Riding his sled/sledge down the stairs at Tobolsk

[skitzo12]

THanks sarushka
that must have taken you a long time to  find them!

cya

alex

[Guinastasia]

It sounds like something my cousins and I might have tried at a family get together-we were always coming up with crazy, semi-dangerous, or just plain messy stunts like that.  Once at a picnic, we hooked a hose up to the water pump and fixed it at the top of the slide, making a water slide.  (Which quickly became a mud slide!).

The only reason I think it merits special mention is that it was more dangerous due to Alexei's condition.  What kid hasn't participated in some crazy, hair-brained activities like this?

[stacey]

I've just been rummaging thru that excellent book The Fate of the Romanovs, written by Greg King and Penny Wilson, and I came across a mention of one of Alexei's most severe injuries.

It occurred at Tobolsk, when, as King and Wilson put it, "Alexei...injured himself while tobogganing down the main staircase." This of course soon triggered a serious attack of hemophilia--altho Alexei did survive it, it left him basically crippled for the rest of his short life.

My question is--why Why would Alexei, who was no longer a small child, do something so foolish, so potentially deadly? He knew how likely it was to trigger an attack (if it didn't kill him outright!). He knew how agonizingly painful such attacks were, and how they could well lead to his death (and Rasputin was no longer alive to come to his rescue). He knew the anguish his parents and sisters--and especially his mother--suffered during any of his attacks of hemophilia. He knew that the last thing his family needed at such a stressful time was to have a badly injured boy to look after.

So why did Alexei drag a toboggan to the top of a steep staircase, sit down, and push the toboggan (with him on it) down all those stairs?

Was he suicidal? Was he so upset by the situation around him that he decided to have some boyish "fun", no matter the consequences? Why would he do something so, excuse my bluntness, stupid

I know he was a reckless boy who loved to play. I understand how frustrating it was for him to suppress his pent-up energy for fear of injury. I've heard that this is not unusual in boys with hemophilia--to live in denial of the seriousness of their illness, to "push the envelope", to tempt fate.

But still....it was such a senseless thing to do, and Alexei was not a stupid or a thoughtless boy.

What do the rest of you think?

Why did Alexei risk that wild toboggan ride down that long staircase, knowing how dangerous it was?? 

[J_Kendrick]

I've just been rummaging thru that excellent book The Fate of the Romanovs, written by Greg King and Penny Wilson, and I came across a mention of one of Alexei's most severe injuries.

It occurred at Tobolsk, when, as King and Wilson put it, "Alexei...injured himself while tobogganing down the main staircase." This of course soon triggered a serious attack of hemophilia--altho Alexei did survive it, it left him basically crippled for the rest of his short life.

My question is--why Why would Alexei, who was no longer a small child, do something so foolish, so potentially deadly? He knew how likely it was to trigger an attack (if it didn't kill him outright!). He knew how agonizingly painful such attacks were, and how they could well lead to his death (and Rasputin was no longer alive to come to his rescue). He knew the anguish his parents and sisters--and especially his mother--suffered during any of his attacks of hemophilia. He knew that the last thing his family needed at such a stressful time was to have a badly injured boy to look after.

So why did Alexei drag a toboggan to the top of a steep staircase, sit down, and push the toboggan (with him on it) down all those stairs?

Was he suicidal? Was he so upset by the situation around him that he decided to have some boyish "fun", no matter the consequences? Why would he do something so, excuse my bluntness, stupid

I know he was a reckless boy who loved to play. I understand how frustrating it was for him to suppress his pent-up energy for fear of injury. I've heard that this is not unusual in boys with hemophilia--to live in denial of the seriousness of their illness, to "push the envelope", to tempt fate.

But still....it was such a senseless thing to do, and Alexei was not a stupid or a thoughtless boy.

What do the rest of you think?

Why did Alexei risk that wild toboggan ride down that long staircase, knowing how dangerous it was?? 

Can anyone really be certain that this often told claim of the "sled on the stairs" had ever really happened?

Oh, sure... It does make for a good story... but...

It is totally unsubstantiated.

Tatiana Botkin was the only source ever to make any suggestion that an injury may have been caused by a "sled on the stairs" (writing in her book several years later), but Miss Botkin was not a witness of those events.  There are no first hand witnesses whatsoever.  In reality, this same unconfirmed notion was actually one of two possibile causes that Miss Botkin had proposed in her book.  Some forty years later, Robert Massie had picked out the more dramatic of those two suggestions that Miss Botkin had proposed in her book... and then wrote his own interpretation as if it were fact.  Now, everyone blindly accepts Mr. Massie's no better than third-hand re-telling of the story as true, in spite of the fact that there is no corroborating evidence at all.

