The Russian Revolution полностью

During one of my brief visits to Moscow—I believe it was a few weeks before the execution of the Romanovs—I remarked in passing to the Politburo that, considering the bad situation in the Urals, one should speed up the Tsar’s trial. I proposed an open court that would unfold a picture of the entire reign (peasant policy, labor, nationalities, culture, the two wars, etc.). The proceedings of the trial would be broadcast nationwide by radio; in the volosti, accounts of the proceedings would be read and commented upon daily. Lenin replied to the effect that this would be very good if it were feasible. But … there might not be time enough.… No debate took place, since I did not insist on my proposal, being absorbed in different work. And in the Politburo there were only three or four of us: Lenin, myself, Sverdlov … Kamenev, as I recall, was not present. At that time Lenin was rather gloomy and had no confidence that we would succeed in building an army …⁴⁹

By June 1918 the idea of a trial had ceased to be realistic. There exists convincing evidence that shortly after the outbreak of the Czech uprising, Lenin authorized the Cheka to make preparations for the execution of all the Romanovs in Perm province, using for pretext the device of contrived “escapes.” On his instructions, the Cheka arranged for elaborate provocations in the three towns where members of the Romanov family were then either confined or living under surveillance: Perm, Ekaterinburg, and Alapaevsk. In Perm and Alapaevsk the plan succeeded; in Ekaterinburg it was abandoned.

A rehearsal for the massacre of Nicholas and his family was staged in Perm, the place of exile of Grand Duke Michael.⁵⁰ On his arrival in Perm in March, in the company of his secretary, the Englishman Nicholas Johnson, Michael was placed in jail. He was soon released, however, and allowed to take up residence, along with Johnson, a servant, and a chauffeur, in a hotel, where he lived in relative comfort and freedom. Although under Cheka surveillance, had he wished to escape he could have done so without difficulty, for he was permitted to move freely about town. But like the other Romanovs he displayed utter passivity. His wife visited him during the Easter holidays, but at his request returned to Petrograd, from where she eventually escaped and made her way to England.

On the night of June 12–13, five armed men drove up in a troika at Michael’s hotel.⁵¹ They awoke the Grand Duke and told him to dress and follow them. Michael asked for their credentials. When they could not produce any, he demanded to see the head of the local Cheka. At this point (as Michael’s valet later told a fellow prisoner before being himself executed), the visitors lost patience and threatened to resort to force. One of them whispered something in the ear of either Michael or Johnson which seems to overcome their doubts. It is almost certain that they posed as monarchists on a rescue mission. Michael dressed and, accompanied by Johnson, entered the visitors’ vehicle parked in front of the hotel.

The troika sped away in the direction of the industrial settlement of Motovilikha. Out of town, it turned into the woods and stopped. The two passengers were told to step out, and as they did so, they were cut down by bullets, probably shot in the back, as was the Cheka’s custom at the time. Their bodies were burned in a nearby smelting furnace.

Immediately after the murder, the Bolshevik authorities in Perm informed Petrograd and cities in the area that Michael had escaped and a search was underway. Simultaneously, they spread rumors that the Grand Duke had been abducted by monarchists.⁵²

The local newspaper, Permskie Izvestiia, carried the following report of the incident:

During the night of May 31 [June 12] an organized band of White Guardists with forged mandates appeared at the hotel inhabited by Michael Romanov and his secretary, Johnson, abducted them, and took them to an unknown destination. A search party sent out that night found no trace. The searches continue.⁵³

This was a tissue of lies. Michael and Johnson in fact had been abducted not by “White Guardists” but by the Cheka, headed by G. I. Miasnikov, an ex-locksmith and professional revolutionary, chairman of the Motivilikha Soviet. His four accomplices were pro-Bolshevik workers from the same town. Since the myth of a “White Guard” plot could not be sustained once the remains of Michael and Johnson had been located by the Sokolov commission the next year, the subsequent official Communist version has claimed that Miasnikov and his accomplices had acted on their own, without authorization either from Moscow or from the local soviet—a version which must strain the credulity of even the most credulous.*