As you know, Nicholas I died on February 18 (March 2), 1855. It was officially announced that the emperor caught a cold while taking the parade in a light uniform, and died of pneumonia (pneumonia). As usual, in the very first days after the death of Nicholas, legends arose about his sudden death, and they began to spread with lightning speed. The first version - the king could not survive the defeat in the Crimean War and committed suicide. The second - the life physician Martin Mandt poisoned the emperor. What really happened?

Emperor Nicholas I

“Totally unexpected even for St. Petersburg”

Poet, journalist and (which is very important!) Doctor of Medical Sciences V.L. Pikov is already in Soviet time talked about this: “Rumors of suicide, of an artificially induced cold, of taking poison, when the cold began to pass, etc., came from the palace, from the medical world, spread among the literary public, wandered in the philistine environment<…>Such a physically strong person, like Nicholas I, could not die from a cold, even its severe form.

And here the question involuntarily arises: were there serious reasons for denying the official version of the death of the emperor? The answer to this question is obvious: of course they were.

First of all, as the historian E.V. Tarle, Russians and foreigners who knew the nature of Nicholas always said that they could not imagine the emperor “sitting down as a defeated at the diplomatic green table for negotiations with the winners.” Hence the version that Nicholas I took the news of the defeat of the Russian troops near Evpatoria hard. He allegedly realized that this was a harbinger of defeat in the entire Crimean War, and therefore asked Martin Mandt to give him poison that would allow him to die, protecting himself from shame.

Supporters of another version, the doctor's fellow contemporaries, unanimously accused him of underestimating the condition of his crowned patient and of inappropriate treatment methods.

The writing brethren also played their part. She preferred the suicide version.

As Tarle noted, rumors of suicide "were widespread in Russia and Europe (and had an impact on the minds)", and "sometimes people believed these rumors, who by no means sinned with gullibility and frivolity." For example, publicist N.V. Shelgunov and historian N.K. Schilder.

In particular, Schilder succinctly stated: "Poisoned." But Shelgunov gave us this version of the rumors about the “highest” death: “Emperor Nicholas died quite unexpectedly even for St. Petersburg, which had not heard anything about his illness before. It is clear that the sudden death of the sovereign caused rumors. By the way, they said that the dying emperor ordered to call his grandson, the future crown prince. The emperor was lying in his office, on a camp bed, under a soldier's overcoat. When the Tsarevich entered, the sovereign allegedly told him: “Learn to die,” and these were his last words. But there were other news as well. It was said that Emperor Nicholas, shocked by the failures of the Crimean War, felt unwell and then caught a bad cold. Despite his illness, he appointed a review of the troops. On the day of the parade, a sudden frost hit, but the sick sovereign did not find it convenient to postpone the parade. When they brought the riding horse, the medical officer Mandt grabbed him by the bit and, wanting to warn the emperor about the danger, as if said: “Sir, what are you doing? This is worse than death: this is suicide, ”but Emperor Nicholas, without answering, mounted his horse and gave him spurs.” It turns out that the form of the voluntary death of Nicholas I was not poison, but an artificially provoked cold.

Of course, there were immediately those who considered all the rumors about the suicide of the king to be unfounded. For example, in 1855, the book of Count D.N. Bludov "The Last Hours of the Life of Emperor Nicholas I". So there it is said about the death of the king as follows: “This precious life was put to an end by a catarrhal disease, which at first seemed insignificant, but, unfortunately, combined with other causes of disorder, which had long been hidden in the constitution, only [outwardly] strong, but in fact shaken , even exhausted by the labors of extraordinary activity, worries and sorrows ... "

"Iron" health of the emperor

Surprisingly, many contemporaries considered the emperor's health to be "iron". In reality, it was not so heroic. Nikolai Pavlovich was an ordinary person, and the impression of the invincibility of his health was rather the result of his conscious efforts to shape the image of the "master of a vast empire." In fact, as Tarle notes, “that something was wrong with the sovereign lately, it was absolutely clear to everyone who had access to the court.”

However, the emperor's health deteriorated much earlier than "everyone" noticed it. In December 1837, a terrible fire engulfed the Winter Palace. This fire lasted about thirty hours. As a result, the second and third floors of the palace were completely burned out and many valuable works of art were lost forever. This event left an indelible mark on the psyche of Nicholas I: every time at the sight of fire or the smell of smoke, he turned pale, his head was spinning and his heartbeat quickened.

Historians, for the most part, believe that Nicholas I's health troubles began in 1843. While traveling in Russia, on the road from Penza to Tambov, his carriage overturned, and the tsar broke his collarbone. From that time on, Nikolai Pavlovich's health began to noticeably change, and most importantly, he developed nervous irritability.

But the emperor felt especially bad in 1844-1845. His “legs ached and swollen”, the doctors were afraid that dropsy would begin. He even went to be treated in Italy, in Palermo. And in the spring of 1847, Nikolai Pavlovich's dizziness intensified. The longer he ruled the country, the more gloomily he looked at the future of Russia, at the fate of Europe, and even at his personal life. He experienced the death of many figures of his reign very hard - Prince A.N. Golitsyna, M.M. Speransky, A.Kh. Benckendorff. Death of daughter Alexandra in 1844 and tragic events The French Revolution of 1848 also clearly did not add to his health.

In January 1854, the emperor began to complain of pain in his foot. The then head of the gendarmerie L.V. Dubelt wrote about this: "Mandt says that he has erysipelas, while others say that it is gout." V.L. Paikov in Soviet times already clarified: “In last years life, gout attacks became more frequent against the background of fullness, which, apparently, was associated with a violation of the diet. One might think that a Soviet researcher every day stood behind the chair of the Emperor eating.

A. Kozlov. News from Sevastopol. Lithography. 1854–1855

Painful Strike

Of course, the Crimean campaign dealt a strong blow to Nicholas I. Relatives often saw how the king in his office "wept like a child when he received every bad news." “And yet, one should not exaggerate the significance of the unfavorable news about what happened near Evpatoria,” the historian P.K. Solovyov. Hoping for the best, the king was preparing for the worst. In letters dated early February 1855, Nicholas I pointed out to Adjutant General M.D. Gorchakov and Field Marshal I.F. Paskevich on the possibility of "failure in the Crimea", on the need to prepare the defense of Nikolaev and Kherson. He considered the probability of Austria entering the war very high and gave orders about possible hostilities in the Kingdom of Poland and Galicia. The tsar did not have any special illusions about the neutrality of Prussia either.

He understood long ago that the leading European powers have never loved and never will love Russia. Of course, there are many explanations for this Russophobia of theirs: France, beaten by the Russians in 1812-1814, dreamed of revenge. Already in 1815, she concluded a secret "defensive alliance" with England and Austria, directed against Russia. Another problem was the so-called "eastern question", that is, the security of Russia's southern borders and the strengthening of its positions in the Balkans. Russian patronage of the Orthodox population of the Balkan Peninsula hindered the expansionist intrigues of England and Austria. In addition, England, which saw Russia as its main geopolitical adversary, was concerned about the success of the Russians in the Caucasus and was afraid of their possible advance into Central Asia, on which it had its own views. As for Prussia, she, like Austria, was ready to support any action directed against Russia. TO mid-nineteenth century, Nicholas I found himself in diplomatic isolation, and this could not help but sadden him.

W. Simpson. Landing in Evpatoria. It took place on September 2 (14), 1854. Nicholas was told:
the expeditionary force of the coalition transported 61 thousand soldiers to the Crimea

Yes, the failure to attempt to storm Yevpatoria dealt a painful blow to Nikolai Pavlovich's pride, but it was not the event that predetermined the outcome of the entire war. The fate of the campaign depended on the defenders of Sevastopol, who continued to fight until the end of August 1855. So the defeat near Evpatoria could not push the emperor to suicide.

Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna testified: “It was not in his nature to complain.” He kept repeating, “I have to serve in everything in order. And if I become decrepit, I will go into a clean resignation. If I am not fit for the service, I will leave, but as long as I have the strength, I will overcome to the end. I will carry my cross as long as I have the strength.”

So the historian Paikov rightly believed that “one should not forget the important fact that Nicholas I was a military man to the marrow of his bones, who knew perfectly well that wars bring with them not only losses, but also defeats. And defeat must be accepted with dignity. And on their basis to build the building of the future victory. The character of this man, strong, resolute, purposeful, the whole history of his thirty-year reign does not give the slightest basis for the assumption of suicide on his part due to private military failures.

However, many sentimental contemporaries of the emperor could not come to terms with the prosaic picture of his death. Here is Prince V.P. Meshchersky romantically stated: “Nikolai Pavlovich was dying of grief, and precisely from Russian grief. This dying did not have signs of physical illness - it came only at the last minute - but the dying took place in the form of an undoubted predominance of mental suffering over his physical being.

The last days of Nicholas I

Director of His Majesty's office, poet V.I. Panaev testified that, no matter how hard Nikolai Pavlovich tried “to overcome himself, to hide his inner torment, it began to be revealed by the gloom of his gaze, pallor, even some darkening of his beautiful face and thinness of his whole body. In this state of his health, the slightest cold could develop a dangerous disease in him. And so it happened. Not wanting to refuse Count Kleinmichel (P.A. Kleinmichel was the Minister of Communications, who oversaw the construction of the Nikolaev railway. - Auth.) in a request to be planted by his father by his daughter, the sovereign went to the wedding, despite the severe frost, wearing a red horse guards uniform with elk trousers and silk stockings. That evening was the beginning of his illness: he caught a cold...

Neither in the city, nor even at the court, did they pay attention to the illness of the sovereign; they said that he was unwell, but he was not lying. The emperor did not express fear about his health, either because he really did not suspect any danger, or, more likely, in order not to disturb his kind subjects. For this last reason, he forbade the publication of bulletins about his illness.

For five days he was ill, but then he got stronger and went to the Mikhailovsky Manege to review the troops. When he returned, he felt unwell: cough and shortness of breath resumed. But the next day, the emperor again went to the Manege to review the marching battalions of the Preobrazhensky and Semyonovsky regiments. On February 11, he could no longer get out of bed. And on the 12th I received a telegram about the defeat of the Russian troops near Evpatoria. “How many lives have been sacrificed for nothing,” Nikolai Pavlovich repeated these words in last days many times in your life.

Near Evpatoria on February 5 (17), 1855, 168 Russian soldiers and officers were killed, 583 people were wounded (including one general), and another 18 people were missing.

On the night of February 17-18, the emperor became noticeably worse. He got paralyzed. What caused it? This remains a mystery. If we assume that he did commit suicide, then who exactly gave him the poison? It is known that two life doctors were alternately at the bedside of the patient: Martin Mandt and Philippe Carell. In memoir and historical literature usually point to Dr. Mandt. But, for example, Colonel I.F. Savitsky, adjutant of Tsarevich Alexander, stated: “The German Mandt is a homeopath, a life physician beloved by the tsar, whom popular rumor accused of the death (poisoning) of the emperor, forced to flee abroad, so he told me about the last minutes of the great sovereign: “After receiving the dispatch about the defeat near Evpatoria, Nicholas I called me to him and said: “You were always devoted to me, and therefore I want to speak with you confidentially - the course of the war revealed the fallacy of my entire foreign policy, but I have neither the strength nor the desire to change and go different dear, that would be contrary to my beliefs. May my son, after my death, make this turn. I am unable and must leave the stage, and with that I called you to ask you to help me. Give me a poison that would allow me to end my life without unnecessary suffering, quickly enough, but not suddenly (so as not to cause misunderstandings).

