Nicholas & Alexandra

Incredibly, before he died, Rasputin had struggled with sufficient strength to free one of his hands from the ropes around him. The freed arm was raised above the shoulder; the effect was that Rasputin's last gesture on earth had been a sign of benediction.

Gregory Rasputin, his bloodstream filled with poison, his body punctured by bullets, had died by drowning.

The size of the Yussoupov fortune was estimated fifty years ago as 350$ million to 500$ million. What the same possessions would be worth today, no one can guess. The family's coal and iron mines, like fields, mills and factories churned out wealth which exceeded even the wealth of the tsars.

Alexandra: " 32 years agoy child's heart already went out to you in deep love... I know I ought not to say this, and for an old married woman it may seem ridiculous, but I cannot help it. With the years, love increases and the time without your sweet presence is hard to bear. Oh, could but our children be equally blessed in their married lives.

Beneath the Victorian surface of reserve, she (Empress) revealed the extravagant, flowery emotions of the Victorian poets.

There were no great balls that winter (1915) in the gray, snow-covered cities of Russia; the young men who danced two winters before lay dead in the forests of East Prussia or on the slopes of the Caprathians.

Each of the Russian armies individually was larger than the German force.

The Kaiser characteristically expressed the German plan more crudely: 'Lunch in Paris, dinner in St. Petersburg'.

During the Word War the First Russian industry was small and primitive. For every factory in Russia, there were 150 in Great Britain.

Witte said: No one here, no thinking man at least, cares a fig for these turbulent and vain Balkan who have nothing Slav about them and are only Turks christened by the wrong name.