After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal - The Final Days of Anastasia Romanov

Episode Date: July 3, 2025

In the aftermath of the bloody Russian revolution, the Romanovs went from being a glittering royal family, to vulnerable everyday citizens who were soon murdered.In the wake of their deaths, the that one family member survived, began to gain traction.How do the claims of Princess Anastasia's survival begin? Why did people want her to survive? And why do humans need to believe in myths?Joining Anthony and Maddy today is author and historian Leonid Trofimov.This episode was edited by Tim Arstall. It was produced by Stuart Beckwith. The senior producer is Charlotte Long.Please vote for us for Listeners' Choice at the British Podcast Awards! Follow this link, and don’t forget to confirm the email. Thank you!You can now watch After Dark on Youtube! www.youtube.com/@afterdarkhistoryhitSign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.  You can take part in our listener survey here.All music from Epidemic Sounds.After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal is a History Hit podcast.

Hello everyone, it's us, your hosts Maddie Pelling and Anthony Delaney. But before we begin the show, we want to ask for a few seconds of your time. If you're enjoying After Dark and we love you if you are, we would love you just a little bit more if you could vote for us in the Listener's Choice category at the British Podcast Awards. So go to the show notes now, click the link and just then search for After Dark. Fill in your name and your email and don't forget to confirm. They will send you an email you need to confirm. The whole process probably takes about 30 seconds.

If you've already voted, we are so, so grateful. If you haven't, stop what you are doing right now. Vote for us before you enjoy this show. Hello and welcome to After Dark. I'm Anthony. And I'm Maddie. And without any further ado, I'm just going to hand over to Maddie because today we are exploring the final days of Anastasia Romanov.

Once there was an empire of snow-draped palaces, gilded ballrooms, and clockwork ceremony, where fabergé eggs glittered and the Tsar's daughters laughed behind lace curtains. Anastasia Romanoff, the youngest child of Russia's last imperial family, belonged to that vanishing world, born into a realm teetering on the edge of fire. On the night of the 17th of July 1918, that world ended abruptly, in a basement in Ekaterinburg. Under the dull light of a single bulb, Anastasia stood beside her family, unaware that the dream of old Russia was about to die with them. The gunfire was swift, yet the killings were clumsy. When all was finally over, the bodies were carted into the forest, where their killers tried to erase them

altogether, burning the remains before burying them in shallow graves. The earth, though, The earth, though, made for an unreliable chronicler. When, years later, the grave was rediscovered, it appeared as though two of the children, the little Prince Alexei and one of his sisters, were missing. Might a Romanov or two have escaped? In the grey-hued, starving years of the Soviet Union that followed the deaths of the Romanovs, the old empire of glittering gold was replaced by factories and famine.

But Anastasia, in particular, lingered in the imagination. A romantic echo of elegance, a symbol of what had been lost. More than a girl, she was old Russia personified, graceful, tragic, and possibly alive. Long after the tsars were dust and their palaces stood hollow, people clung to her legend. For if Anastasia had survived, perhaps the old ways had not quite disappeared. Perhaps, behind the Iron Curtain, a single thread of gold still shivered. This is After Dark, and these are the final days of Anastasia Romanoff. Well, we're starting to get this picture of a Russian history that is emerging from the ashes of an old Russia. And we're focusing on this doomed but fascinating particular part of that history today. Now, as you might be aware, if you've been listening to After Dark for some time, we

have previously released episodes on the Russian Revolution. We've looked at the final days of some of the other Romanov family and Rasputin. But Princess Anastasia's story deserves a closer look, we thought, given its twists and turns and its very unique perspective. But to help us unpick myth from reality is our guest today, Leonid Trofimov. And Leonid is a senior history lecturer at Bentley

University and co-author, the perfect guest for us today of Seven Myths of the Russian Revolution. We're about to talk about some of those myths. Leonard, welcome to After Dark. I'm very glad to be here. Thank you for inviting me. We feel in very capable hands because this is such a fascinating topic, but can be quite vast at times. So it's great to have your expertise with us. For ourselves and for the listeners who are coming to this topic brand new. And I know it's a lot and I So it's great to have your expertise with us for ourselves and for the listeners who are coming to this topic brand new. And I know it's a lot and I know it's quite a lot of detail

actually, but give us a potted history, Leonid, of what is going on in Russia at this time that leads to the revolution that puts the Romanovs in this particular position. Well, that I think is a great place to start. You know, in history, we always sort of think about, okay, so where do we start, right? To understand what is happening in 1918 and later on. And these last years of the Russian Empire, I think, is a critical period. And I loved your poetic introduction and the imagery of the imperial court and the beauty, and of course, the fascination, the magic almost, right, of the high imperial culture. And then of course you also mentioned the vastness of the

empire. And it's important to keep in mind that on one hand we have all these wonderful palaces and Fabergé eggs, but for every Fabergé egg there are hundreds and thousands of villages where people are quite often starving or suffering from shortages of land at least and sometimes food. So in other words, it's a troubled empire, right? It's an empire that kind of inherits in the beginning of the 20th century the worst of both worlds, the worst of the old world of tradition, where 90% of the Russians are Russian people, of course, of many different ethnic backgrounds, live in the countryside and suffer from a lack of healthcare, education, infrastructure.

