Proclamation of Catherine I as Empress

While Peter was struggling with death, in other chambers of the palace the nobles were holding a meeting on the succession to the throne. Some of them then seized on the rights of Grand Duke Peter, the son of Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich; such were the princes Golitsyn, Dolgoruky, Repnin; others - in their brow Menshikov, Admiral General Apraksin, Tolstoy, Buturlin - wanted to enthrone Catherine, based on the fact that Peter himself crowned her, and pointed out that the erection of Grand Duke Peter, who was still a minor, could result in misunderstandings and civil strife . Some of the supporters of Grand Duke Peter tried to agree on both parties and proposed that Grand Duke Peter be declared emperor, and until he came of age to hand over the reign to Catherine along with the Senate. The side that wanted the enthronement of Catherine without the participation of Grand Duke Peter finally gained the upper hand through the fact that Tolstoy and Buturlin invited a circle of guards officers to the palace, and both guards regiments were placed outside the walls of the palace with a readiness to use weapons if necessary.

Catherine I. Portrait of an unknown artist

“Who dared to bring an army here without my knowledge?” - said Prince Repnin, president of the Military Collegium.

“I am,” answered Buturlin; I did this at the behest of the Empress. Everyone is obliged to obey her, not excluding you!

Those who were on the side of Grand Duke Peter lacked consent; almost all were on various occasions in hostility with each other; many, moreover, were afraid that the trial of Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich would not respond to them. Thus, Repnin, who did not get along with the Golitsyns, went over to Catherine's side; Chancellor Golovkin also landed there. They called for Makarov's office secretary; under Peter the Great, for a long time he was in charge of affairs that directly proceeded from the sovereign.

- Is there any will or order of the late sovereign regarding the succession to the throne after his death? – General-Admiral Apraksin asked Makarov.

- There is nothing! Makarov answered. - A few years ago, the sovereign made a will, but destroyed it before his last trip to Moscow. Although he later spoke of the need to write a new one, he did not carry out this intention. The sovereign expressed the following thought: “If the people, brought out by me from an ignorant state and placed on a degree of power and glory, declare themselves ungrateful, they will not act according to my will, even if it was written, and I do not want to subject my last will to the possibility of insult; but if the people feel what they owe me for my labors, they will conform to my desires, and they were expressed with such solemnity that no written document could communicate.

“I ask you to allow me to say a word,” Feofan Prokopovich said then. - And, when he received the desired permission, he began, with his characteristic eloquence, to speak about the sanctity of the oath given by all subjects in 1722 - to recognize the person whom he himself appoints as the successor to the sovereign.

- However, - they objected to him, - the deceased did not leave a will, according to which it would be possible to indicate the person chosen by him. This circumstance can rather be taken as a sign of indecision, and therefore, in the absence of a successor indicated by the former emperor, the issue of succession to the throne must be decided by the state.

- The sovereign indicated his wife Catherine as his successor, having crowned her himself with the imperial crown in Moscow. This crowning in itself, without any other document, gives her an undeniable right to govern the state.

Some objected to this: among other nations, the spouses of monarchs are crowned with them, but such a coronation does not give them the right to inherit the throne after the death of the spouses.

Then one of Catherine’s supporters said: “The late sovereign performed this coronation for this very purpose, in order to indicate in Catherine his successor on the throne. Even before going to Persia, he explained his views to four senators and two members of the Synod, who are now at a meeting: he then said that although in Russia there is no custom to crown queens, but necessity requires this, so that the throne after his death would not remain idle and through that there would not be any reason for misunderstandings and confusion.

Feofan, for his part, spoke about the speech that the late sovereign made before the wedding to the kingdom of Catherine in the house of an English merchant; then the bishop turned to Golovkin and other persons who were with this merchant with the sovereign, and asked: do they remember these words of the late monarch?

The chancellor confirmed the words of Theophanes. Others also answered in the affirmative.

Menshikov, who, in his position, most of all then wanted Catherine to ascend the throne, exclaimed with fervor:

“What other expression of the will of the late monarch should we seek?” The testimony of such venerable persons is worth every testament. If our great sovereign trusted his will to the truthfulness of his noblest subjects, then not to comply with this would be a crime on our part against their honor and against the autocratic will of the sovereign.

“For us,” others said then, “there is nothing to talk about whom to elect as the heir to the throne: the matter has long been decided, and we have gathered here not for election, but for a declaration.

“Yes,” said General Admiral Apraksin, “according to the strength of the coronation performed in Moscow in 1724, the Senate is left to proclaim Ekaterina Alekseevna the Empress and Autocrat of All Russia, with the rights that her late husband used.

In this sense, an act was drawn up, and everyone signed it without objection. Then we went to invite Ekaterina.

Bathed in tears, Catherine came out of the royal bedchamber, accompanied by the duke of Holstein and addressed a touching speech to the nobles, spoke of her orphanhood, widowhood, entrusted herself and her entire family to the protection of the senate and nobles, asked them to be merciful and to the duke of Holstein, whom the deceased loved and appointed as his son-in-law. In response to such words, Apraksin, kneeling down, presented her with an act recognizing Peter as her successor. Approving exclamations were heard in the hall.

- My faithful ones! Catherine said. – Fulfilling the intention of my deceased spouse, who is eternally dear to my heart in Bose, I will devote my days to difficult cares for the welfare of the state until God calls me back from this earthly life. If Grand Duke Peter Alekseevich will use my advice, then perhaps I will have in my sad widowhood the consolation that I will prepare for you an emperor worthy of the blood and name of the one you have just lost.

A loud cheer resounded in the hall; the same cries resounded outside the walls of the palace.

On January 31, a manifesto was issued from the Synod, the Senate and the generals, informing all of Russia of the death of its sovereign, Emperor Peter, and obliging all subjects of the Russian Empire to swear allegiance to Empress Catherine Alekseevna, since already all of Russia in 1722 swore to abide by the law on recognition as the heir the throne is the person that the last sovereign will choose, and in 1724 Peter himself in Moscow crowned his wife Catherine with the imperial crown and thereby indicated in her the person whom he wished to appoint as his successor.

Portrait of Catherine I by J.-M. Nattier, 1717

All Petersburg swore allegiance to the new Empress Catherine I without the slightest sign of grumbling or discontent. When the people began to be sworn in in Moscow, there were small resistances, which, however, had neither influence on the mass of the people, nor important consequences. The two schismatics became stubborn and announced that they would not swear allegiance to Catherine and would not recognize her as an empress. They were first flogged with a whip, and then, when the whip did not pester them, they began to burn them with fire, and after two tortures they forced them to take an oath. In the provinces there were also glimpses of displeasure, expressed chiefly by all sorts of chatter. “Our real tsar Peter,” some said, “did not die, and did not reign; he was still young captured by the Swedes and is still in captivity with them, and the Swedes instead of him sent to Russia a man who looked like him , and he, calling himself Tsar Peter, began to cut people's beards and promoted his non-Christians to high ranks, and he was so similar to the real Peter that no one could recognize that this was not a true king, only the queen recognized him, and for this he divorced the tsarina and put her in a monastery, and he took another wife for himself, from a German woman.This fake Peter recently died, leaving the kingdom to his German queen Catherine. And now the real Tsar Peter has freed himself from captivity and is turning back to his kingdom. And his son, Tsarevich Alexei, is alive and is with his father-in-law, the Caesar. Others did not deny that the one who reigned under the name of Peter was in fact him, but they blamed him for introducing foreign customs and for burdensome institutions for the people, and according to the usual method in Russian spiritual life, they blamed everything bad on the boyars, blaming them for giving bad advice to the sovereign. Still others cried out directly against the accession of Catherine and shouted that it was not for her to reign, but for the prince, the son of Alexei. All this had important consequences for those who only talked like that and were punished for their chatter. The people everywhere dutifully swore allegiance to Catherine. Only the fiction that Tsarevich Alexei, whose death was once announced to all of Russia, did not die, but was saved somewhere, fell more to the liking of the Russian people; but here, too, circumstances have shown that now it is not so easy to inspire universal faith in impostors, as it was at the beginning of the 17th century. Soon after the promulgation of the manifesto on the death of Peter and the ascension of Catherine, two named princes Alexei appeared one after the other in two opposite Russian regions. The first one announced himself in Pochep, in Little Russia. He was a Siberian by birth, the son of a bell ringer from the city of Pogorelsky, served seventeen years in the grenadiers and then was transferred to another regiment located in apartments in Little Russia. No one recognized him there, and he began to proclaim that he was Tsarevich Alexei, who had escaped death. This rogue did not manage to take a walk; he was immediately seized and taken into custody. Another appeared in Astrakhan; and he was also a native of Siberia, a peasant by class, engaged in a cabery trade on a foreign side. His name was Evstigney Artemiev. At first this enterprise was successful for this young man. There were those who believed his speeches. But soon, in some suburban village, he was seized and taken to Astrakhan, and the local authorities there ordered him to be put in prison and sent a report about him to Petersburg. Both named princes - both Pochep and Astrakhan - were brought to St. Petersburg and in November 1725 were publicly executed by death.

The reign of Catherine I

The first time after her accession to the throne, Catherine dedicated the sad duty of the burial of her husband. The embalmed body of the sovereign was exhibited in the palace hall, specially decorated in relation to the meaning of the sad celebration. In this hall, the coffin of Peter stood from February 13 to March 8, and during this period of time another coffin was placed near him - with the corpse of Peter's six-year-old daughter, Natalia. On March 8, both coffins were taken to the wooden church of the Peter and Paul Cathedral, temporarily built before the end of the stone one, and then Feofan Prokopovich delivered his famous funeral speech, which not only made an amazing impression on the audience, but was later considered one of the best examples of spiritual eloquence. The corpse of the deceased emperor, sprinkled with earth, was left in a closed coffin on a hearse and, according to Golikov, stood in the church for about six years.

There were many things started by Peter and not completed on the occasion of his death. Catherine decided to finish them. In February 1725, the Dane Bering was instructed to equip a seafaring expedition to the shores of Kamchatka: this was done at the behest of Peter, who, shortly before his death, was occupied with the thought - to find out if Asia is connected to America or is separated from it by water? At the same time, Catherine, according to the project outlined by Peter in 1724, decided to open the Academy of Sciences and for this purpose ordered the Russian ambassador in Paris, Prince Kurakin, to invite foreign scientists to Russia to take places in the Russian Academy of Sciences, which, however, in fact was opened no earlier than October 1726. In May 1725, the cavalier order of Alexander Nevsky was established, and this was also done according to the thought of Peter: he announced such an intention even before the Persian campaign. The same year, in the same month of May, the marriage of Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna with the Duke of Holstein was performed in fulfillment of the will of the late emperor, who himself betrothed the august couple. Catherine showed mercy to persons who fell under the disgrace of their sovereign in the last time of his reign. Received freedom and restoration of their civil rights to persons punished by political death in the case of Mons; forgiveness was announced to Shafirov, and Catherine instructed him to write the history of Peter the Great; the children of the executed Prince Gagarin were admitted to the service and to the royal mercy; they released the Little Russians, planted by Peter in the Peter and Paul Fortress with the hetman Polubotok, who died in captivity. External affairs in 1725 were going well in the sense of completing Peter's plans. Left in the Transcaucasus by Peter, General Matyushkin pacified the rebellion in Georgia and convinced the Georgian king Vakhtang to surrender under the protection of Russia, and then attacked Dagestan, ruined many auls, destroyed the shakhmal capital of Tarka, drove out the shakhmal himself, hostile to Russia, and completely destroyed the dignity of the shakhmal. In October 1725, the Illyrian Count Savva Vladislavovich was sent by Catherine to distant China to establish strong borders and to spread mutual trade between Russians and Chinese.

