Re: Anastasia Claimant - Anna Anderson a.k.a Franziska Schanzkowska Part 5

[Eddie_uk]

Agreed Lemur!! Absolutely the same.

[ferrymansdaughter]

Oh! They do look exactly alike! Face shape, chin, features and even hair  part. It's funny that on Kurth's site, he matches that particular picture of AA in the fur coat up with Marie F. instead of AN! Side by side with FS, there's no question they are the same woman.

The whole point about that is she looks  very much like some younger pics of the Dowager Empress  - an overall  family resemblance is what is being suggested.

[Lemur]

Oh! They do look exactly alike! Face shape, chin, features and even hair  part. It's funny that on Kurth's site, he matches that particular picture of AA in the fur coat up with Marie F. instead of AN! Side by side with FS, there's no question they are the same woman.

The whole point about that is she looks  very much like some younger pics of the Dowager Empress  - an overall  family resemblance is what is being suggested.

I realize that but I still think it's funny he knew better than to compare her directly to AN, or especially not FS, whom she is the image of (same person) There is no "family resemblance" since she wasn't related to the Dowager Empress, and the real Anastasia herself did not favor her grandmother.

I agree with Annie, Kiki and eddieboy_uk! There's no escaping that perfect match.

Is there a reason Kurth's site is down? I just went to check something and I got an error/no url here message. Is he updating it?

[Eddie_uk]

Maybe he's finally excepted that his websites a joke?

[Annie]

Thank you all! Those pictures are really pretty damning AA=FS!

[dmitri]

The photos show up the fraud for what she was. Even Blind Freddie could see she bears no resemblance whatsoever to the real Anastasia who died in the Ipatiev House.

[dmitri]

Anything AA knew about the Romanovs was told to her by others. She made repeated mistakes when questioned by many. This is why she refused to meet so many relatives of Grand Duchess Anastasia as they would definitely know things she was totally clueless about. What a complete fraud she was.

[KiKi]

The more I look at it, the more I find... I  just now looked closely to the mouth. 

[Johnny]

Something like AA's case could NEVER succeed today, not only because of the DNA, but because of the mass media, paparazzi, investigative reporters, internet, gossip and 'smoking gun' websites. She'd be found out real quick like.

Actually, I think nothing has changed since. Look how the WMD story in conncection with Iraq was sold to people. I am sure in some decades there will be shocking evidence as to what really happened on 9/11. Many people believe the official version of stories, many don't, and this inspite of internet, reporters, paparazzi, and smoking gun websites. How many conspiracy theory websites there are on the internet about 9/11 I don't need to tell you. This was true even then. Many believed she was Anastasia, although there many facts against it, but many others did not believe her story. People choose what they want to believe now as they did then.

[Belochka]

Nevertheless Mrs Manahan's fraudulent behavior was proven beyond reasonable doubt using science.

Yet there remains a small insignificant group who relish conspiracy theories to the point that no matter what indisputable proof is offered they will maintain their own tiresome rebuttals.

Margarita   

[Annie]

Nevertheless Mrs Manahan's fraudulent behavior was proven beyond reasonable doubt using science.

Yet there remains a small insignificant group who relish conspiracy theories to the point that no matter what indisputable proof is offered they will maintain their own tiresome rebuttals.

Margarita   

You tell it exactly as it is. A small group who won't stop, some of them getting very nasty to those do who disagree (one of our newer members is now being harassed in private by Caleb) and reciting the same old tired lists about the shoes, the teeth, the ears, etc. as 'proof' she was AN this is still going on with me in PMs from those who will no longer openly post it ) all leading to my own tiresome rebuttals that they will never accept because it's not what they want to hear. There is a certain faction I know well, small though it is, that I am certain will NEVER accept any evidence that AA wasn't AN. Even if SEARCH fnds and IDs the bones, you'd better believe there will be conspiracy theories that the Russian gov't or the Queen rigged it, somebody was paid off, they were switched, it will never end, but the end result will  never change and nothing is ever going to make AA be AN.

[Annie]

Just for the record, I'm going to give my tiresome rebuttal to the tiresome list one more time. Here's the list someone just sent me, I'll respond to each one logically, for all the good it will do!

1.AA was a girl "around 20" when found
FS would have been 24

If you look at the mugshots, she looks much older than 24! I can't find the quote, but I saw one once where, when she wouldn't give her name or age, she asked the nurses to guess her age. When one guessed 30, she became offended, and snapped back, "I'm not so very old!" So I don't think anyone thought she looked 20, and she didn't. (AN would have been eighteen and a half)

2.AA had reddish dark blond hair
FS had almost black hair'
AA had all teeth (later some extracted at Dalldorf_
FS had "black stumps"

ALL this is heasay, contradictory reports, and is so subjective and prone to incorrect memory of detail, human error, or outright lies it really doesn't hold up as 'evidence'. We do, however, have evidence that AA had her teeth pulled to avoid them being matched to AN's dental records, and that the Romanov family dentist said the jaw mold did not match AN's. Hair? There's dye, you know, and people describing it wrong. Some people call any shade of dark hair 'black'. This means nothing.

