Alexander II of Russia
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Alexander II (Russian: Алекса́ндр II Никола́евич, tr. Aleksándr II Nikoláyevich, IPA: [ɐlʲɪˈksandr ftɐˈroj nʲɪkɐˈlajɪvʲɪtɕ]; 29 April 1818 – 13 March 1881)[a] was Emperor of Russia, King of Congress Poland and Grand Duke of Finland from 2 March 1855 until his assassination in 1881.[1] Alexander's most significant reform as emperor was the emancipation of Russia's serfs in 1861, for which he is known as Alexander the Liberator (Russian: Алекса́ндр Освободи́тель, tr. Aleksándr Osvobodítel, IPA: [ɐlʲɪˈksandr ɐsvəbɐˈdʲitʲɪlʲ]).
The tsar was responsible for other reforms, including reorganizing the judicial system, setting up elected local judges, abolishing corporal punishment,[2] promoting local self-government through the zemstvo system, imposing universal military service, ending some privileges of the nobility, and promoting university education. After an assassination attempt in 1866, Alexander adopted a somewhat more conservative stance until his death.[3]
Alexander was also notable for his foreign policy, which was mainly pacifist, supportive of the United States, and opposite of Great Britain. Alexander backed the Union during the American Civil War and sent warships to New York Harbor and San Francisco Bay ostensibly to deter attacks by the Confederate Navy[4] and sold Alaska to the United States in 1867, fearing the remote colony would fall into British hands if there were another war.[5] He sought peace, moved away from bellicose France when Napoleon III fell in 1871, and in 1872 joined with Germany and Austria in the League of the Three Emperors that stabilized the European situation.
Despite his otherwise pacifist foreign policy, he fought a brief war with the Ottoman Empire in 1877–78, leading to the independence of the Bulgarian, Montenegrin, Romanian and Serbian states, and pursued further expansion into the Far East, leading to the founding of Khabarovsk and Vladivostok; the Caucasus, approving plans leading to the Circassian genocide;[6] and Turkestan. Although disappointed by the results of the Congress of Berlin in 1878, Alexander abided by that agreement. Among his greatest domestic challenges was an uprising in Poland in 1863, to which he responded by stripping that land of its separate constitution and incorporating it directly into Russia. Alexander was proposing additional parliamentary reforms to counter the rise of nascent revolutionary and anarchistic movements when he was assassinated in 1881.[7]
Early life
Born in
His uncle
In the period of his life as heir apparent (1825 to 1855), the intellectual atmosphere of Saint Petersburg did not favour any kind of change: freedom of thought and all forms of private initiative were suppressed vigorously by the order of his father. Personal and official censorship was rife; criticism of the authorities was regarded as a serious offence.[9]
The education of the
In 1839, when his parents sent him on a tour of Europe, he met twenty-year-old Queen Victoria and both fell in love. Simon Sebag Montefiore speculates that a small romance emerged. Such a marriage, however, would not work, as Alexander was not a minor prince of Europe and was in line to inherit a throne himself.[14] In 1847, Alexander donated money to Ireland during the Great Famine.[15]
He has been described as looking like a German, somewhat of a pacifist, a heavy smoker and card player.[16]
Reign
The death of his father gave Alexander a diplomatic headache, for his father was engaged in open warfare in the southwest of his empire. On 15 January 1856, the new tsar took Russia out of the Crimean War on the very unfavourable terms of the Treaty of Paris (1856), which included the loss of the Black Sea Fleet, and the provision that the Black Sea was to be a demilitarized zone similar to a contemporaneous region of the Baltic Sea. This gave him room to breathe and pursue an ambitious plan of domestic reforms.
