He went down in history as the “Russian Don Quixote,” an admirer of chivalry, Prussian customs and his father’s politics. Passions that Paul I could not resist led him step by step to a tragic end.

Parental love was unfamiliar to Paul I. Nevertheless, he idolized his father, who was completely indifferent to him. Only once did Peter express his fatherly feelings - he attended Paul’s lessons, during which he loudly said to the teachers, “I see that this rogue knows subjects better than you.” And he awarded him the rank of guard corporal. When the coup of 1762 broke out in the country, ending with the death of the emperor, Paul was amazed. His beloved father, whose recognition he so wanted to achieve, was killed by his mother’s lovers. Besides, young man explained that in the event of Peter's death, the throne passed to him legally. Now Catherine II stood at the head of the country, but she was supposed to become an adviser and regent to the young heir. It turns out that she stole the throne from him!
Pavel was only seven years old. The murder of his father became a significant example for him, which instilled suspicion in him. His biographers note that from now on he felt only an unaccountable fear of his power-hungry mother. He subsequently did not trust his son Alexander either. As it turned out, not in vain.

Chivalry

Young Pavel's life passed without friends and parental love. Against the background of his loneliness, he developed a fantasy, he lived in its images. Historians note that as a child he was fond of novels about noble and brave knights and read a lot of Cervantes. The fusion of constant fear for life and chivalry determined the character of Emperor Paul I. He went down in history as the “Russian Hamlet” or “Russian Don Quixote.” He had highly developed concepts of honor, duty, dignity and generosity, and a sense of justice was sharpened to the limit. Napoleon called Pavel that way - “Russian Don Quixote”! Paul's medieval knightly consciousness, which he, like the Cervanto hidalgo, formed on chivalric novels, did not correspond to the time in which he lived. Herzen put it more simply: “Paul I was a disgusting and ridiculous spectacle of a crowned Don Quixote.”

Wilhemina of Hesse-Darmstadt

In one of the conversations with his teacher Semyon Poroshin, in a conversation about marriage, young Pavel said: “When I get married, I will begin to love my wife very much and will be jealous. I really don’t want to have a horn.” Pavel really adored his first wife, but betrayal loved one could not be avoided. Paul's wife was Princess Wilhemina of Hesse-Darmstadt, baptized Natalya Alekseevna. Wilhemina and her relatives pulled out a lucky ticket - their family belonged to the impoverished aristocrats, their daughters did not even have a dowry. Pavel himself fell in love with Wilhemina at first sight. In his diary, he wrote: “My choice had almost settled on Princess Wilhemina, who I like best, and I saw her in my dreams all night.” Catherine was pleased with her son's decision. If only they knew how it would end.
Natalya Alekseevna was a beautiful and efficient person. The unsociable and withdrawn Pavel came to life next to her. He married for love, which could not be said about Natalya, who simply had no choice. Pavel was ugly - a button nose, irregular facial features, short stature. Paul’s contemporary Alexander Turgenev wrote: “It is impossible to describe or depict Paul’s ugliness!” Given her position, Natalya Alekseevna soon found herself a favorite - the ladies' man Count Andrei Razumovsky, who, while still unmarried, accompanied her from Darmstadt. Their love correspondence has been preserved. After an unexpected sudden death Natalya as a result of childbirth, Catherine II showed Paul evidence of his wife's infidelity. After reading the letters, Pavel, who loved his wife so sincerely, learned that Natalya preferred Razumovsky to him “before last day throughout my life I never stopped sending tender notes and flowers to my friend.” Pavel did not come to his wife's funeral. Contemporaries noted that it was from this moment that Paul “came into that state of mental disorder that accompanied him all his life.” From a gentle and sympathetic young man, he turned into a psychopath with an extremely unbalanced character.

