page_title: Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich of Russia
section_title: Last years
hierarchical_section_title: Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich of Russia / Last years
caption_attribution_description: English: Grave of Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, Mathilde Kschessinska and Vladimir Romanovsky-Krasinsky. Sainte-Geneviève-des-Bois Russian Cemetery.
context_page_description: Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich of Russia was a son of Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich of Russia, a grandson of Emperor Alexander II and a first cousin of Nicholas II, Russia’s last Tsar.
  In 1900, he began an affair with the famous ballerina Mathilde Kschessinska, becoming the third grand duke to fall for her.
  Grand Duke Andrei followed a military career and graduated from the Alexandrovskaya Military Law academy in 1905. He occupied different military positions during the reign of Tsar Nicholas II, but with no particular distinction. He became senator in 1911 and was appointed Major General in the Russian Army in 1915. He took part in World War I, but was away from real combat spending most of the conflict at Russia's headquarters or in idle time in Saint Petersburg.
  In February 1917, shortly before the fall of the Russian monarchy, Grand Duke Andrei left Saint Petersburg to join his mother in Kislovodsk. He remained in the Caucasus for the next three years. After the October Revolution he was briefly arrested along with his brother, Grand Duke Boris, but they escaped. He departed revolutionary Russia in March 1920, being the last grand duke to leave for exile.
context_section_description: During the 1930s, Mathilde's ballet school prospered, allowing Grand Duke Andrei and his family to have a comfortable, yet modest life. He helped with the financial part of running the school, but continued to be afflicted by ill health due to his weak lungs. Although uninterested in politics, he continued to actively support a number of organization; he headed the Guard association, the Russian Historical and Genealogical Society in Paris and he was an honorary chairman of the union of Izmaylovsky Regiment. Andrei Vladimirovich also kept in touch with his Romanov relatives, particularly his brothers and many of his cousins, such as Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna, Jr. and Prince Gabriel Constantinovich. His relationship with his sister, Grand Duchess Elena Vladimirovna of Russia, became strained as she never truly accepted Mathilde as a member of the family.
  At the outbreak of World War II, under the threat of a German bombing of Paris, Grand Duke Andrei and his family moved to Le Vésinet. They returned after three months. Following the German invasion of France, they fled by train to Grand Duke Boris's Villa in Biarritz. On 26 June, the Germans reached Biarritz and after three months the two couples decided to return to Paris. As their only source of income was the ballet school, they had to keep it opened during the war years in spite of difficulties and decreased attendance. Prince Vladimir Romanovsky-Krasinsky (who took a Westernized version of his mother's Polish name, Krzesińska, hyphenated with the adjective version of his father's name) was spoiled by his parents and never had an independent life. Because he had been a member of the "pro-Soviet " Union of Young Russians in the 1930s, he was regarded as Soviet sympathizer by the Nazi Party. Vladimir was arrested by the Gestapo and held in a camp for Russian emigrants in Compiègne. Grand Duke Andrei visited German Police Headquarters multiple times and asked for help from Russian émigrés to get his son released, but neither group would help him. Vladimir was finally freed after 119 days in detention. During the war years the two other surviving grand dukes died; Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich in 1942 and Grand Duke Boris in 1943. With the death of his brother Boris, Andrei became the last surviving Grand Duke of the Romanov dynasty who had been born in Imperial Russia.
  Grand Duke Andrei's last years were marked by increasingly frail health and straitened financial circumstances. He was forced to sell his house, renting instead. To balance his finances, he relied partially on economic aid from his nephew, Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich. Some of Mathilde's friends and former pupils, such as Margot Fonteyn and Diana Gould Menuhin, also provided financial help. In 1954, Grand Duke Andrei became a godfather of Grand Duke Vladimir's only child, Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna of Russia, the current claimant to the headship of the Romanov family.
  Despite poor health, Grand Duke Andrei lived to be 77 years old, an age reached by few in the Romanov family. He surpassed the longevity record held by his great-uncle, Grand Duke Michael Nikolaevich, by almost six months. On the morning of 31 October 1956, Grand Duke Andrei worked in his study. Having finished a letter on his typewriter, he felt dizzy, went to his bed to lie down and died suddenly. He was buried wearing the uniform of the Horse Guard Artillery Brigade, which he had commanded during World War I. Matilda Kshesinskaya died in Paris in December 1971 at age 99. Prince Vladimir Romanovsky-Krasinsky died unmarried and childless in France in 1974, three years after his mother.
caption: Grave of Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, Mathilde Kschessinska and Vladimir Romanovsky-Krasinsky. Sainte-Geneviève-des-Bois Russian Cemetery.
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