Nicholas, Alexandra and Maria had arrived at the Ipatev house on the eve of May Day. They could hear birds chirping in the trees next morning before the public celebrations commenced. The Red marching bands were distinctly audible from the building.1 While listening to them, Nicholas was unaware of the dangerous volatility of the public mood in Ekaterinburg. People at the Upper Iset Works made a move to proclaim a ‘day of vengeance’ to exact retribution from the imperial family. This so alarmed Beloborodov that he scheduled a presence of Regional Soviet leaders in the Ipatev house for twenty-four hours.2 His priority was to persuade more workers to sign up for the Red Army at a time when anti-Soviet forces were planning to fight for control of the Urals. Parades were held in the central streets in earshot of people on Voznesenski Prospekt. Banners were waved. Soviet leaders delivered speeches on their urgent plans for the defence of Ekaterinburg. Wealthy middle-class residents were press-ganged to dig trenches. Barricades were erected. Hostages were taken and held in prison under threat of execution.3
The Urals communist leadership told the Romanov captives that they would receive no indulgence. Alexandra was affronted by the demand by Didkovski and Avdeev to inspect their possessions – she saw no justification for such a procedure. Avdeev, fresh from Tobolsk and newly appointed as commandant at the Ipatev house, rejected her complaint, arguing that the authorities had to ensure their own security. His remark shattered Nicholas’s composure: ‘The Devil knows what’s up. Until now there has been courteous treatment and decent people everywhere . . . but now?!’ Avdeev bluntly explained that Ekaterinburg was not Tsarskoe Selo and that if Nicholas made any trouble, they would isolate him from his family. When Nicholas refused to calm down, Avdeev added that if the former emperor continued to be obstreperous, he would be taken off and put to forced labour.4 This broke the spirit of resistance in both Nicholas and Alexandra. They could not imagine life apart, either from one another or from their children, four of whom had yet to arrive from Tobolsk.
Avdeev and Didkovski wished to ensure that the Romanovs lived on their state allowances alone and could not subsidize armed resistance. Their enquiries revealed that neither Nicholas nor Alexandra had a single kopek – their daughter Maria was carrying sixteen rubles whereas one of the retainers, Fëdor Gorshkov, kept over 6,000 rubles on his person. The Bolsheviks took most of these monies, leaving their owners with affidavits about the amounts.5
Sverdlov on 3 May had cabled fresh instructions. The telegram served to reveal his continuing support for Yakovlev but also to show how events had overtaken the possibility of fine control from Moscow. Sverdlov laid down that Nicholas should be held ‘in the strictest fashion’ while Yakovlev was to return to Tobolsk and organize the transfer of the Romanovs who remained there.6 Beloborodov cabled a sharp reply. The Romanovs were already under ‘strict arrest’ and no outsider was being allowed to visit them. The retinue, including Botkin, were treated as if they had been arrested, and both Dolgorukov and Bishop Germogen were held in prison. Papers found on Dolgorukov had pointed to a potential plan of escape – Beloborodov told Sverdlov not to entertain any complaints about this from other people. The Urals leadership remained unwilling to admit that Yakovlev had had to take precautions to protect ‘the baggage’ after Tobolsk, and Beloborodov reported that there had been a cold parting between the two sides but that the Executive Committee had absolved him of counter-revolutionary intentions and attributed his behaviour to over-nervousness. Yakovlev, he pointed out, was no longer in Ekaterinburg but at the Asha-Balashev iron works in the Sim River district.7
The Executive Committee cut down the size of the retinue. Nicholas blamed Beloborodov. Whenever Beloborodov made his visits of inspection, it was obvious that his was the greatest influence inside the Urals leadership.8 Nicholas conceived a pronounced dislike for him and asked one of the guards about the religious background of Beloborodov and other leaders. His enquiry was motivated by anti-Semitism, for Nicholas had concluded that Beloborodov must be Jewish. He was surprised when the guard explained that this was not the case and that Beloborodov was a Russian.9 He nonetheless continued to detest him and the Executive Committee for his misfortunes. He deplored the retinue’s treatment. Dolgorukov, Tatishchev and Gorshkov as well as Ivan Sednëv and Klementi Nagorny were under detention in Ekaterinburg prison. On 28 May 1918 Sednëv and Nagorny wrote to Beloborodov asking permission to return to their home provinces; they recognized that their service with the Romanovs had ended, never to be resumed.10 Eventually, eighteen retainers took a train back to Tyumen, although halfway along the line they were halted at Kamyshlov for ten days.11