Exercirmeistership

Paul's favorite pastime, which he inherited from his father, was military affairs; his uncontrollable passion for execution - the trifles of military service - is especially noteworthy. Following the fate of Peter III, Paul determined his sad fate with his passion.
During the war, the young Tsarevich loved the aesthetic side - the beautiful harmony of the form, the impeccable execution of parades and military reviews. He staged similar “male spectacles” every day. Officers were strictly punished if their soldiers, when passing in front of the sovereign, did not maintain formation well and marched “out of step.” Military training became training for ceremonial purposes. Following his mania, Pavel completely changed the uniform of the soldiers, largely copying them from the Prussian costume: short trousers, stockings and shoes, braids, powder. Suvorov, who preferred to live in the village rather than fit into a Prussian uniform, wrote: “There are no lousier people than the Prussians: you won’t be able to pass through a Schilthaus or near a booth without infection, and their headdress with its stench will make you faint. We were clean from the muck, and she is the first nuisance of the soldier now. Boots are rot for your feet."

Prussian order

The Prussian order corresponded exactly to Paul's pedantry. One of the researchers of that time writes: “In Prussia, everything went as if by magic: with mathematical precision, the king from his Sans Souci commanded both the state and the army, and all the secondary performers were nothing more than subordinate persons.” Like Peter III, Paul became an ardent admirer of Frederick II, and considered the Russian order abnormal, and all “because of the woman on the throne”: “we conducted our affairs in a unique way, not only not following the general flow of imitation of the Prussians, but even with disdain looked at the apeism of all Europe.”
Paul's main internal political failure was the desire for complete centralization in command and control, which violated the long-standing traditions of the Russian army and showed negative results during military operations. The system of centralized subordination in the Gatchina troops did not work for the entire country. The destruction of duty stations, which represented the headquarters of senior commanders, offices - all these innovations were dictated by the desire of the suspicious Pavel not to give anyone any rights. They disrupted the communication of commanding officers of all levels with the troops, interfered with the work of the headquarters and ultimately led to a complete breakdown of troop control even in normal peacetime.

The Gatchina Palace, which his mother gave to Paul, in her attempts to alienate the legitimate thirty-year-old heir from the court, became a real delight for Paul I. Ironically, or according to Catherine’s plan, the former palace of Count Orlov, who was ordered to kill Peter III and even paternity, became Paul’s home heir. The Tsarevich created his own state there, based on his fantasies of chivalry, mixed with love for the Prussian order. Today, from Gatchina, its architecture, and decoration, one can reconstruct the character of Paul I - it was completely his brainchild, his Versailles, which he prepared as his future imperial residence. Here he created the Gatchina troops as a silent protest against military system during the reign of Catherine. Paul’s “fun squads” consisted mainly of Prussians; the Russians were reluctant to go there - low pay, uncomfortable uniforms, long and tedious training, and difficult guard duty contributed to the fact that people from the impoverished nobility served in Gatchina only in cases of emergency.
Gatchina was a special closed world, a counterweight to St. Petersburg, where the heir was despised and considered a holy fool. With Pavlovsk's court closed, new state reforms were born Russian Empire, which was started by Paul I and continued by his son Alexander.

Mikhailovsky Castle

In November 1796, Paul's dream finally came true; after the death of his mother, he received the crown, despite all Catherine's attempts to remove her son from the throne. Pavel decided to bring his old plan to life - to build his own residence in St. Petersburg, on the site where he was once born, in the Summer Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna, which was subsequently destroyed. In a conversation with the maid of honor Protasova, Pavel said: “I was born in this place, and I want to die here.”
The Mikhailovsky Castle reflected all of Paul's passion for medieval chivalry. The name itself - a castle, not a palace, as well as the dedication of the new residence to the Archangel Michael, the leader of the heavenly army - all this was a reference to knightly culture. Modern architects see in the castle the symbolism of the Order of Malta - not surprising, because in 1798 Pavel became the Grand Grand Master, and many of his officers became Knights of Malta. Mikhailovsky Castle is similar to the famous Neuschwanstein of Ludwig of Bavaria, who was so captivated by the medieval fairy tale that he built himself a real palace from legends in the Alps, in which he, like Paul in Mikhailovsky, became a victim of a political coup.

