page_title: Elizabeth Alexeievna (Louise of Baden)
section_title: Russian Empress
hierarchical_section_title: Elizabeth Alexeievna (Louise of Baden) / Russian Empress
context_page_description: Princess Louise of Baden was, later known as Elizabeth Alexeievna, the Empress of Russia during her marriage with Emperor Alexander I.
  Born Princess Louise of Baden, she was a daughter of Charles Louis, Hereditary Prince of Baden, and his wife, Landgravine Amalie of Hesse-Darmstadt. She grew up in a close, warm family environment in Karlsruhe during the long reign of her grandfather Charles Frederick, Margrave of Baden.
  Princess Louise came to Russia in November 1792, when she was chosen by Empress Catherine II of Russia as a bride for her eldest grandson, Grand Duke Alexander Pavlovich of Russia, the future Tsar Alexander I. Louise converted to the Orthodox Church, took the title of Grand Duchess of Russia and traded the name Louise Maria for Elizabeth Alexeievna. She married Alexander on 28 September 1793, when he was fifteen and she was fourteen. Initially the marriage was happy. Elizabeth was beautiful, but shy and withdrawn. She had two daughters, but both died in early childhood. During the reign of her father-in-law, Tsar Paul I, Elizabeth supported her husband's policies and she was with him on the night of Paul’s assassination.
context_section_description: The eccentricities of Tsar Paul I led to a plot to overthrow him and place Alexander on the Russian throne. Elizabeth was well aware of this scheme and on the night of Paul's assassination, she was with her husband giving him support.
  Once Alexander I became Emperor, Elizabeth Alexeievna encouraged him to leave behind the trauma of Paul I's murder and dedicate himself to serve Russia. As Empress Consort, she took part in Court life and the duties of representation, but the first female rank in the Empire was reserved for her mother-in-law Empress Maria Feodorovna. During official events, Empress Marie Feodorovna walked next to the Emperor, while Elizabeth was forced to walk alone behind them.
  Alexander I treated his wife indifferently, he was polite toward her in public ceremonies and made an effort to have his meals in her company. Elizabeth was too soft and placid to keep a hold on a restless and soul tortured man such as her husband. In 1803, Alexander began a love affair that would continue for more than fifteen years with the Polish Princess Maria Czetwertynska, wife of Prince Dmitri Naryshkin. Princess Maria Naryshkina flaunted her liaison at Court in a tasteless, blatant fashion.
  Elizabeth Alexeievna, for her part, found solace in her relationship with Adam Czartoryski, who had returned to Russia at Alexander I's ascension to the throne. This liaison ended when she started a love affair with a handsome staff captain, Alexis Okhotnikov (1780–1807). All the correspondence between Elizabeth and Alexis Okhotnikov (and some of her diaries) were destroyed by the Emperor Nicholas I after her death.
  The affair with Okhotnikov had a tragic end. The staff captain, who suffered from tuberculosis, retired due to his worsened health and died in 1807. It was apparently rumored later that Alexander I or his brother Grand Duke Konstantin had ordered him killed; in the early twentieth century  Grand Duke Nicholas Mikhailovich turned those rumors into an elaborate legend for his biography of Elizabeth Alexeievna (although the chapter on Okhotnikov was not published at the time due to Nicholas II's personal intervention) and his other studies of that period.
  On 16 November 1806, Elizabeth gave birth to a second daughter. There were rumors that the newborn, Grand Duchess Elizabeth Alexandrovna, was not a child of Emperor Alexander but of Okhotnikov. After his death, Elizabeth Alexeievna felt more abandoned than ever and poured out all her affection on her daughter Elizabeth, "Lisinka". Fifteen months later, the little girl died suddenly of an infection blamed on teething. "Now," wrote Elizabeth to her mother, "I am not longer good for anything in this world, my soul has no more strength to recover from this last blow."
  The death of their daughter temporarily brought husband and wife closer. Although Elizabeth Alexeievna was not yet thirty years old, neither she nor Alexander had further hopes of a family and they would have no more children.
  During the Napoleonic Wars, Elizabeth Alexeievna was a reliable supporter of her husband's policies as she had been in other personal and political crises. After the fall of Napoleon, she joined her husband and many of the crowned heads of Europe in the Congress of Vienna (1814), where she was reunited with her old paramour, Adam Czartoryski. He was still in love with her and forgave her past infidelity with Okhotnikov. Their reunion was short-lived.
caption: Apotheosis of Empress Elizabeth Alexeievna (1813) by Józef Oleszkiewicz, National Museum in Warsaw
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