50% of all Russians do not live to become adults. Infant mortality is staggering. Plagues happen, right? Starvation happens occasionally. And so all the aspects of underdevelopment in traditional society, hierarchical, exploitative are there. But Russia is also rapidly industrializing. It is entering the 20th century as a quote-unquote great power with rapid urban growth and industrial workers ranks are growing, right? And these workers are essentially peasants, first generation urban dwellers who just came

to the cities because there are more jobs there, there is some work there. But then of course, they are going to discover what English textile workers discovered back in the 1830s. What so many other workers discover is that those higher wages come at a great cost, right? And that has to do with exploitation and suffering and 12 and 15 hour work days and lack of any insurance, any protection and so forth. So it's a troubled empire. And again, it's a difficult combination of the ancient problems and tensions and also these new challenges that relate to rapid industrialization. Right, so Russia is catching up with many other European countries.

And then of course on top of this World War I kicks in, right? And this is a mighty war that leads to the destruction and collapse of four empires, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Russian Empire, of course the German Empire, the Ottoman Empire. Russian Empire, of course, the German Empire, the Ottoman Empire. So overall, one could argue that the 20th century was not kind to vast multi-ethnic empires for good reasons, okay, and we are wondering whether the Russian Empire could have survived without this devastating impact of World War I. Probably can limped along and adapted and that sort of thing. But we have a situation with these major challenges that are magnified by the impact of the war. And then of

course the icing on the cake is this sort of the imperial elite that does not quite often understand what is happening, thinks that everything is fine, everything is beautiful and people are God-loving and loving us and we are the members of the royalty and sort of anointed by God and that sort of thing. So it's a traditional power structure that may have worked not very well but still in peacetimes but then of course World War I takes no prisoners literally. This is a modern experience. This is a transformative experience that the British have a lot of trouble fighting, the French have a lot of trouble fighting, and so do the Russians. Okay, now you see how historians sometimes tend to give you long answers, but I promise

I'll try to be shorter going forward, but hopefully I set the stage, right? What's going on? You absolutely have, Leonard. What you're painting is a complete tinderbox of all these elements that are piling on top of each other. Tell me then how we get from the stage being set, the war is taking place across Europe, the unpopularity of the Romanovs is building, there's incredible poverty in Russia itself. How do we go from that to the Romanovs, the royal family, being deposed and taken into custody? Well, two steps. Well, of course, more than two steps, but just for simplicity's sake. Two will do.

So February 1917 and then October 1917. And of course, what happens in October with the Lenin and the Bolsheviks come to power kind of overshadows a bit what happens in February. But it's important to keep in mind that there are two revolutions that occur in 1917. And in the course of the first revolution, the monarchy essentially collapses, right? That's centuries and centuries old ancient institution that has seemed to be unassailable, seemed to be one of the strongest in the world collapses within one week with very little resistance With very few people willing to support it, right? So it's just a reminder of how traditional structures and imperial structures sometimes how fragile that could be in times of crisis

So that's the first big step and that has to do with unrest in Petrograd, right? We had something that begins essentially as food riots and protests of various kinds. But then if you look at the reports of the governor, military governor of Petrograd, the capital, it was renamed, St. Petersburg becomes Petrograd, the city of Peter to make sure it doesn't sound as German, because of course they were fighting the Germans, right? Okay, so he writes a number of telegrams to Nicholas who is commander-in-chief, not a very competent one and therefore is not in the capital. And his first dispatches are reassuring, Your Majesty, everything is under control, there are some troublemakers, but we have dozens of thousands of troops and the Petrograd garrison will take care of this and so forth. And then gradually the number of loyal troops that he cites begins to decline in those further dispatches. And finally,

he writes, Your Majesty, we have a few thousand troops, but we cannot count on their loyalty either. Okay, so that's an interesting combination of how initial sort of economic unrest becomes political, right, because of disillusionment about the regime, about the structure. And so then the generals also play a role because they want the revolution to stop and they realize that as long as Nicholas is in power, this becomes like a red rag for a bull, right? Or something like that. Even though I think bulls don't actually respond to the red color, contrary to... Maybe it's another myth, right? I don't know. Hell, I'll leave this aside, right? It has nothing to do with the Russian Revolution.

