Yurovsky and GD Marie

Hi Sarushka,

These are the two parts of the 1922 ''note'' that i'm referring to:

'' As far as Marie was concerned she did not behave at all like her elder sisters. Her sincere, modest character was very attractive to the men, and she spent most of her time flirting with them. She was not especially like her sisters, somehow she seemed closed off from most of her family. This obviously followed from what had happened, because her mother and eldest sister treated her as if she didn’t belong, like an outcast.''

and

'' Once we were alone, I resumed the search for valuables. These were found on Olga, Tatiana, and Anastasia, but on Marie’s body. I was not surprised by this, because once again it reflected her disgraced position in the Romanov Family at the end.''

There is a lot of other info that relates to this matter, quotes from Voikov and Yakimov as well as details about whether or not the Ural Soviet was aware the family had concealed valuables as latter claimed by Belorodov's successor Bykov. This further illustrates the Ural Soviet's desire to re write their handling of the Romanovs in a more favourable light (to Moscow) but I had to condense it so that I could fit it all into a post.

Hi Sarushka,

These are the two parts of the 1922 ''note'' that i'm referring to:

'' As far as Marie was concerned she did not behave at all like her elder sisters. Her sincere, modest character was very attractive to the men, and she spent most of her time flirting with them. She was not especially like her sisters, somehow she seemed closed off from most of her family. This obviously followed from what had happened, because her mother and eldest sister treated her as if she didn’t belong, like an outcast.''

and

'' Once we were alone, I resumed the search for valuables. These were found on Olga, Tatiana, and Anastasia, but on Marie’s body. I was not surprised by this, because once again it reflected her disgraced position in the Romanov Family at the end.''

There is a lot of other info that relates to this matter, quotes from Voikov and Yakimov as well as details about whether or not the Ural Soviet was aware the family had concealed valuables as latter claimed by Belorodov's successor Bykov. This further illustrates the Ural Soviet's desire to re write their handling of the Romanovs in a more favourable light (to Moscow) but I had to condense it so that I could fit it all into a post.

Re Yurovsky's last sentence: He wasn't surprised by Marie's not having valuables on her person, but WAS surprised that all the females were laden with jewels? That makes no sense. He knew a lot but he clearly also didn't know a lot else.

His speaking of Marie's "disgraced position in the Imperial Family at the end" is simply a distortion of what seems more a disappointment at most on the part of Olga and her mother. His confidence in his own personal assessment of the IF's  internal family dynamics is , uh, unwarranted, to put it mildly. It's scarcely credible to me that Alexandra would never have expressed anything in her diary over the almost three weeks that she continued writing in it after Marie's supposedly shameful behavior on her birthday.

I agree Alix would have made some remark if it was an on going  concern....perhaps veiled a bit, but something.  Also since Yurovsky didn't know when the family's  jewels were concealed, he was mistaken about why Marie didn't have them. He didn't know she simply wasn't present  when the jewels were sewn into the corsets . The "outcast" was away from the sewing circle and  busy looking after her parents at that time.   

Very observant of you BlessOTMA. I, for one take note of your comment.

Thanks for your responses its really interesting to hear your views, I would like to know what people think Yurovsky's motivation was for these remarks?

Given he was only in contact with the family from the 4th July - 16th I now no longer think this was a personal vendetta or slander rather something much more political as his memoirs were only ever supposed to be seen by Party officials so its fair to assume these details were for their benefit.

Also this story about Maria has become part of her accepted biography , if you look at her wikipedia entry, Helen Rappaports book Ekateringburg, Greg King and Penny Wilson's '' The fate of the Romanvs'' (page 242) all accept the details are sketchy but none explore the fact that this is circumstantial, happended during the ''Officer letters'' period and seems to be largely motivated by the Ural Soviet trying to cover up a serious security breach at the  Ipatiev on 27 06 18.

'' As far as Marie was concerned she did not behave at all like her elder sisters. Her sincere, modest character was very attractive to the men, and she spent most of her time flirting with them. She was not especially like her sisters, somehow she seemed closed off from most of her family. This obviously followed from what had happened, because her mother and eldest sister treated her as if she didn’t belong, like an outcast.''

Thanks.

