During the Bolshevik revolution, the Romanov
dynasty was killed after over a hundred-year reign in Russia. The bodies of the parents and all five children
were laid on the ground. But when the corpses were later moved and
given a proper burial, the bodies of the son, Alexei, and the princess Anastasia were missing. This gave the Russian people hope that at
least two of these innocent children managed to play dead long enough to escape. Several years later, a young woman was admitted
to a mental hospital in Germany. There were scars all over her body, and she
clearly suffered some traumatic event, but her mind had blocked out the painful memories. She couldn’t even remember her own name. The only clue about where she came from was
the fact that she spoke with a Russian accent. Months later, a Russian patient was admitted
to that same hospital, and she immediately began to kneel in front of this young girl. She claimed that she recognized her as the
missing Princess Anastasia. But who was this young woman? Was she really the long-lost princess, or
would this go down as one of the biggest frauds in history? The Young Life of Anastasia
Anastasia Romanov was born in 1901 to Tsar Nicholas II, and his wife, Tsarina Alexandra
Feodorovna. Her proper title was “Grand Duchess”,
but no one ever addressed the young girl with this proper title in her daily life. She had three older sisters- Olga, Maria,
and Tatiana. Her younger brother, Alexei, was meant to
ascend the throne someday. The Romanov children were the first royals
to have such an extensive collection of family photographs. There are hundreds of pictures and videos
of their family vacations, and playing games on the palace grounds. It was easy to see that they lived a carefree
life. Their pictures were publicized all over Russia,
and they were became the darlings of the country. Anastasia was an extremely energetic toddler
who had a bubbly personality. She was very intelligent, so she grew bored
of her tutor’s lessons very quickly. She was a tomboy, and she enjoyed playing
outside far more than doing lady-like activities with her sisters. She was described as clumsy, and she was always
climbing on something or running around. She seemed to have an endless amount of energy. According to some of her cousins and ladies-in-waiting,
Anastasia’s boredom manifested in some terrible ways. She would entertainment herself by playing
pranks on people, and her cousins called her “evil”, and one of the servants called
her a “terrorist”. She tripped her servants in the hallway, climbed
up trees and refusing to come down, and hid rocks inside of snowballs. She would often cheat during games, and she
lied a lot to get herself out of trouble. At one point, a monk named Grigori Rasputin
became the spiritual advisor of the Romanov family. Tsarina Alexandra wholeheartedly believed
that he had magical powers that healed her son, Alexei, who was suffering from hemophilia. Rasputin was able to heal him on the brink
of death. Because of this, she listened to his advice,
and gave him free reign in the royal palace. Anastasia may or may not have realized it,
but her father, Nicholas, had a problem with drugs. In one of his diary entries, he wrote about
waking up with a stuffy nose, and planning to fix it by snorting cocaine. Back then, cocaine was actually prescribed
by doctors as a medication, so it didn’t hold the stigma that it does today. While she did not take recreational drugs,
Tsarina Alexandra was described as being anxious and high-strung. Anastasia commented that her mother barely
ever indulged in coffee or wine, because she had a bad stomach. She was also incredibly spiritual, and often
went to mystics to help her make decisions about her day-to-day life. Rasputin was also known for using morphine,
cocaine, and opium on a regular basis. Some historians believe that the closer he
got to the Tsar and Tsarina, the more the couple became dependent on the drugs and guidance
through fanatical religion that Rasputin was introducing them to. After witnessing the terrible things that
drugs did to the adults in her life, Anastasia became obsessed with clean eating and natural
remedies. She spoke against drug use, and became a vegetarian. Every time she was sick, she would throw a
fit, refusing to take any medicine, because she didn’t want to be like Rasputin and
her father. Servants noted that Rasputin was given a little
too much access to the children. In 1910, one of the nannies, a woman named
Sofia Ivanovna Tyutcheva, was particularly disturbed about the fact that the monk often
witnessed the four girls when they were in their nightgowns. He had the freedom to enter the children’s
nursery whenever he wanted. That same year, one of the other governesses,
Maria Ivanovna Vishnyakova, claimed that Rasputin raped her. She tried to tell the Tsarina. Sadly, she was so brainwashed by Rasputin,
that she refused to believe the governess. The girls were growing older- the eldest daughters
were already teenagers, and Anastasia was 9 years old. Tyutcheva knew of Rasputin’s reputation,
and she believed Vishnyakova’s story about the rape. Their parents were far too preoccupied with
their own issues, so this nanny tried to keep Rasputin away from the children. The girls were very naive, and did not see
any issue with him coming to visit them at night. They called him a “friend”, and when they
told Tsarina Alexandra that the nanny was trying to keep him out of the nursery at night,
she was fired. According to the children, Rasputin was simply
visiting to tell them bedtime stories and help them say their prayers. Back in his hometown, Rasputin actually did
