Conor Byrne: 13 March 1881: The Assassination of Alexander II Graduate of the University of Exeter and author of "Katherine Howard: A New History" and "Queenship in England", both published by MadeGlobal. I specialise in late medieval and early modern queenship. Thursday, 13 March 2014 13 March 1881: The Assassination of Alexander II On this day in history, 13 March 1881, Tsar Alexander II of Russia was assassinated by Nikolai Rysakov, a twenty-year old Russian revolutionary and member of the left-wing terrorist organisation Narodnaya Volya. The Tsar, as he was prone to do on Sundays, had travelled that day to the Mikhailovsky Manege for the military roll call by a carriage. Rysakov threw a bomb at the carriage which killed one of the Cossacks accompanying the carriage. There were two further bombers, Hryniewiecki and Emelyanov, involved. The Tsar was taken to the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg where he was given Communion and last rites before dying later that day, in a horribly mutilated condition.

What drove numerous assassination attempts against the Tsar? Alexander II has traditionally been characterised by historians as successful, in comparison with both his predecessors and successors. Born on 29 April 1818 in Moscow to Nicholas I and his consort Alexandra Fyodorovna, Alexander was emperor for twenty-six years before his reign came to a grisly and bloody end in St. Petersburg, the cultural capital of Russia at that time. Alexander was tutored by Vasily Zhukovsky, a noted translator and liberal romantic poet. Under his tuition the Tsarevich became familiar with several European languages. Alexander is famous for being the first heir to the throne to visit Siberia, as part of a six-month tour of Russia in which he visited 20 provinces. In 1855, aged thirty-seven, Alexander succeeded the throne following the death of Nicholas I. He continued to prosecute the Crimean War then occupying Russia, before suing for peace aided by his councillor Prince Gorchakov. Russia had been badly hit by the Crimean War, leading the new Tsar to enact a phase of reforms. Alexander is perhaps most famous for instigating the emancipation of the serfs in 1861.

This deeply affected the economic, political and social future of Russia as a nation, for the emancipation involved far greater issues than merely the freedom of serfs. Led by Konstantin Romanov, Yakov Rostovtsev and Nikolay Milyutin, the serfs gained freedom that year. The Russian government also reorganised and rearmed both the army and navy as a result of the devastating effects of the war, and universal military conscription was introduced in January 1874. Security of tenure was also enacted alongside a new penal code and a simplified system of civil and criminal procedure. In all, Alexander II's judicial reforms have by and large been considered successful. Alexander II and his wife Marie Alexandrovna. The Tsar is also famous for encouraging Finnish nationalism, Finland traditionally being a part of the Imperial Russian Empire. At the same time, separatist movements were suppressed, leading to the January Uprising of 1863-4 in which hundreds of Poles were executed and thousands deported to Siberia. Territories of the former Poland-Lithuania were excluded from Alexander's reforms.

Native languages alongside Belarusian, Lithuanian and Ukrainian were banned from printed texts, while the Polish language was banned in oral and written form in all provinces except Congress Poland. The Tsar's reign, despite the relative success of his reforms, was however plagued by repeat assassination attempts. In 1866 Dmitry Karakozov attempted to assassinate the emperor in St. Petersburg, but failed and was executed at the Peter and Paul Fortress. Repeat attempts followed in the following years. The Tsar's reforms were met with criticism and hostility by many of his subjects; some believed he had gone too far while others argued that he had not gone nearly far enough. Following Alexander's death his son, Alexander III, acceded to the throne. The "Liberator Tsar" had reigned for 26 years and his death was a setback for the reform movement. It is possible that, had he lived, Russia might have become a constitutional monarchy instead of becoming more oppressive during the reign of Alexander III. The assassination inspired anarchists to advocate "propaganda by deed" - ie. using spectacular violence to incite revolution or rebellion.

The striking Church of the Saviour on the Blood was built, construction beginning in 1883, on the site of the Tsar's assassination and was dedicated to his memory. Alexander III used the Church to commemorate both his father's death alongside symbolising a return to Russian nationalist spirit and a rejection of the reforms and traditions associated with Peter the Great. Above: The Church of the Saviour on the Blood was built on the spot of Alexander II's assassination in 1881. Posted by Alexander II - Blog & Alexander Palace Time Machine Diaries and Letters - Alexander II The Tsar Liberator - by Nick Nicolason The reign of Alexander II is marked by contrasts; while Alexander II was known as the "Tsar-Liberator" for his emancipation of the Russian serfs, he also reigned over one of the most repressive periods in Russian history and faced numerous attempts on his life, ultimately resulting in his assassination. His personal life exhibited a similar dichotomy, as he was an unprecedented benefactor to children and orphans, yet humiliated his own wife and family by installing his mistress (and later morganatic wife) and their children in rooms in the Winter Palace above his family's own quarters.

The eldest son of Emperor Nicholas I, Alexander was born in Moscow on the 17th of April, 1818. Educated by legions of private tutors, Alexander also was forced to endure rigorous military training which his father felt was crucial to the development of strength and character. In 1841, he married a Hessian princess, who, after her conversion to Orthodoxy became known as Maria Alexandrovna. After the death of his father, he ascended the throne on the 19th of February 1855, and was crowned in the Dormition Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin on the 26th of August, 1856. Alexander II came to the throne in the midst of the Crimean War, a devastating military conflict for Russia, in which troops were decimated, and the shortcomings of the Russian military clearly evidenced. Late in 1856, Alexander signed the Treaty of Paris, which brought the ill-fated War to a swift conclusion. After the end of the war, Alexander acknowledged that the serf-based economy would no longer support Russia's needs to compete with nations such as Britain and France.

The landowning nobility objected to this idea, and were certain that the abolition of serfdom would undermine their primary sources of income. Though Alexander understood the devastating effects the abolition of serfdom would have on the fortunes of the rich, he is reported to have addressed a group of Moscow nobles by saying: "It is better to abolish serfdom from above than to wait for the time when it will begin to abolish itself from below." In 1861 Alexander issued the "Emancipation Manifesto" which proposed 17 legislative acts that would abolish serfdom within the Russian Empire. Alexander announced that individual serfdom would be eliminated and all peasants would be allowed to purchase land from their landlords. The State would advance the money to the landlords and would then recover it from the peasants in 49 annual sums known as "redemption payments". This was deleterious to the finances of the state, and the land reforms proved damaging to the entire structure of the Russian Empire by creating deficits, and placing the peasant farmers at the mercy of cruel landlords and unreliable crop returns. In some regions it took peasants nearly 20 years to obtain their land.

Many were forced to pay more than the land was worth and others were given inadequate amounts for their needs. Alexander also introduced other reforms and in 1864 he allowed each district to set up a Zemstvo. These were local councils with powers to provide roads, schools and medical services. However, the right to elect members was restricted to the wealthy noble landowners. Alexander II also implemented many important and original national reforms, including universal military service and municipal and legal reorganization. He also reevaluated foreign policy: Russia reassessed its policy of continuous overseas expansion and concentrated on strengthening its own borders. In 1867, he sold Alaska and the Aleutian Islands to the United States, and used the proceeds to gild the domes of St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg in thanks for the peace that the Russian Empire had begun to enjoy due to his reforms. The most important foreign policy achievement of his reign was the successful war of 1877-8 against the Ottoman Empire, resulting in the liberation of Bulgaria and annulment of the conditions of the Treaty of Paris of 1856, imposed after Russia's defeat in the Crimean War.

