An interview with one of the last living Russian countesses before her death in 1991.
By Robert Hudson Westover
Part One of a Series
Countess Olga de
Chrapovtisky was born into a world of striking contrasts. On one side, Olga’s
side, there was such opulent wealth that it would make a billionaire of today
blush. The other side eventually destroyed a system they had little to no
investment in—in other words: they had nothing.
The Russian Empire’s elite
not only controlled nearly all wealth, the daily operational powers of
government were invested in them as well. Proximity by either birth or
friendship to the Tsar was hugely beneficial to one’s future prospects. Olga’s
family had both.
Had the empire of the
Tsars’ continued, I have no doubt that Olga would have married into the Tsar’s family
and could have possibly been a Grand Duchess. This was the trajectory of her
life as the reader will discover in the following interviews.
 |
Olga C. Morgan (right) with her sister Maya Auchincloss (left)
and brother-in-law Hugh D. Auchincloss Jr. dressed
in traditional Russian costumes.
(Hugh would later marry Janet Bouvier,
becoming Jackie Kennedy's stepfather.) |
When most people think of
Russia they conjure up images of glistering onion-shaped gold and enamel domes.
Or they think of guards with bearskin hats and people speaking in a heavy
Russian accent. And this is all true—and was true in Olga’s time as well.
However, what most people
don’t know is that there was a very Western European side of Russia during
Olga’s time. The well-heeled of the imperial court spoke either English or
French—with near perfect annunciation. The Russian language was for addressing
“the masses.”
A visitor to the Court of
Tsar Nicholas II would hardly be able to tell the difference between the Tsar’s
court and that of Buckingham Palace, except for the excessive display of
wealth. One famous philosopher once said of the Tsar’s court “All the combined
magnificent of the courts of Europe could but match St. Petersburg…”
This was Olga’s Russia.
In March of 1983, renowned
historian Richard Pierce interviewed the former countess now “just” referred to
as Mrs. Olga C. Morgan. Olga’s entire childhood and early adult life was in
close proximity to Tsar Nicholas II and his family. Although Russian, Olga’s
mother, Margaret Taylor, was an American railroad heiress and a native of
Milford, Connecticut.
Conducted at Olga’s home
in Laguna Beach, California, Dr. Pierce’s interview is now housed in the
archives at U.C. Berkeley.
Several years later, Olga
allowed me to interview her as well. Over a period of three weeks I obtained
several hours of conversation I have yet to completely transcribe. Because Olga
did not know Dr. Pierce very well, she was somewhat withheld in the intimate
details of her life in Imperial Russia. And, since Dr. Pierce was only
interested in her imperial background, the interview does not delve too deep
into her life as an exiled countess living in the United States. For instance,
there is no mention of her third marriage to J.P. Morgan’s nephew Jasper
Morgan, nor is there a reference to her sister, Maya, marrying Hugh D.
Auchincloss Jr, the future stepfather to Jaqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis.
 |
Olga C. Morgan, a former Russian countess,with Robert Hudson Westover
at her home in Laguna Beach, California
|
Olga called me her godson
and I referred to her as my godmother. From the time I met her (I was 16) she
held enormous sway over my life, but that’s a story I cover in my soon to be
published book “Lessons in Nobility.”
Throughout the interviews in
this article, I have inserted in italics some of the responses Olga gave to me
when I asked the same or similar questions and other facts that I have since
become aware of through research on various projects related to Olga’s unique
life. Additionally, I have taken the privilege to edit some of Dr. Pierce’s
transcriptions.
As mentioned above, I have
recently finished a manuscript on my time with Olga. Because the work goes into
much of Olga’s life after the Russian Revolution I have kept the following
interviews focused mainly on Olga’s life in imperial Russia.
Note: All photographs are either the property of the author, used by permission or thought to be in the public domain.