So the generals want to do something to stop the revolution in its tracks, to maybe make some concessions, to make this transition, right? To stability and then continue fighting the war. And so they advise Nicholas to step down and Nicholas at first steps down in favor of Alexei and probably you covered that in other episodes, right? But then ultimately he changes his mind and abdicates in favor of his brother, who says, I don't want to be a czar. I will only become a czar if the Russian people elect a democratic assembly and choose monarchy as a political system. Otherwise, I'm not going to stand in the way. And so the monarchy ends. And so that's a spectacular moment which turns, of course, Nicholas and his family

into private citizens, essentially overnight very quickly. I have been a very periphery, I suppose, student of the Russian revolution in one form or another since my undergraduate days, which are quite a few days ago now, quite a few years ago now. And I will say this, Leonid, that is one of the most thrilling retellings of that history that I have heard over my years. I am so delighted that you're here guiding us through this because I'm suddenly getting this far more animated account of events as we go through this. It's really, really compelling actually. But one of the things that

I kind of want to come to now is the early hours of the morning of July 17th. We are in a fortified mansion and these everyday citizens, former royal family, imperial family, is now living there as captives, but as everyday people. But something changes on that day and it leads us towards this history of myth-making and confusion and legend that we're about to discuss in this episode. Can you walk us through the points of what happens in the early hours of the 17th of July? Absolutely. Well, and of course, this has to do with the second step that happens in

October when the Bolsheviks seize power. They take advantage of the fact that the people are disillusioned about the monarchy. Again, the people means peasants. Most people in Russia are peasants. It's really important to keep in mind. But that also means that they are local in the way they think about the world. They don't necessarily have sophisticated, developed doctrines that they embrace and those who do could have an advantage especially if they have enough armed troops on their side and so that explains in part why the Bolsheviks managed to seize power fairly easily in October 1917 and then essentially tried to consolidate their control. So by the summer of 1918, on one hand, they are in control of

Moscow, they moved the capital there, right, and you're part of the country, but on the other hand, after that initial shock where many people didn't really care who was seizing power, right, a big country, who cares what happens in the capital, but because of their policies that are ideological, that have to do with a transformation of Russia into this sort of socialist and communist paradise, there's a growing number of people who don't like that, including many peasants. Because it's one thing for peasants to rejoice when they receive more land from the landlords.

That's what the Bolsheviks do in the beginning. They say, okay, take that land and sort of if you kill a few landlords in the meantime, go for it. Right. So they get all this land. Now it turns out that they cannot really sell any surpluses from that land because the Bolsheviks banned the markets because markets means capitalism. Capitalism is evil. Right. And so what we see by the summer of 1918 is a country that is essentially engulfed in the civil war or perhaps even more accurately, a number of civil wars, right? Peasants are pushing back.

Imperial officers from the army, which is no longer functional, are pushing back because they think that the Bolsheviks are German spies and agents and traitors to Mother Russia and that sort of thing, right? But then there are many other groups as well. And they coalesce. Sometimes they include, for example, the Czechoslovak detachments, the units that have been trained to fight against the Germans and Austrians in World War I, but find themselves in the Russian Empire, they also mutiny. And so the Bolsheviks essentially have the situation that the area under their

control is beginning to shrink, right? In reality, then various other groups seize control of various parts of the territory. And so the Romanovs, who at first were transferred to Balsk in the north, were then transferred to Yekaterinburg in the Ural Mountains, precisely because the Bolsheviks thought that they would be more protected there. Well, protected is perhaps not the best word, but they would be more sort of secure from anyone trying to capture them. But then of course, the fronts continue to move and it's the Czechoslovaks, right? And it's other troops, some of the former imperial officers, some of Bolshevik's political opponents, they're moving on Yekaterinburg. They will take Yekaterinburg nine days later, right? And so the Bolsheviks then have this problem on their hands, you know, what do

we do, right? Based on what we looked at and my co-author Jonathan Daly, I want to thank him greatly for his contribution to this work also, is to find out again how the Bolshevik thinking changes over time. At first it seems that they wanted to have a big trial. They wanted Leon Trotsky to be a chief prosecutor, accusing Nicholas and the Romanov family of all kinds of crimes, because the Bolsheviks sort of were keenly aware of the history of the French Revolution. In some ways, they wanted to imitate some of those elements, the theatrics, right? The sort of the posturing and that sort of thing. So just like there was a trial over the 16th, they wanted to have something like this.

In Moscow, big thing, big propaganda kind of event. They were keen on propaganda. But that becomes increasingly problematic. If we can't do that, what should we do? And then the decision is made to kill the family, Nicholas and everybody else. And historians continue to debate who exactly makes this decision. It's more likely that the decision was made in Moscow and then staged as a local revolutionary decision, right? But once the decision is made, then the fate of the emperor and his family is sealed. And our chapter begins with

a detailed description of what actually happens in the basement of the Ipatiev house. Ipatiev was a merchant in Yekaterinburg, where essentially the family was taken, right down and then Yurovsky and others, the Chakka commanders, told the family and the emperor that they will be executed and so forth. And I actually asked my co-author to write that introduction part of that chapter because I don't like writing. And neither does he, of course, but I just didn't want to write about the gruesome, painful aspects of this event, right?

