Led by Prince Konstantin Konstantinovich. Medical aspects of the biography of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich

Poetic pseudonym K. R. (10 (22) August 1858, Strelna - 2 (15) June 1915, Pavlovsk) - Grand Duke, President of the Imperial St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences, poet, translator and playwright.

The second son of Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich and Grand Duchess Alexandra Iosifovna, grandson of Nicholas I. Received a comprehensive education at home. Famous historians S. M. Solovyov, K. I. Bestuzhev-Ryumin, music critic G. A. Larosh, cellist I. I. Seifert, writers I. A. Goncharov and F. M. Dostoevsky took part in his training and education. . From childhood, the Grand Duke was prepared for service in the navy. At the age of 7, Captain 1st Rank I. A. Zelenoi was appointed his teacher, who held this position until the Grand Duke came of age. Classes were conducted according to the Naval School program. In 1874 and 1876, as a midshipman, he made long voyages to the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea on the frigate Svetlana. In August 1876, he passed the exam for the Naval School program and was promoted to the rank of midshipman.

I opened the window, it became stuffy and unbearable,
Knelt down before him.
And the spring night smelled in my face
The fragrant breath of lilac.

And somewhere in the distance a nightingale sang wonderfully,
I listened to him with deep sadness,
And with longing I remembered my homeland,
I remembered my distant homeland,

Where the native nightingale sings its native song
And, not knowing earthly sorrows, -
Floods all night long
Over a fragrant branch of lilac...

Romanov Konstantin Konstantinovich

From 1877 to 1898, Konstantin Konstantinovich served in various naval and land units, and participated in the Russian-Turkish War of 1877-1878. Since 1898 he was appointed to His Majesty's Retinue. In 1887, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich was awarded the title of honorary member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, and in 1889 he was appointed its President (“August President”). This was the first and only case in the history of Russia when the Academy of Sciences was headed by a member of the reigning house.

Since 1900 - Chief Head of Military Educational Institutions. Under the leadership of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, a lot of work was done to develop and improve training in military educational institutions. Honorary member of the Nikolaev Engineering Academy (since 1904), the Imperial Military Medical Academy and the Mikhailovsky Artillery Academy and many others. etc.

Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov was also a famous Russian poet, translator and playwright, who published his poems under the initials K.R. Signing his works with his full name was prohibited for him to act as a professional poet, actor or musician for one of the members of the reigning house was “out of rank” .

I visited my native ashes -
Destroyed parental hearth,
The home of my past youth,
Where every step reminds me
About the days when the soul is brighter and purer,
Having tasted the highest of blessings for the first time,
Poetry of holy inspiration
I experienced blissful moments.

Romanov Konstantin Konstantinovich

The first poetic works were published in the magazine “Bulletin of Europe” in 1882. The first book “Poems by K.R.” (1886) did not go on sale, it was sent to those whom the poet considered close to him in spirit (including Fet, Ap. Maikov, Polonsky). It evoked poetic dedications and responses in letters - enthusiastic and not entirely objective. Believing in his talent, the Grand Duke began to publish everything that came from his pen: love and landscape lyrics, salon poems, translations, and soon took a strong place in literature. In 1888 K.R. published the first poem “Sebastian the Martyr”, then the collections “New Poems by K.R.”, “Third Collection of Poems by K.R.” (1900), “Poems by K. R.” (1901).

The melodic stanzas of Konstantin Konstantinovich’s poetry easily turned into romances (the most famous is the romance “I opened the window...” with music by P. I. Tchaikovsky). They remained in the vocal repertoire, since Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Glazunov, Gliere wrote music for them. The poem “The Poor Man Died in a Military Hospital” became a popular song. K.R.’s most significant work, the mystery play “The King of the Jews” (1913), was banned from production by the Synod, which did not allow the Gospel story of the Passion of the Lord to be relegated to the theatrical stage. With the permission of the tsar, the play was staged by an amateur court theater, where the author played one of the roles.

I. A. Goncharov, Y. P. Polonsky, A. A. Fet corresponded with the Grand Duke, who appreciated his taste and even instructed him to correct his poems. K.R. also translated a lot into Russian: F. Schiller’s tragedy “The Bride of Messina”, the tragedy of J.V. Goethe, Shakespeare’s “King Henry IV”. K.R. is the author of a successful translation of Shakespeare's Hamlet into Russian, on which he worked from 1889 to 1898; a translation with extensive commentary in 3 volumes was published in 1899 and was reprinted several times.

Oh, God, give me inspiration,
The poet's fiery blood.
Oh, give me meekness and humility,
Delights, songs and love.

Romanov Konstantin Konstantinovich

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich died on June 2, 1915. He was the last of the Romanovs to die before the revolution and was buried in the grand ducal tomb of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

K.R. - literary pseudonym of the Grand DukeKonstantin Konstantinovich Romanov . This pseudonym first appeared in 1882 in the “Bulletin of Europe” under the poem “The Psalmist David”, and then entered Russian poetry for three decades. The poet’s three-volume work, published in the year of his death, included hundreds of lyrical works, the poems “Manfred Reborn” and “Sebastian the Martyr,” translations of Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” and Schiller’s “The Bride of Messina.” Romances based on his poems were written by P. I. Tchaikovsky, S. V. Rachmaninov, A. K. Glazunov, R. M. Gliere and other composers. For more than a quarter of a century he headed the Imperial Academy of Sciences. Under his chairmanship, the celebration of the centenary of Pushkin’s birth was organized and related events were held. He was elected an honorary member of the Stockholm Academy of Sciences. His whole life was inextricably linked with military activities. He commanded a company of the Izmailovsky Regiment, then the Preobrazhensky Regiment, was the main head of military educational institutions in Russia and the chief of the 15th Grenadier Regiment. He harmoniously combined the three main aspects of his personality: poet, president of the Academy of Sciences and military man.

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, grandson of Nicholas I and cousin of Nicholas II, was born on August 10, 1858 in Strelna near St. Petersburg. His father was the younger brother of Alexander II, Konstantin Nikolaevich, an admiral general, manager of the fleet and naval department as a minister, who did a lot for the reform of the Russian fleet, a diplomat, a widely educated figure who patronized the arts. Mother - Alexandra Iosifovna (nee Princess of Saxe-Coburg). The future poet lived in an atmosphere of parental love, serenity and comfort. The childhood and entire subsequent life of Konstantin Konstantinovich was connected with the Marble Palace, which belonged to his father.Received a comprehensive home education. Famous historians took part in his training and educationS. M. Soloviev , K. I. Bestuzhev-Ryumin , musical criticG. A. Laroche , cellistI. I. Seifert , pianistRudolf Kündinger , writersI. A. Goncharov AndF. M. Dostoevsky . From childhood, the Grand Duke was prepared for service in the navy. At the age of 7 he was appointed as his teachercaptain 1st rank I. A. Zelenoy , who held this position until the Grand Duke came of age. Classes were conducted according to the programNaval School . In 1874 and 1876midshipman made a long voyage toAtlantic Ocean AndMediterranean Sea onfrigate "Svetlana". In August1876 passed the exam according to the programNaval School and was produced inrank midshipman .

Deep spiritual sympathy connected Konstantin Konstantinovich with his older sister, the “Queen of the Hellenes” Olga Konstantinovna, the wife of the Greek King George I. It was to her that he turned for support in his first poetic experiments. Many heartfelt lyrical poems are dedicated to her. One of the poems from 1888 reflects the nature of their relationship:

Tomorrow I will bring these poems to show you.

We'll sit next to each other; I will again unroll the treasured scroll;

You will gently lay your head on my shoulder again,

My intricate handwriting on the scroll is hard to decipher...

Friendly connections are established between the Grand Duke, who is keenly interested in art, andF. M. Dostoevsky, I. S. Turgenev, P. I. Tchaikovsky. Turgenev becomes for him an indisputable authority in the field of art.

In 1882, the first works of the poet K.R. appeared in print; By this time, Konstantin Romanov already recognizes himself as a poet. In one of his poems from 1882, he writes:

I have all the love, all the best aspirations,

Everything that excites the chest in the silence of the night,

And all the impulses of the fiery soul

Poured it into poems...

ParticipantRussian-Turkish War of 1877-1878 . 17 October1877awardedOrder of St. George4 degrees:

“In retribution for courage and stewardship in the matter with the Turks on the Danube near Silistria, October 2, 1877, where His Highness personally launched a fire-ship against a Turkish steamer.”

In May1878 produced inlieutenants fleet. In August1878 appointedaide-de-camp . In January-September1880 commanded a company of the Guards crew. In September 1880 he was appointed watch commander on the ship "Duke of Edinburgh", on which until January1882 was sailing in the Mediterranean Sea.

In 1882, due to illness, he was transferred to the land department and in August he was promoted tostaff captains guard. To end1883 was on vacation abroad, during which he met his future wife.

In 1884, he married Elisabeth of Saxe-Altenburg, Duchess of Saxony, to whom he was engaged in May 1883. From this marriage nine children were born - six sons and three daughters. A. A. Fet dedicated a poem to the wife of the Grand Duke-poet:

Two forget-me-nots, two sapphires

Her welcoming look from her eyes,

And the secrets of the heavenly ether

They glide through the living azure.

Her curls are a golden fleece

In such a light as one,

Depicting the unearthly,

The genie brought Peru to earth.

K.R.'s military career has continued in the army since 1883.December1883 appointed commander of the company of His Majesty's Life Guards Izmailovsky Regiment. IN1887produced incaptains guards, andApril 23 1891 - Vcolonels and appointed commander of the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment. IN1894 produced inmajor generals , with confirmation as regiment commander. IN1898 appointed toHis Majesty's retinue . Congenitalgoodwill and devotion to duty earned him respect in the army and helped build his relationships with his subordinates. In the regiment, according to his plans and initiative, literary and musical evenings were organized - “Izmailovo Leisures”, in which famous poets and writers took part, including I. A. Goncharov, Ya. P. Polonsky, A. N. Maikov. In the poem “On the 25th anniversary of Izmailovsky leisure” he recalls:

We intertwined the lyre and sword with flowers

And we didn’t even think about it

How our altar will burn over the years

Light and hot fire.

For reading at these literary evenings, K. R. wrote many poems and began to compose the poem “Manfred Returned.” Special evenings were dedicated to the work of Russian writers and poets. Along with writers, musicians, actors, and scientists took part in the “leisure activities.”

Fate provided Konstantin Konstantinovich with the opportunity to travel a lot and see the world. He spent a lot of time abroad due to poor health. But his thoughts always returned to Russia. In 1887 from Altenburg he wrote:

But I can't wait for the day

When I return from here to you,

To employment, to service and labor.

