Michael Goleniewski
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Michael Goleniewski (August 16, 1922 - July 12, 1993), was an officer of Polish Military Intelligence and a spy for the Russian government during the 1950s. After his defection in 1961, he worked for the CIA. At one point he claimed to be Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich of Russia.[1]
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[edit] Career
Goleniewski was born in Nieswiez. He enlisted in the Polish Army in 1945 and was commissioned a lieutenant colonel in the Polish Army in 1955. He studied law at the University of Poznan and received a master's degree in political science from the University of Warsaw in 1956. He said he was head of the Technical and Scientific Department of the Polish Secret Service from 1957 to 1960. At the same time, he was spying on Polish Intelligence operations for the Russians.[2]
[edit] Defection
He defected to West Germany in 1961 and went to work for the Central Intelligence Agency. The Polish government sentenced him to death in absentia for defecting. A private bill, H.R. 5507, was introduced in the U.S. Congress in July 1963 to make Goleniewski an American citizen. The legislation was passed by both the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate.[3]
[edit] Claim made that he was Tsarevich Alexei
Goleniewski later made the claim that he was Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich, who, by most accounts, was killed with his family by Bolsheviks at Ekaterinburg, Russia on July 17, 1918. Goleniewski claimed that Yakov Yurovsky, one of the assassins, saved the family and helped them to escape. The whole family supposedly traveled to Poland via Turkey, Greece, and Austria. According to his story, the family lived in hiding in Poland.[4]
Tsarevich Alexei, who was born in August 1904, was a haemophiliac. Goleniewski, whose identity card gave his date of birth as 1922, making him eighteen years younger than the Tsarevich, claimed that the haemophilia made him appear younger than he really was and he had been "twice a child." He claimed that his haemophilia had been confirmed by Dr. Alexander S. Wiener, who had co-discovered the Rh factor in human blood. This claim was never confirmed.[5]
He met one of the Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia claimants, Eugenia Smith, in 1963. The meeting was covered by Life magazine. Goleniewski claimed that Smith was his sister Anastasia. Smith also recognized Goleniewski as her brother Alexei, even though she had claimed in her book that she had been the sole survivor at Ekaterinburg.[6]
Goleniewski's claim was an embarrassment to the CIA. He was put on a pension and his employment with the agency was ended in 1964.[7]
[edit] Marriage
Goleniewski married his pregnant girlfriend, Ingrid Kampf, on September 30, 1964, using the name Alexei Romanov. Their daughter Tatiana was born a few hours later. The marriage later broke up.[8]
[edit] Later life
Goleniewski lived the remainder of his life in Queens, New York, still claiming that he was Tsarevich Alexei. He leveled accusations against the government and the Russian Orthodox Church for mistreating him. Few believed his claim.[9]