Because when you write something, it kind of goes through you, you know, and it's not a very pleasant thing. So it's a tragic event. It's a tragic event. And it's something that becomes tremendously traumatic, not only to monarchists, but also to people who feel they're human, that they can relate to the suffering and the tragedy of people who did not deserve to die, of course. I think that's so true, Leonard. We spend a lot of time on the show and in our professional lives as historians with really difficult and often quite dark histories. But this moment for the Romanovs is always one for me that still shocks, I still sort of

feel it in my stomach when I read about it. Ultimately in that small enclosed space, those are just human beings facing some other human beings and what is done to one group by the other is so barbaric. And of course, it's not a quick process either. And eventually the family are all killed. And then we have them being buried in the woods. Tell me about this because this seems like such an unceremonious getting rid of these people. It's an erasure of this family. Is this something that's just done in haste? Is this an act that's meant to show the lack of respect that the revolutionaries have for the royal family.

What's that all about? Well, they had nine days, as I mentioned, right, before the whites, as they were called, which is kind of again a collective name for the Bolshevik opponents, all kinds of groups would sort of move in. And so there was a sense of haste. Now, if you look at the original public announcements that the Bolsheviks make, they declared that the local Bolshevik authorities decided to kill the emperor but his spouse and son were evacuated to a safe location and the fate of the daughter is not even mentioned, as if it doesn't even matter. That creates a space for myths to begin to evolve

later on in the merge. And so I think a lack of time played a role, but also a secrecy. They clearly did not want to publicly announce that all members of the family were executed. And the question is why. And on one hand, they did not hesitate, especially later on to just publicly announce that, hey, you know, here's an attempt on Lenin, they tried to kill our leader, dozens and hundreds of people will be executed for that, here is the list. So they were, the Red Terror, that period that follows, the execution is very, very propaganda kind of loaded and all that.

But in this particular case, one possibility, and again, in history, we always have to deal with uncertainties, right? We can make certain hypotheses, but we can not necessarily prove them the way scientists can, is that there was at this point a fragile peace with Germany because of course the Bolsheviks took Russia out of the war. One of the main reasons why they gained so much support in Russia and they essentially didn't want the Germans to object to that or to be angry, right? After all, let's keep in mind that Alexandra Fodorovna, the wife of Nicholas, was a German princess, right? She was born in the duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt, right? Her native language was most likely English, but still she had roots in

the Hesse-Darmstadt family. And then of course, that means that their children were all sort of related to German aristocracy as well. So that may be one theory, but we do know that at first they dumped the bodies in the mines, then they retrieve them and then buried them even farther just to make sure that they could not be uncovered easily. And they succeeded up to a point. It is only much later in the late Soviet days when those graves were discovered. And again, as you mentioned, not all of them, right?

Because the two bodies were missing in the original discovery. But then of course they discovered the other grave later on as well. So right now all members of the family are accounted for, right? Based on those discoveries and based on DNA. It's important to set things straight because sometimes, you know, when we think about all these dramatic, dramatic speculations and imagery and so forth, they have a staying power and what we discovered writing this book is that sometimes people, as time goes by, right, they tend to remember those kind of graphic and powerful images better than

facts, right? So the big challenge is how do you write about myths without perpetuating the myths, right? And so let's establish that, yes, they're all accounted for, DNA tests have been conducted, right? And then that's sort of the factual level. In the absence, I suppose, Leonid, is what we're looking at in that interim period between those burials and what you're saying now, which is the absolute fact and we've uncovered that entire family set now. But in the absence of that discovery, which I think was in 2007, the final kind of discovery, in that interim period there is a vacuum that

you mentioned already. And we have seen so many times on the other myths that we talk about on this podcast that that is the ripe setting for stories, legends, myths to start growing. And what we see then is this idea that Anastasia, particularly because she is thought to be potentially one of the missing two, were a little unsure in this period of where the boy is and where Anastasia is. And around this figure of the princess, there is perpetrated this myth of she's out there somewhere. We don't even need to think she's still in Russia, although some people would say she is. Other people say obviously she was taken out of Russia as quickly as possible. Again, caveat this, this is not what happened, but these are the stories that are being built up at the time. Why do you think that happens, Leonid? And then if you can feed in, I suppose, to one of the most famous stories

and myths that comes up, and that's that of Anna Anderson and her claim that she was this Russian princess, maybe you could tackle both of those together for us. Yeah, absolutely. And the big question is, why do people believe in this sort of myths or why do they want to believe? And I think, well, the short answer, people believe in myths because they want to believe in myths. OK, and it's just a very simple kind of bottom line thing.

Why do they want to believe in myths? But because they help them deal with harsh realities. Is it sometimes difficult for us to accept certain things and to face certain realities? They're just too harsh. And so if there's even a tiny, tiny chance that something horrible did not happen, we want to believe that. This is very human, right? So this is very, I always want to say a good thing because it just means that we are looking for, we are yearning for something, right? That will be perhaps less traumatic than what things really are. So that's perfectly fine.

And then of course, how do you then look at the evidence, right? If you have that, if you're aware of that sort of emotional predisposition, then it even becomes even more important to look at the hard evidence. And as I mentioned, that original announcement that the Bolsheviks made left that space for speculation and doubt. Where could they be, those Grand Duchesses? Those speculations were further fueled by the fact that the whites, when they took control of Yekaterinburg, did not find, right? And so if the bodies are not there, well, that creates this whole sort of quasi-religious settings. If there's no body, then all kinds of things are possible, right? And then we see a number of imposters popping up here and there, and Alexei and Anastasiya and many of them.