PART ONE
A Compellation of Two Interviews with Olga C. Morgan
Location: Mrs. Morgan’s villa overlooking the Pacific Ocean, Laguna
Beach, California. 1983 (Pierce)/1991 (Westover)
Olga’s Earliest Memories of Her Family
RP (Dr. Richard Pierce): Could we begin with a short autobiographical
sketch, including a bit about your family?
Morgan (Olga C. Morgan): I will do my best! My mother, Margaret Taylor, was
born in 1870. The family had become wealthy; I think it was in railroads. Henry
Augustus Taylor, her father, built the library in Milford, Connecticut, and
they have his portrait in oil there.
My mother met my father,
Nicholas de Chrapovitsky, a Russian naval officer, at a ball in Washington,
D.C.
 |
| Margharita (Margaret )Taylor. (1894) |
A year later she went to
Paris and married him in the church in the Rue de Russe she had become Orthodox
and they went to Russia. Of course, after America it was a very difficult place
for her to live; she didn't speak the language, so she always had an English companion
with her who helped her translate.
RHW (Robert Hudson
Westover): What Olga did not reveal
here is why Margaret Taylor, essentially ran off with a Russian count. Being
from one of the most prominent families in New England, it was a bit surprising
to “society,” as Olga recounted to me. (“Society” at that time was the term for
the ruling class.)
The surprising part of Margaret’s marriage was not only its oddity, but
also the cultural divide and separation it would invariably create. It was one
thing for a power family to marry off a girl to English aristocracy; it was
entirely another thing to ship her off to the mysterious heirs of the
Byzantines, the imperial Russians.
The truth was that Margaret really didn’t have a choice. Since her
mother’s death, her father had slowly begun to erode the social standing the
family once had. “He had whores around the place and mother had had enough…”
Olga told me during one of our interview.
RP:
Do you know when they met, or what had brought him to the United States?
Morgan: I don't know. That's the trouble, there are so many details that I
don't know. I know she met him in Washington, D.C., but I don't even know the
date of their marriage. I only know that I was born on December 19, 1896, so
obviously they must have been married for at least a year before that.
RHW: Through newspaper articles, I have discovered that Olga’s father was a
Romanov and a decedent of Peter the Great. Count Chrapovitsky was a friend of
Nicholas II as well. Margaret went by Margarita. I don’t know why Olga refers
to her as Margaret. Perhaps she was just simplifying her mother’s name.
Nicholas and Margaret did meet at a ball in Washington, D.C. and it was
in 1894—the year of the World’s Columbian Exhibition in Chicago. The Russian naval fleet had come to visit the event and for a time was moored in New York Harbor.
RP:
Could you relate some of your earliest memories?
Morgan: My earliest recollections, strangely enough, are mostly of life in the
country, where we went in summer. We used to go someplace I don't even know
where it was near St. Petersburg, on the water. My father was away most of the
summer. And it had a beach, and I remember we used to go down to the beach, and
we had a little carriage, with a pony, that we drove around, with a governess,
obviously. That I remember quite vividly, but I remember very little of life in
town, and of studying with governesses and all that.
Then I have a very strange
recollection of when I was very small, about five or six. My sister and I slept
in a room where we each had a bed, and at night I used to see a little devil,
walking around my bed. I could have sworn that it was a little black devil, so
there must have been some stories I was told that affected me like that, because
I really saw him, and when I'd get up in the morning and try to get my toys out
of the closet I was always standing off in case he jumped out because I thought
he lived in the closet with my toys. That's a very early recollection of when I
was in town. I don't remember where we stayed in the country. We always rented
different places; I don't remember what they looked like. I only remember that
they used to be near that beach.
RHW: The Chrapovitsky’s townhouse in St. Petersburg, Fontanka 14, was
enormous and survived the Revolution and World War II. When Olga’s family lived
there, the lobby had a large stuffed Russian brown bear with its paw extended
out so that callers could leave their cards. The home was large enough to have dozens
of servants living in it. Some of them where proficient enough with musical
instruments that when needed, the family could summon its own orchestra.