The story of Paul 1 actually began with the fact that Empress Elizaveta Petrovna, the premarital daughter of Catherine the First (who is believed to have been a Baltic peasant by birth), having no children of her own, invited Paul’s future father to Russia. He was a native German city Kiel, K.P. Ulrich of Holstein-Gottorp, Duke, who received the name Peter at baptism. This fourteen-year-old (at the time of the invitation) young man was Elizabeth’s nephew and had rights to both the Swedish and Russian thrones.

Who was the father of Paul the First is a mystery

Tsar Paul 1, like all people, could not choose his parents. His future mother arrived in Russia from Prussia at the age of 15, on the recommendation of Frederick the Second, as a potential bride for Duke Ulrich. Here she got Orthodox name got married in 1745 and only nine years later gave birth to a son, Pavel. History has left two opinions about the possible father of Paul the First. Some believe that Catherine hated her husband, so paternity is attributed to Catherine's lover Sergei Saltykov. Others believe that the father was still Ulrich (Peter the Third), since there is an obvious portrait resemblance, and it is also known about Catherine’s strong hostility towards her son, which may have arisen from hatred of his father. Pavel also disliked his mother throughout his life. A genetic examination of Pavel’s remains has not yet been carried out, so it is not possible to accurately establish paternity for this Russian Tsar.

The birth was celebrated for a year

The future Emperor Paul 1 was deprived of parental love and attention from childhood, since his grandmother Elizabeth, immediately after his birth, took her son from Catherine and placed him in the care of nannies and teachers. He was a long-awaited child for the whole country, since after Peter the Great, Russian autocrats had problems with the continuity of power due to the lack of heirs. Celebrations and fireworks on the occasion of his birth in Russia continued for a whole year.

The first victim of the palace conspiracy

Elizabeth thanked Catherine for the birth of her child with a very large sum - 100 thousand rubles, but showed her son to her mother only six months after his birth. Due to the absence of his mother nearby and the stupidity of the overly zealous staff serving him, Pavel 1, whose domestic and foreign policy in the future was not logical, grew up very impressionable, sickly and nervous. At the age of 8 (in 1862), the young prince lost his father, who, having come to power in 1861 after the death of Elizabeth Petrovna, was killed a year later as a result of a palace conspiracy.

More than thirty years before legitimate power

Tsar Paul 1 received a very decent education for his time, which he long years could not put it into practice. From the age of four, even under Elizabeth, he was taught to read and write, then he mastered several foreign languages, knowledge of mathematics, applied sciences and history. Among his teachers were F. Bekhteev, S. Poroshin, N. Panin, and he was taught the laws by the future Metropolitan of Moscow Platon. By right of birth, Paul already had the right to the throne in 1862, but his mother, instead of a regency, came to power herself with the help of the guard, declared herself Catherine the Second and ruled for 34 years.

Emperor Paul 1 was married twice. The first time was at the age of 19 on Augustine-Wilhelmina (Natalya Alekseevna), who died during childbirth along with her child. The second time - in the year of the death of his first wife (at the insistence of Catherine) to Sophia Augusta Louise, Princess of Württemberg (Maria Feodorovna), who would give birth to ten children to Paul. His older children will suffer the same fate as himself - they will be taken in to be raised by the reigning grandmother, and he will rarely see them. In addition to children born in a church marriage, Pavel had a son, Semyon, from his first love, maid of honor Sofia Ushakova, and a daughter from L. Bagart.

His mother wanted to deprive him of the throne

Pavel 1 Romanov ascended the throne at the age of 42, after the death of his mother (Catherine died of a stroke) in November 1796. By this point, he had a set of views and habits that determined his future and the future of Russia until 1801. Thirteen years before Catherine’s death, in 1783, he reduced his relationship with his mother to a minimum (it was rumored that she wanted to deprive him of the right to the throne) and in Pavlovsk began to build his own model of state structure. At the age of 30, at the insistence of Catherine, he became acquainted with the works of Voltaire, Hume, Montesquieu and others. As a result, his point of view became the following: in the state there should be “bliss for everyone and for everyone,” but only under the monarchy

Coalitions with Europe during the reign

At the same time, in Gatchina, removed from business at that time, the future emperor was engaged in training military battalions. His love for military affairs and discipline will partly determine what the foreign policy of Paul 1 will be. And it will be quite peaceful, compared to the time of Catherine the Second, but not consistent. At first Paul fought against revolutionary France(with the participation of Suvorov A.V.) together with Britain, Turkey, Austria and others, then broke the alliance with Austria and recalled troops from Europe. Attempts to go on an expedition with England to the Netherlands were unsuccessful.