What translation are you using? My Russian version of Yurovsky's 1922 note from Ispoved' Tsareubiits as well as the Istochnik version that was posted previously on the forum does not include the following phrases:
"she spent most of her time flirting with them"
"This obviously followed from what had happened"
"outcast"

Ths Ispoved' and Istochnik versions read as follows:
"As far as Maria is concerned, she was not like the first two sisters and didn’t look like them: she was closed off somehow and it was as though she found herself like a step-daughter in the family."

... I would like to know what people think Yurovsky's motivation was for these remarks? 

I was think about this later. Perhaps an answer is within the remarks themselves. Yurovsky liked Marie. He goes out of his way to say so ,to point out her good qualities and tell us how diffrent she was from the rest.  In this way it's okay for him to like Marie  because in his mind the family has rejected her. She's not a "real" Romanov,  she's an "outcast" to them. That makes he's feelings about her acceptable to himself . His feelings about her were diffrent. So he has a vested interest in making her indeed "diffrent " from the rest of the family.

No matter what he thought about the poor girl, he still shot her.

Thanks BlessOTMA,

thats really interesting he does state how sincere and modest she was, Maria as in life is often overlooked and what bothers me is modern historians are including this story about her without qualifying how vague and circumstantial it is once really looked at, and as with the Wikipedia site where school children and many people just learing about the family might go to this story is being presented as fact, and I think that should be revised or at the very least more qualified.

Hi Sarushka, I got the translation quoted above from KingandWilson. com. I did buy 'Tsareubiits' as recommended but my russian is so poor I found it impenetrable so I have used 'The Fate of the Romanovs', 'A lifelong Passion', 'Nicholas & Alexandra', 'Ekaterinburg', 'File on the Tsar' and 'The Murder of the Romanovs'.

Makes sense BlessOTMA, and I might also mention the exaggeration that often follows the creating of contrast. We are often, intentionally or subconsciously, overly critical of one side of the coin just so the opposite appears shinier.

But he also found the family, according to that 1922 memoir, surprisingly ordinary..."middle-class" in their behavior. "One looked at this family objectively, then it could be said that they were totally inoffensive", etc. That makes it seem to me that one wouldn't haven't to try very hard or do very much to stand out from the pack. Enter Maria...whose behavior while only mildly suggestive in actuality may have appeared downright provocative compared to the sedate nature of the rest of the family.

Also, I'm sure this has been discussed elsewhere, but how good do we think Yurovsky's recollection really was? A lot can happen in four years to alter one's memory, not so much about specific events like the details of the killing, but of emotional attachments like his opinions of the family in general and Maria specifically. Maybe he created a mental list of the qualities of GD Maria when in reality it was just one or two things he admired about her that he fixated on. Then again...his description of the other daughters seems far less detailed as to make me wonder. Anastasia's "pretty little face", pointing out that Tatiana, followed by Olga were the most intelligent, etc.

No matter what he thought about the poor girl, he still shot her.

Exactly!

I feel like Yurovsky escapes judgement at times simply because we need him. His recollection of the events are critical to our own understanding...like giving a criminal immunity simply because he knows too much and we need to bargain for that information.

Then you read about his childhood, his elderly mother imprisoned for a year, his modest affection for Maria, etc, and you start to think of him as a regular guy who just may have used some bad judgement. But WAIT! Then we remember...obeying orders or not...he killed them. And not only that, he was the leader of this gang of thugs. He didn't consider this beautiful young lady, all of 19, to really be one of the Romanov's until it came time to end her life...then she got lumped in with the rest :-(

I totally agree with the fact that we need him as he is one of the only witnesses, and whilst there's nothing we can do about Maria's fate, we can make sure that biased accounts and not necessarily reliable statements about her are correctly interpreted in future.

I totally agree with the fact that we need him as he is one of the only witnesses, and whilst there's nothing we can do about Maria's fate, we can make sure that biased accounts and not necessarily reliable statements about her are correctly interpreted in future.

I always say something  when the no jewels = Marie  the outcast question comes up just for this reason. She was a pillar of the family at this time imo. Indeed edubs31 ....wasn't the last two children found because of one of Yurovsky's testimonies? .Turns out we needed him even in 2007...and  so he gets a sort of plea bargain!