This “recognition” by the tsar may have decided everything. Alexei Kabanov had a brother in an important position—head of the Ekaterinburg prison—and Alexei had thought that the way to prove his loyalty to the new authority was to participate in the execution.
Pavel Medvedev: “At about twelve o’clock (old style), two new style, Yurovsky woke the tsar’s family.
“Whether he told them why he was disturbing them and where they were supposed to go, I don’t know.”
Strekotin: “At that moment electric bells were heard. This was them waking the tsar’s family.”
Yurovsky: “That was when I came and woke them. Dr. Botkin, who slept closer to the door of the room, came out.” (No, the doctor was not sleeping, he was writing his last letter and had broken it off in the middle of a word.)
“The following explanation was given: ‘In view of the unrest in the town, it has become necessary to move the Romanov family downstairs.’
“I suggested everyone dress right away. Botkin woke the rest. They took quite a long time getting dressed, probably at least forty minutes.… When they were dressed I myself led them down the inner staircase to the cellar room.”
Yurovsky: “Downstairs a room had been chosen with a plastered wooden partition (to avoid ricochets), from which all the furniture had been moved. The detachment was at the ready in the next room. The R[omanov]s had no inkling.”
Pavel Medvedev: “The tsar was carrying the heir in his arms. The sovereign and the heir were wearing field shirts and forage caps. The empress and her daughters wore dresses but not wraps. The sovereign walked ahead with the heir. In my presence there were no tears, no sobs, and no questions. They went downstairs, out into the courtyard, and from there through the second door into the downstairs quarters. They were led into the corner room adjacent to the sealed storeroom. Yurovsky ordered chairs brought in.”
Yurovsky: “Nich[olas] was carrying Alexei in his arms, the rest were carrying small pillows and various little items. Entering the empty room, A[lexandra] F[eodorovna] asked: ‘What, no chairs? May we not sit?’
“The com[mandant] ordered two chairs brought in. Nich[olas] put A[lexei] in one and A. F. sat in the other. The rest the commandant ordered stand in a row.”
Strekotin: “They were all led into the room.… Next to my post. Soon Akulov [Nikulin] came out and walking past me said, ‘The heir needs a chair.… Evidently he wants to die in a chair.… Oh well—let’s bring them.’”
Nikulin brought the two chairs Yurovsky wrote about. One for the tsaritsa, the other for Alexei.
The chairs were no whim of Alexandra Feodorovna’s. She could not stand for long because her legs ached constantly. That was why she had brought the wheelchair. The boy, who had just had an attack, could not stand either. That was why they “wanted to die in a chair.”
Medvedev: “The empress sat by the wall where the window was, closer to the back column of the arch. Behind her stood three of her daughters. The sovereign was … in the middle, next to the heir, and behind him stood Dr. Botkin. The maid, a tall woman, stood by the left jamb of the storeroom door. With her stood one of the daughters. The maid had a pillow in her arms. The tsar’s daughters had brought small pillows: they put one on the seat of the heir’s chair, the other on their mother’s.”
At this time Deryabin was watching the same scene, but from the other perspective—through the window of the half cellar room. He saw the executioners:
“They arranged themselves like this: to the right of the entrance was Yurovsky, to the left of him stood Nikulin, the Latvians stood right in the doorway, and behind them was Medvedev [Pavel].”
Through the window Deryabin could see part of Yurovsky’s body, but primarily his arm. He saw Yurovsky saying something and waving his arm. What exactly he said, Deryabin could not tell. He said he could not hear the words.
Strekotin: “With quick gestures Yurovsky directed who went where. In a calm, quiet voice: ‘Please, you stand here, and you here … that’s it, in a row.’ The prisoners stood in two rows: in the first, the tsar’s family; in the second, their people. The heir was sitting on a chair. The tsar was standing in the first row with one of his lackeys directly behind him.”
Yes, Nicholas was standing. It was all just the way it had been at that last service, when they had heard “Rest with the Saints.”