Tatiana Botkin could not possibly have known the real cause of Alexei's health problems at Tobolsk.  In truth, Miss Botkin was not staying with the IF at the time and she was not a first hand witness.  At that very same time, Miss Botkin was staying with her brother in rooms across town during the peak of a snowstorm -- no where near the Imperial family -- so the source for her speculations could only have been second hand at best.

So sure, it does make for a good story, but there is no proof that it ever actually happened.

[matushka]

J_Kendrick, I read Tatiana Botkin's book a long while ago, have not it under hand and can not remember the second possible cause she gave. Could you place refresh my memory? That's true, Mrs Botkina was not in the Governor's mansion; she and her brother only observe the imperial family from their window and, as we can see from her book, they extrapolate about the imperial prisonners' feelings. But, at the same time, let us remember that their father was the whole time with the family and keep contact with Tatiana and Gleb. He probably related them a lot. Another source is this little boy who came to Alexei and played with him, as well as others members of the suite, who had their appartement in the Kornilov's house and were admited in the Governor's mansion. So her testimony keep some valibility.
Did really Alexei toboggan down the stairs or not, we will never know. But we know for sure that this boy first liked very much risk: it is quite common among such ill people, playing incounsciently or not with death. How many time did he already do such things! Second, he was not especially mature for his age and his plays kept a very childish tone. Read again his diary for 1917, he related how he sprand and so on. There is no proof of this incident, was it in the stairs, was it in the snow (mountain...). But there is something like a probability.

[Sarushka]

On the contrary J_Kendrick, as I discovered in December of 2005, we do have proof that Aleksei rode his sled down the stairs in Tobolsk. This is from his diary entry for March 25, 1917 quoted in Romanov Autumn:

"A local businessman sent me a sledge and a boat as a present, modelled on the sledges and small boats they use in this area. Kolia and I played with them for ages and we slid down the staircase in the boat."



There are a number of old threads on this topic:
Riding Sledge down Stairs
Riding His Sled Down the Stairs

[J_Kendrick]

On the contrary J_Kendrick, as I discovered in December of 2005, we do have proof that Aleksei rode his sled down the stairs in Tobolsk. This is from his diary entry for March 25, 1917 quoted in Romanov Autumn:

"A local businessman sent me a sledge and a boat as a present, modelled on the sledges and small boats they use in this area. Kolia and I played with them for ages and we slid down the staircase in the boat."



There are a number of old threads on this topic:
Riding Sledge down Stairs
Riding His Sled Down the Stairs
At that same time,

Yes, but...

That same single quote from Alexei's diary does not say that the "sled on the stairs" was the cause of his medical problems.

Neither Alexei nor anyone else in the family, nor anyone even close to the family, had ever mentioned an incident on the stairs as the cause of Alexei's problems at Tobolsk.  That claim, in reality, is nothing more that one of two possible causes that had first been speculated about only by Tatiana Botkin.

The diary quotes during that same time period from both Alexei himself and from both of his parents had, in fact, attributed the start of his problems at Tobolsk to nothing more dramatic than a persistant cough that had troubled him for several weeks.

[Sarushka]

Yes, but...

That same single quote from Alexei's diary does not say that the "sled on the stairs" was the cause of his medical problems.

Neither Alexei nor anyone else in the family, nor anyone even close to the family, had ever mentioned an incident on the stairs as the cause of Alexei's problems at Tobolsk.  That claim, in reality, is nothing more that one of two possible causes that had first been speculated about only by Tatiana Botkin.

The diary quotes during that same time period from both Alexei himself and from both of his parents had, in fact, attributed the start of his problems at Tobolsk to nothing more dramatic than a persistant cough that had troubled him for several weeks.

That's absolutely true. We can't know for certain what triggered the attack, but at least we know that Aleksei did in fact run his sled down the stairs, as Tatiana Botkin reported. 

[Mischa]

Sorry, but how can a haemophilic boy sledge down the stairs and not have medical problems afterwards?

[J_Kendrick]

Sorry, but how can a haemophilic boy sledge down the stairs and not have medical problems afterwards?

Having haemophilia does not guarantee that the patient will instantly have some sort of medical problem on every occasion that he attempts to do something physical, although many here on this board seem to be under the mistaken impression that it does.

