Naturally they agreed upon the ticklish question of how to announce the execution. Evidently they decided then that the official announcement must refer only to Nicholas. Thus this horrible formula was born: “the family has been evacuated to a safe place.” The caustic Zinoviev may well have been its author.
Yes, the family’s death had to remain a secret for the time being, but an open secret. Trotsky was right: Lenin knew that the danger of reprisals for the bloody deed must close the ranks in these terrible times for the revolution.
Also, anticipating a possible collapse, the government naturally wished to keep its distance from the execution. The decision to execute had to come from the Ekaterinburg Soviet. This was very handy: the Uralites who executed the tsar were left with only two options—victory over the Whites or death. This must have served to close the ranks of the doomed town’s defenders.
Unlike the bloody romantics Trotsky and Zinoviev, Lenin was a pragmatist. The execution of the tsar and his family was to be carried out in one instance only: if Ekaterinburg fell. Otherwise they must remain as before—a card in the future game with the great powers.
It was at the fateful meeting in Moscow that the mechanism must have been devised: the signal to initiate the family’s execution could not come from the savage Ural revolutionaries. It had to come from outside Ekaterinburg. But who on the outside? That we shall learn later.
Such was to be the outcome of the meeting between Lenin and Goloshchekin. Lenin could not have helped but feel how extraordinary it was.
July is a bad month for revolutionaries. In France, Robespierre was executed in July; in Russia, five eminent Decembrists, who had revolted against Nicholas I, were hanged in July. And now in July the hour of vengeance had come. Vengeance against the son and grandson of the man who had once killed Lenin’s brother. The revolutionaries’ age-old hunt for Russian tsars was drawing to a close.
The discussion of the tsar’s fate must have evoked some associations. During that period, when all around him was collapsing, Lenin suddenly developed an interest in implementing the decree “on the removal of monuments honoring the tsars and their servants.” (On July 9 he posed this question insistently at the Soviet of People’s Commissars.)
Lenin fought with surprising enthusiasm against the stone images of the Romanovs.
From the memoirs of Kremlin Commandant P. Malkov:
“ ‘They still haven’t removed this monstrosity’—Lenin pointed to a monument erected on the spot of the murder of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich.… Ilich [Lenin] deftly fashioned a noose and hurled it over the monument. We got down to business and very soon after, the monument was ensnared in ropes from all sides. Lenin, Sverdlov, Avanesov … and other members of the government … harnessed themselves to the ropes, bore down, pulled, and the monument crashed to the cobblestones.”
After Lenin’s death the tradition continued. While destroying one of the Kremlin’s cathedrals, the Bolsheviks would open the sarcophagi and strip them of the remains of the shrouded Muscovite tsaritsas, which they would dump onto a cart. And a horse would drag them across the Kremlin’s ancient St. John’s Square. On one cart were the mother and wife of Ivan the Terrible, the wives of the first Romanovs, the mother of Peter the Great—which would be dropped into the cellar of the Palace of Justice through a hole in the boards.
Seventy years later people in Russia would be tumbling monuments to Lenin from their pedestals—history the joker!
But let us return to 1918. In Moscow an agonizing July week was drawing to a close. Goloshchekin was on his way to Ekaterinburg; Lenin to Kuntsevo in the country, where he spent his free days with his wife and sister. And relaxed.
Chapter 14
PREPARATIONS FOR MURDER
THE LAST TWO WEEKS
In Ekaterinburg, in anticipation of Goloshchekin’s return, preparations for the end were already under way.
On July 4, Commandant Alexander Avdeyev was replaced by Chekist Yakov Yurovsky. Simultaneously the entire guard inside the house was replaced; the outer guard, however, made up of the Zlokazov workers brought in by Avdeyev, remained.
Also remaining was the husband of Avdeyev’s sister—the driver of the house automobile—Sergei Lyukhanov.
Inside the house, unfamiliar, taciturn young blond men appeared: the Cheka’s new Latvians, who occupied the entire downstairs.