Goloshchëkin hand-picked a bunch of Bolshevik supporters to serve in a detachment to guard the Romanovs under Avdeev’s command.12 Steadily, the number of guards was expanded. Sergei Mrachkovski, fresh from leading the Red Guards on the ‘Dutov front’, visited the Sysert factory and recruited thirty workers at 400 rubles a month. A week later Pavel Medvedev, a local ex-miner, returned to the same factory and picked up another twenty volunteers. The Zlokazovo metal factory was another recruiting ground, and Avdeev himself went there in search of volunteers. While most of the new guards were Russian, some were Latvian. These two factories were known as centres of Bolshevik support.13 It was not hard to tempt people to join the unit. As industrial activity waned, work was hard to find, and guard duties at the Ipatev house were paid well and fed well at a time when incomes and food supplies were in decline. Within a short time the unit acquired over fifty men under arms whose political loyalty could be guaranteed. Goloshchëkin, Mrachkovski and Avdeev had put together a Urals detachment from the local factories. Discipline was strict from the outset. The Executive Committee aimed to avoid the kind of outbursts that had often occurred in Tobolsk.14
Avdeev spent every day at the house from nine in the morning to nine at night. His deputy Alexander Moshkin as well as Pavel Medvedev were in permanent residence.15 The guarding functions were organized in four daily shifts.16 The guarding work was simple in nature. Medvedev explained to everyone that a guard was expected to stay at his post when on duty and avoid falling asleep.17 No women were allowed into the building.18
The chief solace for the Romanovs was their religious faith, but the Bolsheviks would not allow them to attend church and only a few services were permitted in the Ipatev house. Father Ioann Storozhev ministered to them on 4 May 1918. The next service was delayed for another month. Indeed, there were only four occasions on which the clergy was allowed to minister to the imperial family.19 Storozhev was to recall a Sunday – it was in fact 2 June – when an ill-kempt, unarmed soldier turned up at his house after early-morning Mass and said: ‘You’re asked to give a service for Romanov.’ To the priest’s enquiry as to exactly whom this was for, the soldier replied: ‘Well, for the former Tsar.’ (Troops in Ekaterinburg refused to provide Nicholas with any lingering status.) Storozhev agreed on condition that his deacon, Buimirov, could accompany him. Avdeev, however, had stipulated that Storozhev alone should perform the function. When the priest stood his ground, the soldier gave way and escorted the two clerics to the Ipatev house. Avdeev let them in but objected to the idea that the emperor would receive a communion wafer from Storozhev – the Bolsheviks would permit no chance of anything else being passed by sleight of hand. Storozhev explained that there could not be even a short form of the Mass without wafers, and Avdeev gave way.20
The imperial family had been eagerly waiting for the service. A table had been prepared as a makeshift altar, and the sickly Alexei lay on a bed with his mother sitting in a chair next to him. Led by Nicholas, all the Romanovs bore up well – or so Storozhev thought, even though Alexandra seemed physically out of sorts. Nicholas sang the Lord’s Prayer with brio. As the service came to a close, the priest considered whether or not to offer the cross for the family to kiss. He and Nicholas glanced at the commandant before doing this, and the rest of the family followed except for Alexei, whom Storozhev approached individually.21
As regards food, Avdeev had started by insisting that it should come to the Romanovs and their retinue directly from the nearby soviet cafeteria and should be heated up on arrival. But after he felt that he had satisfactory control, he permitted the resident retainers to cook for the family.22 The abbess of an Ekaterinburg monastery sent two of her nuns in lay clothing to the house offering additions to the family’s diet. These included cream, radishes, fish soup, gherkins, sausages and bread. Avdeev saw no harm in this and even made suggestions about what he thought might benefit the poorly Alexei.23 There was cunning in the seeming attempt to be helpful, for once Avdeev had received the food supplies, he took what he wanted for himself and the detachment before releasing the remainder to the Romanovs.24 There was inadequate provision of cutlery – on one occasion, for example, there were two spoons too few for the soup course.25 Sometimes Avdeev, in the attempt to impose his authority, chose to join the Romanovs for dinner. He did this with a boorish swagger and once when serving himself from the common plate, he caught the emperor in the face with his elbow.26 Sometimes, too, he was drunk on duty.27
Conditions worsened, moreover, on 14 May 1918, when Nicholas learned from Dr Botkin that the family were to be limited to an hour’s daily exercise in the grounds. When Nicholas asked the guards for an explanation, he was told: ‘So that it should become like a prison regime.’28 Next day a workman turned up to apply paint to all the windows. The Romanovs were to have no sight of the city street, and when the family took a walk in the garden at 3.15 p.m. they were not even given a full hour before being ordered inside.
