Questions about Alexei (small details)

[TsarAlexeiII]

I need help with these small details:

1. Was Alexei born in the Peterhof or Winter Palace?

2. What ethnicities did his heritage consist of? I know he was of Russian, Danish, German, and English lineage, and was in one way or another related to all of the ruling families of Europe. Does anybody else know of his immediate heritage? His maternal grandfather was german, maternal grandmother German and English, paternal grandfather Russian, and paternal grandmother Danish.

[Sarushka]

Peterhof

[Hector]

Alexei's most recent direct-line ancestor who was a King just off the top of my head.

RUSSIA: Father Nicholas II
ENGLAND: Great-grandmother Victoria
DENMARK: Great-grandfather Christian IX
PRUSSIA: Great-great-great Frederick William III
SWEDEN: Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great Charles XI
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE: Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather Ferdinand I
PORTUGAL: Great-great-great-great-great--great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather Edward I

[thelastimpofrussia]

OFF THE TOP OF YOUR HEAD?! I bow down to thee!

[LauraO]

OFF THE TOP OF YOUR HEAD?! I bow down to thee!

LOl i am totally in agreement!
i assume that all the I children were born at peterhof (apart from olga) because they were summer birthdays? or am i wrong is there a different reason?
was he right or left handed?

[Sunny]

Quite sure he was right handed.
All the children were completely right handed; only maria was left handed when she drawed; she was right hand to write.
I wonder if she was corrected?
I mean: my mum is left handed, but when she was a little girl being left handed was believed to be "evil's hand" so she was corrected by force when she was at primary school (they tied her left hand behind her back and compelled her to write with her right hand, that is horrible). Now she writes only with her right hand, but she does ANYTHING else with her left hand.
Wonder if it was the same for Maria or if she was simply ambidextrous as my husband.

[LauraO]

Quite sure he was right handed.
All the children were completely right handed; only maria was left handed when she drawed; she was right hand to write.
I wonder if she was corrected?
I mean: my mum is left handed, but when she was a little girl being left handed was believed to be "evil's hand" so she was corrected by force when she was at primary school (they tied her left hand behind her back and compelled her to write with her right hand, that is horrible). Now she writes only with her right hand, but she does ANYTHING else with her left hand.
Wonder if it was the same for Maria or if she was simply ambidextrous as my husband.

yeh wasn't george vi naturally left handed and was forced to use his right hand, something common in stutterers? a teacher at my school stutters and i noticed she was left handed and asked her  and she said when she was a kid a teacher tried to force her to write with her right hand. i expected he would be. does anyone truly know either way? surely if the tsarevich had been left handed a tutour would have said something in memoirs or something?

[historyfan]

I don't know.... Good question! *checks through as many memoirs as she can find* I haven't found anything.

I will check as soon as I can, but if I remember correctly, Olga Alexandrovna states something to this effect in "25 Chapters".  I remember her mentioning her son, Tikhon, drew with his left hand, and the context was that someone else did also.  It wasn't herself, so perhaps she was talking about GD Maria.  I will doublecheck, though.

[Kalafrana]

Alexei's ancestry was mostly German. There is a tale that a learned professor calculated in about 1910 that nicholas was only 1/128 Russian (Peter the Great was 100% Russian, but all his descendants had married foreigners, mostly Germans). That makes Alexai 1/256 Russian.

Once, for fun, I tried doing a similar calculation with George V, starting from the premise that Edward IV was 100% British (though he wasn't). Somewhere in the fractions of 10,000 I gave up. (Thanks to the Queen Mother, Elizabeth II is by far the most British monarch since Queen Anne.).

Ann

[LauraO]

ha lol, yeh didn't the bowes-lyon family believe themselves more blue blooded and superior to the royals because they thought that they were (excuse the harry potter reference ) pure bloods?

[historyfan]

I don't know.... Good question! *checks through as many memoirs as she can find* I haven't found anything.

I will check as soon as I can, but if I remember correctly, Olga Alexandrovna states something to this effect in "25 Chapters".  I remember her mentioning her son, Tikhon, drew with his left hand, and the context was that someone else did also.  It wasn't herself, so perhaps she was talking about GD Maria.  I will doublecheck, though.

I was wrong - it was GD Michael who drew with his left hand.  On pg 20 of "25 Chapters" she says:
"My youngest brother Misha also liked drawing and always did so with his left hand.  Funnily enough, my eldest boy, Tihon, draws with his left hand too."

[thelastimpofrussia]

Any mention of Maria doing the same? And is there a source thatconfims Alexei was right handed?

[TsarAlexeiII]

Alexei's ancestry was mostly German. There is a tale that a learned professor calculated in about 1910 that nicholas was only 1/128 Russian (Peter the Great was 100% Russian, but all his descendants had married foreigners, mostly Germans). That makes Alexai 1/256 Russian.

Once, for fun, I tried doing a similar calculation with George V, starting from the premise that Edward IV was 100% British (though he wasn't). Somewhere in the fractions of 10,000 I gave up. (Thanks to the Queen Mother, Elizabeth II is by far the most British monarch since Queen Anne.).

Ann

Thank you for the information. Is there a source for the professor's calculation?

[thelastimpofrussia]

Nicholas and Alexandra by Massie does state it somewhere....

[Sarushka]

Any mention of Maria doing the same? And is there a source thatconfims Alexei was right handed?

Maria's habit of sketching left-handed is mentioned in at least one of the courtiers' memoirs. Buxhoeveden for sure, and possibly also Gilliard.