The Race to Save the Romanovs

by Helen Rappaport

  * * *

  Sir Arthur Davidson explained the problems to Balfour:

  It is hoped H.M. will not send any more telegrams as their continuance may very easily lead to the most serious results which it is imperative should be avoided. Queen Alexandra is however very averse to taking advice except from the Fountain Head of knowledge [i.e. her son King George] and I am afraid that any caution will have little or no effect unless it is supplemented by something from a very much more authoritative source.

  Could you therefore send me … a short memorandum showing that owing to the transition state through which Russia is now passing, the situation is most delicate and may very easily become most dangerous.30

  Balfour responded promptly with an official memorandum for Davidson to approve and pass on to the King and his mother:

  The Government are very apprehensive lest it should be thought that influence is being exerted from England in order to restore the Imperial regime. If the revolutionary Committee [the Soviet] were able to produce any evidence that such was the case the [Provisional] Government would be greatly weakened and the whole question of the alliance and of the continuance of the war by Russia might be endangered. The safety also of the whole Imperial Family depends in a great measure on the strictest and most careful avoidance of any form of interference or expression of opinion from England, especially from the King, the Queen and Queen Alexandra. Even the simplest messages of sympathy may easily be distorted into political views or actions.31

  It was Good Friday, 6 April, but the deepening crisis over the Romanov asylum offer was keeping everyone at their desks, both at Windsor and in Westminster. The King, no doubt having perused the latest updates in the ‘Unrest in the Country’ file, had barely had breakfast that morning before sending for Stamfordham. Soon a letter was winging its way to Balfour at the Foreign Office:

  Every day the king is becoming more concerned about the question of the Emperor and Empress coming to this country.

  His Majesty receives letters from people of all classes of life, known or unknown to him, saying how much the matter is being discussed, not only in clubs but by working men, and that Labour Members of the House of Commons are expressing adverse opinions to the proposal.

  As you know from the first the King has thought the presence of the Imperial Family (especially the Empress) in this country would raise all sort of difficulties, and I feel sure that you appreciate how awkward it will be for our Royal Family who are closely connected with both the Emperor and Empress …

  The King desires me to ask you whether after consulting the Prime Minister, Sir George Buchanan should not be communicated with a view to approaching the Russian Government to make some other place for the future residence of their Imperial Majesties.32

  Six hours later another note arrived from Stamfordham; by this time King George’s anxiety levels were so high that he was positively begging Balfour to:

  represent to the Prime Minister that from all he hears and reads in the press, the residence in this country of the ex-Emperor and Empress would be strongly resented by the public, and would undoubtedly compromise the position of the King and Queen from whom it would generally be assumed the invitation had emanated.33

  King George had clearly read the Hyndman article from the previous week’s issue of Justice, for he was now panicking about its suggestion that the invitation to the Tsar ‘has come from Their Majesties’. This time Stamfordham did not beat about the bush:

  Buchanan ought to be instructed to tell Miliukoff that the opposition to the Emperor and Empress coming here is so strong that we must be allowed to withdraw from the consent previously given to the Russian Government’s proposal.34

  Arthur Balfour had no option but to act on this, and that evening he sent off a note to Lloyd George about the need for contingency plans: ‘I think we may have to suggest Spain or the South of France as a more suitable residence than England for the Czar.’35

  One of the first-ever studies of the murder of the Romanovs, published in Paris in 1931, was written by émigré Russian historian Sergey Melgunov. In his Sudba Imperatora Nikolaya II posle otrecheniya (The Fate of Emperor Nicholas II after the Abdication) Melgunov quoted a British newspaper article, which in the most uncompromising terms made patently clear the level of official opposition already gathering towards the Romanovs coming to England.36 However, he wrongly attributed the article to the Daily Telegraph and gave no date, so it has never, till now, been verified. From the tone, it was clear that it had to be an editorial, as it was entitled ‘A Respectful Protest’. The Daily Telegraph for the crucial period is not digitised, and a long search on microfilm failed to locate it. And so I sat down at my desk one Sunday morning to make a speculative search in the British Newspaper Archive online. I entered the keywords ‘respectful protest’ and a few other possible combinations – and, suddenly, there it was.