Konstantin Konstantinovich avoided politics, preferring poetry to it. “How I would like to be able to write poetry constantly, continuously,” he wrote in his diary dated May 8, 1885. Konstantin Konstantinovich was familiar, and sometimes even friendly, with many wonderful Russian writers and poets. The Marble Palace was always open to writers, poets, artists, composers and artists. Among his visitors are I. A. Goncharov, A. N. Maikov, A. A. Fet, Ya. P. Polonsky, A. N. Apukhtin, artist K. Makovsky, composer A. G. Rubinstein; K.R. was on friendly terms with P.I. Tchaikovsky.

In the summer of 1886, the first collection of poems by K.R. was published; It was published in a small edition and did not go on sale. At the end of 1887, K.R. was awarded the title of honorary member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, and on May 3, 1889, by decree of the emperor, he was appointed its president. In the same year, two collections of his poems were published - “Poems by K.R.” (1879-1885) and “New poems by K. R.” (1886-1888), very positively received by the public. It was necessary to have extraordinary energy in order to combine military service, extensive scientific and social work and at the same time write and publish poems. At the same time, the Grand Duke had no right to neglect numerous secular duties, which often caused him nothing but irritation.

In 1889, Konstantin Konstantinovich began translating Shakespeare's Hamlet, and his truly gigantic work continued for almost twelve years. The year 1892 was difficult for the poet: on January 13, his father died, and in the fall, his beloved teacher and friend A. A. Fet died. Over the next few years, Konstantin Konstantinovich wrote almost no original poetry, focusing mainly on

translations.

In 1897 and 1899 The first productions of excerpts from “Hamlet” appeared in K.R.’s translation. The role of Hamlet was performed by Konstantin Konstantinovich himself. The tragedy was staged in its entirety for the first time on the stage of the Hermitage Theater in February 1900, and in the fall the premiere took place at the Alexandria Theater

theater

Konstantin Konstantinovich took an active part in preparing the celebration of Pushkin’s centenary. He headed a special commission for holding celebrations. On his initiative and with his direct participation, an academic edition of Pushkin’s works was prepared, the Pushkin Foundation was founded, a category of fine literature was established in the department of Russian language and literature of the Academy of Sciences, the most famous Russian writers were elected members of the Academy in 1900, an estate was acquired for the treasury Mikhailovskoye, and other anniversary events were also held.

In 1900, two more collections of poems by K.R. were published; he published a lot in the magazines “Russian Antiquity”, “Russian Messenger”, “Russian Review”.March 4 1900 appointed Chief Head of Military Educational Institutions (withMarch 13 1910 - Inspector General of Military Educational Institutions). Under the leadership of the Grand Duke, a lot of work was done to develop and improve training in military educational institutions. In January1901 produced inlieutenant generalsand appointedadjutant general. IN1907 produced ininfantry generals. 2nd of March1911 appointed to attendGoverning Senate (with retention in other positions). IN1913 awarded for meritorious serviceOrder of St. Vladimir 1st degree (4th degree - 1883, 3rd degree - 1896, 2nd degree - 1903).

The events of the Russian-Japanese War and the revolutionary unrest of 1905 left a deep mark on the soul of Konstantin Konstantinovich. Aware of the difficult situation in Russia, he nevertheless did not believe in the reality of the impending catastrophe, maintaining faith in autocracy and the dignity of the House of Romanov. He finds support for himself in these difficult years in activities associated with the name of Pushkin. In 1907, with the direct participation of Konstantin Konstantinovich, the “Regulations on the Pushkin House” at the Academy of Sciences were approved. During these troubled and troubled years, K.R. did not write poetry. Konstantin Konstantinovich acutely feels hostility towards himself as a member of the imperial family, which is reflected in his diary entries. The health of the Grand Duke, who nevertheless continued his social and official activities, was also deteriorating.

In the menacingly alarming last years of K.R.’s life, art remained his only refuge, consolation and means of serving people. In 1910, he completed a translation of Goethe's Iphigenia in Tauris with an extensive research essay on Goethe and his work. He soon begins work on his latest originaldrama a literary work, “The King of the Jews,” which subsequently caused heated controversy in society and attacks from the right, led by Purishkevich. The premiere took place in 1914 in the Hermitage

theater

IN1887 Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich was awarded the title of honorary memberImperial Academy of Sciences , and in1889 was appointed its President (“August President”). On his initiative, the Division of Fine Literature was established at the Department of Russian Language and Literature, according to which famous writers were elected as honorary academicians -P. D. Boborykin ( 1900 ), I. A. Bunin ( 1909 ), V. G. Korolenko ( 1900 ), A. V. Sukhovo-Kobylin ( 1902 ), A. P. Chekhov ( 1900 ) and others. Headed the committee to celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birthA. S. Pushkina . With the assistance of the Grand Duke, a new building was openedZoological Museum in St. Petersburg .

IN1889 elected honorary trustee of the Pedagogical Courses at St. Petersburg girls' gymnasiums. Served as chairmanImperial Russian Archaeological Society (since 1892),Imperial Society of Lovers of Natural History, Anthropology and Ethnography , Imperial Russian Society for Water Rescue,Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society and the St. Petersburg Yacht Club. Full memberImperial Society for the Encouragement of the Arts , Imperial Russian Musical Society . Honorary MemberRussian Astronomical Society , Russian Historical Society , Russian Red Cross Society, Russian Society for the Promotion of Merchant Shipping. The Grand Duke, who himself was a naval sailor in his youth, provided patronage to the Academy of Sciences being equipped where once secretly

were going toDecembrists . He wrote about this to his eldest son: “Mom and I spent a very quiet and pleasant time in Ostashev. It far exceeded Mom's expectations, to my great joy. She really liked both the area and the house, and she wasn’t the only one - everyone was delighted with our new estate.” Since then, the Grand Duke lived for a long time on the banks of the Ruza and raised his children here; one day the whole family took a trip to " First World War ; Theywere detained and expelled from Germany,where did you leave urgently?Andin Russia. The five eldest sons went to the front, and in September his favorite Oleg was seriously wounded and died in the arms of his parents. This wound, inflicted on him by fate, became fatal for Konstantin Konstantinovich. His illness progressed, and on June 2, 1915, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich died .

Almost the main role in the poetic fate of K.R. was played by Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet, who highly appreciated his poetic experiments. He became his teacher, whom K.R. followed and sometimes openly imitated: “No poet captivates me more than Fet; this is true poetry, pure, beautiful, elusive" (August 17, 1888, letter

P.I. Tchaikovsky).

To a certain extent, K.R.’s work stands apart. There is no civic spirit in him, but there is also no pessimism that prevailed in the eighties, characteristic of the work of the idols of the reading public - Apukhtin and Nadson. Nihilism, pessimism, cynicism, so widespread in Russian society at the end of the last century, were completely alien to the worldview of K.R., a poet of bright, life-affirming feelings. For K.R., poetry was a special, created world, sublime and devoid of indispensable reliability, materiality, and everyday prose. He appreciated the semantic capacity of poetry, the subtlety of conveying in poetry all shades of human emotions.

K.R. attached primary importance to the perfection of poetic form and the sound of words. “I began to find special pleasure in trying to sacrifice many successful poems for the sake of maintaining the form and positively prefer poems that are weak in content, but impeccable in form, to poems that, although profound, are vague, drawn out, and tedious in length.”

Largely under the influence of P. I. Tchaikovsky, K. R. strives to comprehend the synthetic nature of Russian artistic culture, especially the relationship between music and poetry, the commonality and difference of their creative worlds.

K.R. considered himself a successor of the Pushkin tradition in Russian poetry; Goncharov, Fet, and many others called him such. The roll call of poetic motifs, the ascent of artistic perception to Christian acceptance of the world and harmony with it - this is what unites the two poets.

Developing in line with traditional classical Russian poetry, K.R.’s lyrical talent is remarkable for its sincerity, melodiousness, and musicality. The author of works filled with bright, life-affirming power, K.R. takes a worthy place among such lyric poets as Fet, Maikov, Polonsky, servants of “pure art.”

Biographical sketch of the life of Grand Duke Konstantin Romanov

February 25, 2016

Not so long ago, for the first time, without censorship, in full and with exhaustive comments, the “Diary of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich (K.R.) 1911-1915” was published. Last June marked one hundred years since his death. The PROZAIK publishing house kindly granted us the right to publish a fragment of the book, but first I would like to preface the publication of selected letters of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich with a biographical sketch. Its author is Vladimir Khrustalev, Candidate of Historical Sciences, an employee of the State Archives of the Russian Federation (GARF), editor, compiler and wonderful commentator on diaries and letters published in a series of books dedicated to the history of the imperial family.

Poet, head of the Academy of Sciences, founder of the Pushkin House, K.R. saw the future of the empire as a synergy of nations and classes in the field of public education and culture. In knowledge there is power, in the general desire for beauty there is moral perfection and valor of citizens, from the private to the sovereign, not revolution, but evolution. With all his advantages and disadvantages, he was a typical representative of the Romanov family. If you understand him, you will understand everyone. On the one hand, members of the imperial family at the turn of the era had an exaggerated sense of honor and duty to the fatherland. They certainly wanted the best. The prosperity of the state-family and family-state was the main motive of their actions and thoughts. Family is the ideal in accordance with which both personal biography and the model of government were built: empire - home, subjects - household members. And vice versa: everything that happens to you and your loved ones does not belong to you alone, but is the property of the state. On the other hand, personal ethics was not a matter of individual choice: the private life of members of the royal family was strictly regulated by law, and it was shaken by the vanity and selfishness of some, the adultery of others, intrigues, and grand-ducal conspiracies. Konstantin Konstantinovich, nicknamed by his contemporaries prince-knight, father of all cadets, was also the father of nine children and a sincerely loving husband, who at the same time found the cause of his deepest suffering in the contradiction of this position with his own homosexuality.

The publication with minor abbreviations was prepared by Alexandra Pushkar

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov (K.R.) - second son of Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich and Grand Duchess Alexandra Iosifovna, cousin of Nicholas II. Born August 10, 1858. His father is the brother of Alexander II, commander-in-chief of the Russian fleet, the closest associate of the reformer tsar in transforming the empire. Her mother was born a German princess of Saxe-Altenburg, her family goes back to the Scottish royal family of the Bruces.