Reforms
Encouraged by public opinion, Alexander began a period of radical reforms, including an attempt not to depend on landed aristocracy controlling the poor, an effort to develop Russia's natural resources, and to reform all branches of the administration.[9]
Boris Chicherin (1828–1904) was a political philosopher who believed that Russia needed a strong, authoritative government by Alexander to make the reforms possible. He praised Alexander for the range of his fundamental reforms, arguing that the tsar was:
called upon to execute one of the hardest tasks which can confront an autocratic ruler: to completely remodel the enormous state which had been entrusted to his care, to abolish an age-old order founded on slavery, to replace it with civic decency and freedom, to establish justice in a country which had never known the meaning of legality, to redesign the entire administration, to introduce freedom of the press in the context of untrammeled authority, to call new forces to life at every turn and set them on firm legal foundations, to put a repressed and humiliated society on its feet, and to give it the chance to flex its muscles.[17]
Emancipation of the serfs
Alexander II succeeded to the throne upon the death of his father in 1855. As Tsesarevich, he had been an enthusiastic supporter of his father's reactionary policies. That is, he always obeyed the autocratic ruler. But now he was the autocratic ruler himself, and fully intended to rule according to what he thought best. He rejected any moves to set up a parliamentary system that would curb his powers. He inherited a large mess that had been wrought by his father's fear of progress during his reign. Many of the other royal families of Europe had also disliked Nicholas I, which extended to distrust of the Romanov dynasty itself. Even so, there was no one more prepared to bring the country around than Alexander II.[18] The first year of his reign was devoted to the prosecution of the Crimean War and, after the fall of Sevastopol, to negotiations for peace led by his trusted counsellor, Prince Alexander Gorchakov. The country had been exhausted and humiliated by the war.[19] Bribe-taking, theft and corruption were rampant.[20]
The Emancipation Reform of 1861 abolished serfdom on private estates throughout the Russian Empire. Serfs gained the full rights of free citizens, including rights to marry without having to gain consent, to own property, and to own a business. The measure was the first and most important of the liberal reforms made by Alexander II.
Polish
Emancipation was not a simple goal capable of being achieved instantaneously by imperial decree. It contained complicated problems, deeply affecting the economic, social, and political future of the nation. Alexander had to choose between the different measures recommended to him and decide, if the serfs would become agricultural laborers dependent economically and administratively on the landlords, or if the serfs would be transformed into a class of independent communal proprietors.[9] The emperor gave his support to the latter project, and the Russian peasantry became one of the last groups of peasants in Europe to shake off serfdom. The architects of the emancipation manifesto were Alexander's brother Konstantin, Yakov Rostovtsev, and Nikolay Milyutin. On 3 March 1861, six years after his accession, the emancipation law was signed and published.
Additional reforms
A host of new reforms followed in diverse areas.[21][22] The tsar appointed Dmitry Milyutin to carry out significant reforms in the Russian armed forces. Further important changes were made concerning industry and commerce, and the new freedom thus afforded produced a large number of limited liability companies.[9] Plans were formed for building a great network of railways, partly to develop the natural resources of the country, and partly to increase its power for defense and attack.[9]
Military reforms included universal conscription, introduced for all social classes on 1 January 1874.[23] Prior to the new regulation, as of 1861, conscription was compulsorily enforced only for the peasantry. Conscription had been 25 years for serfs who were drafted by their landowners, which was widely considered to be a life sentence.[24] Other military reforms included extending the reserve forces and the military district system, which split the Russian states into 15 military districts, a system still in use over a hundred years later. The building of strategic railways and an emphasis on the military education of the officer corps comprised further reforms. Corporal punishment in the military and branding of soldiers as punishment were banned.[25] The bulk of important military reforms were enacted as a result of the poor showing in the Crimean War.
A new judicial administration (1864), based on the French model, introduced security of tenure.