Morgan: My father was killed in the Japanese War, in the Battle of Tsushima May
27-28, 1905, and I know very little about him. I hardly ever saw him because he
was always stationed on the royal yacht, the Standart. He was there all summer.
 |
Count Nicholas Chrapovitsky. (1894)
|
I remember only that when
we went to the United States during the summer of 1905, as we got off the ship
all the correspondents threw themselves on my mother and said "Did you
know that your husband was lost in the battle?" And mother had had a
premonition while she was onboard; she kept saying "I think he's
dead."
But otherwise she didn't
know; it was a rather cruel thing to do, a terrible welcome. He was on the
Alexander III. The whole fleet was sunk, many by their own volition, because
they did not want the Japanese to take them prisoners. They were all regarded
as heroes, so we became ladies-in-waiting to the Empress as one of the rewards
for being daughters of heroes.
The New York Times
June, 7 1905
RUSSIAN COUNTESS HERE
REFUSES TO BELIEVE HER HUSBAND WAS LOST FIGHTING TOGO
The Countess Chrapovitsky, widow of Count Chrapovitsky,
second in command of the Russian battleship Alexander III,
which was one of the vessels of Admiral Rojdesvensky 's
fleet that was destroyed in the battle of the Sea of Japan,
arrived in New York last night on the North German Lloyd
liner Kaiser Wilhelm II.
The Countess, who was accompanied by her two little
daughters, was met by her brother, Henry Taylor of
Milford, Conn., and left for that place soon after the
Kaiser Wilhelm docked.
Mr. Taylor said that his sister was too grieved over the
Misfortune that had overtaken her to talk, and added that
she was not yet certain that her husband was among the lost,
and would not believe so until she received official
confirmation of it.
She heard of the sea battle when the Kaiser touched
at Cherbourg and Southhampton a week ago yesterday.
RHW: According to many accounts of the naval battle, the Alexander III went
down with all hands—several thousand men. The Russian’s quickly went on to
negotiate for peace. There are no known biographical details concerning Count
Chrapovitsky at the Naval Museum in St. Petersburg.
When I asked Olga about her father she did remember her mother telling
her how on their honeymoon in Africa, the count went to shot lions all day and
left his wife in the hot sun. According to Olga, Margaret nearly died of heat
stroke “so he must have been a very selfish man…” Olga added.
Morgan: After my father died my mother never saw his side of the family anymore.
RP:
Why this estrangement?
Morgan: She didn't like them. And then, about a year later, she remarried, to
Christopher der Felden, or Baron der Felden, but he didn't like to use that
because he said it was Germanic.
 |
Famously shy, the Tsarina turned her back
to the camera in this picture with
Count Chrapovitsky (right)
|
Before that, through my
father's family, my mother was always invited to all the balls and other
affairs at court. But after she married Baron der Felden, she never went to the
balls and things like that anymore, but then the Imperial family used to come
and visit us—the Dowager Empress, the
Grand Duke Michael, and quite a few others; they were very close.
RHW: What Olga leaves out here is that Margaret’s strained relationship with
her in-laws resulted in less proximity to the Tsarina, whom she had become
close to. Added to this was the fact that Alexandria really didn’t
care for her
mother-in-law, the Dowager Empress.
Despite the politics of the court, Margaret managed to keep on
relatively good terms with Alexandra but she became very close to the Dowager
Empress Marie. So much so that later in life, the empress gave Margaret many sentimental
objects one of which was a handkerchief that Olga said “had dried the tears of
the Tsar.”
 |
The Russian Dowager Empress Marie with
Baron Christopher der Felden (foreground) |
In exile, both Margaret and the dowager empress played crucial roles in
bringing world attention to Anna Anderson, who claimed to be the Grand Duchess
Anastasia. This collusion between the two is well recorded in Peter Kurth’s
best seller, “Anastasia, The Mystery of Anna Anderson.”
Imperial Schooling
RP:
You mentioned having governesses, could you describe that? At what age did you
have the first?
