Grand Duchess Leonida Romanova buried in St. Petersburg

The funeral of the oldest member of the Russian Royal Family has taken place in St. Petersburg. Grand Duchess Leonida Romanova died, aged 95, in Spain at the end of May.

The Grand Duchess was the last of the dynasty to have been born on the territory of the Russian Empire before the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution.

Her body arrived back in Russia on Wednesday.

Grand Duchess Leonida Romanova lived a fascinating life, though her royal status was the subject of controversy.

Nevertheless, her daughter, Her Imperial Highness, Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna Romanova, is now the head of the Russian Imperial House.

In accordance with her wishes, Grand Duchess Leonida has been buried next to her husband, Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich, in the Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg.

These events, which are linked with monarchy, have brought a small, but very passionate, group of people, who are commemorating the life of the Grand Duchess.

Georgy Fedorov from the Russia Imperial Union Order says that Leonida Romanova “was the last person of the Royal family to be born in Tsarist Russia, lived in the Soviet Union for 10 years and finished her schooling in the Soviet Union. And this is quite surprising among the Royal family, because everybody either was killed or left the country.”