Alexander's bureaucracy instituted an elaborate scheme of local self-government (
Under Alexander's rules Jews could not own land, and were restricted in travel. However special taxes on Jews were eliminated and those who graduated from secondary school were permitted to live outside the Pale of Settlement, and became eligible for state employment. Large numbers of educated Jews moved as soon as possible to Moscow, Saint Petersburg, and other major cities.[29][30]
The
Reaction after 1866
Alexander maintained a generally liberal course.[32] Radicals complained he did not go far enough, and he became a target for numerous assassination plots. He survived attempts that took place in 1866, 1879, and 1880. Finally 13 March [O.S. 1 March] 1881, assassins organized by the Narodnaya Volya (People's Will) party killed him with a bomb. The Emperor had earlier in the day signed the Loris-Melikov constitution, which would have created two legislative commissions made up of indirectly elected representatives, had it not been repealed by his reactionary successor Alexander III.[33]
An attempted assassination in 1866 started a more conservative period that lasted until his death.[3] The Tsar made a series of new appointments, replacing liberal ministers with conservatives.[34] Under Minister of Education Dmitry Tolstoy, liberal university courses and subjects that encouraged critical thinking were replaced by a more traditional curriculum, and from 1871 onwards only students from gymnasiums could progress to university.[35][34] In 1879, governor-generals were established with powers to prosecute in military courts and exile political offenders. The government also held show trials with the intention of deterring others from revolutionary activity, but after cases such as the Trial of the 193 where sympathetic juries acquitted many of the defendants,[36] this was abandoned.[34]
Suppression of separatist movements
After Alexander II became Emperor of Russia and King of Poland in 1855, he substantially relaxed the strict and repressive regime that had been imposed on Congress Poland after the November Uprising of 1830–1831.[37][38][full citation needed]
However, in 1856, at the beginning of his reign, Alexander made a memorable speech to the deputies of the Polish nobility who inhabited Congress Poland, Western Ukraine, Lithuania, Livonia, and Belarus, in which he warned against further concessions with the words, "Gentlemen, let us have no dreams!"[39] This served as a warning to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The territories of the former Poland-Lithuania were excluded from liberal policies introduced by Alexander. The result was the January Uprising of 1863–1864 that was suppressed after eighteen months of fighting. Hundreds of Poles were executed, and thousands were deported to Siberia. The price of suppression was Russian support for the unification of Germany.[citation needed]
The martial law in Lithuania, introduced in 1863, lasted for the next 40 years. Native languages, Ukrainian, and Belarusian, were completely banned from printed texts, the Ems Ukase being an example. The authorities banned use of the Latin script for writing Lithuanian. The Polish language was banned in both oral and written form from all provinces except Congress Poland, where it was allowed in private conversations only.
Nikolay Milyutin was installed as governor and he decided that the best response to the January Uprising was to make reforms regarding the peasants. He devised a program which involved the emancipation of the peasantry at the expense of the nationalist szlachta landowners and the expulsion of Roman Catholic priests from schools.[40] Emancipation of the Polish peasantry from their serf-like status took place in 1864, on more generous terms than the emancipation of Russian peasants in 1861.[41]
Encouraging Finnish nationalism
In 1863, Alexander II re-convened the Diet of Finland and initiated several reforms increasing Finland's autonomy within the Russian Empire, including establishment of its own currency, the Finnish markka.[42] Liberation of business led to increased foreign investment and industrial development. Finland also got its first railways, separately established under Finnish administration.[43] Finally, the elevation of Finnish from a language of the common people to a national language equal to Swedish opened opportunities for a larger proportion of Finnish society. Alexander II is still regarded as "The Good Tsar" in Finland.[43]
These reforms could be seen as results of a genuine belief that reforms were easier to test in an underpopulated, homogeneous country than in the whole of Russia. They may also be seen as a reward for the loyalty of its relatively western-oriented population during the Crimean War and during the Polish uprising. Encouraging Finnish nationalism and language can also be seen as an attempt to dilute ties with Sweden.
Foreign affairs
During the Crimean War
During the American Civil War (1861–1865), Russia supported the Union, largely due to the view that the U.S. served as a counterbalance to their geopolitical rival, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1863, the Russian Navy's Baltic and Pacific fleets wintered in the American ports of New York and San Francisco, respectively.[45]
The
In the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878) the states of Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro gained international recognition of their independence while Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia achieved their autonomy from direct Ottoman rule. Russia took over Southern Bessarabia,[47] lost in 1856.
the matter of complete conquest of the Caucasus is near to conclusion. A few years of persistent efforts remain to utterly force out the hostile mountaineers from the fertile countries they occupy and settle on the latter a Russian Christian population forever.
