Frank Antonowitz (husband) Harry Karadimas (lover)
Relatives
Gabriel Louis Duval (foster grandson)
Granny Alina (died 1969) was the foster grandmother of Gabriel Louis Duval, who claimed in his 2004 book A Princess in the Family that she might have been Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia. (however photos of Granny Alina depict her looking like an older version of Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna of Russia.[1]) According to Duval, Granny Alina married a man named Frank Antonowitz and moved to South Africa, where they started a farrier business together. After Frank's death, she began a relationship with a Greek man named Harry Karadimas, with whom she shared a home. She lived with Duval's family from 1954 until her death in 1969.[2]
In his book, Duval claimed that Granny Alina told him she was a princess, that her family had been murdered during the Russian Revolution, and that she had been rescued. She did not want to talk about the rescue for fear of being sent back to Russia.[2] Duval had her grave exhumed, but her remains were too decomposed to produce an accurate DNA profile. The story attracted some television news coverage in Australia and in the United States.[2]
The House of Romanov was the reigning imperial house of Russia from 1613 to 1917. They achieved prominence after the Tsarina, Anastasia Romanova, was married to the First Tsar of Russia, Ivan the Terrible. Tsar Nicholas II's immediate family was executed in 1918, but there are still living descendants.
Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna of Russia was the second daughter of Tsar Nicholas II, the last monarch of Russia, and of Tsarina Alexandra. She was born at Peterhof Palace, near Saint Petersburg.
Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia was the youngest daughter of Tsar Nicholas II, the last sovereign of Imperial Russia, and his wife, Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna.
Alex Ceslaw Maurice Jean Brimeyer was a pretender who claimed connection to various European thrones. He used fraudulent combined titles such as "Prince d'Anjou Durazzo Durassow Romanoff Dolgorouki de Bourbon-Condé". He authored the highly controversial book, Moi Petit-Arriere-Fils du Tsar. He also sold false titles of nobility through "orders" that he and his associates had created.
Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich of Russia was the Head of the Imperial Family of Russia, a position which he claimed from 1938 to his death.
Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna of Russia has been a claimant to the headship of the House of Romanov, the Imperial Family of Russia since 1992. Although she has used Grand Duchess of Russia as her title of pretence with the style Imperial Highness throughout her life, her right to do so is disputed. She is a great-great-granddaughter in the male line of Emperor Alexander II of Russia.
Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna of Russia was the third daughter of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna. Her murder following the Russian Revolution of 1917 resulted in her canonization as a passion bearer by the Russian Orthodox Church.
The Romanov Family Association is an organization for descendants of the former Russian Imperial House. It was created in 1979 and officially registered in Switzerland. The current head of the organization is Princess Olga Andreevna.
Nicholas Romanovich Romanov was a claimant to the headship of the House of Romanov and president of the Romanov Family Association. Although undoubtedly a descendant of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia, his claimed titles and official membership in the former Imperial House were disputed by those who maintained that his parents' marriage violated the laws of the Russian Empire.
Princess Maria of Greece and Denmark was a daughter of King George I of Greece and his wife Grand Duchess Olga Constantinovna of Russia. She was a sister of King Constantine I of Greece and a first cousin of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and King George V of the United Kingdom.
Princess Tatiana Constantinovna of Russia was the third child and eldest daughter of Grand Duke Constantine Constantinovich of Russia and his wife, Princess Elisabeth of Saxe-Altenburg.
Grand Duchess Alexandra Alexandrovna of Russia was the eldest child and first daughter of Tsar Alexander II of Russia and his first wife Marie of Hesse and by Rhine. She died from infant meningitis at the age of six and a half.
Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaievna of Russia was a daughter of Emperor Nicholas I of Russia, and sister of Alexander II. In 1839 she married Maximilian, Duke of Leuchtenberg. She was an art collector and President of the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg.
Princess Helen of Serbia was a Serbian princess. She was the daughter of King Peter I of Serbia and his wife, the former Princess Ljubica of Montenegro. She was the elder sister of George, Crown Prince of Serbia and King Alexander I of Yugoslavia. Helen was also a niece of Queen Elena of Italy, Princess Anastasia of Montenegro, wife of Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich of Russia and of Princess Milica of Montenegro, wife of Grand Duke Peter Nikolaevich of Russia, the women who introduced Grigori Rasputin to Tsarina Alexandra.
Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna of Russia, known as Maria Pavlovna the Younger, was a granddaughter of Alexander II of Russia. She was a paternal first cousin of Nicholas II and maternal first cousin of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. She was also both the first grandchild of George I of Greece and the first great-grandchild of his father Christian IX of Denmark.
Larissa Feodorovna Tudor was the wife of Owen Frederick Morton Tudor, an officer of the 3rd Hussars. Following her death, it was rumoured that she was in truth Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna of Russia, the second daughter of Nicholas II of Russia, and of Tsarina Alexandra.
Marga Boodts was a woman who claimed to be Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna of Russia. She was one of a considerable number of Romanov pretenders who emerged from various parts of the world following the execution of Tsar Nicholas II and his family at Yekaterinberg on July 18, 1918. She stands out, however, as one of very few who claimed to have been Grand Duchess Olga, the Tsar's oldest daughter. She was also known as Maria Bottcher.
Members of the ruling Russian imperial family, the House of Romanov, were executed by a firing squad led by Yakov Yurovsky in Yekaterinburg, Russia, on July 17, 1918, during both the Russian Civil War and near the end of the First World War.
Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna of Russia was the eldest child of the last Tsar of the Russian Empire, Emperor Nicholas II, and of Empress Alexandra of Russia.
Alexandra Alexandrovna Tegleva, also known as Shura Tegleva and Sasha Tegleva, was a Russian noblewoman who served as a nursemaid in the Russian Imperial Household. As nursemaid to the children of Emperor Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, she went with the family into exile in Tobolsk following the abdication of Nicholas II during the February Revolution, but was ultimately prevented from staying with them during their house arrest at Ipatiev House. She survived the Russian Revolution and married Pierre Gilliard, a Swiss academic who served with her in the Imperial Household as the children's French tutor. She moved to Lausanne as a white émigré and remained there the rest of her life. Tegleva worked with her husband to investigate and debunk the claims made by Anna Anderson, a Romanov impostor who pretended to be Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna.
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