The son of an admiral general, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, was destined for service in the Russian Imperial Navy from childhood. From the age of seven until he reached adulthood, his teacher was Captain 1st Rank Ilya Zelenoy. Like all members of the Imperial family, he received an excellent education. He was taught by historians S.M. Soloviev, K.N. Bestuzhev-Ryumin and O. Shikhovsky, writers I.A. Goncharov and F.M. Dostoevsky, conservatory professors, composers R.V. Kündinger, I.I. Seifert, G.A.Laroche. Lectures on the history of state law were given by Professor I.E. Andreevsky, on political economy - by V.P. Bezobrazov, on Russian literature - by N.A. Sokolov, on general history - by V.V. Bauer. The Grand Duke spoke French, English, German, Latin and Greek, loved music, wrote poetry and plays, acted and staged in the theater, and painted. He, like his father, was close to the views of the Slavophiles.

The Grand Duke was raised in the spirit of Orthodox Christianity, and he was distinguished by his deep religiosity. On March 23, 1876, when he was 17 years old, he wrote in his diary: “I love the Lord so much, so I would like to express my love to Him. Here an inner voice says: “Do astronomy, fulfill your duty...” Is there really a duty in astronomy? Oh, if only I were a disciple of the Savior! How would I walk then after Him, no matter how I listen to all His words! No matter what I do for Him". And later, September 10, 1890: “I have long dreamed, almost as a child, of one day taking the place of Chief Prosecutor of the Synod in order to serve our Church and clergy.”.

Service in the navy for the Grand Duke began in 1870 with annual voyages on the ships of the Naval School. The practice was led by the head of the Naval School, Rear Admiral V.A. Rimsky-Korsakov (brother of the composer N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov). In 1877, already with the rank of midshipman, Konstantin Konstantinovich participated in the Russian-Turkish War. During the fighting, he came under enemy fire and on October 15, 1877, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 4th degree.

On August 9, 1878, Konstantin Konstantinovich received the next rank of lieutenant, and soon the rank of aide-de-camp of the Suite of Emperor Alexander II. On this day he wrote in his diary: “I am an aide-de-camp, today the Emperor granted me this title. What more can I do, in twenty years I have received everything that the most ambitious person can achieve, I even have the Cross of St. George. I don’t know how to thank the Lord God. I ask He only needs help and support for an honest and decent life.".

In September 1880, Konstantin Konstantinovich went as a watch commander on a long voyage (until January 1882) in the Mediterranean Sea on the armored frigate "Duke of Edinburgh". During this campaign he visited the holy land of Jerusalem and Mount Athos. On August 18, 1881, he wrote in his diary about his conversation with the elder of the Athos monastery, Jerome: “I expressed to him the desire to devote my life to improving the life of the clergy and in my old age to take upon myself the angelic image, to be a Bishop and to be useful. He told me: while another service awaits me, other responsibilities, and over time, perhaps the Lord will bless my intention. May God grant that the words of the holy elder come true... I said goodbye to the elder: he blessed me and bowed to the ground. I remembered the bow of elder Zosima (in Dostoevsky) before the future suffering of Dmitry Karamazov. And I, perhaps, will face great suffering ..."

Military service weighed heavily on the Grand Duke. In a letter to his father dated October 13, 1881, he admitted: “I tried to forcibly tie myself to the sea, to force myself to love the navy - but, to my great disappointment, I did not have time to do this. (...) For three years I thought and pondered and came to the conclusion that all my feelings and aspirations were contrary with the position of a sailor. In my last voyages, I reluctantly tried to honestly fulfill my duty and, it seems, never betrayed it. At the same time, thinking that if I have to serve all my life an unlovable object for which I have no attraction, - my life will be one torment and suffering. Of course, while I religiously continue to serve in the navy, I want to sail around the world at all costs, believing that only naval service can serve as preparation for another type of activity, can develop knowledge for me life and people and give me some experience".

At the end of 18"1, Konstantin Konstantinovich fell ill with pneumonia. The diagnosis of life physician S.P. Botkin about the harmful effects of naval service on the health of the Grand Duke decided the question of his future future. On February 22, 1882, due to illness, he was decommissioned from a warship. In in a letter to his father VK reported: “I don’t know what kind of service I will subsequently perform, I would like to according to M<инисте>the people's<ого>enlightenment."

On August 30, 1882, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, with the rank of Life Guards captain, transferred to the Military Department and from December 15, 1883 joined the Izmailovsky Life Guards Regiment, in which he served for seven years, commanding His Majesty’s company from February 15, 1884 ( "Sovereign Company").

Alexander Leontovsky. Portrait of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, President of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. 1906. IRLI (Pushkin House) RAS

The times were troubling. Members of the secret revolutionary organization "People's Will" were preparing new assassination attempts - this time on Emperor Alexander III. On March 1, 1887, Konstantin Konstantinovich writes in his diary: “Again we are destined to live under eternal fear and tremble for the days of the Emperor. Yesterday, on the anniversary of the death of the late Emperor, a terrible plan was discovered. Thank God, the Emperor safely escaped the danger that threatened him. Dad heard about this at dinner with Uncle Misha, who learned the details from Mayor Gresser While the Tsar and the whole family were listening to the funeral liturgy in the Peter and Paul Cathedral, the police seized several people of completely decent appearance, dressed as students; keep an eye on it the day before. They were brought to the house of the mayor (while he was also in the fortress) and small explosive bombs were found on them, hidden in some in a briefcase under their arms, in others in their pockets, and in one - in a book-shaped box specially arranged for this purpose, which he held in his hands. (...) Will this hunt, this persecution, begin again? Is this Sovereign really going to someday fall a victim to murderers?<...>Will the prayers of all Russia not preserve it for us?

Konstantin Konstantinovich connected the future of Russia with autocracy. He was opposed to the constitution and the newly created State Duma as an attempt to limit the power of the tsar. His observations of the heir to the throne, Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich (the future Emperor Nicholas II), made in different years in his diary, are interesting. So, for example, on December 21, 1888, the Grand Duke wrote: “He is gifted with a purely Russian, Orthodox soul, he thinks, feels and believes in Russian...”

While serving in the Izmailovsky regiment, Konstantin Konstantinovich organized a literary and artistic circle called “Izmailovsky Leisures”. The motto of the association was the words “Valour, Kindness, Beauty”, the emblem was a sword and lyre entwined with flowers, and the goal was "to acquaint comrades with their works and the works of various domestic and foreign figures in the field of science and art, but certainly in Russian. (...) Encourage participants to develop their talents. (...) Through the exchange of thoughts and opinions, contribute to the merging of the regimental family together and, finally, to pass on to the Izmailovites of future generations a good example of sound and meaningful passing of idle hours..."

The first meeting took place on November 2, 1884 in the premises of the Officers' Assembly of the Life Guards. Izmailovsky Regiment. The officers read and listened to literary works, played music, and staged plays. “Izmailovo leisure” was a kind of mental and artistic island of military culture in St. Petersburg. They were the first to stage "Hamlet" translated by Konstantin Konstantinovich and his drama "King of the Jews", in which he played the roles of Hamlet and one of Christ's disciples - Joseph of Arimathea. Other members of the Imperial Family also took part in amateur performances.

Konstantin Konstantinovich’s close ties with the Izmailovsky regiment and its “Leisure” were not interrupted until his death, although over time he began to command the Life Guards. Preobrazhensky Regiment. In particular, a letter from Emperor Nicholas II dated September 14, 1912 regarding the production of the drama “King of the Jews” has been preserved. The Emperor informed his cousin: “Dear Kostya, I’ve been meaning to write to you for a long time after reading aloud Alix (Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna - Ed.) of your drama “King of the Jews.” It made a very deep impression on us - more than once tears came to my eyes and my throat ached. I am sure that seeing your drama on stage, hearing in a beautiful paraphrase what everyone knows from the Gospel, all this should give the viewer a truly amazing feeling. Therefore, I fully share the opinion of the Holy Synod on the inadmissibility of staging it on a public stage. But the doors The Hermitage or Chinese theaters may be open to it for performance by participants of the “Izmailovo Leisures”".

Comrade Minister of Internal Affairs (today deputy - Ed.), Moscow general governor and chief of gendarmes V.F. Dzhunkovsky later assessed the production of “The King of the Jews” in St. Petersburg in January 1914: "... Not without excitement and some kind of inner fear, whether I was doing something anti-religious, by going to watch this play from the life of the Savior, I went to this performance. Fortunately, when the curtain opened, my doubts about the content of the drama- the mysteries, as the action of this tragedy, which was the fruit of sincere faith, gradually dissipated. In some places, the tragedy even raised the religious mood highly, evoking a reverent feeling. It was staged with great luxury, strictly historically, the costumes, makeup, everything was consistent. It was especially good production in the 4th act, depicting the garden of Joseph of Arimathea. I returned home under a strong impression and did not regret that I was present at this performance. But at the same time, I could not help but realize that if this tragedy had been staged in a different setting, in an ordinary public theater with mediocre actors and for a paying public, it would be difficult to preserve that religious feeling that did not leave those present in the hall of the Hermitage Theater and forced them to watch the play with precisely this feeling.”

According to historians, a total of 223 “Leisure” events were held, where 1,325 different works were performed.

Konstantin Konstantinovich himself had noticeable artistic abilities. Many contemporaries mentioned this. So, Countess M.E. Kleinmichel noted: “Personally, I didn’t know the Empress very well.<...>I often saw her at theatrical performances in the Hermitage and in the Winter Palace. By the way, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich played Hamlet there, which he beautifully translated into Russian. My daughter played Ophelia. The queen often came to rehearsals. Always cold and indifferent, she seemed to be only concerned with ensuring that there was nothing in Shakespeare’s text that might seem offensive to her. She did not greet anyone. Like ice, she spread the cold around her. The Emperor, on the contrary, was very friendly and very interested in the performance of the artists, all the guards officers he knew. The production of Hamlet became almost an official event - a large sum of money from the Emperor’s personal funds was spent on it. It is difficult to describe the luxury of this production. I am sure that neither Hamlet’s mother nor the king, her husband, ever had such a brilliant retinue as the Russian court arranged for them. Even the queen's pages were real pages of the empress, sons of the best Russian families. This performance was repeated three times - the first time it was given for the court and for the diplomatic corps, the second - for the relatives of the performers, and the third - Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, who was an excellent artist, received permission to perform the role of Hamlet in front of the artists of the imperial theaters - Russian, French and Italian. I would like to emphasize that under no regime have art and artists enjoyed such honor and played such a role as during the monarchy."(Kleinmichel M.E. From a sunken world / Behind the scenes of politics. M., 2001. pp. 483-484.).

Sofia Junker-Kramskaya. Grand Duke K.K. Romanov as Hamlet. 1887. IRLI (Pushkin House) RAS

In the 1900s, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich acted mainly as a translator and playwright. His translation of Shakespeare's Hamlet has been recognized as a classic. In addition to this, he created three independent works on a biblical theme: the dramatic passage “Manfred Reborn”, the poem “Sebastian Martyr” and the drama “King of the Jews” (the idea for the latter was suggested by P.I. Tchaikovsky). The Grand Duke himself played leading roles on the stages of the palace theaters (Chinese - in Tsarskoe Selo, Hermitage - in St. Petersburg).

