The Grand Ducal Burial Vault, officially called the Burial Vault of Members of the Imperial Family (or the New Burial Vault) at the Peter and Paul Cathedral, was built between 1896 and 1908 based on the design by architect D. I. Grimm, with the participation of A. O. Tomishko and L. N. Benois. Its construction was prompted by the fact that by the end of the 19th century, the possibilities for new burials in the Peter and Paul Cathedral, which served as the necropolis of the Romanov family, were practically exhausted.
Under the floor of the Burial Vault, 60 graves were arranged, each representing a two-chamber concrete crypt measuring 2.2 meters deep, 1.3 meters wide, and 2.4 meters long. Each chamber was sealed tightly with three stone slabs. The crypts are separated by concrete walls 12 centimeters thick. The graves are arranged in rows along the walls from east to west. Unlike the Peter and Paul Cathedral, where graves were prepared only after the death of a member of the imperial family, here they were all made at once.
According to the original design, approved by Alexander III back in 1887, the arrangement of an altar (chapel) in the Burial Vault was not planned. In the eastern part, there was supposed to be only a small crucifix. But in the summer of 1905, Nicholas II, at the request of his wife Alexandra Feodorovna and her sister Elizabeth, ordered the installation of an altar with an iconostasis. However, the building was considered not as a church but as a necropolis-mausoleum. Only memorial services were held there in the presence of members of the imperial family.
On November 5, 1908, the newly constructed Burial Vault was consecrated, and three days later the first burial took place — the son of Alexander II, Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich, was buried near the southern altar part.
As in the Peter and Paul Cathedral, all burials in the Burial Vault were conducted according to ceremony. For one or two days, the coffin with the body stood under a special canopy in the center of the cathedral. After the funeral service, it was carried to the Burial Vault and lowered into a copper sarcophagus placed in the grave. The sarcophagus was locked with two locks, the keys to which were kept at the Ministry of the Imperial Court. At a special signal at the moment the coffin was lowered, a rifle and artillery salute was fired from the fortress walls, and the bells rang.
The grave was closed flush with the floor by a white marble slab, on which the title, name, places and dates of birth and death, and the date of burial were engraved.
In February 1909, next to Alexei Alexandrovich, his brother Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich was buried. In the same year, the remains of his son Alexei Vladimirovich were transferred from the Peter and Paul Cathedral. And in 1911–1912, the remains of several other members of the royal family were also moved. The reburial took several days, as the crypts in the Burial Vault were smaller than the sarcophagi being transferred.
By 1916, there were thirteen burials in the Burial Vault, eight of which had been transferred from the Peter and Paul Cathedral.
During the Soviet era, the fate of the Grand Ducal Burial Vault was quite tragic. In December 1926, a commission from Glavnauka, which inspected the building, concluded that all bronze decorations on the tombstones, as well as the grilles of the altar part, "should be melted down as they do not represent historical or artistic value." In 1932, the building was handed over to the State Central Book Chamber. On the marble floor, damaged by the 1924 flood, wooden flooring was installed, on which shelves with books were placed in three tiers. The tombstones were crushed. The passage to the cathedral was bricked up. The book storage remained there until the end of the Great Patriotic War.
After the war, the Burial Vault was used for some time as a warehouse for a paper factory. In 1954, the building was transferred to the Museum of the History of the City, and in the first half of the 1960s, after repair and restoration work, it housed the exhibition "History of the Peter and Paul Fortress." It was dismantled in May 1992 due to the burial of the great-grandson of Alexander II, Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich, and the beginning of restoration work. After completion, the building was restored to its original appearance.
Sources:
https://www.citywalls.ru/house7097.html
