What Happened To The Romanov Family?

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GCSE History Coursework: What Happened To The Romanov Family?

A

Source A is a secondary source because it is a report from an American newspaper. It states that Sergeyev has all the evidence, but I think that this is false about what happened to the family as it is not reliable in a sense that the report may come from other people’s opinions.  He was to examine the lower story of the building which was where the royal family lived and were to be murdered.  But he does say that he doesn’t believe all the members of the family were killed.

Source B was a British report in which they had sent a British representative to investigate the murder entry to the Romanov family.  They only wished to receive the truth and not to gain the Support of the Germans, they were unlike the reds.  This is why they had sent Sir Charles Elliot because he had no need to lie.  In this sense I think the source is reliable.  However the information comes from Sergeyev whom is a white so some of the information may be biased.

The similarities between source A and B are:

  1. Judge Sergeyev was involved in investigating both sources A and B: judge Sergeyev was the investigator within both the sources.  However in source B he was showing Sir Charles Elliot around the house.  In both the sources Sergeyev was examining the buildings in which the Romanov’s were killed.  Both the sources were reports by whites, the American newspapers and Sir Charles Elliot.  On the other hand in source A states at the bottom of the source that Judge Sergeyev was sacked this might have occurred because the information was not reliable, indirect or even too reliable that some of the evidence which had found had to be censored.  However source B was written before source A and was also a report by the whites but he was not sacked by the British government.  They only wished to find out the truth and not to gain support of the Germans.  Sergeyev was a socialist revolutionary whom were the white army and of which were supported by the provisional government who were against the reds.  This suggests that his examines and investigations are likely to be biased.

  1. They both agree that only five members of the royal family were killed: sources A and B suggest that only five members of the Romanov family we killed.  These five people were Tsar, family doctor; two servants and maid were shot in the impative house.  These people may be similar in both the sources as they were investigated by Sergeyev.  I don’t think that this point to how many and who were killed by Sergeyev was reliable because it was written by a white and both sources so it is very likely to be biased as we only see one persons view point.  Another point which I would like to add to the unreliability of both the sources is that they are both report which suggests that they are both secondary pieces of data.  Also the American newspaper and the British government may have censored some part of the investigation of the deaths of the bodies.

  1. They don’t have any evidence on the corpses:  as I said before that both of the sources were secondary so they might have found evidence of the copses however decided to censor some parts of the report.  They both state they the have no evidence on the corpses.  However they both re-enact this in different ways.  Source A doesn’t give information about the corpses.  However it does state that Sergeyev had all the evidence connecting Romanov’s case.  This was written before source B which states that there was no real evidence as to who or how many victims were killed.

The differences between sources A and B are:

  1. Source B states what happened to some of the family members:  unlike source A B states what happened to certain family members.  It states that on the 17th of July a train had left Ekaterinburg and it was believed that surviving family members were in it.  This suggests that some of the family members may have escaped the murder scene and may still be alive.  This may not be reliable because it is from a report and it was believed to have surviving family members on it, this shows they are not certain.
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  1. Source B explains in further detail about the murder:  source B states more information about the murder.  In this information it includes how they were lined up to be killed and how the execution had taken place.  It also states that they found reasonable information about the bullets and to suggest how they were killed by the bullets marks on the wall.  It suggests that the victims were kneeling whilst being shot.  This is the crucial information which sources A lacks otherwise it could be more reliable coming from both the sources.  Too the lack of assurance in ...

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