3. AA had scars and lacerations all over
FS had none

Again, what is the proof? Alleged 'new' records no one found during the trial, that were miraculously not destroyed in either world war, or tossed out as old? I find it hard to believe a doctor's practice would even be around that long, or keep records that long. I was unable to get records from a doctor I'd been to in the past, they told me if a patient doesn't come back for five years they toss them to save space. This in the days of computers! And as for the family denying she had scars, maybe they never saw them! I'm sure my family couldn't name my scars, and in the days of longer dresses and stockings, I'm sure her brother never would have seen them anyway. (besides the fact I believe the family was not telling the truth and covering themselves to avoid claiming and exposing her)

4.AA had very developed Hallux Valgus
FS had none

That's a very common foot condition. AA had TB of the bones and had worked standing on her feet for long hours. It's very possible she developed it after leaving home.

5. AA had borne a child
FS had not

Just because there is no official record of FS having a child means nothing. Remember what a disgrace an out of wedlock pregnancy was in those days! OF COURSE she wouldn't tell her family, she'd hide it from them out of shame. We'll never know what happened to AA/FS's poor baby, there are many possibilities- she may have abandoned it, thrown it in the trash can, or even left it to die in the woods. This happens even to this day with desperate young girls. She may have dumped it an an orphanage anonymously. It may have been stillborn, and she disposed of the body. It may not have even made it to full term, she could have had a miscarriage or abortion. A fetys of at least 4-5 months along will leave the same scars as a full term baby (I know this because my Grandmother lost a baby at 5 months and in old age the doctor told her he could tell she'd  had five children, but she only had 4. The fifth was the lost baby, he could still detect it.)

6. AA spoke Russian, bad German (with a heavy Russian accent) and English
FS spoke good German and a little Kashoubian

I don't even feel like getting into the languages. She obviously didn't know Russian, too many people complained of her inability to speak it. I have seen no proof she was ever given a test to prove it. She didn't originally speak English, and what she later learned was crude and heavily accented, not the proper English of a girl raised in a family where English was spoken every day with a British accent. AA spoke mainly in German, which would have been the least known and used of AN's real languages.

7. AA was found on 2/17
FS moved "to place unknown" on 3/9

It took them awhile to report her missing! If I had a tenant who was gone for days, the first thing I'd think is they had gone on a trip. The next thing I'd suspect is that they skipped out to avoid paying rent. It's very possible that no one really considered her 'missing' for that long. Since there was no close contact via phone and email like there is today, it's very likely her family didn't hear from her all that frequently anyway and didn't find it strange they heard nothing for 2 weeks or more. It took that long before anyone realized something was wrong. By the time she was reported missing, there was so much turmoil in Berlin (Kapp Putsch overthrow of Weimar gov't broke out a few days later, shutting down the city for days, followed by general strikes, joined by the police) so the police had much more important things on their minds than one missing girl. Her case fell through the cracks in those early days of the investigation, but Ernie's PI was able to quickly make the ID of AA to FS using Berlin's records. Of course he was later proven correct by DNA, though AA fanatics will continue to attack both Ernie and the DNA scientists as crooked and wrong

cont...

[Annie]

8. AA had shoe size 36
FS had shoe size 39

Those damn shoes again! We really have nothing here, either. There's no proof of any of this other than word of mouth from different people who were likely just mistaken. Just for fun, I was asking people I knew my shoe size the other day and none of them got it right! So since other people say I wear a different size shoe than I really do, I guess I'm not really me then!

9. AA had "unforgettable" blue eyes
FS had eyes so forgettable that nobody remembered their color

Who said that about the eyes, Mathilde K. in her old age? Sorry, really no evidence here either.


10. AA was "undoubtedly a lady of the higher social classes"
FS was a peasant

and others described her as rough and unrefined (which is what I see on videos of her!) If she acted high class young, it was because she was 'putting on airs' (those who knew FS said she acted this way sometimes) and/or was coached a la "My Fair Lady" by her supporters in the Russian emigre' community. Being a 'peasant' doesn't mean you can't act high class. Look at all the poor people who have become famous actors and actresses and can portray anyone of any class, even royalty. This, too, is a very vague and weak case for AA.


11. AA had "the most beautiful, soft hands"
FS came right from the asparagus farm

She had several months to rest them in the aslyum before she started pretending to be AA. And I don't think anyone was farming any asparagus in January and February!

12. AA demanded a bath every day
FS "showed an inclination against bathing"

Well, if you'd been in a situation where you weren't able to bathe regularly, then suddenly you were, wouldn't you take advantage of it?

13. AA was just under 5'2"
FS was over 5'4"

This is NOT PROOF! Height is perhaps the most subjective and easily mistaken of all. I have often told the story of the people I know who all met a famous singer. They all argued over his height, placing him anywhere from 5'2" to 5'8", though all were standing right next to him! So many things come in to this, such as someone could have been standing on an incline or hillside, someone's shoes could have been higher or lower, or just plain inaccurate memory and distortion in the mind's eye. Besides all that, AA had TB of the bones, which would cause a person to possibly shrink like osteoperosis. So this height thing is the easiest thing I toss out.