At first glance, Catherine I could be considered well prepared for the great role that now fell to her lot. She was a constant companion and most sincere friend of the great sovereign, who ruled Russia with such glory that none of his predecessors had achieved. Most importantly, the great reformer himself declared before all of Russia that Catherine, being his beloved wife, was at the same time his assistant and participant in all important military and civilian enterprises. Much in her favor was already said by the fact that for many years she could not only get along amiably with such a character as Peter had, but also earn his high opinion of herself. But Catherine can serve as a clear argument for the truth that it is impossible to make judgments: how would a well-known human person act in such and such cases, when such cases had not previously presented to her in life. In such judgments we are usually mistaken. We would be mistaken in the verdict about what would have come out of Catherine, who remained on the throne as the sovereign decider of her own fate and the fate of the state subject to her, we would have been mistaken if Catherine left the stage before the death of her husband and did not become after him an autocratic empress. We would have the right to expect something extraordinary from her, especially guided by the verdict of Peter the Great, who knew how to value people so well. Not that showed up in history. Catherine, as Peter's wife, was indeed a woman of great intelligence, but she was one of those intelligent women, of whom there are many in the world in all classes and under all conditions of life. Women like Catherine I, combining honesty with their minds, can be good spouses and mothers, pleasant companions, good housewives and fully deserve the most flattering reviews not only from their relatives and households, but also from strangers who only know them. But then such women do not represent any merit. Without a husband, without adult children, without a close circle of relatives and friends who serve as her constant support, such a woman can definitely get lost, sink and, with all her moral virtues, be of no use anywhere. This is essentially Catherine. She perfectly knew how to use the circumstances in which fate placed her woman's life; she gained the love and respect of both her husband and the whole circle of close people, and so attracted their hearts to her that they recognized in her such virtues, which in fact she did not have at all. Catherine was a woman in the full sense of her age, brought up and living in an environment where a woman, by her very nature, is obliged to be only a helper - whether her husband, parents, friends, anyone, but still only a helper, and not an original activity: in this environment, the female mind is only suitable for such a position. Catherine was a worthy assistant for Peter. We do not know, in fact, how this help was expressed, but we must believe, because Peter himself declares this to us. After the death of Peter the Great, Catherine suddenly found herself in a position above her feminine mind. I had to stand above everyone, lead others, choose suitable assistants for myself. None of the previous circumstances of her life had prepared her for this; the brilliant mind of Peter did not accustom her to this. Peter could not accustom anyone to originality; he loved and valued only assistants who did not dare to contradict him, or give advice when he did not require them, or do anything without his knowledge and without his will. And Catherine deserved her husband's high opinion of herself because she knew how to please him, and pleased him only by being in his constant moral submission. Peter was gone. Catherine, accustomed for more than twenty years to seeing another person around her, to whom she unconditionally obeyed, and to recognize behind herself only a secondary importance, from the first time she shows what her previous life has worked out: she betrays herself with her family to the patronage and protection of senators. and nobles; but they make her an autocrat; she is given something that she could not accept and keep. It was impossible to refuse this honor, even if she wanted to: she would even have to risk her own head and the fate of her daughters. It was necessary to accept a new position. But with this new position, Catherine does not have to be anyone's assistant; she must now have assistants of her own choice, and not one person, but many; if she wanted at all costs to remain as before in the meaning of someone's helper, then she would have to become the helper of many, and this is by no means impossible: many cannot mingle with each other to such an extent as to achieve complete unity. Hence the tragic, one might say, position of Catherine I, which came precisely from the moment when, by the will of fate, she reached that height that she never dreamed of in her youth.

Catherine I and the Senate

And this tragic situation was expressed primarily in the fact that Catherine had to get rid of and dodge Menshikov, who, more than others, contributed to her elevation to the throne, thinking, of course, to rule the entire state on behalf of the one who had once been his servant, and now became the sovereign . It was necessary to look for a counterweight to Menshikov, and Catherine thought to find him in her son-in-law, the Duke of Holstein; she became close to him, and, naturally, Menshikov and the Duke disliked each other. The matter went further. The Senate, which even under Peter often did not represent agreement between its members, but was restrained by the ingenious mind and iron will of the autocrat, was now left without that strong bridle that was necessary for him. At the end of 1725, a disagreement arose in him. Minich demanded 15,000 soldiers to work to finish the Ladoga Canal. Some of the members of the Senate (between them General Admiral Apraksin and Tolstoy) found that it was necessary to fulfill Minich's demand and finish the work begun by Peter, a work to which the great sovereign attached great value. Menshikov opposed, argued that soldiers were recruited at great expense not for earthworks, but to protect the fatherland from enemies, and when his arguments were not accepted, he despotically announced in the name of the empress that the soldiers would not be given work. The senators were offended. After that, grumbling began and then secret considerations and meetings about how, instead of Catherine, to elevate the Grand Duke Peter to the throne; a child king seemed the most suitable king for those who thought to actually rule the state in his name.

Tolstoy found out about this, and according to his assumption, an institution was to be formed, standing above the senate and directly controlled by a special empress. He won over to his side several main and most influential nobles: Menshikov, Prince Golitsyn, Chancellor Golovkin, Vice-Chancellor Osterman and General Admiral Apraksin. They proposed to Catherine a project for the establishment of the Supreme Privy Council, which should be higher than the Senate. The decree on its establishment was given by Catherine I in February 1726. The reason for such an institution is indicated by the fact that some of the members of the Senate are at the same time presidents of the collegiums, and moreover, "as the first ministers have secret councils on political and other military affairs ex officio." At the same time, they are obliged to sit in the Senate and delve into all matters that are subject to the conduct of the Senate, “because of busy work, they cannot soon fix resolutions on internal state affairs, and because of this, in secret councils on the most important matters, they become quite insane, and in the Senate in affairs stop and continue. The new institution separated matters of first importance from the senate and was under the direct chairmanship of the highest person. The affairs that were exclusively subject to the Supreme Privy Council were all foreign and those internal, which essentially require the highest will; for example, new taxes could not be decreed except by decree of the Supreme Privy Council. At the very opening of the new institution, it was ruled that the meetings of the Supreme Privy Council should take place weekly on Wednesday for internal affairs, and on Friday for foreign affairs, but if something unusual happens, then the meeting can take place on some other day of the week, and then all the members are specially informed about it. Decrees from the council are issued on behalf of Empress Catherine. The Senate ceased to have the right to peremptory sentences and was to be titled no longer Governing, but High. Petitioners were allowed to appeal to the Supreme Privy Council both against the Senate and the Collegia, but if anyone files an unfair appeal, he will be fined and paid in favor of those judges against whom he complained, and in such an amount as the fine would have been taken. from these judges, if the complaint filed against them was found to be just. If, however, the petitioner wrongly accuses the judges of such an unlawful act, which, according to the law, is subject to the death penalty, then the petitioner himself will be subject to death. The council - explained in the modern protocol - is not a special court, but an assembly serving to relieve her (the empress) of the burden (Thurs. 1858, 3. Protocols of V. t. Sov., 5).

Three collegiums were withdrawn from the department of the Senate: Foreign, Military and Naval.

The members of the newly established council were the persons who submitted the draft on its establishment; Count Tolstoy was attached to them, and a few days after the opening of the council, which followed on February 8, Catherine I placed the Duke of Holstein among the members (February 17), and even with the clear intention of placing him above the other members: decree, - His dearest son-in-law, His Royal Highness, the Duke of Holstein, at our gracious request, is present in this Supreme Privy Council, and we can completely rely on his faithful zeal for us and our interests, for this reason His Royal Highness, as our most gracious son-in-law and for his dignity is not only superior to other members, and in all incidental cases he has the first vote, but we also allow his royal highness to demand from other subordinate places of the Supreme Privy Council all such statements that are proposed for cases in the Supreme Privy Council, for a better explanation of them he will need." The duke, being present at the Supreme Privy Council for the first time on February 21 and showing his importance, graciously declared that he would be pleased if other members were sometimes of an opposite opinion with him (Protocol. Thu. 1858, 111, 5). The duke did not understand Russian well, if not at all, in Russian, and therefore Prince Ivan Grigoryevich Dolgoruky, a chamber junker, was seconded to translate his opinions into Russian.

In April 1726, Catherine I began to be disturbed by anonymous letters, whose content indicated the existence of people dissatisfied with the government established after the death of Peter. Ministers, members of the Supreme Privy Council, verbally presented various comments to her on how to protect the throne from possible upheavals. Osterman presented his opinion in a letter and proposed, in order to eliminate various opinions on the order of succession to the throne, to marry the Grand Duke Peter with his aunt, Tsarina Elizaveta Petrovna, in spite of their relationship, or inequality in age, so that if they had no heirs, then the inheritance should go to the offspring of Anna Petrovna. This project became the subject of discussion for a long time, but for history it is important mainly because, in its foundation, it was realized by the course of history; although Elizabeth did not marry Peter, she really reigned and, remaining childless, transferred the throne to the offspring of her sister Anna Petrovna.

But as anonymous letters continued to appear, on April 21 Catherine issued a strict decree against their writers and distributors; a double reward was promised to those who would open and bring to justice the writers of anonymous letters, then private discussions and conversations on the question of the rights of succession to the throne were forbidden, and it was announced that if those responsible for compiling anonymous letters were not revealed within six weeks, then they would be committed to church curse.

Domestic policy of Catherine I

With the existence of the Supreme Privy Council, the short reign of Catherine was marked by the fact that attention was drawn to certain methods and institutions of the past reign that were burdensome for the people; some things have been changed, others have been cancelled. All the income of the empire in 1725 extended to 8,779,731 rubles. at an expense of 9,147,108 rubles, hence with a deficit. The main item of income fell on the head tax, which in its total amounted to 4,487,875 rubles, and this type of tax was the most burdensome and the most intolerant of the people, both in its essence and even more in terms of the methods of collection. By its very nature, this tax represented a visible inequality and injustice. They paid those recorded in the revisions, and since revisions could not be undertaken frequently, it necessarily followed that the living had to pay for the dead, adults for the young, workers for the elderly, who were not capable of any kind of work. The method of collecting this tax was extremely difficult and hateful. You need to know that, according to Peter's idea, this tax was determined solely for the maintenance of the army and the army itself was supposed to be quartered in accordance with the collection of funds, so that the levy from those recorded in the capitation salary was provided to the military ranks themselves with the participation of commissars chosen from the Zemstvo nobility. But this was done extremely ruinously for the peasants and with all sorts of signs of abuse, embezzlement, extortion and bribery.

In the decree of Catherine I to the Supreme Privy Council of January 9, 1727, many things were combined that were invented and worked out during the year. There (see Collection. Otde. Russian language and words. Imperial Ak. N., IX, 86 and Reader. 1857, III, 33) it says: "Not only the peasantry, on which the maintenance of the army is supposed, is in great poverty is acquired from great and unceasing executions and other disorders into extreme and eternal ruin, but other things, like commerce, justice and mints, are found in a very ruined state. Peasant escapes that devastated the Russian lands throughout the reign of Peter did not stop even now; others settled on the outskirts, many fled abroad: some sought shelter in Poland, others in Turkish and Crimean possessions or among the Bashkirs. The government and Catherine were aware that such escapes occurred "not only from a lack of grain and from a poll tax," but also "from disagreement among the officers with the Zemstvo." But one should not think that only officers and soldiers weighed down the peasants in their life: “Now there are ten or more commanders above the peasants instead of what used to be one, namely from the military, starting from the soldier to the headquarters and generals, and from the civilian and civilians from the fiscal, commissars, waldmeisters and others to the governor, of which some are not shepherds, but can be called wolves in the herd who burst in. The same is true of many clerks who, after excommunicating their landowners over poor peasants, repair whatever they want.

This was how the government of that time imagined the position of the rural working class, which required measures to alleviate its fate and improve its well-being. At her very accession to the throne, Catherine reduced the per capita salary from the peasants by four kopecks from the revision soul, and this was done out of necessity, since over a million arrears had accumulated over the past year, and in two-thirds of the current year only half of what was due was collected. collect. In 1727, it was decided in the Supreme Privy Council, also as a result of the conviction that it was impossible to collect from the peasants the due amount, followed throughout Russia from the capitation salary: to eliminate the military (generals, headquarters and chief officers) from collecting the capitation salary and withdraw them from the counties , placing settlements near cities, and entrusting the poll tax to the voivods, managing provinces and dependent on the governors, with the participation, together with the voivodes, of a staff officer from the army. Simultaneously with the removal of the military from the collection of per capita money, the position of zemstvo commissars was abolished and their offices were destroyed, and at the same time, the people's courts. Reprisal and trial were assigned to the governor under the jurisdiction of the governors, and the highest authority where it was possible to appeal against the governors was the College of Justice. The Manufactory Collegium was destroyed, and instead a council of factory owners was established, who were supposed to come to Moscow and serve without pay. The government generally had in mind to abolish many chancelleries and government posts, “because the multiplication of rulers and offices is painful for the people and requires a lot of costs,” such a reason is given in the minutes of the Supreme Privy Council. For order in the calculation of income and expenses, the Revision Board, which had been abolished before, was resumed and a taxation office was established. Omissions in the collection of government payments accumulated and increased, which forced the emergence of this institution. We have no reason to indicate the degree of participation that Catherine I personally took in the issue of relieving the people from the hardships of poll taxes and military arbitrariness. But in general, as she put her name on decrees, then, of course, it must be admitted that if their content was composed by others, she nevertheless sympathized with their meaning. Knowing how, at every opportunity, under Peter she appeared on the side of those who, due to their position, needed a good-natured representation for them, we can safely admit that during the original possession of supreme power in matters related to alleviating the lot of the people, the good female heart of Catherine acted .