Alexander's reforms generally did not satisfy liberals and radicals who wanted a parliamentary democracy and the freedom of expression that was enjoyed in the United States and some other European nations Alexander displayed a marked passion for helping orphans and children, and made personal wards of many of the children orphaned by the Crimean and Ottoman Wars. One of these, Catherine Dolgorukaya, captured his particular attention. Princess Dolgoruky, a beautiful descendant of one of Russia's oldest families ultimately became the Emperor's mistress, and the children of this morganatic union carried the title Prince and Princess Yurievsky (after Prince Yuri Dolgoruky, Catherine's earliest ancestor). Some dissidents preferred a policy of terrorism to obtain reform and on 14th April, 1879, Alexander Soloviev, a former schoolteacher, tried to kill Alexander. His attempt failed and he was executed the following month. The government responded to the assassination attempt by appointing six military governor-generals that imposed a rigorous system of censorship and repression in Russia. The following month terrorists used nitroglycerine to attempt to destroy the Tsar's train. However, the terrorist miscalculated and it destroyed another train instead.

An attempt the blow up the Kamenny Bridge in St. Petersburg as the Tsar was passing over it was also unsuccessful. In 1880, Khalturin constructed a mine in the basement of the winter palace under a dining-room. The mine went off at half-past six at the time that the assassins had calculated Alexander would be having his dinner. However, his main guest, Prince Alexander of Battenburg, had arrived late and dinner was delayed and the dining-room was empty. Alexander was unharmed but sixty-seven people were killed or badly wounded by the explosion. The fading health of the Empress and the constant threats on his own life forced Alexander II to think carefully about further reform and his personal future, and so, on 25th February, 1880, Alexander announced that he was considering granting the Russian people a constitution. To show his good will a number of political prisoners were released from prison. Loris Melikof, the Minister of the Interior, was given the task of devising a constitution that would satisfy the reformers but at the same time preserve the powers of the autocracy. In January 1881, Loris Melikof presented his plans to Alexander.

They included an expansion of the powers of the Zemstvo. Under his plan, each zemstov would also have the power to send delegates to a national assembly called the Gosudarstvenny Soviet that would have the power to initiate legislation. Alexander was concerned that the plan would give too much power to the national assembly and appointed a committee to look at the scheme in more detail. On 1st March, 1881, Alexander was traveling in a closed carriage, from Mikhailovsky Palace to the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. An armed Cossack sat with the coach-driver and another six Cossacks followed on horseback. Behind them came a group of police officers in sledges. On a street corner near the Catherine Canal Sophia Perovskaya gave the signal to Nikolai Rysakov and Timofei Mikhailov to throw their bombs at the Tsar's carriage. The bombs missed the carriage and instead landed amongst the Cossacks. The Tsar was unhurt but insisted on getting out of the carriage to check the condition of the injured men. While he was standing with the wounded Cossacks another terrorist, Ignatei Grinevitski, threw his bomb.

Alexander was killed instantly and the explosion was so great that Grinevitski also died from the bomb blast. The constitution was never to be granted. On the site where he was killed, the Cathedral of the Resurrection on Blood was erected. Please send your comments on this page to the author - Nick Nicholson Personalities Assassination of Tsar Alexander II of Russia | Unofficial Royalty Assassination of Tsar Alexander II of Russia Tsar Alexander II of Russia; Photo Credit – Wikipedia by Susan Flantzer March 13, 1881 (Old Style Date March 1) – Assassination of Tsar Alexander II of Russia; buried at the Fortress of Sts. Peter and Paul in St. Petersburg, Russia Of the twenty Romanov monarchs , five died violent deaths (Ivan VI, Peter III, Paul I, Alexander II, and Nicholas II). Tsar Alexander II was assassinated by a bomb on March 13 (Old Style Date March 1), 1881 in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Born in 1818, he was the eldest child of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia and Princess Charlotte of Prussia who was known as Alexandra Feodorovna after her marriage. In 1841, Alexander married Princess Marie of Hesse and by Rhine , known as Maria Alexandrovna after her marriage. Although the marriage produced eight children , Alexander had a number of lovers, the chief one being his long-time mistress Catherine Dolgorukova with whom he had three surviving children . Maria Alexandrovna was frequently ill and died of tuberculosis in 1880. Less than a month after her death, Alexander married Catherine Dolgorukova morganatically. This marriage caused a scandal in the Imperial Family and violated Russian Orthodox regarding the waiting period for remarriage following the death of a spouse. Alexander granted his new wife the title of Princess Yurievskaya and legitimized their children. In 1855, Alexander became Emperor and Autocrat of All the Russias upon the death of his father. He is known as the most reforming tsar since Peter the Great. His foremost accomplishment was the emancipation of the serfs in 1861.

In addition, Alexander II reorganized the judicial system, established local self-government called Zemstvo , instituted universal military service in which sons of the rich and the poor were required to serve, ended some of privileges of the nobility, and promoted higher education in the universities. A liberal leaning ruler, Alexander was subjected to several assassination attempts , including two attempts in 1879 and 1880 by The People’s Will (Narodnaya Volya) , a radical revolutionary group whose goal was a social revolution. After the failed attempts, a committee of The People’s Will members called March 1 (Pervomartovtsy) began to plan the next attack on Alexander II. The group was led by Andrei Zhelyabov who was arrested a few days before the planned attack, and his lover Sophia Perovskaya . On March 13, 1881, Tsar Alexander II signed an order creating several commissions, composed of government officials and prominent private individuals, to prepare reforms in various branches of the government. Afterward, he attended Mass with the Imperial Family, the usual custom on Sunday.

Before leaving the Winter Palace, Alexander’s wife begged him not follow his usual route home because of the reports of possible terrorist attacks. He promised he would return to the palace via the Catherine Canal Embankment instead. Alexander left the Winter Palace and attended a parade at the Michael Riding School and then visited his cousin Grand Duchess Catherine Michaelovna. The conspirators had laid dynamite mines in tunnels dug under the Tsar’s usual route. When Sophia Perovskaya saw that Alexander visited his cousin and might return to the palace using a different route, she arranged her co-conspirators along the Catherine Canal Embankment, the most logical alternate route. Alexander II was riding in a bomb proof carriage, a gift from Emperor Napoleon III of France. As the carriage turned on to the Catherine Canal Embankment, a bomb was thrown. The carriage was damaged and several onlookers were wounded, but the tsar was unharmed. Next, Alexander II made the mistake that cost him his life. Unaware that another conspirator was leaning against a railing about six feet away, he left the carriage to inspect the damage and check on the wounded people, and a bomb was thrown directly between the tsar’s legs.

