A UNIQUE 1894
engagement
photograph of Tsarevich Nicholas (later Tsar Nicholas II) and Princess
Alix of Hesse, German photographer Professor E. Uhlenhuth.
4 1/4 x 6 1/2 in. (10,8 x 16,7 cm)
The photograph is inscribed in black ink by Czarevich Nicholas:
Czarevich Nicholas arrived to Coburg (Germany)
as a head of the delegation of the House of Romanovs,
for the wedding of Alix's brother. The arrival of Czarevich and his
possible engagement were in the center of attention, overshadowing the
wedding itself. The wedding was attended by major European royalty,
like Queen Victoria of England and German Emperor Wilhelm II. Although
Alix fell in love with the Czarevich in 1889 when she visited
Russia, she strongly resisted conversion to the Russian Orthodoxy, what
was mandatory for all non-Russian subjects who were to marry into the
Romanov family. On the forth day of Nicholas's arrival, Alix
finally agreed, and the engagement took place in the afternoon of April
8th (1894).
The photograph was sent by Czarevich Nicholas to
Queen Olga of Greece, who was Russian Grand Duchess Olga Konstantinovna
by birth (Russian: Великая
Княжна Ольга Константиновна), born
in 1851 in the Pavlovsk Palace of Grand Duke Konstantin, married George
I of Greece in 1867, died in 1926.