have children of his own. So it’s always possible that he was acting
on fatherly instinct, but his reputation of a sexual deviant would be enough for anyone
to be worried. After Tyutcheva was fired, she told everyone
she knew about the story. This sparked a rumor that Rasputin had free
reign to visit the princesses at night- in a sexual way. There is no evidence that Rasputin ever actually
abused the Romanov children- but, of course, we will never really know what went on behind
closed doors. However, it was around this time that Tsar
Nicholas ordered Rasputin to leave St. Petersburg. When World War I first began, Anastasia was
only 13 years old. Her mother and sisters were old enough to
volunteer as nurses for The Red Cross. She did her duty by playing pool and chess
with the soldiers, and entertained people with her wild energy and laughter. As a teenager, Anastasia used her acting talents
for good. What seemed like mean-spirited pranks she
played in her childhood actually ended up being a love for comedy. Her family and members of the staff would
often put on their own plays and performances. According to witnesses, Anastasia was naturally
hilarious, and had everyone laughing so hard, they had tears in their eyes. Sometimes, she would bust out funny faces
when the camera was trying to capture a candid moment of her and her sisters. In every difficult situation, Anastasia was
always the one trying to fix it, and make everyone around her smile. After the war, Russia was suffering a terrible
depression. People were starving. Men had died during the war, and people desperately
needed help. Many people viewed the royal family as part
of the problem. Their reputation for bad decision-making with
Rasputin didn’t help, either. It was time for Communism to take hold. By the time Anastasia turned 16, the Romanov
Family was placed under house arrest by the Bolsheviks. The Last Days Of The Romonovs
The Romanov family were ordered to leave their castle, and were put under house arrest. They were moved from place to place, and their
last residence was at a place called Ipatiev House. Even in these dark moments, Anastasia was
still trying to make everyone laugh and smile. It was noted that she adjusted the best to
their new life in captivity. One of the guards told a story of Anastasia
trying to open a window for some fresh air, and they shot at her, to stop her from trying
to escape. She turned to the guard and stuck her tongue
out, slammed the window shut, and walked away. Even in this awful situation, she was fearless. At first, Lenin wrote that the family was
in captivity, and promised that they were still alive. However, he soon realized that as long as
the royal bloodline still existed, there would always be a chance that soldiers loyal to
the Romonovs would try to overthrow him. He decided that the only way for Communism
to exist was to execute the entire family. The family was made to walk down to a basement,
where a group of men were ordered to shoot at them. During the execution, they gunmen realized
that the daughters were still alive, even after being shot multiple times in the chest. It turns out that they were all wearing corsets
that had been lined with the royal gem stones, and this acted like a bulletproof vest. After this, each of the family members received
a shot to the head to ensure that they actually did die. However, some believe that these gem-lined
corsets would have been enough for the gunmen to hesitate to kill the two youngest members
of the family, Alexei and Anastasia. At this point, all of the older daughters
were full-grown women, but Anastasia and Alexei were only 13 and 16 years old. They were innocent children, and they didn’t
deserve to die. Many hoped that the guards would have taken
pity on them. One of the men in the firing squad, Rudolf
Lacher, was originally from Austria, and he was staying in Russia as a prisoner of war. As a foreigner, he had no loyalty to the imperial
family, and was ordered to serve the Bolsheviks. He claimed that he pulled over the truck when
it got stuck in the mud. He could hear a rustling in the back, and
when he went to check on the bodies, he discovered that Anastasia was still alive, and he helped
her escape. However, there were other quotes from Lacher
that indicated the total opposite was true. He was once quoted saying that he didn’t
care about killing the Romanov family. They weren’t relatives of his, and he was
doing his duty for the Bolsheviks. But this confession was enough to spark the
rumors that Anastasia had actually escaped. Anna Anderson
In 1920, a young woman in Berlin, Germany attempted to jump off a bridge to commit suicide. Nearby police officers saved her life, and
brought her to a mental hospital for treatment. She was beautiful, and spoke with a thick
Russian accent. When the doctors asked her who she was, she
replied that she didn’t know. There were scars all over her body, including
a triangle-shaped indentation in her foot, and deep lacerations on her back. It was clear that she had survived some sort
of horrific trauma, and her brain had shut down. Every night, she would wake up screaming to
her nightmares. The memories were too painful for her to recall
when she was awake. The doctors gave her the nickname “Miss
Unknown.” Two years later, Miss Unknown was still living
in a mental hospital in Germany, when a Russian woman was admitted as a patient. The woman was shocked, and immediately kneeled
in front of the young woman. She said that this was the missing Princess
Anastasia. Miss Unknown didn’t confirm or deny this
statement. She had no idea who she actually was, and
becoming a princess sounded just fine. To the doctors, this actually made a lot of
