Teaching Nicholas

Available Guest Lecture & Course:  Nicholas' Russia - 1917 to 1920 — Available Guest Lecture & Course: Nicholas' Russia - 1917 to 1920

Online & Classroom Instruction Through School of Government/Political Science/History

Undergraduate Course: Nicholas' Russia - 1917 to 1920

3 Credit Hours and/or Certificate for Online Study

Also Available as Guest Lecture

Summary: For over 300 years the Tsars ruled Russia. Nicholas II would be the last. History convincingly says that the Romanov family was murdered by rebellious Bolshevik soldiers. Executed to secure power for a new Revolution led by the notorious Vladimir Lenin. Rumors of their survival lived on. Seventy years later, their remains were finally discovered in a hidden grave deep in a conveniently remote forest. Russia closed the investigation into their assassination. History needed the Romanovs dead. But there was an eyewitness. A U.S. Army soldier from Knoxville, Tennessee, who spent a remarkable two weeks with Nicholas, Alexandra, and a Grand Duchess, aboard an American Red Cross train sixteen months after they were said to have been brutally killed. A credible eyewitness who left a previously undisclosed 45-minute recorded account that tells a very different side to the Romanov lore than what history now reports. This course will explore the impact the Romanov reign, especially from 1917 to 1920, had on the world and its consequences for the United States and Great Britain, too.

Grading: Grades for the semester will consist of five parts: Part I will be class participation for which 10% of your grade will be evaluated based on topics that will be covered in class but not through your assigned readings. Part II will be your mid-term exam for which 20% of your grade will be earned. Part III will be your term paper for which 20% of your grade will be earned. Part IV will be a case study for which 20% of your grade will be earned from this exercise. Part V will be your final exam for which the remaining 30% of your grade will be earned. A voluntary mid-term review and a final review will be offered two weeks before each exam. Midterms and finals will consist of both multiple choice and essay questions consisting of equal values. Recommended readings will be provided for each class session.

Remembering the Mystery

· Week 1

o The Enduring Saga of Tsar Nicholas II

Topics To Be Explored:

· Nicholas Romanov II and His Times

· Wilhelm, Nicholas & World War I

· Lenin & The Assassination at Yekaterinburg

· Rumors The Romanovs Lived

· The Controversy Sustained

Recommended Readings:

· Robert K. Massie, Nicholas and Alexandra, London, England: Gollancz, 1968, ISBN-10: 9780679645610.

· Peter Kurth, Tsar: The Lost World of Nicholas and Alexandra, Madison Press Book produced for Little, Brown and Company, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 1995, ISBN: 0-316-50787-3.

· Week 2

o An American Eyewitness in Siberia

Topics To Be Explored:

· The American Expeditionary Force Siberia

· Allied Plots to Save the Tsar

· Martin Hutson's Testimony - Nicholas Lived

· 16 Months After The Murder Mystery

Recommended Readings:

· Ben Everidge, Rescuing Nicholas: The Secret Mission to Save the Tsar, Cannon & Caius, Florida, 2018, ISBN-13: 978-0-9989115-3-3.

· Week 3

o Whispers & Theories

Topics To Be Explored:

· The Various Rescue Attempts

· Alexei Survives?

· The Windsors Knew?

Recommended Readings:

· Michael Gray, Blood Relative: The Astonishing Story of the Survival of the Tsarevich, Victor Gollancz, London, England, 1998, ISBN: 0-575-06608-3.

· Shay McNeal, The Secret Plot to Save the Tsar: The Truth Behind the Romanov Mystery, William Morrow, New York, NY, 2001, ISBN: 0-688-16998-8.

· Week 4

o Theories & Thistles

Topics To Be Explored:

· The American Consul General

· A 1932 Telegram

· The Rise of the Soviet Union

· The Cold War & Berlin Wall

· The Space Race & Ronald Reagan

Recommended Readings:

· Michael Occleshaw, Dances in Deep Shadows: Britain’s Clandestine War in Russia 1917-1920, Constable, London, England, 2006, ISBN-13: 978-0786717897.

