Olga Nikolaevna: Rebellious Dreamer

Although one might not expect such a moody person to be friendly, she was. Despite being profoundly introverted, she was also charming and amusing, much like her father. Unlike her sister, Tatiana, who had greater reserve, Olga had a carefree, although brusque,¹⁷ communication style. Amiable and charismatic, “people loved her from the moment they set eyes on her.”⁸ The outward lightness of heart, however, disguised the deep and philosophical nature hidden inside. With her "crystal soul," transparent, cordial, and frank,⁵ she was unafraid to express her opinions; this, coupled with her hot temper,¹⁶ meant conflict with her was not hard to attain.

Poetic and dreamy, Olga had a natural inclination to be romantic. She had three main crushes, although there were many more: Alexander Shevedov, Pavel Voronov, and Dmitri Shakh-Bagov. All of these were passionate and made even more so by Olga's teenage hormones. There was no future with these men, though. As a grand duchess, Olga was far above them in class, but she promptly rejected eligible men of her rank, instead clinging to Russia and Orthodoxy: "I am Russian, and mean to remain a Russian!" she insisted when Prince Carol of Romania was suggested for her.¹⁴

With her pretty mezzo-soprano voice, Olga was musical, but lacked the diligence of practice that characterized Tatiana. Instead, Olga played when the spirit moved her with an ear that was, teachers said, “absolutely correct.”¹⁶ Perhaps this was why she was so certain in criticizing her sisters’ playing: either “Tatiana is playing Fibich for our listening pleasure—which is very boring, or “Marie is … hitting a lot of wrong notes.”⁵ Neither was music her only talent: her graceful figure made her a beautiful rider and dancer, and she was generally agreed upon to be the most intelligent and studious among her siblings.¹⁶ Still, as she grew older her French tutor Pierre Gilliard noted that instead of making progress, she began to go back.¹⁴ Nor did her intellectual gifts endow her with utter seriousness in the schoolroom: she and Tatiana would maniacally run across the chairs as soon as the teacher left the room, then race back to their seats as the next teacher came in.¹⁶

Her appearance, although not classically beautiful, was irresistible in its charm with her smiling blue eyes, high cheekbones, and straight white teeth, which despite the gap in her front teeth, were still remarkable enough to be commented on by many. She had a short nose that she laughingly referred to as her “humble snub.” Her hair was fair and blonde, and darkened with age; standing at around five foot five, or around 165 centimeters, she was considered to be slightly taller than medium height.

Olga, of her siblings, was the most aware of the turmoil in Russia. She read the newspaper and talked with friends. "Why has the feeling in the country changed against my father?" she asked, but no one could give her a satisfactory answer. She was also the most aware of Rasputin's influence. Although she adored him like all her sisters, with no idea that he was a fraud, she remarked eerily that "Maybe it was necessary to kill him, but not so terribly," adding, "we are a family, one is ashamed to admit they are relatives." Among the killers were Dmitri Pavlovich, one of Olga's father's favorite cousins, who was even considered as a marriage candidate for her, and Felix Yusupov, Olga's cousin Princess Irina Alexandrovna's husband.⁵

When World War I broke out, Olga, Tatiana, and their mother became Red Cross nurses. Unlike Tatiana and Alexandra, however, Olga was not suited for the work. The gruesome natures of the surgeries and amputations caused a nervous collapse, and she began taking arsenic injections as treatment. She also stopped nursing. However, she continued to stay active on an administrative level and bandaged patients, enchanting them with her feminine charm.⁴ Patient Semyon Pavlov remembered that she had a gloriously kind heart and even that hypothetically in a crisis, he would approach her for assistance rather than her more reserved sister Tatiana.

Olga's dream was to marry and live in the countryside, with nothing of the court, and no even court officials.⁵ Unfortunately, the Russian Revolution caused Olga to sink deeper into depression when her family was first placed under house arrest and then sent to Siberia, in Tobolsk, and later on to the Ipatiev House in Yekaterinburg. Unlike her sisters, she did not like talking to the guards, and instead stayed off to the side, occupied with her brother.⁵ Even so, Olga still liked playing the piano, likely to relieve the boredom, choosing catchy and plaintive tunes, an echo of the whimsicality of her former self. But the monotony was not to last. In the early morning hours of July 17, 1918, after seventy eight days in Yekaterinburg, she and her family were led into the cellar of the Ipatiev House and killed with bullets and bayonets. Olga was only twenty-two years of age.