— Imperial rescript of Alexander II ordering the implementation of Circassian genocide and advancement of Russian settler-colonial program in Caucasus. (Dated 24 June, 1861)[48][49]
End of the Caucasian War
The Russo-Circassian War concluded as a Russian victory during Alexander II's rule. Just before the conclusion of the war the Russian Army, under the emperor's order, implemented the mass-killings and extermination of Circassian "mountaineers" in the Circassian genocide, which would be often referred to as "cleansing" and "genocide" in several historic dialogues.[50][51]
In 1857, Dmitry Milyutin first published the idea of mass expulsions of Circassian natives.[52] Milyutin argued that the goal was not to simply move them so that their land could be settled by productive farmers, but rather that "eliminating the Circassians was to be an end in itself – to cleanse the land of hostile elements".[52][53] Tsar Alexander II endorsed the plans.[52] A large portion of indigenous peoples of the region were ethnically cleansed[53] from their homeland at the end of the Russo-Circassian War by Russia. A large deportation operation was launched against the remaining population before the end of the war in 1864 and it was mostly completed by 1867.[54] Only a small percentage accepted surrender and resettlement within the Russian Empire. The remaining Circassian populations who refused to surrender were thus variously dispersed, resettled, tortured, and most of the time, killed en masse.[55]
Liberation of Bulgaria
In April 1876, the
After the failure of the Constantinople Conference, at the beginning of 1877, Emperor Alexander II started diplomatic preparations with the other Great Powers to secure their neutrality in case of a war between Russia and the Ottomans. Alexander II considered such agreements paramount in avoiding the possibility of causing his country a disaster similar to the Crimean War.[42]
The Russian Emperor succeeded in his diplomatic endeavors. Having secured agreement as to non-involvement by the other Great Powers, on 17 April 1877 Russia declared war upon the Ottoman Empire. The Russians, helped by the Romanian Army under its supreme commander King Carol I (then Prince of Romania), who sought to obtain Romanian independence from the Ottomans as well, were successful against the Turks and the
For his social reforms in Russia and his role in the liberation of Bulgaria, Alexander II became known in Bulgaria as the "Tsar-Liberator of Russians and Bulgarians". A monument to Alexander II was erected in 1907 in Sofia in the "National Assembly" square, opposite to the Parliament building.[42] The monument underwent a complete reconstruction in 2012, funded by the Sofia Municipality and some Russian foundations. The inscription on the monument reads in Old-Bulgarian style: "To the Tsar-Liberator from grateful Bulgaria". There is a museum dedicated to Alexander in the Bulgarian city of Pleven.
Assassination attempts
In April 1866, there was an attempt on the emperor's life in
During the
On the morning of 20 April 1879, Alexander was briskly walking towards the Square of the Guards Staff and faced
The student acted on his own, but other revolutionaries were keen to murder Alexander.
On the evening of 5 February 1880
Assassination
After the last assassination attempt in February 1880,
On 13 March [O.S. 1 March] 1881, Alexander was assassinated in Saint Petersburg.[60]
As he was known to do every Sunday for many years, the emperor went to the
The street was flanked by narrow pavements for the public. A young member of the Narodnaya Volya ("People's Will") movement, Nikolai Rysakov,[58] was carrying a small white package wrapped in a handkerchief. He later said of his attempt to kill the Tsar:
After a moment's hesitation I threw the bomb. I sent it under the horses' hooves in the supposition that it would blow up under the carriage... The explosion knocked me into the fence.[62]
The explosion, while killing one of the Cossacks and seriously wounding the driver and people on the sidewalk,[58] had only damaged the bulletproof carriage, a gift from Napoleon III of France. The emperor emerged shaken but unhurt.[58] Rysakov was captured almost immediately. Police Chief Dvorzhitzky heard Rysakov shout out to someone else in the gathering crowd. Dvorzhitzky offered to drive the Tsar back to the Palace in his sleigh. The Tsar agreed, but he decided to first see the culprit, and to survey the damage. He expressed solicitude for the victims. To the anxious inquires of his entourage, Alexander replied, "Thank God, I'm untouched".
Nevertheless, a second young member of the Narodnaya Volya, Ignacy Hryniewiecki,[58] standing by the canal fence, raised both arms and threw something at the emperor's feet. He was alleged to have shouted, "It is too early to thank God".[63] Dvorzhitzky was later to write:
I was deafened by the new explosion, burned, wounded and thrown to the ground. Suddenly, amid the smoke and snowy fog, I heard His Majesty's weak voice cry, 'Help!' Gathering what strength I had, I jumped up and rushed to the emperor. His Majesty was half-lying, half-sitting, leaning on his right arm. Thinking he was merely wounded heavily, I tried to lift him but the czar's legs were shattered, and the blood poured out of them. Twenty people, with wounds of varying degree, lay on the sidewalk and on the street. Some managed to stand, others to crawl, still others tried to get out from beneath bodies that had fallen on them. Through the snow, debris, and blood you could see fragments of clothing, epaulets, sabres, and bloody chunks of human flesh.[64]
Later, it was learnt there was a third bomber in the crowd.