Catherine I. Engraving 1724

Feofan Prokopovich and Theodosius Yanovsky

But not in all the affairs of her reign, when decisions followed on her behalf, it is possible to reliably recognize the personal participation of Catherine. Blatant outrageous deeds were committed, and although officially they came from her, she was as guilty here as much as guilt can fall on a weak or underage person sitting on the throne, when orders are made in his name that he either did not think about, or did not at all. knew. To the category of such cases, we can safely include the case of the archbishop of Novgorod Theodosius Yanovsky, which was under Catherine. This man, one of the smart and bright archpastors of the Petrov century, the favorite of the late sovereign and the executor of his plans, had a stubborn and quarrelsome disposition, and therefore ill-wishers surrounded him and no one loved him. This was taken advantage of by the Pskov bishop Feofan Prokopovich, an extremely intelligent and learned man, but cunning and cunning, who did not stop at any path to his own exaltation. By the way, it happened to him that Theodosius, in accordance with his restless disposition, uttered some expressions that should not have pleased the supreme power, and in April 1725 Theophan filed a denunciation of his comrade; before, he had been on friendly terms with him: they were both preparing for the death of Peter the Great. Theodosius, in a conversation with Theophanes and other synod members, grumbled about the unwillingness of secular dignitaries to the clergy, threatened God's punishment on Russia for this, criticized the actions of the former emperor, condemned his excessive desire to follow secret affairs, which "shows in him a tormenting heart, thirsting for human blood ", recalled how he was "fickle and imprudent: today he will think up one great thing, tomorrow he will start even more, from the slander of soulless people and informers about all spiritual and secular persons, he began to have a bad opinion as unfaithful to himself, had secret spies who over they supervised everyone and sometimes embarrassed him so much that he couldn’t sleep at night, for that suspicion he was afraid of everyone, for not very important words he ordered to be executed by death, but it was possible without such bloodshed in the words of vile people and rely on God’s providence in everything. Speaking about the futility of harsh measures, he expressed: “How many people have been executed, but theft does not decrease, the conscience in people is not bound, it is necessary to teach through schools, and from that they will know God and what is sin; only this cannot be done without money, and the tool is iron ( i.e. for executions) is a small curiosity: give two hryvnias! On the death of the sovereign, Theodosius noted that the illness "came to him from immeasurable womanizing." When the highest authorities appointed divine services, the Novgorod bishop made the following remark on this occasion: “What tyranny! Worldly power forces the spiritual to pray! they didn’t exile, but will God hear such a prayer? Other clerics, asked about Feofanov's denunciation, confirmed his denunciation: among these clerics was Theophylact Lopatinsky, the Tver bishop, who later himself experienced a fate from Theophanes, similar to that which he and Feofan now prepared for the unfortunate Theodosius. The accused confessed, asked for pardon, but he had no intercessors. With his restless disposition and careless tongue, he had already managed to arm the mighty Menshikov against himself.

Once, when the guards did not want to let him into the palace, he said in a temper: "I myself am better than the Most Serene Prince!" Menshikov knew about this incident, and now, when Feodosius was in danger, he did not open his mouth in favor of the obstinate bishop. In addition, Theodosius was also accused of embezzlement and appropriation of church property in the salaries of images and silver utensils. On May 11, 1725, Catherine was sentenced to death for approval - "for the opposition and obscene words he had committed to the Church of God and the decrees of Her Majesty." But Catherine "for the commemoration of His Majesty" throughout the state abolished the death penalty and ordered: "Theodosius from the Synod government, the Novgorod diocese and the archimandrite of the Alexander Nevsky Monastery should be dismissed and exiled to a distant monastery, namely Korelsky at the mouth of the Dvina, where it is impossible to keep under guard and give him two hundred rubles a year for food and clothing. But the evil enemies dealt with him even more severely than what was prescribed in the decree. He was removed from his rank and, with the rank of a simple monk, under the name of the monk Theodos, was sent to the place of imprisonment and put into a stone prison with a small window, defining him only bread and water for food. The sufferer, sent to the Korelsky monastery in September 1725, died in February of the following year from hunger, grief and lack of fresh air, persecuted by envious people and enemies, without arousing compassion in anyone because of his perky and quarrelsome disposition. No one pursued him with such bitterness as Feofan Prokopovich, although he had previously been apparently on friendly terms with the Novgorod bishop; but Theophanes had in mind to take the place of the deposed Theodosius, and therefore, more than anyone else, he was afraid that Theodosius would not receive forgiveness and again enter into favor with the supreme authority; therefore, it was necessary for Theophan to drive Theodosius of Yanovsky out of the world as soon as possible.

Catherine I and Menshikov

Menshikov did not stop at any path leading to the satisfaction of his greed and ambition. But his Serene Highness met opposition from other nobles, especially from the Duke of Holstein. From this, Catherine did not immediately endow him with the wealth that he coveted. Even under Peter, there were large charges to the treasury on him, and for a long time he could not get these charges removed from him. He wanted to add land and villages in Little Russia to his vast possessions - and he did not get that. Under Catherine I, he had the opportunity to become a sovereign duke in Courland; then old Ferdinand was considered the Duke of Courland; he had lived outside his dukedom for many years, because he did not get along with his subjects. But besides him, the Dowager Duchess Anna Ivanovna, the niece of Peter the Great, lived in Mitava, surrounded by Russians; the affairs of Courland were in charge of the Russian sovereign. Meanwhile, on the basis of state law, Courland was considered a fief possession of the Polish Commonwealth, which, due to internal civil strife and a long-term external war, was not so strong as to put pressure on the country, which was considered its property during the life of Peter. But Peter was gone; the ducal old man was close to death; Important changes awaited Courland. In Poland, the lords interpreted that since the house of Ketler, which ruled in Courland, was finally fading away, under which Courland became a Polish fief, now the Courland region, as an escheat fief possession, should join the direct possessions of the Commonwealth and be divided, like the latter, into voivodeships. But the Polish king August II, who was also the Saxon prince-elector, wanted to deliver the Duchy of Courland to his natural son Moritz at the choice of the Sejm of Courland, and in this the aspirations of the king ran counter to the views of the Polish lords. In general, the Polish lords rarely got along with their kings, guarding themselves against the aspirations inherent in kings to strengthen the monarchical power. And now the lords were ready to oppose any royal aspirations of this kind.

Poland's neighbors, Prussia and Russia, were as repugnant to the intentions of the Polish king as to the types of the Polish nation. Both did not want to allow the spread of the borders of the Commonwealth, were not disposed to contribute to the strengthening of the Saxon house; finally, both wanted to plant their candidates in the Duchy of Courland. The Polish king secretly sent Moritz to Courland. Moritz liked the Courland nobility; it was ready to elect him, but offered him a condition: to marry the Dowager Duchess Anna Ivanovna. Everything was the best luck for both Moritz and the Courlanders: Anna Ivanovna liked Moritz very much. Courlanders began to gather to convene the Diet and elect Moritz to the dukes. But they learned about it in Russia and looked unfriendly at such an intention of the Courlanders. On May 31, 1726, the Supreme Privy Council sent a decree to the Russian resident Bestuzhev to try with all his might to convince the people of Courland not to choose Moritz, but to choose the Holstein prince, the son of the deceased Bishop Lubsky. The deputies who had gathered for the Sejm did not listen to Bestuzhev, assuring that Catherine I was merciful to Anna Ivanovna and would do everything for her at her request, and representing for their part that if the duke was not elected now, the Poles would hasten to declare Courland an escheat fief and annex it to the Polish possessions, and this will not be considered beneficial for Russia. On June 18, 1726, the Diet of Courland elected Moritz duke unanimously.

At that time, Menshikov decided to become the Duke of Courland himself. This desire was still under Peter, but then it was inconvenient to lean on it, but now Menshikov more boldly proposed his plan to Catherine when the question arose of electing a new duke in Courland. Catherine, for her part, considered it too intrusive to force the people of Courland to choose Menshikov, but put him among the candidates pleasing to Russia instead of Moritz, leaving the choice of these candidates to the Sejm of Courland itself. At the end of June, still probably not knowing about Moritz's choice that ended in Mitau, the Supreme Privy Council sent Menshikov to Courland and at the same time ordered the Russian ambassador, Prince Vasily Dolgoruky, to go there as well. They had to offer the Courlanders: if they want to live on friendly terms with Russia, then let them choose either the Holstein prince, the son of Bishop Lubsky, or Prince Menshikov, or one of the two princes of Hesse-Homburg, who were then in the Russian service. But Menshikov went to Courland with the intention of conducting business in such a way that not someone else would be chosen, but certainly his person. On June 28, Menshikov arrived in Riga, and Anna Ivanovna arrived there from Mitava and, without entering the city, stopped behind the Dvina and sent to ask Menshikov to her place. Menshikov has arrived. Anna Ivanovna began to ask him to intercede with the empress for permission to marry her to Moritz and approve the latter in the ducal dignity conferred on him by the Sejm of Courland.

- Your Highness! - Menshikov told her, - It would be indecent to enter into a marital union with him, because he was born from a metress, and not from a lawful wife; and to you, and to Her Majesty our Empress, and to our entire state, it will be dishonorable, and it is impossible for Prince Moritz to be admitted to the dukedom for the harmful interests of Russia and Poland. Her Majesty the Empress Empress Catherine I deigns to work for the interests of the Russian Empire, so that it is always safe from this side, and for the benefit of the entire Principality of Courland, so that under Her Majesty's high patronage, with her faith and fidelity, in eternal times it will continue to be, and for this, I deigned to indicate to introduce the successors, which are written in the instructions of Prince Dolgoruky, so that Your Highness would know about such a high permission of Her Majesty the Empress Empress and choose the best from it.

“I,” said the duchess, “will obey the will of Empress Catherine I and leave my former intention. If it is the will of the empress that one of those proposed in the instructions of Prince Dolgorukov be the duke, then I most desire that you be elected the duke, because at least I hope to be at peace in the possession of my villages; and if someone else is chosen, I don’t know if he will be kind to me, and I’m afraid that he might take away my widow’s food from me.

Anna Ivanovna, speaking such words, was cunning; she did not at all wish Menshikov to increase his power; she had long ceased to bear him, and regarded him as her enemy. She had something else on her mind. She planned to go to Petersburg and personally ask Catherine I for herself, setting the Duke of Holstein to intercede for her.

After a conversation with Menshikov, Anna Ivanovna left for Mitava, and after her departure, Prince Vasily Lukich Dolgoruky and the Russian resident, who was constantly in Courland, Pyotr Bestuzhev, came from Mitava to Riga to meet with Menshikov. Prince Dolgoruky informed Menshikov that he made proposals to the Courland ranks to act in accordance with the instructions received from the Russian government, but did not meet on their part the desire to comply with the will of the Russian Empress. The Courlanders did not want to elect Menshikov as duke, saying that he was not a natural German and not of the Lutheran religion - they did not want to elect the Holstein prince, representing the fact that he was still a minor and had only reached the age of thirteen; they also did not want the Hesse-Homburg princes serving in Russia.

Menshikov reprimanded Bestuzhev for allowing, while in Mitau, the choice of Prince Moritz without protest; then Menshikov himself went to Mitava, accompanied by a significant military convoy.

The next day after Menshikov's arrival in Mitava, Prince Moritz appeared to him.

“Empress Catherine I wants,” Menshikov told him, “so that the Courland ranks gather again and make a new choice: this is why I came here.”

- This is an impossible thing, - answered Moritz; - the Diet is over; the ranks have departed; if now they are gathered and forced to make new elections, then the elections he has made will not have legal force. I have been chosen as a city in accordance with the ancient form of government in Courland, and if after my election I am not a duke, then Courland should be, like an escheated fief, attached to the Commonwealth and divided into voivodeships, or else be conquered by Russia.

“Nothing like that will happen,” said Menshikov, “Courland will have its own ancient form of government, but should not seek other patronage than Russia.

On the same day, Menshikov called the Seim Marshal, the Chancellor and several influential members of the Seim to his place and told them that it was imperative to convene the Seim again and make new elections, otherwise he threatened to enter Courland with the Russian troops and exile the stubborn to Siberia. According to German sources, during Menshikov's stay in Mitava, the matter with Moritz came to a military skirmish. Menshikov sent to take Moritz, and Moritz, having locked himself in the house, fought off the Russians, and at the same time several people were killed.

