George Mikhailovich, Count Brasov - Childhood

Childhood

In the fall of 1914, at the start of World War I, Grand Duke Michael requested permission to return to Russia to rejoin the army, which was fighting on the Eastern Front. Nicholas II granted his request and George and his family returned to live in a villa at 24 Nikolaevskaya, Gatchina, that Michael had bought for Natalia. (Natalia was not permitted to live at any of the imperial palaces.) George's English nanny, Miss Rata, accompanied them to Russia, after marrying Michael's head groom, Mr Bennett. Michael became a general and earned a Cross of St. George, the highest military award, for action in the Carpathian mountains.

Michael wrote to Nicholas asking him to legitimise George so, he argued, that the boy would be provided for in the event of Michael's death at the front. Six months later, Nicholas legitimised George by decree, and created him a count. George and his descendants would, however, be excluded from the order of succession.

By 1915, Mrs Bennett was pregnant, so she left the family's service and was replaced by her friend and fellow Englishwoman, Margaret Neame. George's father remained at the front until September 1916, but he was invalided from October with stomach ulcers, and the family spent the winter in the Crimea as Michael recuperated, and then spent Christmas at Brasovo. The Christmas holiday was cut short, however, when one of the guest's children contracted diphtheria and died. At risk of infection, the family evacuated the estate by snow-bound sleigh ride. It was the last time any of them would see Brasovo.