Alexander was carried by sleigh to the
The dying emperor was given Communion and Last Rites. When the attending physician, Sergey Botkin, was asked how long it would be, he replied, "Up to fifteen minutes."[67] At 3:30 that day, the standard of Alexander II (his personal flag) was lowered for the last time.[citation needed]
Aftermath
Alexander II's death caused a great setback for the reform movement. One of his last acts was the approval of Mikhail Loris-Melikov's constitutional reforms.[69] Though the reforms were conservative in practice, their significance lay in the value Alexander II attributed to them: "I have given my approval, but I do not hide from myself the fact that it is the first step towards a constitution."[70] In a matter of 48 hours, Alexander II planned to release these plans to the Russian people. Instead, following his succession, Alexander III, under the advice of Konstantin Pobedonostsev, chose to abandon these reforms and went on to pursue a policy of greater autocratic power.[71]
The assassination triggered major suppression of civil liberties in Russia, and
Finally, the tsar's assassination also inspired
In 1881, the Alexander Church, designed by Theodor Decker and named after Alexander II, was completed in Tampere.[73][74] Also, with construction starting in 1883, the Church of the Savior on Blood was built on the site of Alexander's assassination and dedicated in his memory.
Marriages and children
First marriage
In 1838–39, the young bachelor, Alexander made the Grand Tour of Europe which was standard for young men of his class at that time. One of the purposes of the tour was to select a suitable bride for himself. His father Nicholas I of Russia suggested Princess Alexandrine of Baden as a suitable choice, but he was prepared to allow Alexander to choose his own bride, as long as she was not Roman Catholic or a commoner.[75] Alexander stayed for three days with the maiden Queen Victoria. The two got along well, but there was no question of marriage between two major monarchs.
In Germany, Alexander made an unplanned stop in Darmstadt. He was reluctant to spend "a possibly dull evening" with their host Louis II, Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine, but he agreed to do so because Vasily Zhukovsky insisted that his entourage was exhausted and needed a rest.[75] During dinner, he met and was charmed by Princess Marie, the 14-year-old daughter of Louis II, Grand Duke of Hesse. He was so smitten that he declared that he would rather abandon the succession than not marry her.[76] He wrote to his father: "I liked her terribly at first sight. If you permit it, dear father, I will come back to Darmstadt after England."[77] When he left Darmstadt, she gave him a locket that contained a piece of her hair.[76]
Alexander's parents initially did not support his decision to marry Princess Marie of Hesse. There were troubling rumors about her paternity. Although she was the legal daughter of Ludwig II, Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine, there were rumors that Marie was the biological daughter of her mother's lover, Baron August von Senarclens de Grancy.[76] Alexander's parents worried that Marie could have inherited her mother's consumption. Alexander's mother considered the Hesse family grossly inferior to the Hohenzollerns and Romanovs.[76]
In April 1840, Alexander's engagement to Princess Marie was officially announced.[78] In August, the 16-year-old Marie left Darmstadt for Russia.[78] In December, she was received into the Orthodox Church and received the names Maria Alexandrovna.[79]
On 16 April 1841, aged 23, Tsesarevitch Alexander married Marie in St. Petersburg.
The marriage produced six sons and two daughters:
- Grand Duchess Alexandra Alexandrovna of Russia (30 August 1842 – 10 July 1849), nicknamed Lina, died of infant meningitis in St. Petersburg at the age of six
- Nicholas Alexandrovich, Tsesarevich of Russia (20 September 1843 – 24 April 1865), engaged to Princess Dagmar of Denmark
- Emperor Alexander III (10 March 1845 – 1 November 1894) he married Princess Dagmar of Denmark on 9 November 1866. They had six children.
- Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich of Russia (22 April 1847 – 17 February 1909) he married Duchess Marie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin on 28 August 1874. They had five children.
- Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich (14 January 1850 – 14 November 1908) he married Alexandra Zhukovskaya in 1870. They had one son.
- Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia (17 October 1853 – 24 October 1920) she married Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha on 23 January 1874. They had six children.