Nicholas had diminishing access to news about what was happening in Ekaterinburg or anywhere else in Russia. He no longer had visitors or daily newspapers, and the letters reaching him contained little information about public affairs because his correspondents knew that they had to avoid provoking those who censored the contents. For a man who remained preoccupied about the consequences of the Russian military collapse, the blackout of news was acutely frustrating. And the entire family wanted to hear about what, if anything, Moscow had in mind for their ultimate fate. One of their few sources of reportage was Dr Derevenko, who had lodgings elsewhere in Ekaterinburg. Avdeev saw what was happening and ruled that Derevenko could attend to the Romanovs only under his supervision, and there were days when Avdeev’s absence meant that the doctor could not enter the Ipatev house.29 Until then, the Romanovs had been able to use Derevenko as a two-way conduit of information. With Avdeev looking over his shoulder, the doctor could no longer say or hear anything that might make trouble for Nicholas and Alexandra.30
The Romanovs had never known much about internal Bolshevik politics and now they knew even less. Whereas Pankratov, Kobylinski and even Yakovlev had acted as a buffer between them and ‘soviet power’, all the authorities in the Ipatev house were hostile to the family. It made sense for Nicholas to get hold of the Bolshevik press. When Vorobëv, editor of the regional Bolshevik newspaper, demanded the normal payment for a month’s subscription, Nicholas duly complied. He also sought news from the guards. When he asked about how the war was going, Pavel Medvedev replied that the fighting was now between Russians and Russians.31
Nicholas liked to ask any soldiers he encountered when they had entered military service, and whenever one of them mentioned a year before 1917 he would refer to him as ‘my soldier’. When the answer was 1917 or 1918, he commented that he was a youngster.32 One day Nicholas asked Medvedev why he was plucking and tearing up burdock. The answer said a lot about economic conditions: Medvedev was using the plant as a tobacco substitute.33 Nicholas had a touching sympathy with his lot, and even the Bolshevik leaders admitted that the family eschewed many of the accoutrements of luxury. Nicholas wore patched old boots. The Romanov daughters, who lacked their mother’s haughtiness, frequently raced to the kitchen to knead the dough and help to prepare the meals.34 All the Romanov women sewed and knitted to keep busy and Alexei fashioned little chains for his toy soldiers. Nicholas did some outdoor work as at Tsarskoe Selo and Tobolsk, but it was not long before the authorities banned him even from cleaning up the garden.35 He also suffered a problem with haemorrhoids and had to lie down with a compress to ease the pain, and Dr Botkin arranged for him to have his meals in bed.36
Ekaterinburg was meanwhile becoming a magnet for monarchist groups. One was based in the 1st Guards Cavalry Division in Petrograd and called itself the Union of Heavy Artillery. A plan was made for Colonel Kirill Sobolev to scout the possibilities. In May he arrived ostensibly to train at the General Staff Academy but with the intention of planning how to rescue the Romanovs. His survey of the landscape and security precautions around the Ipatev house convinced him that it would be suicidal to attack the premises. Although he remained at the Academy and held discussions with sympathetic fellow officers, he refrained from action.37
The hotels of Ekaterinburg continued to greet visitors who petitioned the regional soviet for consent to meet the emperor, and the British consulate across the road erected an observation point from which to follow events at the house.38 The Urals communist leaders refused every request for an interview with Nicholas. The requests themselves served only to agitate the Bolsheviks, who were acutely worried about the danger of armed conspiracy. Sophie Buxhoeveden, Pierre Gilliard and Sydney Gibbes continually pressed the Western consulates to find a way to secure the release of Nicholas and his family.39 But there was nothing that the diplomats could do in the situation and they found that their enquiries about the Ipatev house served merely to aggravate the mood of agitation among the Urals communist leadership, and Major Migic, who belonged to the general staff of the Serbian forces and spoke fluent Russian, was especially insistent that he had to discuss the course of the Great War with Nicholas. Other Serbians arrived, including an ensign called Vožetic and a certain Smirnov who served in the Queen of Serbia’s entourage. It became clear that they represented Grand Duchess Elena Petrovna, the Serbian wife of Nicholas’s cousin Ioann Konstantinovich, who was in custody in the Urals.40
Beloborodov and Goloshchëkin were never going to let a foreign in-law of the house of Romanov enter the Ipatev house, far less discuss the Great War. The imperial family was to remain isolated so that no harm could come to the Soviet cause.41 In fact, Nicholas was never quite the innocent prisoner that he pretended to be. One of the Cheka officials, I. I. Radzinski, later claimed that Nicholas wrote verses ridiculing the Bolsheviks – supposedly they were found in his bedside drawer.42 This was the least of his disruptiveness. On one occasion when he wrote to relatives, he tucked a sketch of the Ipatev house into the envelope with indications about who was to be found in each room. This would help assailants if ever they could find a way to break into the building. Nicholas was obviously nursing hopes of a rescue attempt, but he reckoned without Avdeev’s scrutiny of every letter.