However, according to Savitsky's memoirs, Mandt refused to give poison to the emperor. But on the same night, February 18 (March 2), 1855, the emperor died.

And by morning, the rapid decomposition of the body began, and yellow, blue and purple spots appeared on the face of the deceased. The heir to the throne, Alexander, was horrified to see his father so disfigured, and called two doctors: N.F. Zdekauer and I.I. Myanovsky - professors of the Medical and Surgical Academy. He ordered them to remove by any means "all signs of poisoning, so that in four days the body would be properly displayed for a general farewell according to tradition and protocol."

"He was too religious to be discouraged"

Supporters of the poisoning version claim that the two professors called in, in order to hide the true cause of death, literally repainted the face of the deceased and properly processed it. But the new method of embalming the body allegedly used by them was not yet well developed, and it did not prevent its rapid decomposition. But at the same time, it is somehow forgotten that Zdekauer and Myanovsky were therapists and never did embalming at all!

It is also confirmed that last will Nicholas I had a ban on the autopsy of his body: he allegedly feared that the autopsy would reveal the secret of his death, which the desperate emperor wanted to take with him to the grave. But this is not entirely true either. Nikolai Pavlovich wrote his last spiritual testament on May 4, 1844. And in this document there is no mention of according to what ritual to bury him in the event of death. However, back in 1828, during the funeral of his mother, Empress Maria Feodorovna, he publicly stated that during his burial, the ceremonial should be simplified as much as possible.

V.L. In this regard, Paikov writes: “When Nicholas I died, the “simplified ceremonial” of the funeral was interpreted as a desire to quickly hide the body of the deceased in the grave, and with it the secret of his “mysterious” death. But it was only about the desire of Nicholas I to save state funds on his funeral.

As for the rapid decomposition of the body of the deceased, it could be due to the fact that there were no special refrigeration chambers at that time. But the air temperature in St. Petersburg that day suddenly rose sharply from -20°С to +2°С. Plus, as noted by the maid of honor of the court A.F. Tyutchev, "farewell to the emperor took place in a small room, where a lot of people gathered who wanted to say goodbye to the king, and the heat was almost unbearable."

So the rumors about the king's suicide are groundless.

And two more important points.

Firstly, Nicholas I was a deeply religious person who cared about the posthumous fate of his soul. His daughter, Olga Nikolaevna, said: "He was too religious to be discouraged." And even more so, he hardly even allowed the thought of suicide.

And here is the testimony of the adjutant wing of the emperor V.I. Dena: “Whoever knew Nikolai Pavlovich closely could not help but appreciate the deeply religious feeling that distinguished him and which, of course, would help him with Christian humility to endure all the blows of fate, no matter how hard, no matter how sensitive they were to his pride” .

Any Christian knows that an unauthorized departure from life is a grave offense, a mortal sin that surpasses even murder. Suicide is one of the most terrible sins that cannot be repented of. So the 58-year-old emperor clearly would not have dared to step over this, challenging God himself and refusing to recognize Him as the head of human life.

Secondly, speaking of the death of Nicholas I, we must not forget about one more circumstance. The emperor was on the verge of old age - in July 1855 he was supposed to be 59 years old. Of course, these days it's not much. But in comparison with other Pavlovichs, Nikolai was almost a long-liver. For comparison: his older brother Alexander I died at the age of 47, Konstantin Pavlovich - at 52, Mikhail Pavlovich - at 51, Ekaterina Pavlovna - at 30.

Nicholas I was buried in the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg.

Alexandra Feodorovna, his wife, died on October 20 (November 1), 1860 in Tsarskoye Selo, and she was also buried in the Peter and Paul Cathedral.

By the way

The historian Tarle notes: “For the enemies of the Nikolaev regime, this alleged suicide was, as it were, a symbol of the complete failure of the entire system of merciless oppression, the personification of which was the king, and they wanted to believe that in the night hours from February 17 to 18, left alone with Mandt, the culprit, who created this system and led Russia to a military catastrophe, realized his historical crimes and pronounced a death sentence on himself and his regime. In rumors of suicide, the broad masses drew evidence of the impending collapse of the system, which so recently seemed indestructible.

A symbol of failure... I realized... I pronounced a sentence over myself... All this, perhaps, is true. But from awareness to a concrete step - the abyss. As the saying goes, "it happens that you do not want to live, but this does not mean at all that you want not to live." And if so, then one cannot but agree with the historian P.A. Zayonchkovsky, who draws the following conclusion: “The events in Sevastopol sobered him up. However, the rumors about the king's suicide are without any foundation.

Sergei Nechaev

Nicholas I (short biography)

The future Russian Emperor Nicholas I was born on June 25, 1796. Nicholas was the third son of Maria Feodorovna and Paul the First. He was able to get a pretty good education, but denied the humanities. At the same time, he was well-versed in fortification and military art. Nikolai also owned and engineering. But despite all this, the ruler was not a favorite of soldiers and officers. His coldness and cruel corporal punishment led him to be nicknamed "Nikolai Palkin" in the army environment.

In 1817 Nicholas married the Prussian princess Frederica Louise Charlotte Wilhelmine.

Nicholas I comes to the throne after the death of his elder brother Alexander. The second pretender to the Russian throne, Konstantin renounces the rights to rule during the life of his brother. At the same time, Nicholas did not know this and at first gave the oath to Constantine. Historians call this time the Interregnum.

Although the manifesto on the accession to the throne of Nicholas I was issued on December 13, 1825, his actual administration of the country began on November 19. On the very first day of the reign, the Decembrist uprising took place, the leaders of which were executed a year later.

The domestic policy of this ruler was characterized by extreme conservatism. The smallest manifestations of free thought were immediately suppressed, and the autocracy of Nicholas was defended with all his might. The secret office, which was led by Benckendorff, carried out a political investigation. After the release in 1826 of a special censorship charter, all printed publications that had at least some political overtones were banned.

At the same time, the reforms of Nicholas I were distinguished by their limitations. Legislation was streamlined and the publication of the Complete Collection of Laws began. In addition, Kiselev is reforming the management of state peasants, introducing new agricultural techniques, building first-aid posts, etc.

In 1839 - 1843 the financial reform, which establishes the relationship between the banknote and the silver ruble, but the issue of serfdom remained unresolved.

Nikolaevskaya foreign policy had the same goals as the internal one. The constant struggle against the revolutionary moods of the people did not stop.

As a result of the Russian-Iranian war, Armenia joins the state territory, the ruler condemns the revolution in Europe and even sends an army in 1849 to suppress it in Hungary. In 1853 Russia enters the Crimean War.

Nicholas died on March 2, 1855.

Date of publication or update 01.11.2017

Contents: Rulers

Nicholas I Pavlovich Romanov
Years of life: 1796–1855
Russian emperor (1825–1855). King of Poland and Grand Duke Finnish.

From the Romanov dynasty.

Monument to Nicholas I in St. Petersburg.

In 1816 he made a three-month journey through European Russia, and since October 1816. to May 1817 Nicholas traveled and lived in England.

In 1817 Nikolay the First Pavlovich married the eldest daughter of the Prussian king Frederick William II, Princess Charlotte Frederick-Louise, who adopted the name Alexandra Feodorovna in Orthodoxy.

In 1819, his brother Emperor Alexander I announced that the heir to the throne, Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich, wanted to renounce his right to succeed to the throne, so Nicholas would become the heir as the next brother in seniority. Formally, Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich renounced his rights to the throne in 1823, since he had no children in a legal marriage and was married in a morganatic marriage to the Polish Countess Grudzinskaya.

On August 16, 1823, Alexander I signed a manifesto appointing his brother Nikolai Pavlovich as heir to the throne.

but Nikolay the First Pavlovich refused to proclaim himself emperor until the final expression of the will of his older brother. Nicholas refused to recognize Alexander's will, and on November 27 the entire population was sworn in to Constantine, and Nicholas Pavlovich himself swore allegiance to Constantine I as emperor. But Konstantin Pavlovich did not accept the throne, at the same time he did not want to formally renounce him as emperor, to whom the oath had already been taken. An ambiguous and very tense interregnum was created, which lasted twenty-five days, until December 14th.

Nicholas was married once in 1817 to Princess Charlotte of Prussia, daughter of Friedrich Wilhelm III, who received the name Alexandra Feodorovna after converting to Orthodoxy. They had children:

Alexander II (1818-1881)

Maria (08/6/1819-02/09/1876), was married to the Duke of Leuchtenberg and Count Stroganov.

Olga (08/30/1822 - 10/18/1892), was married to the King of Württemberg.

Alexandra (12/06/1825 - 29/07/1844), married to Prince of Hesse-Kassel

Konstantin (1827-1892)

Nicholas (1831-1891)

Mikhail (1832-1909)

Nicholas led an ascetic and healthy lifestyle. He was a believing Orthodox Christian, he did not smoke and did not like smokers, he did not drink strong drinks, he walked a lot and did drills with weapons. He had a remarkable memory and a great capacity for work. Archbishop Innokenty wrote about him: "He was ... such a crowned bearer, for whom the royal throne served not as a head to peace, but as an incentive to unceasing work." According to the memoirs of the maid of honor of Her Imperial Majesty, Anna Tyutcheva, the favorite phrase of Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich was: "I work like a slave in the galleys."

The king's love for justice and order was well known. He personally visited military formations, inspected fortifications, educational establishments, government agencies. He always gave concrete advice to correct the situation.

He had a pronounced ability to form a team of talented, creatively gifted people. The employees of Nicholas I Pavlovich were the Minister of Public Education Count S. S. Uvarov, the commander Field Marshal His Serene Highness Prince I. F. Paskevich, the Minister of Finance Count E. F. Kankrin, the Minister of State Property Count P. D. Kiselev and others.

Growth Nicholas I Pavlovich was 205 cm.

All historians agree on one thing: Nikolay the First Pavlovich was undoubtedly a bright figure among the rulers-emperors of Russia.

Emperor of All Russia in 1825-1855.

Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich was born in Tsarskoye Selo (now) on June 25 (July 6), 1796. He was the third son of Tsarevich Pavel Petrovich, the future emperor.

In 1800, Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich, together with his brother Mikhail, was entrusted with the supervision of the director of the 1st Cadet Corps, Count V. N. Lamzdorf, who gave his ward a pedantically severe military education. Nikolai Pavlovich's attraction to military affairs developed early and was supported by the whole environment of life around him.

On July 1 (12), 1817, the Grand Duke married the eldest daughter of the Prussian king, Princess Louise Charlotte, who adopted the name Alexandra Feodorovna in Orthodoxy. On April 17 (29), 1818, Grand Duke Alexander Nikolayevich, the future emperor, was born in their family.