- Princess Elisabeth of Hesse and by Rhineon 15 June 1884. They had no children.
- Olga Karnovichon 10 October 1902. They had three children.
Alexander particularly placed hope in his eldest son,
Alexander's second son, Grand Duke Alexander became tsesarevich and married the late Tsesarevich Nicholas's fiancée. The couple married in November 1866, with Dagmar converting to Orthodoxy and taking the name Maria Feodorovna.[citation needed]
Alexander grew estranged from his second son, Grand Duke Alexander.[81]
Alexander's favorite child was his daughter,
In 1866, Alexander II took a mistress, Catherine Dolgorukova, with whom he would father three surviving children. In 1880, he moved his mistress and their children into the Winter Palace. Alexander's affair alienated all his children except Alexei and Marie Alexandrovna.[87] Courtiers spread stories that the dying Empress Marie was forced to hear the noise of Catherine's children moving about overhead, but their respective rooms were actually far.[88] In May 1880, Grand Duchess Marie Alexandrovna visited Russia to see her dying mother. She was horrified to learn that Catherine lived in the Palace and she confronted him.[89] Shocked by the loss of support from his daughter, he quietly retreated to Gatchina Palace for military reviews.[89] The quarrel, however, evidently, jolted his conscience enough to lead him to return to St. Petersburg each morning to ask after his wife's health.[89]
Empress Marie Alexandrovna suffered from tuberculosis. She succumbed to it on 3 June 1880.
Second marriage
On 18 July [O.S. 6 July] 1880, Alexander II married his mistress Catherine Dolgorukova morganatically in a secret ceremony at Tsarskoye Selo.[90] The action scandalized both his family and the court. It violated Orthodox custom which required a minimum period of 40 days mourning between the death of a spouse and the remarriage of a surviving spouse, eliciting criticism in foreign courts.[91] Alexander bestowed on Catherine the title of Princess Yurievskaya and legitimized their children.[91]
Before their marriage, Alexander and Catherine had four children:
- Prince George Alexandrovich Yuryevsky (12 May 1872 – 13 September 1913) he married Countess Alexandra von Zarnekau on 11 February 1900 and they were divorced in 1908. They had one son.
- Princess Olga Alexandrovna Yurievskaya (7 November 1873 – 10 August 1925) she married Count Georg of Merenberg on 12 May 1895. They had three children.
- Prince Boris Alexandrovich Yurievsky (23 February – 11 April 1876)
- Princess Catherine Alexandrovna Yurievskaya (9 September 1878 – 22 December 1959) she married Prince Alexander Vladimirovich Baryatinsky (1870–1910) on 18 October 1901. They had two sons. She remarried Prince Sergei Platonovich Obolenskyon 6 October 1916 and they were divorced in 1924.
In fiction
Alexander II appears prominently in the opening two chapters of Jules Verne's Michael Strogoff (published in 1876 during Alexander's own lifetime). The Emperor sets the book's plot in motion and sends its eponymous protagonist on the dangerous and vital mission which would occupy the rest of the book. Verne presents Alexander II in a highly positive light, as an enlightened yet firm monarch, dealing confidently and decisively with a rebellion. Alexander's liberalism shows in a dialogue with the chief of police, who says "There was a time, sire, when NONE returned from Siberia", to be immediately rebuked by the Emperor who answers: "Well, whilst I live, Siberia is and shall be a country whence men CAN return."[92]
The films Katia (1938) and Magnificent Sinner (1959) depict a highly fictionalized account of the Tsar's romance with the woman who became his second wife.
In The Tiger in the Well, Philip Pullman refers to the assassination – though he never names Alexander – and to the pogroms that followed. The anti-Jewish attacks play an important role in the novel's plot. Andrew Williams's historical thriller, To Kill A Tsar, tells the story of The People's Will revolutionaries and the assassination through the eyes of an Anglo-Russian doctor living in St Petersburg.
Alexander II's reasons to sell Alaska to the United States in 1867 are fictionized in the epilogue of the novel Forty-Ninth[93] by Boris Pronsky and Craig Britton, in a form of a letter to Catherine Dolgorukova. Prior to that, the book explores the events immediately after the first assassination attempt on the Tsar in 1866, as well as the relationship with his brother, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich.
