On July 17 , 1918 , Tsar Nicholas II of Russia , his married woman , and his five nestling were woken up before daybreak , lead into a basement , and shoot by a firing squad . Their bodies were burned , doused in back breaker , and afterwards dumped into a mass grave near the Ural Mountains .
In 1991 , building workers uncovered the corpses , and scientists later confirmed , via genetic testing , that they belong to the Romanov clan . The folk was finally canonized and buried in St. Petersburg ’s Peter and Paul Cathedral . However , two skeletons remain missing — the pearl of Crown Prince Tsarevich Alexei and the Grand Duchess Maria . For year , rumors swirled thatthe two had somehow outlive and take flight Russia .
In 2007 , researchers confirmed that the two small fry ’s torso hadfinally been foundin another tomb nearby . After days of delays , a gamy - stratum political science task violence has been planningto burythe two alongside their sept at the cathedral this fall . However , the Russian Orthodox Church still questions the authenticity of the stiff , and now wants to transmit further examination before declaring the new skeletal system holy souvenir .
To assuage all doubts , Russia ’s investigative committee re - open up the case of the class ’s murder . Earlier this week , they disinter the corpse of Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra Fyodorovna , according to theAFP . The commission also accumulate other pieces of grounds , including samples from the bloodstained uniform of Nicholas II ’s grandfather , Emperor Alexander II , who died in a bombardment in 1881 .
As for now , the bones of the Crown Prince and the Grand Duchess are being bear in the Russian State Archives , where they ’ve lain since 2007 . It looks like they ’ll sit there a little longer until the Church is satisfied they formally go in the Romanov kin crypt .
[ h / tThe Guardian ]
