Although the evidence is inconclusive, it appears that Moscow ordered Ekaterinburg to withhold the announcement because of the very sensitive issue of the fate of the Empress and children.
The problem was the Germans, whom the Bolsheviks at this time went to extreme lengths to cultivate. The Kaiser was a cousin of Nicholas and a godfather of the Tsarevich. Had he been so inclined, he could have demanded that the ex-Tsar and his family be turned over to Germany as part of the Brest-Litovsk peace settlement, a demand that the Bolsheviks would have been in no position to refuse. But he did nothing. When in early March the King of Denmark asked him to intercede on their behalf, the Kaiser responded that he could not offer asylum to the Imperial family because the Russians would interpret it as an attempt at a restoration of the monarchy.86 He also rejected the request of the Swedish King to help ease the plight of the Romanovs.87 The most likely explanation of this behavior was provided by Bothmer, who thought it was due to fear of the German left-wing parties.*
For all its indifference to the fate of Nicholas, Berlin displayed some concern for the safety of the Tsarina, who was of German origin, her daughters, and the several other German ladies at the Russian court, among them Elizaveta Fedorovna, Alexandra’s sister, whom they referred to collectively as the “German princesses.” Mirbach raised the issue with Karakhan and Radek on May 10, and reported as follows to Berlin:
Of course, without venturing to act as an advocate for the overthrown regime, I have nevertheless expressed to the commissars the expectation that the German princesses will be treated with all possible consideration and, in particular, that there will be no small chicaneries, let alone threats to their lives. Karakhan and Radek, who represented the indisposed Chicherin, received my remarks in a very forthcoming and understanding manner.88
On the morning of July 17, an official of the soviet in Ekaterinburg—almost certainly its chairman, Beloborodov—appears to have sent a cable to the Kremlin with a report on the events of the preceding night. The extremely detailed chronicle of Lenin’s life, which traces his public activities hour by hour, notes cryptically in an entry under that date: “Lenin receives (at 12 noon) a letter from Ekaterinburg and writes on the envelope: ‘Received. Lenin.’ ”89 Since at this time Ekaterinburg did not communicate with the Kremlin by post but by direct wire, it can be taken for granted that the document in question was not a letter but a telegram. Second, the chronicle in question normally provides the gist of those messages to Lenin which it lists. The omission in this case suggests that it concerned the murder of the Imperial family, a subject which Communist literature invariably disassociates from Lenin. Apparently the message was not specific enough about the fate of Nicholas’s wife and children, because the Kremlin telegraphed Ekaterinburg for clarification. Later that same day Beloborodov sent to Moscow a coded message which sounds as if it were a response to a query. Sokolov found a copy of this cable at the Ekaterinburg telegraph office. He was unable to break the code. This was accomplished only two years later in Paris by a Russian cryptographer. The document settled the question of the final fate of the Imperial family:
MOSCOW Kremlin Secretary of Council of People’s Commissars Gorbunov with return verification. Inform Sverdlov whole family suffered same fate as head officially family will perish during evacuation. Beloborodov.90
Beloborodov’s message reached Moscow that night. The following day, Sverdlov announced the news to the Presidium of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, carefully omitting to mention the death of Nicholas’s family. He spoke of the grave danger of the ex-Tsar falling into Czech hands and obtained from the Presidium formal approval of the actions of the Ural Regional Soviet.91 He did not bother to explain why the Imperial family had not been moved to Moscow in June or early July, when there had been ample time to do so.
Late that day, Sverdlov dropped in on a meeting of the Council of People’s Commissars which was in progress in the Kremlin. An eyewitness describes the scene:
During the discussion of a project concerning public health, reported on by Comrade Semashko, Sverdlov entered and took his seat, a chair behind Ilich. Semashko finished. Sverdlov approached, bent over Ilich, and said something.
“Comrade Sverdlov asks for the floor to make an announcement.”
“I have to say,” Sverdlov began in his customary steady voice, “that we have received information that in Ekaterinburg, by decision of the Regional Soviet, Nicholas has been shot. Alexandra Fedorovna and her son are in reliable hands. Nicholas wanted to escape. The Czechs were drawing near. The Presidium of the Executive Committee has given its approval.”
General silence.
“We shall now proceed to read the project, article by article,” Ilich suggested.
The reading, article by article, got underway, followed by a discussion of the project on statistics.92
It is difficult to know what to make of this charade, for surely the members of the Bolshevik cabinet knew the truth.* Such procedures seemed to satisfy the Bolshevik need for formal “correctness” with which to justify arbitrary actions.
Sverdlov next drafted an official statement which he gave to Izvestiia and Pravda for publication the following day, July 19. As translated by The Times of London, where it appeared on July 22, it read as follows:
At the first session of the Central Executive Committee elected by the Fifth Congress of the Councils a message was made public, received by direct wire from the Ural Regional Council, concerning the shooting of the ex-Tsar, Nicholas Romanoff.
Recently Ekaterinburg, the capital of the Red Ural, was seriously threatened by the approach of the Czecho-Slovak bands. At the same time a counterrevolutionary conspiracy was discovered, having for its object the wresting of the tyrant from the hands of the Council’s authority by armed force.
In view of this fact the Presidium of the Ural Regional Council decided to shoot the ex-Tsar, Nicholas Romanoff. This decision was carried out on July 16.
The wife and son of Romanoff have been sent to a place of security. Documents concerning the conspiracy which were discovered have been forwarded to Moscow by a special messenger.
It had been recently decided to bring the ex-Tsar before a tribunal, to be tried for his crimes against the people, and only later occurrences led to delay in adopting this course. The Presidency of the Central Executive Committee, after having discussed the circumstances which compelled the Ural Regional Council to take the decision to shoot Nicholas Romanoff, decided as follows: The Russian Central Executive Committee, in the persons of the Presidium, accept the decision of the Ural Regional Council as being regular.
The Central Executive Committee has now at its disposal extremely important material and documents concerning the Nicholas Romanoff affair: his own diaries, which he kept almost to the last days; the diaries of his wife and children; his correspondence, amongst which are letters by Gregory Rasputin to Romanoff and his family. All these materials will be examined and published in the near future.
Thus the official legend was born: that Nicholas—and he alone—was executed because he had attempted to escape and that the decision was made by the Ural Regional Soviet rather than the Bolshevik Central Committee in Moscow.
On and immediately following July 19, when Pravda and Izvestiia carried the first announcements of the alleged decisions of the Ekaterinburg Soviet—along with the decree nationalizing Romanov properties signed into law on July 13—the Ekaterinburg Soviet still maintained a stony silence.