In 1817, Nikolai Pavlovich was appointed inspector general for engineering. From 1823 he commanded the 1st Guards Division. In the spring of 1825, when he was leaving for Warsaw, Nikolai Pavlovich was left temporarily interceding for the emperor in matters of supreme administration.

After the death of Emperor Alexander I, Tsarevich Konstantin Pavlovich was supposed to inherit the throne, but, as it turned out during the days of mourning, he abdicated as early as 1822. However, before the confirmation of his abdication, the oath to Konstantin Pavlovich as emperor was carried out throughout the country.

Uncertainty with the succession to the throne created a favorable situation for the performance of the Decembrists. The publication of the manifesto on the accession to the throne of Nicholas I on December 14 (26), 1825, coincided with the exit of the military units of the capital's garrison, led by conspirators, to the Senate Square. The confident actions of the young emperor and his supporters, as well as the indecision of the leaders of the uprising, predetermined his defeat.

Emperor Nicholas I was crowned on August 22 (September 3), 1826. In 1829, in Warsaw, he was crowned constitutional monarch of the Kingdom of Poland.

At the beginning of his reign, Nicholas I sought to reform the existing state institutions. In 1826-1830, a special secret committee, chaired by Count V.P. Kochubey, worked, which, with the participation of the emperor, was considering ways to modernize government controlled. Some of the committee's projects were later brought to life, but most were never implemented.

Nicholas I paid close attention to the codification of Russian legislation. In 1826, to solve this problem, the Second Department was formed as part of His Imperial Majesty's Own Chancellery. The leadership of this work was entrusted to a member State Council. Its result was the 45-volume chronological collection of Russian laws published in 1830 from the Code of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich to the last decree of Emperor Alexander I - the Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire, subsequently replenished with all newly issued acts. In 1832, the Second Department prepared for publication a complete set of laws in force in the empire in 15 volumes.

The most important question domestic policy Nicholas I was a peasant. The emperor understood the need to abolish serfdom, but could not carry it out because of the opposition of the nobility and fear of a "general shock". Because of this, he limited himself to ineffective measures, such as the issuance of a law on indebted peasants, and the partial reform of state peasants. However, despite the policy of conservation of existing feudal institutions, the course of development of society objectively led the government to take actions that contributed to economic development: the creation of manufacturing and commercial councils, the organization of industrial exhibitions, the opening of higher educational institutions, including technical ones.

In 1826, Nicholas I formed the Third Section of His Majesty's Own Chancellery, which was under the command of the chief of gendarmes and dealt with the affairs of the highest police, both observational and preventive. With this new institution, the emperor wished to strengthen his direct supervision over the protection of the legitimate rights, honor and tranquility of his subjects. In fact, it has become a secret political police department.

Nicholas I brutally suppressed separatist movements on the national outskirts of the empire. During the years of his reign, most of military actions of the Caucasian war of 1817-1864. The Polish uprising of 1830-1831 ended with the complete defeat of the rebels and the liquidation of the autonomy of the Kingdom of Poland.

The foreign policy of Nicholas I was characterized by the continuation of traditional Russian expansion in the southern and eastern directions. The Russo-Persian war of 1826-1828 ended with the Turkmenchay peace, according to which Russia gained the Erivan and Nakhichevan regions. The Russian-Turkish war of 1828-1829, the prelude to which was the Navarino battle of 1827, ended with the Andrianopol peace, according to which Greece gained independence, and Russia held part of Bessarabia and in the eastern theater of the war - fortresses, Akhaltsykh, Akhalkalaki and Poti. The government of Nicholas I pursued a policy of energetic territorial expansion in Central Asia and Kazakhstan.

An important aspect of the foreign policy of Nicholas I was the return to the principles Holy Union, proclaimed in 1833 after the official entry into allied relations with the Emperor of Austria and the King of Prussia to fight the revolutionary movement in Europe. Implementing the principles of this alliance, in 1848 Nicholas I severed diplomatic relations with France, launched an invasion of the Danubian principalities, and took an active part in the brutal suppression of the Hungarian Revolution of 1848-1849.

The main direction of the foreign policy of the state under Nicholas I was the solution of the so-called. Eastern question. Its essence was to ensure a favorable regime for Russia in the Black Sea straits, which was extremely important both for the security of the southern borders and for the economic development of the state. The Unkyar-Iskelesi Treaty of 1833 became a stage in achieving this goal. The desire to solve the Eastern question by dividing the Ottoman Empire gave rise to the beginning of the Crimean War of 1853-1856. Russia's unsuccessful participation in this conflict was one of the reasons for the collapse of the Nikolaev political system and the death of the emperor himself.

Emperor Nicholas I died in the Winter Palace on February 18 (March 2), 1855. His reign entered the history of Russia as the period of the highest flowering of absolute monarchy in its military-bureaucratic form.

Nicholas I Pavlovich
Coronation:
Predecessor:	Alexander I
Successor:	Alexander II
Coronation:
Predecessor:	Alexander I
Successor:	Alexander II
Predecessor:	Alexander I
Successor:	Alexander II
Religion:	Orthodoxy
Birth:
Buried:	Peter and Paul Cathedral
Dynasty:	Romanovs
	Maria Fedorovna
	Charlotte of Prussia (Alexandra Feodorovna)
Monogram:

Biography

Childhood and adolescence

The most important milestones of the reign

Domestic politics

Peasant question

Nicholas and the problem of corruption

Foreign policy

Emperor Engineer

Culture, censorship and writers

Nicknames

Family and personal life

Monuments

Nicholas I Pavlovich Unforgettable (June 25 (July 6), 1796, Tsarskoye Selo - February 18 (March 2), 1855, St. Petersburg) - Emperor of All Russia from December 14 (December 26), 1825 to February 18 (March 2), 1855, Tsar of Poland and Grand Duke of Finland . From the imperial house of the Romanovs, Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov dynasty.

Biography

Childhood and adolescence

Nicholas was the third son of Emperor Paul I and Empress Maria Feodorovna. He was born on June 25, 1796 - a few months before the accession of Grand Duke Pavel Petrovich to the throne. Thus, he was the last of the grandchildren of Catherine II, born during her lifetime.

The birth of Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich was announced in Tsarskoye Selo by cannon fire and bell ringing, and news was sent to St. Petersburg by courier.

Odes were written for the birth of the Grand Duke, the author of one of them was G. R. Derzhavin. Before him, in the imperial house of the Romanovs, the Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov dynasty, children were not named after Nikolai. Name day - December 6 according to the Julian calendar (Nicholas the Wonderworker).

According to the order established under Empress Catherine, Grand Duke Nikolai from birth entered into the care of the royal grandmother, but the death of the Empress that followed soon cut off her influence on the course of the upbringing of the Grand Duke. His nanny was Scottish Lyon. She was for the first seven years the only leader of Nicholas. The boy, with all the strength of his soul, became attached to his first teacher, and one cannot but agree that during the period of tender childhood, “the heroic, chivalrous, noble, strong and open character of Nanny Lyon” left an imprint on the character of her pupil.

Since November 1800, General M. I. Lamzdorf became the tutor of Nikolai and Mikhail. The choice of General Lamzdorf for the post of educator of the Grand Duke was made by Emperor Paul. Paul I pointed out: “Just don’t make such rake of my sons as German princes” (German. Solche Schlingel wie die deutschen Prinzen). IN highest order On November 23, 1800, it was announced:

"Lieutenant-General Lamzdorf has been appointed to be under His Imperial Highness Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich." The general stayed with his pupil for 17 years. Obviously, Lamzdorf fully satisfied the pedagogical requirements of Maria Feodorovna. Thus, in a parting letter of 1814, Maria Fedorovna called General Lamzdorf the “second father” of Grand Dukes Nikolai and Mikhail.

The death of his father, Paul I, in March 1801, could not but be imprinted in the memory of the four-year-old Nicholas. He later described what happened in his memoirs:

The events of that sad day are preserved in my memory like a vague dream; I was awakened and saw Countess Lieven before me. When I was dressed, we noticed through the window, on the drawbridge under the church, the guards, which were not there the day before; there was the entire Semyonovsky regiment in an extremely careless form. None of us suspected that we had lost our father; we were taken downstairs to my mother, and soon from there we went with her, sisters, Mikhail and Countess Liven to the Winter Palace. The guard went out into the courtyard of the Mikhailovsky Palace and saluted. My mother immediately silenced him. My mother was lying in the back of the room when Emperor Alexander entered, accompanied by Konstantin and Prince Nikolai Ivanovich Saltykov; he threw himself on his knees before his mother, and I can still hear his sobs. They brought him water, and they took us away. We were happy to see our rooms again and, I must tell you the truth, our wooden horses, which we had forgotten there.

This was the first blow of fate dealt to him during the period of his most tender age, a blow. Since then, concern for his upbringing and education has been concentrated entirely and exclusively in the jurisdiction of the widowed Empress Maria Feodorovna, out of a sense of delicacy towards which Emperor Alexander I refrained from any influence on the upbringing of his younger brothers.

Empress Maria Feodorovna's greatest concern in the education of Nikolai Pavlovich was to try to turn him away from the passion for military exercises, which was found in him from early childhood. Passion for the technical side of military affairs, instilled in Russia by Paul I, let royal family deep and strong roots - Alexander I, despite his liberalism, was an ardent supporter of the watch parade and all its subtleties, Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich experienced complete happiness only on the parade ground, among the drilled teams. The younger brothers were not inferior in this passion to the older ones. From early childhood, Nikolai began to show a special passion for military toys and stories about military operations. The best reward for him was permission to go to a parade or a divorce, where he watched everything that happened with special attention, dwelling on even the smallest details.

Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich was educated at home - teachers were assigned to him and his brother Mikhail. But Nikolai did not show much zeal for study. He did not recognize the humanities, but he was well versed in the art of war, was fond of fortification, and was familiar with engineering.

According to V. A. Mukhanov, Nikolai Pavlovich, having completed his education, was himself horrified by his ignorance and after the wedding he tried to fill this gap, but the living conditions were scattered, the predominance of military occupations and bright joys family life distracted him from constant office work. “His mind was not processed, his upbringing was careless,” Queen Victoria wrote about Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich in 1844.

It is known that the future emperor was fond of painting, which he studied in childhood under the guidance of the painter I. A. Akimov and the author of religious and historical compositions, Professor V. K. Shebuev

During Patriotic War In 1812 and the subsequent military campaigns of the Russian army in Europe, Nikolai was eager to go to war, but met with a decisive refusal from the Empress Mother. In 1813, the 17-year-old Grand Duke was taught strategy. At this time, from his sister Anna Pavlovna, with whom he was very friendly, Nicholas accidentally learned that Alexander I had visited Silesia, where he had seen the family of the Prussian king, that Alexander liked his eldest daughter, Princess Charlotte, and that his intention was that Nicholas somehow met her.

