Oleg Filatov - The Unknown Tsesarevitch. Reminiscences and Considerations on V. K. Filatov’s Life and Times

© Oleg Vasiljevitch Filatov, 2019

ISBN 978-5-4496-1717-0

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(Reminiscences and Considerations on V.K. Filatov’s Life and Times)

За Отрока – за Голубя – За Сына

За царевича младого Алексия

Помолись, церковная Россия!

Очи ангельские вытри

Вспомяни, как пал на плиты

Голубь углицкий – Дмитрий

Ласковая ты, Россия, матерь!

Ах, ужели у тебя не хватит

На него – любовной благодати?

Грех отцовский, не карай на сыне

Сохрани, крестьянская Россия

Царскосельского ягнёнка – Алексия! Marina Tsvetaeva 1

April 4, 1917

Third day of Easter

Here is the content of the verse

For the Adolescent – for the dove

For the son

For the young Tsarevich Alexei

Pray, Christian Russia!

Dry your angelic eyes

Remember the Uglich dove

Tsarevich Dimitri

Falling to the flagstones

Russia, our tender Mother!

Is it possible that you do not give?

Your loving kindness to Alexei?

Do not punish the son

For his father’s sins

Peasant Russia, save Alexei

A lamb from Tsarskoe Selo!

Once after an ordinary chat of the father and the son, I (Anzhelika Petrovna) asked Vasily Ksenofontovich about his attitude to the writing of memoirs. He answered: “I can’t stand it at all, and about my wanderings you can read in the works of A.M. Gorky. He expertly describes this time”. And to the question why he did not write, he replied: “Because all the memoirs in the world reveal the image of the author himself, and the time is not yet right, society has changed little since 1917.”

When the son volunteered to describe the life of both his father and himself, he answered: “One shouldn’t begin such a noble cause before 40 years are past.”

At that time all members of the family were in no mood either for reminiscences or for literary effort. Only now, 10 years after V.K. Filatov’s death, after numerous medical and criminal investigations and studies of archives, has each of us understood their task

In 1998 the “Blits” Publishing House in S.-Petersburg published the book “Tsesarevich Alexei’s Rescue. The Historical-Criminalistic Reconstruction of the Execution of the Tsar’s Family”.The book describes examinations carried out on the identity of Vasily Ksenofontovich Filatov, a school teacher, and Tsesarevich Alexei. Based on the comparison of their handwriting, photos made with the use of techniques generally accepted in the domestic criminal investigation, it was established that V.K. Filatov and Tsesarevich Alexei were the same man. Accordingly, it was Tsesarevich Alexei and not V.K. Filatov, who having lived the full-blooded life of a village teacher, retired on his pension in 1967. Everything happened as Marina Tsvetaeva prayed in her poem-prayer: peasant Russia had rescued Tsesarevich. In 1953, as a geography teacher in a village school, Alexei Nikolayevich Romanov (Vasily Ksenofontovich Filatov) married Lidiya Kuzminichna Klimenkova, born in 1917, a mathematics teacher in the same school. They gave birth to four children: Oleg, Olga, Irina, Nadezhda. On starting our reminiscences we saw that some self-manifestation could not be avoided. The most difficult part of the work has fallen to Oleg’s lot. But it was he who had stimulated our desire to write and to acquaint others with our thoughts. The events of our epoch have been shown through our reminiscences about one man. The history of the soul of a highly moral and charming man, our contemporary, will be constructed, like a mosaic, of the impressions of people who have known him well – his family. I am glad that I have had occasion to have been acquainted with this interesting man, in spirit so like my grandmother Alexandra Ivanovna Karmaleyeva, born in 1898, who, like him, was inclined to original philosophic deductions and generalizations. Their discussion of life, their feelings, thoughts, their inner development will be of interest to many others. So, it was in April 1983 when I first heard the family history. I had come, at that time, to get acquainted with my husband’s parents. On March 26, I got married to Oleg and he hastened to share his happiness with his mother and father. After the feeble spring of a northern town the Astrakhan sun seemed particularly bright. Numerous fishermen in their fishing-boats were seen on the Volga. They called these springtime catches ‘the spring fishing season’. The leaves were turning green – and human hearts softened by the warmth were ready to open up to communication. On the morning of April 2 my husband and I went on the ‘Meteor’ hovercraft down the Volga to the village Ikrianoe, where his parents were living. His mother was busy with housework but his father was not feeling well after his work in the garden. Any scratches and blows would cause serious pain. ‘Doctors can’t ease my pain, – he said, – they only prescribe ‘confinement to bed’ for 2—3 days.’ He would lay in bed and read, knowing his illness too well. Why did he know it? To make it clear, we should go back several decades. But we shall speak about this in more detail later. All day on April 2nd, I spoke enthusiastically about my relatives and myself, answering their interested questions. At first the questions were general, and then they became specific and laconic. Direct questions demanded direct answers. Vasily Ksenofontovich listened to me attentively without interrupting. Then he asked if I remembered my ancestors. He was satisfied with my answer. He considered me sufficiently prepared for the story of his own. Among his kin there was a famous man – Metropolitan Filaret (Fyodor Nikitich was his worldly name). His own lands were in the region of the Middle Volga, in Kostroma Province. The peasants living on metropolitical monasterial lands as well as his relatives were nicknamed the Filatovs – this sounded more natural to the Russian ear. Filaret-Filafet-Filat – is the same name and means ‘virtue-lover’. During the Time of Troubles Filaret had been captured by the Poles, and upon returning to Russia he had become a patriarch of the church. Vasily Ksenofontovich spoke about Filaret as a man experienced in politics, which had a serious influence on the government. ‘That is where our roots come from. It must be known, – he used to say, – remember this.’ The story was very interesting and, of course, it has remained in my memory. More than once did he remind his son Oleg of Filaret, of the necessity to learn languages, to understand political affairs and know history well to avoid mistakes. Vasily Ksenofontovich wanted to know whether I had any people in my family who had been connected with the church. I told him that my great-grandfather Ivan Karmaleev, a middle-class man, had a house of his own at Tver. The house was located near the church, in a very picturesque place, where the Tvertsa River flows into the Volga. On one bank there was a convent, on the other – a monastery. All the Karmaleevs have been tied to the river. This explains their family name. In his youth Ivan had even taken a job of a barge-hauler. This had told on his health in his old age. He had got hydropsy of the joints of his legs. He could not do any active physical work, but he worked as a churchwarden and bedral. He had taught his elder son Arseny to ring the church bells.