Every year, Alexandra gave her children each a silk covered diary. Marie wrote for as long as she could in her 1916 diary- adding 1917 notes and entries in 1918 until her life ended.."Later, I learned from the good doctor, that as severe as The Big Pair’s illness had been, it was I who suffered the most drastic form of measles. Having resisted so long, when my body surrendered, my constitution collapsed and came near to eclipse. The next memory I have is so sweet. I awoke looking into the gentle azure-blue gaze of my adored and adoring father. Forgetting his own woes, Papa had donned the male nurse’s white smock and knelt, praying and administering to each of us children."
“Masha,” he whispered, calling me by the most Russian form of my name.