Only at the beginning of 1814 did Emperor Alexander allow his younger brothers to join the army abroad. On February 5 (17), 1814, Nikolai and Mikhail left Petersburg. On this journey they were accompanied by General Lamzdorf, gentlemen: I.F. Savrasov, A.P. Aledinsky and P.I. Arseniev, Colonel Gianotti and Dr. Rühl. After 17 days, they reached Berlin, where the 17-year-old Nicholas saw the 16-year-old daughter of the King of Prussia, Frederick William III, Charlotte.

After spending one day in Berlin, the travelers proceeded through Leipzig, Weimar, where they saw their sister Maria Pavlovna, Frankfurt am Main, Bruchsal, where Empress Elizaveta Alekseevna then lived, Rastatt, Freiburg and Basel. Near Basel, they first heard enemy shots, as the Austrians and Bavarians were besieging the nearby fortress of Güningen. Then through Altkirch they entered France and reached the tail of the army at Vesoul. However, Alexander I ordered the brothers to return to Basel. Only when the news came that Paris had been taken and Napoleon had been banished to the island of Elba, did the grand dukes receive orders to come to Paris.

On November 4, 1815, in Berlin, during an official dinner, the engagement of Princess Charlotte and Tsarevich and Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich was announced.

After the military campaigns of the Russian army in Europe, professors were invited to the Grand Duke, who were supposed to "read the military sciences as fully as possible." For this purpose, the well-known engineering general Karl Opperman and, to help him, colonels Gianotti and Markevich were chosen.

Since 1815, military conversations between Nikolai Pavlovich and General Opperman began.

On his return from his second campaign, beginning in December 1815, Grand Duke Nicholas again began to study with some of his former professors. Balugyansky read "the science of finance", Akhverdov read Russian history (from the reign of Ivan the Terrible to the Time of Troubles). With Markevich, the Grand Duke was engaged in "military translations", and with Gianotti - reading the works of Giraud and Lloyd about various campaigns of the wars of 1814 and 1815, as well as analyzing the project "on the expulsion of the Turks from Europe under certain given conditions."

Youth

In March 1816, three months before his twentieth birthday, fate brought Nicholas together with the Grand Duchy of Finland. At the beginning of 1816, the University of Åbo, following the example of the universities of Sweden, most humbly interceded whether Alexander I would honor him with royal grace to grant him a chancellor in the person of His Imperial Highness Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich. According to the historian M. M. Borodkin, this “thought belongs entirely to Tengström, the bishop of the Abo diocese, a supporter of Russia. Alexander I granted the request and Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich was appointed chancellor of the university. His task was to maintain the status of the university and the conformity of university life with the spirit and traditions. In memory of this event, the St. Petersburg Mint minted a bronze medal.

Also in 1816 he was appointed chief of the cavalry chasseurs.

In the summer of 1816, Nikolai Pavlovich was to complete his education by taking a trip around Russia to get acquainted with his fatherland in administrative, commercial and industrial terms. Upon returning from this trip, it was also planned to make a trip abroad to get acquainted with England. On this occasion, on behalf of Empress Maria Feodorovna, a special note was drawn up, which summarized the main foundations of the administrative system of provincial Russia, described the areas that the Grand Duke had to pass through, in historical, everyday, industrial and geographical terms, it was indicated what exactly could be the subject of conversations between the Grand Duke and representatives of the provincial authorities, what should be paid attention to, and so on.

Thanks to a trip to some provinces of Russia, Nikolai got a visual idea of ​​the internal state and problems of his country, and in England he got acquainted with the experience of developing one of the most advanced socio-political systems of his time. However, Nicholas's emerging political system of views was distinguished by a pronounced conservative, anti-liberal orientation.

On July 13, 1817, Grand Duke Nicholas married Princess Charlotte of Prussia. The wedding took place on the birthday of the young princess - July 13, 1817 in the church of the Winter Palace. Charlotte of Prussia converted to Orthodoxy and was given a new name - Alexandra Feodorovna. This marriage strengthened the political union of Russia and Prussia.

The question of succession. Interregnum

In 1820, Emperor Alexander I informed his brother Nikolai Pavlovich and his wife that the heir to the throne, their brother Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich, intended to renounce his right, so Nikolai would become the heir as the next brother in seniority.

In 1823, Konstantin formally renounced his rights to the throne, as he had no children, was divorced and married in a second morganatic marriage to the Polish Countess Grudzinska. On August 16, 1823, Alexander I signed a secretly drawn up manifesto, which approved the abdication of the Tsesarevich and Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich and approved Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich as the Heir to the Throne. On all packages with the text of the manifesto, Alexander I himself wrote: "Keep until my demand, and in the event of my death, open before any other action."

On November 19, 1825, while in Taganrog, Emperor Alexander I died suddenly. In St. Petersburg, the news of Alexander's death was received only on the morning of November 27 during a prayer service for the emperor's health. Nicholas, the first of those present, swore allegiance to "Emperor Constantine I" and began to swear in the troops. Constantine himself was in Warsaw at that moment, being the de facto governor of the Kingdom of Poland. On the same day, the State Council met, at which the contents of the Manifesto of 1823 were heard. Finding themselves in a dual position, when the Manifesto pointed to one heir, and the oath was taken to another, the members of the Council turned to Nicholas. He refused to recognize the manifesto of Alexander I and refused to proclaim himself emperor until the final expression of the will of his elder brother. Despite the content of the Manifesto handed over to him, Nicholas called on the Council to take an oath to Constantine "for the peace of the State." Following this call, the State Council, the Senate and the Synod took an oath of allegiance to "Konstantin I".

The next day, a decree was issued on the universal oath to the new emperor. On November 30, the nobles of Moscow swore allegiance to Konstantin. In St. Petersburg, the oath was postponed until December 14.

Nevertheless, Konstantin refused to come to St. Petersburg and confirmed his renunciation in private letters to Nikolai Pavlovich, and then sent rescripts to the Chairman of the State Council (December 3 (15), 1825) and the Minister of Justice (December 8 (20), 1825). Constantine did not accept the throne, and at the same time did not want to formally renounce him as emperor, to whom the oath had already been taken. An ambiguous and extremely tense situation of the interregnum was created.

Accession to the throne. Decembrist revolt

Unable to convince his brother to take the throne and having received his final refusal (albeit without a formal act of renunciation), Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich decided to accept the throne in accordance with the will of Alexander I.

On the evening of December 12 (24), M. M. Speransky compiled Manifesto on the accession to the throne of Emperor Nicholas I. Nikolai signed it on December 13 in the morning. Attached to the Manifesto was a letter from Constantine to Alexander I dated January 14, 1822 on the refusal to inherit and the manifesto of Alexander I dated August 16, 1823.

The manifesto on accession to the throne was announced by Nicholas at a meeting of the State Council at about 22:30 on December 13 (25). A separate clause in the Manifesto stipulated that November 19, the day of the death of Alexander I, would be considered the time of accession to the throne, which was an attempt to legally close the gap in the continuity of autocratic power.

A second oath was appointed, or, as they said in the troops, "re-oath", - this time to Nicholas I. The re-oath in St. Petersburg was scheduled for December 14th. On this day, a group of officers - members of a secret society appointed an uprising in order to prevent the troops and the Senate from taking the oath to the new tsar and prevent Nicholas I from taking the throne. The main goal of the rebels was the liberalization of the Russian socio-political system: the establishment of a provisional government, the abolition of serfdom, the equality of all before the law, democratic freedoms (press, confession, labor), the introduction of a jury, the introduction of compulsory military service for all classes, the election of officials, abolishing the poll tax and changing the form of government to a constitutional monarchy or republic.

The rebels decided to block the Senate, send a revolutionary delegation there consisting of Ryleev and Pushchin and present the Senate with a demand not to swear allegiance to Nicholas I, declare the tsarist government deposed and issue a revolutionary manifesto to the Russian people. However, the uprising was brutally suppressed on the same day. Despite the efforts of the Decembrists to stage a coup d'état, troops and government offices were sworn in to the new emperor. Later, the surviving participants in the uprising were exiled, and five leaders were executed.

My dear Konstantin! Your will is done: I am the emperor, but at what cost, my God! At the cost of the blood of my subjects! From a letter to his brother Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich, December 14. No one is able to understand the burning pain that I feel and will experience all my life when I remember this day. Letter to the Ambassador of France, Count Le Ferrone No one feels a greater need than I do to be judged with leniency. But let those who judge me consider the extraordinary manner in which I have risen from the post of newly appointed chief of division to the post I currently hold, and under what circumstances. And then I will have to admit that if it were not for the obvious patronage of Divine Providence, it would not only be impossible for me to act properly, but even to cope with what the ordinary circle of my real duties requires of me ... Letter to the Tsarevich.

The highest manifesto, given on January 28, 1826, with reference to the “Institution of the Imperial Family” on April 5, 1797, decreed: “First, as the days of our life are in the hands of God: then in case of OUR death, until the legal age of the Heir, the Grand Duke ALEXANDER NIKOLAEVICH, we appoint as the Ruler of the State and the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Finland, inseparable from him, OUR BEST BROTHER, Grand Duke MIKHAIL PAVLOVICH. »

He was crowned on August 22 (September 3), 1826 in Moscow - instead of June of the same year, as originally planned - due to mourning for the Dowager Empress Elizaveta Alekseevna, who died on May 4 in Belev. The coronation of Nicholas I and Empress Alexandra took place in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin.

Archbishop Filaret (Drozdov) of Moscow, who served during the coronation of Metropolitan Seraphim (Glagolevsky) of Novgorod, as is clear from his track record, was the person who presented Nicholas "a description of the opening of the act of Emperor Alexander Pavlovich stored in the Assumption Cathedral."

In 1827, the Coronation Album of Nicholas I was published in Paris.

The most important milestones of the reign

• 1826 - Establishment of the Third Branch of the Imperial Chancellery - a secret police to monitor the state of minds in the state.
• 1826-1828 - War with Persia.
• 1828-1829 - War with Turkey.
• 1828 - Foundation of the Technological Institute in St. Petersburg.
• 1830-1831 - Uprising in Poland.
• 1832 - Approval of the new status of the Kingdom of Poland within the Russian Empire.
• 1834 - The Imperial University of St. Vladimir in Kyiv was founded (the University was founded by decree of Nicholas I on November 8, 1833 as the Kyiv Imperial University of St. Vladimir, on the basis of the Vilna University and the Kremenets Lyceum closed after the Polish uprising of 1830-1831.).
• 1837 - Opening of the first Russian railway St. Petersburg - Tsarskoye Selo.
• 1839-1841 - Eastern crisis, in which Russia acted together with England against the France-Egypt coalition.
• 1849 - Participation of Russian troops in the suppression of the Hungarian uprising.
• 1851 - Completion of the construction of the Nikolaev railway, which connected St. Petersburg with Moscow. Opening of the New Hermitage.
• 1853-1856 - Crimean War. Nikolai does not live to see its end. In winter, he catches a cold and dies in 1855.

Domestic politics

His very first steps after his coronation were very liberal. The poet A. S. Pushkin was returned from exile, and V. A. Zhukovsky, whose liberal views could not be known to the emperor, was appointed the main teacher (“mentor”) of the heir. (However, Zhukovsky wrote about the events of December 14, 1825: “Providence saved Russia. By the will of Providence, this day was the day of purification. Providence was from the side of our fatherland and the throne.”)

