George Mikhailovich, Count Brasov

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George Mikhailovich
Count Brasov
Born(1910-08-06)6 August 1910
Moscow, Russian Empire
Died21 July 1931(1931-07-21) (aged 20)
Sens, France
Burial
Passy Cemetery, Paris, France
FatherGrand Duke Michael Alexandrovich of Russia
MotherNatalia Brasova

George Mikhailovich, Count Brasov (

House of Romanov through a morganatic
line.

Early life

George with his parents.

George was born in his mother's

Emperor Nicholas II
.

At the time of George's birth, Natalia was still legally married to her second husband, army officer Vladimir Vladimirovich Wulfert. Wulfert and Grand Duke Michael had served in the same regiment, The Dowager Empress's Life Guard Cuirassier Regiment, known as the Blue Cuirassiers, stationed at Gatchina near Saint Petersburg. After the scandal that arose from Michael's affair with Wulfert's wife, Wulfert was transferred to Moscow, and Michael was transferred to the Chernigov Hussars at Orel.[2] Michael and Natalia feared that her husband would try to claim custodial rights over George, and had instituted divorce proceedings,[3] but the divorce was only finalised after George's birth. It was said that Wulfert was bought off with a bribe of 200,000 roubles,[4] and the date of the Wulferts divorce was back-dated, so that George was recognised as Natalia's illegitimate son, though inheriting her noble status, rather than the legitimate child of Wulfert's.[5]

George was baptised on 22 September 1910 at the Church of St Basil of Caesarea in Moscow, by Father Peter Pospelov, and named after his late uncle, Grand Duke George Alexandrovich of Russia, who had died in 1899. His godparents were Aleksei Matveev and Margaret Abakanovich. Matveev was the husband of George's maternal aunt, Olga, and Abakanovich was a family friend who was married to Michael's adjutant. Abakanovich was absent, and George's half-sister, Natalia Sergeyevna Mamontova, Natalia's daughter from her first marriage, stood proxy.[1] On 13 November 1910, Emperor Nicholas II decreed that the boy would be known as George Mikhailovich Brasov, with the surname taken from one of Michael's estates: Brasovo near Orel.[5]

Grand Duke Michael was second in the line of imperial succession after his nephew,

Tsarevich was so close to dying.[8] Michael and his family were exiled from Russia.[9] They stayed in grand hotels in Cannes, Paris, Chexbres, Bad Kissingen and London before settling in England in September 1913.[10]

Childhood

White male with classically-handsome features and a thin moustache wearing military uniform
George's father, Grand Duke Michael

In the fall of 1914, at the start of

Carpathian mountains.[14]

Michael wrote to Nicholas asking him to legitimise George so, he argued, that the boy would be provided for in the event of Michael's death at the front.[15] Six months later, Nicholas legitimised George by decree, and created him a count.[16] George and his descendants would, however, be excluded from the order of succession.

By 1915, Mrs Bennett was pregnant, so she left the family's service and was replaced by her friend and fellow Englishwoman, Margaret Neame.[17] George's father remained at the front until September 1916, but he was invalided from October with stomach ulcers, and the family spent the winter in the Crimea as Michael recuperated, and then spent Christmas at Brasovo.[18] The Christmas holiday was cut short, however, when a guest's child contracted diphtheria and died.[19] At risk of infection, the family evacuated the estate by snow-bound sleigh ride. It was the last time any of them would see Brasovo.[20]

February Revolution

Three-quarter length portrait photograph of a lady wearing an Edwardian-style dress and hat with furs
George's mother, Natalia Brasova, in a World War I postcard

New Year 1917 was spent back at Gatchina. During the February Revolution two months later, Nicholas II abdicated for himself and his son and nominated Michael to succeed him. Michael declined to accept unless ratified by an elected assembly, and issued a manifesto that recognised the de facto control of the Russian Provisional Government.[21] With the revolutionaries in power, and the influence of the imperial family all but ended, George and his family were placed under house arrest at the villa in Gatchina.[22]

In September 1917, the house arrest was lifted.

Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov. George was friends with Nabokov senior's niece, Sophie Vonlyarlarskaya. Their plan was discovered by the Bolsheviks, and the children returned to Gatchina, once again under house arrest.[25]

In March 1918, George's father was exiled to the remote city of

Wilhelm II, German Emperor, chose to ignore the fact that the British Miss Neame was an enemy alien, and permitted them to continue their journey to Copenhagen.[28]

Exile

On the night of 12–13 June 1918, George's father was shot dead on the outskirts of Perm by the

Kiev, in German-controlled Ukraine, by the Germans.[29] After the armistice in November 1918, the Royal Navy evacuated George's mother and half-sister to England, and George and Miss Neame joined them in a rented house at Wadhurst, Sussex, just after Easter 1919.[30]

Red-brick Tudor-style building with castellated gables
Old Schools, Harrow

George was enrolled at

public boarding school in 1920.[32] In 1927, due to financial problems, his mother relocated to Paris but he remained in England to finish his school year. He then went to another boarding school, École des Roches in Verneuil, Normandy, and then the Sorbonne.[33] As he matured, many remarked at his strong resemblance to his father.[34]

To George's amusement, the idea of him claiming the throne was circulated during his lifetime.

Grand Duke Cyril Vladimirovich, declared himself Emperor Cyril and George a prince.[35]

In 1928, George's grandmother, the

Dowager Empress Marie, died and George inherited a third of her estate.[36] He had enjoyed riding his Norton motorcycle as a teenager, and some of his inheritance was spent on a Chrysler sports car.[33] In summer 1931, he finished his final examinations at the Sorbonne, and planned a holiday in the south of France with his 19-year-old Dutch friend, Edgar Moneanaar. On the drive from Paris to Cannes, their car skidded near Sens, while Moneanaar was driving. They crashed into a tree, and Moneanaar was killed. With both thighs broken and severe internal injuries, George was taken to hospital. Natalia rushed to be at his bedside. He died without recovering consciousness the following morning.[37]

George was buried in Passy Cemetery in Paris. In 1952, his mother died from cancer, and she was interred beside him in a grave marked by a Slavonic cross of stone on a marble tomb. (Section 9, near the intersection with the outer wall and Section 8.) The gold inscription reads, Fils et Epouse de S.A.I. Grand Duc Michel de Russie.[38]

Although he had no succession rights due to the morganatic marriage of his parents, George was the last male-line descendant of Alexander III of Russia.

Notes

His grave in Paris.
  1. ^ a b Crawford and Crawford, p. 104
  2. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 59–104
  3. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 94–96
  4. ^ Letter from Michael Bakhrushin to Pauline Gray, 17 December 1973, Leeds Russian Archive, MS 1363/136, quoted in Crawford and Crawford, p. 107
  5. ^ a b Crawford and Crawford, p. 107
  6. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 128
  7. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 129–131
  8. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 130–132
  9. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 136
  10. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 138–146
  11. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 159–160
  12. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 161
  13. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 159
  14. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 178
  15. ^ Letter from Michael to Nicholas, 15 November 1914, State Archive of the Russian Federation, 601/1301, quoted in Crawford and Crawford, p. 164
  16. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 182
  17. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 209
  18. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 233–245
  19. ^ Irina, the daughter of Natalia Brasova's childhood friend Maria Lebedeva
  20. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 246
  21. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 312–313
  22. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 327–330
  23. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 332
  24. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 334
  25. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 335
  26. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 344
  27. ^ a b Margaret Neame: letter to her sister Janet, 16th May 1918
  28. ^ a b Crawford and Crawford, p. 345
  29. ^ Crawford and Crawford, pp. 374–377
  30. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 381
  31. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 382
  32. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 385
  33. ^ a b Crawford and Crawford, p. 390
  34. ^ a b His half-sister's memoirs, Majolier, Natalia (1940) Stepdaughter to Imperial Russia, London: Stanley Paul, pp. 225–226, quoted in Crawford and Crawford, p. 390
  35. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 389
  36. ^ Clarke, p. 162
  37. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 391
  38. ^ Crawford and Crawford, p. 395

References

  • Clarke, William (2007). Romanoff Gold: The Lost Fortune of the Tsars, Stroud: Sutton Publishing,
    ISBN 978-0-7509-4499-1
  • Crawford, Rosemary; Crawford, Donald (1997). Michael and Natasha: The Life and Love of the Last Tsar of Russia, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson,
    ISBN 978-0-7538-0516-9
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