Mikołaj I Romanow (1796-1855)

Russian Emperor (1825–1855) and King of Poland (1825–1831). Son of Emperor Paul I and Maria Wirtemberska, grandson of Empress Catherine II, younger brother of Tsar Alexander I and Grand Duke Konstantin.

Alexander appointed him as his successor. He assumed the throne during the anti-Tsarist Decambrist revolt. Having sensed the looming danger, he set up a police regime in Russia and in Poland. He attempted to maintain the Tsarist autocracy and Christian Orthodoxy.

In 1829, he crowned himself in Warsaw as the King of Poland, and suppressed the November Uprising shortly afterwards. When the Sejm decided to dethrone him (in 1831), in 1832, he abolished the Polish constitution and substituted it with the Organic Statue, which rendered Poland part of the Russian Empire.

Following the November Uprising, he travelled to Warsaw on several occasions. He would stay in the Palace on the Isle at the Royal Łazienki – bought by his predecessor – Alexander I. He died in Saint Petersburg.