The Haileybury Society is saddened to learn of the death of Prince Andrew Andreivitch Romanoff (ISC (C) 36), who has died on November 28th 2021, aged 98.

Queen Mary, his “auntie”

Born the youngest of three children of His Highness Prince Andrei Alexandrovitch of Russia and Donna Elisabetta Ruffo di Sant’Antimo (1886-1940), Andrew was also was the great-grandson of Tsar Alexander III of Russia and the great-nephew of Tsar Nicholas II. It was for this reason that Andrew spent his childhood years at Frogmore Cottage, a grace and favour home provided for his grandmother, Grand Duchess Xenia, by King George V, her first cousin. Queen Mary suggested that he even call her “Auntie Mary”, such was his proximity to British royalty at that time.

Naval service and move to US

After attending the Imperial Service College (a school also attended simultaneously by his cousin Nikita (ISC [C] 36)), where he was in the 1st Rowing VIII, Andrew joined the RNVR and later served in World War II. With the death of George V at Sandringham in January 1936, the family was asked to leave Frogmore Cottage, moving to other accommodation at Hampton Court. Briefly, he farmed in Kent before he and Nikita joined his brother, Prince Vasili, in America in 1949, settling in San Francisco and becoming a naturalised US citizen in 1954.

University of Berkeley

In the manner of the American Spirit of anything goes, Andrew was involved in numerous ventures – including selling “smoking paraphernalia” and being a tree surgeon – before studying sociology and criminology at the University of California at Berkeley. After this, he began working as a broker in a shipping company and spent three years in Japan and Korea before returning to San Francisco, where he became a real estate agent.

Reburial of Tsar Nicholas

In 1998, following the discovery of the remains of the last Tsar of Russia, Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra and three of their five children, Andrew flew to St. Petersburg for the reburial of the remains, a ceremony also attended by then Russian President Boris Yeltsin.

Humble artist

Despite his royal connections, Andrew was phlegmatic about his apparent status and never used his official title of His Serene Highness while he lived in America. Instead, and more humbly, in later years he explored his early life through his art, in 2006 publishing a memoir of his early life – in particular his life at Windsor – in The Boy Who Would be Tsar .

He is survived by his third wife, Inez (whom he married in 1987), his three sons Alexis (b. 1953), Peter (b. 1961) Andrew (b. 1963) and by his granddaughter, Natasha Romanov, his half-sister, Olga Romanov, to whom the Haileybury Society sends its deepest condolences.

Image: image of Andrew courtesy of Alternative History website