The emperor closely followed the process of the participants in the December speech and instructed to draw up a summary of their criticisms of the state administration. Despite the fact that attempts on the life of the king, according to existing laws, were punishable by quartering, he replaced this execution by hanging.

The Ministry of State Property was headed by the hero of 1812, Count P. D. Kiselev, a monarchist by conviction, but an opponent of serfdom. The future Decembrists Pestel, Basargin and Burtsov served under him. The name of Kiselyov was presented to Nikolai in the list of conspirators in connection with the putsch case. But, despite this, Kiselev, known for the impeccability of his moral rules and talent as an organizer, made a successful career under Nicholas as the governor of Moldavia and Wallachia and took an active part in preparing the abolition of serfdom.

Deeply sincere in his convictions, often heroic and great in his devotion to the cause in which he saw the mission entrusted to him by providence, it can be said that Nicholas I was a donquixote of autocracy, a terrible and malicious donquixote, because he possessed omnipotence, which allowed him to subjugate all his fanatical and outdated theory and trample underfoot the most legitimate aspirations and rights of his age. That is why this man, who combined with the soul of a generous and chivalrous character of rare nobility and honesty, a warm and tender heart and an exalted and enlightened mind, although devoid of breadth, that is why this man could be a tyrant and despot for Russia during his 30-year reign who systematically stifled any manifestation of initiative and life in the country he ruled. A. F. Tyutcheva.

At the same time, this opinion of the court maid of honor, which corresponded to the mood of representatives of the highest noble society, contradicts a number of facts indicating that it was in the era of Nicholas I that Russian literature flourished (Pushkin, Lermontov, Nekrasov, Gogol, Belinsky, Turgenev), which had never happened before, Russian industry developed unusually rapidly, which for the first time began to take shape as technically advanced and competitive, serfdom changed its character, ceasing to be serf slavery (see below). These changes were appreciated by the most prominent contemporaries. “No, I’m not a flatterer when I compose free praise to the tsar,” A. S. Pushkin wrote about Nicholas I. Pushkin also wrote: “There is no law in Russia, but a pillar - and a crown on a pillar.” By the end of his reign, N.V. Gogol sharply changed his views on autocracy, which he began to praise, and even in serfdom he almost did not see any evil.

The following facts do not correspond to the ideas about Nicholas I as a "tyrant", which existed in the noble high society and in the liberal press. As historians point out, the execution of 5 Decembrists was the only execution in all 30 years of the reign of Nicholas I, while, for example, under Peter I and Catherine II, executions were in the thousands, and under Alexander II - in the hundreds. The situation was no better in Western Europe: for example, in Paris, 11,000 participants in the Parisian uprising in June 1848 were shot within 3 days.

Torture and beatings of prisoners in prisons, which were widely practiced in the 18th century, became a thing of the past under Nicholas I (in particular, they were not applied to the Decembrists and Petrashevists), and under Alexander II, beatings of prisoners resumed again (the trial of populists).

The most important direction of his domestic policy was the centralization of power. To carry out the tasks of political investigation in July 1826, a permanent body was created - the Third Branch of the Personal Office - a secret service with significant powers, the head of which (since 1827) was also the chief of the gendarmes. The third department was headed by A. Kh. Benkendorf, who became one of the symbols of the era, and after his death (1844) - A. F. Orlov.

On December 8, 1826, the first of the secret committees was created, whose task was, firstly, to consider the papers sealed in the office of Alexander I after his death, and, secondly, to consider the issue of possible transformations of the state apparatus.

On May 12 (24), 1829, in the Senate Hall in the Warsaw Palace, in the presence of senators, nuncios and deputies of the Kingdom, he was crowned as King (Tsar) of Poland. Under Nicholas, the Polish uprising of 1830-1831 was suppressed, during which Nicholas was declared deprived of the throne by the rebels (Decree on the dethronement of Nicholas I). After the suppression of the uprising, the Kingdom of Poland lost its independence, the Sejm and the army and was divided into provinces.

Some authors call Nicholas I the "knight of autocracy": he firmly defended its foundations and stopped attempts to change the existing system - despite the revolutions in Europe. After the suppression of the Decembrist uprising, he launched large-scale measures in the country to eradicate the "revolutionary infection". During the reign of Nicholas I, the persecution of the Old Believers resumed; The Uniates of Belarus and Volhynia were reunited with Orthodoxy (1839).

As for the army, to which the emperor paid much attention, D. A. Milyutin, the future Minister of War in the reign of Alexander II, writes in his notes: “... Even in military affairs, which the emperor was engaged in with such passion, the same concern for order, about discipline, they were chasing not for the essential improvement of the army, not for adapting it to a combat mission, but only for external harmony, for a brilliant view at parades, pedantic observance of countless petty formalities that dull the human mind and kill the true military spirit.

In 1834, Lieutenant General N. N. Muravyov compiled a note “On the causes of escapes and means to correct the shortcomings of the army.” “I drew up a note in which I outlined the sad state in which the troops are morally,” he wrote. - This note showed the reasons for the decline in morale in the army, flight, weakness of people, which consisted mostly in the exorbitant demands of the authorities in frequent reviews, the haste with which they tried to educate young soldiers, and, finally, in the indifference of the closest commanders to the well-being of people, they entrusted. I immediately expressed my opinion on the measures that I would consider necessary to correct this matter, which is ruining the troops year by year. I proposed not to make reviews, by which troops are not formed, not to change commanders often, not to transfer (as is now done) people hourly from one part to another, and to give the troops some peace.

In many ways, these shortcomings were associated with the existence of a recruiting system for the formation of the army, which was inherently inhumane, representing a lifelong compulsory service in the army. At the same time, the facts show that, in general, the accusations of Nicholas I in the inefficient organization of the army are unfounded. Wars with Persia and Turkey in 1826-1829. ended in the rapid defeat of both opponents, although the very duration of these wars puts this thesis into serious doubt. It must also be taken into account that neither Turkey nor Persia were among the first-class military powers in those days. During the Crimean War, the Russian army, which was significantly inferior in terms of the quality of its weapons and technical equipment to the armies of Great Britain and France, showed miracles of courage, high morale and military skills. The Crimean War is one of the rare examples of Russia's participation in the war with a Western European enemy over the past 300-400 years, in which the losses in the Russian army were lower (or at least not higher) than the losses of the enemy. The defeat of Russia in the Crimean War was associated with the political miscalculation of Nicholas I and with the development of Russia lagging behind Western Europe, where the Industrial Revolution had already taken place, but was not associated with the fighting qualities and organization of the Russian army.

Peasant question

In his reign, meetings of commissions were held to alleviate the situation of the serfs; Thus, a ban was introduced to exile peasants to hard labor, to sell them one by one and without land, the peasants received the right to redeem themselves from the estates being sold. A reform of the management of the state village was carried out and a “decree on obligated peasants” was signed, which became the foundation for the abolition of serfdom. However, the complete liberation of the peasants during the life of the emperor did not take place.

At the same time, historians - specialists in the Russian agrarian and peasant issue: N. Rozhkov, the American historian D. Blum and V. O. Klyuchevsky pointed to three significant changes in this area that occurred during the reign of Nicholas I:

1) For the first time there was a sharp decrease in the number of serfs - their share in the population of Russia, according to various estimates, decreased from 57-58% in 1811-1817. up to 35-45% in 1857-1858 and they ceased to make up the majority of the population. Obviously, a significant role was played by the cessation of the practice of "distributing" state peasants to the landlords along with the lands, which flourished under the former tsars, and the spontaneous liberation of the peasants that began.

2) The situation of the state peasants improved greatly, the number of which by the second half of the 1850s. reached about 50% of the population. This improvement was mainly due to the measures taken by Count P. D. Kiselev, who was in charge of managing state property. Thus, all state peasants were allocated their own plots of land and forest plots, and auxiliary cash desks and bread shops were established everywhere, which provided assistance to the peasants with cash loans and grain in case of crop failure. As a result of these measures, the well-being of the state peasants not only increased, but also the treasury income from them increased by 15-20%, tax arrears were halved, and by the mid-1850s there were practically no landless laborers who eked out a beggarly and dependent existence, all received land from the state.

3) The position of the serfs improved significantly. On the one hand, a number of laws were adopted to improve their situation; on the other hand, for the first time the state began to systematically ensure that the rights of the peasants were not violated by the landowners (this was one of the functions of the Third Section), and to punish the landowners for these violations. As a result of the application of punishments in relation to the landlords, by the end of the reign of Nicholas I, about 200 landowners' estates were under arrest, which greatly affected the position of the peasants and the landowner's psychology. As V. Klyuchevsky wrote, two completely new conclusions followed from the laws adopted under Nicholas I: first, that the peasants are not the property of the landowner, but, first of all, subjects of the state, which protects their rights; secondly, that the personality of the peasant is not the private property of the landowner, that they are bound together by their relationship to the landlords' land, from which the peasants cannot be driven away. Thus, according to the conclusions of historians, serfdom under Nicholas changed its character - from the institution of slavery, it turned into an institution that to some extent protected the rights of the peasants.

These changes in the position of the peasants caused discontent on the part of large landowners and nobles, who saw them as a threat to the established order. Particular indignation was caused by the proposals of P. D. Kiselev in relation to the serfs, which boiled down to bringing their status closer to state peasants and strengthening control over the landowners. As the great nobleman Count Nesselrode declared in 1843, Kiselev's plans for the peasants would lead to the death of the nobility, while the peasants themselves would become more impudent and rebel.

For the first time, a program of mass peasant education was launched. The number of peasant schools in the country increased from only 60 schools with 1,500 students in 1838 to 2,551 schools with 111,000 students in 1856. During the same period, many technical schools and universities were opened - in fact, A system of vocational primary and secondary education was created in the country.

Development of industry and transport

The state of affairs in industry at the beginning of the reign of Nicholas I was the worst in the history of the Russian Empire. An industry capable of competing with the West, where the Industrial Revolution was already coming to an end at that time, actually did not exist (for more details, see Industrialization in the Russian Empire). Russia's exports included only raw materials, almost all types of industrial products needed by the country were purchased abroad.

By the end of the reign of Nicholas I, the situation had changed dramatically. For the first time in the history of the Russian Empire, a technically advanced and competitive industry began to form in the country, in particular, textile and sugar, the production of metal products, clothing, wood, glass, porcelain, leather and other products developed, and their own machine tools, tools and even steam locomotives began to be produced. . According to economic historians, this was facilitated by the protectionist policy pursued throughout the reign of Nicholas I. As I. Wallerstein points out, it was precisely as a result of the protectionist industrial policy pursued by Nicholas I that the further development of Russia did not follow the path that most of the countries of Asia and Africa followed at that time And Latin America, and on a different path - the path of industrial development.

For the first time in the history of Russia, under Nicholas I, intensive construction of paved highways began: the Moscow-Petersburg, Moscow-Irkutsk, Moscow-Warsaw routes were built. Of the 7700 miles of highways built in Russia by 1893, 5300 miles (about 70%) were built in the period 1825-1860. The construction of railways was also begun and about 1,000 versts of railroad tracks were built, which gave impetus to the development of their own mechanical engineering.