Avdeev was furious. Instead of talking to Dr Botkin as usual, he summoned Nicholas in person. Nicholas asked for Botkin to be allowed to accompany him. When Avdeev disallowed the request, Nicholas went instead with one of his daughters. Avdeev waved him towards a seat. Nicholas refused, preferring to stay on his feet. If he thought this would give him a psychological edge, he was soon proved wrong. Avdeev began by announcing that a prohibited sketch had been discovered in the latest outgoing letter. Nicholas blustered that this was news to him. Avdeev took no nonsense; he explained that anyone could tell that the handwriting was unmistakably that of the former emperor. Nicholas crumbled, admitting responsibility for the sketch and promising never to repeat the behaviour. He was warned unequivocally that if he failed to keep his word, he would be hauled off by himself to prison. This was enough to break his resolve: he could not bear the idea of being separated from his family, and he reverted to passive acceptance of the current situation.43
Pëtr Voikov and I. I. Radzinski tested his sincerity by concocting two provocative letters addressed to Alexandra. Voikov, Regional Commissar for Food Supplies, became involved because he knew French after years working in emigration. He dictated the texts to Radzinski, who wrote them out in red ink and signed them ‘Russian Officer’. The aim was to trick the Romanovs into colluding with a conspiracy that did not exist.44 One of the guards passed a letter to them in late June from someone signing himself this time as ‘Officer of the Russian Army’ and alerting them to the worsening military situation for the Bolsheviks. Samara, Chelyabinsk and Siberia were now held by their enemies, and the Czechoslovak Legion of ex-POWs, which had risen against Sovnarkom, was only fifty miles from Ekaterinburg. According to the letter, the imminence of military defeat increased the Bolshevik threat to Nicholas and his family. The self-styled officer asked them, in preparation of a rescue attempt, to transmit a sketch of the interior of the Ipatev house.45 Several exchanges of correspondence followed and the ‘officer’ instructed the inmates to sleep in their day clothes and be ready to climb from a front window at dead of night. The Romanovs fell for the deceit while asking for a guarantee of no bloodshed, and the Urals leadership acquired confirmation of their feeling that Nicholas would cooperate with any serious effort to liberate them.46
Suspicions grew on both sides. On 10 June, the guards ransacked the suitcases stored in the vestibule and removed a lot of items that had accompanied the Romanovs from Tobolsk. No explanation was given. Nicholas felt sure that these things would end up in guards’ homes and be lost forever: ‘Disgusting!’47 He noticed a change in the whole demeanour of the guard unit, especially their new reluctance to speak to him. He had the impression that they were worried about something: ‘Incomprehensible!’48 Then on 15 June Dr Derevenko was barred from the residence. He stood outside pleading at least for permission to deliver milk and eggs. Dr Botkin, who lived at the Ipatev house with the Romanovs, made a request to send a letter to the regional soviet asking it to extend outdoor exercise to two hours a day and to get the windows opened.49 Neither of the doctors was successful. The Romanovs had blotted their already stained reputation in the eyes of the Urals leadership, and no pleas on their behalf stood any chance of fulfilment.