Claimant of Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna

[jeremy galeaz]

This thread will be for those who claim to be Anastasia Nicholaevna.  This is not the place to post about Anna Anderson or Eugenia Smith.


Alixz  05/25/09

Hi everyone,

I'm actually working on a film documentary on the Romanovs, and I was wondering if anyone out there had any iformation on a woman who died, in russia, in 1971 claiming to be anastasia? i've searched on the web, but everything is about anna anderson or eugenia smith.
if you could point me in the right direction i'd greatly appreciate it.

thanks
jeremy

[Namarolf]

In a Spanish magazine, "Hola", there was an article (1996 I think) about that woman, including several pictures and letters by her, including some addressed to King George V and (I think) Anna Aleksandrovna Virubova.  The article also deals with an "Aleksey" who was in a prisoners camp in the late1940's and passed away in 1970 or so.
May be you can write the magazine to ask about her or the article.

[jeremy galeaz]

thank you!

I'll look it up

jeremy galeaz

[Jeremy Galeaz]

So Far

no luck with finding information on the 1971 pretender. Any other suggestions out there?

Thanks
Jeremy Galeaz

[Namarolf]

Does anyone in this forum ever saw that article in the Spanish magazine "Hola" about the women claiming to be GD Anastasia who died in Russia in 1971? The article included many pictures of the real Romanovs, and one of the claimant, whose name I don't recall. It was an issue of "Hola" published soon before Infante Elena's wedding to Don Jaime de Marichalar, who were in the cover pic of the magazine.

[stepan]

Unfortunately I diden´t read the article in "Hola" about a Anastasia claimant who died in 1971. But I suppose it was about Nadezda Ivanovna Vasilyeva who appeared in Siberia about 1920. She was arrested when she tried to go to China and shuttled between prisons in Nizhnij Novgorod,Moscow,Leningrad.
In 1934 she was dispatched to a prison hospital in Kazan.From there she wrote letters to king George V in French and German pleading for help. For a period she changed her story and said she was the daughter of merchant from Riga. According to the hospital staff she was quite normal exept for her claim to be Anastasia.This information I got from Massie´s "The romanovs."  I haven´t read more about this woman anywhere but perhaps there was more in Hola.

[AGRBear]

Penny Wilson>> He wrote in her medical certificate: " Citizen Nadezhda V. Ivanova-Vasilyeva aged 33, .. manifests clear symptoms of panic disease in the form of paranoia expressed as systematized delusion of grandeur and persecution. <<

Very interesting.  Thanks for keeping us in touch with all avalible information.  You and Greg have been great.

Did this process  Nadezhda endured  have records with a photo attached?

I would assume someone who was in hiding, for whatever reason, would have "panic disease".

Also, it is true that when the USSR officials wanted to rid themselves of any problem people, the asylums were often used.  I assume just the thought of someone saying they were Anatasia was a problem for them.

Added to this is a quote from the article:
"I can recall over 30 stories about impostors using the name "Anastasia", once said Alexii II, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia. Only three women succeeded in the role of "miraculously saved" princess,  two of which were mentally sick.

Who can name the thirty?  

AGRBear

[Louise]

I was browsing through some old musty, dusty books and happened upon "Hunt for the Tsar and Files on the Tsar" Going through the pictures and the authors attempt to show how the Tsar's children and the Tsar lived, there was a picture of Eugenie Smith. Whatever happened to her and what if anything became of her claim to fame as "GD Anastasia"?

Luise

[Annie]

Did you know there was an entire book about her? A big thick one? I had it out of the library a long time ago. She wrote it like an autobiography. The by-line even said 'Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Anastasia Nicholaievna" This woman looked NOTHING like Anastasia at all. But I guess she had enough people believing her to have some kind of following.

[Annie]

I just did a 'google' search on her and turned up nothing :-/

[Dashkova]

Just a suggestion, but you might want to try searching under:

Eugenia Smith Anastasia

I found a number of websites this way.  Spelling her first name as EugeniA instead of EugeniE seems to help.

[Annie]

Thanks, that helped. I found this:

http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Eugenia%20Smith

One more interesting thing to note here, not meaning to drag the AA thing back up, is that this woman was buried in a Russian Orthodox cemetary, and AA was cremated, which I find suspicious for 2 reasons: someone raised Orthodox would be unlikely to request cremation of their own free will, as AA did, and doing so only added to the case against her, making it look as if she had wanted her remains destroyed to stop any possible tests. Also, remember she was trying to commit suicide when found, another thing a devout Orthodox person is unlikely to do. Just my 2 cents.

[Katya04]

That Smith lady didn't look a bit like her!

[bookworm]

It would be very interesting if someone in Russia produced a photo of this Nadezhda, wouldn't it? Sounds like she was the right age and had the appropriate physical scars.

[Winston Skinner]

Eugenia Smith and I were pen pals for a number of years. She passed away several years ago after having lived in Newport, R. I. for some years. My wife and I took our children to meet her while vacationing in that part of the U. S. a couple of years before she died. She certainly presented herself as Anastasia, and some of those close to her said they felt she "believed" she was the grand duchess, whether they did or not. She was a painter and had a large painting in her apartment -signed "OTMA" - that appeared to depict the Romanov children. She was particularly kind to my daughters who were approximately 10 and 14 at the time.

Winston Skinner