Embed from Getty Images

Today marks the 155th Anniversary of the Birth of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna of Russia, who was born on this day in 1864. Born Princess Elisabeth of Hesse and by Rhine, the second daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine and Princess Alice of the United Kingdom, her siblings included Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna, the Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine, and Princess Victoria, Marchioness of Milford Haven. In 1878, Princess Elisabeth was the only member of her family not struck down by diphtheria, which claimed the life of her mother and younger sister, after which the siblings were partly raised by their grandmother, Queen Victoria. In 1884, she married Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, the fifth son of Emperor Alexander II of Russia, becoming famous in Russian society for her beauty and charitable endeavours, until her the Grand Duke’s assassination in 1905, when she gave up Imperial life and became a nun, founding the Marfo-Mariinsky Convent in Moscow, which helped the underprivileged. Arrested by the Bolsheviks, she was murdered, on the same night as the Tsar and her sister, by being thrown down a shaft, and her body now lies in Jerusalem. The Grand Duchess was canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad in 1981, and by the Moscow Patriarchate in 1992 as the Holy Martyr Elizabeth Feodorovna.

Click HERE to learn about her Emerald Kokoshnik Tiara, and HERE to learn about her Aquamarine Parure!