The rapid development of industry led to a sharp increase in the urban population and the growth of cities. The share of the urban population during the reign of Nicholas I more than doubled - from 4.5% in 1825 to 9.2% in 1858.

Nicholas and the problem of corruption

In the reign of Nicholas I in Russia, the "era of favoritism" ended - a euphemism often used by historians, which essentially means large-scale corruption, that is, the usurpation of public positions, honors and awards by the favorites of the tsar and his entourage. Examples of "favoritism" and related corruption and plunder of state property on a large scale abound in almost all reigns from early XVII in. and up to Alexander I. But in relation to the reign of Nicholas I, there are no such examples - in general, there is not a single example of a large-scale plunder of state property that would be mentioned by historians.

Nicholas I introduced an extremely moderate incentive system for officials (in the form of renting estates / property and cash bonuses), which he controlled to a large extent. Unlike previous reigns, historians have not recorded large gifts in the form of palaces or thousands of serfs granted to any nobleman or royal relative. Even V. Nelidova, with whom Nicholas I had a long relationship and who had children from him, he did not make a single truly large gift, comparable to what the kings of the previous era did to their favorites.

To combat corruption in the middle and lower levels of officials, for the first time under Nicholas I, regular audits were introduced at all levels. Previously, such a practice practically did not exist, its introduction was dictated by the need not only to fight corruption, but also to restore elementary order in public affairs. (However, this fact is also known: the patriotic residents of Tula and the Tula province, by subscription, collected a lot of money for those times - 380 thousand rubles to install a monument on the Kulikovo field in honor of the victory over the Tatars, for almost five hundred years have passed, and the monument And they sent this money, collected with such difficulty, to St. Petersburg, to Nicholas I. As a result, A.P. Bryullov in 1847 composed a draft of the monument, iron castings were made in St. Petersburg, transported to the Tula province, and in 1849 This cast-iron pillar was erected on the Kulikovo field, its cost was 60 thousand rubles, and where the other 320 thousand went was unknown.

In general, one can state a sharp reduction in large-scale corruption and the fight against medium and petty corruption has begun. For the first time the problem of corruption was raised to the state level and widely discussed. Gogol's "Inspector General", which flaunted examples of bribery and theft, was shown in theaters (while earlier the discussion of such topics was strictly prohibited). However, the tsar's critics regarded the fight against corruption initiated by him as an increase in corruption itself. In addition, officials came up with new methods of theft, bypassing the measures taken by Nicholas I, as evidenced by the following statement:

Nicholas I himself was critical of the successes in this area, saying that only he and the heir did not steal in his entourage.

Foreign policy

An important aspect of foreign policy was the return to the principles of the Holy Alliance. The role of Russia in the fight against any manifestations of the "spirit of change" in European life has increased. It was during the reign of Nicholas I that Russia received the unflattering nickname of the "gendarme of Europe." So, at the request of the Austrian Empire, Russia took part in the suppression of the Hungarian revolution, sending a 140,000-strong corps to Hungary, which was trying to free itself from oppression by Austria; as a result, the throne of Franz Joseph was saved. The latter circumstance did not prevent the Austrian emperor, who was afraid of an excessive strengthening of Russia's positions in the Balkans, soon taking a position unfriendly to Nicholas during the Crimean War and even threatening her with entering the war on the side of a coalition hostile to Russia, which Nicholas I regarded as ungrateful treachery; Russian-Austrian relations were hopelessly damaged until the end of the existence of both monarchies.

However, the emperor helped the Austrians not just out of charity. “It is very likely that Hungary, having defeated Austria, due to the circumstances, would have been forced to actively assist the plans of the Polish emigration,” wrote the biographer of Field Marshal Paskevich, Prince. Shcherbatov.

A special place in the foreign policy of Nicholas I was occupied by the Eastern Question.

Russia under Nicholas I abandoned plans to divide the Ottoman Empire, which were discussed under previous tsars (Catherine II and Paul I), and began to pursue a completely different policy in the Balkans - the policy of protecting the Orthodox population and ensuring its religious and civil rights up to political independence. For the first time this policy was applied in the Akkerman treaty with Turkey in 1826. According to this treaty, Moldavia and Wallachia, remaining part of the Ottoman Empire, received political autonomy with the right to elect their own government, which was formed under the control of Russia. After half a century of the existence of such autonomy, the state of Romania was formed on this territory - according to the San Stefano Treaty of 1878. “In exactly the same order,” wrote V. Klyuchevsky, “other tribes of the Balkan Peninsula were liberated: the tribe rebelled against Turkey; the Turks sent their forces to him; at a certain moment, Russia shouted to Turkey: “Stop!”; then Turkey began to prepare for war with Russia, the war was lost, and by agreement the rebel tribe received internal independence, remaining under the supreme power of Turkey. With a new clash between Russia and Turkey, vassalage was destroyed. This is how the Serbian Principality was formed according to the Adrianople Treaty of 1829, the Greek Kingdom - according to the same agreement and according to the London Protocol of 1830 ... "

Along with this, Russia sought to ensure its influence in the Balkans and the possibility of unhindered navigation in the straits (Bosphorus and Dardanelles).

During the Russian-Turkish wars of 1806-1812. and 1828-1829, Russia made great strides in implementing this policy. At the request of Russia, which declared itself the patroness of all Christian subjects of the Sultan, the Sultan was forced to recognize the freedom and independence of Greece and the broad autonomy of Serbia (1830); According to the Unkyar-Iskelesik Treaty (1833), which marked the peak of Russian influence in Constantinople, Russia received the right to block the passage of foreign ships to the Black Sea (which it lost in 1841)

The same reasons: the support of the Orthodox Christians of the Ottoman Empire and disagreements on the Eastern Question, pushed Russia to aggravate relations with Turkey in 1853, which resulted in her declaring war on Russia. The beginning of the war with Turkey in 1853 was marked by the brilliant victory of the Russian fleet under the command of Admiral PS Nakhimov, who defeated the enemy in Sinop Bay. It was the last major battle of the sailing fleet.

Russia's military successes caused a negative reaction in the West. The leading world powers were not interested in strengthening Russia at the expense of the decrepit Ottoman Empire. This created the basis for a military alliance between England and France. The miscalculation of Nicholas I in assessing the internal political situation in England, France and Austria led to the fact that the country was in political isolation. In 1854, England and France entered the war on the side of Turkey. Due to the technical backwardness of Russia, it was difficult to resist these European powers. The main hostilities unfolded in the Crimea. In October 1854, the Allies laid siege to Sevastopol. The Russian army suffered a series of defeats and was unable to provide assistance to the besieged fortress city. In spite of heroic defense city, after an 11-month siege, in August 1855, the defenders of Sevastopol were forced to surrender the city. At the beginning of 1856, following the results of the Crimean War, the Treaty of Paris was signed. According to its terms, Russia was forbidden to have naval forces, arsenals and fortresses on the Black Sea. Russia became vulnerable from the sea and was deprived of the opportunity to pursue an active foreign policy in this region.

Even more serious were the consequences of the war in the economic field. Immediately after the end of the war, in 1857, a liberal customs tariff was introduced in Russia, which practically abolished duties on Western European industrial imports, which may have been one of the peace conditions imposed on Russia by Great Britain. The result was an industrial crisis: by 1862, iron smelting in the country fell by 1/4, and cotton processing - by 3.5 times. The growth of imports led to the outflow of money from the country, the deterioration of the trade balance and the chronic shortage of money in the treasury.

During the reign of Nicholas I, Russia participated in the wars: Caucasian war 1817-1864, Russo-Persian War 1826-1828, Russian-Turkish war 1828-29, Crimean War 1853-56.

Emperor Engineer

Having received good things at a young age engineering education, Nikolai showed a fair amount of knowledge in the field of construction equipment. So, he made sensible proposals regarding the dome of the Trinity Cathedral in St. Petersburg. In the future, already occupying the highest position in the state, he closely followed the order in urban planning and not a single significant project was approved without his signature. He established a regulation on the height of buildings in the capital, forbidding the construction of civil structures higher than the eaves of the Winter Palace. Thus, the well-known, and existed until recently, St. Petersburg city panorama was created, thanks to which the city was considered one of the most beautiful cities in the world and was included in the list of cities considered cultural heritage humanity.

Knowing the requirements for choosing a suitable place for the construction of an astronomical observatory, Nikolai personally indicated a place for it on the top of Pulkovo Mountain

The first railways appeared in Russia (since 1837).

There is an opinion that Nikolai got acquainted with steam locomotives at the age of 19 during a trip to England in 1816. The locals proudly showed Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich their successes in the field of locomotive building and railway construction. There is a statement that the future emperor became the first Russian stoker - he could not resist asking engineer Stephenson for his railway, climbing onto the platform of a steam locomotive, throwing several shovels of coal into the furnace and riding this miracle.

The far-sighted Nikolai, having studied in detail the technical data of the railways proposed for construction, demanded a broadening of the Russian gauge compared to the European one (1524 mm versus 1435 in Europe), rightly fearing that the enemy would be able to come to Russia by steam locomotive. This, a hundred years later, significantly hampered the supply of the German occupation forces and their maneuver due to the lack of locomotives for the broad gauge. So in the November days of 1941, the troops of the Center group received only 30% of the military supplies necessary for a successful attack on Moscow. The daily supply was only 23 echelons, when 70 were required to develop success. In addition, when the crisis that arose on the African front near Tobruk required the rapid transfer to the south of part of the military contingents withdrawn from the Moscow direction, this transfer was extremely difficult for the same reason.

The high relief of the monument to Nicholas in St. Petersburg depicts an episode that occurred during his inspector tour of Nikolaevskaya railway, when his train stopped at the Verebinsky railway bridge and could not go further, because the rails were painted white out of loyal zeal.

Under the Marquis de Travers, due to lack of funds, the Russian fleet often operated in the eastern part of the Gulf of Finland, which was nicknamed the Marquis Puddle. At that time, the naval defense of St. Petersburg relied on a system of wood-and-earth fortifications near Kronstadt, armed with outdated short-range cannons, which allowed the enemy to destroy them from long distances without hindrance. Already in December 1827, at the direction of the Emperor, work began on replacing wooden fortifications with stone ones. Nikolai personally reviewed the designs of the fortifications proposed by the engineers and approved them. And in some cases (for example, during the construction of the fort "Paul the First"), he made specific proposals to reduce the cost and speed up construction.

The emperor carefully selected the performers of the work. So, he patronized the previously little-known lieutenant colonel Zarzhetsky, who became the main builder of the Kronstadt Nikolaev docks. The work was carried out in a timely manner, and by the time the English squadron of Admiral Napier appeared in the Baltic, the defense of the capital, provided by strong fortifications and mine banks, had become so impregnable that the first Lord of the Admiralty, James Graham, pointed out to Napier that any attempt to capture Kronstadt was disastrous. As a result, the St. Petersburg public received a reason for entertainment by going to Oranienbaum and Krasnaya Gorka to observe the evolution of the enemy fleet. Created under Nicholas I for the first time in world practice, the mine and artillery position turned out to be an insurmountable obstacle on the way to the capital of the state.

