Natalia Androsova

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Natalia Alexandrovna Iskander Romanova
Princess Romanovskaya-Iskander of Russia
House of Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov
FatherAlexander Nikolaevich Romanov, Prince Romanovsky-Iskander
MotherOlga Iosifovna Rogowska
ReligionEastern Orthodox

Princess Natalia Alexandrovna Romanovskaya-Iskander (Russian: княгиня Наталья Александровна Романовская-Искандер,

secret agent of the Lubyanka
.

Early life

As the daughter of Prince Romanovsky-Iskander, né

Grand Duke Nicholas Constantinovich, the disgraced grandson of Tsar Nicholas I; thus, she was a patrilineal great-great-granddaughter of Nicholas I
. Her date of birth is disputed, and has been reported as 10 February 1916, 3 February 1917, or 17 February 1910.

mother's diamonds. Grand Duke Nicholas established a palace in Tashkent and lived in grand style where he sired a son, whom Tsar Alexander III (his great-uncle) granted the title Prince Iskander (Iskander was the Arabic form of Alexander[1]
).

This prince, Alexander Nikolaievich (15 November 1887

Grand Duke Cyril Vladimirovich of Russia
, who became the grandfather of Princess Natalia in absentia, in 1925, in turn, fathered the Princess Iskander. Alexander Nikolaievich only had issue by his first wife.

Natalia Androsova was born in

Russian Imperial Family. She had an older brother, Prince Kirill Romanovsky-Iskander (1914–1992). Her parents, who had been married since 5 May 1912, separated and in 1924 Natalia and her brother moved with their mother to Moscow
(first moved to Plyushchikha Street, later to Old Arbat), where Olga remarried to Nicholas Androsov. Natalia's stepfather adopted her and her brother so Princess Iskander was renamed Natalia Nikolaievna Androsova (Russian: Наталья Николаевна Андросова). Her father remarried also, to Natalia Hanykova (b Saint Petersburg; 30/20 December 1893; d Nice 20 April 1982), dau of Maj.-Gen. Constantin Nikolaievich Hanykov and his wife Natalia Efimovna Markova, on 11 October 1930 in Paris.

After the Russian Revolution, Natalia and her brother Kirill were the only two Romanov descendants

Grand Duke Nicholas Constantinovich of Russia, and was based on Natalia's memories of him. She was a friend of Alexander Galich, Yuri Nikulin, Yuri Nagibin, and Alexander Vertinsky.[3]
Princess Natalia is also known for her brave personality. She was a motorcyclist in motorcyclist-circus. Besides, in the war time she was a driver in army.

Russian Revolution and Civil war

When the revolution progressed, the Iskander family decided that it was safer in Central Asia and joined the old grand duke in Tashkent; the place where Natalia's early childhood had been spent. Natalia was barely one year old when her grandfather was killed by local revolutionaries, the first grand duke to die in the Red Terror. The family never discussed the circumstances of his death, and now no one knows exactly what happened. Her father and uncle Artemi left home to join the Whites, and for a time the two Iskander princes were lost in the swirling havoc of civil war. Prince Alexander was reported missing in action. Meanwhile, the revolutionaries forced Natalia, her brother Kirill and her mother Olga to leave the grand ducal palace, but they did not persecute them.

Adult life

The family were helped by the fact that their name was Iskander, not Romanov, but even more by the preoccupation of the revolutionaries with their own survival in a bitter seesaw civil war. After the war, the palace became a museum and little Natalia would visit it, aware of the fact that it had once been her home and that all its treasures-armor, sculpture, paintings-had once belonged to her family. The lavish rose garden, shielded by its high walls from Asian dust and harsh desert winds, continued to bloom. And in the cellar, a few hunting dogs still lived. Their master was gone, but they waited for his return. Peace meant that the Bolsheviks would have the opportunity to become interested in the Iskander family, conspicuous because of the memory of the grand duke. Nicholas Constantinovich had spent his own personal funds to build canals for irrigating the crops essential for sustaining the life of the people. But Natalia's mother knew she could expect no gratitude from the Bolsheviks and decided that she would take her family to Moscow.

Giving up her husband for lost, she married and changed the name of her children immediately to that of her new husband. Thus, Natalia dropped Iskander for Androsova. Moscow offered new jobs and also safety in anonymity of big city life. Former tsarist officers, bureaucrats, professors and merchants hoped to find privacy and security in the bustling new capital of the Soviet regime. The new-Androsovs found a spacious apartment, but a neighbor, apparently wanting the place himself and learning who they really were, threatened to report them to the secret police.

The family fled to the

Grand Duke Nicholas Constantinovich
, his brother K.R. and Natalia's father, Prince Alexander Iskander.

Natalia would proudly tell close friends of her real origins. Everyone was astonished; one of the friends said disgustedly, "Put those pictures away; it is indecent to keep them!" But the Androsovs were bold. Friends returning from

Siberian exile, political pariahs
, always knew that they could spend a few nights with the Androsovs. Natalia perhaps inherited some of her grandfather's propensity for adventure. She did not conceal that she was a Romanov.

Motorcyclist

She chose a wild career, that of a professional motorcyclist. She joined the famous sports club

motorcycle racer. Then the troubles came. It was 1939; Russia was experiencing Joseph Stalin's Great Terror, when millions were taken away to die, often inexplicably. Natalia was twenty-two. A young mechanic from Dynamo came courting her. When she boasted of her imperial lineage, he tried to blackmail her into sleeping with him. When she refused, he threatened to report her to the Lubyanka. Married and the mother of one, Natalia slapped him hard across the face. He was very tall and muscular, but "I was a very strong woman," she said proudly. Still, she panicked and burned all of her family papers. She changed her sports club and went to another famous one, Spartak
. But in several weeks the Lubyanka summoned her. The secret police people were explicit. She had only two options, they said. Either she became a secret agent, or she would be shot.