Nicholas felt it immediately: the “dark man” had come. Now it would be soon.
Yurovsky had entered the Ipatiev house in the guise of a deliverer. First he had been a doctor. Now he was a battler against dishonest thievery.
He informed Nicholas of the many robberies by the former guard. Silver spoons, which had been found buried in the garden, were returned to the family triumphantly.
At the same time, however, all the family’s property was recorded—for purposes of learning the extent of the robberies, naturally. This record began with the jewels.
The Romanovs were under arrest, and of course they were not allowed to wear jewels, such being the lot of all prisoners, explained Yurovsky. For now they must not. The experienced Chekist cleverly weighed this “for now” in his conversation. For now. Until the denouement. Until their fate was decided.
That was what Nicholas understood, although he did not believe him, of course.
This secretive and at the same time very trusting man. He did not know the slogan of the great revolutions: Rob the robbed. It seemed to him that for the first time an understanding had arisen between him and this altogether incomprehensible power. The town would fall, and they had decided to take his life, but in doing so, naturally, they must surrender to the family that which belonged to it, intact and preserved. The jewels—that was all they had. It was unclear where they would have to live afterward. Or how. He was the father of the family, and he was obliged to consider their future. He was happy with this unspoken gentlemen’s agreement.
Nicholas’s diary:
“21 June [4 July]. Today there was a change of commandant. During dinner Beloborodov and others came and announced that instead of Avdeyev they were appointing the man we took for a doctor, Yurovsky. In the afternoon before tea he and his assistant compiled a list of gold things: ours and the children’s. The greater part [rings, bracelets] they took with them. They explained that there had been an unpleasant story in our house.… Am sorry for Avdeyev, but he is to blame for not keeping his own people from robbing from the trunks in the shed.”
Yurovsky appreciated Nicholas’s trust. He did not even begin to conduct a search, so as not to undermine this faith. Although, why did he need to search them now, when he could do it after?
Alix did not trust the new commandant. She did not trust a single word he said. She was happy that she had prudently concealed everything most valuable.
Alix’s diary:
“June 21 (July 4). Thursday. Avdeiev is being changed a[nd] we get new commandant (who came once to look at Baby’s leg …) with a young help who seems decent where as the others vulgar a[nd] unpleasant. All our guards inside left.… Then made us show all our jewels and the young one [the assistant] wrote them all down in detail and then they were taken from us (where to, for how long? why? don’t know) Only left me two bracelets I can’t take off.”
The commandant’s “young help,” who “seems decent” to Alix was indeed a most pleasant young man. Clear-eyed, with a clean side-buttoned shirt and a name soothing to the tsaritsa’s ears—Grigory. This was Nikulin, who in just a few days would shoot her son.
From Nikulin’s autobiography (kept in the Museum of the Revolution in Moscow):
“My father was a bricklayer, a stove-fitter, and my mother was a housewife. His education was the lowest, he completed two grades.
“Starting in 1909 I worked as a bricklayer and then at a dynamite factory (this was during the war, to get excused from military service). Ever since the factory closed in March 1918, I have worked in the Ural Regional Cheka.”
Yurovsky noticed him immediately.
Nikulin did not drink, a rarity among former workers who joined the Cheka. Most important, he knew how to inspire confidence immediately. Yurovsky appreciated all this and tenderly called him “my son.” When Yurovsky became commandant, he took Grigory Nikulin for his assistant.
Alix’s diary:
“June 22 (July 5). The command[ant] came with our jewels before us.… Left them on our table a[nd] will come every day to see we have not opened the packet.”
As before, Nicholas believed in the new commandant.
Nicholas’s diary:
“23 June [6 July]. Saturday. Yesterday Commandant Yu[rovsky] brought a small box with all our stolen jewels, asked us to verify the contents, and sealed it in our presence, leaving it with us for safekeeping.… Yu. and his helper are starting to understand what type of people surrounded and guarded us, robbing us….