Nicholas was aware of the need for reforms, but taking into account the experience gained, he considered their implementation a lengthy and cautious matter. Nikolai looked at the state subordinate to him, as an engineer looks at a complex, but deterministic mechanism in its functioning, in which everything is interconnected and the reliability of one part ensures the correct operation of others. The ideal of a social structure was army life fully regulated by charters.

Death

He died “at twelve minutes after one in the afternoon” on February 18 (March 2), 1855 due to pneumonia (he caught a cold while taking the parade in a light uniform, being already sick with the flu).

There is a conspiracy theory, widespread in the society of that time, that Nicholas I accepted the defeat of General Khrulev S.A. near Yevpatoriya during the Crimean War as the final harbinger of defeat in the war, and therefore asked the life physician Mandt to give him poison that would allow him commit suicide without unnecessary suffering and quickly enough, but not suddenly, to prevent personal shame. The emperor forbade the autopsy and embalming of his body.

As eyewitnesses recalled, the emperor passed away in a clear mind, not for a minute losing his presence of mind. He managed to say goodbye to each of the children and grandchildren and, having blessed them, turned to them with a reminder that they should remain friendly with each other.

His son Alexander II ascended the Russian throne.

“I was surprised,” A.E. Zimmerman recalled, “that the death of Nikolai Pavlovich, apparently, did not make a special impression on the defenders of Sevastopol. I noticed in everyone almost indifference to my questions, when and why the Sovereign died, they answered: we don’t know ... ”.

Culture, censorship and writers

Nicholas suppressed the slightest manifestations of freethinking. In 1826, a censorship charter was issued, nicknamed "cast iron" by his contemporaries. It was forbidden to print almost everything that had any political overtones. In 1828, another censorship charter was issued, somewhat softening the previous one. A new increase in censorship was associated with the European revolutions of 1848. It got to the point that in 1836 the censor P. I. Gaevsky, after serving 8 days in the guardhouse, doubted whether it was possible to let news like “such and such a king died” be allowed to go into print. When, in 1837, an article about an attempt on the life of the French King Louis Philippe was published in the St.

In September 1826, Nikolai received Pushkin, who had been released by him from Mikhailov’s exile, and listened to his confession that on December 14 Pushkin would have been with the conspirators, but he treated him kindly: he saved the poet from general censorship (he decided to censor his writings himself), instructed him to prepare note "On public education", called it after the meeting " smartest person Russia ”(however, later, after the death of Pushkin, he spoke of him and this meeting very coldly). In 1828, Nikolai dismissed the case against Pushkin about the authorship of the Gavriiliada after a handwritten letter from the poet, which, according to many researchers, was handed over to him personally, bypassing the commission of inquiry, contained, in the opinion of many researchers, recognition of the authorship of the seditious work after long denials. However, the emperor never fully trusted the poet, seeing him as a dangerous "leader of the liberals", the poet was under police surveillance, his letters were censored; Pushkin, having gone through the first euphoria, which was also expressed in poems in honor of the tsar (“Stans”, “To Friends”), by the mid-1830s, he also began to evaluate the sovereign ambiguously. “He has a lot of ensign and a little Peter the Great,” Pushkin wrote about Nikolai in his diary on May 21, 1834; at the same time, the diary also notes “sensible” remarks to the “History of Pugachev” (the sovereign edited it and gave Pushkin 20 thousand rubles in debt), ease of handling and good language king. In 1834, Pushkin was appointed chamber junker of the imperial court, which weighed heavily on the poet and was also reflected in his diary. Nikolai himself considered such an appointment a gesture of recognition of the poet and was internally upset that Pushkin was cool about the appointment. Pushkin could sometimes afford not to come to the balls to which Nikolai invited him personally. Balam Pushkin preferred communication with writers, while Nikolai showed him his displeasure. The role played by Nikolai in Pushkin's conflict with Dantes is controversially assessed by historians. After the death of Pushkin, Nikolai granted a pension to his widow and children, but he tried in every possible way to limit speeches in memory of him, showing, in particular, thereby dissatisfaction with the violation of his ban on duels.

Guided by the charter of 1826, the Nikolaev censors reached the point of absurdity in their prohibitive zeal. One of them forbade printing an arithmetic textbook after he saw three dots between the numbers in the text of the problem and suspected the author's malicious intent. Chairman of the censorship committee D.P. Buturlin even proposed to cross out certain passages (for example: "Rejoice, invisible taming of cruel and bestial lords...") from the akathist to the Protection of the Mother of God, because they looked "unreliable."

Nikolai also doomed Polezhaev, who was arrested for free poetry, to years of soldiery, twice ordered Lermontov to be exiled to the Caucasus. By his order, the magazines "European", "Moscow Telegraph", "Telescope" were closed, P. Chaadaev and his publisher were persecuted, F. Schiller was banned from staging in Russia.

I. S. Turgenev was arrested in 1852, and then administratively sent to the village only for writing an obituary dedicated to the memory of Gogol (the obituary itself was not passed by the censors). The censor also suffered when he let Turgenev's Notes of a Hunter go to print, in which, in the opinion of the Moscow Governor-General Count A. A. Zakrevsky, "a decisive direction was expressed towards the destruction of the landlords."

Liberal contemporary writers (primarily A. I. Herzen) were inclined to demonize Nicholas.

There were facts showing his personal participation in the development of the arts: personal censorship of Pushkin (the general censorship of that time was much tougher and more cautious in a number of issues), support for the Alexandrinsky Theater. As I.L. Solonevich wrote in this regard, “Pushkin read “Eugene Onegin” to Nicholas I, and N. Gogol - “ Dead Souls". Nicholas I financed both, was the first to note the talent of L. Tolstoy, and wrote a review about the Hero of Our Time, which would do honor to any professional literary critic ... Nicholas I had both literary taste and civic courage to defend The Inspector General and after the first performance, say: “Everyone got it - and most of all ME.”

In 1850, by order of Nicholas I, the play by N. A. Ostrovsky "Let's Settle Our People" was banned from staging. The Committee of Higher Censorship was dissatisfied with the fact that among the characters drawn by the author there was not "none of those respectable merchants of ours, in whom piety, honesty and directness of mind constitute a typical and inalienable attribute."

Liberals were not the only ones under suspicion. Professor M. P. Pogodin, who published The Moskvityanin, was placed under police supervision in 1852 for a critical article about N. V. Kukolnik's play The Batman (about Peter I), which received praise from the emperor.

A critical review of another play by the Dollmaker - "The Hand of the Most High Fatherland Saved" led to the closure in 1834 of the Moscow Telegraph magazine, published by N. A. Polev. The Minister of Public Education, Count S. S. Uvarov, who initiated the repressions, wrote about the journal: “It is a conductor of the revolution, it has been systematically spreading destructive rules for several years now. He doesn't like Russia."

Censorship did not allow publication of some jingoistic articles and works containing harsh and politically undesirable statements and views, which happened, for example, during the Crimean War with two poems by F.I. Tyutchev. From one (“Prophecy”), Nicholas I with his own hand crossed out a paragraph that dealt with the erection of a cross over Sophia of Constantinople and the “all-Slavic king”; another (“Now you are not up to poetry”) was banned from publication by the minister, apparently due to the “somewhat harsh tone of presentation” noted by the censor.

"He would like," S. M. Solovyov wrote about him, "to cut off all the heads that rose above the general level."

Nicknames

Home nickname is Nix. Official nickname - Unforgettable.

Leo Tolstoy in the story "Nikolai Palkin" gives another nickname for the emperor:

Family and personal life

In 1817, Nicholas married Princess Charlotte of Prussia, the daughter of Friedrich Wilhelm III, who, after converting to Orthodoxy, received the name Alexandra Feodorovna. The couple were each other's fourth cousins ​​and sisters (they had a common great-great-grandfather and great-great-grandmother).

In the spring of the following year, their first son Alexander (future Emperor Alexander II) was born. Children:

• Alexander II Nikolaevich (1818-1881)
• Maria Nikolaevna (6.08.1819-9.02.1876)

1st marriage - Maximilian Duke of Leuchtenberg (1817-1852)

2nd marriage (unofficial marriage since 1854) - Stroganov Grigory Alexandrovich, Count

• Olga Nikolaevna (08/30/1822 - 10/18/1892)

husband - Friedrich-Karl-Alexander, King of Württemberg

• Alexandra (06/12/1825 - 07/29/1844)

husband - Friedrich Wilhelm, Prince of Hesse-Kassel

• Konstantin Nikolaevich (1827-1892)
• Nikolai Nikolaevich (1831-1891)
• Mikhail Nikolaevich (1832-1909)

Had 4 or 7 alleged illegitimate children (see List of illegitimate children of Russian emperors # Nicholas I).

Nikolay was in connection with Varvara Nelidova for 17 years.

Assessing the attitude of Nicholas I towards women in general, Herzen wrote: “I do not believe that he ever passionately loved any woman, like Pavel Lopukhin, like Alexander of all women except his wife; he 'was kind to them', nothing more.

Personality, business and human qualities

“The sense of humor inherent in Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich is clearly visible in his drawings. Friends and relatives, met types, peeped scenes, sketches of camp life - the plots of his youthful drawings. All of them are executed easily, dynamically, quickly, with a simple pencil, on small sheets of paper, often in the manner of a caricature. “He had a talent for caricatures,” Paul Lacroix wrote about the emperor, “and in the most successful way he captured the funny sides of the faces that he wanted to put in some kind of satirical drawing.”

“He was handsome, but his beauty was cold; there is no face that reveals the character of a person so mercilessly as his face. The forehead, quickly running back, the lower jaw, developed at the expense of the skull, expressed an unyielding will and weak thought, more cruelty than sensuality. But the main thing is the eyes, without any warmth, without any mercy, winter eyes.

He led an ascetic and healthy lifestyle; never missed Sunday services. He did not smoke and did not like smokers, did not drink strong drinks, walked a lot, and did drills with weapons. His strict adherence to the daily routine was known: the working day began at 7 o'clock in the morning, at exactly 9 o'clock - the acceptance of reports. He preferred to dress in a simple officer's overcoat, and slept on a hard bed.

He had a good memory and great working capacity; The working day of the king lasted 16 - 18 hours. According to the words of Archbishop Innokenty (Borisov) of Kherson, “he was such a crowned bearer, for whom the royal throne served not as a head to rest, but as an incentive to unceasing work.”

Fraylina A.F. Tyutcheva, writes that he “spent 18 hours a day at work, worked until late at night, got up at dawn, sacrificed nothing for pleasure and everything for the sake of duty, and took on more work and worries than the last day laborer from his subjects. He honestly and sincerely believed that he was able to see everything with his own eyes, hear everything with his ears, regulate everything according to his own understanding, transform everything with his will. But what was the result of such a hobby of the supreme ruler for trifles? As a result, he only piled up a heap of colossal abuses around his uncontrolled power, all the more pernicious because they were covered from the outside by official legality and that neither public opinion nor private initiative had the right to point them out, nor the opportunity to fight them.