  The reference to the Daily Telegraph was wrong; the article was published in a London evening newspaper, The Globe. The timing behind this editorial – 5 April 1917 – is crucial; its political significance only too plain to see.

  A Respectful Protest

  We most sincerely hope that if there really is any idea of inviting the ex-Tsar and his Consort to make their home in England it will be abandoned. It is necessary to speak very plainly on this matter. To offer an asylum to the Imperial Family in this country would be deeply and justly resented by the Russians who have been compelled to organise a great revolution mainly because so long as the ex-Tsar remained on the throne, they were continually being betrayed by those who are our enemies as well as theirs. We regret to be obliged to speak in strong terms of an exalted lady nearly allied to our own Royal House, but it is impossible to blink [sic] the fact that the ex-Tsaritsa was the centre, if not the actual originator of the pro-German intrigues which inflicted the gravest disaster upon our Allies, and were very nearly successful in beguiling them into a premature and dishonourable peace. The Consort of the Russian Tsar, she yet could never forget that she was a German Princess, and wrecked the dynasty of the Romanoffs by attempts to betray the country of her adoption to the country of her birth. The English people will not endure that she shall be given a refuge in England, from which to resume her dangerous activities, and no pity for fallen greatness will induce them to countenance a step so suicidal. We speak plainly because we must, and because the danger is great and imminent. The British Throne itself would be imperilled if this thing were done.37

  There was a very good reason for this damning, if not libellous piece appearing in The Globe. The newspaper was Conservative in its political leanings and occasionally published ministerial communications; its target audience was the educated classes. In 1917 it was controlled by the industrial magnate Max Aitken, who as owner of the Daily Express had the previous year been a key player in the downfall of Asquith’s Liberal government. He was also a leading supporter of David Lloyd George’s new coalition ministry, which was now in power. Lloyd George rewarded Aitken with a peerage for his support, and he took the title Baron Beaverbrook.

  It is a curious thing that this most rabid character assassination of the Tsaritsa does not appear amid the numerous cuttings in the ‘Unrest in the Country File’ presented to King George by Lord Stamfordham. Perhaps its subversive tone was deemed too strong for the King’s sensitive ears – Alexandra being his cousin after all. But it makes clear, by acting as an indirect mouthpiece for David Lloyd George, that the British government’s position over the Romanov asylum was, despite the display of superficial good intent, entirely negative. Which makes it even more poignant that the one and only positive, well-intentioned message of support from his British cousin and ally, King George, had never reached Nicholas.

  * * *

  Over in Russia, Sir George Buchanan was still in discussion with Kerensky about a possible departure date for the Imperial Family. Kerensky had told him that he would be visiting the Tsar at Tsarskoe Selo the next day, but that:

 
he did not think the Emperor would be able to leave for England for another month. It would be difficult to allow him to go until examination of documents seized had been completed and he hoped that I would not press Government to hasten his departure. I said I had no intention of doing so though we were naturally anxious that every precaution should be taken for His Majesty’s safety.38

  Kerensky hinted that these were potentially incriminating documents showing the Tsaritsa’s ‘pro-German sympathies’ and her involvement in a plot to bring about a separate peace with Germany. As a result, Nicholas and Alexandra were temporarily separated at Tsarskoe Selo and were only allowed to share meals together while the investigation was ongoing.