But when Menshikov let Catherine I know about his decision announced to the Courlanders, the Supreme Privy Council did not quite approve of such a decisive tone. could irritate both states. Much to the detriment of Menshikov's intentions, the Dowager Duchess Anna Ivanovna arrived in Petersburg on July 23 and stayed with the Duke of Holstein. She raised both him and the entire imperial family to their feet. She complained bitterly about Menshikov's arbitrariness and arrogance. The Duke of Holstein, always beloved by his mother-in-law, took the case of the Duchess of Courland to heart. Under his influence, Catherine received and listened to Anna Ivanovna very friendly and became so irritated against Menshikov that many, having learned about this, expected something bad for the prince; they even said that the empress would order his arrest. But everything, however, was limited to the fact that Catherine ordered a reprimand to be sent to him, indicating that with his harsh actions in Courland he could bring Russia to an untimely quarrel with the Prussian and Polish kings and the Polish Commonwealth. Catherine I demanded him back to Petersburg for advice on important matters. Menshikov returned. His enemies thought that now, as they say, the star of his happiness would set, but fate delayed its judgment on him. Menshikov had a friend Bassevich, a minister of the Duke of Holstein, who had a great influence on the latter. This man, incited by Menshikov, inspired his duke that in his position it was much better to get along with Menshikov, since Menshikov’s enemies were supporters of the party of Grand Duke Peter Alekseevich, and if this party prevailed, it would not benefit either the duke or his Holsteiners . The Duke trusted Bassevich, whom he had long been accustomed to regard as his sincere well-wisher. The duke himself began to ask the empress for Menshikov, and Catherine, as if condescending to the petition of her son-in-law, returned Menshikov's former favor and disposition; the duke imagined that by his magnanimity he had conquered his rival and bound him to eternal gratitude. But Menshikov was not such as to be touched by a feeling of gratitude to the duke: after that he began to hate him even more, having experienced that the duke enjoys great power with the empress. But, knowing how to hide his real feelings, he became kind to the duke, did not resist when the duke received command over the Preobrazhensky Guards Regiment, and with his feigned friendliness to the duke gained Catherine's favor. The mercies of the empress to him not only did not decrease, but increased. The Empress herself again thought of giving him the Duchy of Courland by choice, but in agreement with Poland; however, Menshikov himself, having failed, abandoned his ambitious plans for Courland and turned to another path that would lead him to a higher height than that to which the achievement of the ducal title could elevate him. Menshikov decided to enlist the favor of the party of the Grand Duke, but decided to act in such a way that Catherine and other members of the imperial family would not immediately see harm for themselves; knowing the lack of character of the empress, he hoped to influence her and induce her to make such orders in favor of the Grand Duke that at the same time would be useful to him himself.

From the very moment she assumed autocratic autocracy, Catherine was distinguished neither by firmness, nor insight, nor love for business. Before, when she was the wife and assistant of Peter and was in his constant moral submission, she, pleasing her husband in everything, seemed mobile, hardworking, able to endure hardships; now she became lazy, careless, pampered, prone to luxury and empty amusements, and, what was worse, having previously been accustomed to obey Peter and not having her own will, now she also had no will and obeyed anyone who knew how to become close to her. Catherine I was led by the Duke, then Menshikov, then Tolstoy, then Yaguzhinsky, Golovkin and others, depending on the circumstances. The longer she reigned, the lower she sank. After the sovereign, gifted with a terrifying iron will and incomprehensible insight, the throne was occupied by Catherine I, reminiscent of the king sent by Zeus to the frog kingdom, in a well-known fable. At the end of July 1726, the envoy of the Polish king and the Saxon prince-elector Augustus, Lefort, wrote in his dispatch: “At court, days constantly turn into nights; they have fun in all sorts of ways. Nobody talks about business; the most capable and most weighty people do not take not for any work otherwise than in such a way that if only it were off the shoulders as soon as possible. Everyone is terribly dissatisfied with not receiving a salary; the government owes everyone eight months." In mid-December of the same year, he wrote: “The more I peer into the various circumstances of the present reign, the less I see traces of the former industriousness, vigilance and fear. True patriots previously contributed to the general good, their advice was accepted and weighed, now the fatherland has no king, dominate luxury, luxury, laziness. The Supreme Council exists only in name; the Duke of Holstein would like to seize the reins of government, but he is not allowed, and for four weeks the Supreme Council has not met. Only the spirit of discord brings people together, and private advantage dominates the common good. Nothing is done, all vigilance is aimed only at emptying the treasury. Costs increase to infinity, everyone drags as much as they can, nothing is done without cash "(R. I. O. Sat., vol. III, p. 455). On January 18, 1727, it is written: “For eighteen months the Persian army does not receive a penny, and the fleet for nine months, the guard for about two years; civil officials are also paid very badly. maybe he draws as much as he wants from the treasury in his favor. To complete the decline of power, Catherine's health began to get worse and worse from the winter. It was said that even in the summer of 1726 dashing people gave her something, but such rumors were not based on correct data, which at present history would have the right to be based on. There is no doubt that from December Catherine was ill until her death.

Meanwhile, Lieutenant General Devier was sent there, as if to verify Menshikov's actions in Courland. Such an appointment shows that he was run by hands hostile to Menshikov. Anton Devier, who was the chief of police under Peter, Menshikov's son-in-law (married to his sister), was at the same time his sworn enemy. But Devier could not do anything bad to Menshikov in Mitau, and when he returned to Petersburg in February 1712, he saw that Menshikov had already become so high that he could do almost everything with Catherine. Menshikov asked the empress to own the city of Baturin and the estates belonging to Mazepa, assigned to the Gadyatsky castle (Protocols of the Upper T. Sov. Thu 1858, vol. III, 42 - 43), and in December 1726 they were removed from it all the odds that were on it under Peter the Great. True, Menshikov did not succeed even now in begging for himself the title of generalissimo, which he had long sought, but he set Catherine up that she agreed to make him the father-in-law of the heir to her throne.

Question about the heir of Catherine I

Until now, everyone considered Menshikov in no way capable of taking the side of the Grand Duke Peter, but meanwhile this side was strong among the nobles, and, most importantly, in favor of the Grand Duke was generally the conviction of the Russian people, who could not sympathize with the strange order of succession to the throne, introduced by Peter the Great, and could not renounce respect for the birthright. Menshikov knew that the idea of ​​declaring Grand Duke Peter the heir to the throne after Catherine I would be enthusiastically received throughout Russia, and after his failure in Courland he himself stuck to this idea, but he wanted to strengthen his security by marrying the Grand Duke to his daughter. Whether someone else gave this idea to Menshikov or whether he himself came up with it - we do not know, but it is true that Menshikov found strong accomplices in this - a powerful representative of the old boyars, Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Golitsyn, many other nobles and two foreign ministers, whom the courts had it is desirable and beneficial for the Grand Duke Peter to become emperor: the first of these foreign ministers was the Caesar's envoy Rabutin, the second was the Danish envoy Westfalen. The sovereign of the first, Emperor Charles VI, desired the accession of Peter, because Peter, by his mother, was the nephew of the empress; the sovereign of the second, the Danish king, wanted the same thing, to reject the election to the Russian throne of the Duke of Holstein, whom Catherine loved very much and, for this love, could make her successor; the Danish king did not like the duke due to a long-standing enmity to the Holstein house. It was so desirable to the Caesar's court that Grand Duke Peter become emperor that Rabutin promised Menshikov the first fief in the empire if Menshikov had time to persuade the empress to appoint Peter as his successor on the throne. Menshikov began to influence the empress and began by obtaining permission from Catherine for the marriage of his daughter with Peter, although the latter, being still a minor, could not soon make this marriage. By the way, Menshikov had the following circumstance: Menshikov's daughter was conspired for the Polish native Sapieha, granted the title of field marshal in St. Petersburg. Sapega was a wonderfully handsome and dexterous fellow. Catherine wished to marry him to her niece, the daughter of her brother Karl Skovronsky, whom she had just granted the dignity of a count. Menshikov, as if in reward for taking away his daughter's fiance, asked to give her another - the Grand Duke. Catherine agreed. In general, having become an autocratic empress, from time to time she became more and more pliable, and here she was still weakening in health, and it is not surprising that it was not difficult for Menshikov to force such consent from a sickly and almost feeble-minded woman.

The upcoming marriage of the Grand Duke with Menshikov's daughter was not associated with the appointment of Peter as heir to the throne, and perhaps Catherine succumbed to Menshikov's request so easily because she did not see anything related to important state issues. But everyone, having learned about the consent given by the Empress to such a marriage, clearly saw where things were going and what Menshikov was preparing for himself in the future. First of all, both daughters of Catherine were horrified, threw themselves at the feet of their mother and pointed out to her the disastrous consequences of her succumbing to the plans of an ambitious person. Catherine said that the marriage of Grand Duke Peter to Menshikov's daughter would not change her secret intention, which she had regarding the appointment of an heir, but it was already impossible to change the word of consent given to Menshikov.

Then the party hostile to Menshikov began to plot with the aim of preventing Catherine I from leaving her son-in-law Menshikov as heir at all costs. Pyotr Andreevich Tolstoy, who had so recently worked together with Menshikov, was now attached to Menshikov's enemies. The participants in this conspiracy were Devier, General Buturlin, Grigory Skornyakov-Pisarev, General Ushakov, Alexander Lvovich Naryshkin, the terrible head of the Secret Chancellery under Peter, and Prince Ivan Alekseevich Dolgoruky. The Duke of Holstein also knew about the conspiracy and naturally sympathized with it.

The beginning, it seems, was laid by the duke of Holstein: this is evident from the testimony of Devier, published in the appendices to the history of Catherine I. (Uch. zap. Imp. Ak. nauk. Book II, issue I, p. 246). The duke, having seen Devier, asked him: does he know about the matchmaking of the Grand Duke Peter?

“I heard about it in part,” Devier replied, “but whether it’s true or not, I don’t know.

The duke said: “Will it be good and useful for Her Majesty Catherine I? It is necessary for Her Majesty to convey this with the circumstance; Tolstoy told me this: Her Majesty needs to have precautions; the Most Serene Prince is strong, he has troops in command and the Military College under the command , and if it happens as he wants, then he will come to the best of his strength, and then ask her majesty to take the former queen from Schlutenburg, and she is a person of the old custom, she can change everything in the old way, of an angry temper. "Perhaps she wants to offend Her Majesty and her children. So Tolstoy told me. Yes, I myself admit that it is not good, and I must tell Her Majesty about it, as she pleases, so that she knows."

- Not bad, - answered Devier; - you need to know about that empress. Why don't you report to Her Majesty yourself?

“I,” replied the duke, “already gave her majesty something to know, only I deigned to keep silent.

Devier said: "When you find time, report to her majesty."

After the Easter holiday, Tolstoy came to Devier and at first talked about how to beg mercy from the Empress for her delinquent son, and then, with an air of frankness, asked Devier: "Did His Royal Highness the Duke tell you anything?"

"Told me something," Devier said.

“Do you know,” Tolstoy asked, “that the grand duke is wooing the daughter of his Serene Highness?”

“I know,” answered Devier, “but in part, but I really don’t know, I only see that his lordship treats the Grand Duke kindly.

Tolstoy said: “It is necessary to convey everything to Her Majesty in detail and show her what can happen in the future; the Most Serene Prince is now so great, in mercy, and if this happens by the will of Her Majesty, will there be any opposition to Empress Catherine after that? After all, he wants good things more for the Grand Duke than for her; besides, he is very ambitious; it may happen that he will make the Grand Duke his heir and orders his grandmother to be brought here, and she is a woman of special character, hard-hearted, wants to avenge the malice and deeds that were in the blessed memory of the sovereign, - to refute, for this it is necessary to convey to her majesty in detail, as she deigns, if only everything was known about it; I myself want to convey, and I ask you, if you find time, report it to you. to me that it would be better when her imperial majesty, for her own interest, deigns to crown the crown princess Elizaveta Petrovna or Anna Petrovna, or both together, and when this is done, her majesty is more trustworthy b will leave, and then, as the Grand Duke learns, then it will be possible to send him overseas for a walk and send him to other states for training, just like other European princes are sent.

But when it was a matter of which of the two princesses to prefer as an heiress to Catherine I, both friends disagreed in their views. Devier stood behind the eldest, the duchess, and said: "She is pretty in character, touching and accepting, and has a great mind, she looks a lot like her father and is fair in humanity, and the other princess, even if fair, will only be more angry." But Tolstoy was for Elizabeth: “Anna’s husband,” he said, “the Duke of Holstein, is unloved by us, like a foreigner, and he himself looks at Russia only as a means to get the Swedish throne. Elizabeth Petrovna must be erected, and Grand Duke Peter still small, let him learn, then travel abroad, and in the meantime, Tsarina Elizabeth will be crowned and established on the throne.

Similar conversations were held between Devier and Tolstoy with the Buturlins, Skornyakov-Pisarev, Ushakov and the Duke of Holstein. Everyone talked about the need to report to the Empress, point out to her the danger from Menshikov and convince her to appoint one of her daughters as the heir to the throne in advance. Devier expressed a desire to sit among the members of the Supreme Privy Council, and the duke of Holstein - to receive the rank of generalissimo. Meanwhile, everyone was just talking among themselves, without starting an explanation with the empress; And so the days passed after days, until finally, on April 10, the Duke of Holstein sent to Tolstoy to invite him for a conference in Andrei Ushakov's house. Tolstoy, not finding Ushakov at home, drove down the street, and suddenly the duke of Holstein overtook him, invited him to his carriage and ordered him to go to his house. Ushakov was already there.

