Formative Years
His parents' marriage was unhappy and Dimitri was still a child when his father started a new family with his mistress, a Russian ballerina. A second family setback scared him even further. Dimitri was fourteen when his eldest brother Nicholas Constantinovich was disinherited, declared insane and sent into internal Russian exile, after stealing some diamonds from an icon in his mother’s bedroom. Grand Duchess Alexandra Iosifovna made her three remaining sons: Constantin age sixteen, Dimitri fourteen, and Vyacheslav twelve, promise her that they would never drink, never give themselves to a life of self-indulgence, never forget that that all the privileges of their wealth and rank were meant for use and not enjoyment. Brought up under these conditions, the younger Constantinovich grand dukes grew into thoughtful, introspective men
At the age of fifteen, Dimitri, with his younger brother Viacheslav, was enrolled as a cadet aboard the tender Kadetski. Together the two brothers underwent the rigors of life at sea. During their training cruises through the Gulf of Finland, they spent their time drilling, standing watch, and taking turns leading their fellow cadets. In 1877, the seventeen year old Dimitri made his first official public appearance as a member of the Imperial family, he joined Alexander II with his father and cousins Grand Duke Sergei and Grand Duke Paul Alexandrovich on a journey to southern Russia in the aftermath of the Russo-Turkish War, 1877–1878.
Dimitri soon disappointed his father’s wishes when he decided to abandon his career in the Navy in favor of the Imperial Army. He used the interval of an illness to ask his father to allow him to join the army. It was a blow to Constantine to see his third consecutive son to leave the navy, but Dimitri begged his father and with the intervention of Alexandra Iosifovna, he was eventually allowed to leave the Navy and join the Horse Guards regiment in 1879.
Like his parents, Dimitri was musical; he had a particular love for Russian church music. In later years, he often sang in the chapel choirs at Strelna, the Marble Palace and the Pokrovsky Convent in Kiev. Duty stood at the core of his being and he was fiercely critical of a system, which pushed members of the Imperial family forward simply because of who they were. He believed that their promotions should be earned
Intensely shy, Dimitri preferred to avoid society, but on summer evenings at Petergof he often rode from Strelna to Znameka, the house of his cousin, Grand Duke Peter where he was a welcome guest. Peter’s wife, Grand Duchess Militsa, played the piano while Dimitri was usually persuaded to join in, accompanying with his own singing of Russian folk songs.
Read more about this topic: Grand Duke Dimitri Constantinovich Of Russia
Famous quotes related to formative years:
“The social forces that operate on a family during the daughter’s formative years continue to shape her experience. Thus the families, schools, and jobs that involve poor women are likely to be very hierarchically arranged, demanding conformity, passivity, and obedience—all unsupportive of continued intellectual growth.”
—Mary Field Belenky (20th century)