The Khodynka Crush | A Short Documentary | Fascinating Horror

[Music] on the 30th of May 1896 a lavish public banquet was laid on for the citizens of Moscow Russia to celebrate the coronation of their new emperor Nicholas II Zar Nicholas was Keen for the celebration to be a moment of Hope and stability for his people and they would look back on fondly and that would help to unite and uplift the nation at the start of his Reign ultimately however the banquet at Kinka field would be remembered by those who survived it in a very very different way when Nichol

as was born his grandfather Alexander II was Emperor of Russia and his father was seen as a likely Heir in 1881 however Alexander II was assassinated in front of the teenage Nicholas his father was now the emperor and he was heir to the throne it was a sudden and huge step up but at the same time the dangers of the position he was destined to hold had been made horribly clear to him his father Alexander III did little to prepare Nicholas to be emperor when Alexander III died suddenly in 1894 Nic

holas was just 26 years old overwhelmed Nicholas wrote to his cousin saying what is going to happen to me to mother to all of Russia I am not prepared to be a zar I never wanted to become one I know nothing about the business of ruling Nicholas was incredibly close to his family when his father died he brought forward his planned wedding to Princess Alex of H by rine as he was desperate for her to be at his side throughout the entire process he had relatives in kingdoms all over Europe largely b

ecause most of the ruling class of the time were in some way related to Queen Victoria of Great Britain Nicholas was cousin of George V of the UK and bore a striking resemblance to him but despite these many relationships throughout Europe when he came to power he felt helpless and alone one person he decided to rely on was his uncle on his father's side Grand Duke Sergey alexandrovich at the time that Nicholas came to power Sergey was governor general of Moscow a powerful position which made hi

m answerable only to the emperor he took Nicholas under his wing as governor general of Moscow Sergey was responsible for organizing the coronation Ceremonies for Nicholas and Alex which were to be held in the the city the coronation itself took place on the 26th of May 1896 and was followed by days and weeks of grand public celebrations one of which was to be a huge banquet for the people of the city the venue for the banquet was to be Kinka field a huge open space in the city that had been use

d for large scale festivals since the time of Katherine the Great the field had a ravine was surrounded by many ditches and was sometimes used as a military training ground but it was spacious enough for a celebration befitting the occasion so Sergey approve the plans the plans were very ambitious a temporary Town Square was installed and around it were set up miniature theaters 150 buffets and 20 different drinking establishments gifts were to be handed out to everyone who attended including a

bread roll a sausage some pretzels some gingerbread and a commemorative cup there was a lot of excitement in the leadup to the event on the evening of the 29th of May the day before the banquet people had already begun to gather in cinka field the setup for such a big event was an attraction in and of itself families gathered to watch cart after cart Laden with beer food and gifts heading into the grounds people came from all over the Russian Empire to Kinka field as many as 500,000 were estimat

ed to be there by the early hours of the morning on the 30th of May rumors began to spread amongst the crowd about what gifts were on offer some claimed that the commemorative cups would contain real gold coins a possibility that caused Great excitement at around 6:00 a.m. rumors quickly spread that some booths had opened up and were already handing out gifts this information passed through the crowd at incredible speed and then almost as one the crowd began to Surge towards the booths further r

umors spread as people rushed across the field it was said that some special prizes were on offer if you were lucky you might be given a cow a horse or even a house although of course these prizes were limited in number and would soon run out the excitement grew to a frenzy as the crowds began to Surge the workers handing out the gifts became worried some started to throw gifts into the crowd in an effort to calm people down and reduce the pressure in the immediate vicinity of the booth ultimate

ly though this only added to the chaos the movement of the crowd swept up every man woman and child in the area with many tripping and falling as they were pulled along the ground was uneven and the people were so tightly packed in places that those in the crowd couldn't even see the ground beneath them the Ravine and several drainage ditches were situated close to the booths handing out gifts as the movement of the crowd became uncontrolled people were swept into these in their hundreds one on

top of the other many people in the crowd fainted but they weren't able to fall to the ground so were carried along upright but unconscious famed Russian writer Leo Tolstoy was deeply affected by the events that day and would later write a short story featuring them though it is of course fiction it gives some insight into what it may have been like to experience the catastrophic Crush he fell a woman in a headscarf fell upon him he shook her off his back wanting to return but others pressed fro

m behind and he didn't have the strength he lent forward but his feet set on something soft on people they grabbed him by the legs and screamed he saw nothing heard nothing and moved forward treading on people there was a police force of around 1,800 present in cinka field that day but they had no chance of controlling a crowd of half a million thousands of people were thrown into ditches and the Ravine piled up on top of each other with no hope of survival for those at the bottom there was also

a well on the field into which 27 people fell only one of them would survive gradually the crowd calmed and began to disperse the police were ordered to clear the area and remove the bodies of the dead so that the festivities could continue as planned with this as a priority little attempt was made to Aid the injured and dying at the same time there were parts of the massive field that were so far removed from the worst parts of the crush that some attendees were entirely unaware of what had ha

ppened the celebrations did indeed carry on while nearly 1,300 corpses were removed from the scene and around 9,000 injured people left to seek medical attention a valet for the court of Nicholas II Alex volov later recalled his experience of walking around the area as people left the celebration in an account which highlights both the scale of the event and the confusion I met many groups of people coming back from that site carrying the sar's gifts the strange thing though was that not one per

son mentioned the catastrophe and I did not hear about it until the next morning Zar Nicholas II was informed of the tragedy he and his wife went that same day to the site in order to pay their respects to the debt but by the time they arrived at around 2: p.m. there was no sign at all that a tragedy of any kind had taken place that evening the French Ambassador had arranged a ball for Nicholas as part of the coronation celebrations it is thought that Nicholas may have been uncertain about atten

ding such a lavish ball in the wake of the disaster but as France was such an important Ally to Russia his advisers persuaded him to attend conflicting reports also emerged highlighted by those who opposed the monarchy reports that Nicholas was warned not to attend by some advisers but did so anyway China's imperial commissioner was present at the ball and remarked that a Chinese emperor would never have gone to a ball after such a tragedy whether he was reluctant to attend the ball or not the f

act that he did left a sour taste in the mouths of the people of Moscow it was seen as a disrespectful act thear feasting and dancing while the people mourned their dead the Zar did pay compensation to the families of the victims out of his own Pockets he also played an active role in the resulting investigation the findings of this investigation led him to dismiss his uncle Sergey who had gained the nickname the Duke of cinka for his role in the disaster it is indicative of this period in histo

ry that most of the reporting of the Kinka Crush was focused on the impact on the Zar and the ruling class rather than the thousands of people that died and were injured that day the disaster became a talking point for those seeking to take or retain power while the general public that had suffered in it were left largely unaided to deal with the tragic [Music] consequences