“Do you know,” said the duke, “the Empress Catherine became very ill, and there is little hope of recovery. If she dies without disposing of the succession to the throne, then we will all perish; Is it possible now to quickly persuade her Majesty to declare her daughter her heiress.

“They didn’t do it before,” said Tolstoy, “now it’s too late, when the Empress is dying.

“True,” said Ushakov.

Since Catherine fell ill and her illness inspired fear, Russian nobles hid behind each other, pretended to be sick, trying to keep themselves away from business, so as not to get into a mess. Apraksin, Golitsyn, Golovkin, Menshikov, Osterman - all were pretending to be ill, depending on the calculation, when they found it useful for themselves. By the end of April, Catherine's health had become hopeless. Menshikov took possession of a special dying woman and tried not to let anyone near her. In such a state of affairs, it was not difficult for him, on behalf of the empress, to accuse Devier of obscene words and misconduct and dress up a commission of inquiry over him. Menshikov calculated that if Devier was hooked, then his other accomplices would open up behind him and get caught. The commission appointed to interrogate Devier consisted of the following persons: Chancellor Golovkin, real Privy Councilor Prince Golitsyn, Lieutenant General Mamonov and Prince Yusupov, with the participation of the commandant of the St. Petersburg fortress Famintsyn. The interrogation was carried out in the fortress.

The case was set up in such a way as if the investigation about Devier arises from the testimony of the crown princes.

Anton Devier was accused of the fact that on April 16, when the empress was especially ill and "all the benevolent subjects were in sorrow," he "was not in sorrow, but had fun." So, for example, he turned the crying niece of the Empress Sofya Karlovna, as if dancing with her, and said: "There is no need to cry"; sitting on the bed next to the Grand Duke, he whispered something in his ear, and when Tsarina Elizabeth entered at that time, he did not give her "the proper slavish respect" and "with his evil impudence" said: "What are you sad about? Have a glass of guilt!" And to the Grand Duke, as the latter announced, he said: "Let's go with me in a carriage, it will be better for you and your will, and your mother will not be alive!" And he also joked with the Grand Duke, saying that "His Highness agreed to marry, and they will drag after his bride, and he will become jealous."

These accusations were brought up in order to find a reason to start a search for another case and through such a search to find out: in what force the evil words were spoken, where, with whom and when he was in the council, and what evil intention he had.

According to the then legal customs, Devier was tortured. Devier could not endure bodily torment and opened up to everyone with whom he had conversations about preventing Grand Duke Peter from marrying Princess Menshikova and about removing Peter from succession to the throne after Catherine I.

On May 6, Menshikov communicated to the Supreme Privy Council a decree on behalf of the Empress, which decided the fate of Devier and his accomplices. Devier and Skornyakov-Pisarev are ordered to be deprived of their ranks, honor and property, to be punished with a whip and exiled to Tobolsk; Tolstoy, together with his son Ivan - sent to imprisonment in the Solovetsky Monastery, Buturlin and Naryshkin, depriving them of their ranks, sent to live in the villages; Prince Ivan Dolgoruky and Ushakov - transferred to the field regiments.

Death and testament of Catherine I

Catherine I ended her life on the very day when Menshikov issued a decree allegedly approved by the empress on the execution of Devier with accomplices. It goes without saying that the dying empress was neither in soul nor body guilty of this. The disease tormented Catherine from the winter; in the spring it intensified; On April 16, everyone thought that the Empress would die at the same time; nobles and guards officers spent the whole night in the palace chambers. Then, by order of the empress, it was ordered to distribute 15,000 rubles to the poor, release prisoners from prisons and pray in churches for the empress. At a time when everyone expected Catherine I to breathe, she fell asleep, lasting five hours, and after that she seemed to feel better; there was little hope of recovery. Near the sick empress, her daughter Anna Petrovna was relentless. In early May, doctors noticed that the Empress had an abscess in her lungs. This abscess broke through, and on the 6th of May, at nine o'clock in the afternoon, Catherine died quietly and calmly. Judging by the described signs of the course of her illness, she died of consumption. Her death befell her at the forty-fourth year of her age. (Weber. Das veranderte Russland, III, 81, 82).

Menshikov immediately declared a will, as if drawn up at the behest of the late empress. The throne was left to the Grand Duke Peter Alekseevich. We will not analyze this testament, since it belongs, in fact, to the next reign. We think that Catherine participated in the drafting of it as much as in the approval of the sentence on Devier and his comrades.

Evaluation of the personality of Catherine I

The era of Peter the Great can truly be called the era of miracles. We are not talking about such phenomena as the emergence of a strong navy in a state that until that time did not have a single sea vessel - the formation of a large and well-armed army that won brilliant victories over the first commander of its century - the establishment of factories and plants in the country , where until that time there were only the primary beginnings of a handicraft industry to satisfy the unpretentious needs of the common people - the education of scientists, artists, statesmen and diplomats from a people who had a weak degree of literacy - all these phenomena are too well known and have long been on all modes are valued: new rumors about them may seem fruitless rhetoric. But we will point to that circle of persons who were in closer contact with the special person of the great Transformer: and here we will be presented with personalities in whose fate there was something unusual, marvelous, mysterious. We are involuntarily struck by the fate of a poor commoner boy who sold pies on the Moscow streets; he subsequently became the owner of many lands and slaves, the owner of thirteen million capital, reached the status of the most powerful man in the state, he lacked only a scepter and a crown: and this man, deprived of everything, dies a poor exile in the Siberian tundra. And here is another boy, a beggar, an orphan, wandering the streets of another city, Kyiv: later - this is a mighty hierarch, Feofan Prokopovich, glorious both in his mind and in his machinations. And here is the poor Tula gunsmith who accidentally corrected Peter's pistol: later he was the founder of the richest house in Russia. And how many others, exalted by Peter, made strong nobles, and then, after Peter, after Menshikov, who spent the rest of their sad life in Siberia! But no one was as close to Peter as Catherine. How wonderful, how unusual the fate of this woman. A commoner, a poor orphan who, out of Christian philanthropy, received shelter and a piece of bread from kind people, Catherine grows up, finds a groom for herself, marries, prepares to live by labor in accordance with the circle in which she was born. Suddenly, fate scatters her desires in the wind, destroys the union of family love that has just taken place, fate attracts Catherine as a miserable captive to a foreign land, to strangers. For what? Is it in order to leave a soldier's laundress or a slave in some manor house? No. In order to make the wife of one of the greatest sovereigns of the earth and after his death to make the autocratic owner of a vast monarchy. Doesn't it look like a fairy tale? In fact, if someone, in the form of a fairy tale, told a similar fate of a woman, then the narrator would be blamed for the extreme improbability of fiction. And yet this is not a fairy tale, but a historical fact. Fate, as it were, indicated to Catherine a calling - to live for Peter, to be necessary for a great man and thereby render a great service to Russia and all mankind. We said above that we do not know the extent of Catherine's participation in military and civilian enterprises, as Peter stated, but we are sure that she was really his assistant to the extent that this great man needed a softening, calming influence of the female soul. Peter found this feminine soul in Catherine. Whether he would have found her if fate had not brought him to the Livonian captive - we do not undertake to guess about it; but it is true that Peter did not find this female soul either in Evdokia Lopukhina, or in Anna Mons, or in many other female persons with whom he met by chance and for a short time. One Ekaterina tied him to her. Only Catherine managed to be a worthy friend of this great genius, who fully understood and appreciated the moral dignity of a woman, although she temporarily descended into the mud of cynicism and depravity: this mud could not, clinging to his powerful nature, spoil him. Only such a friend as Catherine was needed by Peter; the great man himself was aware of this, and that is why he extolled his "Katerinushka" so highly. She did all her work, fulfilled the secret calling of her earthly life; she lived with Peter for twenty years, patiently endured the cross of his obstinate and wild temper, the cross was sometimes very heavy, kindly and lovingly served him as a comforting angel in all life's paths, sat vigilantly at the head of his deathbed for many days and nights and closed her eyes to her great friend. Here Catherine's earthly calling ended. She was left without Peter in this world; people then lifted her up to such a height that she could no longer hold on; and in this outward grandeur, Catherine became completely superfluous in the world; it can be recognized to her as a special favor of Providence that she outlived her husband by only two years and three months. Who knows what would have awaited her in this whirlpool of machinations of temporary workers, cunning self-lovers, greedy self-lovers who clashed with each other, trying to drown one another in order to become taller themselves. In any case, Catherine's role was not brilliant, rather miserable, and perhaps deplorable. Fate delivered her from this temptation; Catherine died by the way, leaving a bright memory in history - as a long-term companion of the great Russian sovereign, dearly loved by him, and as a kind woman, always, as far as possible, ready to alleviate other people's disasters and did no harm to anyone.

We have not read the real file on this conspiracy, which belongs to the secret files of the State Archives; we did not have access to these cases, and therefore, if necessary, we must be guided by the information reported from this case by Messrs. Arseniev and Solovyov, and moreover, the news of foreigners. The Frenchman Villardeau says that Tolstoy, in a strong speech, represented a danger to Catherine, but could not reject her. The extracts from the investigative file, known to us, which we will further use, do not allow us to trust Villardo. It is evident that Tolstoy did not have the opportunity to talk about this with the empress.

When writing the article, an essay by N. I. Kostomarov was used - “Ekaterina Alekseevna, the first Russian Empress”

Russian tsarina (March 6, 1717) and empress (December 23, 1721), crowned May 7, 1724 and ruling the country from January 28, 1725 to May 6, 1727.

She was born on April 5 (15), 1684 in Lithuania. The daughter of the Latvian peasant Samuil Skavronsky (according to other sources, the Swedish quartermaster I. Rabe, but there is a legend that her mother belonged to the Livonian nobleman von Alvendahl, who made her his mistress, and Catherine is the fruit of this misalliance). Before the adoption of Orthodoxy, she bore the name Marta. She did not receive an education and until the end of her days she could only put a signature. She spent her youth in the house of pastor Gluck in Marienburg (now Aluksne, Latvia), where she was both a laundress and a cook. According to another legend, she gave birth to a daughter from the Livonian nobleman Tizenhausen, who lived less than a year. In order to put an end to the free behavior of the maid, the pastor married her to the Swedish dragoon Kruse, who soon disappeared in the war.

On August 25, 1702, during the capture of Marienburg by Russian troops, Martha became a war trophy and the mistress of a certain non-commissioned officer, later she got into the convoy B.P. Sheremetev, who gave her porter (laundress) A.D. Menshikov. In 1703, Peter I noticed her and was captivated by something in her (according to modern ideas, she was not a beauty, her facial features are incorrect). Martha became one of his mistresses; in 1704 she, baptized according to the Orthodox custom under the name of Ekaterina Alekseevna, was pregnant by Peter, in March 1705 they had two sons - Peter and Pavel. However, Catherine continued to live in the Menshikov house in St. Petersburg.

Gradually, the relationship between Peter and Catherine became closer (this can be seen from their correspondence in 1708). The king had many mistresses, whom he discussed with her, she did not reproach him and adapted to the royal whims, put up with his outbursts of anger, helped during epileptic attacks, shared with him the difficulties of camp life, imperceptibly becoming the actual wife of the king. She did not try to take direct part in solving political issues, but she had influence on the king. She acted as Menshikov's constant intercessor.

From 1709 she accompanied Peter on all campaigns and trips. In the Prut campaign of 1711, when the Russian troops were surrounded, she saved her husband and the army, giving the Turkish vizier her jewels and persuading him to sign a truce.

Upon returning to St. Petersburg on February 20, 1712, Peter married Catherine, their daughters Anna (later the wife of the Duke of Holstein) and Elizabeth (future Empress Elizaveta Petrovna), then aged 3 and 5, performed the duties of maid of honor at the wedding. The marriage was almost secret, performed in a chapel that belonged to Prince. Menshikov.

From that time on, Catherine acquired a court, received foreign ambassadors, and met with European monarchs. Her descriptions, left by foreigners, said that she "doesn't know how to dress", her "low birth is conspicuous, and her court ladies are ridiculous". The clumsy wife of the reformer tsar was not inferior in willpower and endurance to her husband: from 1704 to 1723 she bore him 11 children, most of whom died in infancy, but frequent pregnancies did not prevent her from accompanying her husband on his wanderings. She could sleep on a hard bed, live in a tent and make many days of riding. In 1714, in memory of the Prut campaign, the tsar established the Order of St. Catherine and awarded his wife on her name day.

During the Persian campaign of 1722-1723, Catherine shaved her head and wore a grenadier cap. Together with her husband, she reviewed the troops, drove through the ranks before the battle. She placed all monetary gifts from her husband and other persons in the Amsterdam Bank - and this also made her different from the wives of the kings before her.

