Tuesday, November 15, 2011

It's a girl for Nicholas and Alexandra



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November 15, 1895

The Chicago Daily Tribune reports that the "accouchement of the Czarina occurred this evening."   Empress Alexandra Feodorovna gave birth to a daughter at 9 p.m.   Both the "mother and child are doing well."

Court doctors "report the child to be a handsome girl."  Empress Alexandra is "rapidly recovering."  The infant Grand Duchess has been named Olga.

The former Princess Alix of Hesse and By Rhine married Emperor Nicholas II on November 25, 1894.  Princess Alix was only 12 years old when she first met her future husband when both were guests at the marriage of her sister, Princess Ella, to Nicholas' uncle, Grand Duke Serge, in 1884.   Six years later,  they met again, and love ensued.   

Alix, "an ardent Lutheran, was able to embrace the Orthodox faith without having to declare first that her "former religion to be accursed, nor that her conversion was due to the conviction that the truth  lies not with her own but with the Russian Church."  

The Holy Synod was "satisfied" that Princess Alix joined the Russian Orthodox Church "in order to be of the same religion as her husband."

The young empress is said to have "artistic tastes."  She enjoys music and outdoor sports.  She is said to have a "sweet disposition, sympathetic, and kind, and she had made many friends."

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