Paul 1 defended the Order of Malta

After Bonaparte in France concentrated all power in his hands in 1799 and the likelihood of the spread of the revolution disappeared, he began to look for allies in other states. And I found them, including in the face Russian Emperor. At that time, a coalition of united fleets was discussed with France. The foreign policy of Paul 1 in the period towards the end of his reign was associated with the final formation of a coalition against Britain, which had become too aggressive at sea (attacked Malta while Paul was Grand Master of the Order of Malta). Thus, in 1800, an alliance was concluded between Russia and a number of European states, which pursued a policy of armed neutrality towards England.

Utopian military projects

Paul 1, whose domestic and foreign policies were not always clear even to those around him, wanted to harm Britain in its Indian possessions at that time. He equipped the expedition to Central Asia from the Donskoy army (about 22.5 thousand people) and set the task for them to go to the Indus and Ganges region and “disturb” the British there, without touching those who oppose the British. By that time, there were not even maps of that area, so the campaign in India was stopped in 1801, after the death of Paul, and the soldiers were returned from the steppes near Astrakhan, where they had already managed to reach.

The reign of Paul 1 was marked by the fact that during these five years no foreign invasions were carried out on the territory of Russia, but no conquests were made either. In addition, the emperor, caring for the interests of the knights in Malta, almost dragged the country into direct conflict with the strongest naval power of that time - England. The British were perhaps his greatest enemies, while he had great sympathy for Prussia, considering the organization of the army and life in those lands to be his ideal (which is not surprising, given his origins).

Reducing government debt by fire

Paul 1 was aimed at trying to improve life and strengthen order in Russian reality. In particular, he believed that the treasury belonged to the country, and not to him personally, as a sovereign. Therefore, he gave orders to melt some silver services from the Winter Palace into coins and burn part of the paper money worth two million rubles in order to reduce the national debt. He was more open to the people than his predecessors, and even his followers, hanging out on the fence of his palace a box for sending petitions addressed to him, which often contained caricatures of the Tsar himself and lampoons.

Strange ceremonies with dead bodies

The reign of Paul 1 was also marked by reforms in the army, where he introduced a single uniform, regulations, and uniform weapons, believing that in the time of his mother the army was not an army, but just a crowd. In general, historians believe that much of what Paul did, he did out of spite for his mother who had passed away. There were even more than strange cases. For example, having come to power, he removed the remains of his murdered father Peter the Third from the grave. After which he crowned the ashes of his father and the corpse of his mother, placing a crown on his father’s coffin, while his wife, Maria Feodorovna, placed another crown on the deceased Catherine. After this, both coffins were transported to the Peter and Paul Cathedral, while the murderer of Peter the Third, Count Orlov, was carried in front of his coffin imperial crown. The remains were buried with a single burial date.

Paul 1, whose reign was short-lived, gained misunderstanding among many due to such events. And the innovations he introduced in various areas did not attract support from the environment. The Emperor demanded that everyone fulfill their duties. There is a well-known story when he gave the rank of officer to his orderly because the former did not independently carry his military equipment. After such incidents, discipline in the troops began to intensify. Pavel also tried to instill strict rules in the civilian population by introducing bans on the wearing of certain styles of dress and demanding that they wear German-style items of a certain color with a given collar size.

