Grand Duchess Anna Feodorovna

A miniature portrait of Grand Duchess Anna Feodorovna nee Princess Juliane Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld from the Royal Collection. She was the first wife of Grand Duke Constantine Pavlovich of Russia, and an aunt of Queen Victoria.

Anna was around 15 to 16 years old when this portrait was painted. This was how her sister-in-law and close friend, the future Empress Elizabeth Alexeievna of Russia, described Anna:

"Julie is such a wonderful child: kind, polite, trustworthy, and she is the best friend I could ever dream of. She is cheerful and amusing... She has brown hair, brown dazzling eyes, and a pretty mouth..."

Almost an Empress - Anna Feodorovna of Russia

Grand Duchess Anna Feodorovna of Russia
Born Princess Juliane of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld
From a portrait by Elisabeth Vigee Le Brun
(The Royal Collection)

Little has been written about the Grand Duchess Anna Feodorovna of Russia in English so it's not surprising that many people reading about the Romanovs are not familiar with her. And yet, she bears that distinction as the first princess who married into the Romanov Family to be divorced from her husband. She was related to almost all royal families in Europe, and perhaps the most famous of her relatives was Queen Victoria. Anna Feodorovna was the sister of Queen Victoria's mother, the Duchess of Kent, as well as Leopold, King of the Belgians, thus, Anna was aunt to Victoria.