's health made him indispensible. But his religious teachings were unorthodox, and his charismatic presence aroused in many ladies of the St Petersburg aristocracy an exalted response, which he exploited sexually. Shady financial dealings added to the atmosphere of debauchery and scandal, and he was also seen as a political threat. He was assassinated in 1916.


July 1914

July 1914

Author: Sean McMeekin

Publisher: Basic Books

Published: 2014-04-29

Total Pages: 482

ISBN-13: 0465038867

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When a Serbian-backed assassin gunned down Archduke Franz Ferdinand in late June 1914, the world seemed unmoved. Even Ferdinand's own uncle, Franz Josef I, was notably ambivalent about the death of the Hapsburg heir, saying simply, "It is God's will." Certainly, there was nothing to suggest that the episode would lead to conflict -- much less a world war of such massive and horrific proportions that it would fundamentally reshape the course of human events. As acclaimed historian Sean McMeekin reveals in July 1914, World War I might have been avoided entirely had it not been for a small group of statesmen who, in the month after the assassination, plotted to use Ferdinand's murder as the trigger for a long-awaited showdown in Europe. The primary culprits, moreover, have long escaped blame. While most accounts of the war's outbreak place the bulk of responsibility on German and Austro-Hungarian militarism, McMeekin draws on surprising new evidence from archives across Europe to show that the worst offenders were actually to be found in Russia and France, whose belligerence and duplicity ensured that war was inevitable. Whether they plotted for war or rode the whirlwind nearly blind, each of the men involved -- from Austrian Foreign Minister Leopold von Berchtold and German Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Sazonov and French president Raymond Poincaré- sought to capitalize on the fallout from Ferdinand's murder, unwittingly leading Europe toward the greatest cataclysm it had ever seen. A revolutionary account of the genesis of World War I, July 1914 tells the gripping story of Europe's countdown to war from the bloody opening act on June 28th to Britain's final plunge on August 4th, showing how a single month -- and a handful of men -- changed the course of the twentieth century.