Konstantin Romanov began writing his own poems as a teenager. During a trip to Crimea in May 1879, he composed the “first successful” poem in Oreanda - it was published in the August 1882 issue of the journal “Bulletin of Europe”:

The waves fell asleep

The vault of the sky is clear;

The full moon is shining

Above the azure waters.

The sea is silvering,

It burns quiveringly...

So is joy and sorrow

It will illuminate brightly.

It was signed with the cryptonym K.R. (Konstantin Romanov). Subsequently, it was set to music by S.V. Rachmaninov.

Apart from the poetic work of K.R. there are military lyrics. In the diary entries of the Grand Duke there is a lot of evidence of how he knew, loved and understood the essence of an ordinary soldier. He works with illiterate recruits, reads books to the soldiers, takes care of their health, regularly tastes the soldiers' food, goes with the soldiers to the shooting range, etc. On February 7, 1884 he writes: “One day I will achieve that the soldiers will see in me not only a boss, but also their man?” It is known that Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich submitted the Most Submissive Note to Emperor Nicholas II “On Trust in the Soldier,” where, in particular, he emphasized: “Soldier is a common, famous name. Both the first general and the last private are called soldiers...” This is what they taught 50 years ago. Now they teach that “the title of a soldier is high and honorable.” (...) Is that what we see? In reality, the soldier is not only not surrounded by respect and honor, but and does not enjoy even the most limited trust of even his closest bosses."

The Grand Duke's views on military service were reflected in his literary work - "Essays on Regimental Life" and in "Soldiers' Sonnets." It is worth noting that the famous poem by K.R. "He died, poor fellow..." became popular. Before the revolution in Russia, this work was included in the programs of many choirs and pop singers. All of Russia sang it - from members of the royal family to ordinary soldiers and disabled people, who perceived it as a folk song. And after the Second World War, one could hear a familiar chant on trains and in markets: “He died, poor fellow! I spent a long time in a military hospital, my dear, but this soldier’s life was gradually finished off by a serious illness.”.

Konstantin Konstantinovich himself critically assessed his work, as can be seen from his diary entries: “Sometimes I have doubts... am I falling into sentimentality, will I end up with a toy, pastoral soldier? It’s scary! I attach considerable importance to these verses.”.

Out of modesty, Konstantin Konstantinovich did not publish his works and even hid his gift until Emperor Alexander III found out about it and allowed their publication. They were published under the initials K.R. (Konstantin Romanov).

The admiral father did not approve of his son's hobbies. In October 1882, Konstantin Konstantinovich asked if he had read his poems about Venice. He replied that he had seen K.R.’s poems in the “Bulletin of Europe”, but that they aroused in him the most unpleasant feeling of shame for his son. And he explained that in childhood he also dabbled in writing poetry, but that his father, Emperor Nicholas I, upon learning of this, fell into anger and gave him a severe reprimand: “My son would rather die than be a poet.” According to Nicholas I, the Grand Duke had no right to engage in anything other than public service.

In 1886, the first collection of the Grand Duke in Russia, “Poems by K.R.”, was published in St. Petersburg in the amount of 1 thousand copies. It was small in format, printed on the best paper and had 228 pages. The Grand Duke bought the entire print run from the printing house. The book did not go on sale, but was sent to august relatives, friends and people of art, whose opinions were dear to him - poets A.A. Fet, Y.P. Polonsky, Ap.N. Maykov, composer P.I. Tchaikovsky and others .

On the memorable day of his thirtieth birthday (August 10, 1888), Konstantin Konstantinovich wrote: “My life and activities are completely defined. For others, I am a military man. For myself, I am a poet. This is my true calling.”

Later, other poetry collections and individual works of the Grand Duke were published: “New poems by K.R. 1886-1888” (St. Petersburg, 1889); "Sebastian the Martyr" (St. Petersburg, 1898); "The third collection of poems by K.R. 1889-1899" (St. Petersburg, 1900); "Poems. 1879-1885" (St. Petersburg, 1909), "Cantata for the bicentenary of the birth of M.V. Lomonosov" (St. Petersburg, 1911); "Poems. 1900-1910" (St. Petersburg, 1911); "Poems. 1879-1912" (in 3 volumes; St. Petersburg, 1913); “Selected Lyrical Works” (Pg., 1915) and “Critical Reviews: Literary Critical Articles on Russian Poetry for 1905-1913” (Pg., 1915).

Many of K.R.'s poems were set to music by famous composers - P.I. Tchaikovsky, A.K. Glazunov, S.V. Rachmaninov, Ts.A. Cui, R.M. Gliere and others. Among them: “Lilac”, “A whiff of bird cherry”, “O child, under your window I will sing a serenade for you...”, “I opened the window”. Tchaikovsky, with whom Konstantin Konstantinovich was friends for many years, wrote eight romances based on his poems. In total, about seventy works by K.R. were set to music.

Konstantin Konstantinovich himself, according to his contemporaries, was a capable composer and talented musician. There are memories of his performances in the Marble Palace in St. Petersburg (his family home) of Mozart's concerto and Tchaikovsky's First Concerto. He also wrote three romances - based on poems by Alexei Konstantinovich Tolstoy, Apollo Nikolaevich Maykov and Victor Hugo.

Since 1887, Konstantin Konstantinovich was an honorary member, and from May 3, 1889 until the end of his life (1915) - President of the St. Petersburg Imperial Academy of Sciences. On May 2, 1889, the Grand Duke made an interesting entry in his diary: “My vain pride was extremely flattered, but at the same time I was quite embarrassed at the thought of such a high position. I have no reason to refuse. In the evening, after dinner, I took a moment to talk with the Emperor face to face. I asked him, how he looks at the proposal made to me. The Emperor answered me that he was glad to see him, said that the President-The Grand Duke can rise above all intrigues, expressed a desire for me to accept this title, and shook my hand. (...) With God, in good time. With God blessing".

Konstantin Konstantinovich had the opportunity to be at the head of the Academy of Sciences for twenty-six long years. With the assistance of the Grand Duke, a number of major scientific and cultural projects were carried out: the Zoological Museum was opened in St. Petersburg, new laboratories and observatories were organized, scientific expeditions were organized, including Spitsbergen - for degree measurements (1898), polar - to explore the archipelago lying to north of the New Siberian Islands (1901), as well as to Mongolia, the Pamirs and Tien Shan. At the request of K.R. an academic commission was established to distribute benefits and pensions among needy scientists, their widows and orphans (50,000 rubles per year). At his request, in 1911 the government bought the Yasnaya Polyana estate from the heirs of Leo Tolstoy, preserving it for Russia. Important undertakings of the Grand Duke were the organization of the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the birth of A.S. Pushkin, the establishment of a fund named after him for the publication of works by Russian writers, a dictionary of the Russian language and other works. In 1899, Konstantin Konstantinovich led the Pushkin Anniversary Committee. On his initiative, the Pushkin House (now the Institute of Russian Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences) was created. The Grand Duke headed several academic commissions - and above all the commission on the reform of Russian spelling. The reform project, later almost completely copied by the Bolsheviks and known as the Soviet decree “On the introduction of a new spelling,” was developed by this commission back in 1904. On the initiative of Konstantin Konstantinovich, a category (department) of fine literature was established at the Academy of Sciences and in 1900 the first nine honorary academicians of the category were elected (including Konstantin Konstantinovich himself, L.N. Tolstoy, A.P. Chekhov, A.F. Koni , V.G. Korolenko, etc.).

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich combined the leadership of the Academy of Sciences with military service. On April 21, 1891, he was promoted to colonel, and on April 23 he was appointed commander of the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment. The heir, Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich, served as an officer in this oldest guards regiment until his ascension to the Russian throne in 1894. Konstantin Konstantinovich was friendly with him and dedicated interesting memories to the Tsarevich’s service in the Preobrazhensky Regiment. It is worth emphasizing that since the ascension of Nicholas II to the Russian throne, Konstantin Konstantinovich’s attitude towards his now reigning cousin has changed somewhat. On November 14, 1894, he recorded in his diary: “Today is the Tsar’s wedding. A few days will pass and the Tsar will keep his promise to me and come to the regiment. I really miss our simple relationship with Niki; we saw each other almost every day for the almost two years that He served in our ranks. Now there can be no mention of the dear past. I will not go to see Him without an invitation, considering it disrespectful and indecent, but He has enough to do without me, and, of course, I do not complain that I am not invited. I say this sincerely .-They chatter that the uncles of the Sovereign are trying to have influence on the Tsar and do not leave Him without advice. But I think that these rumors speak of envy and that they are empty gossip.". Four months later, on March 1, 1895, another entry: "[Grand Duke] Nikolai [Mikhailovich] (...) is very friendly with me, attributes to me great influence on the young Sovereign and reproaches me for not taking advantage of this attention. He is mistaken. There is no influence, and if there was , I would not consider myself to have the right not only to abuse it, but also to use it until I am asked.".

On December 6, 1894, Konstantin Konstantinovich was promoted to the rank of major general with confirmation as commander of the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment. On April 5, 1898, he was enlisted as a major general in the Suite of Emperor Nicholas II. Since March 4, 1900, Konstantin Konstantinovich - Chief Head of military educational institutions of the Russian Empire. He was in charge of cadet corps and military schools. From that moment until the end of his life, he became (according to the apt description of his contemporaries) “the father of all cadets.”

In the order of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich on the department dated February 24, 1901, it was recommended for mandatory leadership: to raise in pupils "consciousness of human dignity and carefully eliminate everything that can offend or humiliate this dignity".

In 1907, through the efforts of the Grand Duke, new educational programs were introduced in military schools - with the aim of "to bring the military knowledge of cadets closer to military life and prepare them for the duties of an educator and teacher of soldiers". In 1909, he began to introduce new programs in the cadet corps, which turned into full-fledged secondary educational institutions that prepared the younger generation for both military service and higher education.

On February 13, 1910, Konstantin Konstantinovich was appointed to a new position - inspector general of military educational institutions, where he remained until the end of his life. He paid a lot of attention to improving the organization of both academic and physical education in cadet corps and military schools and was very popular among their students, who remembered him warmly many decades later.

Military schools, Pazhesky and cadet corps during the First World War continued to train young officers, but at an accelerated rate. As before, in times of peace, the Emperor was present at their graduations. So, for example, on October 1, 1914, Emperor Nicholas II wrote in his diary: “At 2 o’clock in the Grand Palace there was the promotion of pages and cadets to officers - there are about 700 people here, and 2400 people throughout Russia.”

