![[ALEXANDRA FEODOROVNA, TSARITSA] YONGE, CHARLOTTE M. The Heir of Redclyffe](/sites/default/files/styles/auction_slider/public/images/lots/2015-04-15/1070035.jpg?itok=OcjPd-g7)
Lot Details
Lot 237
[ALEXANDRA FEODOROVNA, TSARITSA] YONGE, CHARLOTTE M. The Heir of Redclyffe. New York: A. L. Burt, circa 1900. Inscribed in pencil in...
. New York: A. L. Burt, circa 1900. Inscribed in pencil in the hand of the Empress Alexandra "For/Darling Tatiana/fr. Papa & Mama/G.C. Jan 12, 1910," with a hand-written Soviet era book label reading [approximately] "Alexander Palace Museum, children's half, classroom of the young Duchesses, (inventory) Nr. 874." Original publisher's green pictorial cloth, housed in a chemise and pull-off leather backed case. 7 1/4 x 4 7/8 inches (18 x 12.5 cm); [2] 591 pp. Generally fine condition, old bookseller's description mounted to front paste-down, a small label [Cabinet section 1, shelf 2] mounted to the rear paste-down.
Large quantities of books from the Tsarkoye Selo museum were acquired in the 1930s via Hammer Galleries (founded 1928), owned by the industrialist Armand Hammer and his brother Victor. At the time, the government of the U.S.S.R. was desperate for hard currency, and Hammer was one of the primary vehicles by which objects of vertu (including the Imperial Easter Eggs produced by Faberge) were sold in the West. Given to Alexandra's daughter Tatiana (the Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna of Russia), who was 13 at the time of the gift (she was born in 1897), the English inscription is quite customary for the Imperial family, as Alexandra was the daughter of Princess Alice of the United Kingdom, the second daughter of Queen Victoria. We have found at least one comparable inscription (and label) from a children's book originating from the Hammer trove. Tatiana, along with her mother, father, sisters, brother and family attendants, were infamously murdered by the Bolsheviks in 1918, likely as a result of direct orders from Lenin. Tatiana, the recipient of this book, was the second daughter of Tsar Nicholas II, and is a passion bearer in the Russian Orthodox Church. With a recent letter of authenticity from Lion Heart Autographs.
C
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