Morgan: The first was before 1905. She was a French governess, whom we disliked
very much. Whenever we did anything that she didn't like she would say
"Faite la planche!" which is French for "make the board' so we
had to get down on the floor and lie like a board we hated her! And we were
never able to tell anyone how much we disliked her, except when we went on this
trip in 1905 to America. Then every day we would come out and say "Oh, how
wonderful it is, to be without her! How wonderful it is not to have
Mademoiselle Mizan around our neck! "
And mother said, "Do
you really dislike her that much?" So when we got back she fired her or
retired her people didn't fire a governess, they retired her. But when we lived
in summer in a country place we had a governess for each day. We had to take a
walk with her, eat with her, talk to her, all day, and then the next day it
would be a French governess.
In the winter we had the
same thing; a governess for each day. It was very strict, we had always to take
long walks and do healthy things, and then study that particular language for
one day and then another language another day, and so I am very proficient in
French. After I have been in Paris for two or three weeks they can hardly tell
that I am not French.
RP:
So this was from the age of 6 or 7?
Morgan: Yes, and before that. This lasted until my stepfather got very ill.
Then we had to break the whole monotony of the thing, because then we went
every year to Cannes, Nice and places like that. They thought he had TB and
that he couldn't stand the winter climate. So then we had only one governess
with us, but then we would get another governess there who could speak French.
German was a little bit forgotten at that time. We had the Russian governess
come with us, the maids my mother's maid and our own maid to take care of my
sister and me, and a valet who took care of my stepfather, so you can see what
a large procession of people traveled back and forth.
RP:
That was in what year?
Morgan: In 1907, 1908 and 1909, and I think he died in 1910. After that mother
was completely broken up; she never went out socially after he died. She was
completely devastated. Then we started the routine of the governesses again,
but by that time we were much older, so we were able to pick and choose a
little bit.
RP:
So it was always female tutelage?
Morgan: Entirely female, except for mathematics. Then I had some kind of young
man who taught me mathematics I don't think he was a professor; he was probably
a student. I was very good at mathematics; I wish I had continued. But
otherwise it was always females. We had a butler and a valet in the house, but
when the war came on in 1914 then there were no men doing any work for us,
except that we did have a coachman, but he must have been a very old man;
everyone else went to the front.
Imperial Living
RP:
Where was your house in Petersburg?
Morgan: It was Fontanka 14. After mother remarried, when we moved in the summer
we always went to the same country house that belonged to my stepfather, in
Gatchina, and that place we adored, for then we had our own animals; we had
left them there for the winter.
 |
| A page from one of Olga's photo albums which includes both a photo (top right) and a postcard (bottom right) of pre-1917 St. Petersburg. On the top left is the above referenced photo of Margaret Taylor in her youth. The bottom left photo is if a youthful Countess Maya de Chrapovitisky who would become the first wife of Hugh D. Auchincloss Jr. |
RP:
Gatchina that was where Paul spent so many years, waiting for his mother to die
so that he could gain the throne. It was almost destroyed during the war, but
they have done a remarkable job of restoring it.
Morgan: It was a beautiful palace. The Dowager Empress used to come and stay
there, and behind the palace was a huge park. We children used to take walks
there every day, and on the way to the park we used to buy great loaves of
bread and feed it to the geese, ducks and swans. And we loved that; it was
beautiful.
But it was quite dangerous
in the autumn, because then the elk fought; sometimes it was quite frightening.
So it was a beautiful, beautiful park; I think that they have left it quite as
it was. We also used to drive through it quite a lot, because walking was a
little far. We'd drive to it, and then get out and walk, with those loaves of
bread to feed the birds.
 |
| Gatchina Palace, Russia |
RHW: Olga recounted to me that on many occasions, the Dowager Empress would
visit her mother at their home in Gatchina. One can only imagine what an ordeal
that must have been!
RP:
This takes us up to what point?
Morgan: Oh, it must be already 1908, 09 and 10.
RP:
And still you never were in school, but always with governesses?
