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« on: May 18, 2019, 02:22:05 PM »
(me, crawling out of unactivity after forgetting my password and remembering it by typing in a random one on the first try months after trying to get back on originally) I LIVEEEE!
I would tell her everything, and probably tell her to take her children and run the minute she's able even if yes, she has to leave Maria behind (but Kerensky seems like the type of person to allow a recovered Maria and whoever of the staff stays to look after her to leave and join the family). Of course I wouldn't be able to stick around to personally oversee their safety and if I could I would tell her which playmate of Alexei's got him and Olga sick and eventually the other girls so he wouldn't be able to infect them if I knew his identity but unfortunately I don't.
But to your last comment 'however one must recognise that she was a contributing factor, especially given the influence she held with her husband'.
I used to believe as many do that Alexandra's influence on Nicholas was negative and he followed her every command without question. In actuality I have discovered Alexandra's influence was the best thing for Nicholas; the decisions people blame on Alexandra was actually his, not hers, and all of her decisions were actually good for the people. Alexandra is much shrouded in mystery and rumors back then that cropped up that are still believed now don't help. For example people believing she hated Ducky because Marie Pavlovna the Elder said in a letter it was her who exiled her son and Ducky (Marie did not like her one bit and blamed her for almost everything) when in fact she didn't-it was Nicholas who had warned Kirill before hand in a letter-and even pitied her, even afterwards they had frequent visits when they got back from their exile including Ducky being one of Alexei's godparents.
But back to her influence; here's some evidence by Romanov-professionals to back it up.
“It’s often said that he was under the heel of his wife, Empress Alexandra Fedorovna, and that through her acted the evil genius Rasputin. No, no. Alexandra Fedorovna’s real influence on politics arose only in 1915, but even then her influence was far from domineering. This is clearly seen in their personal correspondence. The empress gave the tsar a lot of advice, but in reality, he ignored the majority of it. As for Rasputin, if we look at what advice he gave on domestic and foreign policy, almost none of it was put into practice. Yes, Rasputin tried to play in politics, tried to take the side of this or that power group, or rather, this or that person of authority. But his real influence was small.”
- Fedor Gaida (associate professor in the department of history at Moscow State University)
“Her influence on affairs of state was greatly exaggerated by her detractors. Nicholas never did anything he didn’t himself wish to do. Biggest example of this was Rasputin’s strong advice (he practically begged him) not to get involved in the war because If he does, it will destroy everything. Alix felt same. If only N actually listened to good advice then, but he didn’t. The point is - Nicholas listened to what they had to say, but in the end did what he felt was right. Sometimes that coincided with what Alexandra advised him sometimes it didn’t. But to say that he was her or his puppet, and that she actually had any serious influence on what happened, is absurd.”
- Helen Azar (author of ‘In the Steps of the Romanovs: Final Two Years of the Last Russian Imperial Family’ and several more Romanov books)
“Any normal person would voice his or her opinion to their spouse about things that are going on, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Even if that spouse happens to be a Tsar or king. In fact, it would be a bit weird if they didn’t. I doubt that Alix expected him to do as she said, and of course he didn’t. But she had the right to express her opinion and give advice as his spouse, the rest was up to him, he was the autocrat not her. Besides, we don’t know of whether he tended to use her as a sounding board, as a lot of spouses do for each other.
Personally I don’t think there is anything wrong with her expressing her opinions or even advising him, doing that alone doesn’t actually make it happen. As far as Rasputin, chances are that if Nicholas actually listened to his advice about the war, that would have saved him, his family and his dynasty. His advisors, who were supposedly so smart and politically savvy, all encouraged the war loudly, and he followed their advice. And look where that got him. Rasputin really nailed it, if ever N needed to listen to R and his wife, it was that one time.”
- Once more, Helen Azar
“Her ‘meddling’ in reality did nothing - the Tsar followed her advice on only a few occasions - it was analysed years ago on the Alexander Palace Forum and it turned out he followed her advice something only like only 6 or 7 times, and those times it was mostly with a good result. It was more the perception that she was meddling that caused damage to their reputation.”
- George Hawkins (co-author of a forthcoming book with Helen Azar on Grand Duchess Maria, also a translator of many Russian primary sources)
See? It was even talked about here years back!
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