Duchess Alexandra Petrovna of Oldenburg
Alexandra von Oldenburg, full name Alexandra Friederike Wilhelmine von Oldenburg (. * 21 Maijul / June 2 1838greg in Saint Petersburg, .. . † 13 Apriljul / April 26 1900greg in Kiev ) was a German princess of the House of Schleswig- Holstein - Gottorp. It was through marriage Grand Duchess Alexandra Petrovna Romanovna and after entering the monastery, she took the name Sister Anastasia.
Life
Alexandra was the eldest daughter of Duke Peter of Oldenburg and his wife Princess Therese Wilhelmine of Nassau -Weilburg (1815-1871), daughter of Crown Prince Wilhelm Georg and his first wife Princess Charlotte Luise of Saxony- Hildburghausen. Your paternal grandparents were Prince Georg of Oldenburg and Grand Duchess Catherine Pavlovna, later Queen of Württemberg. Her great-grandfather was Tsar Paul I of Russia. My father served in the Russian army and was a scholar and philanthropist. She enjoyed an extensive training. A special interest they took in medicine and social work.
Her parents arranged a connection to the Imperial House of Romanov -Holstein -Gottorp, by the engagement took place in 1855 with the third son of Tsar Nicholas I. Before the wedding, Alexandra stepped over to the Orthodox faith. On February 6, 1856 Alexandra Petrovna married in the Winter Palace of the Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich Romanov ( 1831-1891 ). The marriage had two sons:
- Nikolai Nikolaevich Romanov (1856-1929)
- Peter Nikolaevich Romanov (1864-1931)
She was interested less the tsar, rather than their religion and the preference for medicine. She was a talented painter. It was considered a sincere and of course what their sympathy to the family, especially with her sisters in law, Maria Alexandrovna and Alexandra Iosifowna earned. At first, her husband took her ideas seriously and financed a hospital in St. Petersburg, there to test their theories in practice. She often worked with there and established a sister school. After the birth of her second child, the marital relations cooled down, and her husband made the ballerina Yekaterina Chislova (1846-1889) to the mistress. From the relationship five children to emerge. In the palace the couple lived in different wings, so that they hardly looked. From bitterness to the failure of their marriage Alexandra Petrovna often retired to the monastery back in Kiev.
In 1880 she left St. Petersburg and lived first in Marijinskyj Palace in Kiev, later they withdrew entirely back to the monastery founded by her Pokrowskyj. However, Alexandra Petrovna refused a divorce, which suggested her husband. So he hoped soon to be a widower, as her health was not very stable. But they both survived for several years. When her husband died in 1891, she refused to organize the funeral and attend. On November 3, 1889 Alexandra Petrovna became a nun and took the name Sister Anastasia on. She founded another hospital with an adjacent sister school in Kiev. The relationship with her sons and two daughters-in was very warm.
On April 26, 1900 Sister Anastasia died of stomach cancer and was buried in the monastery garden of Pokrowskyj monastery in Kiev.