The noise from the bomb was deafening, smoke filled the air, wounded people were screaming, and the snow was drenched with blood. When the smoke cleared, Tsar Alexander II lay mortally wounded, his legs crushed and torn from the blast of the bomb. Alexander asked to be taken to the Winter Palace so he could die there. As they heard the news (and some of them heard the two bombs), members of the Imperial Family arrived at the Winter Palace. The sight that greeted them was grim. Alexander II’s face and body was intact, but his legs were basically gone up to his knees. The room began to get crowded as more family members arrived. Alexander II’s eldest son Alexander and his Danish wife Dagmar arrived. Dagmar was still wearing her skating costume and carrying her ice skates as she had been planning to go ice skating. Dagmar’s husband stood in disbelief and their eldest son 13 year old Nicholas was clinging on to a cousin for comfort. The tsar’s wife Catherine Dolgorukova (Princess Yurievskaya) hysterically ran into the room, threw herself on her husband’s body, kissed his hands, and called out his name.

For 45 minutes, those in the room watched as Tsar Alexander II’s life ebbed away. At 3:35 PM, the tsar died, and as the Imperial Family knelt to pray, his wife fainted and was carried from the room, her clothes drenched with his blood. Assassination of Tsar Alexander II. photo: Wikipedia Just the day before he died, Alexander II had completed plans to create an elected parliament and he intended to release these plans within a few days. Perhaps if Alexander II had lived Russia would have become a constitutional monarchy and not been led down the path the country ultimately took. Alexander II’s son and successor, Alexander III was very conservative and reversed some of the liberal reforms of his father. One of the first things he did as tsar was to tear up his father’s plans for an elected parliament and cancel the order his father had signed the day he died. Two of Tsar Alexander II’s sons met violent deaths: Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich was assassinated by a terrorist bomb at the Kremlin in Moscow in 1905 and Grand Duke Paul Alexandrovich was shot by the Bolsheviks at the Peter and Paul Fortress in 1919.

Tsar Alexander II was buried at the Peter and Paul Cathedral in the Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg next to his first wife. Tomb of Alexander II (on left) and Maria Alexandrovna, his wife (on right); Photo Credit – Susan Flantzer, August, 2011 In 1883, construction was started on the Church on the Spilt Blood . The church was built on the site of Alexander’s assassination and is dedicated to his memory. Church on the Spilt Blood in St. Petersburg, built on the site of Alexander II’s assassination; Photo Credit – Susan Flantzer, August, 2011 Was Alexander II a Tsar liberator or a Tsar prosecutor? - Quora Quora Written Sep 21, 2013 Alexander II, who ruled Russia from 1855 until his assassination in 1881, is frequently known as Alexander the Liberator as a result of his 1861 reform to liberate the serfs. Roughly two in five people in Russia at the time were serfs, owned by other people and forbidden from leaving the land to which they were bound.

State-owned serfs were liberated five years later. These were not the only liberal reform measures taken by Alexander II. His treatment of Finland was rather better than what was expected, with Finnish nationalism being encouraged. His response to the disastrous defeat in the Crimean War was to reform the military, removing exemptions from the drafts for aristocrats and banning corporal punishment. He also reformed the judiciary. Also, had he lived two days longer than he did, he would have announced plans to form a parliament. By the standards of Russian monarchs, Alexander II was extremely liberal. However, these reforms tended to be slightly poorly thought out. In the case of the liberation of the serfs, conditions did not change very much for the Russian peasantry, and not for the better when changes did take place. Serfs who had worked in the fields were each given small plots of land, but the plots were too small to be profitable and government taxation meant that the newly liberated peasants couldn't hold on to any of what they had produced. Additionally, the supposedly liberated serfs still couldn't leave the land. The house serfs arguably had it worse - liberation did not bring them land, money or employment.

Additionally, Alexander's crackdown on nationalism in Poland and Russia's Baltic possessions was brutal - a stark contrast to his treatment of the Finns. Most of his liberal reforms were not extended to those regions at all. Alexander II's intentions were certainly liberal in nature and he certainly wanted to be the Tsar Liberator. However, his ability to turn these intentions into good, strong policy was lacking and his reign can therefore be viewed as something of a failure and a missed opportunity. Alexander II of Russia. Who is who — Moscow Travel Guide Google+ He was also the King of Poland and the Grand Prince of Finland. Alexander was the most successful Russian reformer since Peter the Great. His most important achievement was the emancipation of serfs in 1861, for which he became known as Alexander the Liberator. The tsar was responsible for numerous other reforms including reorganizing the judicial system, setting up elected local judges, abolishing capital punishment, promoting local self-government through the zemstvo system, imposing universal military service, ending some of the privileges of the nobility, and promoting the universities. Despite these reforms, during his reign, his brutal secret police, known as the Third Section, sent thousands of dissidents into exile in Siberia.

DescriptionAlexander II of Russia photo.jpg unknown , Public Domain In foreign policy, Alexander sold Alaska to the United States in 1867, fearing the remote colony would fall into British hands if there was another war. He sought peace, moved away from bellicose France when Napoleon III fell in 1871, and in 1872 joined with Germany and Austria in the League of the Three Emperors that stabilized the European situation. Despite his otherwise pacifistic foreign policy, he fought a brief war with Turkey in 1877–78, pursued further expansion into Siberia and the Caucasus, and conquered Turkestan. Although disappointed by the results of the Congress of Berlin in 1878, Alexander abided by that agreement. Among his greatest domestic challenges was an uprising in Poland in 1863, to which he responded by stripping that land of its separate Constitution and incorporating it directly into Russia. Alexander was proposing additional parliamentary reforms to counter the rise of nascent revolutionary and anarchistic movements when he was assassinated in 1881.

Early life Born in Moscow, he was the eldest son of Nicholas I of Russia and Charlotte of Prussia, daughter of Frederick William III of Prussia and Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. His early life gave little indication of his ultimate potential; until the time of his accession in 1855, aged 37, few imagined that he would be known to posterity as a leader able to implement the most challenging reforms undertaken in Russia since the reign of Peter the Great. In the period of his life as heir apparent, the intellectual atmosphere of Saint Petersburg was unfavourable to any kind of change: freedom of thought and all forms of private initiative were being suppressed vigorously. Personal and official censorship was rife; criticism of the authorities was regarded as a serious offence. Some 26 years afterward, he had the opportunity of implementing changes; he would, however, be assassinated in public by the Narodnaya Volya (People's Will) terrorist organisation.

Alexander II as a boy Attributed to George Dawe (1781–1829) , Public Domain His education as a future emperor was carried out under the supervision of the liberal romantic poet and gifted translator Vasily Zhukovsky, grasping a smattering of a great many subjects and becoming familiar with the chief modern European languages. His alleged lack of interest in military affairs detected by later historians was his reflection on the results on his own family and on the effect on the whole country of the unsavoury Crimean War. Unusually for the time, the young Alexander was taken on a six-month tour of Russia, visiting 20 provinces in the country. He also visited many prominent Western European countries. As Tsarevich, Alexander became the first Romanov heir to visit Siberia. Reign Alexander II succeeded to the throne upon the death of his father in 1855. The first year of his reign was devoted to the prosecution of the Crimean War and, after the fall of Sevastopol, to negotiations for peace, led by his trusted counsellor Prince Gorchakov. The country had been exhausted and humiliated by the war. Bribe-taking, theft and corruption were everywhere.

