by
W.E. Aughinbaugh, M.D., LL.B., LL.M.
Is the former Czar and his Imperial family still alive? There are
millions of people in Europe and America who are asking this question.
European governments have considered the question of sufficient
interest to justify the investigation by official bodies of the
alleged extinction of this ancient Royal Line. Millions have been
expended for that purpose. Commissions have pretended to investigate
the subject _after_ the event. Volumes have been returned of a
speculative nature to authenticate a mysterious _disappearance_ that
has never been explained.
April 5; the Universal Service carried a cable from Paris reading:
"Czar Nicholas and all members of the Imperial family of Russia are
still alive, according to M. Lassies, former member of the Chamber of
Deputies, who has just returned from a mission to Russia." This was
several weeks after the manuscript of the following account of the
_Czar's Escape_ was in my possession.[A] Yet this confirmation of the
manuscript has not sufficiently overcome the universally persistent
doubt that has grown out of many previous imposing reports.
In certain Royal quarters the anxiety to disseminate the "reports"
of their Commissions is too apparent to authorize a judicial mind to
accept their speculative guesswork as convincing evidence of a legal
_corpus delicti_ when no identified bodies have ever been produced.
This eagerness to convince the world by substituting a mere
_disappearance_, or the lack of evidence, for positive proof of the
Royal assassination raises very naturally the presumption that certain
circles are more interested in misleading than in satisfying the
public mind.
To those schooled in the methods and objects of international
propaganda during the Great War it is evident that, in a period of
revolution, when thrones and dynasties become unpopular within the
area of hostility and discontent, the adherents of Royalty may not
be unwilling to appease the demand for vengeance by some theatrical
display of meeting it with a pretense or an artifice until the
passions of the populace have subsided and sober toleration resumes
its sway over the sated revolutionary mind.
That such may be the fact will seem convincing from a careful study of
the incidents narrated in the following rudimentary story of "Rescuing
the Czar." In a technical sense it is not a story. Nevertheless, while
partaking of the nature of a simple diary, it reads like a romance of
thrilling adventure upon which a skilful novelist may easily erect a
story of permanent interest and universal appeal. But it is this very
lack of art--this indifference to accomplished technique--that makes
"Rescuing the Czar" so interesting and so convincing a rebuttal of the
Royal Executioners' Case.
There have been many periods in the progress of society when such an
original piece of work as "Rescuing the Czar" would have been welcomed
by the historian of serious events. The preservation, discovery and
the piecing together of the various scraps of first-hand information
by the actual participants in the tragic scenes narrated in these
diaries, by the compiler of this book represent a work of so
discriminating a judgment that its contribution to the historical
wealth of the period involved will assume an increasing, if not a
prophetic, value as time goes on, either to explain the mystery or
authenticate the evidence revealed. While apparently no connection
is evident between the two authors of the First and Second Parts of
"Rescuing the _Czar_," the discriminating reader will be impressed
by the independent way each of them, operating unconsciously of
the other, sustains the manifest conclusion that both are recording
international secrets that never were intended for the public eye.
Imbedded in the national consciousness of many European States the
historian finds everywhere the shadowy outlines of "nobility" and
"aristocracy" delineated on the surface of traditionary pretense and
political desire. It forms the inheritance of distributive power
in nations ascending from monarchial institutions to theoretical
republics or pseudo-democracies, and it imparts a touch of pathos to
the lingering hope of Royalty that humanity may some day welcome its
return to reverence and power. It forms the superstructure on which
the crumbling column of aristocracy sustains its capital pretensions
amid the ruins of privileged exemption from the universal law of
change. Consequently the reader will not be surprised nor much alarmed
when encountering its subterranean methods depicted in these pages.
They will merely fortify the accepted impression among students of
events that when Time binds up the wounds of Revolutionary Russia
the world will discover an Agrarian Democracy, instead of a Soviet
Communism or Romanoff Empire, emerging from the cosmos of organized
disorder in that land. This seems to be the trend of thought behind
"Rescuing the Czar." Yet it does not conceal a fundamental inclination
to sympathize with every rank that suffers in this onward sweep of
power. Royalty and Rags, throughout these pages, find many mourners
over the sacrifices each has made to reconcile the eternal conflict
between poverty and pomp. In the abysmal void between the disappearing
star and the aspiring glowworm men tramp upon, there seems to be
sufficient latitude for the play of gratitude or grief. A Napoleon
exiled by the French or a Ney shot down by Frenchmen is unthinkable
today. In like manner, when the revolutionary passions of Russia have
subsided, there may be men and women of the humblest estate who
will wonder how it happened that their Emperor, whose darkest sin,
apparently, was loyalty to Russia, could have been murdered by their
countrymen in cold blood.
It will never be believed.
In reflecting on the experiments of their Revolution, finding much
to be admired and more to be condemned, they will not accept without
resentment an accusation from posterity that they lacked both
gratitude and pity when the test of national manhood came. In
exculpation of such an imputation they will doubtless reverence the
tradition of a House that fell only with the ruins of their native
land. Viewing as they may the fragments of their once majestic Empire
annexed to alien States in compensation of successful perfidy and
neglect, they will lament the lot of Nicholas II while reflecting
on their fate. If their democracy shall survive their own
self-amputation, the lightness of their governmental burdens will
stimulate the flow of mercy through their social institutions and
direct their thoughts toward pity for the useless sacrifice.
In simple justice, therefore, "Rescuing the Czar" is offered in
extenuation of this doubtful charge against the entire Russian race.
For nothing is better calculated to sanctify a martyrdom and make a
race abhorred than a belief in its injustice. Nothing is more potent
to dissolve a race and scatter its suspected members from the altar of
their fathers than the fable of their unrepentant hostility to the cry
of Mercy from the sacrificial Ikon. Nothing so quickly exposes their
abandoned fields to the tramp of hostile feet and the subjugation
of their soil. Ambitious rivalry has no better ally than unexplained
suspicion.
If "Rescuing the Czar" does no more than set at rest the _fable_ of
the "Romanoff Execution," it will have done its work by characterizing
the source and methods and objects of its inspiration. If it raises
the presumption of generosity in quarters generally subject to
suspicion, it will be equally praiseworthy for expelling the darkness
that has always hovered around Imperial thrones. If it does nothing
but portray the dignified composure of Russian womanhood in the
presence of unspeakable affronts, it will have justified its
publication by adding to the diadem of virtue a few more jewels to
glorify the crest of motherhood. If it performs no other service than
to place upon the pale face of tragic possibility the red-pink blush
of romantic probabilities, it will have justified its presence in the
society of the learned by the sincerity of its purpose and the candor
of its appeal to the conscience of the world.
New York, 1920.
[Footnote A: February 20, 1920]