PHOTO: Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich and Emperor Nicholas II

On this day – 14th (O.S. 1st) March 1917 – Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich (1876-1938) committed treason against Emperor Nicholas II

* Click HERE to read my article Grand Duke Kirill’s act of treason against Emperor Nicholas II, published on 26th May 2021

Before the Emperor’s abdication, Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich was one of the first Russian officers to commit an act of betrayal to his oath of loyalty to the Sovereign and to his dynastic duty. While commanding the Marine of the Guard, which was responsible for guarding the Imperial Family at Tsarskoye Selo, Kirill Vladimirovich marched them into Petrograd to declare their allegiance to the new Provisional Government.

Prior to that, the Grand Duke sent notes to the chiefs of the military units at Tsarskoye Selo, with a proposal “to join the new government”, following his own example.

In June 1917, Grand Duke Kirill was the first Romanov to flee Russia, along with his pregnant wife and their two children. Not only was his desertion “illegal”, Kirill, who was serving as a rear admiral in active military service in a country at war, had thus abandoned his honour and dignity. It is interesting to add, that the Kirillovich were the only branch of the Imperial Family who managed to escape the Bolsheviks, without losing any family members.

Not only was Grand Duke Kirill a coward, he was clearly a man who lacked a moral compass and a traitor to his Sovereign and to Russia. His acts of treason and desertion, and later his support of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis during his years in exile, thus deprived his descendants any rights to the Russian throne.

* Click HERE to read my article “The Russian Imperial House ended with the murder of Nicholas II” , published on 17th February 2021

© Paul Gilbert. 14 March 2022