And they sometimes, again, it's hard to know how much of this is manipulation, how much of this is genuine belief that they are actually not who they are, but the grand dukes and princesses and all that sort of thing. It depends on people's mental state, right? And again, when you hear about traumas and tragedies, that's something that's very mentally unsettling, right? So that's why we see a number of such claimants pop up here and there both before and after this most famous case of Anna Anderson, which of course not her real name and It's swankowska right as her real name, right? She is the Polish industrial worker perhaps of Kashubian background one of the ethnic minorities in Poland as recent historians have suggested

So the milieu is there, right? And then it depends on who is more successful or whose story is more fascinating and that sort of thing. Right. And so then the big question is why let's call her Anna Anderson. That's one of her, of course, or just call her Anastasia in quotes. Right. That's how I did it throughout the chapter.

In part, this has to do with her own traumatic state, right? So when she is dragged out of the canal where she jumps to commit suicide, right? That already kind of creates a sense of sympathy for someone in that condition. Apparently, she was involved in some kind of an industrial accident in the factory that she worked in. So that also resulted in physical harm that she experienced. And then there seems to be an element of amnesia as well. And so when she is in that asylum in Germany, she is called a Frau Unknown. So that's another name that we have for her because nobody knows her name and she doesn't talk. And so we see someone who

does not necessarily appear eager to con anybody. We see someone who is deeply traumatized, someone who is suffering, and someone who many times just wants to be left alone. But then also perhaps on her own initiative at first or maybe even some people around her, they start looking at all these illustrated magazines and say, oh, you look like her, right? That sort of thing, right? So we don't know who sort of makes that first step, right? But we do know that once she becomes aware of those similarities,

she begins to play along increasingly eagerly and this becomes for her, well, a game of sorts, I guess, right? But also ultimately a life, right? Because she constructs her life around that fate. So another long answer to your question. Sorry about this. Feel free to interrupt me because we can talk for so long. Historians and history profs. No, we are absolutely delighted to let you go

because this is your area. You know more than we do and we are so happy to listen to you talk to the listeners will be as well. What started the Civil War? What ended the conflict in Vietnam? Who was Paul Revere? And did the Vikings ever reach America? I'm Don Wildman, and on American History Hit, my expert guests and I are journeying across the nation and through the years to uncover the stories that have made America. We'll visit the battlefields and debate floors where the nation was formed, meet the characters who have altered it with their touch, and count the votes that have changed the direction of our laws and leadership.

Find American History Hit twice a week, every week, wherever you get your podcasts. American History Hit, a podcast from history hit. My understanding of it, Leonid, is that she had a story that she said she had survived the execution in Ickhatterenburg and had been rescued then by, I suppose you'd call it like a sympathetic guard or something, somebody that was secretly on their side. And that's how that she managed to escape. But this story still had a lot of gaps. There was a lot of inconsistencies. Yes, it was true. I've seen a picture of her. I was doing some research ahead of the time on this and it was like, yeah, there are some interesting physical

similarities, I suppose, that you could draw between the two women in question. So that helped convince people. And so she did have her supporters who wanted to believe this. But of course, there were skeptics too and saying, well, this couldn't really have happened. And of course, she spoke quite poor Russian as I understand it. And probably more damning than anything else, the Dowager Empress, who was Anastasia's grandmother, never accepted her story as genuine. She could smell the problems, the factual problems a mile off. So it is a very complex thing and it's so interesting how somebody, and I'm sure you

found this in your book, it's so interesting how somebody inserts themselves into this history and then becomes part of the history, even though as we will go on to discover, things may not be exactly as they seem. But so important was this claim to a lot of people and to Anna herself that there was a legal element to as this went on. They tried to establish this legally, right? Absolutely. The longest legal case in German history. How about that? Speaking of all the splashes she made in the media, in popular culture, in the legal world, right? And of course, this also had to do with the interruption during the war when the case could not be explored further. But then yes, a number of investigations, assessments, anthropological, genealogical, all kinds of

assessments, because yes, there is an element of similarity and As one of the distant relatives of the Romano family put it. Yes. She is similar. Yes She's similar, but what does this all mean if she is not her right? so in other words those similarities were again troubling to many and Put people in the position where many just were afraid to make a mistake What if what if it's her right? So in other words being in the situation where they would in fact contribute to that tragedy by denying her claim if she is who she is was already a kind of a psychological incentive to many to just take another look and maybe come up

with a version of events that looked plausible and that sort of thing. And of course, the version of the events kind of evolves over time. She doesn't just say, well, here's my story. One, two, three, four, five, right? She says certain things and other things, and then some things don't fly. And she no longer says them. For example, at some point she recalled how Leon Trotsky visited Nicholas in the Winter Palace in the capital and broke some china and this is a crazy story and of course it couldn't happen and then she just

could have no longer mentioned that right but there were other stories that were sort of captivating about that that guard Tchaikovsky who took her out of that building and ultimately traveled with her all the way to Romania. Again, there are no records confirming that, right? We don't... Tchaikovsky probably is one of those Russian last names that everybody knows, right? So who knows why she came up with that name, right? At some point then she mentions the child that supposedly she had with Tchaikovsky and that they put him in some orphanage in Bucharest in Romania.