· Michael Occleshaw, The Romanov Conspiracies: The Romanovs and the House of Windsor, Orion Books, Ltd., London, England, 1994, ISBN-13: 978-1857974287.

The Romanov Rescuers

· Week 5

o Aide's Covenant

Topics To Be Explored:

· Woodrow Wilson & The Aide-Mémoire

· The Kansas City Train Station Meeting

· A Fourth Objective?

Recommended Readings:

· A. Scott Berg, Wilson, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, New York, NY, 2013, ISBN: 978-0-399-15921-3.

· John Milton Cooper, Jr., Woodrow Wilson: A Biography, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, NY, 1998, ISBN-13: 978-0-307-26541-8.

· Week 6

o Polar Bears & Wolfhounds

Topics To Be Explored:

· Russian Sectors

· The Polar Bears Mission

· The Wolfhounds Mission

· Red Russians

· White Russians

Recommended Readings:

· William S. Graves, America’s Siberian Adventure, Peter Smith, New York, NY, 1941, ISBN-10: 0-844-61205-7 and Uncommon Valor Press, Kindle Version, 2013.

· Gibson Bell Smith, Guarding the Railroad, Taming the Cossacks: The U.S. Army in Russia, 1918-1920, National Archives, Washington, DC, Vol 34, No. 4. 2002.

· Week 7

o Reconstructing Timelines

Topics To Be Explored:

· The Lead-Up Years to the Revolution

· Abdication & House Arrest

· The Assassination to Christmas 1918

· AEF in Siberia

· The Remains Found

Recommended Readings:

· David Bullock, The Russian Civil War, 1918-22, Oxford, England: Osprey Publishing, 2008, ISBN-10: 1846032717.

· Betty Miller Unterberger, America’s Siberian Expedition, 1918-1920, Duke University Press, Durham, NC, 1956, ASIN: B000NZZWDW.

· Week 8

o Midterm Review

o Midterm Exam

· Week 9

o Warring Cousins

Topics To Be Explored:

· England's George V

· Germany's Wilhelm II

· Russia's Nicholas II

· Queen Victoria

Recommended Readings:

· Dennis Judd, The Life and Times of George V, Weidenfield & Nicholson, London, England, 1993, ASIN: B00120FKVC.

· John van der Kiste, and Coryne Hall, Kaiser Wilhelm II: Germany’s Last Emperor, Sutton, Gloucester, England, 1996, ISBN-13: 978-0750919418.

· Week 10

o Wilson's Boys

Topics To Be Explored:

· Secretary of War Newton D. Baker

· General Black Jack Pershing

· Major General William Sidney Graves

· William Gibbs McAdoo

· Colonel Edward House

· Industrialist Charles Crane

· Assistant Navy Secretary Franklin Roosevelt

Assigned Readings:

· Douglas B. Craig, Progressives at War: William G. McAdoo and Newton D. Baker, 1863-1941, Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013, ISBN 1 4214 0718.

· Donald Smythe, Pershing: General of the Armies, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IL, 1986, ISBN-13: 978-0253219244.

Escaping Siberia

· Week 11

o Red Cross, Red Spies

Topics To Be Explored:

· The Wilson Special #28?

· The American Red Cross

· Irkutsk

· Chita & Harbin

· The Dignitaries Onboard

· The Vladivostok Train Station

Recommended Readings:

· Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra, St. Martin’s Press, New York, NY, 2014, ISBN: 978-1-250-02020-8.

· James P. Smythe, Rescuing the Czar, California Printing Company, San Francisco, CA, 1920, ISBN-13: 978-1438518831.

· Week 12

o The President's Mystery Story

Topics To Be Explored:

· FDR, Assistant Navy Secretary

· Winston Churchill, Secretary of War

· He Died So That He Could Live

Recommended Readings:

· Greg King and Penny Wilson, The Fate of the Romanovs, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ, 2003, ISBN: 0-471-20768-3.

· Helen Rappaport, The Last Days of the Romanovs: Tragedy at Ekaterinburg, St. Martin’s Griffin, New York, NY, 2008, ISBN: 978-0-312-60347-2.

· Week 15

o Holidays

· Week 16

o Course Review & Connecting the Dots

· Week 17

o Final Exam