Encouraged by public opinion he began a period of radical reforms, including an attempt to not depend on a landed aristocracy controlling the poor, a move to developing Russia's natural resources and to reform all branches of the administration. In 1867 he sold Alaska to the United States for $7 million (equivalent to roughly $200 million in current dollars) after recognising the great difficulty of defending it against the United Kingdom or the former British colony of Canada. Painting by Mihály Zichy of the coronation of Emperor Alexander II and the Empress Maria Alexandrovna, which took place on 26 August/7 September 1856 at the Dormition Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin. The painting depicts the moment of the coronation in which the Emperor crowns his Empress Mihály Zichy (1827–1906) , Public Domain After Alexander became emperor in 1855, he maintained a generally liberal course. Despite this, he was a target for numerous assassination attempts (1866, 1879, 1880).

On 13 March 1881, members of the Narodnaya Volya (People's Will) party killed him with a bomb. The Emperor had earlier in the day signed the Loris-Melikov constitution which would have created two legislative commissions made up of indirectly elected representatives, had it not been repealed by his reactionary successor Alexander III. Emancipation of the serfs Main article: Emancipation reform of 1861 Soon after the conclusion of peace, important changes were made in legislation concerning industry and commerce, and the new freedom thus afforded produced a large number of limited liability companies. Plans were formed for building a great network of railways, partly for the purpose of developing the natural resources of the country, and partly for the purpose of increasing its power for defense and attack.

The existence of serfdom was tackled boldly, taking advantage of a petition presented by the Polish landed proprietors of the Lithuanian provinces and, hoping that their relations with the serfs might be regulated in a more satisfactory way (meaning in a way more satisfactory for the proprietors), he authorized the formation of committees «for ameliorating the condition of the peasants,» and laid down the principles on which the amelioration was to be effected. This step was followed by one still more significant. Without consulting his ordinary advisers, Alexander ordered the Minister of the Interior to send a circular to the provincial governors of European Russia (serfdom was rare in other parts), containing a copy of the instructions forwarded to the Governor-General of Lithuania, praising the supposed generous, patriotic intentions of the Lithuanian landed proprietors, and suggesting that perhaps the landed proprietors of other provinces might express a similar desire. The hint was taken: in all provinces where serfdom existed, emancipation committees were formed. The emancipation was not merely a humanitarian question capable of being solved instantaneously by imperial ukase. It contained very complicated problems, deeply affecting the economic, social and political future of the nation.

Alexander had to choose between the different measures recommended to him and decide if the serfs would become agricultural laborers dependent economically and administratively on the landlords or if the serfs would be transformed into a class of independent communal proprietors. The emperor gave his support to the latter project, and the Russian peasantry became one of the last groups of peasants in Europe to shake off serfdom. The architects of the emancipation manifesto were Alexander's brother Konstantin, Yakov Rostovtsev, and Nikolay Milyutin. On 3 March 1861, 6 years after his accession, the emancipation law was signed and published. Other reforms In response to the overwhelming defeat (1856) suffered by Russia in the Crimean War and to attempt to keep pace with military advances in other European countries, Alexander II appointed Dmitry Milyutin to carry out significant reforms in the Russian armed forces. The changes included universal military conscription, introduced for all social classes on 1 January 1874. Prior to this new regulation, as of 1861, conscription was only compulsorily enforced for the peasantry.

Conscription had, previously to this reform, been 25 years for serfs that were drafted by their landowners, which was widely considered to be a life sentence. Other military reforms included extending the reserve forces and the military district system, which split the Russian states into 15 military districts, a system still in use over a hundred years later. the building of strategic railways and an emphasis on the military education of the officer corps comprised further reforms. Corporal punishment in the military and branding of soldiers as punishment were banned. The bulk of important military reforms were enacted as a result of the A new judicial administration (1864), based on the French model, introduced security of tenure. A new penal code and a greatly simplified system of civil and criminal procedure also came into operation. Reorganisation of Judiciary, to include trial in open court, with judges appointed for life, a jury system and the creation of justices of the peace to deal with minor offences at local level.

Alexander's bureaucracy instituted an elaborate scheme of local self-government (zemstvo) for the rural districts (1864) and the large towns (1870), with elective assemblies possessing a restricted right of taxation, and a new rural and municipal police under the direction of the Minister of the Interior. Suppression of separatist movements In 1856, at the beginning of his reign, Alexander had made a memorable speech to the deputies of the Polish nobility who inhabited Congress Poland, Western Ukraine, Lithuania, Livonia and Belarus, in which he admonished, «Gentlemen, let us have no dreams!» The result was the January Uprising of 1863–1864 that was suppressed after eighteen months of fighting. Hundreds of Poles were executed, and thousands were deported to Siberia. The price for suppression was Russian support for the unification of Germany. Years later, Germany and Russia became enemies. All territories of the former Poland-Lithuania were excluded from liberal policies introduced by Alexander. The martial law in Lithuania, introduced in 1863, lasted for the next 40 years.

Native languages, Lithuanian, Ukrainian and Belarusian were completely banned from printed texts, the Ems Ukase being an example. The Polish language was banned in both oral and written form from all provinces except Congress Poland, where it was allowed in private conversations only. Encouraging Finnish nationalism In 1863, Alexander II re-convened the Diet of Finland and initiated several reforms increasing Finland's autonomy from Russia including establishment of its own currency, the markka. Liberation of business led to increased foreign investment and industrial development. Finland also got its first railways, separately established under Finnish administration. The monument to Alexander II «The Liberator» at the Senate Square in Helsinki was erected in 1894, 13 years after the assassination of Alexander II. The sculptor was Walter Runeberg. At the time, Finland was still a Russian grand duchy. The date «1863» refers to the reopening of the Diet of Finland. This monument, expressing the Finns' gratitude to this Emperor, survived unharmed through many later periods of tension and war with Russia under various of its later regimes.

Anitsa Molotkova , Public Domain Finally, the elevation of Finnish from a language of the common people to a national language equal to Swedish opened opportunities for a larger proportion of the society. Alexander II is still regarded as «The Good Tsar» in Finland. These reforms could be seen as results of a genuine belief that reforms were easier to test in an underpopulated, homogeneous country, than in the whole of Russia. They may also be seen as a reward for the loyalty of its relatively western-oriented population during the Crimean War and during the Polish uprising. Encouraging Finnish nationalism and language can also be seen as an attempt to dilute ties with Sweden. Rule during the Caucasian War It was during Alexander II's rule that the Caucasian War reached its climax. Just before the conclusion of the war with a victory on Russia's side, the Russian Army, under the emperor's order, sought to eliminate the Circassian «mountaineers» in what would be often referred to as «cleansing» in several historic dialogues. The ethnic cleansing of the Circassians by the Russian army under the direction of Alexander II meets the modern international legal definition of genocide.