Morgan: Always governesses. No, I never went to school, but we bothered mother
so much about it that finally she said "All right, once a year you can go
and take exams." Which was not pleasant, because we had never seen any of
the people who would give us papers. She felt that maybe that would keep us on
our toes.
We had very few girlfriends,
unfortunately, because we never went to school. There were just children of my
mother's friends, so we had about five families with whom we were very close.
Among them was the
Countess Tolstoy and all
her children and I'm still close to them now.
We attended very few
social events. As a social event we used to have dancing class when we were
young, which I thought made up for a real social life. And I did go to one ball
when I was only sixteen. It was Grand Duchess Olga and she was giving a ball.
She came over to the house and she asked me, "Would you like to go to a
ball?"
"Oh yes I exclaimed,
"I would love to!"
So she said to mother,
"I have invited your little girl."
Mother said, "It's
not possible! She has not been out in society or anything."
But she then told me,
"Never mind, I told her you could go."
So they made me a dress,
which had to be covered up, of course, to the neck, with the arms covered and everything,
and then I went to the ball and it was very interesting. Everybody was so
beautifully dressed. Pushkin describes it as everything gleaming with jewelry
and everything beautiful. And I danced. It was in her palace.
 |
| Grand Duchess Xenia |
That was in 1914, in the
spring, just before I went to the Crimea. She was the Emperor's sister; she
later married a commoner, and she went to Canada and she died there. A book was
written about her, it was called Once a Grand Duchess.
RHW: How often did you see the Tsar?
Morgan (interview with RHW): Quite often. In the winter, when we lived in St. Petersburg, we used to
go to visit [the imperial family at Tsarskoe Selo], and even in summer, when we
were there they used to have parades on the Champ de Mars, and it was very beautiful
and very exciting, with wonderful music. The Emperor was always in them!
Before mother married Baron der Feldon we often were invited to play
with the Grand Duchess not only at Tsarkoe Selo but also in Crimea.
 |
Tsar Nicholas II
(From the collection of Robert Hudson Westover) |
RHW: What was your clearest memory of these visits?
Morgan: On one visit to Crimea, we were invited to Sunday dinner at the imperial
palace. Later that evening, we played a series of children’s parlor games. I
think I was ten years-old or so. The emperor almost always joined in on these
games. Anyway, during one particular game, I think it was Post Office, or
something like that, the point is is that a certain times in the games the
participants are to quickly sit down. I did. Then everyone went suddenly
silent. I looked up, and saw the face of the emperor smiling down at me! In a
complete state of fear I ran out of the room! Everyone burst into laughter!
Even the empress laughed!
RHW: She was rather dower wasn’t she?
Morgan: Oh, yes and most of the time she sat very quietly as we played with the
children [the Grand Duchesses]. The Tsarevich never played with us. He usually
sat with his mother. Everyone knew something was wrong with him but no one
dared ask. Of course, our regular visits ended when mother remarried. We would
still see them though, [the Grand Duchesses] on occasion.
I was very strictly brought up I had to have very good manners always,
especially when in the presence of the imperial family! My sister and I we were
being groomed, you see, for being ladies in waiting. We couldn't have bad
manners; you had even to eat in an especially neat way.
Beyond 1910 -- After Margaret’s marriage to Baron
der Feldon
RP:
During this earlier period [after Margaret’s marriage to Baron Der Feldon],
were you able to attend many cultural events? These seem always to have been an
important part of Russian life.
Morgan: Do you mean like theaters? No, we were pretty well cut off, you see,
because the trains ran very sporadically to St. Petersburg, and to take a train
just to go and see a play... We used to see little plays in Gatchina, there
were sometimes put on by amateurs and whatever, but that was about all that we
saw, a few little ballets and things like that, but we never went to St.
Petersburg anymore.
Morgan (RHW interview): But before we moved to Gatchina the cultural events were very splendid.