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich was not present at this solemn event. And there was a good reason for this: at that time he was in Vilna, in the hospital, where before his eyes his son Oleg Konstantinovich, who was awarded the Order of St. George the Victorious, died from a serious wound from a German bullet received in a dashing cavalry attack. th degree. Gendarmerie Major General A.I. Spiridovich described the death of Prince Oleg Konstantinovich as follows:

On September 27, in the afternoon, the Guards Cavalry Division advanced towards Vladislavov. In the vanguard were two squadrons of the hussar regiment. Passing near the village of Pilvishki, the advanced units encountered German patrols. A shootout began. Prince Oleg Konstantinovich began to ask the squadron commander to allow him and his platoon to capture the enemy patrol. He did not agree at first, but still gave the order. The prince rushed with a platoon to pursue the Germans. The blood mare Diana carried him far ahead. And when victory had already been achieved, when some of the Germans had already been killed and some had surrendered, one of the wounded German cavalrymen, lying down, took aim at the prince. A shot rang out and the prince fell down, seriously wounded. Then he was transported on a cart to Pilvishki, where he received communion. Then we were taken to Vilna, where we arrived the next day at 10 o’clock in the morning. Examination of the wound showed that putrefactive blood poisoning had begun.<...>

The prince endured the operation well. When in the afternoon a telegram was received from the Sovereign about awarding him the Order of St. George, he was happy<...>.

Prince Oleg's condition worsened: delirium began, his strength was fading. They started giving us champagne. A saline solution was poured into the hand. When the parents arrived in the evening, the prince recognized them and said: “Finally, finally!”

The Grand Duke Father brought the cross of St. George for the wounded man, which was pinned to his shirt. The wounded man was very happy and kissed the cross. He began to tell what the attack was like, but again fell into oblivion. The delirium began. A priest was invited.

Complete silence. The priest whispers his way out, barely audible. Kneeling at the head of the bed, the father carefully closes the eyes of the dying man. His mother desperately tries to warm his hands. Standing at my feet, barely holding back sobs, are brother Igor and an old teacher-friend. At 8:20 a.m. the prince passed away. The Imperial House, in the person of the young hero, suffered its first victim.

Posthumous photograph of Prince Oleg Konstantinovich Romanov

During these years, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, in addition to military educational institutions, also had additional responsible responsibilities. In February 1911, he was appointed senator, and on February 16, 1912, on the initiative of ordinary Cossacks and atamans, he enlisted in the Orenburg Cossack Army. As a member of the Russian Imperial House, he takes part in government affairs, being the chairman of numerous committees and commissions, and a member of the State Council.

Konstantin Konstantinovich, as a person prone to moral analysis, often wrote down critical remarks in his diary. He does not accept many new phenomena of the 20th century: strikes, terror, revolutionary uprisings, the established State Duma, etc. He is horrified that the autocrat has to travel in his own country under heavy security. At the same time, he himself did not humiliate himself to the point of fear of terrorists. So, disregarding the danger, he went to the funeral of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, uncle of Nicholas II, Moscow governor-general, husband of V.K. Elizaveta Fedorovna, who died from a bomb by the Socialist-Revolutionary terrorist I.P. Kalyaev on February 4, 1905. Besides him, the only person from the Romanovs at the funeral was Grand Duke Pavel Alexandrovich. But he arrived from France to Moscow only on the day of the funeral service and burial.

"Here in Moscow,-Konstantin Konstantinovich notes in his diary the day after the terrorist attack,-The absence of immediate family makes a strange and difficult impression.” And further he describes the reaction to these events of Moscow society: “At the site of the death of my poor Sergei, the 5th Kiev Grenadier Regiment erected an iron cross with the image of St. Sergius, the Preobrazhentsy built a lamp. The place is fenced with a wooden lattice. The terrible event seems to me like some kind of dream... In Russia, things are getting worse...-I just can’t believe how quickly we are moving towards unknown but inevitable disasters. There is unbridledness everywhere, everyone is confused..."

The Grand Duke's trip to Moscow for the funeral caused different rumors. Infantry General N.A. Epanchin recalled: "...the heartfelt desire to pay his last respects to his cousin and personally express sympathy for the unfortunate widow is so understandable and does honor to Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich. But this is not how the Royal Family looked at his trip to Moscow. None of the August Persons went to the funeral of the Grand Duke Sergei Aleksanrovich, even his own brothers, and what’s more, they believed that Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich had let them down, because with his presence at the funeral he seemed to emphasize their absence.”

The personal adjutant of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, Colonel V.F. Dzhunkovsky, wrote about the same thing: " ...Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich arrived as a representative of the Sovereign Emperor. They say that at first the Emperor wanted to go to Moscow for his uncle’s funeral, but thanks to Trepov’s influence he did not go. The same happened with Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich, the elder brother of Sergei Alexandrovich, who, as they say, with tears in his eyes begged the Tsar to let him go, but the Tsar did not allow him to go. Meanwhile, I think if the Emperor had not listened to Trepov and had come to Moscow, it would have made a colossal impression and would have raised the Tsar’s halo among the people.”

Back on December 2, 1904, analyzing the course of the Russo-Japanese War and the growing revolutionary events, Konstantin Konstantinovich noted in his diary:

“It’s as if a dam has broken here, in just three months Russia has been gripped by a thirst for change, they are talking about it loudly... The revolution seems to be knocking loudly in the door. They talk about the constitution almost openly. It's embarrassing and scary." And a year later, October 4, 1905: “The government has lost all significance since last year, there is no power, and the general collapse is increasingly shaking poor Russia. Recently Nikolai Mikh<айлович>scared my wife that we all-Imperial Family-they will soon drive away and that we must hurry to save children and movable property. But I cannot and do not want to agree with him and consider it beneath my dignity to take such precautions."

The Tsar's Manifesto of October 17, 1905 on the granting of freedom of conscience and assembly was characterized by Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich on the day of its appearance as follows: "New liberties-not a manifestation of the free will of the Sovereign power, but only a concession wrested from this power by force."

Concessions to liberals and democrats on the part of the Sovereign did not slow down the spontaneous, and sometimes skillfully directed wave of revolutionary uprisings and only added fuel to the fire. In Moscow, things came to an armed uprising and barricades. The Life Guard was sent to pacify the rebels in the ancient capital. On December 10, 1905, Konstantin Konstantinovich wrote: "It seems to me that the troops should act more decisively, then the inevitable bloodshed would end quicker. (...) Someday a historian will look back at the time we are living through with amazement and disgust. Unfortunately, too many Russians have been affected by mental illness."

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich conducted extensive public activities. Just listing all his positions and honorable duties would take several pages. Therefore, in addition to those already mentioned above, we will mention only a few of them: Chairman of the Russian Archaeological Society; vice-chairman of the Russian Musical Society; full member of the Imperial Society for the Encouragement of Arts; honorary member of the Imperial Society of Anthropology and Ethnography, Imperial Mineralogical Society, Imperial Geographical Society, Moscow Society of Naturalists, Russian Historical Society, Russian Astronomical Society, Russian Theater Society, Moscow Archaeological Society, Imperial Institute of Experimental Medicine, St. Petersburg, Kazan, Kiev Universities , Committee for the organization of the Museum of Applied Knowledge in Moscow, Committee for the organization of the Museum of Fine Arts named after Emperor Alexander III (now the State Museum of Fine Arts named after A.S. Pushkin), St. Petersburg Council of Orphanages, Trusteeship of Empress Maria Feodorovna for the Deaf and Mutes, Russian Red Cross Society; trustee of the Women's Pedagogical Institute and the Konstantinovskaya women's gymnasium attached to it, Pedagogical courses at St. Petersburg women's gymnasiums; patron of the All-Russian Union for perpetuating the memory of war heroes and establishing orphanages-schools for war orphans, the Russian Society of Printing Workers, the Komissarovsky Technical School in Moscow, the Pavlovsk St. Petersburg Province city 4-grade school, the Odessa Cadet Corps, schools of the Imperial Russian Technical Society, School of Emperor Alexander II, Port Arthur Pushkin City School, parochial school in the Klimenets Monastery of the Olonets Diocese, Society for the Welfare of Former Students of the 1st Moscow Cadet Corps and the 1st Moscow Military Gymnasium, Society for the Welfare of Former Cadets of the Yaroslavl Cadet Corps and persons who served in it, the Society for Assistance to Needy Suvorovites, the Society for Assistance to Former Junkers of the Alexander Military School... The City Duma of Belgorod elected Konstantin Konstantinovich an Honorary Citizen of their city.

Osip Braz. Portrait of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich. 1912. Museum-reserve "Pavlovsk"

After in 1889 Konstantin Konstantinovich was elected honorary trustee of the Pedagogical Courses at St. Petersburg women's gymnasiums, on his initiative, at his own expense in 1903, instead of the two-year women's Pedagogical courses, a Pedagogical Institute was created in St. Petersburg with a four-year university program, with physics -mathematical and historical-philological faculties. At the institute there was a Konstantinovskaya women's gymnasium, in which those who graduated from the institute, in the fifth year of their stay there, gave lessons in their chosen discipline. The institute graduated nine female teachers.

Konstantin Konstantinovich was the chairman of the Commission for the construction of the monument to A.S. Pushkin in St. Petersburg, under his patronage the Commission worked to collect donations for the monument to I.S. Turgenev in Orel, and at his own expense the monument to M.Yu. Lermontov was opened in St. Petersburg. The Grand Duke was both the initiator and patron of the fund-raising campaign for the construction of the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, opened in 1901.

"It would seem that such a humane and enlightened person as Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich would be an invaluable assistant to the Sovereign in matters of administration of the Empire,- recalls Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich. - But, unfortunately, Konstantin Konstantinovich hated politics and shunned any contact with political figures. He sought, first of all, solitude in the company of books, dramatic works, scientists, soldiers, cadets and his happy family, consisting of his wife, Grand Duchess Elizaveta Mavrikievna (Princess of Saxe-Weimar), six sons and three daughters. In this regard, the will of the Grand Duke was adamant, and therefore the throne was deprived of valuable support in his person."

The wife of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich - nee Princess Elizabeth Augusta Maria Agnes of Saxe-Altenburg, Duchess of Saxony, daughter of Duke Moritz of Saxe-Altenburg and Duchess Augusta of Saxe-Meiningen-Hildburghausen, German by nationality - received the name upon marriage (the wedding took place on April 15, 1884) Grand Duchess Elizaveta Mavrikievna. She did not convert to Orthodoxy and remained a Lutheran until her death. This deprived her children of the right to ascend to the Russian throne, and therefore they were not called grand dukes, but only princes of the imperial blood.