Everything in this scene is clear—except for one thing: Why were they arrayed so picturesquely? Earlier, when they had listened to the prayers, they had lined up before Father Storozhev and the deacon, but now—when they were waiting for it to end?
They were waiting out some new danger, so why were they so inappropriately, so picturesquely arrayed? And why did they ask for only two chairs; after all they could be waiting for it to end indefinitely.
THE PHOTO-EXECUTION
A man called me after the publication of my first article. He started right in:
“I will tell you what the second generation of Soviet agents was told in agent school. What is the second generation? If the famous Soviet agent Rikhard Zorge was the first generation, then this is 1927–1929. They are all long since in their graves, and you are unlikely to hear this from anyone but me.… So, at agent classes we were told the following … : they had to arrange the family as conveniently as possible for the execution. The room was narrow, and they were worried the family would crowd together. Then Yurovsky had an idea. He told them they had to go down to the cellar because there was danger of firing on the house. While they were at it, they had to be photographed because people in Moscow were worried and various rumors were going around—to the effect that they had fled. [Indeed, in late June there had been a disturbing telegram to that effect from Moscow.]
“So they went downstairs and stood—for a photograph along the wall. And when they had lined up….”
How simple it all proved to be. Of course, he thought of saying he was going to photograph them. He may even have joked about how he had once been a photographer. Hence his orders, about which Strekotin wrote: “Stand on the left,… and you on the right.” Hence also the calm obedience of all the characters in this scene. Then, when they were standing, waiting for the camera to be brought in….
Yurovsky: “When they were all standing, the detachment was called in.”
Strekotin: “A group of people went to the room where the prisoners had just been led. I followed them, leaving my post. We all stopped at the door to the room.”
So the firing squad was already crowding in the wide double doors to the room, and Strekotin was right beside them.
Ermakov: “Then I came out and told the driver: ‘Get going.’ He knew what to do, the car roared to life, and exhaust appeared. All this was necessary in order to muffle the shots, so that no sound would be heard at liberty.”
The driver, Sergei Lyukhanov, in the courtyard, was sitting in the cab of the truck, listening to the motor running—and waiting.
Yurovsky: “When the detachment com[mandant] walked in, he told the R[omanov]s: ‘In view of the fact that your relatives are continuing their attack on Sov[iet] Russia, the Ural Executive Committee has decided to execute you.’ Nicholas turned his back to the detachment, his face to the family, then sort of came to and turned around to face the com[mandant] and asked: ‘What? What?’”
Strekotin: “Yurovsky was standing in front of the tsar, his right hand in his pants pocket and a small piece of paper in his left. Then he began to read the sentence. But he had not finished the last word when the tsar asked very loudly for him to repeat it.… So Yurovsky read it a second time.”
Yurovsky: “The com[mandant] quickly repeated it and ordered the detachment to get ready.… Nicholas did not say anything more, having turned back toward the family; the others uttered a few incoherent exclamations. It all lasted just a few seconds.”
THE TSAR’S LAST WORDS
He “asked him to repeat it” and “did not say anything more”! Such were Nicholas’s last words, wrote Yurovsky and Strekot
in.
But the tsar did say a few more words. Yurovsky and Strekotin did not understand them. Or rather, they did not choose to write them down.
Ermakov did not write them down either, but he did remember them. He did not remember much, but this he did not forget. He even talked about it sometimes.
From a letter of Alexei Karelin in Magnitogorsk:
“I remember Ermakov was asked, ‘What did the tsar say before the execution?’ ‘The tsar,’ he replied, ‘said, “You know not what you do.”’”
No, Ermakov could not have invented that sentence; he did not know those words, this assassin and atheist. Nor was there any way he could have known that those words of the Lord were written on the cross of Nicholas’s slain uncle Sergei Alexandrovich. The tsar repeated them, as Ella must have repeated them at the bottom of the mine: “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
A few months later in the Fortress of Peter and Paul, another Romanov, Grand Duke Dmitry Konstantinovich, would be led before a firing squad:
“The prison guard said that while Dmitry Konstantinovich was on his way to his execution, he kept repeating Christ’s words: ‘For-give them, Lord, for they know not what they do’” (From the memoirs of Grand Duke Gavriil Konstantinovich, In a Marble Palace).
