Nicholas II, Russian in full Nikolay Aleksandrovich, (born May 6 [May 18, New Style], 1868, Tsarskoye Selo [now Pushkin], near St. Petersburg, Russia died July 17, 1918, Yekaterinburg), the last Russian emperor (1894–1917), who, with his wife, Alexandra, and their children, was killed by the Bolsheviks after the October Revolution. Nikolay Aleksandrovich was the eldest son and heir apparent (tsesarevich) of the tsarevitch Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (emperor as Alexander III from 1881) and his consort Maria Fyodorovna (Dagmar of Denmark). Succeeding his father on November 1, 1894, he was crowned tsar in Moscow on May 26, 1896. Neither by upbringing nor by
Grigori Rasputin, Siberian peasant and mystic whose ability to improve the condition of Aleksey Nikolayevich, the hemophiliac heir to the Russian throne, made him a favorite at the court of Emperor Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra. Rasputin reached the pinnacle of his power at the Russian court after 1915.