The king's love for law, justice, and order was well known. I personally visited military formations, reviews, examined fortifications, educational institutions, office premises, and government agencies. Remarks and "spreading" was always accompanied by specific advice on correcting the situation.

A younger contemporary of Nicholas I, historian S. M. Solovyov, writes: "according to the accession of Nicholas, a military man, like a stick, accustomed not to reason, but to perform and capable of accustoming others to perform without reasoning, was considered the best, most capable boss everywhere; experience in affairs - no attention was paid to this. Soldiers sat down in all government places, and ignorance, arbitrariness, robbery, all kinds of unrest reigned with them.

He had a pronounced ability to attract talented, creatively gifted people to work, “to form a team”. The employees of Nicholas I were the commander Field Marshal His Serene Highness Prince I.F. Paskevich, the Minister of Finance Count E.F. Kankrin, the Minister of State Property Count P.D. Kiselev, the Minister of Public Education Count S.S. Uvarov and others. Talented architect Konstantin

Ton served under him as a state architect. However, this did not stop Nikolai from severely fining him for his sins.

Absolutely not versed in people and their talents. Personnel appointments, with rare exceptions, turned out to be unsuccessful (the most striking example of this is the Crimean War, when, during the life of Nicholas, the two best corps commanders - Generals Leaders and Rediger - were never assigned to the army operating in the Crimea). Even very capable people often appointed to completely inappropriate positions. “He is the vice director of the trade department,” Zhukovsky wrote to the appointment of the poet and publicist Prince P. A. Vyazemsky to a new post. - Laughter and more! We use people nicely…”

Through the eyes of contemporaries and publicists

In the book of the French writer Marquis de Custine "La Russie en 1839" ("Russia in 1839"), sharply critical of the autocracy of Nicholas and many features of Russian life, Nicholas is described as follows:

It can be seen that the emperor cannot for a moment forget who he is and what attention he attracts; he constantly poses and, consequently, is never natural, even when he speaks with all frankness; his face knows three different expressions, none of which can be called kind. Most often, severity is written on this face. Another expression, rarer, but much more suited to his beautiful features, is solemnity, and, finally, the third is courtesy; the first two expressions evoke cold surprise, slightly softened only by the charm of the emperor, of whom we get some idea, just as he honors us with a kind address. However, one circumstance spoils everything: the fact is that each of these expressions, suddenly leaving the face of the emperor, disappears completely, leaving no traces. Before our eyes, without any preparation, a change of scenery is taking place; it seems as if the autocrat puts on a mask that he can take off at any moment.(...) A hypocrite, or a comedian, are harsh words, especially inappropriate in the mouth of a person who claims respectful and impartial judgments. However, I believe that for intelligent readers - and only to them I am addressing - speeches do not mean anything in themselves, and their content depends on the meaning that is put into them. I do not at all want to say that the face of this monarch lacks honesty - no, I repeat, he lacks only naturalness: thus, one of the main disasters from which Russia suffers, the lack of freedom, is reflected even on the face of its sovereign: he has several masks, but no face. You are looking for a man - and you find only the Emperor. In my opinion, my remark for the emperor is flattering: he conscientiously corrects his craft. This autocrat, towering over other people due to his height, just as his throne rises above other chairs, considers it a weakness for a moment to become an ordinary person and show that he lives, thinks and feels like a mere mortal. He does not seem to know any of our affections; he forever remains commander, judge, general, admiral, finally, monarch - no more and no less. By the end of his life he will be very tired, but the Russian people - and perhaps the peoples of the whole world - will lift him to a great height, for the crowd loves amazing accomplishments and is proud of the efforts made in order to conquer it.

Along with this, Custine wrote in his book that Nicholas I was mired in debauchery and dishonored a huge number of decent girls and women: “If he (the tsar) distinguishes a woman on a walk, in the theater, in the world, he says one word to the adjutant on duty. A person who has attracted the attention of a deity falls under supervision, under supervision. They warn the spouse, if she is married, parents, if she is a girl, about the honor that has fallen to them. There are no examples of this distinction being accepted otherwise than with an expression of respectful gratitude. Similarly, there are no examples yet of dishonored husbands or fathers not profiting from their dishonor. Custine claimed that all this was “put on stream”, that girls dishonored by the emperor were usually given off as one of the court suitors, and none other than the tsar’s wife herself, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, did this. However, historians do not confirm the accusations of debauchery and the existence of a “conveyor of victims” dishonored by Nicholas I contained in Custine’s book, and vice versa, they write that he was monogamous and for many years maintained a long attachment to one woman.

Contemporaries noted the “basilisk look” peculiar to the emperor, unbearable for people of the timid ten.

General B. V. Gerua in his memoirs (Memories of my life. "Tanais", Paris, 1969) gives the following story about Nicholas: “Regarding the guard duty under Nicholas I, I recall the tombstone at the Lazarevsky cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in St. Petersburg. His father showed me when we went with him to worship the graves of his parents and passed by this unusual monument. It was excellently executed in bronze - probably by a first-class craftsman - the figure of a young and handsome officer of the Semyonovsky Life Guards Regiment, lying as if in a sleeping position. His head rests on a bucket-shaped shako of the Nikolaev reign, its first half. The collar is open. The body is decoratively covered with a thrown-on cloak, which descended to the floor in picturesque, heavy folds.

My father told the story of this monument. The officer lay down on guard duty to rest and unfastened the hooks of his huge stand-up collar, which cut his neck. It was forbidden. Hearing some noise through a dream, he opened his eyes and saw the Sovereign above him! The officer never got up. He died of a broken heart."

N.V. Gogol wrote that Nicholas I, with his arrival in Moscow during the horrors of the cholera epidemic, showed a desire to raise up and encourage the fallen - “a trait that hardly any of the crowned bearers showed”, which caused A. S. Pushkin “these wonderful poems ”(“ A conversation between a bookseller and a poet; Pushkin talks about Napoleon I with a hint of modern events):

In Selected Places from Correspondence with Friends, Gogol enthusiastically writes about Nikolai and claims that Pushkin also allegedly addressed Nikolai, who read out Homer during the ball, with the apologetic poem “You talked to Homer alone for a long time ...”, hiding this dedication for fear of being branded a liar . In Pushkin studies, this attribution is often questioned; it is indicated that the dedication to the translator of Homer N. I. Gnedich is more likely.

An extremely negative assessment of the personality and activities of Nicholas I is associated with the work of A. I. Herzen. Herzen, who from his youth painfully experienced the failure of the Decembrist uprising, attributed cruelty, rudeness, vindictiveness, intolerance to “free thinking” to the personality of the tsar, accused him of following a reactionary course of domestic policy.

I. L. Solonevich wrote that Nicholas I was, like Alexander Nevsky and Ivan III, a true "sovereign master", with a "master's eye and master's calculation"

N. A. Rozhkov believed that Nicholas I was alien to the love of power, the enjoyment of personal power: "Paul I and Alexander I, more than Nicholas, loved power, as such, in itself."

AI Solzhenitsyn admired the courage of Nicholas I, shown by him during the cholera riot. Seeing the helplessness and fear of the officials around him, the tsar himself went into the crowd of rebellious people with cholera, suppressed this rebellion with his own authority, and, leaving the quarantine, he himself took off and burned all his clothes right in the field so as not to infect his retinue.

And here is what N.E. Wrangel writes in his "Memoirs (from serfdom to the Bolsheviks)": Now, after the harm caused by the lack of will of Nicholas II, Nicholas I is again in vogue, and I will be reproached, perhaps that I this, “adored by all his contemporaries,” the Monarch did not treat with due respect. The fascination with the late Sovereign Nikolai Pavlovich by his current admirers, in any case, is both more understandable and sincere than the adoration of his deceased contemporaries. Nikolai Pavlovich, like his grandmother Ekaterina, managed to acquire an innumerable number of admirers and praisers, to form a halo around him. Catherine succeeded in this by bribing encyclopedists and various French and German greedy brethren with flattery, gifts and money, and her Russian close associates with ranks, orders, endowing peasants and land. Nikolai also succeeded, and even in a less unprofitable way - by fear. By bribery and fear, everything is always and everywhere achieved, everything, even immortality. Nikolai Pavlovich's contemporaries did not "worship" him, as it was customary to say during his reign, but they were afraid. Ignorance, non-worship would probably be recognized as a state crime. And gradually this custom-made feeling, a necessary guarantee of personal security, entered the flesh and blood of contemporaries and then was instilled in their children and grandchildren. The late Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolayevich10 used to go to Dr. Dreherin for treatment in Dresden. To my surprise, I saw that this seventy-year-old man kept kneeling down during the service.

How does he do it? - I asked his son Nikolai Mikhailovich, a well-known historian of the first quarter of the 19th century.

Most likely, he is still afraid of his "unforgettable" father. He managed to instill in them such fear that they will not forget him until their death.

But I heard that the Grand Duke, your father, adored his father.

Yes, and, oddly enough, quite sincerely.

Why is it strange? He was adored by many at the time.

Do not make me laugh. (...)

Once I asked Adjutant General Chikhachev, the former Minister of Marine, whether it was true that all his contemporaries idolized the Sovereign.

Still would! I was even flogged for this time and it was very painful.

Tell!

I was only four years old when, as an orphan, I was placed in the juvenile orphanage section of the building. There were no educators, but there were ladies-educators. Once mine asked me if I love the Sovereign. I heard about the Sovereign for the first time and answered that I did not know. Well, they beat me up. That's all.

And did it help? Loved?

That is how! Directly - began to idolize. Satisfied with the first spanking.

What if they didn't worship?

Of course, they wouldn't pat on the head. It was mandatory, for everyone, both upstairs and downstairs.

So it was necessary to pretend?

At that time, they did not go into such psychological subtleties. We were ordered - we loved. Then they said - only geese think, not people.

Monuments

In honor of Emperor Nicholas I in the Russian Empire, about a dozen monuments were erected, mainly various columns and obelisks, in memory of his visit to one place or another. Almost all sculptural monuments to the Emperor (with the exception of the equestrian monument in St. Petersburg) were destroyed during the years of Soviet power.

Currently, there are the following monuments to the Emperor:

• St. Petersburg. Equestrian monument on St. Isaac's Square. Opened June 26, 1859, sculptor P. K. Klodt. The monument has been preserved in its original form. The fence surrounding it was dismantled in the 1930s, recreated again in 1992.

• St. Petersburg. Bronze bust of the Emperor on a high granite pedestal. It was opened on July 12, 2001 in front of the facade of the building of the former psychiatric department of the Nikolaev military hospital, founded in 1840 by decree of the Emperor (now the St. Petersburg District Military Clinical Hospital), 63 Suvorovsky pr. a bust on a granite pedestal, was opened in front of the main facade of this hospital on August 15, 1890. The monument was destroyed shortly after 1917.

• St. Petersburg. Gypsum bust on a high granite pedestal. Opened on May 19, 2003 on the front staircase of the Vitebsk railway station (Zagorodny pr., 52), sculptors V. S. and S. V. Ivanov, architect T. L. Torich.