Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1880-03-11
The Cars Winter Palace-The Last
Attempt at Assassination.


Attempt at Assassination.
The seat of the last attempt directed
against the Cars life, the private din
ing-room of the Imperial family, is sit
uated in the wing of the Winter Palace,
facing the so-called Palace or Admiral
ty Square, a vast space Of open ground,
covered in part by garden and bor-
dered by large buildings almost exclu-
sively occupied by Government offices.
Directly opposite the palace, the For
eign Office, the General Staff and the
Finance Ministry are situated. This
great square surrounds the Winter Pal
ace on its southern and eastern front.
To the west flows the broad stream of
the Neva, and to the north the palace is
separated from the adjoining building
(the barracks of the Preobrajensky Reg
iment) by deep canal. Thus from the
very configuration of the palace and the
grounds surrounding it, it seems highly
improbable that the mine should have
extended beyond the walls of the palace.
The part of the palace in which the
explosion took place is exclusively de-
voted to the private apartments of the
Gar, the Empress, and of their young
er children. The rooms of the first
floor, adjoining the watch room, which
has suffered so severely from the shock,
and in which so many lives were lost,
were formerly occupied by the Grand
Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, now
Duchess of Edinburgh. At present
they are occupied by the Countess Tolls
toy, the former tutoress of the Duchess,
and other ladies of the Imperial suite.
The basement, beneath which the mine
had been laid, is inhabited by some of
of the most devoted and Oldest
male and female servants of the
Imperial family. The inner court,
in which, according to one of to-day's
cable dispatches, the wires of the mine
have been traced, is situated in the
heart of the palace, and runs lengthwise
from north to south throughout the
whole building, emerging into mar
row passage which runs between the
Winter Palace and the adjoining and
connecting building of the "Eremil
tage," where the celebrated Imperia-
Art Museum and Picture Gallery are
situated. In this court a busy life and
turmoil of couriers coming and going,
petty court officials, servants and door
nicks (porters) attending to their vari-
Gus work, reigns all day and part of the
night. The entrance into this court is
severely prohibited 10 all persons who
have no special permission or business
to transact with some of the employees
of the palace. Here also q constant
guard is kept, not only by military
watchmen and policemen, but by num-
berless secret spies and detectives, the
Third Section (secret police having a
special department composed of its
shrewdest and most devoted agents,
whose sole business consists in watching
day and night the palace, its surround
ings and all the movements of the Car
and his family. From these facts it APP
pears at least highly probable that either
the Nihilists have nothing to do with
the explosion of Tuesday night and that
the latter is the work of some Court
party or of some ambitious member of
the Imperial family, or else that the
Nihilists have in this instance been but
the tools in the hands of such a court
intrigue. Possibly, however, they Sc
cured allies in the palace.
The huge structure of the Winter
Palace is inhabited, besides the I'm
perial family, by over 500 persons
the most different stations in life and
official positions, ranging from the
drornik (porter), the istopnik (stove
lighter, and the sIorochod (messenger),
to the ladies of the Imperial household
and the Grand Marshal of the Court,
and all this great army of attendants is
attached by the most vital ties to the
interests of the Court and of the I'm
perial family. 1t is next to impossible
for a revolutionary party to find among
this throng sufficient number of de-
voted and energetic allies, whereas the
fact of . Court intrigue, headed by
member of the Imperial family and
abetted by some high officials of the en-
pire, finding willing tools among the
Court servants, would be neither novel
nor original, and has indeed become
leading feature of Russian history.
Thus Catherine IL. has marched to the
throne over the corpse of her husband,
Peter III, and Alexander l., the uncle
of the present Emperor, has taken ad-
vantage of the tra0edy enacted in the