The Detective Who Questioned Everyone

Name: The Detective Who Questioned Everyone
Genre: Documentary

Nikolai Sokolov builds the first great Romanov case file from witnesses, photographs and fragments scattered by civil war.

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Transcript

The Romanov murder case raced against time—one investigator questioned everyone.
Within days of the deaths, the White Army entered Ekaterinburg. By July 30th, an investigation had been ordered.
An admiral took forensic materials from the first investigators, calling them inept.
Then, on February 6th, 1919, he handed the case to Sokolov.
On February 6th, 1919, Sokolov opened the file, starting witness questions.
He examined all available witnesses to the imperial family's exile.
Servants, doctors, tutors, guards, soldiers and local eyewitnesses were logged.
Sokolov gathered photographs, deposing servants, doctors, tutors, guards, soldiers, local eyewitnesses.
The team pushed back, challenging each account before it entered the file.
Witness Sidney Gibbes tutored the family from 1908 until evacuation.
Maria Romanova, one of the family's daughters, told Gibbes, keeping her private wish. I would happily stay in Tobolsk forever.
A case can preserve a voice long after the person behind it is gone.
The Sokolov Commission findings grew into eight volumes and dozens of photographs.
Sokolov transported a set of documents through Vladivostok to Paris.
Sokolov's book about the family's fate appeared posthumously in 1925.
Seven original volumes are now held at Harvard University.

Sokolov had built eight volumes of evidence—but now those volumes had to escape Russia before the case disappeared with them.

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