Liberation of Bulgaria In April 1876 the Bulgarian population on the Balkans rebelled against Ottoman rule. The April Uprising was suppressed brutally and drowned in blood, causing a general outcry throughout Europe. Some of the most prominent intellectuals and politicians on the Continent, most notably Victor Hugo and William Gladstone, sought to raise awareness about the atrocities that the Turks imposed on the Bulgarian population. To solve this new crisis in the «Eastern question» a special conference was convened in Constantinople at the end of the year. The participants in the Conference failed to reach a final agreement. After the failure of the Constantinople Conference, at the beginning of 1877 Emperor Alexander II started diplomatic preparations with the other Great Powers to secure their neutrality in case there was a war between Russia and the Ottomans. Alexander II considered such agreements paramount in avoiding the possibility of placing his country in a second disaster, similar to the Crimean War. The Russian Emperor was successful in his diplomatic endeavours. Having secured agreement to non-involvement by the other Great Powers, on 17 April 1877 Russia declared war upon the Ottoman Empire.

The Russians were successful against the Turks and the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878 ended with the signing of the preliminary peace Treaty of San Stefano on 19 February (3 March N.S.) 1878. The treaty and the subsequent Congress of Berlin secured the emergence of an independent Bulgarian state for the first time since 1396, and the tsar's nephew, Prince Alexander of Battenberg, was elected as the Bulgarians' first ruler. For his social reforms in Russia and his role in the liberation of Bulgaria, Alexander II became known in Bulgaria as the «Tsar-Liberator of Russians and Bulgarians». A monument to Alexander II was erected in 1907 in Sofia in the «National Assembly» square, opposite to the Parliament building. The monument underwent a complete reconstruction in 2012, funded by the Sofia Municipality and some Russian foundations. The inscription on the monument reads in Old-Bulgarian style: «To the Tsar-Liberator from grateful Bulgaria». There is a museum dedicated to Alexander in the Bulgarian city of Pleven.

Assassination attempts In April 1866, there was an attempt on the emperor's life in St. Petersburg by Dmitry Karakozov. To commemorate his narrow escape from death (which he himself referred to only as «the event of 4 April 1866»), a number of churches and chapels were built in many Russian cities. Viktor Hartmann, a Russian architect, even sketched a design of a monumental gate (which was never built) to commemorate the event. Modest Mussorgsky later wrote his Pictures at an Exhibition; the last movement of which, «The Great Gate of Kiev», is based on Hartmann's sketches. During the 1867 World Fair Polish immigrant Antoni Berezowski attacked the carriage with Alexander, his two sons and Napoleon III. His self-modified, double-barreled pistol misfired and only a horse of an escorting cavalryman was hit. The assassination of Alexander II. Drawing by G.

Broling 1881 Jägarn , Public Domain On the morning of 20 April 1879, Alexander was briskly walking towards the Square of the Guards Staff and faced Alexander Soloviev, a 33-year-old former student. Having seen a menacing revolver in his hands, the Emperor fled in a zigzag pattern. Soloviev fired five times but missed. He was hanged on 28 May, after being sentenced to death. The student acted on his own, but other revolutionaries were keen to murder Alexander. In December 1879, the Narodnaya Volya (People's Will), a radical revolutionary group which hoped to ignite a social revolution, organised an explosion on the railway from Livadia to Moscow, but they missed the emperor's train. On the evening of 5 February 1880 Stephan Khalturin, also from Narodnaya Volya, set off a charge under the dining room of the Winter Palace, right in the resting room of the guards a story below, killing 11 people and wounding 30 others.

However, dinner was delayed by the late arrival of the tsar's nephew, the Prince of Bulgaria, so the tsar and his family were not in the dining room at the time of the explosion and were unharmed. Family life By his empress consort, Tsarina Maria Alexandrovna, Alexander II had eight children, seven of whom survived into adulthood. He particularly put his hope in his eldest son, Tsarevich Nicholas. In 1864, Alexander II found Nicholas a bride, Princess Dagmar of Denmark, second daughter of King Christian IX and Queen Louise of Denmark and younger sister to Alexandra, Princess of Wales and King George I of Greece. However, in 1865, during the engagement, Nicholas died and the tsar's second son, Grand Duke Alexander, not only inherited his brother's position of tsarevich, but also his fiancee and the couple married in November 1866, with Dagmar converting to Orthodoxy and taking the name Maria Feodorovna. In time, political differences, and other disagreements, led to estrangement between the two Alexanders.

Amongst his children, he remained particularly close with his second, and only surviving daughter, Grand Duchess Marie Alexandrovna. In 1873, a quarrel broke out between the courts of Queen Victoria and Alexander II, when Victoria's second son, Prince Alfred, made it known that he wished to marry the Grand Duchess. The tsar objected to the queen's request to have his daughter come to England in order to meet her, and after the January 1874 wedding in St. Petersburg, the tsar insisted that his daughter be granted precedence over the Princess of Wales, which the queen rebuffed. Later that year, after attending the engagement ceremonies of his second surviving son, Vladimir, to Marie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin in Berlin, Alexander II, with his third son, Alexei, accompanying him, made a visit to England. While not a state visit, but simply a trip to see his daughter, he was nevertheless partook in receptions at Buckingham Palace and Marlborough House, inspected the artillery at the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich, reviewed troops at Aldershot and met both Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli and leader of the opposition, William Gladstone.

Disraeli observed of the tsar that «his mien and manners are gracious and graceful, but the expression of his countenance, which I could now very closely examine, is sad. Whether it is satiety, or the loneliness of despotism, or fear of a violent death, I know not, but it was a visage of, I should think, habitual mournfulness.» At home, Tsarina Marie Alexandrovna was suffering from tuberculosis and was spending increasing time abroad. In 1866, Alexander II took a mistress, Catherine Dolgorukya, with whom he would father three surviving children. The affair, in the face of the tsarina's declining health, served to alienate the rest of his adult children, save his son Alexei, and his daughter, who, like Alexander II's brothers, believed that the tsar was beyond criticism, from him. In 1880, however, following threats on Catherine's life, the tsar moved his mistress and their children into the Winter Palace, installing them in rooms directly above the apartments of his ailing wife.

When Grand Duchess Marie Alexandrovna made a visit in May 1880, being warned that her mother was dying, she was horrified to learn of his father's mistress' living arrangements and confronted her father. Shocked by the loss of support from his daughter, he quietly retreated to Gatchina Palace for military reviews. The quarrel, however, evidently, jolted his conscience enough to lead him to return to St. Petersburg each morning to ask after his wife's health. The tsarina, however, had not much longer to live, dying on 3 June 1880. On 18 July 1880, Alexander II and Catherine were married in a secret ceremony at Tsarskoe Selo. The action scandalized both his family and the court, as well as violated Orthodox custom, which required a forty-day minimum period between the death of a spouse and the remarriage of a surviving spouse, and was condemned in foreign courts. Alexander also bestowed on Catherine the title of Princess Yurievskaya and legitimized their children.

