Question by Laura Geelan: Did Tsar Nicholas II do anything positive for his people or Country during his reign?
I wanted to know is Tsar Nicholas II did anything for Russia or its people, because so far I have only established the negatives. Thankyou!
Answers and Views:
Answer by b0ils
You have to understand russians are a completely different people. With a harsh attitude and general way of doing things. Nicholas didnt do anything worse than any previous czar, in my opinion he didnt do enough ( to stop the revolution; and his eventual death). Have to keep in mind that at the time he was overthrown WW1 was raging and russians’ both civilians and troops were starving.
I think times were just changing and the czars’ way of ruling the country was at its end.
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Sam says
The tragedy of Nicholas II, the Last Imperial Ruler of Russia, was that he appeared in the wrong place in history. Equipped by education to rule in the nineteenth century, where the world seemed orderly, and equipped by temperament to be a constitutional monarch, where a sovereign needed only be a good man in order to be a good king. He lived and reigned in a transforming Russia of the early twentieth century.
The Emperor had the outstanding qualities of a man and a ruler, but his favorite expression with regard to himself in a close family circle was “I am just a plain, common man.” He had an excellent memory, exceptional energy and broad learning, a strong and disciplined will power, an acute sense of morality, a great awareness of his responsibilities. Devoted to his ideals, he defended them with patience and persistence. Thoroughly honest, he was a slave to his word and his loyalty towards the allies, which was the reason of his death, proved it better than anything else.
Growing up, Nickolas's father, Emperor Alexander III, did not let him participate in his father's meeting with counclers, which was a large mistake, for if Nicholas had been more active in his father's life as a Tsar, he would not made so many mistakes during his rule.
In the summer of 1904, the long-awaited heir to the throne was born. He became the center of the family, the favorite. Alexei was an exceptionally handsome boy, the most wonderful child anyone could hope for. But alas, when he was two months old the Empress discovered that he was afflicted with hemophilia, a hereditary disease of the House of Hesse, now transmitted tragically to him, the long awaited heir. The Empress suffered agony, blaming herself to be responsible for his condition. Alexandra's shame of this may have been one of the factors why she turned to the uncouth holy man Gregory Rasputin. During the Spala episode of October 1912 when their son Alexei appeared to be on the brink of death, the Emperor wrote to his mother: “The days from the 10th to the 23rd were the worst. The poor child suffered greatly; the pain was sporadic, occurring every 15 minutes. He hardly slept at all, did not have the strength to cry but only moaned, repeating the same words all over again: “Lord have mercy on me.” I could not stand it but had to remain in the room in order to relieve Alix who had exhausted herself completely, spending every night at his bedside. She bore this trial better than I, especially when Alexis’ sufferings were at their worst.”
For a week and a half the boy displayed symptoms of pallor, internal haemorrhaging, abdominal swelling, pain and bleeding in the joints, delirium, and dangerously high fever, but he suddenly began to recover after the arrival of a telegram sent by Rasputin to the Empress Alexandra.
He did not heal Alexei's disease as historians have suggested, but Rasputin did heal Alexandra's faith and her belief that there could be a brighter future for her son. The Emperor and Empress had by this time realised that anyone to whom they showed any special mark of favour would be immediately pecked at and intrigued against. So when rumers becan to spread about him, they atributed it to this. The Empress saw Rasputin solely with religious eyes, neither the uncouth peasant, nor the man, but the helping spirit sent in her hour of need. She trusted, from the first, that his prayers might cure her son. She, who disliked all publicity, hid the fact of the child's illness.
Hatred for Rasputin, the man who was supposed to be responsible for all the Government's mistakes became a real obsession. The feeling against him became so intense that in 1916 a plot was formed to murder him in order to save Russia.
Nicholas II Romanov ruled Russia from 1895 to 1917 and lost power during Russia's February Revolution, when in the spring of 1917 he had to abdicate. The power was transferred to the Provisional Government, but shortly after that Nicholas Romanov and his family were arrested and were kept under close surveillance at the Alexander Palace in Tsarskoye Selo, near the Russian capital Petrograd (now St. Petersburg). Romanovs were then transported to inner Russia to prevent them from running away abroad or from being captured by the approaching German troops. Russia's last tzar and his family spent the last months in Yekaterinburg. During their time in housearrest, the family came yet closer and really didn't want leave Russia. They saw it as their duty to stay, and as the empress said: "If it is god's will, we must endure it to the very end…" And so they did…
As a tsar, and even after he abdicated, Nicholas II was the head of the Russian Orthodox Church. After the assassination, he and his family were revered by many as martyrs and numerous miracles were attributed to them. The family was canonized as royal martyrs by the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad in 1981.
ammianus says
He certainly did. Apart from establishing the Duma, the first elected government body in Russian history (1906), the Franco-Russian alliance of 1894 opened up Russia to considerable French investment, encouraged by the Czar himself.
This investment was particularly important in terms of the Russian transport infrastructure, both railway track mileage and the number of good roads markedly increasing.Indeed, the projection was that by 1916, the transport infrastructure nationwide would be so improved as to cut mobilization time for the Russian army from 8 weeks to 4 – one of the reasons Germany gave Austria unconditional support following the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. If no general European war started before 1916, Germany's Schlieffen Plan, designed to defeat France quickly before the Russian army was fully mobilized, would be obsolete.
elena says
You are absolutely right! He did nothing positive for Russia. For something he was known in Russia as "Bloody". From the day of his coronation when Khodynka Tragedy occurred (a lot of people were trampled to death during the celebration of coronation…and the tragedy didn't stop Nicolas from dancing at balls…) he proved to be very cruel and tyrannous. He didn't ever think about his people…he was driven by his ambitions. He was an absolutist, the worst ever strategist, very mean and retarded (only a mean and not clever person could be influenced by somebody like Rasputin!) – He engaged Russia in two wars in succession slaying Russians, mostly untrained muzhiks, as they were tin solders. And he had what he gained! The only one to blame for destruction, poverty, hunger and as a consequence of those, 3 revolutions in succession in Russia which not only ended with his family and him, but with the very idea of a tzar in Russia!