On December 23, 1721, the Senate and the Synod recognized her as empress. For her coronation in May 1724, a crown was made that surpassed the king's crown in splendor, Peter himself laid it on his wife's head. It is believed that he was going to officially proclaim her his successor, but did not do this when he learned about his wife's betrayal with chamberlain Willy Mons (his sister Modesta Balk was the empress's closest confidante). On November 16, 1724, Mons was beheaded, the colleges were forbidden to take orders from her, and a "questor" was imposed on her personal funds.

Relations between Peter and Catherine became strained. According to Y. Lefort, they no longer spoke to each other, did not dine, did not sleep together. In early January 1725, their daughter Elizabeth was able to bring her father and mother together. “The queen knelt before the king for a long time, asking for forgiveness for all her misdeeds; the conversation lasted more than three hours, after which they had dinner together and dispersed” (J. Lefort).

Less than a month later, Peter died.

Through the efforts of Menshikov, I.I. Buturlin, P.I. Yaguzhinsky, relying on the guards (the empress promised immediate payment of salaries to the guards, detained for 1.5 years and 30 rubles of reward for each soldier), she was enthroned under the name of Catherine I.

By agreement with Menshikov, she was not involved in state affairs. On February 8, 1726, she transferred control of the country to the Supreme Privy Council (1726–1730). Among the most significant events of this time is the opening of the Academy of Sciences on 19 November 1725, Vitus Bering sent an expedition to Kamchatka, improving diplomatic relations with Austria. Returned from exile shortly before her death P.P.Shafirov, instructing him to write a history of the deeds of his husband.

Having become an autocrat, she discovered a craving for entertainment and spent a lot of time at feasts, balls, and various holidays. This had a detrimental effect on her health. In March 1727, a tumor appeared on the Empress's legs, which quickly grew along her thighs. In April 1727 she fell ill, and on May 6 she died at the age of 43. She wanted to pass the throne to her daughter, Elizaveta Petrovna, but a few days before her death she signed a will on the transfer of the throne to the grandson of Peter I, Peter II Alekseevich, who was advocated by representatives of the clan nobility even during her accession to the throne (D.M. Golitsyn, V.V. Dolgoruky).

Natalya Pushkareva

Date of publication or update 01.11.2017

Contents: Rulers

Ekaterina I Alekseevna(Marta Skavronskaya)
Years of life: 1684–1727
Reigned: January 28, 1725 to May 6, 1727
Russian Empress from March 6, 1717
Empress since December 23, 1721

Former servant and porter, who became the wife of Tsar Peter I, and after the Russian queen and empress.

Catherine was born on April 5 (15), 1684 in Lithuania in the family of the Latvian peasant Samuil Skavronsky (according to other sources - the Swedish quartermaster I. Rabe or the nobleman von Alvendahl) from presumably (Anna) Dorothea Gan. Before the adoption of Orthodoxy, Catherine bore the name Marta (Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich became her godfather, hence her patronymic). She did not receive an education and until the end of her days she only knew how to put a signature. She spent her youth in the house of pastor Gluck in Marienburg (Latvia), where she was a laundress and a cook. The pastor married Martha to a Swedish dragoon, the trumpeter Kruse, who soon disappeared during the war.

On August 25, 1702, during the capture of Marienburg by Russian troops, Martha first became a military trophy - the mistress of some non-commissioned officer, and later fell into the convoy of B.P. Sheremetev, who gave her a porter (i.e. laundress) A.D. Menshikov , a friend of Peter I.

Soon, in 1703, Tsar Peter saw Martha at Menshikov's, and this meeting finally decided the fate of the 18-year-old laundress. Although according to modern ideas, she was not a beauty, her facial features were wrong, yet she sunk into Peter's soul. At first Martha became one of his mistresses; and in 1704, baptized according to the Orthodox custom under the name of Ekaterina Alekseevna, she was expecting children from Peter, in March 1705 they had 2 sons - Pavel and Peter. But Catherine still continued to live in the Menshikov house in St. Petersburg.

Gradually, the relationship between Peter and Ekaterina Alekseevna became closer. She knew how to adapt to the royal whims, put up with his outbursts of anger, helped during attacks of epilepsy, shared with him the difficulties of camp life, imperceptibly becoming the actual wife of the king. Catherine did not try to take direct part in solving state issues, but she had influence on the king. She was a constant intercessor of Menshikov. Peter - and this was extremely important - recognized the children that Catherine bore him.

Before that, Peter's family life was not going well. From the first wife of Evdokia there were 3 sons, of whom only Tsarevich Alexei survived. But since 1692, quarrels began in the family, as Peter understood that he needed a completely different life partner next to him. And returning from abroad, in 1698 Peter ordered to send his wife to a monastery.

At the end of December 1706, Catherine gave birth to the tsar's daughter Catherine. In 1708, Anna's daughter was born, and the following year, Elizabeth.

From 1709, Catherine accompanied Peter on all campaigns and trips. In the Prut campaign of 1711, when the Russian troops were surrounded, she saved her husband and the army by giving her jewels to the Turkish vizier and persuading him to sign a truce.

Upon returning to St. Petersburg on February 20, 1712, Peter married Catherine. The marriage was secret and took place in a chapel that belonged to Prince. Menshikov.

Since that time, Catherine has acquired a court, received foreign ambassadors, met with European monarchs. The wife of the reformer tsar was not inferior in willpower and endurance to her husband Peter: from 1704 to 1723 she bore him 11 children, most of whom died in infancy. Frequent pregnancies did not prevent her from accompanying her husband on his campaigns, she could sleep on a hard bed, live in a tent. In 1714, in memory of the Prut campaign, Tsar Peter established the Order of St. Catherine and awarded his wife Catherine on her name day.

During the Persian campaign of 1722–1723, Ekaterina Alekseevna shaved her head and wore a grenadier cap. Together with her husband, she reviewed the troops, passing before the battle.

On December 23, 1721, the Senate and the Synod recognized Catherine as Empress. For her coronation in May 1724, a crown was made, which surpassed the king's crown in splendor, and Peter himself placed it on his wife's head. There are versions that he was going to officially proclaim Catherine his successor, but did not do this when he learned about Catherine's betrayal with chamberlain Willy Mons, who was executed soon after.

Relations between Tsar Peter and Ekaterina Alekseevna became strained. Only at the beginning of January 1725, their daughter Elizabeth was able to reconcile her father and mother. Less than a month later, Tsar Peter died (on the night of January 28-29, 1725).

After Peter's death, the crowd of courtiers and generals divided into 2 main "parties" - supporters of Peter Alekseevich Jr. and supporters of Catherine. The split was inevitable.

With the help of Menshikov, I.I. Buturlina, P.I. Yaguzhinsky and, relying on the guards, she was enthroned under the name Catherine I. By agreement with Menshikov, Catherine did not deal with state affairs, and on February 8, 1726, she transferred control of the country to the Supreme Privy Council (1726–1730).

From the first steps of her reign, Catherine I and her advisers sought to show everyone that the banner was in safe hands, that the country was confidently following the path outlined by the Great Reformer. The slogan of the beginning of Catherine's reign was the words of the decree of May 19, 1725: "We wish to accomplish all the deeds conceived by the hands of the emperor, with the help of God."

Having become an autocrat, Catherine discovered a craving for entertainment and spent a lot of time at balls and various holidays. This adversely affected the health of the Empress. In March 1727, a tumor formed on the Empress's legs, which quickly spread to her thighs. In April 1727, she fell ill, and on May 6, 1727, Ekaterina Alekseevna died at the age of 43.

They say that a few hours before her death, Ekaterina Alekseevna dreamed that she, sitting at a table surrounded by courtiers, suddenly saw the shadow of Peter, who beckoned her, his “hearty friend” behind him, and they flew away, as if into clouds.

Catherine wanted to transfer the throne to her daughter, Elizabeth Petrovna, but a couple of days before her death, under pressure from Menshikov, she signed a will to transfer the throne to the grandson of Peter I - Peter II Alekseevich, who was also represented by representatives of the clan nobility (D.M. Golitsyn, V.V. Dolgoruky ) upon her accession to the throne. And in the event of the death of Peter Alekseevich, to her daughters or their descendants.

Despite the enormous influence of Menshikov, many good things were done during the reign of Ekaterina Alekseevna. Among the most significant events during the reign of Catherine were the opening of the Academy of Sciences on November 19, 1725, the dispatch of Vitus Bering's expedition to Kamchatka (February 1725), as well as the improvement of diplomatic relations with Austria. Shortly before her death, P.P. returned from exile. Shafirov, instructing him to write a history of the deeds of her husband Peter. Catherine, following the Christian custom of forgiveness, released many political prisoners and exiles - victims of Peter's autocratic wrath. Catherine approved a reduction in taxes and some benefits for the fined. The order named after Alexander Nevsky was established. By her decree, it was ordered from the collegiums and offices to deliver to the printing house information about all "noble matters that were subject to the conduct of the people." She did not cancel any of Peter's unfinished undertakings.

In total, Ekaterina Alekseevna and Peter had 11 children:

Peter (1704 - 1707)

Pavel (1705 - 1707)

Catherine (1706 - 1708)

Anna (1708-1728) is the mother of the Russian Emperor Peter III (1728-1762). In 1725 she married the German Duke Karl-Friedrich.

Elizabeth (1709 - 1761) - Russian Empress (1741-1762).

In 1744 she entered into a secret marriage with A. G. Razumovsky, from whom she gave birth to several children.

Natalia (1713 - 1715)

Margarita (1714 - 1715)

Peter (1715 - 1719) - Was considered the official heir to the crown from 1718 until his death.

Pavel (born and died 1717)

Natalia (1718 - 1725)

Peter (1719 - 1723).

There are some dark spots in the biography of Catherine I, information about some periods of her life is very scarce. It is known that before the adoption of Orthodoxy, Ekaterina Alekseevna was called Marta Samuilovna Skavronskaya.

She was born in April 1684. Marta was of Baltic origin, lost her parents early, and was raised in the family of a Protestant pastor.

At the beginning of the 18th century, Russia participated in the Great Northern War. Sweden was the enemy of the Russian state. In 1702, the army occupied the Marienburg fortress, which is located on the territory of modern Latvia.

During the military operation, about four hundred inhabitants of the fortress were captured. Among the prisoners was Martha. There are two versions of how Marta got into the environment of Peter I.

The first says that Marta became the mistress of the commander of the Russian army, Sheremetyev. Later, Menshikov, who had more influence than the field marshal, took Marta for himself.

The second version looks like this. Martha was assigned to manage the servants in the house of Colonel Baur. Baur could not get enough of his manager, but Menshikov drew attention to her, and until the last decade of 1703 she worked in the house of His Serene Highness Prince Alexander Danilovich.

In Menshikov's house, Peter I paid attention to Marta. Relations between Peter I and Martha developed rapidly. In 1704, the couple had a child - a boy named Peter, who died soon after.

The same fate befell the second boy, Pavel. In 1705, Marta lives in Preobrazhensky village, where she is taught to read and write. In Preobrazhensky, she struck up friendly relations with the Menshikov couple.

Martha accepted Orthodoxy either in 1708 or a year later. Different historical sources indicate different dates on this score. At baptism, she took the name Ekaterina Alekseevna. She received such a patronymic because her godfather was the son of Peter from his first marriage - Tsarevich Alexei.

In 1708 and 1709, Ekaterina Alekseevna made Peter I happy with her two daughters, Anna and Elizabeth. The second, as a result, will become the Russian Empress Elizaveta Petrovna. It is worth noting that the children were considered illegitimate, because their parents were not in a church marriage.

In 1711, Peter I took Ekaterina Alekseevna with him on the Prut campaign. During the campaign, Catherine showed herself well, tying Peter to her even more. After returning from the Prut campaign, the couple decided to get married. The wedding took place on February 19, 1712. The couple had 11 children, but all of them, except for Elizabeth and Anna, died in infancy.

After the death of Peter I, the question arose of who would rule the Russian Empire. The first Russian Emperor did not leave a will. The confrontation of various political forces, decided the guards rebellion. The guards put Ekaterina Alekseevna on the throne, who went down in history as the first Russian empress.

Catherine I died on May 6 (17), 1727.

She ruled from January 28, 1725 to May 1727. Her reign did not bring any significant changes to the life of Russian society. Under Catherine I, the Bering expedition was organized, the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky was established. Here, one might say, are all the important events of the reign of Catherine I.

Portrait of Catherine I. Artist J.-M. Natya. 1717

In her honor, Peter I established the Order of St. Catherine (in 1713) and named the city of Yekaterinburg in the Urals (in 1723). The name of Catherine I is also the Catherine Palace in Tsarskoye Selo (built under her daughter Elizabeth).

early years

Information about the youth of Catherine I is contained mainly in historical anecdotes and is not sufficiently reliable. Until now, her place of birth and nationality have not been precisely determined.