Assassination Main articles: Narodnaya Volya and Pervomartovtsi After the last assassination attempt in February 1880, Count Loris-Melikov was appointed the head of the Supreme Executive Commission and given extraordinary powers to fight the revolutionaries. Loris-Melikov's proposals called for some form of parliamentary body, and the Emperor seemed to agree; these plans were never realised. On 13 March (1 March Old Style Date), 1881, Alexander fell victim to an assassination plot in Saint Petersburg. As he was known to do every Sunday for many years, the emperor went to the Mikhailovsky Manège for the military roll call. He travelled both to and from the Manège in a closed carriage accompanied by five Cossacks and Frank (Franciszek) Joseph Jackowski, a Polish noble, with a sixth Cossack sitting on the coachman's left. The emperor's carriage was followed by two sleighs carrying, among others, the chief of police and the chief of the emperor's guards. The route, as always, was via the Catherine Canal and over the Pevchesky Bridge. The street was flanked by narrow pavements for the public.

A young member of the Narodnaya Volya («People's Will») movement, Nikolai Rysakov, was carrying a small white package wrapped in a handkerchief. «After a moment's hesitation I threw the bomb. I sent it under the horses' hooves in the supposition that it would blow up under the carriage...The explosion knocked me into the fence.» The explosion, while killing one of the Cossacks and seriously wounding the driver and people on the sidewalk, had only damaged the bulletproof carriage, a gift from Napoleon III of France. The emperor emerged shaken but unhurt. Rysakov was captured almost immediately. Police Chief Dvorzhitsky heard Rysakov shout out to someone else in the gathering crowd. The surrounding guards and the Cossacks urged the emperor to leave the area at once rather than being shown the site of the explosion. Nevertheless, a second young member of the Narodnaya Volya, Ignacy Hryniewiecki, standing by the canal fence, raised both arms and threw something at the emperor's feet. He was alleged to have shouted, «It is too early to thank God».

Dvorzhitsky was later to write: «I was deafened by the new explosion, burned, wounded and thrown to the ground. Suddenly, amid the smoke and snowy fog, I heard His Majesty's weak voice cry, 'Help!' Gathering what strength I had, I jumped up and rushed to the emperor. His Majesty was half-lying, half-sitting, leaning on his right arm. Thinking he was merely wounded heavily, I tried to lift him but the czar's legs were shattered, and the blood poured out of them. Twenty people, with wounds of varying degree, lay on the sidewalk and on the street. Some managed to stand, others to crawl, still others tried to get out from beneath bodies that had fallen on them. Through the snow, debris, and blood you could see fragments of clothing, epaulets, sabres, and bloody chunks of human flesh.» Later, it was learned there was a third bomber in the crowd. Ivan Emelyanov stood ready, clutching a briefcase containing a bomb that would be used if the other two bombers failed.

Alexander was carried by sleigh to the Winter Palace to his study where, twenty years before almost to the day, he had signed the Emancipation Edict freeing the serfs. Alexander was bleeding to death, with his legs torn away, his stomach ripped open, and his face mutilated. Members of the Romanov family came rushing to the scene. The dying emperor was given Communion and Last Rites. When the attending physician, Sergey Botkin, was asked how long it would be, he replied, «Up to fifteen minutes.» At 3:30 that day, the standard (Alexander's personal flag) of Alexander II was lowered for the last time. Aftermath Alexander II's death caused a great setback for the reform movement. One of his last ideas was to draft plans for an elected parliament, or Duma, which were completed the day before he died but not yet released to the Russian people. In a matter of 48 hours, Alexander II planned to release his plan for the duma to the Russian people. Had he lived, Russia might have followed a path to constitutional monarchy instead of the long road of oppression that defined his successor's reign.

The first action Alexander III took after his father's death was to tear up those plans. A Duma would not come into fruition until 1905, when Alexander II's grandson, Nicholas II, commissioned the Duma following extreme pressure on the monarchy as a result of the Russian Revolution of 1905. The assassination triggered major suppression of civil liberties in Russia, and police brutality burst back in full force after experiencing some restraint under the reign of Alexander II, whose death was witnessed first-hand by his son, Alexander III, and his grandson, Nicholas II, both future emperors who vowed not to have the same fate befall them. Both of them used the Okhrana to arrest protestors and uproot suspected rebel groups, creating further suppression of personal freedom for the Russian people. A series of anti-Jewish pogroms and legislation were yet another result. Finally, the tsar's assassination also inspired anarchists to advocate «'propaganda by deed'—the use of a spectacular act of violence to incite revolution.» With construction starting in 1883, the Church of the Savior on Blood was built on the site of Alexander's assassination and dedicated in his memory.

Article is based on: Wikipedia , CC BY-SA 3.0 . Photo: Mrlopez2681 , Public Domain. Photogallery Years of life: 29 April [O.S. 17 April] 1818 in Moscow – 13 March [O.S. 1 March] 1881 in Saint Petersburg Useful Information Marriages and children First marriage During his bachelor days, Alexander made a state visit to England in 1838. Just a year older than the young Queen Victoria, Alexander's approaches to her were indeed short-lived. Victoria married her German cousin, Albert of Saxe-Coburg in February 1840. On 16 April 1841, aged 23, Tsarevitch Alexander married Princess Marie of Hesse in St Petersburg, thereafter known in Russia as Maria Alexandrovna. (Marie was the legal daughter of Ludwig II, Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine and Princess Wilhelmina of Baden, although some gossiping questioned whether the Grand Duke Ludwig or Wilhelmina's lover, Baron August von Senarclens de Grancy, was her biological father.

Alexander was aware of the question of her paternity.) The marriage produced six sons and two daughters: Grand Duchess Alexandra Alexandrovna (30 August 1842 – 10 July 1849), nicknamed Lina, died of infant meningitis in St.

Petersburg at the age of six Tsarevich Nicholas Alexandrovich (20 September 1843 – 24 April 1865), engaged to Dagmar of Denmark (Maria Feodorovna) Emperor Alexander III (10 March 1845 – 1 November 1894), married 1866, Dagmar of Denmark, had issue Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich (22 April 1847 – 17 February 1909), married 1874, Marie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, had issue Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich (14 January 1850 – 14 November 1908), had (presumably illegitimate) issue Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna (17 October 1853 – 20 October 1920) married 1874, Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, had issue Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich (11 May 1857 – 17 February 1905), married 1884, Elisabeth of Hesse (Elizabeth Feodor

ovna) Grand Duke Paul Alexandrovich (3 October 1860 – 24 January 1919), married 1889, Alexandra of Greece and Denmark (Alexandra Georgievna), had issue; second marriage 1902, Olga Karnovich, had issue Empress Maria Alexandrovna died of tuberculosis on 6 June 1880, at the age of fifty-five.

