The Children of Tsar Nicholas II ("OTMAA")


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Anastasia and Alexei are cute on this picture. Do you have some pictures of them ?
 
Anastasia and Alexei are cute on this picture. Do you have some pictures of them ?
I have a full version of that photo, and I have more photos of Alexei and Anastasia:










 
This is very interesting from The life and tragedy of Alexandra Feodorovna. Description of the four daughters of the tsar. By: Sophie Buxhoeveden

Chapter XVI
The Empress and her Family

After her departure, the Grand Duchesses had no one especially attached to them. Mlle. Schneider took the charge of the two youngest, Marie and Anastasia, while the elder ones went about with one or other of the Empress's ladies-in-waiting.
The Empress really brought up her daughters herself, and her work was well done. It is not possible to imagine more charming, pure and high-minded girls. She could exercise her authority when necessary, but not in such a way as to interfere with the perfect confidence that existed between mother and daughters. She understood the high spirits of youth, and never put a check on laughter or wild pranks. She liked, too, to be present at their lessons, and to discuss with their teachers the line their studies should follow.

The girls were all very good-looking. The eldest, the Grand Duchess Olga Nicolaevna, was fair and tall, with smiling blue eyes, a somewhat short nose, which she called CC my humble snub," and lovely teeth. She had a remarkably graceful figure and was a beautiful rider and dancer. She was the cleverest of the sisters, and was very musical, having, her teachers said, an " absolutely correct ear." She could play by ear anything she had heard, and could transpose' complicated pieces of music, play the most difficult accompaniments at sight, and her touch on the piano was delightful. She sang prettily in a mezzosoprano. She was lazy at practising, but when the spirit moved her she would play by the hour.

Olga Nicolaevna was very straightforward, sometimes too outspoken, but always sincere. She had great charm, and could be the merriest of the merry. When she was a schoolgirl, her unfortunate teachers had every possible practical joke played on them by her. When she grew up, she was always ready for any amusement. She was generous, and an appeal to her met with immediate response. "Oh, one must help poor so-and-so. I must do it somehow," she would say. Her more careful sister, Tatiana, would suggest practical measures, would note names and details, and come back to the subject later out of a sense of duty.Olga Nicolaevna was devoted to her father. The horror of the Revolution told on her more keenly than on any of the others. She changed completely, and all her bright spirits disappeared.

Tatiana Nicolaevna was to my mind prettier than her sisters. She was taller even than the Empress, but she was so slight and well-proportioned that her great height was not remarkable. She had fine, regular features, recalling pictures of ancestresses who had been famous beauties. She had dark hair, a rather pale complexion, and wide-apart, light-brown eyes, that gave her a poetic far-away look, not quite in keeping -with her character. This was a mixture of exactness, thoroughness and perseverance, with leanings towards poetic and abstract ideas. She was closest in sympathy to her mother, and was the definite favorite of both her parents. She was completely unselfish, always ready to give up her own plans to go for a walk with her father, to read to her mother, to do anything that was wanted. It was Tatiana Nicolaevna who took care of the little ones, and who -was a constant help to the Household, always willing to help them in arranging that their official duties should not clash with their private engagements. She had the Empress's practical mind and love of detail. She planned and arranged everything in the " Children's quarters " as it was called. She had a less strong character than Olga Nicolaevna, whose lead she would always follow, but she could make up her mind in an emergency quicker than her elder sister, and never lost her head.

When her brother was ill, Tatiana Nicolaevna could take her mother's place, following the doctor's directions and playing with the sick boy for hours. Out of a sense of duty, she undertook more thin her share of public appearances. She was shy, Eke all her sisters, but her natural friendliness made her want to say pleasant things to people. She became much better known than her cleverer elder sister, as she took more trouble about the people she met.Tatiana Nicolaevna loved dress. Any frock, no matter how old, looked well on her. She knew how to put on her clothes, was admired and liked admiration. She was sociable, and friends would have been welcome, but no young girls were ever asked to the Palace. The Empress thought that the four sisters should be able to entertain one another. They were close friends when they outgrew the squabbles of childhood. The two elder shared one bedroom, the two younger another, while their schoolrooms and dining-room were in common. The little Tsarevich had his own rooms, in which M. Gilliard ruled.

