I have not read or seen the original Return of Martin Guerre, but what I got from Sommersby is that, in the end, it was his love for the woman who had accepted him as her husband and their unborn child( born or unborn, I can't remember) that led him to continue to be "Sommersby" and to die as him.
It was better to die and keep his "wife" an honest woman and their child legitimate, than to tell the truth and leave her as a liar and to "bastardize" the child. It was truth verses love and loyalty. During that particular era being a widow was preferable to being found out as a conspirator and Sommersby as too kind and too much in love by this time to hurt his "wife" and child and leave them with that legacy.
But the comparison to AA or to the person who claimed to be Michael Alexandrovich or even to the Canadian who claimed to be Alexei Nicholaevich is right on target.
The big difference is that no one from the IF wanted to take in the "stranger" as did the wife of Sommersby. And she did that since he was so much nicer and more loving than her husband.
No one in the IF found the "impostors" to be more wonderful that the originals.
And as much as I would have loved to believe that AN escaped. I always hated the way that AA lived. In filth and without grace and dignity. I mean I love cats, but she just had too darn many! Even in Kurth's book he describes the home of the Manahans as being the disgrace of the block.
And I don't think that anything could erase the years of training in being Imperial and a lady for the original AN. Even when Olga Alexandrovna began to live as simply as she could with her husband and family, she did not descend into filth or degrade the memory of her family. She was always, as she said, "A Russian Grand Duchess".