His last words. At that moment it came to pass—the story of the sacrifice. And forgiveness.
After reading the piece of paper, Yurovsky jerked out his Colt.
Yurovsky: “The detachment had been told beforehand who was to shoot whom, and they had been ordered to aim straight for the heart, to avoid excessive quantities of blood and get it over with quicker.”
Strekotin: “At his last word he instantly pulled a revolver out of his pocket and shot the tsar. The tsaritsa and her daughter Olga tried to make the sign of the cross, but did not have enough time.”
Yurovsky: “Nich[olas] was killed by the commandant, point blank. Then A[lexandra] F[eodorovna] died immediately.”
Yurovsky wrote that it was he who killed the tsar. Strekotin too saw Yurovsky finish reading the paper and immediately pull out his hand with the gun and shoot the tsar.
Actually, that day Yurovsky had two guns with him.
Yurovsky: “Colt no. 71905 with a cartridge clip and seven bullets, and Mauser no. 167177 with a wooden gunstock and a clip with ten bullets.… I killed Nicholas point blank with the Colt.”
But Strekotin was only watching Yurovsky reading, and the guard only saw Yurovsky’s hand aimed at the former Autocrat of All the Russias.
Two others would later assert that they had shot the tsar.
The son of Chekist Medvedev: “The tsar was killed by my father.… As I already said, they had agreed who was to shoot whom. Ermakov the tsar, Yurovsky the tsaritsa, and my father Marie. But when they stood in the doorway, my father found himself directly opposite the tsar. While Yurovsky was reading the paper, my father stood there watching the tsar. He had never seen him so close up. As soon as Yurovsky repeated the last words, my father was ready and waiting and fired immediately. And he killed the tsar. He fired his shot faster than anyone.… Only he had a Browning. On a Mauser, a revolver, or a Colt you have to cock it, and that takes time. On a Browning you don’t have to.”
But Ermakov, to whom the tsar “belonged” by agreement….
Ermakov: “I shot him point blank, and he fell instantly.”
I am certain, though, that everyone crowding in the doorway of that terrible room, all twelve revolutionaries, had come to kill the tsar, and all twelve sent their first bullet into him. The triumphant inscription left on the wall—“On this night Belshazzar was killed by his lackeys”—was literally true. That was why Nicholas toppled over backward with such force. Only then did they turn to the others, and the chaotic shooting ensued.
Kabanov: “I remember it well: when all of us participating in the execution walked up to the opened door of the room, there turned out to be three rows of us firing revolvers, and the second and third rows were firing over the shoulders of the ones in front. There were so many arms with revolvers pointed toward those being executed, and they were so close to each other, that whoever was standing in front got a burn on the inside of his wrist from the shots of his neighbor behind.”
They gave up the entire space of the tiny room of execution to the eleven unfortunates, who raced around in that cell while the twelve sharpshooters, sorting out their victims, fired continuously from the mouth of the double doors, giving those in front gunpowder burns.
Hands holding revolvers poked through the doorway.
The son of Chekist Medvedev: “My father had a gunpowder burn on his neck, and Yurovsky burned his finger.” (Yes, they were both in the first row!)
Yurovsky: “A[lexe]i, three of his sisters, the lady-in-waiting [as he referred to Demidova], and Botkin were still alive. They had to be finished off. This amazed the com[mandant] since we had aimed straight for the heart. It was also surprising that the bullets from the revolvers bounced off for some reason and ricocheted, jumping around the room like hail.”
So the tsar was down, felled by the first shots, felled by them all. The tsaritsa was down, too, killed in her chair, and the swarthy servant Trupp, who collapsed right after his master. And Botkin and the cook Kharitonov. But the girls were still alive. It was bizarre how the bullets bounced off them. Bullets flew around the room. Demidova was dashing about the tiny room wailing.… She shielded herself with a pillow, into which they emptied bullet after bullet.