The ballet was marvelous and the opera was very good as well. We always had seats, very good ones, and
always in boxes; we never sat in the main portion. We never were taken much to
the theater, because it was not supposed to be for young people, but we were
taken very often to the ballet and to the opera, at least once a week.
The Last Summer of the Old World
RHW: You spent the late spring early summer of 1914 in Crimea. This was the
last summer of the “old world” [as the pre-World War I has come to be known].
What were your clearest memories of this visit?
Morgan: The Grand Duke George and his wife invited me to go visit with them and
their two daughters, Nina and Xenia. We were very close, and we remained very
good friends. The family had a beautiful home, near the Black Sea. It wasn't a
home where they lived all the time. It was just a place where they went in
spring and maybe in autumn.
Here, I have picture of the visit (shows a picture of her with men in
military uniform). They all belonged to the Tsar’s Crimean regiment. This (second
row, sitting) was the Grand Duchess Marie who was once married to the Crown
Prince of Sweden which ended horribly! Also we had this lady in waiting, who
came with us to see that we behaved. The officers were very handsome! They took
us to their regimental place and gave us lunch and then they had the men do a
Cossack dance for us. That was an outing!
RHW: Wasn’t the Grand Duchess Marie an adult?
Morgan: Yes, but it didn’t matter. We still had to be accompanied by a
chaperone. But aside from the occasional lady-in-waiting that trip was really
the first time in my life that I had fun, because I didn't have a governess
with me! (Holding another photo) I am here in back, in white, third, there's
the Grand Duchess Marie.
 |
First row on the left, the Grand Duke George,
on the far right is the Grand Duchess Marie
(Olga is sitting just behind the Grand Duchess) |
RP:
I suppose much attention was given to dress?
Morgan: We were very clothes conscious, unfortunately, even as young children,
because mother bought all her clothes in Paris, and then she had a very famous
dressmaker in St. Petersburg where she got other clothes. When I was going to
the Crimea, she took me to that dressmaker and got me some beautiful special
clothes to wear there. When you were young you were supposed to be completely
covered up, never to be decollete in any way, shape or manner. Even in the day
we always wore something right up to our neck, and long sleeves. It was very
different from today.
RP:
And jewelry?
Morgan: We were given a few jewels to wear, but very few. I still have a piece
of jewelry which was made for me. My stepfather had a star from someone, it was
all diamond chips, you know the kind of diamonds they use in the jewelry in
Constantinople. We were taken to the jeweler, and they showed us a lot of
designs and I chose one for a barrette, because that's all we wore, you know we
wore our hair back through the barrette. It was like a clip; I still have it,
but I have it made over into a pin now, because where would I ever wear a barrette?
So we did have a bit of jewelry even then, although we were very young, and it
was not supposed to be worn by young girls. Mother, of course, was always
beautifully dressed, and all the people around me.
RHW: Little did you know but this would be your last trip to Crimea. Did you
ever see the imperial family again?
Morgan: No. Not in a social setting. However, the Emperor and Empress, along
with the Grand Duchesses and sometimes the Tsariviech, would attend the
departure of troops and other duties related to the war and we would see them
there, but no, never again for any social gathering. It was on one of these
occasions that I first saw Rasputin [at a train station].
RHW: What was that like?
Morgan: Oh, simply horrible. He was just so arrogant! Everyone knew he had a
horrible influence over the empress. He was the only one who could save her
son, so she believed. He [Rasputin] behaved as if he owned the world. Well, I
suppose he did by that point…”
 |
| Rasputin |
RHW: Yes, he seemed to have such magical powers. I read that the Tsarvich was
dying of hemophila and was about to be pronounced dead until a telegram arrived
from Rasputin telling the Tsarina to have the doctors leave the child along and
that he would recover and he did! Do you think had he been killed earlier the
empire would have been saved?
Morgan: Yes. I don’t doubt it for a moment. Rasputin destroyed Russia. Once his
daughter wanted to speak with me, and I said to the messenger “Why would I want
to speak with that peasant.”