sense. Miss Unknown had clearly endured something
horrific, and it was the answer to a mystery they had long been trying to solve. Comparing photos of both Miss Unknown and
Anastasia next to one another, it is easy to see why so many people believed this to
be true. They have the same ears, nose, and eyes. Miss Unknown was also the same age. In 1922, newspapers began to claim that the
princess had been found, and her photo was published. Friends and family of the Romanovs came from
all over the world to visit her. They would ask her questions that only Anastasia
would know, and yet somehow, this woman knew many of the answers. The opinion of the friends and family was
divided 50/50. While her case was under investigation, she
was invited to stay in castles with Romanov cousins, and several people sent her money
to help pay for her expenses. Anastasia’s tutor, Sydney Gibbes, was one
of the most outspoken critics. He vividly remembered his student’s personality. No matter how much they looked the same, this
woman lacked Anastasia’s wit and sense of humor. Another tutor, Pierre Guillard, agreed that
they found the true princess, at first. However, once he spent more time around this
woman, he agreed that they were not the same person. She was soft-spoken and lady-like. For relatives who only saw her when she was
on her best behavior, it was easier to imagine that she could be Anastasia. But for people who knew what she was really
like, this was an entirely different person. The surviving members of the royal family
met up to discuss whether or not this woman deserved to receive the inheritance of the
Romanov family. In the end, they came to a vote, and decided
that there was not enough evidence to prove that she was the real Anastasia. Her supporters were shocked, because they
felt that she was clearly the true princess. Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna, sister of
Tsar Nicholas II and Anastasia’s aunt, wrote that she was outraged by this decision, and
that the remaining family was just greedy. For the friends and family who believed her,
they felt very sorry for this disowned princess, and wanted to whatever they could to help
her. She lived a life of luxury, and she was given
anything she would ever want. She eventually moved to New York with a woman
named Annie Burr Jennings, where she was able to live in a gorgeous penthouse. She changed her name to Anna Anderson. She met a man named Jack Manahan, who was
a history teacher in Virginia. They lived out a very happy life together
in the United States. Ms. Anderson went to her grave claiming that
she was the Grand Duchess Anastasia. DNA Evidence
After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, historians searched for the bodies of the
Romanov family. After confirming their identities through
DNA tests with surviving relatives, they were given a proper burial at the St. Peter and
Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg, and canonized as saints in 1998. However, the bodies of Alexei and Anastasia
were missing. This was enough to fuel the fire of the debate. Was Anna Anderson actually Anastasia, after
all? This inspired several movies and plays, including
the 1997 animated movie Anastasia. In 2007, the bones of two human bodies were
found buried in the middle of the woods Siberia. One was a male, and the other was female. The bones showed signs of being doused with
acid and burned by fire, as well. It was finally confirmed through DNA testing
that these were the missing bodies of Anastasia and Alexei. According to records and forensic evidence,
scientists and historians now believe that the men who killed the Romanovs attempted
to burn the bodies, but started off with the two smallest- Alexi and Anastasia. They covered the bones in sulfuric acid, and
then set them on fire. When they discovered that this did not completely
destroy the evidence, they decided to move along and bury the rest of the bodies elsewhere. This is why the two children had been separated
from the rest of their family. As for Anna Anderson, she was dead years before
the truth of her identity was revealed. It turns out that she was a Polish factory
worker. She was married, and worked together with
her husband. One day, a grenade was tossed into the factory,
and exploded. She had to witness the love of her life and
several co-workers dying around her, before receiving a serious head injury. Her body was scarred from the shrapnel of
the explosion. After recovering from her wounds, she had
no family or friends to help her home. She somehow made her way to Germany, which
is where the police found her, and the rest is history. After revealing the truth of her identity,
many people began to call Anna Anderson a “fraud” and a liar. Since she was able to live a life of luxury,
many consider her to be a skilled con-woman. However, it’s very possible that in her
mental state, she may have actually believed she really was Anastasia. Before she was discovered in the mental hospital,
she was a young woman who had nothing left to live for. She was ready to take her own life. But becoming Anastasia gave her an identity,
a purpose, and a family who loved her. For the people who desperately needed to regain
their faith in humanity, they needed to believe the innocent children had survived the slaughter. In her own way, Anna Anderson gave them a
reason to believe in miracles. From what we know about the real Anastasia,
she lived to make people smile. If she knew that her memory and even the mere
possibility of her being alive brought so much hope and joy to so many people, she would
surely be proud.
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