14. AA's handwriting matched AN's
FS' did not

Who did the analysis, and how do you know it was fair or right? Was AA trained to copy her handwriting? Was the 'expert' a member or Grandanour? This is no evidence compared to DNA.

15. AA's face matched AN's
FS' did not

Again I question the 'specialist.' Was this one of those Nazi scientists who judged the face masks of the Tibetians as being of German descent? Whoever they were, they were very wrong. Goodness gracious you can look at the pictures and see that AA and AN had very different features and bone structure. AA's chin was short and flat, AN's longer and ovally rounded. AN's lips thin, small and shapely, AA's large, full and shapeless. See the 'photographic comparison' thread for more on this. Anyone who matched them as 'twins' was, to put it nicely, wrong.

16. AA's ears matched AN's
FS's did not

How did FS's not? The only pic of FS has her hair covered. You cannot accurately match ears from a shadowy black and white picture of Anastasia (or Marie!)

17. AA knew details from the Russian court that not even the intimates knew (the Swastika on the car, f. ex. that not even Volkov remembered.)
Oh! So if not even the 'intimates' knew, who verified them as accurate? 

>FS would never been privy to that kind of info

No, but perhaps someone in the Russian court knew and fed the info to her as AA!

18. AA could name people at the court from photos

I've never heard this one! If so, she was alerted ahead of time in order to 'amaze' in public.

>FS would not have had a chance to find out

Oh, but she would as AA, from someone who had been in the Russian court and escaped to tell her!

19. AA could name rooms in the palaces
FS had no books to find that information in
AA knew court etiquette to the max'
FS would have had no-one to train her

Again, all of this could easily have come from Russian emigres'. And she got some of the rooms wrong!

Next: The dreaded list of those who 'recognized' her!

[Annie]

That was all from a list of 'evidence' AA is AN that an avid AA supporter sent me. Now for the rest of it, the people who 'recognized' her:

Alexis Volkov- Really? I've never heard that one. I thought he didn't? Read his memoirs.

Grand Duchess Olga
Pierre Gilliard

NO. They went in hopeful, and thought perhaps it was her in bad shape as my friend did when she found the dirty dog and thought it was hers, but as time went on they were all able to realize they'd made a mistake. Just because it took them a little longer to make sure doesn't mean they 'lied' or 'changed their minds' because of some sinister plot! Both of them fought AA until their dying days, and no one was paying them off. They did it for love and AN's memory.

Crown Princess Cecilie- She didn't even know AN! They were third cousins, 15 year age difference, didn't grow up together, Cecile moved to Germany when AN was 3, and since children weren't allowed at social functions and parties, it was extremely unlikely she saw much of AN. Then the war broke out in 1914, and Cecile, being married to the German crown prince, couldn't go back to Russia. So the very latest she could have seen, or even glimpsed AN, IF she even did, was at age 12-13. I do not consider her a good judge of AA, and besides the weak connection here there's the part where she went eccentric after the war.

Tatiana Botkin
Gleb Botkin

Do I even have to get into this? Did they really beileve her, or were they some of the ones giving her the info and promoting her as the lost princess? A lot of people don't like to hear or believe this for various reasons, but the fact is AA wasn't AN and somebody had to have helped her. They played very prominent roles in her claim. Everyone knows what I think of this.

Princess Märtha of Sweden- Who? When did she meet AN?

Lili Dehn- Was very old, and met when AA was in her 50's. There would be little chance she could have seen a teenage AN in a real AN, much less a false one. AA tricked Lili with a story from her own book! (forgot to mention in above post that there were several books about the IF written by insiders in the early 20's AA/FS could have consulted. Lili's book was pubished in 1922.)

Zinaida Tolstoy- I really don't know this story, but she was wrong.

Xenia Leeds- A second cousin who hadn't seen her since childhood. Could you accurately ID a cousin you saw only a few times at family parties as a child after they were grown?

Maria Rasputin- By the time they met when both were in old age, this lady was just as wacky as ol' AA. Besides, it was hard enough sneaking Rasputin into the palace, I'm sure his kids didn't see much of the IF!

Grand Duke Andrew- How would he know? He was a Vladmirovichi, the line detested by N and A. They sure never saw much of the family! Besides that Andrew was married to N's ex mistress, so add that to N and A's hatred of Andrew's mother and brothers and you see this was an awkward and unlikely family guest he'd have been! He had little contact with the family, and likely none with the younger children. Olga A. said in a letter she thought he was up to something to hurt them (Alexandrovichi) because she knew he didn't really believe it. Think about this, too- Andrew's brother Kyril was the self proclaimed "Tsar in Exile"- so IF there was any chance of a restoration of the throne or gaining of a bank account, that branch of the family would have been the LAST to want to see one of Nicky's kids show up! AGAIN no!


> The rest of the family never met her and have no say in identification.

According to what I've read, a lot of them took the 'high ground' or a sort of 'I won't dignify this with a response' type of attitude.


And I think many posters here agree.

[dmitri]

Wel lanswered Annie. You can drive a fully laden semi-trailer through the so-called arguments of the AA supporters. These people must have very little historical knowledge to support the AA rubbish.