The domestic policy of Paul 1 also affected the sphere of education, in which, as expected, he contributed to improving the situation of the Russian language. After ascending the throne, the emperor banned ornate phrases, ordering him to express himself in writing as clearly and simply as possible. He reduced French influence on Russian society by banning books in this language (revolutionary, as he believed), and even banned playing cards. In addition, during his reign, it was decided to open many schools and colleges, restore the university in Dorpat, and open the Medical-Surgical Academy in St. Petersburg. Among his associates were both gloomy personalities like Arakcheev, and G. Derzhavin, A. Suvorov, N. Saltykov, M. Speransky and others.

How the Tsar helped the peasants

However, Paul 1, whose reign was 1796-1801, was rather unpopular than popular with his contemporaries. Taking care of the peasants, whom he rightly considered the breadwinners of all other classes of society, he introduced the exemption of farmers from work on Sunday. By this he incurred the discontent of the landowners, for example, in Russia, and the discontent of the peasants in Ukraine, where there was no corvee at that time, but it appeared for three days. The landowners were also dissatisfied with the ban on separating peasant families during sales, the ban on cruel treatment, the removal of duties from peasants to keep horses for the army and the sale of bread and salt from state reserves to them at preferential prices. Paul 1, whose domestic and foreign policies were contradictory, simultaneously ordered the peasants to obey the landowners in everything under pain of punishment.

Infringement of the privileges of the nobility

The Russian autocrat rushed between prohibitions and permissions, which may have led to the subsequent murder of Paul 1. He closed all private printing houses so that it would not be possible to spread the ideas of the French Revolution, but at the same time gave shelter to high-ranking French nobles, like Prince Condé or the future Ludwig the Eighth . He banned corporal punishment for nobles, but introduced for them a tax of twenty rubles per head and a tax for the maintenance of local government bodies.

The short-term reign of Paul 1 also included such events as a ban on resignation for nobles who had served less than a year, ban on filing collective noble petitions, abolition noble meetings in the provinces, legal actions against nobles who evaded service. The emperor also allowed state-owned peasants to register as petty bourgeois and merchants, which caused discontent among the latter.

Actually founded dog breeding in Russia

By what other actions did Paul 1 go down in history, whose domestic and foreign policy was a thirst for large-scale transformations? This Russian Tsar allowed the construction of temples according to Old Believer faith(everywhere), forgave the Poles who participated in the Kosciuszko uprising, began to purchase new breeds of dogs and sheep abroad, essentially establishing dog breeding. His law on succession to the throne is also important, which excluded the possibility of women ascending the throne and established the order of the regency.

However, with all positive aspects, the emperor was unpopular among the people, which created the preconditions for repeated attempts on his life. The murder of Paul 1 was committed by officers from several regiments in March 1801. It is believed that the conspiracy against the emperor was subsidized by the English government, which did not want Russia to strengthen in the Maltese region. The involvement of his sons in this action was not proven, however, in the 19th century, some restrictions were introduced on the study of the reign of this emperor in Russia.

He could not have children due to chronic alcoholism and, interested in the birth of an heir, turned a blind eye to the closeness of her daughter-in-law, first with Choglokov, and then with the chamberlain of the Grand Duke’s court, Saltykov. A number of historians consider Saltykov’s paternity to be an undoubted fact. Later they even claimed that Paul was not Catherine’s son. In "Materials for the biography of Emperor Paul I" (Leipzig, 1874) it is reported that Saltykov allegedly gave birth to a dead child, who was replaced by a Chukhon boy, that is, Paul I is not only not the son of his parents, but not even Russian.

In 1773, not even 20 years old, he married Princess Wilhelmina of Hesse-Darmstadt (in Orthodoxy - Natalya Alekseevna), but three years later she died in childbirth, and in the same 1776 Pavel married a second time, to Princess Sophia of Württemberg. Dorothea (in Orthodoxy - Maria Feodorovna). Catherine II tried to prevent the Grand Duke from participating in discussions of state affairs, and he, in turn, began to evaluate his mother’s policies more and more critically. Pavel believed that this policy was based on love of fame and pretense; he dreamed of introducing strictly legal governance in Russia under the auspices of the autocracy, limiting the rights of the nobility, and introducing the strictest, Prussian-style, discipline in the army.