Now that didn't fly very well also because that meant that technically speaking that orphan would be the rightful heir to the Russian imperial throne. And there were many other people in the big extended imperial family that didn't like that idea at all. And so she again sets this aside. Right. So she kind of evolves her story and she helps other people who are sympathetic to her to construct her story. So it's a fascinating kind of a two-way street that is happening over the years, right? And of course, with every year she learns more and more about the imperial court, she learns more and more about various things, details, minutiae and all that. And then that

means that she could impress people potentially open to consider her Plainfield. How could she know that? Right? That sort of thing. Right? Even though of course there was tons of stuff circulating in the 1920s in Germany and beyond that has to do with the fascination about the Imperial family. And she was an avid reader of those things. Lainard, I'm absolutely fascinated by Anna Anderson, let's call her that. Not least because I loved the the 1990s animated Anastasia film growing up and that was my first reference point, sort of introduction to this history, but also because I've just finished writing a book about 18th century imposters in Britain. And I'm really interested in what you say about, you know, possibly it was the

people around her first fed this idea to her and that's certainly what I find with the people that I look at. I'm just wondering as a historian, when you come to a history like this, because there's been so many myths added to I'm talking specifically about Anna Anderson here, you know, there's this sort of retelling of her story again and again, there's I think a 1956 film, you know, there's multiple books and movies and plays about it. How difficult or easy is it to excavate that history and get to the truth of a person who is slippery, to say the least, whether she means to be or not, and she occupies these different identities and these different masks? How do you access her from this modern perspective?

Yeah, it's one of those great challenges because we cannot prove anything that we discover or argue scientifically, right? And that's why people with scientific backgrounds sometimes feel annoyed about history, right? Because ultimately, there is this space, right, to keep an open mind about various things. And it's important to do that, right? We have to be open to the evidence, right? But then the big problem is that everybody has to be open to evidence, scientists and so forth, physicists and so forth, but they could sometimes get the level of certainty that we could only dream about because we don't have a time machine, right? We cannot actually go there and observe what exactly happened and how in that basement,

right? In Yekaterinburg. We cannot know so much, right, so it just adds a bit of humility to our theories, right, and interpretations, right, helps us keep an open mind. At the same time, I would say just sort of also gives some space for imagination. But again, here we have to be very careful because we don't want to end up where Alastaceo's supporters way, I'd be very careful because we don't want to end up where Alastaceo supporters became. So imagination helps a little bit, right? But also common sense helps, logic helps, context helps. I know one thing that people sometimes hate about history is all these dates and numbers and so forth and so forth. But it's like in any foreign language, right? If you want to enjoy the language, you need to get to know these fundamentals

and facts and they will also protect you from making some of those mistakes. And again, it's okay to make mistakes, right? It's okay not to know everything, right? So I think if we do that, then we'll look at how these things play out. It makes studying history even more fascinating. There's always an intrigue there and you mentioned all the different productions, right? That of course begin to occur. By the 1960s, 70s, this is really kind of the myth in the full bloom, right? Even the skating show, I think, is, and this is a quote from the Chicago Tribune, the only family I show in history to be based on Bolshevik brutality. So, okay, so.

Wow. A very specific claim. Yeah, yeah. So all kinds very specific claim. Yeah, yeah. So all kinds of things. But again, there's something, this means that there's something in the story that is very human that people can relate to, right? It's a story of separation, right? And confusion and lost identity and also yearning for belonging and that sort of thing.

You mentioned the mother of Nicholas, right? Empress Maria, who actually did escape and returned back to Denmark where she was born. And yes, she did not accept Anastasia, but you know something? She actually refused to accept the news of his son's execution. She had believed for a long time that he was alive. Again, speaking of how myths emerge, right? And how people are looking for any chance, right? Any hope that they could get, right? To maybe shield themselves from that harsh reality. So she did not accept her claims, but many people did. And here it's interesting how any,

and I think this is true of other myths also, any piece of information that we as historians treat as evidence, right? Is viewed by those who embrace the myth as something that supports the myth. She says something in Russian, wow, right, she is the Russian princess, she doesn't say anything in Russian and in fact it appears that she didn't really speak Russian at all, she could understand Russian because of Slavic sort of common roots but not necessarily speak. And then okay, it's because of the trauma that she experienced in the basement.

Right. So everything can be explained in that view, right. Or in that sort of mindset, right. If you have that mindset, she is capricious and angry, right. And paranoid. Well, just like her mother, Alexandra Fodor, was sort of the very kind of difficult personality, let's put it this way. Alexander Fodor was sort of like a very kind of difficult personality, let's put it this way.

