A Message from the Head of the Russian Imperial House, Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna, to the Third International Congress of Cossacks

I send my heartfelt greetings to the participants and attendees of the Third International Congress of Cossacks.

Remembering my own participation in the previous Congress in 2005, I prize more than anything else the fact that we together took important steps forward toward the reestablishment and strengthening of unity among the Cossacks. I anticipate that the present meeting will likewise continue this important effort. Only in a spirit of love and mutual understanding, with strong faith in God and with loyalty to the Fatherland, with respect for the laws and for the general well-being of the state, will the Cossacks be able fully to recapture the significant social position they previously enjoyed and effectively serve today’s Russia.

Unfortunately, circumstances do not permit me at this time to be together with you at the Congress. But you are all in my thoughts, and I pray for a successful meeting, and believe in your unswerving devotion to the House of Romanoff, of which I am head, and to which your ancestors in 1613 played so crucial a role in its ascension to the throne.

My most August mother, the Dowager Grand Duchess Leonida Georgievna, and my son and heir, Grand Duke Georgii Mikhailovich, also send their very best wishes to you all.

May the Lord keep you all!

The original is signed in Her Imperial Highness’s own hand:

Maria
Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna 

Certifying that this text is faithful to the original:

A. N. Zakatov
Director of H.I.H.’s Chancellery 

Issued in Madrid, 11 October 2008