In 1794, the Empress decided to remove her son from the throne and hand him over to her eldest grandson Alexander Pavlovich, but did not meet with sympathy from the highest state dignitaries. The death of Catherine II on November 6, 1796 opened the way for Paul to the throne.

The new emperor immediately tried to undo what had been done during the thirty-four years of Catherine II’s reign, and this became one of the most important motives of his policy.

The emperor sought to replace the collegial principle of organizing management with an individual one. An important legislative act of Paul was the law on the order of succession to the throne, published in 1797, which was in force in Russia until 1917.

In the army, Paul sought to introduce Prussian military order. He believed that the army is a machine and the main thing in it is the mechanical coherence of the troops and efficiency. In the field of class politics, the main goal was to transform the Russian nobility into a disciplined, fully serving class. Paul's policy towards the peasantry was contradictory. During the four years of his reign, he gave away gifts to about 600 thousand serfs, sincerely believing that they would live better under the landowner.

IN Everyday life They banned certain styles of clothing, hairstyles, and dances in which the emperor saw manifestations of freethinking. Strict censorship was introduced and the import of books from abroad was prohibited.

The foreign policy of Paul I was unsystematic. Russia constantly changed allies in Europe. In 1798, Paul joined the second coalition against France; At the insistence of the allies, he placed Alexander Suvorov at the head of the Russian army, under whose command the heroic Italian and Swiss campaigns were carried out.

The capture by the British of Malta, which Paul took under his protection, accepting the title of Grand Master of the Order of St. in 1798. John of Jerusalem (Order of Malta), quarreled him with England. Russian troops were withdrawn, and in 1800 the coalition finally collapsed. Not content with this, Paul began to draw closer to France and conceived a joint struggle against England.

On January 12, 1801, Pavel sent the ataman of the Don Army, General Orlov, an order to march with his entire army on a campaign against India. A little over a month later, the Cossacks began their campaign, numbering 22,507 people. This event, accompanied by terrible hardships, was, however, not completed.

Paul's policies, combined with his despotic character, unpredictability and eccentricity, caused discontent in various social strata. Soon after his accession, a conspiracy began to mature against him. On the night of March 11 (23), 1801, Paul I was strangled in his own bedroom in the Mikhailovsky Castle. The conspirators burst into the emperor's chambers demanding that he abdicate the throne. As a result of the skirmish, Paul I was killed. It was announced to the people that the emperor had died of apoplexy.

The body of Paul I was buried in the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg.

The material was prepared based on information from open sources

Pavel 1

Pavel Petrovich was born on September 20, 1754 in the city of St. Petersburg, in the Summer Palace. Subsequently, on the instructions of Paul, this palace was demolished, and Mikhailovsky Castle was erected in that place. At the birth of Paul 1, Paul's father, Prince Pyotr Fedorovich, the Shuvalov brothers and Empress Elizaveta Petrovna were present. After the birth of Pavel, his mother and father, in fact, due to political struggle, almost did not take part in raising their child. In his childhood, Pavel was deprived of the love of his relatives, since, by order of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna, he was separated from his parents and surrounded by a large number of nannies and educators. Despite the external resemblance between Pavel and his father, rumors constantly spread at court that the child was born from a union with one of his favorites, Sergei Saltykov. These rumors were aggravated by the fact that Pavel was born after 10 years of marriage between Catherine and Peter, when many already considered their marriage barren.

Childhood and upbringing of Pavel 1

One of the first people involved in raising Pavel was the famous diplomat F.D. Bekhteev, obsessed with compliance with various regulations, orders, military discipline bordering on drill. Bakhteev even published a newspaper in which he reported on all the actions of the boy Pavel. In 1760, grandmother Elizaveta Petrovna changed her mentor, creating new regulations that indicated the main parameters for training the future emperor; N.I. became his new mentor. Panin. The new teacher reached the age of 42 and had extensive knowledge, introducing additional subjects when teaching Pavel. A significant role in Paul’s upbringing was played by his entourage, among whom were the most educated people of that time, among whom it is worth highlighting G. Teplov and Prince A. Kurakin. Among Pavel's mentors was S.A. Poroshin, who from 1764 to 1765 kept a diary, which later became a source for studying the personality of Pavel 1. To raise Pavel, his mother Catherine acquired large library Korfa. Pavel studied subjects such as arithmetic, history, geography, the Law of God, fencing, drawing, astronomy, dancing, as well as French, Italian, German, Latin and Russian. In addition to the main training program, Pavel became interested in studying military affairs. During his studies, Pavel showed good abilities, was distinguished by a developed imagination, loved books and at the same time was impatient and restless. Loved French and German, mathematics, military exercises and dancing. At that time Paul received better education that others could only dream of.