In nonfiction
Mark Twain describes a short visit with Alexander II in Chapter 37 of The Innocents Abroad, describing him as "very tall and spare, and a determined-looking man, though a very pleasant-looking one nevertheless. It is easy to see that he is kind and affectionate. There is something very noble in his expression when his cap is off."[94]
Ancestors
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Honours
- Domestic orders and decorations[95][self-published source?]
- Knight of St. Andrew, 29 April 1818
- Knight of St. Alexander Nevsky, 29 April 1818
- Knight of St. Anna, 1st Class, 29 April 1818
- Knight of St. Vladimir, 1st Class, 1 January 1846
- Knight of St. George, 4th Class, 10 November 1850; 1st Class, 26 November 1869
- Knight of St. Stanislaus, 1st Class, 11 June 1865
- Golden Sword "For Bravery", 28 November 1877
- Poland: Knight of the White Eagle, 12 July 1829[96]
- Foreign orders and decorations[95]
- Austrian Empire:[97]
- Grand Cross of the Royal Hungarian Order of St. Stephen, 1839
- Knight of the Military Order of Maria Theresa, 1875
- Grand Cross of the Royal Hungarian
- Baden:[98]
- Knight of the House Order of Fidelity, 1839
- Grand Cross of the Zähringer Lion, 1839
- Knight of St. Hubert, 1829[99]
- Belgium: Grand Cordon of the Order of Leopold, 25 April 1856[100]
- Empire of Brazil:
- Grand Cross of the Southern Cross, 15 May 1845
- Grand Cross of the Order of Pedro I, 14 February 1856
- Emirate of Bukhara: Order of Noble Bukhara, 1881
- Denmark: Knight of the Elephant, 23 April 1834;[101] with Golden Collar, 1838
- Ernestine duchies: Grand Cross of the Saxe-Ernestine House Order, June 1847[102]
- France:
- Kingdom of France: Knight of the Holy Spirit, 5 February 1824[103]
- French Empire: Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour, 30 July 1856[104]
- Kingdom of Greece: Grand Cross of the Redeemer, 8 November 1835
- Kingdom of Hanover:[105]
- Grand Cross of the Royal Guelphic Order, 1838
- Knight of St. George, 1840
- Grand Cross of the Golden Lion, 18 August 1847[106]
- Grand Duchy of Hesse:[107]
- Grand Cross of the Ludwig Order, 25 March 1839
- Grand Cross of the Merit Order of Philip the Magnanimous, 25 December 1843
- Military Merit Cross, 16 May 1878
- Empire of Japan: Grand Cordon of the Order of the Chrysanthemum, 27 April 1877[108]
- Mecklenburg: Grand Cross of the Wendish Crown, with Crown in Ore and Golden Collar, 21 June 1864
- Mexican Empire: Grand Cross of the Mexican Eagle, with Collar, 1865[109]
- Grand Cross of St. Charles, 22 July 1873[110]
- Principality of Montenegro: Knight of St. Peter of Cetinje
- Knight of the Gold Lion of Nassau, May 1858[111]
- Netherlands:
- Grand Cross of the Netherlands Lion, 2 December 1834
- Grand Cross of the Military William Order, 13 September 1855[112]
- Oldenburg: Grand Cross of the Order of Duke Peter Friedrich Ludwig, with Golden Crown, 27 September 1847[113]
- Ottoman Empire:
- Order of the Medjidie, 1st Class, 1 February 1860
- Order of Osmanieh, 1st Class, 25 May 1871
- Duchy of Parma: Senator Grand Cross of the Constantinian Order of St. George, with Collar, 1851[114]
- Persian Empire: Order of the Lion and the Sun, 1st Class, 10 July 1850
- Kingdom of Portugal: Grand Cross of the Sash of the Three Orders, 27 November 1855[115]
- Kingdom of Prussia:
- Knight of the Black Eagle, 10 June 1826; with Collar, 1856[116]
- Grand Commander's Cross of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern, 30 May 1856[116]
- Pour le Mérite (military), 8 December 1869; with Oak Leaves, 8 December 1871; Grand Cross, 24 April 1878[117]
- Kingdom of Sardinia: Knight of the Annunciation, 20 October 1845[118]
- Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach: Grand Cross of the White Falcon, 12 September 1838[119]
- Kingdom of Saxony: Knight of the Rue Crown, 1840[120]
- Spain: Knight of the Golden Fleece, 14 May 1826[121]
- Sweden-Norway: Knight of the Seraphim, 6 March 1826[122]
- Two Sicilies: Grand Cross of St. Ferdinand and Merit, 20 January 1839
- United Kingdom: Stranger Knight of the Garter, 14 August 1867[123]
- Württemberg:[124]
- Grand Cross of the Württemberg Crown, 1829
- Knight of the Military Merit Order, 25 December 1850
Arms
Gallery
-
Portrait of Alexander II, 1856
-
Portrait of Emperor Alexander II wearing the greatcoat and cap of the Imperial Horse-Guards Regiment. c. 1865
-
Alexander II, by Sergei Lvovich Levitsky, 1860 (The Di Rocco Wieler Private Collection, Toronto, Canada)
-
Alexander II, portrait by Konstantin Makovsky. 1881
-
TheRusso-Turkish War of 1877–78.
