Born: 27 January 1708, Russia
Died: 4 March 1728
Country most active: Russia
Also known as: Анна Петровна
The following is excerpted from A Cyclopædia of Female Biography, published 1857 by Groomsbridge and Sons and edited by Henry Gardiner Adams.
ANNA PETROVNA Was the eldest daughter of Peter the Great, by his second wife Catharine; she was born on the 27th. of February, 1708, and married, on the 28th. of May, 1725, a few months after the death of her father, to Charles Frederick, duke of Holstein-Gottorp, who not only lost his chance of succession to the crown of Sweden, to which he had claims as the nephew of Charles the Twelfth, but was also deprived of his hereditary dominions by the king of Denmark, who was, however, compelled to restore half of them by the Czar Peter, in whose court and that of the Empress Catharine, the duke of Holstein and his wife resided until after the death of the tatter; when the duke’s rival. Prince Menshikov, obtained the ascendancy over the young emperor, yet a junior, whose guardian Anna Petrovna had been nominated by the late empress, and obliged Anna and her husband to quit the Russian dominions. They accordingly removed, in July, 1727, to Kiel, where the duchess gave birth to a son, Peter Ulric, who was destined to receive the offer of both the Swedish and Russian crowns, and to perish the victim of his greatness. Three months after his birth his mother died; and soon after, in 1736, the widower instituted, in her honour, the order of St. Anne, which has been adopted in Russia, and is now the fourth order of knighthood in that empire. Anna Petrovna was the favourite daughter of Peter, whom she greatly resembled. She was remarkably beautiful and accomplished.