“25 June [8 July]. Monday. Our life has not changed a bit under Yu. He comes into the bedroom to check that the seal on the box is intact and looks out the open window.… Inside the house new Latvians are standing guard, outside it is the same—some soldiers, some workers. Rumor has it that several of Avdeyev’s men are already under arrest. The door to the shed with our baggage has been sealed—if only they had done that a month ago. Last night a storm and now even cooler.”
——
A stormy summer. He noted the storms in his diary. Lightning in the sky—and water on the land. A lot of water.
For that reason the forest roads had largely washed out and it would be hard for the truck to drive down those roads with its corpses.
Meanwhile, the house was already being readied for the final event. He paid no attention, but she took note.
“June 25 (July 8). Lunch only at 1.30 because they were repairing the electricity in our rooms.”
The jewelry had been listed and the electricity fixed.
The next day, July 9, Dr. Botkin began writing his final letter….
“I AM DEAD, BUT NOT YET BURIED”
After the execution, Yurovsky collected in Dr. Botkin’s room the papers of the last Russian court physician.
I am looking them over: “1913 Calendar for Doctors,” “notice from main headquarters on the death of [his son Dmitry] in battle, December 1914.”
And here is his letter, which he wrote to a classmate who had graduated with him long before, in 1889. He began writing it on July 3 and evidently continued to work on it throughout the following days. Then he copied out this very long letter in his minuscule handwriting. He was copying it out on the last day when someone interrupted him in the middle of a word:
“My dear, good friend Sasha. I am making a last attempt at writing a real letter—at least from here—although that qualification, I believe, is utterly superfluous. I do not think that I was fated at any time to write anyone from anywhere. My voluntary confinement here is restricted less by time than by my earthly existence. In essence I am dead—dead for my children, for my work.… I am dead but not yet buried, or buried alive—whichever: the consequences are nearly identical.… My children may hold out hope that we will see each other again in this life.… but I personally do not indulge in that hope.… and I look the unadulterated reality right in the eye.… I will clarify for you with small episodes illustrating my condition. The day before yesterday, as I was calmly reading Saltykov-Shchedrin, whom I was greatly enjoying, I suddenly saw a reduced vision of my son Yury’s face, but dead, in a horizontal position, his eyes closed. Yesterday, at the same reading, I suddenly heard a word that sounded like papulya [papa dear]. I nearly burst into sobs. Again—this is not a hallucination because the word was pronounced, the voice was similar, and I did not doubt for an instant that my daughter, who was supposed to be in Tobolsk, was talking to me.… I will probably never hear that voice so dear or feel that touch so dear with which my little children so spoiled me….
“… If ‘faith is dead without deed,’ then deeds can live without faith. If any of us does combine faith and deeds, then it is only out of God’s special kindness. One such happy man—through grave suffering, the loss of my firstborn, my half-year-old little boy Seryozha—was I. Ever since then my code has significantly expanded and defined itself, and in every case I have also been concerned about the patient’s soul. This vindicates my last decision, too, when I unhesitatingly orphaned my own children in order to carry out my physician’s duty to the end, as Abraham did not hesitate at God’s demand to sacrifice his only son.”
Nicholas’s diary:
“28 June [11 July]. Thursday. In the morning, at about 10.30, three workers came up to the open window, hoisted a heavy railing, and attached it to the outside of the frame without any warning from Yu. We like this man less and less! Began to read the eighth volume of Saltykov-Shchedrin.”
This was the last straw. It was awful to enter the room and see that dark railing. He suffered both for her and for the boy.
And she … she was living the hard existence of captivity. She explained in her diary Nicholas’s obscure entry: “We like this man less and less.”
“June 28 (July 11). Thursday.… Command[ant] insisted to see us all at 10, but kept us waiting 20 m. as was breakfasting & eating cheese wont permit us to have any more any cream. Workmen turned up outside and put up iron railings before our only open window. Always fright of our climbing out no doubt or getting into contact with the sentry. Strong pains continue.… Remained in bed all day.”
Yes, the dark man wielded them two blows that day. In the final analysis, the cream, cheese, and eggs brought from the monastery had been a distraction to Alexei’s perpetual boredom.