-
A monument to Alexander II in Częstochowa, removed after liberation of Poland.
-
A monument to Alexander II in Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
See also
- Third Section of His Imperial Majesty's Own Chancellery
- Tsars of Russia family tree
Notes
- ^ Old style: 17 April 1818; 1 March 1881
References
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- ^ "Контрреформы 1889–1892 гг.: Содержание контрреформ // Николай Троицкий". scepsis.net (in Russian).
- ^ Wallace 1911, pp. 559–60.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Wallace 1911, p. 560.
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- ^ Edvard Radzinsky, Alexander II: the Last Great Tsar, p. 63.
- ^ Edvard Radzinsky, Alexander II: The Last Great Tsar, pp. 65–69, 190–91 & 199–200.
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Sources
- public domain: Wallace, Donald Mackenzie (1911). "Alexander II.". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 559–561. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
- Richmond, Walter (2008). The Northwest Caucasus : past, present, future. London: Routledge. ISBN 9780415693219.
Further reading
- Crankshaw, Edward (2000). The Shadow of the Winter Palace: The Drift to Revolution, 1825–1917. Da Capo Press. ISBN 978-0-306-80940-8.
- Eklof, Ben; John Bushnell; L. Larisa Georgievna Zakharova (1994). Russia's Great Reforms, 1855–1881. Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-20861-3.
- Lincoln, W. Bruce. The Romanovs: Autocrats of All the Russias (1983) excerpt and text search
- Lincoln, W. Bruce. The Great Reforms: Autocracy, Bureaucracy, and the Politics of Change in Imperial Russia (1990)
- Moss, Walter G., Alexander II and His Times: A Narrative History of Russia in the Age of Alexander II, Tolstoy, and Dostoevsky. London: Anthem Press, 2002. online Archived 12 January 2006 at archive.today
- Mosse, W. E. Alexander II and the Modernization of Russia (1958) online Archived 13 August 2017 at the Wayback Machine
- Pereira, N.G.O.,Tsar Emancipator: Alexander II of Russia, 1818–1881, Newtonville, Mass: Oriental Research Partners, 1983.
- Polunow, Alexander (2005). Russia in the Nineteenth Century: Autocracy, Reform, And Social Change, 1814–1914. M E Sharpe Incorporated. ISBN 978-0-7656-0672-3.
- Radzinsky, Edvard, Alexander II: The Last Great Tsar. New York: The Free Press, 2005.
- Zakharova, Larissa (1910). Alexander II: Portrait of an Autocrat and His Times. ISBN 978-0-8133-1491-4.
- Watts, Carl Peter. "Alexander II's Reforms: Causes and Consequences" History Review (1998): 6–15. Online Archived 18 April 2022 at the Wayback Machine
External links
- "Alexander II (Obituary Notice, Monday, March 14, 1881)". Eminent Persons: Biographies reprinted from the Times. Vol. II (1876–1881). London: Macmillan and Co. 1893. pp. 268–291. .
- The Emperor Alexander II. Photos with dates.
- The Assassination of Tsar Alexander II from In Our Time (BBC Radio 4)
- Alexander II – the Liberator. Russian-speaking forum.
- Romanovs. Romanovs. The seventh film. Nicholas I; Alexander II on YouTube