Nikolay Nikolayevich Senior

Educated according to the requirements of military career. Unlike his brother Constantine , Nicholas was originally trained for military service. The tutor of the Grand Duke was General A.I. Filosofov . At the age of 8 he was enrolled in the 1st Cadet Corps .

Nicholas was educated in very tough conditions. This formed in him such traits as perseverance, diligence, discipline. The military path clearly fascinated him, especially he was interested in engineering.

Nikolai Nikolaevich's entry into Tyrnovo on June 30, 1877 in the painting by N. D. Dmitriev-Orenburg

Nikolai Nikolayevich devoted his whole life to a military career, he went from being a captain to a field marshal general of the Russian army. From birth, the grand duke was enrolled in the Life Guards Battalion of the Sapper .

July 27, 1831 became the chief of the Life Guards of the Ulansky regiment , which he was until his death.

In 1843 and 1844, together with his brothers Konstantin and Mikhail, he practiced on the lugger Oranienbaum , going to the Gulf of Finland ^[2] .

He began his military service in 1851 in the Life Guards Mounted Regiment . In 1852, in the rank of Major General , the Grand Duke was appointed Inspector General for the engineering part (in fact, since 1856), as well as the brigade commander in the 1st Light Guards Cavalry Division. In the future, all the military activity of Nikolai Nikolayevich was associated with the reorganization of the armed forces of the Russian Empire, especially in the field of engineering and cavalry service (it was the inspector general of cavalry and the engineering part).

With the beginning of the Crimean War in 1854, Nicholas I was sent along with his brother Michael to the army in the field. October 23, arrived at Sevastopol , on the eve of the battle of Inkerman , where he took part. For the difference in this battle, he received the Order of St. George of the 4th degree. From January 1855 he led all engineering works, fortifications and batteries on the northern side of Sevastopol in the area from the Konstantinovskaya battery to the Mekenzievy mountains .

At the end of the Crimean War, having become attached to the peninsula, he acquired the seaside estate Gaspra for residence. From 1855 he was a member of the State Council , from 1857 he commanded the 2nd Guards Cavalry Division ; from 1859 - commander of the Guards reserve cavalry corps; in 1861–1864 - commander of the Separate Guards Corps .

He was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Guard and St. Petersburg Military District troops on August 30, 1867. During the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878, he was commander-in-chief of the army in the Balkans. In June 1877 he was on reconnaissance at Zimnitsa , in July he crossed the Danube at Zimnitsa on Sistovo . In September 1877 he participated in the reconnaissance of the fortifications of Pleven and led its last assault on November 28, 1877 . Signed on January 19, 1878 from Russia in Andrianopol preliminary conditions of peace and concluded a truce.

After that, Nikolai Nikolayevich received instructions from Alexander II, which boiled down to bringing troops into Constantinople only if requested by its inhabitants. This telegram linked the actions of Nikolai Nikolayevich, who believed that only by occupying Constantinople and the Gallipoli peninsula Russia could dictate the terms of the peace of the Ottoman Empire and oppose Britain supporting it.

Having received Alexander II’s telegraphic order on February 9, 1878, to speed up the occupation of the suburbs closest to Constantinople, Nikolai Nikolayevich warned the Ottoman delegates that he intended to take San Stefano , where he actually arrived on February 12 accompanied by one company and one squadron. Here on February 19, finally, a preliminary peace treaty was signed .

On March 27, Nikolai Nikolayevich telegram asked Alexander II to replace him with another person in the post of commander-in-chief for health reasons. On April 2, he received a telegram with a notice of his dismissal from command of the army. April 16, 1878 he was granted the rank of Field Marshal .

From 1880, he was seriously ill: he had a malignant tumor of the gums, which probably metastasized to the brain and affected the prince’s mental health. And previously prone to eccentric behavior, Nikolai Nikolayevich led a wasteful lifestyle and was forced to lay the Nicholas Palace . The new emperor Alexander III accused his uncle of embezzling public funds and in 1882 seized his property.

His illness worsened after the death of his beloved in 1889. The Grand Duke was sexually attracted to all the women around her; after a series of incidents, it became apparent that he was unable to control his own behavior. In recent years, he was under home surveillance and did not appear in public.

He died on April 13 (25), 1891 in Alupka , from where his body was transported for burial in the capital's Peter and Paul Cathedral . Alexander III wrote to his son Nikolay :

We barely had time to bury poor Aunt Olga , as again the new demise of poor Uncle Nizi in Alupka, but this death was rather desirable; He has been in such a terribly sad position all of the time, almost in complete idiocy. And for all those around him, it was pure penal servitude and an ordeal. I still can not forget in what a sad state we left him at parting in August in Rivne, and then it went worse and worse, and in Alupka he no longer lived, but lived down. ^[3]

Results of the Greek Plebiscite

In 1862, after the overthrow in Greece as a result of the uprising of the reigning King Otto I (of the Wittelsbach family), the Greeks held a plebiscite at the end of the year for a new monarch. There were no ballots with candidates, so any Greek subject could offer his candidacy or type of government in the country. The results were made public in February 1863.

