Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia (; – July 17, 1918) was the youngest daughter of Tsar Nicholas II, the last sovereign of Imperial Russia, and his wife, Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna. Anastasia was the younger sister of Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, and Maria, and was the elder sister of Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia. She was murdered with her family by members of the Cheka, the Bolshevik secret police, in Yekaterinburg on July 17, 1918. Persistent rumors of her possible escape circulated after her death, fuelled by the fact that the location of her
Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna of Russia (1890–1958) as you described to me in your last letters." The marriage had positive political and diplomatic implications for both Russia and Sweden and Tsar Nicholas II gave his consent. Grand Duke Paul was not consulted. From Peterhoff, Maria Pavlovna went to Grand Duchess Elisabeth’s rural estate, Ilinskoe, near Moscow, where Wilhelm joined them for a month before he left on a cruise to America. The young couple maintained their intimacy through letters. Maria imagined herself in love: “It’s lovely to have somebody, even far away, who love you more than anything and whom you love more than everybody on earth“,