The interior of Empress Alexandra’s Maple Drawing Room at the Alexander Palace of Tsarskoe Selo is decorated with a porcelain plate depicting Emperor Nicholas II in soldier’s full marching uniform with Tsesarevich Alexei in his arms.
From the late 1920s to 1941, this plate was displayed in the Maple Drawing Room, together with a similar plate with the image of the White Palace in Livadia, which arrived in Pavlovsk after the Second World War. It is believed that both plates entered the museum’s collection after the Revolution, but it still has to be explored as to the story of their arrival, use and manufacture.
The plate depicts an event that is widely known and interesting. In October 1909, while in Crimea, Emperor Nicholas II wished to test the soldier’s complete marching outfit on himself. This story was described in detail in a brochure by Nikolai Bresler and distributed all over Russia in leaflets. The Emperor requested a soldier’s uniform and walked in it incognito in Livadia: he went down from the Great Palace to the seashore, went up to the ruins of the old palace in Oreanda, and returned to Livadia, filling the flask with spring water on the way and saluting a passing officer. The test lasted 1 hour and 40 minutes. (from 10:30 to 12:10), in which time Nicholas covered about 10 km, thus moving at an average speed of 6 km per hour. “In the morning, ” he wrote in his diary, “I put on my rifleman’s shirt of the 16th Rifle Regiment and full marching gear and set out for Livadia and Oreanda. I returned an hour and 40 minutes later satisfied with the ordeal, but soaked through. The weather was wonderful and very warm.”
Empress Alexandra Feodorovna is known to have taken several pictures of her husband in a soldier’s uniform on the balcony of the Livadia Palace on October 24, 1909. In one of them Nicholas II is captured with Tsesarevich Alexei in his arms. This photo served as the prototype of the image on the plate from the collection of the Alexander Palace.
The collection of the Arkhangelskoye State Museum and Estate contained 65 dessert plates with openwork decorations on the sides, similar to the plate from the collection of the Tsarskoe Selo State Museum and Heritage Site. The plates arrived at Arkhangelskoye in April 1927 from the Leningrad branch of the State Museum Fund, where they had been transferred the year before from the Yusupov Palace on 94, Moika. The plates were commissioned by Princes Yusupov at the Meissen factory. At present 59 of them are kept in the Archangelskoye Museum, one in each of the museum-reserves “Pavlovsk” and “Tsarskoe Selo”, and four are listed as wanted since 1947.
From the late 1920s to 1941, this plate was displayed in the Maple Drawing Room, together with a similar plate with the image of the White Palace in Livadia, which arrived in Pavlovsk after the Second World War. It is believed that both plates entered the museum’s collection after the Revolution, but it still has to be explored as to the story of their arrival, use and manufacture.
The plate depicts an event that is widely known and interesting. In October 1909, while in Crimea, Emperor Nicholas II wished to test the soldier’s complete marching outfit on himself. This story was described in detail in a brochure by Nikolai Bresler and distributed all over Russia in leaflets. The Emperor requested a soldier’s uniform and walked in it incognito in Livadia: he went down from the Great Palace to the seashore, went up to the ruins of the old palace in Oreanda, and returned to Livadia, filling the flask with spring water on the way and saluting a passing officer. The test lasted 1 hour and 40 minutes. (from 10:30 to 12:10), in which time Nicholas covered about 10 km, thus moving at an average speed of 6 km per hour. “In the morning, ” he wrote in his diary, “I put on my rifleman’s shirt of the 16th Rifle Regiment and full marching gear and set out for Livadia and Oreanda. I returned an hour and 40 minutes later satisfied with the ordeal, but soaked through. The weather was wonderful and very warm.”
Empress Alexandra Feodorovna is known to have taken several pictures of her husband in a soldier’s uniform on the balcony of the Livadia Palace on October 24, 1909. In one of them Nicholas II is captured with Tsesarevich Alexei in his arms. This photo served as the prototype of the image on the plate from the collection of the Alexander Palace.
The collection of the Arkhangelskoye State Museum and Estate contained 65 dessert plates with openwork decorations on the sides, similar to the plate from the collection of the Tsarskoe Selo State Museum and Heritage Site. The plates arrived at Arkhangelskoye in April 1927 from the Leningrad branch of the State Museum Fund, where they had been transferred the year before from the Yusupov Palace on 94, Moika. The plates were commissioned by Princes Yusupov at the Meissen factory. At present 59 of them are kept in the Archangelskoye Museum, one in each of the museum-reserves “Pavlovsk” and “Tsarskoe Selo”, and four are listed as wanted since 1947.
