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1875, Russia, Emperor Alexander II. Early Copper 5 Kopeks Coin. VF-/F+

Mint Year: 1875 Condition: VF-/F+  Reference: KM-12.1. Denomination: 5 Kopeks Mint Place: Ekaterinburg (E.M) Weight: 16.16gm Material: Copper Diameter: 33mm

Obverse: Denomination (5 KOPEKS) flanked by stars. Mint initials (E.M.) below. Legend (translated): "1875 Year" Reverse:Heraldic eagle with shields of provinces (duchies), holding imperial orb and scepter. Legend (translated): "FIVE KOPEKS - COPPER RUSSIAN COIN"

Alexander II (Russian: Aleksandr II Nikolaevich) (29 April [O.S. 17 April] 1818,    Moscow – 13 March [O.S. 1 March] 1881, Saint Petersburg), also known as Alexander the Liberator (Russian: Aleksandr Osvoboditel') was the Emperor of the Russian Empire    from 3 March 1855 until his assassination in 1881. He was also the   King  of Poland and the Grand Duke of Finland.

Born in 1818, he was the eldest son of Nicholas I of    Russia and Charlotte of Prussia, daughter of Frederick William III of    Prussia and Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. His early life gave little    indication of his ultimate potential; until the time of his accession    in 1855, aged 37, few imagined that he would be known to posterity as  a   leader able to implement the most challenging reforms undertaken in    Russia since the reign of Peter the Great. The kings that are listed in    this section are among the best that empire had ever seen.

In the period of his life as heir apparent the    intellectual atmosphere of Saint Petersburg was unfavourable to any kind    of change: freedom of thought and all forms of private initiative were    being suppressed vigorously. Personal and official censorship was   rife;  criticism of the authorities was regarded as a serious offence.   Some  26 years after he had the opportunity of implementing changes he    would, however, be assassinated in public by the Narodnaya Volya    (People's Will) terrorist organisation.

His education as a future Tsar was carried out under    the supervision of the liberal romantic poet and gifted translator    Vasily Zhukovsky, grasping a smattering of a great many subjects, and    becoming familiar with the chief modern European languages. His  alleged   lack of interest in military affairs detected by later  historians   could have been only his reflection on the results on his own  family   and on the effect on the whole country of the unsavoury  Crimean War.   Unusually for the time, the young Alexander was taken on a  six-month   tour of Russia, visiting 20 provinces in the country. He also  visited   many prominent Western European countries. As Tsarevich,  Alexander   became the first Romanov heir to visit Siberia.

Alexander II succeeded to the throne upon the death    of his father in 1855. The first year of his reign was devoted to the    prosecution of the Crimean War and, after the fall of Sevastopol, to    negotiations for peace, led by his trusted counsellor Prince Gorchakov.    The country had been exhausted and humiliated by the war. Bribe-taking,    theft and corruption were everywhere. Encouraged by public opinion he    began a period of radical reforms, including an attempt to not to    depend on a landed aristocracy controlling the poor, a move to    developing Russia's natural resources and to thoroughly reform all    branches of the administration.

After Alexander became Tsar in 1855, he maintained a    generally liberal course. Despite this he was a target for numerous    assassination attempts (1866, 1879, 1880). On 13 March [O.S. 1 March]    1881 members of the Narodnaya Volya (People's Will) party killed him    with a bomb. The Tsar had earlier in the day signed the Loris-Melikov    constitution which would have created two legislative commissions made    up of indirectly elected representatives, had it not been repealed by    his reactionary successor Alexander III.

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