Among those who entered the Greeks, was Nikolai Nikolayevich, he took fourth place and scored less than 1 percent of the vote. True, it must be admitted that representatives of Russian, British and French ruling houses could not occupy the Greek throne according to the London Conference of 1832 ^[4] .

In his youth, judging by the diaries, he was in love with Mary Anna of Prussia , but the marriage did not take place because of a close relationship.

He was fascinated by the eldest daughter of Pushkin Maria Alexandrovna. In 1856, in St. Petersburg, he married Alexander Friderik Wilhelmina, the eldest daughter of the Duke of Oldenburg, Konstantin Friedrich Peter (in Orthodoxy, Alexander Petrovna ). Children ^[5] :

1. Nikolai (November 6, 1856-1929)
2. Peter (January 10, 1864–1931)

As Count Sergey Dmitrievich Sheremetev wrote, “The Grand Duke was a man of a kind soul, of noble aspirations, but of weak character. He was worthy of a better fate, he was worthy of more attention to him, more caring, more cordial warmth. but all this could not give him Alexandra Petrovna. With him she was sharp and mocking. She was repelled abruptly, coldly inadmissible. "

After 10 years, the marriage broke up de facto; Nikolai Nikolayevich publicly accused his wife of adultery with the abbot of their palace church and the grand duchess confessor, Archpriest Vasily Lebedev. Nikolai Nikolayevich ousted Alexander Petrovna from the Nicholas Palace , taking away jewels, including his own gifts. Emperor Alexander II took the side of the Grand Duke, taking, however, all the costs of maintaining the expelled daughter-in-law at his own expense. She never returned to St. Petersburg and ended her days in the Kiev Pokrovsky Monastery founded by her.

Outside of marriage

After a break with his legitimate wife, Nikolai Nikolayevich created an actual family with the ballet dancer of the theater in Krasnoe Selo, Ekaterina Gavrilova Chislovaya (1846-1898). The latter bore him five children, who, together with her mother in 1883, gave the highest name to the surname of Nikolaev and the rights of the nobility ^[6] :

1. Olga (1868–1950), wife of Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Kantakuzin (1858–1927), lieutenant general.
2. Vladimir (1873–1942), after the revolution, lived in Paris, had five children from four marriages, whose descendants live in France, Quebec and Finland. Of these, only daughter Galina (1897–1971) remained in Soviet Russia — with her husband, Colonel Alexander Nikolayevich Gotovsky, who was shot in 1937. The couple had three sons Rostislav (1922–1991), Sergey (1924–1946), George (1927–1932); the descendants of the eldest of them live in Moscow.
3. Catherine (1874-1940), after the revolution lived in Belgrade, was married to Nikolay Korevo and Ivan Persiani.
4. Nikolay (1875–1902), had two daughters married to Olga Dmitrievna Zabotkina (1871–1925), who, widowed, became the wife of his brother Vladimir.
5. Galina (1877-1878).

In a letter to Emperor Alexander III of May 14, 1884, Procurator-General K. P. Pobedonostsev reported on the Grand Duke’s urgent requests to allow the “noblewoman Nikolaeva” (as well as her own petitions before the St. Petersburg Metropolitan ) to have a home church, since “ she cannot go to parish churches ”; Pobedonostsev's opinion on the petitions was skeptical ^[7] .

Honorary Member:

• Nikolaev Academy of General Staff
• Imperial Academy of Sciences
• Imperial Russian Geographical Society
• Mikhailovsky Artillery Academy
• Medico-Surgical Academy
• Petersburg University
• Parma Academy of Sciences

• The bronze equestrian statue of the Grand Duke on a high artistic pedestal was solemnly opened on January 12, 1914 at Manezhnaya Square in Petrograd. The horse figure was cast on the model of the Italian sculptor Pietro Canonic . The monument was dismantled in 1918.
• The monument to the bust of the Grand Duke is currently located in the Bulgarian city of Pleven , near the house-museum of the Tsar Liberator Alexander II ^[9] .

• A. Petrov. Nikolai Nikolaevich the Elder // Russian Biographical Dictionary : in 25 volumes. - SPb. - M. , 1896-1918.
• D.N. Shilov. Members of the State Council of the Russian Empire 1801-1906 . SPb., 2007, pp. 552-560.
• Gervais V.V. Field Marshal, Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolayevich Sr.: Historical sketch of his life and work, 1831-1891 . SPb., 1911.
• Memoirs of Count S. D. Sheremetev

• Biography on the Russian Imperial Army website
• Pedigree of the House of Romanov