03 — Captivity and Death
The sixteen months from house arrest to the basement of the Ipatiev House. This section follows the family through the three stages of captivity — the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoe Selo, the governor’s mansion at Tobolsk, and the “House of Special Purpose” at Ekaterinburg — and then gives the sober, documented account of the killing on the night of 16–17 July 1918. It is on the conduct of this captivity and the manner of this death, not on the reign that preceded them, that the Church’s glorification rests.
Tradition: Russian Orthodox / ROCOR
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| From Tsarskoe Selo to Ekaterinburg | The three captivities: house arrest at the Alexander Palace (March–August 1917); the Tobolsk exile under Kerensky (August 1917–spring 1918); and the transfer to the Ipatiev House at Ekaterinburg under the Ural Soviet (spring–summer 1918). |
| The Murder of 16–17 July 1918 | The killing of the eleven — the seven family members and four retainers — in the basement, drawn soberly from the Yurovsky Note and the Sokolov investigation; the disposal of the bodies; and the disputed question of who ordered it. |
See Also
- The Inner Spiritual Life — the faith of the family in captivity, from their own letters and diaries
- The Theology of the Passion-Bearer — the category the manner of this death invokes
- The Discovery and Identification — the later fate of the remains disposed of here
References
- King, Greg, and Penny Wilson. The Fate of the Romanovs. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2003.
- Service, Robert. The Last of the Tsars: Nicholas II and the Russian Revolution. London: Macmillan, 2017.
- Steinberg, Mark D., and Vladimir M. Khrustalëv. The Fall of the Romanovs. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995.