(“It’s boring! What boredom!” These exclamations filled the boy’s diary.) And now on top of that—the railings.
But Yurovsky was only doing his job.
Their days were numbered, and he had already begun to isolate them from the world. He feared the monastery. Yes, the Cheka had conceived of transmitting the deceitful letters, but what if suddenly someone else.… He had to consider that “suddenly.” There was anarchy in Ekaterinburg. The gold reserves had been evacuated, the archives had already left town. Only the small detachment—that was all he had.
That was all right, though, for a few days.
THE DECREE OF EXECUTION
It happened on July 12—the day after the railings were put up.
Upon his return from Moscow, Goloshchekin called a meeting of the Ural Soviet Executive Committee.
The loyal Goloshchekin did not say a word about his agreements with Moscow: only the most restricted circle knew about them—the Ural Soviet presidium. The Soviet’s rank-and-file members were certain that today they themselves would decide the Romanovs’ fate. The Whites were advancing. All of them realized what this decision might mean in their lives.
Nevertheless, they passed the decree unanimously. The Ural Soviet’s decree of execution.
From a letter of Alexander Kruglov in Perm:
“My father kept a copy of the text of the decree on shooting the tsar, which was posted around town after the execution:
“ ‘Decree of the Ural Executive Committee of the Soviet of Worker, Peasant, and Red Army Deputies. Possessing information that Czechoslovak bands are threatening the Red capital of the Urals, Ekaterinburg, and bearing in mind that the crowned hangman could hide and escape the people’s tribunal, the Executive Committee, carrying out the will of the people, has decreed to execute the former tsar Nicholas Romanov, guilty of countless bloody crimes.’”
Implementation of the decree was entrusted to Yakov Yurovsky, commandant of the “House of Special Designation.”
“WE HAVE NO NEWS FROM THE OUTSIDE”
Nicholas’s diary:
“30 June [13 July]. Saturday. Alexei took his first bath since Tobolsk. His knee is improving, but he cannot bend it completely. Weather is warm and pleasant. We have no news from the outside.”
With this hopeless sentence, the day after the execution decree, as if he had sensed something, Nicholas closed his di
ary (see Appendix).
What follows are empty pages carefully numbered by him to the end. There is something awful in those blank pages.
All these days she had been waiting. Waiting for more news from the suddenly silent “Russian army officer.”
She listened and listened to the sounds outside the window.
Alix’s diary:
“June 29 (July 12).… Constantly hear artillery passing, infantry & twice cavalry, during the course of two week. Also troops marching with music—twice. It seems to have been the Austrian prisoners who are marching against the Czechs (also our former prisoners), who are with the troops coming through Siberia & not far from here now. Wounded daily arrive to the town….
“June 30 (July 13). At 6½ Baby had his first bath since Tobolsk. He managed to get in and out alone, climbs also alone in & out of bed, but can only stand on foot as yet.… Rained in the night. Heard three revolver shots in the night.”
THE FINAL THREE DAYS
Three days before their end, Nicholas broke off his diary. She continued hers. She took their story to its end.
“July 1 (14). Sunday. Beautiful summer’s morning. Scarcely slept because of back & legs. 10½. Had the joy of a vespers—the young Priest for the 2nd time.”
It was Sunday. And while the new leader of the country, the atheist Ulyanov, was relaxing at his dacha in Kuntsevo, the former leader of the country, prisoner Romanov, received permission for a service.
Father Storozhev was invited to serve the vespers the family had ordered. Father Storozhev had already held services once in the Ipatiev house, and Yurovsky agreed to call him a second time.
The commandant’s room was slovenly and filthy; grenades and bombs littered the piano. Grigory Nikulin was sleeping on the bed fully clothed after his shift. Yurovsky was slowly drinking his tea and eating his bread and butter. While the priest and deacon arrayed themselves, they began to talk.
“What’s wrong with you?” asked Yurovsky, noticing that Father Storozhev kept wringing his hands.
The Last Tsar Page 40