So whatever happens to her, whatever she does, right, is viewed as evidence in favor of her claims for people who believe that she is right. And so people end up just reinforcing that original beliefs. These stories, I suppose we can see that they're enduring these myths that are growing up are enduring over the course of, you know, 50 or 60 year period. But time is a very interesting thing and does a very interesting thing to these types of myths because we get to 1979 and although it's not widely publicized, this myth of Anastasia surviving starts to crumble away because there is the discovery of a grave in I think it's on a pig farm or a pig meadow or something, right? Near Ekaterinburg. And

although the two amateur Russian historians who find it, and you'll have to excuse my butchering of their names, which is I believe Alexander Avdonin and Gaily Rehobov. They have to keep this secret, but this is a discovery that will eventually unravel this myth. Isn't that right? For some, and yet still not for everybody, believe it or not. Well, the author's church is a little bit skeptical at first because they, well, they are skeptical about scientific evidence sometimes, because they think that maybe something was manipulated and that's the thing. So they were reluctant to accept the findings. And then there were some other people. I have a quote from Marc Faroult, who's a great

French historian who at some point says, historical reasoning can be more reliable than DNA tests, which is, I wouldn't take it that far necessarily, right? And then there's also one book I remember seeing about this where the author wrote how about there's still a chance that DNA testing is not completely accurate. There's still a chance, there's still like a zero point percent and that's what I'm saying. So it's interesting how, yes, for most people, this is the end of the story, but not for everyone. I suppose we need to be really clear about the fact that the two men found this shallow mass grave it contain nine skeletons and. This is something that is going to come out in nineteen ninety one after the collapse of the soviet right first discovery that's yeah that's when it's officially excav's officially excavated in 1991. So we know now that there's a family connection to the Romanovs, right? But there are still, in 1991, there's still two children

missing, isn't that the case? Right, right. But then of course, that discovery is made in 2007, as you mentioned, and that's when the two remaining bodies were discovered. And then of course, DNA testing becomes more sophisticated over time time as we all know those who use 23andMe or whatever right so we know how sophisticated but again not 100% accurate right because as you probably know I'm not sure if you did any of those tests but there's that one percent that sometimes changes designation right okay this is Portuguese or whatever and then you check it again six months later and it's Italian or

whatever, right? So there is this sort of element of uncertainty and science is never 100% final in its sort of judgments also. The scientists also have to keep an open mind. So yes, I would agree, however, that the peak of that fascination with that myth is over, right? I don't necessarily rule out the possibility of another musical, right another opera, another ballet, whatever, because it does relate to people's feelings on that fundamental human level. And then that means that it's no longer a myth, right? This becomes part of our culture. And that's a good thing, right? To see that how myths evolve, right? And all these angry accusations back in the 1920s and 1930s was really bitter, you know, because they were accusing one another of nefarious motives, right? Those members of the Imperial family who said, no, it's not her, were accused of being greedy and eager to get the money

and that sort of thing, right? Those, of course, who believed that she was an imposter also declared that, well, she and her supporters were after money and that sort of thing, right? So it's sort of a good thing to see how over time those those fights sort of dissipate. What started the Civil War? What ended the conflict in Vietnam? Who was Paul Revere? And did the Vikings ever reach America? I'm Don Wildman, and on American History Hit, my expert guests and I are journeying across the nation and through the years to uncover the stories that have made America.

We'll visit the battlefields and debate floors where the nation was formed, meet the characters who have altered it with their touch, and count the votes that have changed the direction of our laws and leadership. Find American History Hit twice a week, every week, wherever you get your podcasts. American History Hit, a podcast from History Hit. I suppose as well, there's a sort of romanticism isn't there about the Romanovs as representatives of this old world order and this kind of glitteringly beautiful regime that is if you were at the very upper echelons of society and of course it was not like that for most people in Russia at the time. But I suppose you can understand, I mean it's obviously factually incorrect but you can understand why people are drawn to this idea that one of the Romanovs

are still potentially walking around today or certainly in the 20th century compared to the reality which is that they were brutally killed, burned and put into a mass grave. And I suppose in some ways that's the more appealing history, it's not the real history, but I can certainly see why people are drawn to that and why they want to tell that again and again. But Leonard, what happens to Anna Anderson herself because she doesn't live out the rest of her days in Russia, does she? Oh, no, no. In fact, I don't think that she ever actually been to Russia unless, of course, we consider

Poland, which was the Duchy of Warsaw and part of the Russian Empire, right? So she didn't speak Russian, she didn't speak French that well, she didn't speak English that well, and she spoke German better. She then learned other languages to a certain degree, but she moves to the United States eventually. First, to spend some time with New York bohemian kind of crowd, right? So that like to have a royal celebrity, who cares about the details, right? And then she goes back to Germany. And while that case is in German course, she lives in

Germany for a number of years, over 30 years, I believe. And then she moves back to the United States. One person that seems to be a loyal supporter of hers is Gleb Botkin, who is the son of Dr. Botkin, who was in that basement, who was executed together with the members of the Imperial family. I think it's important to mention this aspect of the tragedy because he is not a members of the imperial family. I think it's important to mention this aspect of the tragedy because he is not a member of the imperial family. He's a doctor, right? And he really is suffering this heroic and tragic fate, right?

