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Grand Duchess George Romanov of Imperial Russia to Grand Duchess Anastasia 1900
Product code:
5953
£395.00
Charming letter written on Grand Hotel Victoria, Sorrento stationery signed by Grand Duchess Marie Georgievna of Russia (1876-1940), dated 10/25 May 1900. The letter was written shortly after her wedding to Grand Duke George Mikhailovich of Russia, whilst on their honeymoon in Sorrento. The letter is written in English to her sister-in-law Grand Duchess Anastasia Mikhailovna of Russia (1860-1922).
"My dearest Anastasia
How can I thank you enough for having sent me that lovely brooch!
It was really awfully kind of you & I was greatly touched!
Both George & I were very dissappointed not to have had you at our wedding, but I suppose it was impossible as every thing was decided in such a hurry so as to avoid being married in May, as both in Greece & Russia it is not considered proper! I was so happy that your dear Papa was able to come to xxx. I think he liked it, as it is really quite heavenly.
Today we spent the day at Capri which was rather interesting. We are very busy sight-seeing where ever we go - I hope we we may meet you somewhere on our way home. the day after tomorrow we leave for Naples where we intend remaining a couple of days, then to Rome, Florence, Munich & Vienna. We will probably be at Florence towards 18/31 also for a couple of days.-
George begs me to kiss the dear old "[Russian] Goose" from him.
The weather here is divine & luckily quite cool. We drive & walk about a good deal.
There are a lot of Russians staying here too.-
Thanking you once more heartily for your lovely present & kind attention, I remain with a kiss your loving
Sister in law
Minny"
Grand Duchess George was the fifth child and second daughter of King George I of Greece and Olga Constantinovna of Russia, and thus a member of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg. She was later the king's only surviving daughter after the death of her older sister Grand Duchess Alexandra Georgievna of Russia in 1891.
She was born in Athens as a younger sister to King Constantine I of Greece, Prince George of Greece and Denmark, Princess Alexandra of Greece and Denmark and Prince Nicholas of Greece and Denmark. Maria (sometimes Marie) was an elder sister of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark (father of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh) and Prince Christopher of Greece and Denmark as well as the short-lived Princess Olga of Greece and Denmark. Her family called her "Minnie", like her paternal aunt, Empress Maria Feodorovna of Russia. She and her aunt Minnie's eldest daughter, Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna, were very close; the cousins later married brothers, two Romanov Grand Dukes, and stayed together on many occasions.
On 30 April 1900, Maria was married in Corfu to Grand Duke George Mikhailovich of Russia, a maternal cousin. He had chased after Maria, who was nicknamed "Greek Minnie" to tell her apart from the elder "Minnie" (the Dowager Empress Maria of Russia). She refused to marry unless her place in the line of succession to the Greek and Danish thrones was secured, and made it clear that she was not in love with the Grand Duke when she married him, but George hoped that her feelings would grow in time. The couple had two daughters: Nina, born 7 June 1901; and Xenia, born 9 August 1903. As they grew older, Maria seized the opportunity to spend more time abroad, ostensibly for her daughters' health, but also to spend more time away from her husband. She was in Great Britain when World War I broke out and chose not return to Russia, living in Harrogate where she was patron of three military hospitals, funding them generously and nursing patients herself.
She became a widow on 30 January 1919, when her husband was murdered by the Bolsheviks. On 16 December 1922, Maria was remarried to Admiral Pericles Ioannides in Wiesbaden. Grand Duchess Maria Georgievna died in her native Athens during the Greco-Italian War.
Her daughter Xenia lived for years in Long Island and was for a time married to millionaire William Leeds, son of Nancy Stewart Worthington Leeds. She took in for a few months a woman later found to be an impostor, Anna Anderson. Anderson fraudulently claimed to be Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia, the youngest daughter of Emperor Nicholas II, and was forced to leave Xenia's house at the demand of William Leeds. Grand Duchess George never recognised Anderson.
Grand Duchess Anastasia was a daughter of Grand Duke Michael Nicolaievich of Russia and a granddaughter of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia.
She was raised in the Caucasus, where she lived between 1862 and 1878 with her family. In 1879 she married Friedrich Franz III of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, who in 1883 became the reigning Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. The couple had three children, but her husband was plagued by ill health and they spent most of the year living abroad. The Grand Duchess never became used to her new country where she was unpopular. After the death of her husband in 1897, her visits to Schwerin were sparse.
A strong-willed, independent and unconventional woman, she caused a royal scandal when in 1902 she had a child fathered by her personal secretary. In her widowhood, she lived most of the year in the South of France. During World War I, she decided to settle in neutral Switzerland, living in Lausanne. She died after a stroke a few years later.
Size: 22 x 14 cm approx
| Product Code | 5953 |