  What is so striking about this despatch from Buchanan is that it was sent to Balfour on 9 April, three days after the King and his government had begun back-pedalling, at a point when the British resolve to get the Imperial Family out of Russia was already falling apart. Why had Buchanan not been informed sooner? An obscurely published but crucial letter written that very same day by Stamfordham’s deputy – assistant private secretary Sir Clive Wigram – is damning in its candid assessment of the situation:

  You have probably heard rumours of the Emperor and Empress of Russia, together with many Grand Dukes, coming to England to find asylum here. Of course the King has been accused of trying to work this for his royal friends. As a matter of fact His Majesty has been opposed to this proposal from the start, and has begged his ministers to knock it on the head. I do not expect that these Russian royalties will come, but if they do their presence here will be due to the War Cabinet and not to His Majesty.39

  On 10 April, the King was so adamant that his feelings be made abundantly clear to his government that Lord Stamfordham, armed with his file of cuttings, travelled from Windsor Castle, where the royal family were spending Easter, to 10 Downing Street for a face-to-face meeting with David Lloyd George. During the meeting Stamfordham fiercely defended George’s position, and ‘tried to impress upon him [Lloyd George] the King’s strong opinion that the Emperor and Empress of Russia should not come to this country’. The situation since the King’s first expression of support, he argued, had changed dramatically: public opinion here had become ‘stoutly opposed to the idea’; he emphasised again that the King was daily receiving messages, ‘anonymous and otherwise, from persons unknown to him as well as from his friends, inveighing against an arrangement, which, say what the Government may, will be put down entirely to the King [my italics]’.40

  As defender of the King’s honour, this wasn’t good enough for Stamfordham: ‘Even if the Government publicly stated that they took the responsibility for T.I.M.’s [Their Imperial Majesties] coming here the PEOPLE would reply that this was done to screen the King.’ Such loading of personal responsibility for the entire exercise on George’s shoulders was more than he could tolerate – or, for that matter, risk. ‘His Majesty’s Government,’ insisted Stamfordham once more, ‘must withdraw the consent previously given.’41 Lloyd George agreed that perhaps the South of France might be a better place for the Romanovs; he said he would raise the matter with the French president, Alexandre Ribot, in a forthcoming meeting; his Foreign Secretary, Balfour, would also solicit the opinion of Francis Bertie, British ambassador to France.

  Stamfordham was somewhat surprised to discover, at a meeting with Balfour immediately afterwards, that Sir George Buchanan was still ‘[taking] it for granted that the Emperor and Empress were coming to England, and that it was a question of delay with regard to certain matters that had not been cleared up, which prevented an early start’. Shouldn’t the ambassador have ‘been informed that the whole question was being reconsidered, and that our previous Agreement could no longer be held as binding?’ he asked. Balfour agreed that a telegram would be sent to Buchanan in Petrograd forthwith.

  * * *

  In her later memoirs, Buchanan’s daughter Meriel claims to have vividly remembered the moment an urgent telegram was received at the British embassy in Petrograd. ‘“I have bad news from England,” her father said, and his voice sounded flat and lifeless, “They refuse to let the Emperor come over.”’42 ‘It was the 10th April,’ she claimed, but this cannot be so.43* I searched long and hard for this much-quoted communication of the 10th. But I could find no Foreign Office telegram to Sir George in Petrograd on that date in the official files, although there is one about the Queen Mother’s letters to Dagmar. The telegram to Buchanan instructing him about the change of heart was sent to Petrograd at 4 p.m. on 13 April, marked ‘Personal and Most Confidential’. It probably did not arrive till the following morning – the 14th.

  * * *

  Approved by Lord Hardinge and David Lloyd George, the telegram outlined the government’s serious concerns:

  There are indications that a considerable anti-monarchical movement is developing here, including personal attacks upon the King … It is thought that, if the Emperor comes here, it may dangerously increase this movement. It is also worth consideration whether the presence of the Emperor here might not weaken us in our dealings with the new Russian Government … Please let me have your views and in the meantime say nothing further [my italics] to the Russian Government on the subject unless they themselves raise the question.44

  Sir George was deeply upset about the government’s change of heart, but by 15 April was beginning to regretfully accept the wisdom of the decision made in London, having recently become more fully aware of the wider political ramifications. Only the previous day he had welcomed two British Labour MPs to Petrograd, Will Thorne and James O’Grady. In private conversation Thorne had advised him that ‘if we were to offer His Majesty asylum in England, consequences might be very serious’; no doubt a veiled threat of left-wing unrest. But what if the initiative came from the Provisional Government rather than being an invitation from the British? asked Buchanan hopefully. Thorne replied that ‘we must not allow him to stop in England under any circumstances so long as the war lasted’.45 In Moscow soon afterwards, a Labour Party delegate was even more candid at a dinner given for the British colony there: ‘People are saying that the Tsar is going to England. Let me tell you at once, that this is not true. If he is not good enough for Russia, he is not good enough for us.’46