And so his son who actually spent a lot of time in Nellis Osea believes that Anderson is hers and continues to believe that for years and decades adamantly, right? While of course, we also have people who have similar sort of interactions with her and who do not believe her. So again, it's a very painful, painful kind of collision, right? Of very strong emotions. And so he helps her out in many circumstances and ultimately he lives in the US. And so she then is traveling back to the US and she she gets married to a university professor Manehan in Virginia and in fact when she dies there is one official

document that confirms her royalty and that's the death certificates issued by the Commonwealth of Virginia and Stated that she was Anastasia Nikolayevna Manehan, right?'s the last name of her husband, daughter of Tsar Nikolai and Alex of Axis Hadarmstead. Occupation, royalty. So she gets that. Oh, wow. I didn't know that. I didn't know that there was, gosh, I mean, talk about, see, this is exactly kind of what you're warning against, Leonhard, where actually in 200 years time, if somebody were to find that document, a historian was to find that document, that's a pretty... We work with wills all the time. We work with death certificates all the time.

And we go, ah, here are the facts. They're written in black and white on this piece of paper. But of course, we know that that's not the case. And the way we can be so sure is DNA tests were carried out on Anna. And it was shown that she was in no way linked to that family. But that's so incredible. I want to ask you before we go and wrap things up, I want to ask you one question because we've talked about this idea of how myths can be quite placatory and they can make us feel better about

difficult histories. But in our own time, we are also dealing with this idea of mythmaking in another guise and that could well be something that we are more familiar with this idea of mythmaking in another guise, and that could well be something that we are more familiar with in terms of fake news and faking and mythologizing one's history nationally to form this idea of a national history that's not true and that doesn't really stand up to historical scrutiny. And so I would love to hear your thoughts, Leonid, on the dangers of myth making like this. I mean, in the case of Anastasia, OK, it's not going to topple governments or take food from people's tables. But these myths can be quite powerful at the same time and really change the course of history.

Absolutely. And I'll just give you an example that actually relates to the Russian Revolution. And this is, I probably enjoyed writing this chapter more than any other chapters, but there's some of the chapters in that book about seven myths of the Russian Revolution deal with the myths that are much more dangerous and dramatic. And one of them was that the Russian Revolution was the result of a Jewish conspiracy. So that's the myth that many Russian immigrants take with them to Germany in the 1920s and for a while there is this coalition almost between some of the anti-Semitic members of the Russian nobility and the Nazi leaning elements in Weimar Germany. Now that alliance doesn't

last for long because all these Russian nobles then discovered that from the Nazi perspective they themselves as Slavs are also inferior creatures, right? So, but still for a while, right? That's that you can see how anger and bitterness and I guess unwillingness to face complex reality, right? Because psychologically it's not very comfortable, right? To live in the world where bad things happen all the time, when things are very uncertain. And of course, in our modern world, things are increasingly uncertain. And so myths give people that sort of anchor, psychological, but also mental anchor, to make sense of the world and kind of explain things to themselves to the extent that they want this world to be what they want.

And of course, that creates a gap between reality and constructed pictures of history and of the world. And this gap could broaden over time. And then it's very difficult to actually rescue people from embracing those myths. In fact, and we looked at some findings in cognitive science, it turns out that quite often people with higher education, right, with greater level sort of of intellectual sophistication, right, and logical acuity could actually believe some of the myths even more adamantly because they come up with more sophisticated structures to explain

things and to argue things, you know, so there is something very deeply psychological that has to do with myth-making and Again, we sometimes hope that education helps, right these things but sometimes it does as much as it doesn't and one other thing that we discovered and we looked at this when we looked at The chapter about Rasputin where again the royal family believed so they're all myths about the great sort of man of God Rasputin where again the royal family believed their own myth about the great sort of man of God Rasputin. Every time other members of the imperial family tried to talk them out of this and tell them look this is not who Rasputin claims to be right. Nicholas of Alexander would say well it's biblical prophecies all the prophets were always sort of accused of all kinds of things. And so whenever an attempt is made to explain things to people, their belief in myths could become even more entrenched. So it's not always a good thing

to just debate myths or challenge people's myths openly because sometimes that only results in – and you see that in our state your case, right? All this bittering, bitter quarreling over who is right and who is wrong made those parties more entrenched in what they believed in. Right? And so we see that pattern. So the big open question is then how do you deal with this?

Right? Because we certainly don't want to live in the world where people no longer recognize the world for what it is. It's an open question. I don't have an answer for you guys. I'm sorry. If you did, you'd be a multi multi millionaire. I'm not sure about that. Sometimes believing your own world actually helps make money. So yeah, yeah, yeah, true, true. There would be world peace if you have the answer, Leonid. Well, I mean, I think that's a warning for us all in our own age, actually. Thank you so much. And thank you listeners at home for taking part in this episode. And this really fascinating and important history that is so steeped in myth. And

hopefully we've taken you down to ground level and got you some of the facts about that history. If you have a suggestion for other episodes that you want us to cover, then email us at afterdark at historyhit.com. See you next time.