The detachment kept firing, almost hysterically. Through the gun smoke the light was barely visible. The prostrate figures lay in pools of blood, and on the floor the boy stretched his arm out through the smoke, shielding himself from the bullets. Nikulin, in horror, not understanding what was going on, fired at him, and fired, and fired.
Yurovsky: “My assistant spent an entire clip of bullets.” (The strange vitality of the heir must probably be put down to my assistant’s poor mastery of his weapon and his inevitable nerves evoked by his long ordeal with the armored daughters.)
Then the commandant stepped into the fierce, acrid smoke.
Yurovsky: “The remaining bullets of the one loaded clip for the Colt, as well as the loaded Mauser, went to finish off Nicholas’s daughters and the strange vitality of the heir.”
He put an end to that “vitality” with two shots. So he believed. And the boy fell quiet.
Kabanov: “The tsar’s two youngest daughters, pressed up against the wall, were squatting, covering their heads with their arms, and then two men fired at their heads.… Alexei was lying on the floor, and they fired at him, too. The lady-in-waiting [Demidova] was lying on the floor still alive. Then I ran into the execution room and shouted to stop the firing and finish off those still alive with bayonets. One of the comrades began plunging the bayonet of his American Winchester into her chest. The bayonet was like a dagger, but it was dull and would not penetrate. She grabbed the bayonet with both hands and began screaming. Later they got her with their rifle butts.”
Now all eleven were on the floor—barely visible through the smoke.
Pavel Medvedev: “The blood was gushing out … the heir was still alive—and moaning. Yurovsky walked over to him and shot him two or three times at point-blank range. The heir fell still. The scene made me want to vomit.”
Strekotin: “The smoke was blocking out the electric lamp. The shooting was halted. The doors of the room were opened for the smoke to disperse. They started picking up the bodies.”
They had to get them out as quickly as possible. This truck had to be on its way while the July night still hung over the town. Quickly, hastily, they turned the bodies over, checking pulses. They were in a hurry. The light barely shone through all the gun smoke.
Yurovsky: “The whole procedure, including the checking [feeling pulses and so on] took about twenty minutes.”
The bodies had to be carried through all the downstairs rooms to the front entrance, where the truck was waiting with the drive
r Lyukhanov.
Pavel Medvedev got the idea of carrying them out on sheets, so as not to drip blood in the rooms. He went upstairs, to the family’s rooms. After he collected the sheets in the grand duchesses’ room he grabbed a cover and wiped his hands, which were spattered with the tsar’s blood—and threw it into the corner. That was the cover they later found—from his, Medvedev’s, bloody fingers.
Pavel Medvedev: “We took the bodies out on stretchers made from sheets stretched between shafts taken off the cart in the courtyard.”
Strekotin: “The tsar’s body was carried out first. The bodies were carried out to the truck.”
On the bottom of the truck they laid a cloth, which had been in the storeroom covering the family’s belongings. Now it was protecting the floor of the truck from the tsar’s blood.
The tsar was carried out first in the wide marital sheet. They carried out the head of the family, Then they brought his daughters.
Strekotin: “When they laid one of the daughters on the stretcher, she cried out and covered her face with her arm. The others [the daughters] also turned out to be alive. We couldn’t shoot anymore—with the open doors the shots could have been heard on the street. According to the comrades in the detachment, the shots had been heard at all the posts.”
When the slain grand duchess rose up with a shout on the sheet—and her sisters rustled on the floor—horror gripped the detachment.
At that point they still did not know the reason for their “strange vitality,” as Yurovsky put it. It seemed to them that heaven itself was against them. Again the Chekists did not err. Ermakov set the example. He had no fear of heaven.
Strekotin: “Ermakov took my bayonet from me and started stabbing everyone dead who had turned out to be alive.”
Yurovsky: “When they tried to stab one of the girls with a bayonet, the point just would not go through her corset.”
The Livadia Palace, the children’s balls, the luxury of the Winter Palace, the anticipation of love—it all came to an end on a dirty floor, to the panting of a former convict. In impossible pain from a dull bayonet—it all came to an end.
The Last Tsar Page 46