Grand Duke Michael was the youngest son and fifth child of Emperor Alexander III of Russia and younger brother of Tsar Nicholas II.
In 1912, Michael shocked Nicholas by marrying the unpopular Natalia (Natasha) Wulfert, who had two previous marriages behind her. Nicholas, in anger, accused Michael of disloyalty to the pledges of the line of succession and exiled Michael to England and removed him from the line of succession.
After the outbreak of World War I, Michael returned to Russia, assuming command of the ’Savage Division‘, which was a cavalry regiment. When Nicholas abdicated on 15th. March 2017, he named Michael as his successor instead of his son Alexie, but he deferred acceptance of the Throne until ratification by an elected assembly. He therefore became Tsar for twelve hours. Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, he was imprisoned and murdered in Perm in June 1918.

Nicholas Johnson was born in Russia in 1878. His father, a British Citizen, was a Captain in the Imperial Army being posted to the Royal Courts.
He shared a love of music with the Anglophile Grand Duke Michael, who, like Nicholas, was also a graduate of the Mikhailovsky Artillery School. These connections and shared interests led to a deep friendship between them and he was given the nickname ‘Johnny’.
Speaking three languages, he was sociable, smiling, and an accomplished pianist, and would accompany the very musical Michael, who played several instruments, notably the guitar. In late 1912 the Grand Duke Michael chose Nicholas as his private secretary. He devoted himself to serving his master, and even in the face of certain death his loyalty never wavered. Thus, after the Revolution, Michael pleaded with his faithful servant to flee to Britain, but Nicholas refused to leave his side.

Natalia Brasova was a Russian noblewoman who married Grand Duke Michael. They were both exiled from Russia in 1912 and eventually, after a year of living in European hotels, went to England and lived there until the start of the war.
At that point Michael asked his brother if he could return and partake in duties of the war. This was accepted and in September 1914 he left Paddockhurst in Sussex and returned with Natasha and their son George, eventually settling back in the family home at Gatchina.
She died in poverty in 1952.

During 1917 and 1918, Olga was covertly working in Russia for MI6 in the guise of a Senior Commander Commissar, with sweeping powers of arrest from non-conformity in party doctrine and ideology. She was expert in several European languages and adept at mathematics and creative thinking. Known for her coolness under stress, she could marginalise aggression in her opponents through her wit and charm. Together with her planning and strategic thinking, Olga was key in assisting Sidney Reilly in the Russian theatre of operations, and settlement of Imperial Families in exile. In her post-war years, after decommissioning from MI6, she chose to continue using her covert operational code name, Olga Bystrovia.

Ethel Lilian Voynich was an Anglo-Irish novelist and musician, and a supporter of several revolutionary causes. She was born in Cork, but grew up in England. Voynich was a significant figure, not only on the late Victorian literary scene, but also in Russian émigré circles. She is best known for her novel The Gadfly, which became popular in her lifetime, especially in Russia. It is said that she had an intense relationship with Sidney Reilly in 1895, and subsequently wrote the book with him as the main character in 1897.
However, a noted biographer of Reilly, recalls that these were romanticised versions of such events and very doubtful, and counters instead that Reilly was perhaps informing on Voynich’s radical, pro-émigré activities to the Metropolitan Police Special Branch.

Albert Henry Stopford, known as Bertie Stopford, was a British antique and art dealer, who also specialised in the manufactured jewellery from the houses of Fabergé and Cartier. He was well known to the three British Monarchs of the first part of the twentieth century, and as an emissary for the M16 becoming the eyes and ears of Petrograd during the First World War. During the years leading to, and the war, he forged friendships with several high-ranking members of the Russian Royal Family, becoming an intimate friend of the Romanovs. He carried out many courier activities under the guise of his diplomatic immunity, transporting out of revolutionary Russia, vast quantities of wealth in antiques and jewellery.

Sidney George Reilly, commonly known as the ‘Ace of Spies’, was a secret agent of the British Secret Service Bureau, the precursor to the modern British Secret Intelligence Service, MI6. He is alleged to have spied for at least four different powers. Reilly was heavily involved in the revolutionary years, in the main to facilitate and support the overthrow of the Bolshevik regime via the planned invasion of Russia by the Western Powers.

Parliamentary Minister for Munitions to the British Government, Secretary of State
for War and Air during 1917–1919. A major preoccupation of his tenure in the War Office was the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War, declaring that Bolshevism must be ‘strangled in its cradle’ and created a plan for an allied invasion of Russia in 1918. He secured, from a divided and loosely organised Cabinet, intensification and prolongation of the British involvement in Russia, beyond the wishes of any major group in Parliament or the nation and in the face of bitter hostility from the Labour Party.

