When the Hurly-Burly's Done: The House of Stuart Sequence, #8

By George Kearton

The Great War has been raging for eighteen years. 

In celebration of Christmas, Tsar Nicholas II attends the theatre in St. Petersburg but he is not to survive the evening.
His successors determine that taking part in the peace talks which Pope Benedict has mooted may well be to Russia's advantage. After deliberate delays, they travel to Rheinfelden to meet with British Prime Minister Bonar Law, French President Georges Clemenceau and American Prime Minister Woodrow Wilson.

Representing Russia, both Alexander Kerensky and Leon Bronstein make demands which are not acceptable to the Entente powers and the talks break up.

A resumption of war now seems inevitable and, in an attempt to open up a second front against the Russians outside Europe, Bonar Law sets diplomatic and military matters in motion.

T E Lawrence is sent to Kashmir to set the East ablaze, diplomat John Buchan is sent on an international journey to secure a new ally and to re-invigorate American participation in the Great War. Former American Prime Minister Theodore Roosevelt returns to power in what some term a coup d'état.

Subsequently, the Russians come under attack in Uzbekistan, China and Siberia and suffer humiliating losses.

The Western Front will once again, however, become the major area of conflict; British troops on the Somme make progress but only at horrendous cost and Denmark faces new and terrifying weapons as it struggles to halt the Russian steamroller.
Who will emerge triumphant 'when the battle's lost and won'?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sea Lion Press
• Release date: Jul 5, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393086109

Book preview

This book is a work of fiction. Where 'real-world' characters may appear, the nature of the divergent story means any depictions herein are fictionalised and in no way an indication of real events. Above all, characterisations have been developed with the primary aim of telling a compelling story.

Published by Sea Lion Press, 2019. All rights reserved.

It is 1913; eighteen years since Russian armies swept across Europe, conquered half of China and invaded Afghanistan.

The Stuart realms, including the United States of British North America (currently under the premiership of Woodrow Wilson), have joined in coalition with France to drive the invaders back but, despite several bloody campaigns, little real progress has been made.

Norway, Sweden, the Belgian provinces of the Republic of the Netherlands and much of France have fallen under Russian control. Denmark remains under close siege by the Russians and has only held onto its independence with British military support.

In the Balkans, the Serbian allies and co-religionists of Russia have captured Albania, Montenegro and much of Greece. The Austrian Confederacy has invaded the Grand Duchy of Danubia and has captured Hungary in the first moves of its declared mission to restore German national prowess and destroy pan-Slavic influences.

China has disappeared; the former Empire is now divided between the mutually hostile nations of Nippon and Russia. They have already fought one war, an inconclusive victory for Nippon. Russia is now on the defensive in Manchuria but is threatening Anglo-American trade interests in the North Pacific.

Pratap Singh, ruler of Kashmir, having helped local tribesmen drive the Russians out of Afghanistan, is now seizing control of many minor princely states in the north of India.

Almost exhausted by eighteen years of war, the Stuart realms have persuaded their European allies to seek peace talks with the Russians and Serbs. They have enlisted the support of Pope Benedict XV, who has agreed to act as honest broker.

By December, no replies have been received to the invitations His Holiness has relayed, via the Orthodox Churches, to both Serbia and Russia.

As Christmas approaches, Tsar Nicholas and his mistress attend a gala evening at the Imperial Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg – but as they enter the theatre arm-in-arm, three shots ring out...