Marie Nicolaevna was like Olga Nicolaevna in colouring and features, but all on a more vivid scale. She had the same charming smile, the same shape of face, but her eyes, "Marie's saucers," as they were called by her cousins, were magnificent, and of a deep dark blue. Her hair had golden lights in it, and when it was cut after her illness in 1917, it curled naturally over her head. Marie Nicolaevna, alone of the sisters, had a decided talent for drawing, and sketched quite -well, always with her left hand. "Mashka," as her sisters called her, was ruled entirely by her youngest sister, Anastasia Nicolaevna, nicknamed by her mother "the imp."


Perhaps Anastasia Nicolaevna would have grown up the prettiest of the sisters. Her features were regular and finely cut. She had fair hair, fine eyes, with impish laughter in their depths, and dark eyebrows that nearly met. These combined to make the youngest Grand Duchess quite unlike any of her sisters. She had a type of her own and was more like her mother's than her father's family. She was rather short even at seventeen, and was, then decidedly fat, but it was the fatness of youth. She would have outgrown it, as had her sister Marie.
Anastasia Nicolaevna was the originator of all mischief, and was as witty and amusing as she was lazy at her lessons. She was quick and observant, with a keen sense of humour, and was the only one of the sisters who never knew the meaning of shyness. Even as a baby she had entertained grave old men, who were her neighbors at table, with her astonishing remarks.

Alexei Nicolaevitch was not impressed by his own importance, and his simple courteous manner was like his father's. He knew and felt that he was the Tsarevich, and from babyhood mechanically took his place in front of his elder sisters. But he took no pride in the position that he knew was his due, and, after the Revolution, gave it up quite quietly, without a word. His chief friend was the son of Dr. Derevenko, and as a small child he played with the sons of his sailor servant, whose name also, curiously enough, was Derevenko.
All the children adored their mother, but her constant care of him made a particular bond of love between mother and son. When the Emperor left for General Headquarters in 1915, Alexei Nicolaevitch felt he was, as he once said to me, " the man in the house," and it was delightful to see the grown-up way in which he would look after the Empress when they went to church or to some function together. He would help her to rise, or would unobtrusively push a chair towards her, as the Emperor might have done.
From the very first, the Empress looked after her children's education herself, She gave them their first spelling lessons, and taught them their prayers, going up each evening to pray with them - a custom which she kept up to the end with Alexei Nicolaevitch. As the children grew older, they had of course their own teachers. The Tsarevich had an excellent tutor in M. P. Gilliard, a Swiss, who was helped after 1915 by an English colleague, Mr. Sydney C. Gibbes.
 
Very interesting, AnastasiaEvidence. Thanks for sharing.
 
Holly aka AnastasiaEvidence, Thank you so much for the other photos I haven't seen of them!

Did you buy those letters of OTMA and Alyosha?
 
Holly aka AnastasiaEvidence, Thank you so much for the other photos I haven't seen of them!

Did you buy those letters of OTMA and Alyosha?


Hey, Olyashka!
I'm not Holly.

No, I didn't buy those letter of OTMA, they came from a Russian livadia website.
Here's the link. It has hundreds of photos of livadia's exterior and interior, it also includes those letters that I've posted earlier.
Livadia Palace,Crimea,Ukraine.Livadia(Livadiya) Organ.Livadia photo,Crimea,Ukraine(Livadiya)
 
Oh I'm so sorry if I've mistaken you as Holly.
Thanks for the links too. Ventsenosnaya Semya is my most favorite movie based on the story of the Romanovs.
Sorry again....for my mistake
 
It's okay, I understand.
Yes, and finally the English version of Ventsenosnaya Semya came out in February this year!
 
I hope these were not posted before:
 
Thanks for posting those Olyashka! These five were not posted earlier in the thread. The last one with Olga is so amazing, I love it!
 
You're so welcome, AnastasiaEvidence! :lol:
I'll be posting more soon.
 
