PEARL EARRING BELONGING TO THE EMPRESS
IKONS (HOLY IMAGES), BELONGING TO THE EMPRESS AND HER DAUGHTERS
THE ENTRANCE TO THE SHAFT NEAR EKATERINBURG
from Ekaterinburg gave the necessary indications. The grand duchesses were “to dispose of the medicines as had been agreed.” This meant that the jewels had to be secreted in the clothing in such a way as to escape search (Nicholas, Alexandra, and Maria had been “searched” very thoroughly and brutally). For some days the grand duchesses and their trusty servants worked at the task, sewing up the valuables in their bodices, in their hats, and even inside their buttons. The Empress had few if any valuables with her—possibly because there had been no time to secrete them—but thanks to the precautions now taken, the grand duchesses managed to smuggle all that was of greatest value into their last prison-house. Womanlike, they clung to these relics of former happiness, and perhaps deep down in their hearts slumbered some hope that the gems might help them to escape.
Leaving Tobolsk by steamer on May 20th the family and household reached Ekaterinburg on the 22nd without incident.
In handing over his prisoners to the Ekaterinburg Soviet, Yakovlev obtained the following written acknowledgment:—“Russian Federal Soviet Republic. Uralian Regional Council of Deputies. Receipt. 30th April, 1918. I, the President of the Regional Uralian Council of Deputies, Beloborodov, have taken over from the member of the All-Russian Tsik comrade Yakovlev the interned: former Tsar Nicholas Romanov, the former Tsaritsa Alexandra Feodorovna, the former Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna, and the persons accompanying them. All these persons are under arrest and under guard. The President of the Uralian Regional Sovdep. (Signed) Beloborodov.”