Mistresses Alexander had many mistresses during his marriage and fathered seven known illegitimate children. These included: Charlotte Henriette Sophie Jansen (15 November 1844 – July 1915) with mistress Sophie Charlotte Dorothea Von Behse (1828–1886) Joseph Raboxicz Michael-Bogdan Oginski (10 October 1848 – 25 March 1909) with mistress Countess Olga Kalinovskya (1818–1854) Antoinette Bayer (20 June 1856 – 24 January 1948) with his mistress Wilhelmine Bayer On 6 July 1880, less than a month after Empress Maria's death, Alexander formed a morganatic marriage with his mistress Princess Catherine Dolgorukov, with whom he already had four children: George Alexandrovich Romanov Yurievsky (12 May 1872 – 13 September 1913). Married Countess Alexandra Zarnekau and had issue. They later divorced.

Olga Alexandrovna Yurievskaya (7 November 1873 – 10 August 1925). Married Count Georg Nikolaus of Nassau, Count of Merenberg. Boris Alexandrovich Yurievsky (23 February 1876 – 11 April 1876). Catherine Alexandrovna Yurievskaya (9 September 1878 – 22 December 1959) Her first husband was the 23rd Prince Alexander Alexandrovich Bariatinski, (1870–1910) the son of the 22nd Prince Alexander Vladimirovich Bariatinski, (1848–1909). Her second husband, later divorced, was Prince Serge Obolensky, (1890–1978). Alexander II's dog, Milord A favourite dog of Alexander II was an Irish Setter named Milord. Contemporaries wrote that Milord was a Black Setter, but now it is understood to have been a Red Setter with black color on the tips of its hair – which gave the dog a black color with a red nuance.

Many citizens of Saint Petersburg came to know the figure of the emperor – a tall stately man, who frequently walked with his Setter along the lattice of the Summer Garden. Milord was likely the most famous animal in the Russian Empire at that time. In fiction Alexander II appears prominently in the opening two chapters of Jules Verne's Michael Strogoff (published in 1876 during Alexander's own lifetime). The Emperor sets the book's plot in motion and sends its eponymous protagonist on the dangerous and vital mission which would occupy the rest of the book. Verne presents Alexander II in a highly positive light, as an enlightened yet firm monarch, dealing confidently and decisively with a rebellion. Alexander's liberalism shows in a dialogue with the chief of police, who says "There was a time, sire, when NONE returned from Siberia", to be immediately rebuked by the Emperor who answers: "Well, whilst I live, Siberia is and shall be a country whence men CAN return." The films Katia (1938) and Magnificent Sinner (1959) depict a highly fictionalized account of the Tsar's romance with the woman who became his second wife.

In The Tiger in the Well, Philip Pullman refers to the assassination – though he never names Alexander – and to the pogroms that followed. The anti-Jewish attacks play an important role in the novel's plot. Andrew Williams's historical thriller, To Kill A Tsar, tells the story of The People's Will revolutionaries and the assassination through the eyes of an Anglo-Russian doctor living in St Petersburg. Oscar Wilde's first play Vera; or, The Nihilists, written in 1880 – Alexander II's last year – features Russian revolutionaries who seek to assassinate a reform-minded Emperor (and who, in the play, ultimately fail in their plot). Though Wilde's fictional Emperor differs from the actual Alexander, contemporary events in Russia – as published in the British press of the time – clearly influenced Wilde. In nonfiction Mark Twain describes a short visit with Alexander II in Chapter 37 of The Innocents Abroad, describing him as "very tall and spare, and a determined-looking man, though a very pleasant-looking one nevertheless. It is easy to see that he is kind and affectionate.

There is something very noble in his expression when his cap is off." Titles and styles Historical Fun: Emperor Alexander II of Russia: The many assassinations of Tsar Alexander II Alexander-The-Second-Time-I-Have-To-Ask-I-Kill-You, was known as Alexander the Liberator due to his impressive reforms. He reorganized the judicial system by setting up elected local judges and abolishing capital punishments. He also promoted local self-governance, imposed a universal military service, and ended a lot of privileges of the nobilities. However, and there's always a however, he was also a right git. His secret police, known as the Third Section, captured, imprisoned, and tortured, tens of thousands of people who had anything bad to say about him. When they said really bad things, he sent them into exile in Siberia. The Many Assassinations of Alexander II of Russia On the 4th of April 1866, Tsar Alexander suffered his first assassination attempt. It was a cold day in St. Petersburg when Dmitry Karakozov decided he'd had enough of the Emperor. Alexander was out for a walk in the Summer Garden of St.

Petersburg admiring a couple of humping hedgehogs when Dmitry Karakozov fired at him six times. The hedgehogs, unknown to Karakozov, were secret ninja hedgehogs. They interrupted their activities and leapt into action. Each of the first five shots were either punched or kicked away from Alexander, doing the Russian Emperor no harm. The sixth shot was deflected by the male hedgehog with its fun-stick. It ricocheted off the tip and impacted a wall three miles away, killing two thousand peasants on the way to its very speedy destination. Wanting to keep the identity of the hedgehogs a secret, and not wanting their ninja abilities to become public knowledge, a local peasant by the name of Ossip Komissarov was asked to take credit for saving the Emperor's life. A story was invented that made him the hero. He saw Dmitry Karakozov pull a gun from between his butt cheeks and rushed forwards to knock the gun from his hands. After the attempt on his life, Alexander rushed to Kazan Cathedral and gave thanks for his narrow escape from death. It was said he was more peeved that the assassin was of noble birth, than an attempt being made on his life.

Karakozov attempted escape, but the Tsar's guards woke from their afternoon nap and captured him. Karakozov was then tried, found guilty, and finally hanged to death on the 3rd of September 1866. On the 6th of June, 1867 at the World Fair of 1867, held in 1867 in Paris in 1867, Antoni Berezowski, who, like Karakozov, was also of noble birth, made another attempt on the Russian Tsar's life. Antoni Berezowski, son of a Polish Nobleman, fired at Alexander at Longchamps Racecourse in the Bois de Boulogne. The Emperor was trundling along in his carriage, with his two sons, and Napoleon III, when Antoni Berezowski fired into it with a self-modified, double-barrelled pistol. There's a handy lesson to learn if you plan on assassinating the Russian Tsar: Don't buy a cheap, second-hand gun. The gun broke. The shot went wide. Very wide. It killed a horse of a cavalryman escorting the motorcade of John F.

Kennedy at Dallas in 1963. And to top it off, it blew Berezowski's hand off. The Polish Nobleman's son was arrested, tried and, guess what, he was also found guilty. Although, this time he didn't suffer death by hanging. He was sentenced to lifelong imprisonment with hard labour on Nou Island. He did eventually get pardoned in 1906 but didn't dare go home. The 20th of April 1879, Alexander II was out speed walking towards the Square of the Guards Staff, his little butt cheeks chewing on his Lycra shorts, when Alexander Soloviev blocked his path. Alexander Soloviev was a 33-year-old former student, which you could say about a lot of people, with a mean looking face and something menacing in his pants. It is presumed the Tsar saw the menacing revolver that Soloviev pulled from his man-cave, as his reactions would have seemed really weird if he hadn't.

