Derevenko the Sailor-nanny

[Pravoslavnaya]

Dear Antonio -

I have not come across anything about the sailor Andrei Derevenko's sons after the revolution, but your question about the two boys reminds me very much of something I have tried to translate from Russian.  Please forgive my paraphrasing, particularly if someone knows this very well:

Nikolai Vladimirovich (Kolya) Derevenko, the son of the Tsarevich's specialist physician, was perhaps Alexei's very best friend.  In his later years his fellow emigres often begged him to write down his memories of Alexei, even insisting that he owed it to posterity.  'Kolya' politely declined for quite some time, until one day he finally said:

"You don't know how I have suffered all these years (because of all that happened). If I give in and write about my memories (of Alexei), I won't eat, I won't sleep, I won't take care of myself... I'll go out of my mind!"

There must have been much fear in those days... and much pain over such a horrific end to a friendship as the murder of one's friend.

[Robert_Hall]

As there were 2 Derevenkos in this story, it can get confusing.
Thr Dr. is one, I think the sailor/nanny is more intriging.

[Penny_Wilson]

It's important to remember that the only account we have for Andrei Eremeyevich Derevenko's allegedly dreadful behavior to Alexei comes from Anna Viroubova.

When we were putting together FOTR, Greg and I had some information that ran counter to Viroubova's statements.  This info was cut from the book in the interests of space -- plus it had to do with the early part of the captivity, and our book was heavily weighted towards the end.

I have looked briefly this evening through some of our literally thousands of pages of notes, and haven't found the sources, though of course I will continue to look if this is of any interest to anyone.

What we had, briefly, is a statement or collection of statements that claim that the sailor Derevenko planned to accompany the Family into exile, and had applied to the Provisional Government for permission to do so.  Almost at the last moment, after all the packing was done, he was refused permission to go to Tobolsk.

Given that he had planned to travel with the Family, the fact that some of Alexei's possessions were located in the Derevenko trunks that went to Siberia assumes a less sinister note.

AE Derevenko was killed in the Civil War in 1921, fighting on the side of the Whites.

This alone makes me take Viroubova with a pinch of salt...

Penny

[Robert_Hall]

Thank you Penny.  
I would have said a lot more than a pinch of salt to swallow Vyrubova's story.
But that is just my opinion.

[Antonio_P.Caballer]

Well, Penny, that information is quite amazing. I didn´t knew that he died fighting on the white side.That alone is for me a very important sign of loyalty, not to say if he  would have been willing to go to Tobolsk with the family...However it´s always difficult for me to imagine Anna or another close friend of the family lying. Why should she do it?
By the way, it was hard to read about Sophia´s treason in your book...i was so sad.

[Antonio_P.Caballer]

Dear Antonio -

I have not come across anything about the sailor Andrei Derevenko's sons after the revolution, but your question about the two boys reminds me very much of something I have tried to translate from Russian.  Please forgive my paraphrasing, particularly if someone knows this very well:

Nikolai Vladimirovich (Kolya) Derevenko, the son of the Tsarevich's specialist physician, was perhaps Alexei's very best friend.  In his later years his fellow emigres often begged him to write down his memories of Alexei, even insisting that he owed it to posterity.  'Kolya' politely declined for quite some time, until one day he finally said:

"You don't know how I have suffered all these years (because of all that happened). If I give in and write about my memories (of Alexei), I won't eat, I won't sleep, I won't take care of myself... I'll go out of my mind!"

There must have been much fear in those days... and much pain over such a horrific end to a friendship as the murder of one's friend.

Dear Pravoslavnaya,

Thanks so much for your reply, ive just read it. The details about Kolya´s attitude towards writing his memoirs are very interesting. I would respest this feeling of him, but it´d be great if he would have writen something...

[M. Breheny]

This is just a though.  Is it possible that Kolya Derevenko's  feelings were due to the fact that his father was allowed to practice medicine in Ekaterinburg in relative freedom while Dr. Botkin chose to stay with the family and to die with them?  

[Jmentanko]

Are you refering to Vladimir Derevenko?

[M. Breheny]

I am sorry I didn't make myself clear.  I was speaking of Kolya, the son of the family doctor, Vladimir Derevenko -- not Derevenko the sailor-nanny.  

[Penny_Wilson]

Well, Penny, that information is quite amazing. I didn´t knew that he died fighting on the white side.That alone is for me a very important sign of loyalty, not to say if he  would have been willing to go to Tobolsk with the family...However it´s always difficult for me to imagine Anna or another close friend of the family lying. Why should she do it?

I don't know.  Why does anyone lie?  Maybe she didn't like him.  Or maybe she was dramatizing events.  Or maybe it was a genuine misunderstanding of something: I suppose it's possible that she saw Derevenko making Alexei get his stuff together to be packed -- you know, making him help -- and perhaps Anna didn't like that, or thought that it was inappropriate for Derevenko to do this.  IF she did see something like this, then it was probably a pretty benign event, as no-one other than Viroubova saw fit to record it.