On April 10, 1884, Konstantin Konstantinovich wrote in his diary: "We had a difficult conversation. She flatly refused to venerate the cross and icons and perform our rituals. I persuaded her. She did not agree with my arguments that one should not offend the feelings of an entire people without fulfilling their demands and without honoring what is sacred to them and dearly. She claimed that if she venerated the cross, she would show human fear and sacrifice the fear of God. I did not want to force her convictions. But it hurt me, so much pain that I did not know where to go from anguish, and treated prayer to God. And who got this test? Me, who previously assured that he would not marry a non-Orthodox woman."

It is worth noting in fairness that after some time Elizaveta Mavrikievna was ready to give in to her husband on the issue of faith, but Konstantin Konstantinovich showed a sense of tact and high decency: “My wife agrees that you cannot remain a Protestant when your conviction dictates that the truth is on the side of Orthodoxy, my wife told me that she was hurt for me. I reassured her by saying that even if she wanted to convert to my faith, I would become her to hold back so as not to upset my father-in-law, who was firmly attached to his religion, and told her that, in my opinion, the Lord puts our convictions in our hearts, and therefore we must rely on Him alone.”(diary entry dated January 26, 1891).

The grand ducal couple had nine children - six sons and three daughters: John, Gabriel, Tatiana, Konstantin, Oleg, Igor, George, Natalya and Vera. In a large and friendly family, Konstantin Konstantinovich was a loving but strict father. His son Gabriel wrote about him:

The bright image of my father stands before my eyes: tall, with a light brown beard and very beautiful hands, with long fingers covered with rings.<...>Father was very strict with us, and we were afraid of him. “I can’t” or “I don’t want” should not have existed for us. But my father also developed independence in us: we had to do everything ourselves, keep the toys in order, put them in place ourselves. My father couldn’t stand it when foreign words were inserted into Russian speech; he wanted Russian to be our first language. That’s why we had Russian nannies, and everything was done in Russian. In my father’s prayer room, in the Marble Palace, between the office and the corridor, there were many images hanging and a lamp was always glowing. Every day they brought to the chapel from our home church an icon of the Saint whose day it was. These icons, all in the same style, were given to my father by my uncles Sergei Alexandrovich and Pavel Alexandrovich. Later, when we grew up and came to our father on our own to say hello, the valet on duty told us that we couldn’t go in because “dad was praying.”<...>My father read and wrote a lot. He closely followed both Russian and foreign literature and read as many new books as possible.<...>In the evenings, after dinner, my father, with a cigar in his mouth, sat down at his desk again. His small, cozy office always smelled so good of cigars... In the family circle, he did not like to talk about his affairs, much less- worries. When he had troubles, he experienced them in silence, “carried them in his heart,”- That's why it didn't last long.

Konstantin Konstantinovich himself wrote with satisfaction in his diary: “Looking at our children, I remember my childhood and am amazed, noticing the difference between us. We have never been as attached to our parents as our children are to us. For them, for example, it is a great pleasure to run into our rooms and walk with us. “When we were very little, we approached Mom’s door with fear” (June 26, 1894); “The other day, our Kostya, saying goodbye to me before going to bed, hugged me tightly and said: “I love you very much.” I ask: “How do you love me?” He replies: “To the point of blood and death.” And where would a six-year-old child come up with such an idea?”(March 19, 1897).

The depth of his father’s feelings was expressed in his “Lullaby,” dedicated to the birth of his first child:

“At times, melancholy attacks me, and I cry easily. Horror and trembling take over when you think that the same thing could happen to four sons, who soon need to return to the active army, as with Oleg. You remember the myth of Niobe, who was supposed to to lose all our children. Is this really destined for us too? And I hasten to repeat: “Thy will be done.”

Konstantin Konstantinovich had a presentiment of his imminent death and sought to make the appropriate orders. He bequeathed his diaries and part of his correspondence to the Academy of Sciences, stipulating a prohibition period for their publication. He died of a heart attack in the fifty-seventh year of his life on June 2, 1915 in the Pauline Palace (not far from Petrograd) and on June 8 he was buried in the grand ducal tomb of the Peter and Paul Cathedral of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

On June 2, Nicholas II wrote in his diary: "After the report, little Georgy Konst came in<антинович>and reported the death of Kostya. At 9¼ we went to Pavlovsk for the first funeral service. There were: t<етя>Olga(Grand Duchess Olga Konstantinovna), Mavra(Grand Duchess Elizaveta Mavrikievna) and Mitya; none of the adult sons. Returned home at 10¾". On June 8, he made another sad note: " At 10.10 I went with Ella, O<льгой>, T<атьяной>them<арией>into the city directly to the Peter and Paul Cathedral. The funeral liturgy and funeral service lasted two and a half hours. It was sad to look at Comrade Olga, Mavra and especially poor Tatyana Konst<антиновну>when they lowered Kostya’s body into the grave!”

“This was a great loss both for the Sovereign and for the entire royal family, who lost in the person of the late most noble Grand Duke, a devoted and selfless servant of the Throne,- V.F. wrote in his memoirs. Dzhunkovsky. - Everyone who knew him and had the good fortune to communicate with him could not help but mourn this Grand Duke-Knight.<...>I personally knew the Grand Duke well, who was always very kind and attentive to me; he was a rare family man, he always behaved simply, his modesty and delicacy were extraordinary. He left a particularly good memory among the students of military educational institutions for which he was a real loving father, very often visited schools and buildings, spending whole days among the pupils and being interested not only in their successes, but also in the conditions of their family life, coming to the aid of everyone in need. He was buried on June 8 in the Peter and Paul Cathedral, in a new tomb with the usual ceremony. The transportation of his body from Pavlovsk to Petrograd was very solemn.".

The Manifesto of Nicholas II dated June 2, 1915 on the death of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich says: “The late Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich devoted his life to domestic science and put a lot of work and care into the highest management of the military education of youth, which produced such a valiant composition of officers, whose heroic exploits in the present war will forever be imprinted in the history of the Russian army.”

This royal Manifesto sums up the life path of the Grand Duke and his services to the Fatherland. On our own behalf, we would add with hope that a renewed Russia will remember Konstantin Romanov with gratitude more than once. After many years of silence, social experiments, ideological cliches, through the works of historians and archivists, the bright memory of this extraordinary man is finally returning to us. So let's cherish this memory. Poems and plays by K.R., his thoughts scattered in diaries and letters, museums, monuments, conservatories, theaters built with his assistance and direct participation, cadet corps created by him (now this tradition is being revived) - all this calls on us to love our Fatherland, work for its good, protect it, be proud of it. The publication of the diaries presented in this volume is only the first sign of the return of the handwritten heritage of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov, but it will also help to gain a more complete understanding of the history of our Motherland. Now - after reading the primary sources - each reader has the opportunity to draw his own conclusions.

Author - A-delina. This is a quote from this post

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov.

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, poetic pseudonym K.R. (August 10, 1858, Strelna - June 2, 1915, Pavlovsk) - member of the Russian Imperial House, adjutant general (1901), general of infantry (1907), inspector general of Military training institutions, president of the Imperial St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences (1889), poet, translator and playwright.

Leontovsky Alexander Mikhailovich. The main head of military educational institutions, Lieutenant General Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich in 1901.

The second son of Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich and Grand Duchess Alexandra Iosifovna, grandson of Nicholas I. At baptism, he was awarded the orders of St. Apostle Andrew the First-Called, St. Alexander Nevsky and St. Anna of the 1st degree, appointed chief of the Tiflis Grenadier Regiment and included in the lists of the Life Guards. Guards Horse and Izmailovsky Regiments, Life Guards Battery No. 5 of the 3rd Guards and Grenadier Artillery Brigade (1st Battery of the Life Guards 3rd Artillery Brigade) and the Guards crew. In 1859 he was enrolled in the lists of the Life Guards of the 4th Infantry Battalion of the Imperial Family. In 1865, he was promoted to ensign and awarded the Order of the White Eagle and St. Stanislaus, 1st degree.

Grand Duchess Alexandra Iosifovna with her children.

Alexandra Iosifovna and Konstantin Nikolaevich with their daughter Olga./ Konstantin Konstantinovich in childhood.

On the right is Photographer S. Bergamasco. Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich as Mozart. 1880s

Received a comprehensive home education. Famous historians S. M. Solovyov, K. N. Bestuzhev-Ryumin, music critic G. A. Larosh, cellist I. I. Seifert, pianist Rudolf Kündinger, writers I. A. Goncharov and F took part in his training and education. M. Dostoevsky. From childhood, the Grand Duke was prepared for service in the navy. At the age of 7, Captain 1st Rank A.I. Zelenoi was appointed his teacher, who held this position until the Grand Duke came of age. Classes were conducted according to the Naval School program. In 1874 and 1876, as a midshipman, he made long voyages to the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea on the frigate Svetlana. In August 1876, he passed the exam for the Naval School program and was promoted to the rank of midshipman.

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich.

Participant in the Russian-Turkish War of 1877-1878. On October 17, 1877, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 4th degree: “In retribution for courage and stewardship in the matter with the Turks on the Danube near Silistria, on October 2, 1877, where His Highness personally launched a fire-ship against a Turkish steamer.” In May 1878 he was promoted to naval lieutenant. In August 1878 he was appointed aide-de-camp. In January-September 1880 he commanded a company of the Guards crew. In September 1880, he was appointed watch commander on the ship "Duke of Edinburgh", on which he was sailing in the Mediterranean until January 1882. During this voyage, in the summer of 1881, Konstantin Konstantinovich visited Athos; in a conversation with the elder, he expressed a desire to “bring great benefit” in the priesthood, but the elder said that “for now, another service, other responsibilities await me, and over time, perhaps the Lord will bless the intention. God grant that the words of the holy elder come true.”

Left: Photographer A. Pasetti. Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich in the garden. 1880s

In 1882, due to illness, he was transferred to the land department and in August he was promoted to staff captain of the guard. In December 1883, Konstantin Konstantinovich was appointed commander of the company of His Majesty's Life Guards Izmailovsky Regiment. Until the end of 1883, he was on vacation abroad, during which he met his future wife, Elisabeth Augusta Maria Agnes, the second daughter of the Prince of Saxe-Altenburg, Duke Moritz of Saxony. This acquaintance became decisive in Constantine’s choice, and he “expressed a desire” to become Princess Elizabeth’s groom. However, the princess's parents did not agree. Konstantin showed enviable persistence, and his parents agreed to their marriage. By that time, the Grand Duke had already left for Russia, and the bride sent him an encrypted telegram: “The piano has been purchased.” This meant that Konstantin could come to Altenburg to officially ask for her hand.

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich./ Elizabeth and Konstantin. 1884-85

Princess Elizabeth.