OTMA are the most beautiful girls in the world. They all were angels. Beautiful, kind, clever and well-brought up. Nicholas loved them very strongly. Tsar always respected their sense of choice, loved when his girls made perfomances, he also loved to see girls reading. He said that in such moments the girls' behavour changed at once as they started becoming very serious.
 
They were innocent and died tragically, but you can over romanticize them too. Yes, I suppose they were angels in a sense, certainly they were innocent young women who tragically never got a chance to have a life simply because they were Nicholas II's daughters. Where does the observation about the girls reading and then their behavior changing come from? I like that story a lot, but can't recall coming across it.
 
No, Grace Angel. I have learnt lots of documents and professional books of Tsar Nicholas and his family. As for my observations, I can say that Alexandra Feododorovna said that education is impossible without serious care of learning.
All girls had a very tight schedule, when they woke up, they must made their beds themselves, no outside help. (They began doing it since 6 years old). Then the whole family had breakfast together, after that they went to the church for an hour. The best time for that was 7 a.m. After coming back home, all girls started learning with the theachers. According to the contemporaries' recollections the most talanted girl in studying was Olga, the laziest was Maria.
 
Thanks. Since you're from Russia, I was wondering whether that story about OTMA was from a book in Russian maybe. I can only read English and there' s books in Russian about the Romanovs that I will never be able to read, alas.
 
Dear Grace Angel, the language isn't problem nowadays. Let's start learning Russian, if there is a difficult, I'll help you.)))
 
The photo is as beautiful as girls are. The most beautiful girls were Tatiana and Maria.
 
The last photo is my favorite of all OTMA photos. Note the beaded, glittery trim on their dresses. These dresses don't survive do they? (I know some of their clothes survive and I have seen pictures on other sites, but not these dresses).
Interesting question. I too, would like to know the name of the material and fashion designs of these dresses. It is very interesting to know. I don't know if those dresses survived. I do know that the material is silk, and I'm not sure if silk can last for 100 years?
 
If you look on the Hermitage website they have clothes that did belong to OTMA, but not these dresses. But they do have gowns much like this material and age on there, that are much like these gowns of OTMA. These dresses of look alike material and age have survived the years, so maybe OTMA's gowns did too, they've never been exhibited though. Olga and Tatiana's 1913 court dresses have, however survived and been exhibited.
 
If you look on the Hermitage website they have clothes that did belong to OTMA, but not these dresses. But they do have gowns much like this material and age on there, that are much like these gowns of OTMA. These dresses of look alike material and age have survived the years, so maybe OTMA's gowns did too, they've never been exhibited though.

Olga and Tatiana's 1913 court dresses have, however survived and been exhibited.
1913 dresses of Olga and Tatiana
silk does last long.

Yes, I saw those dresses. The exhibtion also had OTMA's summer dresses from 1907 here . But, these are in silk fabrics though. The 1910 set also wasn't made in silk either.

I think those dresses in the photo might be in the exhibition, since silk does last long. It just hasn't been photographed yet. It really would be nice if someone who has been to the Alexander Palace can say whether these dresses are in the exhibition if not, they maybe in the Winter Palace.
 
I hadn't thought of the fact that they might be in the exhibition but not photographed. They look fragile, but that might have been more looks than factual. I would think had these dresses been in the exibition they would have been photographed, since these formal photos of OTMA in these dresses are some of the most widely known photos of OTMA. They are my favorite pics of OTMA anyway.
 
I think those dresses were stored privately in the upstairs rooms of the Alexander Palace. The upstairs rooms are where the girls rooms are, so I suspect that those dresses are upstairs in the storage along with many other dresses in OTMA's photos. Too bad the upstairs section is off limits.
 
Hopefully, someday they will appear in an exhibition if they survive.I think they are too well known not to. I actually e-mailed the Hermitage through their website recently to ask if they possibly have these dresses. But I haven't heard back. I thought it was worth a try, since they have had exibitions of OTMA's clothes in the past, and have some of OTMA's dresses and other clothing of the IF on their website.
 
Just a note: 1913 court dresses of Olga and Tatiana were made of satin, not silk. Silk was included on their kokoshniki however.
 
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