A Night at the Opera

The shots came as a complete surprise to the Tsar and those accompanying him. On both sides of the foyer, crowds had gathered to welcome their royal guest; they were a mixture of the nobility, regular theatre-goers and theatre staff including waiters. A shabbily-dressed man, one hand wrapped in a handkerchief, extended his arm to the Tsar. He pulled the handkerchief away and revealed a revolver; he managed to fire three shots before he was pulled to the ground, but the damage had been done. The first shot hit the Tsar’s companion, Polish ballerina Matylda Krzesinksa, in the left arm. The second two shots both hit the Tsar; one struck him in the chest and one in the abdomen. Streaming blood, he fell to the ground. His physicians were immediately sent for; they supervised the careful movement of the obviously badly-wounded Tsar to the Winter Palace. A medical examination revealed that the first bullet, which had hit the Tsar in the chest, had lodged itself in the large insignia of the Order of St Andrew which the Tsar had been wearing. Of the second bullet there was no sign, apart from a small hole in the abdomen which had now stopped bleeding; there appeared to be no exit wound, so surgical attempts were made to locate and remove the bullet. These attempts were unsuccessful, though some pieces of the Tsar’s tunic, which had been driven into his abdomen by the force of the bullet, were removed; the wound was then closed up, using black silk stitches.

Conscious throughout the procedure, the Tsar’s first questions were about the fate of Matylda. He then issued orders to convene a meeting of his Imperial Council of State for the following day; but by the time the meeting was convened, his condition had deteriorated and he was only semi-conscious. He was able to issue just one order – his cousin the Grand Duke Nikolay, commander of Russia’s European armies, was to be sent for; should the Tsar not survive, Nikolay was to be proclaimed Regent on behalf of the young Alexei, Nicholas’ son and heir.

As rumours swept across Russia and then into Western Europe, a harsh military interrogation had revealed some details of the attacker. His name was Leon Czolgosz and he was one of eight children born into a staunchly Catholic family in Poland. He freely confessed to bearing a hatred for Russia and for the Tsar; his family had apparently sought permission to leave Poland for the United States in early 1895 but permission had been denied, probably because of the imminent start of hostilities by the Russian army. Czolgosz believed that, had his family been allowed to leave Russia for the USA, his life would have been very different and possibly very much better. He had shifted in and out of a series of jobs in Poland and then moved to the Saint Petersburg area, where he had worked as a glass-blower and in a steel mill.

He seemed to have only gradually drifted into the politics of anarchy, but his potential comrades were less than trusting of his motives. The following warning appeared in a local anarchist news-sheet:

ATTENTION! The attention of all comrades is called to a possible spy who styles himself as Leon Czolgosz. He is well dressed, of medium height, rather narrow shoulders, blond and about 35 years of age. Up to the present he has made his appearance in Warsaw and Saint Petersburg. In the former place he remained only a short time, but while there he disappeared when the comrades had confirmed themselves of his identity and were on the point of exposing him. His demeanour is of the usual sort, pretending to be greatly interested in the cause, asking for names or soliciting aid for acts of contemplated violence. If this same individual makes his appearance elsewhere then comrades are warned in advance and can act accordingly

The weapon he had used did arouse some interest and brief speculation about the possible involvement of foreign agents; it was a small-calibre revolver, made by the American firm of Iver Johnson. Czolgosz never revealed how he had procured it, nor did he reveal the names of any accomplices. He had gained entry to the Mariinsky by taking a job there as a waiter, but, on investigation of other members of staff, no-one came forward claiming to have known him. He declared himself to have been inspired by Gaetano Bresci, the assassin of King Umberto of Italy, and also made one further statement just before he was hanged:

I killed the Tsar because he was the enemy of the good people – the good working people.

He was thrown, without coffin, into an unmarked grave in the barracks where he had been interrogated and hanged; sulphuric acid was then poured into the grave so as to disfigure and decompose his body. There could be no memorial or remains for any future worshippers of a regicide.

The Grand Duke, leaving his second-in-command, General Samsonov, in charge of the Russian armies in the West, finally arrived in Saint Petersburg six days later, just after the Tsar had died from gangrene caused by the bullet still lodged in his body.

Russia mourned their Tsar, and many tears were shed at the sight of the new Tsar Alexei, aged nine, who walked, dressed in Cossack uniform, behind his late father’s horse-drawn bier. Alexei was flanked by the Grand Duke on one side and by his tutor, Father Grigori Rasputin, on the other.

Interregnum

Before the outbreak of war, British diplomats had regularly passed on their impressions of Tsar Nicholas to their lords and masters in London.

