Victoria Melita ('Ducky'), formerly Princess Victoria Melita of Edinburgh and Saxe-Coburg (1876-1936) pictured with her second husband, Grand Prince Kirill, son Vladimir and younger daughter Kira at St Briac in Britanny in 1928. Victoria Melita's first marriage to her cousin, Duke Ernst Ludwig of Hesse-Darmstadt ended in mutual unhappiness seven years later. Her decision to divorce Ernst Ludwig and marry Kirill shocked the family on both sides. The couple escaped Russia because Kirill took an oath of allegiance to the Provisional Government before the Tsar's abdication. He was next in line to the throne after the deaths of the Tsar, Tsesarevich and Grand Duke Mikhail, the Tsar's brother and was persuaded to state his own claim: in 1922 as 'Curator of the Thone' and in 1924 as 'Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias'. The shock of revolution took its toll on Kirill's health and his mental state fragile. The couple lived in Coburg for a time and were attracted to the Nazi party in its early days.