By the way, it was hard to read about Sophia´s treason in your book...i was so sad.

I have to tell you, Antonio, that I tend to be a bit more Bolshie about these things than most people here probably are.  Sophie is probably not a good example, because she certainly did behave criminally in terms of stealing money and Imperial property, but I see nothing inherently wrong with trying to save your own life.  

On the night when the Romanovs were leaving Tsarskoye Selo for Tobolsk, the servants and members of the suite and household who were to accompany them were told to gather in a field near the train station the evening before.  So they did.  But many of them had second thoughts in the course of the night, and ran off before the train showed up -- and these were not just young footmen and under-housemaids.  Some of them had been considered quite respectable members of the Suite.  This was told to me by the elderly son of one of the runners.  So what do we do with this?  How do we judge these people?   They couldn't have known what was going to happen, but in the end, they may have saved their lives by running away.  Was this wrong?  I really don't know...   :-/

[Antonio_P.Caballer]

Thanks Penny for the reply,
I´m afraid i use to idealize people...and really your book was sometimes hard.But the truth is what it is, and so we must know it.
It´s difficult to try to judge people in circumstances in wich we don´t know how would have we acted...
Although i would try to save my life i don´t agree it must be done at any price(that remind me the rats in a sinking ship). Living after having lost your dignity as Sophia did??? Everyone should be respected with her/his decissions, but i cannot help having my own opinion.
What happened on board the Russ was the most terrible experience i could imagine for the grand duchesses and those related who cared for them, therefore i cannot understand her reaction. If she had run to save her life,that´s one thing, but trying to save her life denouncing the girls...well that´s very different. By doing this she also reisked their lives, i think. How could she describe in "Left behind" the last farewell with them so touchingly when in fact the next thing she do was to inform the bolsheviks on the jewels???
Well, it´s only my opinion but i profoundly despise her.
It´s very interesting that about the people that run away...the noble status do not grant the nobleness in actions, just remember people like Sablin running away when the Tsar´s train arrived to Tsarskoe...
The servants had in fact the oportunity to be with the family ar not when they were imprisoned but perhaps they changed their mind afterwards...
History do justice with everyone at the end and put him/her in the right level. Anna Demidova is in the Petropavlovsky Krepost and Countess Gendrikova will be remembered as well as the others...Sophia and people like her will have their own place according to their actions.

Best regards,

[Louise]

Antonio, I may have lost your train of thought with all that is happening on the board. I have not yet read Greg and Penny's book (sorry you two, I do plan to buy it soon--promise) so I am not sure who you mean by Sophia, in regards to betraying the Imperial Family. Are you referring to Sophia Buxhoevden?

Louise

[Antonio_P.Caballer]

Hello Louise,
Yes, i was speaking about Sophia Buxhoeveden. I will try as well as i can what happened (my english is quite poor...) and my excuses  to Greg and Penny if i do not do it correctly...
Well, in the first night of the trip on board the steamer Russ the drunken soldiers LOCKED all the men in charge of the grand duchesses(Gilliard, Gibs, and so on...) including Alexey in their rooms. Then the women were forced to leave their cabin doors open. As the night went on the soldiers became more and more wild, as Penny and Greg wrote: " the soldiers leered at the grand duchesses... Gibbes listened helplessly as the drunken guards harassed the girls...It was dreaful what they did, the former tutor recalled. The "terrified screams" of the girls, Gibbes said, haunted him to the end of his life".
And while those screams were sounding, Sophia was quickly in search of Rodionov, not looking for help to save the girls but only to tell him ACCURATELY about the jewels concealed in the girls clothes, only in the hope of saving herself.( I feel repugnancy only to write about it...)
 So if you have wondered sometime why she was spared the death that people like Gendrikova or Schneider found, now you have the answer.
 If you read her book "Left behind" you will find the moment in wich,she writes, was left alone in the train for hours and then left free. The truth is that those "hours" were employed to describe to the Ural Soviet averything about that jewels.
Hope this will help you to understand the matter i was speaking about. Greg and Penny´s book is a must for any interested on the Romanovs and you will find many different points of view in this, i think the most important, study of the last days of the Romanovs.

Take care, Louise!

[Louise]

Antonio:

Your English is just fine and thank you for explaining this event to me.  I have read Sophie's biography of the Empress, but this latest revelation repulses me. I can't imagine the hurt and the confusion that the Imperial Family must have gone through as their most "trusted" friends betrayed them.

I'm off this afternoon to purchase The Fate of the Romanovs.

Louise

[Antonio_P.Caballer]

Thanks Louise!
The imperial family never knew about this doings of Sophia, so i´m happy they were spared that last suffering...