Alexander, the Russian Emperor, the Tsar, the most feared and powerful man in Europe, ran from Soloviev in a zigzag pattern, whilst flailing his arms around like an epileptic octopus who had just been strobed. Soloviev, after he managed to stop laughing, fired at the fleeing Emperor five times. Each shot missed. Due to Soloviev's inadequate gunmanship skills, or the constant chortling, nobody knows. Alexander Soloviev was tried, found guilty and sentenced to death by way of hanging on the 28th of May, 1879. During December 1879, the Narodnaya Volya, or People's Will, felt an uncontrollable urge to kill the Russian Tsar. They planted three explosive devices on the train tracks at Odessa, Alexandrovsk, and Moscow. Their plan was to blow up the Tsar's train as he journeyed back from his holiday down south in Livadia to Moscow. Bad weather made the train take a diversion and Alexander avoided the first device at Odessa. As the train passed by Alexandrovsk, it failed to detonate. The third explosive did go off. However, it exploded under the wrong train.

It was a dark, cold night on the 5th of February, 1880. The fires were lit at the Winter Palace and Tsar Alexander II had planned an elaborate meal for a select guest list, which included his immediate family and also a special guest in his nephew, Alexander of Hesse-Darmstadt, the Prince of Bulgaria. Stephan Khalturin, who was also a member of the Narodnaya Volya, had snuck into the Winter Palace and planted a bomb in the rest-room of the guards, which was immediately below the dining room where the Tsar and his family were to dine that evening. Alexander was suffering from some serious cramping. When he found out his nephew would arrive later than expected, he used the delay to sneak off to his private chambers for a some much needed evacuation of his bowels. Stephan Khalturin had already set the timing of the fuse on the dynamite and it exploded whilst the Tsar was away creating his own explosions. The bomb killed eleven people and wounded over thirty more. The Tsar and his family were unharmed.

The one that that hit the mark On the 13th of March, 1881, Alexander II was in St. Petersburg conducting a roll call for the military stationed at the main barracks. This happened like clockwork each Sunday morning. After the previous five attempts on his life, Alexander had taken special precautions with his safety. Although, as it turns out, not enough. He journeyed to the Mikhailovsky Manege to the Roll Call in a specially constructed and closed, armoured carriage. He was accompanied by five Cossacks, Frank Joseph Jackowski, a Polish Noble, and another Cossack who sat on the front to the coachman's left. He also had two sleighs following which contained the Chief of Police and the Chief of the Emperor's Guards. In the crowds was Nikolai Rysakov, part of the Narodnaya, or People's Will, the revolutionary movement who was rather upset by the Tsar. He had a small package wrapped in a handkerchief. "After a moment's hesitation, I threw the bomb. I sent it under the horses' hooves in the supposition that it would blow up under the carriage. The explosion knocked me into the fence.

Nikolai Rysakov threw the bomb, and it did manage to land beneath the Tsar's carriage. It exploded, but did the armoured carriage little damage, although it did kill one of the Cossacks. Alexander exited the carriage a little shaken, but unharmed. Rysakov was captured with little effort, too shaken to try to flee. As the guards grabbed him, he shouted something into the crowds. I didn't even blow the bloody doors off. Although the Tsar's guards and advisors advised him to leave the scene immediately, Alexander was too curious. He insisted on being shown the damage to the carriage. As he was inspecting the damage, Ignacy Hryniewiecki, a compatriot of Rysakov in the Narodnaya Volya, shouted something and threw another device at the Tsar's feet. "It's too early to thank God." Tsar Alexander II was rushed by sleigh to the Winter Palace. His legs were blown off, his stomach torn open, his face mutilated, and he was bleeding profusely from various other wounds. All in all, he was not in good shape.

His family were summoned and they attended post haste, after completing the Sudoku puzzle they had been working on all morning, and the Emperor was given Communion and Last Rites. After seeing the badly mutilated face, the torn off legs, the ripped open belly, and all the blood, Captain James T. Kirk asked, "So, will he survive?" Sergey Botkin, the attending physician said, "I'm a doctor, Jim, not a specialist cyborg builder." He then added, "He'll be dead in fifteen minutes. Three if he farts." At 3:30pm on the 13th of March, 1881, Alexander II's personal flag, The Standard, was lowered for the last time. Turns out, they came prepared. It was discovered later, Ivan Emelyanov had been standing with a briefcase which contained another bomb. His instructions were to throw it at the Tsar, Alexander II, if the first two attempts to blow him up failed. The Police Chief, Dvorzhitsky, who had accompanied the Emperor on that fateful day wrote: I was deafened by the new explosion, burned, wounded and thrown to the ground.

Suddenly, amid the smoke and snowy fog, I head His Majesty's weak voice cry, "Help." Gathering what strength I had, I jumped up and rushed to the emperor. His Majesty was half-lying, half-sitting, leaning on his right arm. Thinking he was merely wounded heavily, I tried to lift him but the tsar's legs were shattered, and the blood poured out of them. Twenty people, with wounds of varying degree, lay on the sidewalk and on the street. Some managed to stand, others to crawl, still others tried to get out from beneath bodies that had fallen on them. Through the snow, debris, and blood you could see fragments of clothing, epaulets, sabres, and bloody chunks of human flesh. Posted by Tsar Alexander II Romanov of Russia Autograph Tsar Alexander II Romanov of Russia Autograph £1,500.00 Add to cart Fine autograph removed from a document of Tsar Alexander II (29 April [O.S. 17 April] 1818 – 13 March [O.S. 1 March] 1881) framed with a contemporary engraving.

He was the Emperor of Russia from 2nd March 1855 until his assassination in 1881. He was also the King of Poland and the Grand Prince of Finland. Alexander was the most successful Russian reformer since Peter the Great. His most important achievement was the emancipation of serfs in 1861, for which he became known as Alexander the Liberator. The tsar was responsible for numerous other reforms including reorganizing the judicial system, setting up elected local judges, abolishing capital punishment, promoting local self-government through the zemstvo system, imposing universal military service, ending some of the privileges of the nobility, and promoting the universities. Despite these reforms, during his reign, his brutal secret police, known as the Third Section, sent thousands of dissidents into exile in Siberia. In foreign policy, Alexander sold Alaska to the United States in 1867, fearing the remote colony would fall into British hands if there was another war. He sought peace, moved away from bellicose France when Napoleon III fell in 1871, and in 1872 joined with Germany and Austria in the League of the Three Emperors that stabilized the European situation.

Despite his otherwise pacifistic foreign policy, he fought a brief war with Turkey in 1877–78, pursued further expansion into Siberia and the Caucasus, and conquered Turkestan. Although disappointed by the results of the Congress of Berlin in 1878, Alexander abided by that agreement. Among his greatest domestic challenges was an uprising in Poland in 1863, to which he responded by stripping that land of its separate Constitution and incorporating it directly into Russia. Alexander was proposing additional parliamentary reforms to counter the rise of nascent revolutionary and anarchistic movements when he was assassinated in 1881. Signed in cyrillic: "Alexander" Housed in a modern wooden frame and has been conserved under conservation glass by Pure & Applied conservation framers of London. Size: 35 x 25 cm approx Shop Free shipping on all items Bibelots

Question: Which Russian Tsar, known as 'The Liberator', was assassinated in March 1881?
Answer: ALEXANDER II