[RealAnastasia]

Well...I may said (since I live few steps ago from an Hospital specialized in blood diseases, specially Leukemia and Haemophilia- I'm speaking of "Fundaleu"- ) that Mr. Kendrick is right in a point: haemophiliac person not always get injured after an accident. I spoke about it with a specialist in "Fundaleu" Hospital, and he ven gave me some good booklets and a book about this particular disease. Sometimes, a little blow, will cause a really great bleeding who could bring the patient right to death, or to a ver deep crisis, at least. Sometimes, big blows or injures, causes nothing to the patient...Or the inverse. haemophilia, as Robert K. Massie would say, is a "capricious disease".

On the other hand, I think that the "sled affair" could be considered as settled. All the books speaks about it. Not only Penny Wilson and Greg King's one...All the other historians (being pro-survivors or againts-survivors theorist) accepted the fact. I do not have the book "Nicholas and Alexandra: a lifelong passion", which has an extensive compilation of the IF writings and letters, at hand, but I believe that there is a letter from Alexandra to Anna Virubova, telling her Alexei's accident in the staircase.

Of course, if it happened, it was a foolish behaviour in a 13 years old child who knows that he may get seriously injured if doing something like that. But do not forget that Alexei was already a teen - teens could be foolish time to time...and I said it for I was a teen myself!  - and that he was bored...VERY bored. Some days ago, soldiers had distroyed the mountain of snow where he used to go down with his sled, and that they stealed him his little saber. He must have been with his nerves very excited, feeling himself closed in a prison and without knowing how get rid of the exces of activity which a young man NEEDS to get away. It's not so weird he did something so "foolish" like going down a staircase with his sled.

RealAnastasia.

P.S: the scene with Alexei going down the staircase must be seen in "Nicholas and Alexandra" 's movie. The things is not show exactly like it really happened, but the important is that the fact was mentioned long before Wilson and King's book. So, they didn't made up it...

[RealAnastasia]

There is more than a year that there isn't any new message to this topic, but since we began to discuss the matter again, recently I wanted to see a little thing more about it. It's about the movie "NIcholas and Alexandra", and the sled incident.

Most of people sees it as a suicide attempt...But why wouldn't we see it otherwise? In the movie, Alexei sled down the staircase RIGHT AFTER he heard that they must leave Tobolsk in the morning. He asked to his father if there is not any hope to avoid it, and even if Nicholas answered "Nonsense", he quickly picked up that, in fact there wasn't any hope after all. They MUST leave. So, he did the stupid thing of the staircase to avoid the moving, and not in order to suicide. If he was severely ill, Bolsheviks wouldn't move the family...(of course, they moved it all the same)

Of course, we are speaking about the MOVIE and not about Alexei's real life. In real life, if the accident really took place, it happened long time before they moved to Ekaterinburg, and maybe he injured internally only for his bad coughing attack. Who knows?

However, we have two established facts: 1-Alexei DID sled down that staircase (even if we didn't know if he got hurt after doing it) 2-Alexei had an hemorrage 'cause a bad coughing attack. Maybe we will never know which of this two things caused him the last hemorrage that avoided him to walk anymore.

RealAnastasia.

[rosieposie]

That reminds me of Rasputin (the HBO production) when Alexei over heard Nicky and Alix talking about being over thrown.  Alexei walks with his cane and tells his sisters "We are all going to die" in a matter of fact tone.

[AaronGlaeser]

The stairwell accident has been linked to the reason that two separate groups were removed from Tobolsk.  Alexei was too ill to be moved with his parents and the rest of the first group.  This is noted in countless historical accounts as being the root cause for two separate groups being transferred.

If anyone has any sources or insight as to another reason that Alexei was too ill to be moved with the first group, then I for one would find this very interesting.

Aaron

[Sarushka]

The stairwell accident has been linked to the reason that two separate groups were removed from Tobolsk.  Alexei was too ill to be moved with his parents and the rest of the first group.  This is noted in countless historical accounts as being the root cause for two separate groups being transferred.

If anyone has any sources or insight as to another reason that Alexei was too ill to be moved with the first group, then I for one would find this very interesting.

There is no question that Aleksei was ill with a bout of hemophilia in April of 1918, and that his illness prevented the family from being transported together to Yekaterinburg. As has been discussed here and on similar threads, it's impossible to know for sure whether that hemophilia attack was brought on by Aleksei's sledding down the steps, or by a chronic cough which worsened that same night.

Further, sledding on the steps was *not* an accident; it was a deliberate playtime activity.

Sorry, but how can a haemophilic boy sledge down the stairs and not have medical problems afterwards?

It was surely a bumpy ride down the steps, but unless he actually crashed into something, it's entirely possible for Aleksei to have suffered no injuries. As J_Kendrick pointed out, part of the trouble with hemophilia is that it's so unpredictable.