Ella on Ernie's Alleged Homosexuality

[grandduchessella]

Let's steer the topic back to the original question please. 

[Eric_Lowe]

yes I think Ella knew all about Ernie and was very supportive of him (like VMH), and it was also extended to Ducky as well (although Alicky did not see it that way). 

[bell_the_cat]

yes I think Ella knew all about Ernie and was very supportive of him (like VMH), and it was also extended to Ducky as well (although Alicky did not see it that way). 

We've been assuming that Alexandra either didn't know about her brother or wasn't very supportive. Is there any evidence of this? If Ella "knew", then surely, Alexandra did too. Alexandra grew up with her brother,and she was by no means a prude (she says something of this sort in one of her early letters to her husband). She accompanied Ernie on a fairly long holiday (to Italy!) in about 1891.

Nicholas was deeply shocked by the divorce and by the Kyril Ducky relationship marriage which was carried on behind his back. Alexandra stood by his opinion on this, hence her coldness towards Victoria Melita (I think they had never liked each other much anyway). However, Ernie was a welcome guest of Nicholas and Alexandra until the outbreak of war, and they seem to have enjoyed his camp ways (eg rearranging the furniture at the Alexander Palace in more "artistic arrangements"). Can it be that they knew about his bisexuality, but didn't mind much?

[Eddie_uk]

How do we know that Ernie was bisexual? Just because he married twice and had kids? 

I think Ella and Alix were both supportive of Ernies sexuality he was their only brother and they must have doted on him, which may have contributed to his feminine side. That's providing they knew, and I think they must have done (if as Ducky claimed he was sleeping so openly with men). I thought Alex and Ernie were very close, they had lived and travelled together, she must have known!!:)

[bell_the_cat]

How do we know that Ernie was bisexual? Just because he married twice and had kids?  ??

You're right, we don't know!   

[Svetabel]

How do we know that Ernie was bisexual? Just because he married twice and had kids? 

Well, don't get me wrongly but frankly the neverending discussions here on our Forums "Ernnie was/was not bisexual/gay" are hoary tales.

[grandduchessella]

Or Alexandra didn't believe any of the stories--she was certainly capable of believing what she wanted to believe--and chalked up the stories as Ducky's maliciousness. This wouldn't have made her any fonder of her former sister-in-law either.

[bell_the_cat]

Also maybe Alexandra didn't spend that much time pondering her brother's personal life. She had her own family to worry about, and of course, her favourite topic, herself!

[Romanov_fan]

I think Alexandra at least knew of stories about her brother in this direction. She may not have believed them, you are right, because she may have said that it was because of Ducky that these stories were being told, and not because of any underlying truth. If she did, ( and I find it easy to believe she might not have), then she perhaps disregarded it, whatever she thought privately. But, in theory ( as it is very likely she didn't believe such stories), she most likely would not have been as understanding as Ella. But I can see her believing it, and disregarding it, if need be, whatever her opinion would have been, had she considered it.

[Eric_Lowe]

I think Both Ella & VMH were supportive of both Ernie & Ducky when they decide to divorce. VMH wrote very understandingly in her memoirs and agreed that it was best that they seperate. Ella was close to Marie Coburg and Ducky and bore her no ill will during the divorce. The only person who seemed outraged was Alicky, who thought that her brother was insulted by this divorce and re-marriage (she was openly bitter about this). However I think Alicky and Ducky WERE close as cousins go. When the Grand ducal couple was invited to the cornoation, Alicky and Ella sent Ducky info on the dresses and trains required for the ceremonies. Ducky on her part was quite sympathetic to Alicky's plight (having producing only daughters for a long time), and expressed such sentiments in her letters to Missy. 

[Romanov_fan]

I guess the popular conception is that Ducky and Alexandra did not get along at all after that divorce. I have never read that they did not get along in particular before the divorce. I always thought that Alexandra was upset that Ducky divorced her brother, and that she was thereafter much upset with Ducky. The only discord I have read of between them before that is that Alexandra did not like it when Ducky married her brother, and became first lady, as it were, of Hesse. Alexandra rather thought her position usurped as her brother's hostess in Hesse, since that was her position as the youngest daughter, unmarried, the only daughter left I believe.

[Eric_Lowe]

That was speculation. I personally do not think that Alicky held a grudge against Ducky because she married her brother. I think she was sad because she felt she wasn't needed anymore in Darmstadt and now have to make a decision about her feelings about Nicky. 

[Taren]

I guess the popular conception is that Ducky and Alexandra did not get along at all after that divorce. I have never read that they did not get along in particular before the divorce. I always thought that Alexandra was upset that Ducky divorced her brother, and that she was thereafter much upset with Ducky. The only discord I have read of between them before that is that Alexandra did not like it when Ducky married her brother, and became first lady, as it were, of Hesse. Alexandra rather thought her position usurped as her brother's hostess in Hesse, since that was her position as the youngest daughter, unmarried, the only daughter left I believe.

I agree, in that I've never heard of Ducky and Alix being particularly close before the divorce or marriage for that matter. Ducky might not have been one that Alix dropped her normally gloomy demeanor around. Maybe on some level, Alix thought that as the Tsarina of Russia, married to the Tsar and therefore supposed to uphold everything the Russian Orthodox Church teaches, that it reflected badly on her that her brother was divorcing. So instead of blaming her brother, who she loved and was going to side with, she blamed Ducky. Alix once said that once you were her friend you were her friend for life. Since she obviously wasn't friends with Ducky post divorce, perhaps she never was at all.

[Eric_Lowe]

Well...I really do not think that Alicky had many friends to begin with. Her natural shyness may have prevented her from making many. 

[Romanov_fan]

It might have been speculation, but nothing can ever make me believe that Ducky and Alix were friends except in more of a friend- relative sense. I am not sure they were ever particularly close relatives, as rumours of discord reach back pretty far with them knowing each other, even if they are just rumours. They had very different tempraments and goals; both could be volatile. They had different positions that contradicted each other. I just can't see them being friends, and the rumours of discord seem factual to me. Of course it was easier for Alexandra to blame Ducky rather than her brother for what happened, but I am not sure they were ever really on good terms to begin with.