When he inherited the family business in the nineteenth century, he moved from producing jewellery in the then-fashionable French eighteenth-century style to becoming artist-jeweller.
Fabergé’s production of the very first so-called Fabergé egg, the Hen Egg, given as a gift from the Tsar to his wife Maria Fyodorovna on Easter of 1885, so delighted her that the Emperor assigned Fabergé the title 'Goldsmith by Special Appointment' to the Imperial Crown.

The last serving Liberal British Prime Minister, Lloyd George welcomed the fall of the Tsar in a message to the new Russian Prime Minister Kerensky but became concerned to the suggestion of the Russian Foreign Minister Pavel Milyukov that the toppled Tsar and his family be given sanctuary in Britain. In April 1917, the British Government withdrew its consent under Royal pressure. Eventually, the Russian Royal Family were moved to the Urals where they were executed in 1918. Lloyd George was often blamed for the refusal of asylum.

Jellicoe, commanded the Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland in May 1916. Both sides claimed victory, but history shows the battle was drawn as each side lost many ships and thousands of men. The German High Seas Fleet retreated to port, but the British public were disappointed that the Royal Navy had not won a victory on the scale of the Battle of Trafalgar. Jellicoe later served as First Sea Lord, overseeing the expansion of the Naval Staff at the Admiralty and the introduction of convoys.

Thomas Woodrow Wilson was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th President of the United States from 1913 to 1921.
Wilson found it increasingly difficult to maintain neutrality in World War I, due to Germany’s commitment to unrestricted submarine warfare and their promise to the Mexican Government that if Germany was victorious, she would support them in winning back the southern states from the USA. On April 2 1917, the USA declared war with Germany.
The overthrow of the Russian Monarchy brought the war with Russia and Germany to an end. This allowed them to dedicate more troops to the Western Front, thus making U.S. Forces central to Allied success in the remaining battles of 1918.
Wilson dedicated military resources to an intervention in Russia against the Bolsheviks, as he was convinced of the potential benefit to assist the Allies on the Eastern Front and bring Russia back to war with Germany.

George V was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India. When Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, George’s first cousin, was overthrown in the Russian Revolution of 1917, the British Government offered political asylum to the Tsar and his family. However, worsening conditions for the British people, and fears that revolution might come to the British Isles, led George to think that the presence of the Romanovs would be seen as inappropriate. Advanced planning for a rescue was undertaken by MI1, a branch of the British Secret Service. But because of the strengthening position of the Bolshevik Revolutionaries and wider difficulties with the conduct of the war, the plan was never put into operation. The Tsar and his immediate family remained in Russia, where they were murdered by Bolsheviks in 1918.

Reinhard Scheer was an Admiral in the Imperial German Navy during World War I.
In 1916 Admiral Scheer took command of the 3rd Battle Squadron, which consisted of the newest and most powerful battleships in the High Seas Fleet. Scheer led the German fleet at the Battle of Jutland on 31 May–1 June 1916, which was one of the largest modern naval battles in history.
Scheer joined those calling for unrestricted submarine warfare against the Allies, a move the Kaiser eventually permitted. In August 1918, Scheer was promoted to the Chief of Naval Staff and retired after the end of the war.

Tirpitz took the modest Imperial Navy, starting in the 1890s, and turned it into a world-class force that could threaten the British Royal Navy. His navy, however, was not strong enough to confront the British successfully in the First World War. The one great engagement at sea, the Battle of Jutland, ended in a draw with both sides claiming victory. Tirpitz turned to submarines, which antagonised the United States, and called for the most extreme use of weapons, especially unrestricted submarine warfare.

Russian Communist revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served
as head of government of the Russian Republic from 1917 to 1918, of the Russian
Soviet Federative Socialist Republic from 1918 to 1924, and of the Soviet Union
from 1922 to 1924. His main concern during 1918 was the possibility of a resurgence of support for the return of the Imperial Throne. His only certainty of retaining control was the ultimate permanent removal of the Imperial Families.

Marcov was a member of the gang that murdered Grand Duke Michael and Nicholas Johnson in June 1918 and fired the fatal shot to the head of Michael. As a token of the work they had carried out for the Bolshevik Revolution, Marcov stole a wristwatch from Johnson. He kept it until his death in 1965, claiming it had never needed any repairs and had kept perfect time.

Menzies entered service with MI6 and was soon promoted as second in command to Sir Hugh Sinclair. He became an associate of Sidney Reilly and through Reilly’s skulduggery became allegedly involved in the downfall of the Labour Government. After the death of Sinclair, Menzies was made Chief of SIS in 1939.