At the end of March, Goloshchekin left for Moscow. He reported to Sverdlov on the situation in Tobolsk, warning of the need for urgent measures to prevent the Imperial family’s escape. Approximately at the same time—the first week of April—the Presidium of the CEC in Moscow also heard a report on the situation in Tobolsk from a representative of the local guard. According to an account given to the CEC by Sverdlov on May 9, this information persuaded the government to authorize the transfer of the ex-Tsar to Ekaterinburg. This explanation, however, is a post facto attempt to justify events which unfolded contrary to the government’s intentions. For it is known that on April 1 the Presidium resolved “if possible” to bring the Romanovs to Moscow.17
On April 22, there appeared in Tobolsk Vasilii Vasilevich Iakovlev, an emissary from Moscow. Long a mysterious figure, suspected even of being an English agent, he has recently been identified as an old Bolshevik whose real name was Konstantin Miachin. Born in 1886 near Orenburg, he had joined the Social-Democratic Party in 1905 and taken part in many Bolshevik armed robberies (“expropriations”). In 1911 he emigrated under false identity (Iakovlev) and worked in Belgium as an electrician. He returned to Russia after the February Revolution. In October 1917 he served on the Military-Revolutionary Committee and was a delegate to the Second Congress of Soviets. In December 1917 he was appointed to the Collegium of the Cheka. He participated in the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly.18 In other words, he was a tried and trusted Bolshevik.
Iakovlev-Miachin was silent about the ultimate purpose of his mission, and Communist sources have been similarly reticent. But it can be established with certainty that his task was to bring Nicholas, and, if feasible, the rest of his family, to Moscow, where the ex-Tsar was to stand trial. This can be established from circumstantial evidence: common sense dictates that the government would not have sent an emissary from Moscow to Tobolsk, nearly 2,000 kilometers away, to escort the Imperial family to nearby Ekaterinburg, especially since the Ekaterinburg Bolsheviks were most eager to have them in their custody. But there exists also direct evidence to this effect, supplied by N. Nemtsov, a Bolshevik commissar from Tiumen and chairman of the Perm Guberniia Central Executive Committee. Nemtsov recounts that in April he had a visit from Iakovlev, who appeared with a “Moscow detachment” of forty-two men:
[Iakovlev] presented me with a mandate for the “removal” of Nicholas Romanov from Tobolsk and his delivery to Moscow. The mandate was signed by the chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars, Vladimir Ilich Lenin.*
This testimony, which somehow slipped by the exceedingly tight Soviet censorship on all information concerning the fate of the Romanovs, should put an end to speculation that Iakovlev either was under orders to bring the Romanovs to Ekaterinburg or that he was a secret White agent sent to abduct them and bring them to safety.
En route to Tobolsk, Iakovlev stopped in Ufa to meet with Goloshchekin. He showed his mandate and asked for additional men. From there he proceeded to Tobolsk, going not by the direct route through Ekaterinburg, but by a roundabout way through Cheliabinsk and Omsk.19 He did so apparently out of fear that the Ekaterinburg hotheads, eager to lay their hands on Nicholas, would abort his mission, for the success of which he had assumed personal responsibility. Indeed, while he was en route to Tobolsk, Ekaterinburg attempted to anticipate him by sending a company of soldiers to bring back the ex-Tsar “dead or alive.” Iakovlev almost caught up with this detachment, arriving in Tobolsk a couple of days later.20 He had a guard of 150 cavalry, 60 of them provided by Goloshchekin. The party was armed with machine guns.
Iakovlev spent two days in Tobolsk acquainting himself with the situation. He met with the local garrison and won its favor by distributing its overdue pay. He also familiarized himself with conditions inside the Governor’s House. He learned that Alexis was severely ill. The Tsarevich, who had suffered no hemophiliac attacks since the fall of 1912, had bruised himself on April 12 and since then was confined to bed. He was in great pain, with both legs swollen and paralyzed. Iakovlev twice visited the Imperial household and convinced himself that the Tsarevich indeed was in no condition to undertake the hazardous journey to Moscow. (“Intelligent, highly nervous workman, engineer” was Alexandra’s impression of him.) April was the worst possible time for traveling in the Urals because by that time the snow had melted sufficiently to impede the movement of sleds and carts but not enough to free the rivers for navigation. On April 24, Iakovlev communicated with Moscow by wire: he was instructed to bring Nicholas alone and for the time being leave the family behind.21 †
