 Following the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the murder of his father, Botkin fled Tobolsk.He later spent a summer at a Russian Orthodox monastery and briefly considered becoming a priest, but decided against the religious life.He married Nadezhda Mandrazhi-Konshina, widow of Ensign of the Dragoons regiment, nobleman Mikhail Nikolaevich Mandrazhi, who was the chevalier of the Order of Saint George and was killed in battle in June 1915 at Grodno in Belarus.