With the assassination of her husband, Ella renounced society and, against considerable opposition, founded the first religious Order of its kind in Russia, working for the poor and destitute of Moscow. Though loved for her charitable works and pionerering achievements, Ella, like Nicholas, Alexandra, and fourteen members of their family, met a brutal death at the hands of the Bolsheviks. At the height of the Russian Revolution, she was taken captive to Siberia where, having been clubbed with rifle butts, she was hurled alive into a disused mineshaft and left to die of her injuries. Later retrieved, her incorrupt body was eventually laid to rest on the Mount of Olives. She was subsequently canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church as the Holy Imperial Martyr Saint Elisabeth Romanova.
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"As ... Warwick’s biography of Ella aptly demonstrates, unravel one biography of a late-19th-century European royal and the entire dynasty unfolds." (The Daily Telegraph, November 2006)
"…inspiring…" (Majesty, November 2006)
"Christopher Warwick marshals an impressive dossier of research, drawing extensively on primary sources, to bring to life the lost worlds of late 19th Century royalty and the sumptuous last gasp of the Romanovs...it is hard to imagine a more rigorous study of a woman who, unusually in the annals of history, combined the roles of society beauty and latter-day saint." (Mail on Sunday, December 2006)
"Warwick's biography is freighted with domestic and cultural detail and weighted with tragedy." (The Times, December 2006)
“Christopher Warwick’s well-research biography fills a gap in the literature of royal lives.” (The Times Literary Supplement, February 2007)
"Christopher Warwick has given the story a new power and a subtle shift of meaning." (Royalty Digest, February 2007)
"Christopher Warwick's acclaimed new biography of Ella sheds new light on a remarkable woman." (Royalty Magazine)
"…a definitive biography…Elisabeth Feodorovna is one of the last century's true heroes. Christopher Warwick's book will tell you why." (The Tablet, February 2007)
The remarkable life of Elizabeth, or Ella as she was almost universally known, is revealed in fascinating detail by Warwick.” (Yorkshire Evening Post, March 2007)
“…Warwick has produced a definitive biography…” (The Tablet, March 2007)
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Following the assassination of her husband, Ella renounced society and, against considerable opposition, founded the first religious Order of its kind in Russia, working for the poor and destitute of Moscow, Though loved for her charitable works and pioneering achievements, Ella, like Nicholas, Alexandra and fourteen members of their family, met a brutal death at the hands of the Bolsheviks. At the height of the Russian Revolution, she was taken captive to Siberia where, having been clubbed with the rifle butts, she was hurled alive into a disused mineshaft and left to die of her injuries. She was subsequently canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church as the Holy Imperial Martyr Saint Elisabeth Romanova.
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Serge was and is an enigma. He was either beloved or hated. Rumors of his sexual proclivities and peculiarities abounded while he was alive and intensified after his death at the hands of a terrorist in 1905. Christopher Warwick admits that no one can now know the truth about Serge, but he speculates that Ella's marriage was unconsummated, which naturally affected her emotionally and helped lead her to her eventual doom.
The finest parts of this book come toward the end, when Warwick describes Ella's putting aside her wealth and social position and founding an order of nursing sisters in Moscow. Her devotion to her work kept her from fleeing to safety after the Revolution, and eventually she was murdered just one day after her younger sister, Empress Alexandra. The circumstances of her life and death have made her an Orthodox Saint and Martyr, and she is remembered today in Westminster Abbey as one who suffered and died for her faith.
Warwick writes well and does a very thorough job covering Ella's life. Sometimes the descriptions of court ceremonies and celebrations wax a bit tedious, but that is how they must have seemed to some of the participants, like Ella, who had their minds on higher things.
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