According to one version, she was born on the territory of modern Latvia, in the historical region of Vidzeme, which was part of Swedish Livonia at the turn of the 17th-18th centuries, in the family of a Latvian or Lithuanian peasant from the vicinity of Kegums. According to another version, the future empress was born in Dorpat (now Tartu, Estonia) in a family of Estonian peasants.

Martha's parents died of the plague in 1684, and her uncle gave the girl to the house of the Lutheran pastor Ernst Gluck, famous for his translation of the Bible into Latvian (after the capture of Marienburg by Russian troops, Gluck, as a learned man, was taken to the Russian service, founded the first gymnasium in Moscow, taught languages ​​and wrote poetry in Russian). Marta was used in the house as a servant, she was not taught to read and write.

According to the version set out in the dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron, Marta's mother, having become a widow, gave her daughter to serve in the family of pastor Gluck, where she was allegedly taught to read and write and needlework.

According to another version, until the age of 12, the girl lived with her aunt, Anna-Maria Veselovskaya, before she ended up in the Gluck family.

At the age of 17, Martha was married to a Swedish dragoon named Johann Kruse, just before the Russian advance on Marienburg. A day or two after the wedding, the trumpeter Johann left for the war with his regiment and, according to the widespread version, went missing.

Origin question

The search for Catherine's roots in the Baltics, carried out after the death of Peter I, showed that the Empress had two sisters - Anna and Christina, and two brothers - Karl and Friedrich. Catherine moved their families to St. Petersburg in 1726. According to A. I. Repnin, who led the search, Khristina Skavronskaya and her husband “lie”, they are both “stupid and drunk people”, Repnin suggested sending them “somewhere else, so that there would be no big lies from them.” Catherine awarded Charles and Friedrich in January 1727 the dignity of a count, without calling them her brothers. In the will of Catherine I, the Skavronskys are vaguely named "close relatives of her own surname." Under Elizabeth Petrovna, Catherine's daughter, immediately after her accession to the throne in 1741, the children of Christina (Gendrikova) and the children of Anna (Efimovskaya) were also elevated to count dignity. Later, the official version was that Anna, Christina, Karl and Friedrich were Catherine's siblings, children of Samuil Skavronsky.

However, since the end of the 19th century, a number of historians have questioned this relationship. The fact is pointed out that Peter I called Catherine not Skavronskaya, but Veselevskaya or Vasilevskaya, and in 1710, after the capture of Riga, in a letter to the same Repnin, he called completely different names to “my Katerina’s relatives” - “Yagan-Ionus Vasilevsky, Anna Dorothea, also their children. Therefore, other versions of the origin of Catherine were proposed, according to which she is a cousin, and not a sister of the Skavronskys who appeared in 1726.

In connection with Catherine I, another surname is called - Rabe. According to some sources, Rabe (and not Kruse) is the surname of her first dragoon husband (this version ended up in fiction, for example, A. N. Tolstoy's novel "Peter the Great"), according to others, this is her maiden name, and someone Johann Rabe was her father.

1702 - 1725 years

Mistress of Peter I

On August 25, 1702, during the Great Northern War, the army of Russian Field Marshal Sheremetev, fighting against the Swedes in Livonia, took the Swedish fortress of Marienburg (now Aluksne, Latvia). Sheremetev, taking advantage of the departure of the main Swedish army to Poland, subjected the region to merciless ruin. As he himself reported to Tsar Peter I at the end of 1702:

“I sent in all directions to captivate and burn, there was nothing left, everything was ruined and burned, and your military sovereign people were taken in full of male and female and rob several thousand, also working horses, and cattle with 20,000 or more ... and what they could not lift they stabbed and chopped”

In Marienburg, Sheremetev captured 400 inhabitants. When pastor Gluck, accompanied by his servants, came to intercede about the fate of the inhabitants, Sheremetev noticed the maid Marta Kruse and took her by force as his mistress. After a short time, around August 1703, Prince Menshikov, a friend and ally of Peter I, became its owner. This is how the Frenchman Franz Villebois, who has been in the Russian service in the navy since 1698 and married to the daughter of Pastor Gluck, tells. The story of Villebois is confirmed by another source, notes of 1724 from the archive of the Duke of Oldenburg. According to these notes, Sheremetev sent pastor Gluck and all the inhabitants of the Marienburg fortress to Moscow, while Marta left himself. Menshikov, having taken Martha from the elderly field marshal a few months later, had a strong quarrel with Sheremetev.

Portrait of Alexander Danilovich Menshikov in 1698, painted in Holland during the Great Embassy of Peter the Great

The Scot Peter Henry Bruce in his "Memoirs" sets out the story (according to others) in a more favorable light for Catherine I. Marta was taken by the colonel of the dragoon regiment Baur (later became a general):

“[Baur] immediately ordered her to be placed in his house, which entrusted her to the cares, giving her the right to dispose of all the servants, and she soon fell in love with the new steward for her manner of household. The General later often said that his house was never as well maintained as in the days of her stay there. Prince Menshikov, who was his patron, once saw her at the general, also noting something extraordinary in her appearance and manners. Asking who she was and whether she knew how to cook, he heard in response the story just told, to which the general added a few words about her worthy position in his house. The prince said that it was in such a woman that he really needed now, for he himself was now served very poorly. To this, the general replied that he owed too much to the prince so as not to immediately fulfill what he only thought of - and immediately calling Catherine, he said that in front of her was Prince Menshikov, who needed just such a maid as she, and that the prince will do everything possible to become, like himself, her friend, adding that he respects her too much to prevent her from receiving her share of honor and a good fate.

In the autumn of 1703, on one of his regular visits to Menshikov in St. Petersburg, Peter I met Marta and soon made her his mistress, calling her in letters Katerina Vasilevskaya (perhaps by the name of her aunt).

Peter I with the sign of the Order of St. Andrew the First-Called on a blue St. Andrew's ribbon and a star on his chest. Artist J.-M. Nattier, 1717

Franz Villebois relates their first meeting as follows:
“This is how things were when the tsar, traveling by post from St. Petersburg, which was then called Nyenschanz, or Noteburg, to Livonia, in order to travel further, stopped at his favorite Menshikov, where he noticed Catherine among the servants who served at the table. He asked where it came from and how he acquired it. And, speaking quietly in his ear with this favorite, who answered him only with a nod of his head, he looked at Catherine for a long time and, teasing her, said that she was smart, and ended his joking speech by telling her, when she went to bed, to take light a candle in his room. It was an order, spoken in a playful tone, but not subject to any objections. Menshikov took it for granted, and the beauty, devoted to her master, spent the night in the king's room ... The next day the king left in the morning to continue his journey. He returned to his favorite what he lent him. The satisfaction of the king, which he received from his nightly conversation with Catherine, cannot be judged by the generosity that he showed. She limited herself to only one ducat, which is equal in value to half of one louis d'or (10 francs), which he thrust into her hand in a military way at parting.

Catherine I. Portrait of an unknown artist.

In 1704, Katerina will give birth to her first child, named Peter, the next year, Paul (both died soon after).

In 1705, Peter sent Katerina to the village of Preobrazhenskoye near Moscow, to the house of his sister Tsarevna Natalya Alekseevna, where Katerina Vasilevskaya learned Russian literacy, and, in addition, became friends with the Menshikov family.

When Katerina was baptized into Orthodoxy (1707 or 1708), she changed her name to Ekaterina Alekseevna Mikhailova, since Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich was her godfather, and Peter I himself used the surname Mikhailov if he wanted to remain incognito.

In January 1710, Peter staged a triumphal procession to Moscow on the occasion of the Poltava victory, thousands of Swedish prisoners were held at the parade, among whom, according to the story of Franz Villebois, was Johann Kruse. Johann confessed about his wife, who gave birth one after another to the Russian Tsar, and was immediately exiled to a remote corner of Siberia, where he died in 1721. According to Franz Villebois, the existence of a living legal husband of Catherine during the years of the birth of Anna (1708) and Elizabeth (1709) was later used by opposing factions in disputes over the right to the throne after the death of Catherine I. According to notes from the Duchy of Oldenburg, the Swedish dragoon Kruse died in 1705, however one must keep in mind the interest of the German dukes in the legitimacy of the birth of the daughters of Peter, Anna and Elizabeth, who were looking for suitors among the German specific rulers.

Wife of Peter I

The wedding of Peter I and Katerina Alekseevna in 1712. Engraving by A.F. Zubov.

Even before her legal marriage to Peter, Katerina gave birth to daughters Anna and Elizabeth. Katerina alone could cope with the tsar in his fits of anger, knew how to calm Peter's attacks of convulsive headache with kindness and patient attention. According to Bassevich's memoirs:
“The sound of Katerina's voice calmed Peter; then she sat him down and took him, caressing him, by the head, which she scratched lightly. This had a magical effect on him, he fell asleep in a few minutes. In order not to disturb his sleep, she held his head on her breast, sitting motionless for two or three hours. After that, he woke up completely fresh and vigorous.

In the spring of 1711, Peter, having become attached to a charming and light-tempered former maid, ordered Catherine to be considered his wife and took her on the Prut campaign, which was unfortunate for the Russian army. The Danish envoy Just Yul, according to the words of the princesses (nieces of Peter I), wrote down this story in this way:
“In the evening, shortly before his departure, the tsar called them, his sister Natalya Alekseevna, to one house in Preobrazhenskaya Sloboda. There he took his hand and placed before them his mistress Ekaterina Alekseevna. For the future, the tsar said, they should consider her his lawful wife and Russian tsarina. Since now, due to the urgent need to go to the army, he cannot marry her, he takes her with him in order to do this on occasion in more free time. At the same time, the king made it clear that if he died before he had time to marry, then after his death they would have to look at her as his lawful wife. After that, they all congratulated (Ekaterina Alekseevna) and kissed her hand.

In Moldova in July 1711, 190,000 Turks and Crimean Tatars pressed the 38,000th Russian army to the river, completely surrounding it with numerous cavalry. Ekaterina went on a long trip, being 7 months pregnant. According to a well-known legend, she took off all her jewelry in order to bribe the Turkish commander. Peter I was able to conclude the Prut Peace and, having sacrificed the Russian conquests in the south, to withdraw the army from the encirclement. The Danish envoy Just Yul, who was with the Russian army after she left the encirclement, does not report such an act of Catherine, but says that the queen (as everyone now called Catherine) handed out her jewelry to the officers for safekeeping and then collected them. Brigadier Moreau de Brazet's notes also do not mention the bribery of the vizier with Catherine's jewels, although the author (the Brigadier Moro de Brazet) knew from the words of Turkish pashas about the exact amount of state sums aimed at bribes to the Turks.

Unknown artist. Portrait of Catherine I.

The official wedding of Peter I with Ekaterina Alekseevna took place on February 19, 1712 in the church of St. Isaac of Dalmatsky in St. Petersburg. In 1713, in honor of the worthy behavior of his wife during the unsuccessful Prut campaign, Peter I established the Order of St. Catherine and personally laid the signs of the order on his wife on November 24, 1714. Initially, it was called the Order of Liberation and was intended only for Catherine. Peter I recalled the merits of Catherine during the Prut campaign in his manifesto on the coronation of his wife dated November 15, 1723:
“Our dearest wife, Empress Catherine, was a great helper, and not only in this, but also in many military actions, postponing the infirmity of a woman, she was present with us by her will and helped us as much as possible, and most of all, in the Prut campaign with the Turks, read the desperate time, as acted masculinely, and not feminine, our entire army is aware of this ... "

Peter I and Catherine I ride along the Neva

In personal letters, the tsar showed unusual tenderness for his wife: “Katerinushka, my friend, hello! I hear that you are bored, but I am not bored either ... ”. Ekaterina Alekseevna gave birth to her husband 11 children, but almost all of them died in childhood, except for Anna and Elizabeth. Elizabeth later became empress (ruled in 1741-1762), and Anna's direct descendants ruled Russia after the death of Elizabeth, from 1762 to 1917. One of the sons who died in childhood, Peter Petrovich, after the abdication of Alexei Petrovich (Peter's eldest son from Evdokia Lopukhina) from February 1718 until his death in 1719, he was the official heir to the Russian throne.

Foreigners, who followed the Russian court with attention, note the tsar's affection for his wife. Bassevich writes about their relationship in 1721:
“He loved to see her everywhere. There was no military review, descent of the ship, ceremony or holiday at which she would not appear ... Catherine, confident in the heart of her husband, laughed at his frequent love affairs, like Livia at the intrigues of Augustus; but on the other hand, when he told her about them, he always ended with the words: nothing can compare with you.

Artist Stanislav Khlebovsky. Assembly under Peter I.

