Elizabeth Kerri Mahon

Scandalous Women is pleased to welcome Christina Croft's guest blog on Grand Duchess Elizabeth (Ella) as our 100th post! It might seem strange to include a granddaughter of Queen Victoria and saint of the Orthodox Church in a site about scandalous women, but from the moment Grand Duchess Elizabeth (Ella) stepped into the glittering world of the Romanov Court at the age of nineteen, her life was constantly dogged by gossip and scandal. Despite the disapproval of her grandmother, Queen Victoria, and having rejected the proposals of several suitors - including her cousin, Willy, the future Kaiser Wilhelm II -'the most beautiful princess in Europe' chose to marry Grand Duke Serge Alexandrovich, younger brother of Tsar Alexander III. Immediately, she became the focus of gossip and, within six months of her marriage, German newspapers reported she was about to be divorced. Her husband, it was said, was a homosexual, a pervert and a masochist, who treated her cruelly. She, it was ...

I'm delighted to announce that tomorrow, Scandalous Women welcomes it's first guest blogger, biographer and novelist, Christina Croft . Christina is the author of a biography and novel about Grand Duchess Elizabeth of Russia. Elizabeth, called Ella, was the sister of Tsarina Alexandra and a granddaughter of Queen Victoria. Like her sister, Elizabeth was also murdered by the Bolsheviks during the Russian Revolution. But before her death, her marriage to Grand Duke Serge, was subject to the most vicious rumors, and she was suspected of having an affair. Christina Croft was born in Warwickshire in 1961, the youngest of three children, and was brought up to appreciate literature from an early age. Her childhood memories of holidays are of visiting historic buildings and the homes of famous authors, playwrights and poets. Following an academic education at Notre Dame Grammar School in Leeds, she studied English and Divinity in Liverpool, gaining a Bachelor of Arts degree and a Post ...