In 1884, Konstantin Konstantinovich married Princess Elizabeth (Russian name Elizaveta Mavrikievna; she did not convert to Orthodoxy). His wife was his second cousin (both were descendants of Emperor Paul I). The Romanovs gave her a contemptuous nickname - Mavra. It seemed to Konstantin that with this woman he would find family happiness, their home would be warm and cozy. He affectionately called her Lilinka and dreamed that he would find a spiritual friend in his wife. But the Grand Duke was cruelly mistaken. Mavra turned out to be a simple, down-to-earth creature, she was a little stupid and was not interested in anything other than everyday affairs, gossip and raising children. “She rarely has real conversations with me. She usually tells me common things. You need a lot of patience. She considers me much higher than herself and is surprised at my gullibility. She has the common Altenburg family suspicion, boundless timidity, emptiness and devotion to news that seems to me not worth any attention. Will I ever remake it in my own way?” – asked Konstantin. He tried his best to captivate his wife with lofty themes, poetry, literature in general. Not a damn thing! When Konstantin once read Dostoevsky to her (she did not speak or understand German or Russian), trying to convey to her the meaning of “Crime and Punishment,” he noticed that she dozed off. It was a shock for him. After this incident, educational sessions with Mavra ended. She showed no interest in them, and he did not intrude anymore.

Leontovsky Alexander Mikhailovich. Portrait of Grand Duchess Elizaveta Mavrikievna.

Braz Osip Emmanuilovich. Portrait of Grand Duchess Elizaveta Mavrikievna. 1912

The marriage produced nine children:
*John (1886-1918), killed by the Bolsheviks;
*Gabriel (1887-1955), was arrested, saved from execution by Maxim Gorky, went to Finland, and then to Paris; author of memoirs;
*Tatyana (1890-1979), married Konstantin Bagration-Mukhransky, who died at the beginning of the First World War. In 1921 she married Alexander Korochentsov, who died a year later. She ended her life in a monastery;
*Konstantin (1891-1918), lieutenant of the Life Guards Izmailovsky Regiment, Knight of St. George, killed by the Bolsheviks.
*Oleg (1892-1914), died at the front during the First World War;
*Igor (1894-1918), killed by the Bolsheviks;
*George (1903-1938), died in New York at the age of 35 after an unsuccessful operation;
*Natalia (1905), died in infancy;
*Vera (1906-2001), never married. She died in New York.

Children of Konstantin Konstantinovich (postcard).

Photo from the 1890s. Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov, his wife Elizaveta Mavrikievna and their eldest children John, Gabriel, Tatiana, Konstantin, Oleg and Igor (George).

Family of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov. 1903

Family of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov. 1905

Family of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov. 1909

The diary entries of the Grand Duke, transferred by K.R. to the archives of the Russian Academy of Sciences with the condition of publication no earlier than 90 years after his death (published in 1994), contain references to homosexual contacts of Konstantin Konstantinovich: “My secret vice completely took possession of me. There was a time, and quite a long one, that I almost defeated him, from the end of 1893 to 1900. But since then, and especially since April of this year (just before the birth of our charming George), I slipped and rolled again and am still rolling, as if on an inclined plane, lower and lower.”

In 1887 he was promoted to captain of the guard, and on April 23, 1891 - to colonel and appointed commander of the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment. In 1894 he was promoted to major general, with confirmation as regiment commander. In 1898 he was appointed to His Majesty's Suite. In 1887 he was elected an honorary member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, and in 1889 he was appointed its President (“August President”). On his initiative, the Division of Fine Literature was established at the Department of Russian Language and Literature, according to which famous writers were elected as honorary academicians - P. D. Boborykin (1900), I. A. Bunin (1909), V. G. Korolenko (1900) , A.V. Sukhovo-Kobylin (1902), A.P. Chekhov (1900) and others. He headed the committee to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of A.S. Pushkin. With the assistance of the Grand Duke, a new building of the Zoological Museum was opened in St. Petersburg.

Repin Ilya Efimovich. Portrait of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov. 1891

In 1889 he was elected honorary trustee of the Pedagogical Courses at St. Petersburg girls' gymnasiums. He was the chairman of the Imperial Russian Archaeological Society (since 1892), the Imperial Society of Lovers of Natural History, Anthropology and Ethnography, the Imperial Russian Society for Water Rescue, the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society and the St. Petersburg Yacht Club. Full member of the Imperial Society for the Encouragement of the Arts, Imperial Russian Musical Society. Honorary member of the Russian Astronomical Society, Russian Historical Society, Russian Red Cross Society, Russian Society for the Promotion of Merchant Shipping. The Grand Duke, who himself was a naval sailor in his youth, provided patronage to the Russian polar expedition of Baron E. V. Toll, equipped by the Academy of Sciences.

On the right is Konstantin Konstantinovich in stage costume.

On March 4, 1900, he was appointed Chief of Military Educational Institutions (from March 13, 1910 - Inspector General of Military Educational Institutions), after which he toured all the institutions entrusted to him. As a result of the inspection, an order appeared in which the Grand Duke spoke about the tasks of military education: “A closed institution is obliged, as its students grow morally, to gradually raise in them the consciousness of their human dignity and to carefully eliminate everything that can humiliate or insult this dignity. Only under this condition can high school students become WHAT they should be - the color and pride of their institutions, friends of their teachers and reasonable guides of public opinion of the entire mass of students in a good direction.”

He visited Odessa twice to observe the construction of the Cadet Corps, and on October 6, 1902, he was present at the consecration of the corps church in memory of the holy Equal-to-the-Apostles brothers Cyril and Methodius. The next day, the Grand Duke became acquainted with those newly admitted to the corps. In the hall of the 3rd company, in the presence of the Grand Duke, a musical and literary evening took place with the participation of a choir of singers, a brass corps orchestra and individual cadet performers. “I get the most pleasant impression from the Odessa Cadet Corps, from the consecration of its temple and everything I saw,” were the words of the Grand Duke before his departure. In memory of those events, in 1999 in Odessa, on the territory of the former Cadet Corps, a bust of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich was erected. In December 2015, the monument was dismantled.

On the right is a monument in Odessa.

In January 1901, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich was promoted to lieutenant general and appointed adjutant general. In 1907 he was promoted to infantry general. On March 2, 1911, he was appointed present in the Governing Senate (with retention in other positions). In 1913, for meritorious service, he was awarded the Order of St. Vladimir, 1st degree (4th degree - 1883, 3rd degree - 1896, 2nd degree - 1903). He was also the chief of the 2nd battalion of the Life Guards of the 4th Infantry Regiment of the Imperial Family, on the lists of the Life Guards of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, the Pavlovsk Military and Konstantinovsky Artillery Schools, the Corps of Pages and the Orenburg Cossack Army. Honorary member of the Nikolaev Engineering Academy (since 1904), the Imperial Military Medical Academy and the Mikhailovsky Artillery Academy.

Leontovsky Alexander Mikhailovich. Portrait of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, President of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. 1906

Konstantin Konstantinovich had a weakness for the “nests of the nobility” near Moscow and in 1903 acquired the Ostashevo estate on the banks of the Ruza River, where the Decembrists once secretly gathered. He wrote about this to his eldest son: “Mom and I spent a very quiet and pleasant time in Ostashev. It far exceeded Mom's expectations, to my great joy. She really liked both the area and the house, and she wasn’t the only one - everyone was delighted with our new estate.” Since then, the Grand Duke lived for a long time on the banks of the Ruza and raised his children here; one day the whole family traveled along the “golden ring” all the way to Romanov-Borisoglebsk and Uglich.

Braz Osip Emmanuilovich. Portrait of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich. 1912

He was a famous Russian poet, author of several collections. The first poetic works were published in the journal "Bulletin of Europe" in 1882. The first collection, which included poems from 1879-1885, was published in 1886. In 1888 he published the first poem "Sebastian the Martyr", then the collections "New Poems by K.R." “The third collection of poems by K.R.” (1900), “Poems by K. R.” (1901). He belonged to the so-called old school and was a continuer of classical traditions. The poet K.R. did not possess first-class talent, but he took his place in the history of Russian literature. Many of his poems were distinguished by melody and were set to music (the most famous is the romance “I opened the window...” with music by P. I. Tchaikovsky, who also composed music for “I didn’t love you at first...”, “The separation is over” and other poems K.R.). For the 100th anniversary of the birth of A.S. Pushkin, he wrote the text of the Solemn Cantata in memory of the poet. The cantata was set to music by Alexander Glazunov and performed at a solemn emergency meeting of the Academy of Sciences in honor of the anniversary. M. A. Bulgakov used K. R.’s play on the gospel story “The King of the Jews” and the author’s notes to it as material for the novel “The Master and Margarita.” But K.R.’s poems, “The poor man died in a military hospital,” gained special, popular love. The song performed by Nadezhda Plevitskaya to the music of Yakov Prigozhey, recorded on a gramophone and distributed in the form of a gramophone record to the most remote corners of the Russian Empire (and then Russian emigrants spread it throughout the world), was popular among the soldiers of the First World War not only because of its special penetration. Already as an official, Konstantin Konstantinovich took all measures to revise the regulations on soldier’s funerals, and soon new rules for the burial of lower ranks were approved. As a result, in 1909, the “Rules for Burial of Lower Ranks” were adopted - an example of the state’s respectful attitude towards the deceased, regardless of their social status and service rank.

K.R. translated into Russian the tragedy of F. Schiller “The Bride of Messina”, the tragedy of J.V. Goethe, Shakespeare’s “King Henry IV”. Author of a successful translation of Shakespeare's Hamlet into Russian, on which he worked from 1889 to 1898; a translation with extensive commentary in 3 volumes was published in 1899 and was reprinted several times. In 1897 and 1899, excerpts from the play were staged in an amateur theater, and K.R. himself. played the role of Hamlet. The entire play was staged in February 1900 on the stage of the Hermitage Theater, and in the fall of the same year in Alexandrinka.

Sofya Ivanovna Junker-Kramskaya. Grand Duke K.K. Romanov as Hamlet. 1887

He owned the Marble (Konstantinovsky) palace and apartment building (21 Spasskaya Street) in St. Petersburg, a palace in Pavlovsk, and the Ostashevo estate in Mozhaisky and Ruzsky districts. Moscow province, part of the Uch-Dere estate in the Sochi district of the Black Sea province, plots of land in the area of ​​the Kherati and Kudebti rivers in the Black Sea province (1287 des., together with his brother Dmitry), two separate plots from the Mir state forest dacha of the Serpukhov forestry of Podolsk district. Moscow lips The summer of 1914, Konstantin Konstantinovich with his wife and younger children spent in Germany, his wife’s homeland, where they were caught by the outbreak of the First World War; were detained and expelled from Germany. The Grand Duke experienced a new severe shock in the fall of 1914 with the death of his son, Prince Oleg. These trials undermined the already fragile health of the Grand Duke.

Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich died on June 2, 1915, in his office in the palace in Pavlovsk, in the presence of his 9-year-old daughter Vera, and there was a burial service in the palace church. He was the last of the Romanovs to die before the revolution and was buried in the grand ducal tomb of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

Memoirs of Prince Gabriel Konstantinovich.

“My father bequeathed to be buried in the uniform of the 15th Grenadier Regiment. Arriving at the Alexander Palace, I asked to report myself to the Emperor. He received me in his office and ordered me to dress my father in a tunic. From the Sovereign I stopped by the Chief Marshal, Count. Benkendorf, also on behalf of his uncle, to ask whether the St. George Cross should be put on his father. Benckendorf said that there is no need to wear the St. George Cross. The father was embalmed in the mezzanine room, next to the office of Emperor Paul. Doctors discovered an ulcer in the heart. Now my father’s words have become clear that sometimes he feels “wounds in his heart.” However, he rarely complained about his suffering and kept everything to himself. After one of the funeral services in my father’s office, my uncle, my brothers and I, and the officials of our court, put my father in a coffin. The coffin was moved to the second floor, to the magnificent rotunda. Three flags were placed at my father’s head: an admiral’s, a vice-admiral’s, and a rear admiral’s, since my father was a member of the Guards crew. On both sides of the coffin there was a guard from the Military Educational Institutions, as well as from the units in which the father was registered. Unfortunately, the father's body was poorly embalmed and his facial expression changed.

It was covered with a gold brocade coverlet trimmed with ermine. Chandeliers with lit candles stood around the coffin. The atmosphere was very solemn. During one of the funeral services, a Horse Guardsman standing sentry at the coffin with a rifle over his shoulder fainted. A lot of people came to the funeral services. The Family stood in the rotunda itself, and the audience stood nearby, in the Greek Hall and on the landing of the stairs. The removal of my father’s body from the Pavlovsk Palace and its transportation to Petrograd, to the Peter and Paul Fortress, took place on the eighth day after his death. The take-out took place after breakfast, at about three o'clock. The Emperor, Pavel Alexandrovich and Georgy Mikhailovich arrived. Other members of the Family met their father’s body in Petrograd, at the Tsarskoye Selo station, on the Tsarskaya Line. The Emperor followed the coffin through the palace courtyard and then left for Tsarskoe Selo. All the others accompanied the coffin to the Pavlovsky station and went with it to Petrograd on a special train.

There were a lot of people standing along the highway along which my father’s coffin was being transported to Pavlovsk. As we approached the station, the orchestra, which was giving concerts in the station hall, began playing a funeral march. Our train approached the platform of the Tsarskaya Line in Petrograd, where the meeting was prepared. The Emperor stood on the platform along with both Empresses. They wore crepe black dresses and St. Andrew's ribbons. To the sounds of “How Glorious,” the coffin was taken out of the carriage and placed on the carriage of the Konstantinovsky Artillery School, in which the father was enrolled. The drivers were school cadets. Pages with torches walked along the sides of the coffin. Empresses and grand duchesses rode in ceremonial funeral carriages. Mother and nine-year-old sister Vera rode in the same carriage with Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. Along the path of the sad procession there were troops. Ioanchik and I walked along the uncle’s sides.

The next day, after the father’s body was transported to the Peter and Paul Fortress, there was a funeral service and funeral. The coffin stood high under the canopy. There was a guard around him. To the right of the Family, next to Grand Duke Georgiy Mikhailovich, stood the English Ambassador Buchanan, the same one who contributed to our “great and bloodless” revolution.

Mother behaved calmly and, as always, with great dignity. When the coffin lid was slowly closed, mother bent lower and lower to see the face of the deceased until the last moment. They buried my father in a new tomb, in the same place where my grandparents and my sister Natalya were buried. The coffin was lowered into a very deep and narrow well. Thank God, my father’s valet, Fokin, who had been with his father since the Russian-Turkish War, remembered that his father always carried with him a box of soil from Strelna, where he was born. He brought it with him to the tomb and this earth was poured onto the lid of the coffin when he was lowered to his resting place. On the lid of this metal box were engraved, in mother’s handwriting, the words of Lermontov: “Is it possible not to remember your homeland?”

The well was covered with a slab, the same as those on other graves. Before my father’s funeral, I didn’t think that coffins were lowered into such deep and narrow wells. The tombstones are made flush with the stone floor. Previously, all persons of the Dynasty were buried in the Peter and Paul Cathedral itself, and tall white marble sarcophagi with a golden cross were placed over each grave. You could kneel in front of the sarcophagus, lean on it and pray. Thus, you felt close to your dear deceased. And in the tomb, your dear departed were somewhere under your feet. How to approach them and how to feel close to them?

Elizaveta Mavrikievna, widowed in 1915, after the February Revolution of 1917, first went to Sweden, and from there to Germany, to her native Altenburg, where she died in 1927.

In 2014, with the assistance of members of the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society, a memorial plaque was erected in Orel to Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, who repeatedly visited the Oryol Bakhtin Cadet Corps.

One version of why the adjective “blue” began to denote homosexuals is that previously homosexuality was characteristic only of the aristocratic strata of society. To those who have blue blood flowing in their veins.
In the Russian Empire there were clans with “blueder” blood than the Romanovs, and maybe that’s why homosexuals among the members of the Imperial House can be counted on one hand. One well-known (largely thanks to Boris Akunin’s book “Coronation, or the Last of the Romanovs”) is Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, uncle of Nicholas II and governor of Moscow.
He never hid his inclinations, although he was married, preferred to sleep with his adjutants, and did not see any sin in it. But there was another case.

“Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich” I.E. Repin, 1891

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Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich Romanov was born on August 22 (August 10, O.S.) 1858, and was the second son of Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich Romanov. Among the ever-repeating Nikolaevs, Alexandrovs and Konstantinov Romanovs, you can get confused, so I will only say that Konstantin Konstantinovich was the younger brother of the more famous.
But unlike his scandalous brother, Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich was a model for example. As a midshipman in the Russian fleet, in the Russian-Turkish War of 1877-1878, in a battle near Silistria on the Danube, he sank a Turkish ship, for which he was awarded the Cross of St. George, IV degree. In 1882, due to illness, he was transferred to the guard and five years later became commander of the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment. He was president of the Academy of Sciences and one of the founders of the Pushkin House.
Konstantin Konstantinovich was also known as the most educated man of his time, an excellent pianist and the most famous poet of that era, writing under the pseudonym “K.R.” All reading Russia knew his romantic poems, girls copied them into their girlish diaries and albums, and Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Alyabyev and many other composers wrote romances on them. Here is a typical example of the work of the poet K.R.:
When a cold wave hits me
The scope of the world is vanity,
The star will be my guiding star
Love and beauty.

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He was successfully married to his distant relative (they were both great-great-grandsons of Emperor Paul I), the German princess Elisabeth of Saxe-Altenburg. Upon arrival in Russia, she began to be called Elizaveta Mavrikievna, but did not convert to Orthodoxy, remaining a Lutheran. The Grand Duchess loved her husband tenderly and selflessly, he reciprocated her feelings, and in their marriage they had nine children.

Konstantin Konstantinovich was lucky - he suffocated during an attack of angina pectoris in the Pavlovsk Palace in 1915, and became the last of the Romanovs who died before the revolution and were solemnly buried in the grand ducal tomb of the Peter and Paul Fortress.
He did not live to see the fall of the monarchy and the Russian Empire, the death of his sons John, Konstantin and Igor, who the day after the execution of the royal family were thrown alive into a mine near Alapaevsk.
But his daughter, Grand Duchess Vera Konstantinovna, lived to be 94 years old and died in 2001, becoming today the last of the Romanovs who remembered pre-revolutionary life (in this photo she is in her father’s arms).

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Throughout his life, K.R. kept diary entries, which, according to his will, after his death were transferred to the archives of the Academy of Sciences with the condition of publication no earlier than 90 years later.
Russian historians violated the will of the deceased, and these diaries were published 79 years after the death of K.R., in 1994, and plunged historians into some confusion - it turns out that the happy father of the family and an excellent family man, Konstantin Konstantinovich, was a secret homosexual all his life. And in his diaries he described his homosexuality with extraordinary frankness. Here are just a few of the Grand Duke's notes:

December 28, 1903 - St. Petersburg.
My life flows happily, I am truly “fate’s darling”, I am loved, respected and appreciated, I am lucky in everything and succeed in everything, but... there is no main thing: peace of mind.
My secret vice completely took possession of me. There was a time, and quite a long one, that I almost defeated him, from the end of 1893 to 1900. But since then, and especially since April of this year (just before the birth of our charming George), I slipped and rolled again and am still rolling, as if on an inclined plane, lower and lower.
Meanwhile, I, who stand at the head of the upbringing of many children and youth, must know the rules of morality.
Finally, I am no longer young, married, I have 7 children, the eldest are almost adults, and old age is just around the corner. But I’m like a weather vane: sometimes I accept a firm intention, pray fervently, spend an entire mass in fervent prayer, and then immediately, when a sinful thought appears, everything is immediately forgotten, and I again fall under the power of sin.
Is it really impossible to change for the better? Am I really going to wallow in sin?

April 19, 1904 - St. Petersburg.
I feel bad again in my soul, sinful thoughts, memories and desires haunt me again. I dream of going to the bathhouses on the Moika or having a bathhouse flooded at home, I imagine my familiar bathhouse attendants - Alexei Frolov and especially Sergei Syroezhkin. My lusts always related to simple men; outside their circle I did not look for and did not find participants in sin. When passion speaks, the arguments of conscience, virtue, and prudence fall silent.

June 23, 1904 - St. Petersburg.
I again gave up fighting my lust, it wasn’t that I couldn’t, but I didn’t want to fight. In the evening they heated our bathhouse for me; The bath attendant Sergei Syroezhkin was busy and brought his brother, a 20-year-old guy named Kondraty, who works as a bath attendant at the Usachev Baths. And I brought this guy into sin. Perhaps I made him sin for the first time and only when it was too late did I remember the terrible words: woe to him who seduces one of these little ones.

All his life, Konstantin Konstantinovich successfully hid his secret sin from those around him, who did not even suspect his homosexual inclinations (the Grand Duke sinned only with commoners). But why did he decide to make all this public, even 90 years after his death?
Either it was extremely important for him as a manifestation of the integrity of his personality, or for the edification of his descendants, or just like that. I don't know... I have no explanation. Maybe you have them?