In the autumn of 1724, Peter I suspected the empress of adultery with her chamberlain Mons, who was executed for another reason. He stopped talking to her, she was denied access to him. Only once, at the request of his daughter Elizabeth, Peter agreed to dine with Catherine, who had been his inseparable friend for 20 years. Only at death did Peter reconcile with his wife. In January 1725, Catherine spent all her time at the bedside of the dying sovereign, he died in her arms.

Opinions about the appearance of Catherine are contradictory. If we focus on male eyewitnesses, then, in general, they are more than positive, and, on the contrary, women were sometimes biased towards her: “She was short, fat and black; her whole appearance did not make a favorable impression. One had only to look at her to immediately notice that she was of low birth. The dress she was wearing was in all probability bought from a shop in the market; it was of an old-fashioned style, and all trimmed with silver and sequins. From her outfit, one could mistake her for a German itinerant artist. She wore a sash adorned on the front with an embroidery of precious stones, a very original design in the form of a two-headed eagle, the wings of which were studded with small precious stones in a bad setting. The queen was hung with about a dozen orders and the same number of icons and amulets, and when she walked, everything rang, as if a dressed up mule had passed.

The family of Peter I in 1717: Peter I, Catherine, the eldest son Alexei Petrovich from his first wife, the youngest two-year-old son Peter and daughters Anna and Elizabeth. Enamel on copper plate.

Descendants of Peter I from Catherine I

Anna Petrovna (1708-1728) In 1725 she married the German Duke Karl-Friedrich; left for Kiel, where she gave birth to a son, Karl Peter Ulrich (later Russian Emperor Peter III).

Elizaveta Petrovna (1709-1762). Russian empress since 1741.

Natalia Petrovna (1713-1715).

Margarita Petrovna (1714-1715).

Petr Petrovich (1715-1719). He was considered the official heir to the crown from 1718 until his death.

Pavel Petrovich (1717-1717).

Natalia Petrovna (1718-1725).

Portrait of Catherine I by Karel de Moor, 1717.

Rise to power

By a manifesto of November 15, 1723, Peter announced the future coronation of Catherine as a token of her special merits.

May 7, 1724 Peter crowned Catherine as empress in the Assumption Cathedral in Moscow. This was the second coronation in Russia of a female sovereign's wife (after the coronation of Marina Mnishek by False Dmitry I in 1605).

By his law of February 5, 1722, Peter canceled the previous order of succession to the throne by a direct descendant in the male line, replacing it with the personal appointment of the reigning sovereign. Any person worthy, in the opinion of the sovereign, to head the state could become a successor according to the Decree of 1722. Peter died in the early morning of January 28, 1725, without having time to name a successor and leaving no sons. In the absence of a strictly defined order of succession to the throne, the throne of Russia was left to chance, and the subsequent time went down in history as the era of palace coups.

The popular majority was in favor of the only male representative of the dynasty - Grand Duke Peter Alekseevich, the grandson of Peter I from his eldest son Alexei, who died during interrogations. For Pyotr Alekseevich there was a well-born nobility (Dolgoruky, Golitsyn), who considered him the only legitimate heir, born from a marriage worthy of royal blood. Count Tolstoy, Prosecutor General Yaguzhinsky, Chancellor Count Golovkin and Menshikov, at the head of the service nobility, could not hope to retain the power received from Peter I under Peter Alekseevich; on the other hand, the coronation of the empress could be interpreted as Peter's indirect reference to the heiress. When Catherine saw that there was no longer any hope for her husband's recovery, she instructed Menshikov and Tolstoy to act in favor of their rights. The guard was devoted to adoration to the dying emperor; she transferred this attachment to Catherine.

Officers of the Guards from the Preobrazhensky Regiment came to the meeting of the Senate, knocking down the door to the room. They frankly declared that they would smash the heads of the old boyars if they went against their mother Catherine. Suddenly, a drum beat sounded from the square: it turned out that both guards regiments were lined up in front of the palace under arms. Prince Field Marshal Repnin, President of the Military Collegium, angrily asked: “Who dared to bring regiments here without my knowledge? Am I not a field marshal?" Buturlin, the commander of the Semyonovsky regiment, replied to Repnin that he had called up the regiments at the behest of the empress, to whom all subjects were obliged to obey, "not excluding you," he added impressively.

Thanks to the support of the guards regiments, it was possible to convince all the opponents of Catherine to give her their vote. The Senate "unanimously" elevated her to the throne, calling her "the most glorious, most powerful great empress, Empress Ekaterina Alekseevna, autocrat of all Russia" and in justification announcing the will of the late sovereign interpreted by the Senate. The people were very surprised by the accession for the first time in Russian history to the throne of a woman, but there was no unrest.

On January 28, 1725, Catherine I ascended the throne of the Russian Empire thanks to the support of the guards and nobles who rose under Peter. In Russia, the era of the reign of empresses began, when, until the end of the 18th century, only women ruled, with the exception of a few years.

Unknown artist. Portrait of Catherine I with a black child.

Governing body. 1725-1727 years.

The actual power in the reign of Catherine was concentrated by Prince and Field Marshal Menshikov, as well as the Supreme Privy Council. Catherine was completely satisfied with the role of the first mistress of Tsarskoye Selo, relying on her advisers in matters of state administration. She was only interested in the affairs of the fleet - Peter's love for the sea touched her too.

The nobles wanted to rule with a woman, and now they really achieved their goal.

From the "History of Russia" S.M. Solovyov:
Under Peter, she did not shine with her own light, but with a light borrowed from the great man of whom she was a companion; she had the ability to keep herself at a certain height, to show attention and sympathy for the movement that took place around her; she was initiated into all the secrets, the secrets of the personal relationships of the people around her. Her position, her fear for the future, kept her mental and moral powers in constant and intense tension. But the climbing plant reached its height only thanks to that giant of the forests around which it twisted; the giant is slain, and the weak plant is spread over the earth. Catherine retained a knowledge of faces and relationships between them, retained the habit of wading between these relationships; but she had neither due attention to matters, especially internal ones, and their details, nor the ability to initiate and direct.

On the initiative of Count P. A. Tolstoy, in February 1726, a new body of state power, the Supreme Privy Council, was created, where a narrow circle of chief dignitaries could govern the Russian Empire under the formal chairmanship of a semi-literate empress. The Council included Field Marshal Prince Menshikov, Admiral General Count Apraksin, Chancellor Count Golovkin, Count Tolstoy, Prince Golitsyn, and Vice Chancellor Baron Osterman. Of the six members of the new institution, only Prince D. M. Golitsyn was a descendant of noble nobles. A month later, the son-in-law of the Empress, the Duke of Holstein Karl-Friedrich (1700-1739), was included in the number of members of the Supreme Privy Council, on whose zeal, as the Empress officially declared, "we can fully rely on."

As a result, the role of the Senate declined sharply, although it was renamed the "High Senate". The leaders jointly decided all important matters, and Catherine only signed the papers they sent. The Supreme Council liquidated the local authorities created by Peter and restored the power of the governor.

Silver ruble of 1727

The long wars waged by Russia affected the country's finances. Due to crop failures, the price of bread rose, and discontent grew in the country. To prevent uprisings, the poll tax was reduced (from 74 to 70 kopecks).

The activity of the Catherine's government was limited mainly to petty issues, while embezzlement, arbitrariness and abuse flourished. There was no talk of any reforms and transformations; there was a struggle for power within the Council.

Despite this, the common people loved the empress because she sympathized with the unfortunate and willingly helped them. Soldiers, sailors and artisans were constantly crowding in her front rooms: some were looking for help, others asked the queen to be their godfather. She refused no one and usually gave each of her godsons a few chervonets.

During the reign of Catherine I, the Academy of Sciences was opened, the expedition of V. Bering was organized, the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky was established.

Foreign policy

During the 2 years of the reign of Catherine I, Russia did not wage major wars, only in the Caucasus a separate corps operated under the command of Prince Dolgorukov, trying to recapture the Persian territories, while Persia was in a state of unrest, and Turkey unsuccessfully fought the Persian rebels. In Europe, Russia was diplomatically active in defending the interests of the Duke of Holstein (husband of Anna Petrovna, daughter of Catherine I) against Denmark. The preparation of an expedition by Russia to return Schleswig, taken by the Danes, to the Duke of Holstein led to a military demonstration in the Baltic by Denmark and England.

Another direction of Russian policy under Catherine was to ensure the guarantees of the Nishtad peace and the creation of an anti-Turkish bloc. In 1726, the government of Catherine I concluded the Treaty of Vienna with the government of Charles VI, which became the basis of the Russian-Austrian military-political alliance in the second quarter of the 18th century.

Unknown artist Portrait of Empress Catherine I.

End of reign

Catherine I ruled for a short time. Balls, festivities, feasts and revels, which followed a continuous series, undermined her health, and on April 10, 1727, the empress fell ill. The cough, previously weak, began to intensify, a fever was discovered, the patient began to weaken day by day, signs of damage to the lung appeared. The queen died from complications of a lung abscess. According to another unlikely version, death came from a severe attack of rheumatism.
The government had to urgently resolve the issue of succession to the throne.

Question of succession

Catherine was easily enthroned due to the infancy of Peter Alekseevich, however, in Russian society there were strong sentiments in favor of the grown-up Peter, the direct heir to the Romanov dynasty in the male line. The empress, alarmed by anonymous letters sent against the decree of Peter I of 1722 (by which the reigning sovereign had the right to appoint any successor for himself), turned to her advisers for help.

Vice-Chancellor Osterman proposed, in order to reconcile the interests of the noble and new serving nobility, to marry Grand Duke Peter Alekseevich to Princess Elizabeth Petrovna, Catherine's daughter. Their close relationship served as an obstacle, Elizabeth was Peter's own aunt. In order to avoid a possible divorce in the future, Osterman proposed to determine the order of succession to the throne more strictly when entering into a marriage.

Catherine, wanting to appoint her daughter Elizabeth (according to other sources - Anna) as her heir, did not dare to accept Osterman's project and continued to insist on her right to appoint her successor, hoping that the issue would be resolved over time. Meanwhile, the main supporter of Ekaterina Menshikov, having assessed the prospect of Peter becoming the Russian emperor, went over to the camp of his adherents. Moreover, Menshikov managed to get Catherine's consent to the marriage of Maria, Menshikov's daughter, with Peter Alekseevich.

The party led by Tolstoy, which most of all contributed to the enthronement of Catherine, could hope that Catherine would live for a long time and circumstances might change in their favor. Osterman threatened people with uprisings for Peter as the only legitimate heir; they could answer him that the army was on the side of Catherine, that it would also be on the side of her daughters. Catherine, for her part, tried to win the affection of the troops with her attention.

Menshikov managed to take advantage of the illness of Catherine, who signed on May 6, 1727, a few hours before her death, an accusatory decree against Menshikov's enemies, and on the same day Count Tolstoy and other high-ranking enemies of Menshikov were sent into exile.

Artist Heinrich Buchholz. Portrait of Catherine I. 1725

Will

At 9 pm on May 6, 1727, the 43-year-old Empress died.

When the empress fell dangerously ill, members of the highest government institutions gathered in the palace to decide on a successor: the Supreme Privy Council, the Senate and the Synod. Guards officers were also invited. The Supreme Council resolutely insisted on the appointment of the infant grandson of Peter I, Peter Alekseevich, as the heir. Before his death, Bassevich hastily compiled a will, signed by Elizabeth instead of the infirm mother empress. According to the will, the throne was inherited by the grandson of Peter I, Peter Alekseevich.

Subsequent articles dealt with the guardianship of a minor emperor; determined the power of the Supreme Council, the order of succession to the throne in the event of the death of Peter Alekseevich. According to the will, in the event of Peter's childless death, Anna Petrovna and her descendants became his successor, then her younger sister Elizaveta Petrovna and her descendants, and only then Peter II's sister Natalya Alekseevna. At the same time, those applicants for the throne who were not Orthodox or already reigned abroad were excluded from the order of succession. It was to the will of Catherine I that 14 years later Elizaveta Petrovna referred in the manifesto, setting out her rights to the throne after the palace coup of 1741.

The 11th article of the will amazed those present. It ordered all the nobles to contribute to the betrothal of Peter Alekseevich with one of the daughters of Prince Menshikov, and then, upon reaching adulthood, to promote their marriage. Literally: “our princesses and the government of the administration also have to try to arrange a marriage between his love [Grand Duke Peter] and one princess of Prince Menshikov.”

Such an article clearly testified to the person who participated in the preparation of the will, however, for Russian society, the right of Peter Alekseevich to the throne - the main article of the will - was indisputable, and there were no unrest.

Later, Empress Anna Ioannovna ordered Chancellor Golovkin to burn the spiritual Catherine I. He did, nevertheless keeping a copy of the will.