The Tsar had been generally viewed as a kindly man but without any of the characteristics or abilities needed to be an effective ruler of the largest Empire in the world. Decisions seemed to terrify him, and were often made on the advice of the last person he had spoken to before making his decision. Not only that, but the decisions he did eventually make took months and months to arrive at; his Ministers of State were often kept waiting when speed should have been of the essence. Very early in his military command, Grand Duke Nikolay had realised the situation, and since 1896 he had made most of his command and campaign decisions without referring them back to the Tsar.

A later historian summed Nicholas up in the following words:

He was a sovereign who had but one idea of government; to preserve intact the absolute monarchy bequeathed to him by his father and who, lacking the intellect, energy or training for his job, fell back on personal favorites, whim, simple mulishness, and other devices of the empty-headed autocrat. He seemed to have learned nothing during his reign, and the impression of correct imperturbability he conveyed was, in reality, apathy; the indifference of a mind so shallow as to be all surface. When a telegram was brought to him announcing the Nipponese capture of Port Arthur, he read it, stuffed it in his pocket, and went on playing tennis.

Other documents suffered the same fate; the Papal invitation to peace talks at Rheinfelden was one such. Several weeks after becoming Regent, Grand Duke Nikolay discovered it, apparently unread, in a desk drawer in the late Tsar’s study.

Also discovered were two unopened letters from the Serbian government, seeking advice as to how they should react to the invitation they had received to the peace talks.

Nikolay saw himself as only ruling on behalf of the young Alexei; he had no dynastic ambitions of his own. As he surveyed the chaos left behind by Nicholas, he very soon realised that the proposed peace talks actually presented two opportunities for Russia: the opportunity to start to rebuild the country socially and economically without the pressures of an ongoing war to contend with; and, if the peace talks could be prolonged (and Nikolay would ensure that they were), the opportunity to secretly rebuild Russian arms should they be called into play again. This second consideration was probably also in the minds of the Entente powers, and was certainly a major consideration for countries such as Denmark and Greece. Nikolay determined, therefore, to eventually accept the invitation to the proposed peace talks, but he obviously wanted to make Russia’s position as strong as possible before any talks commenced.

His first step was to make substantial administrative changes to the Russian Empire. All of Russia’s conquests during the nineteenth century had been declared by the Tsars as Grand Duchies. ‘Finland’ now consisted of Sweden and Norway as well as Finland itself; ‘Poland’ enfolded the bulk of Germany, which Russia had conquered in 1860, as well as the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth; and ‘Danubia’ comprised the former Habsburg province of Hungary, as well as Romania and Bulgaria, which Russia had acquired by treaty from the Ottoman Empire before the outbreak of the General European Wars. All of these territories were now to become merely provinces of Russia, and their Governors (all either Russian Generals or minor members of the Romanov family) were forced into ignominious retirement. Outside of Danubia, this made little difference (although Finland, Sweden and Norway were combined into what Nikolay was to term ‘the Northern Baltic Provinces’, so as to completely subsume their individual national pride) but the changes to Danubia were especially significant in two regards. Firstly, Nikolay now had the power (which he swiftly employed) to order the withdrawal of the Bulgarian troops which the former Governor had ordered to move in support of Serbia, and secondly, he pointed out to the Austrians that their occupation of Hungary was now an act of war against the whole of the Russian Empire. Not wishing to risk such a conflict, the Austrians withdrew their troops immediately and the boundaries of Danubia were thus restored. Russian troops had also conquered nearly half of China in the 1890s, and Nikolay proclaimed that these lands were now to become part of Russia’s Eastern Maritime Provinces. To give local politicians in the former Duchies at least the hope of future advancement, Nikolay also announced that he was considering plans for a Duma, or Parliament, which would have, among its membership, representatives from all parts of the re-organised Russian Empire. Wisely, he offered no dates by which this Duma would meet, but did point out (perhaps tongue-in-cheek) that the population of the former Duchies now enjoyed exactly the same level of political rights as the population of the rest of Russia. Although many of these changes seemed impressive, they were, in effect, only cosmetic and did not, of themselves, enable any of the changes needed in the