Agent

Under the codename Lola, Natalia began to work for Stalin's

Arbat
where they met, not in her apartment but in the shadows of an archway outside. Years later Natalia learned that her file at the Lubyanka described her in the most flattering terms. She was young, intelligent and attractive. She had, in short, all the qualities of an excellent agent except one: She did not want the job. Her friends knew nothing of her Lubyanka affiliation. But she knew which of them would be arrested and when.

Styles of
Princess
Romanovskaya-Iskander of Russia
Reference style
Her Highness
Spoken styleYour Highness

Many people found Natalia's manner pleasingly raffish; she dressed in men's jackets and leggings. She smoked. She was proud of her ancestry, especially her grand ducal grandfather. She liked to whisper to guests that she was a Romanov, a descendant of tsars. Soon she became known as the Queen of the Arbat, a district that was taking on some of the character of New York's Greenwich Village. Visitors found hers a warm hearth in a cold and gray metropolis. She embarked on an extraordinary career as a vertical motorcyclist at Gorky Park. She drove the machine up a wall. The secret to success, she said, was to feel the vehicle and to look only forward, never at the wheels. Then the war broke out.

World War II

In 1941

fire brigade
, on the alert for incendiary bombs dropped by German aircraft. When these bombs hit the ground, they exploded and shot out a sea of flames. One had to catch the moment of impact and throw sand over the bomb to smother it before the explosion. Impatient Natalia would often seize the hissing bomb itself and throw it into the sand. Sometimes the white-hot bodies of bombs buried themselves deeply into the asphalt, setting even that aflame, and at night explosions and fires burst out everywhere, with people shouting and horses neighing in terror.

Natalia also joined a paramilitary militia as a motorcyclist courier. When she came to her Arbat neighborhood dressed exotically in a brown velvet jacket, army boots and breeches, some passerby, unused to such extravagant dress, detained her as "German saboteur." Natalia took another job, driving a truck, delivering bread to the troops at the front and clearing snow from downtown streets afterward. She discovered that she had talent for mechanical matters, and she could keep her truck in good repair. As early as the summer 1942, Stalin, feeling more secure about the course of the war, decided that it was time to cheer up his people. He ordered more performances in Moscow, including theater, concerts, opera and the circus.

After the war

Natalia returned to her earlier career as a vertical motorcyclist. In the summer of 1953, just after Stalin's death, they gave her a new assignment, promising it would be her last. Her career as a motorcyclist soared. She was at the top of her profession and toured of the USSR. She used the world's best motorcycles such as

Harley Davidsons and Indian Scouts
. But her performance, called "Fearless Flight" by people around her, was always dangerous. Sometimes she would spend a month in the hospital nursing broken bones.

Natalia became friendly with the leading Moscow

Empress Elizabeth
in 1742, a small decorative box, a cross and a tiny hinged icon. Whatever else of value she inherited, she had to sell in hard times. But material objects seemed not of great importance to her. In 1999 she died of old age at the age of 82.

Ancestry

16.
Grand Duke Nicholas Constantinovich of Russia
18. Joseph, Duke of Saxe-Altenburg
9. Princess Alexandra of Saxe-Altenburg
19. Duchess Amelia of Württemberg
2. Alexander Nikolaevich Romanov [ru]
(1887–1957)
20. Gustav von Dreyer
10. Alexander Gustavovich von Dreyer
21.
5. Nadejda Alexandrovna von Dreyer (1861–1929)
22. Ivan Opanovskoy
11. Sophia Ivanovna Opanovska
23.
1. Princess Natalia Alexandrovna Iskander
24.
12.
25.
6. Iosif (Joseph) Rogowski
26.
13.
27.
3. Olga Iosifovna Rogovskaya/Rogowska (1893–1962)
28.
14.
29.
7.
30.
15.
31.

References

Notes
  1. ^ Behind the Name
  2. ^ Interview with Eleonora Dostal-Oruç (1999-2000's archive) Sabah News 29 January 2000, retrieved 19 June 2011.
  3. ^ About the family by Andrei Voznesensky Archived 2011-08-15 at the Wayback Machine includes Князь Михаил Греческий "Биография Великого Князя Николая Константиновича" and О.Лунькова "Княжна на мотоцикле".
Sources
  • Лунькова, Ольга (27 August 1996). Княжна на мотоцикле.
    Огонёк (журнал) (in Russian) (35): 44–48. Archived from the original
    on 28 September 2011.
  • Нагибин, Ю. М. (1996). Юрий Кувалдин: общая редакция, составление, послесловие, указатель имён (in Russian). Книжный сад. pp. 624–625.
    ISBN 5-85676-043-3. Archived from the original
    on 23 March 2013.
  • "Some of the books, about the family, for the Russian higher education associations" (in Russian). Archived from the original on 9 December 2012. Retrieved 20 June 2011.
  • C. Arnold McNaughton, The Book of Kings: A Royal Genealogy, in 3 volumes (London, U.K.: Garnstone Press, 1973)
    ISBN 978-0-8129-0280-8
Natalia Androsova
Cadet branch of the House of Oldenburg
Born: 2 February 1917 Died: 25 July 1999
Russian royalty
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