Nicholas II of Russia facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Nicholas II |
|||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
-2.jpg)
Nicholas II in 1912
|
|||||
| Emperor of All Russia | |||||
| Reign | 1 November 1894 – 15 March 1917 | ||||
| Coronation | 26 May 1896 | ||||
| Predecessor | Alexander III | ||||
| Successor | Monarchy abolished Georgy Lvov (as Minister-Chairman) |
||||
| Prime Minister | See list | ||||
| Born | 18 May [O.S. 6 May] 1868 Alexander Palace, Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire |
||||
| Died | 17 July 1918 (aged 50) Ipatiev House, Yekaterinburg, Russian Soviet Republic |
||||
| Burial | 17 July 1998 Peter and Paul Cathedral, Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation |
||||
| Spouse |
Alexandra Feodorovna (Alix of Hesse) (m. 1894)
|
||||
| Issue | |||||
|
|||||
| House | Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov | ||||
| Father | Alexander III of Russia | ||||
| Mother | Maria Feodorovna (Dagmar of Denmark) | ||||
| Religion | Russian Orthodox | ||||
| Signature |  |
||||
| Saint Nicholas II of Russia | |
|---|---|
| Passion-Bearer | |
| Venerated in | Eastern Orthodoxy |
| Canonized |
|
| Major shrine | Church on Blood, Yekaterinburg, Russia |
| Feast | 17 July |
Nicholas II or Nikolai II Alexandrovich Romanov (18 May [O.S. 6 May] 1868 – 17 July 1918), known in the Russian Orthodox Church as Saint Nicholas the Passion-Bearer, was the last Emperor of Russia, ruling from 1 November 1894 until his abdication on 15 March 1917. During his reign, Nicholas gave support to the economic and political reforms promoted by his prime ministers, Sergei Witte and Pyotr Stolypin. He advocated modernization based on foreign loans and close ties with France, but resisted giving the new parliament (the Duma) major roles. Ultimately, progress was undermined by Nicholas's commitment to autocratic rule, strong aristocratic opposition and defeats sustained by the Russian military in the Russo-Japanese War and World War I. By March 1917, public support for Nicholas had collapsed and he was forced to abdicate the throne, thereby ending the Romanov dynasty's 300-year rule of Russia.
Nicholas signed the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907, which was designed to counter Germany's attempts to gain influence in the Middle East; it ended the Great Game of confrontation between Russia and the British Empire. He aimed to strengthen the Franco-Russian Alliance and proposed the unsuccessful Hague Convention of 1899 to promote disarmament and solve international disputes peacefully. Domestically, he was criticised for his government's repression of political opponents and his perceived fault or inaction during the Khodynka Tragedy, anti-semitic pogroms, Bloody Sunday and the violent suppression of the 1905 Russian Revolution. His popularity was further damaged by his supposed responsibility for defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, which saw the Russian Baltic Fleet annihilated at the Battle of Tsushima, together with the loss of Russian influence over Manchuria and Korea and the Japanese annexation of the south of Sakhalin Island.
During the July Crisis, Nicholas supported Serbia and approved the mobilization of the Russian Army on 30 July 1914. In response, Germany declared war on Russia on 1 August 1914 and its ally France on 3 August 1914, starting the Great War, later known as the First World War. The severe military losses led to a collapse of morale at the front and at home; a general strike and a mutiny of the garrison in Petrograd sparked the February Revolution and the disintegration of the monarchy's authority. After abdicating for himself and his son, Nicholas and his family were imprisoned by the Russian Provisional Government and exiled to Siberia. After the Bolsheviks took power in the October Revolution, the family was held in Yekaterinburg, where they were executed in July 1918.
In 1981, Nicholas, his wife, and their children were recognized as martyrs by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, based in New York City. Their gravesite was discovered in 1979, but this was not acknowledged until 1989. After the fall of Communism, the remains of the imperial family were exhumed, identified by DNA analysis, and re-interred with an elaborate state and church ceremony in St. Petersburg on 17 July 1998, exactly 80 years after their assassination. They were canonized in 2000 by the Russian Orthodox Church as passion bearers. In the years following his death, Nicholas was reviled by Soviet historians and state propaganda as a "callous tyrant" who "persecuted his own people while sending countless soldiers to their deaths in pointless conflicts". Despite being viewed more positively in recent years, the majority view among historians is that Nicholas was a well-intentioned yet poor ruler who proved incapable of handling the challenges facing his nation.
Images for kids
-
Nicholas II as a child with his mother, Maria Feodorovna, in 1870
-
Tsar Nicholas II of Russia with his physically similar cousin, King George V of the United Kingdom (right), in German military uniforms in Berlin before the war; 1913
-
Tsarevich Nicholas in Japan (1891)
-
Official engagement photograph of Nicholas II and Alexandra, April 1894
-
Nicholas II and family.
-
Tsar Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra with their first child, 1896
-
Coronation by Valentin Serov
-
Silk Imperial Crown of Russia 1896 Coronation gift to Nicholas II
-
Nicholas II of Russia as Tsarevich in 1892
-
The Russian Baltic Fleet was annihilated by the Japanese at the Battle of Tsushima.
-
One ruble silver Coin of Emperor Nicholas II, dated 1898, with the Imperial coat-of-arms on the reverse. The Russian inscription reads:B[ozheyu] M[ilostyu] Nikolay Imperator i Samoderzhets Vse[ya] Ross[ii].[iyskiy].The English translation is, "By the grace of God, Nicholas II, Emperor and Autocrat of All the Russias."
-
Nicholas II, Stolypin and Jewish delegation during the Tsar's visit to Kiev in 1911
-
Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich, c. 1913
-
Nicholas II and his son Alexei aboard the Imperial yacht Standart during King Edward VII's state visit to Russia in Tallin, 1908
-
Nicholas II (right) with Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany in 1905. Nicholas is wearing a German Army uniform, while Wilhelm wears that of a Russian hussar regiment.
-
Russian prisoners at the Battle of Tannenberg, where the Russian Second Army was annihilated by German forces
-
Nicholas II with his family in Yevpatoria, Crimea, May 1916
-
One of the last photographs of Nicholas II, showing him at Tsarskoye Selo after his abdication in March 1917
-
The Governor's Mansion in Tobolsk, where the Romanov family was held in captivity between August 1917 and April 1918
-
Russian Imperial family (between circa 1913 and circa 1914)
-
Yekaterinburg's "Church on the Blood", built on the spot where the Ipatiev House once stood
-
Emperor Nicholas II Land in a 1915 map of the Russian Empire. Back then it was believed that what is now Severnaya Zemlya was a single landmass.
-
After his coronation, Nicholas II leaves Dormition Cathedral. The Chevalier Guard Lieutenant marching in front to the Tsar's right is Carl Gustaf Mannerheim, later President of Finland.
-
Nicholas II and Victor Emmanuel III of Italy in 1902
-
King Chulalongkorn of Siam with Nicholas II in Saint Petersburg, during the king's visit to Europe in 1897
b.jpg)
.jpg)