  Nevertheless, although the official British initiative to give asylum to the Romanovs had now withered away, Sir George Buchanan was still searching for an alternative solution. Why could the Provisional Government not let the Tsar ‘go, as I believed he wished, to Livadia?’ he asked Prince Lvov. He would have thought it ‘would be quite easy to isolate him there as well as to provide for his protection’. ‘The risk of the journey would be too great,’ Buchanan was told; Lvov’s government was still hoping for England. But by now the ambassador was also worrying about the reaction of the ‘extreme Left Parties’ to such an eventuality. ‘If only the French Government would consent,’ he telegraphed to London, ‘it would be far better from our point of view. Perhaps it would be well to sound them on the subject?’47

  Lord Cecil, the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, confirmed that an approach had already been made to France.48 A private letter from Lord Hardinge had meanwhile been sent to the British ambassador in Paris, Francis Bertie, backed up by a personal message from Stamfordham on the King’s behalf. The British government found itself in ‘a situation of grave embarrassment’. The King would not like to show the Tsar ‘the cold shoulder’, Hardinge explained, but could the French step in and save the situation?49

  Alas, all hopes of a resolution were quickly dashed. Not only were the French indifferent to the fate of the Romanovs, they were actively hostile. Many in the French political establishment had been delighted at the overthrow of the Tsar, seeing in it close parallels with the French Revolution of 1789; and, like the British, the French Left sent socialist delegates to Russia in April to congratulate the new government. French Prime Minister Raymond Poincaré worried, as the British did, about the effect that the revolution wo
uld have on the Russian war effort.50 It came as no surprise, therefore, when Francis Bertie wrote to Balfour that he thought it was ‘a mercy that the idea has been dropped’:

  I do not think the ex-Emperor and his family would be welcome in France. The Empress is not only a Boche by birth but in sentiment. She did all she could to bring about an understanding with Germany. She is regarded as a criminal or a criminal lunatic and the ex-Emperor as a criminal from his weakness and submission to her prompting.51

  With so much violent hostility towards Alexandra being expressed in diplomatic circles, it is obvious that Nicholas and Alexandra were a political hot potato that nobody wished to handle. By the end of April, barely six weeks after the revolution had toppled them from power, the former Emperor and Empress of Russia were personae non gratae across Europe. ‘We are looking round for a refuge for them,’ Lord Hardinge told Bertie in Paris, ‘but do not see where they would be welcome. I can quite understand that the French do not want them any more than we do, but the position here would be much more difficult than in France.’52

  Over in Russia, the Imperial Family and the Provisional Government continued to wait for news of an evacuation, not knowing that the British offer was already dead in the water and that the former Tsar and Tsaritsa were pariahs in the eyes of the rest of Europe. Nevertheless, persistent rumours over the last 100 years suggest that perhaps the British had in fact put tentative evacuation plans in place in the very first days after the revolution.

  Chapter 5

  ‘Port Romanoff by the Murmansk Railway’

  At the end of March 1917, Swiss tutor Pierre Gilliard, held captive with the Romanovs at the Alexander Palace, noted a gathering sense of uncertainty about the hoped-for evacuation to England: ‘The days passed and our departure was always being postponed.’ He had already become aware that the Provisional Government was running up against the intransigence of the Petrograd Soviet in arranging things and that its ‘authority was slipping away from it’. ‘Yet we were only a few hours by railways from the Finnish frontier,’ he noted plaintively, ‘and the necessity of passing through Petrograd was the only serious obstacle … If the authorities had acted resolutely and secretly it would not have been difficult to get the Imperial Family to one of the Finnish ports and thus to some foreign country.’1