In 1773, Pavel married Wilhelmine of Hesse of Darmstadt, who later cheated on him with Count Razumovsky, dying 2.5 years later during childbirth. In the same year, Paul 1 found himself a new wife, who became Sophia Dorothea of ​​Württemberg, who later received the name after accepting Orthodoxy. Traditionally, at that time, the final stage of training was a trip abroad, on which Paul and his new wife went in 1782 under the names of the fictitious Count and Countess of the North. During the journey, Paul visited Italy and France; his journey abroad lasted 428 days, during which the future emperor covered 13,115 miles of travel.

Relationship between Catherine 2 and Paul 1

Immediately after his birth, Pavel was removed from his mother; subsequently, Catherine saw her son very rarely and only with the permission of her mother Elizabeth. When Pavel was 8 years old, his mother, with the support of the guard, carried out a coup, during which Pavel’s father died under unclear circumstances. When Catherine 2 ascended the throne, the troops swore an oath not only to her, but also to her son Paul. But Catherine did not intend to transfer full power to him in the future, after her son reached adulthood, using him only as a possible heir to the throne after her death. During the uprising, the name of Paul was used by the rebels; Pugachev himself said that after the overthrow of Catherine’s power, he did not want to reign and was only working in favor of Tsarevich Paul. Despite this upbringing as the heir to the throne, the older Paul became, the further he was kept from government affairs. Subsequently, mother Empress Catherine II and son Pavel became strangers to each other. For Catherine, her son Pavel was an unloved child, born to please politics and the interests of the state, which irritated Catherine, who contributed to the spread of rumors that Pavel was not her own child, but was replaced in his youth on the orders of his mother Elizabeth. When Paul came of age, Catherine deliberately did nothing to mark the onset of this event. Subsequently, people close to Paul fell out of favor with the empress; relations between mother and son worsened in 1783. Then, for the first time, Paul, invited to discuss state issues, showed the opposite point of view to the empress in resolving important matters of the state. Subsequently, before the death of Catherine 2, she prepared a manifesto, according to which Paul was expected to be arrested, and his son Alexander was to ascend the throne. But this manifesto of the empress after her death was destroyed by secretary A.A. Bezborodko, thanks to which, under the new Emperor Paul 1, he received highest rank Chancellor

Reign of Paul 1

On November 6, 1796, having reached the age of 42, Paul 1 ascended the throne, after which he began to actively destroy the order established by his mother. On the day of his coronation, Paul accepted new law, according to which women were deprived of the right to inherit Russian throne. Subsequently, the reforms carried out by Emperor Paul 1 greatly weakened the position of the nobility, among which it is worth noting the introduction corporal punishment for committing crimes, increasing taxes, limited the power of the nobles, introduced liability for nobles evading military service. The reforms carried out during the reign of Paul 1 improved the situation of the peasants. Among the innovations, it is worth noting that the abolition of corvee on holidays and weekends and no more than three days a week, the grain offense was abolished, preferential sales of salt and bread began, a ban was introduced on the sale of peasants without land and the division of peasant families when they were sold. The administrative reform carried out by Paul restored the boards previously simplified by Catherine, the department of water communications was created, the state treasury was created and the position of state treasurer was introduced. But the main part of the reforms carried out by Emperor Paul 1 affected the army. During the reforms, new military regulations were adopted, limiting the service life of recruits to 25 years. Introduced new form clothing, among which it is worth noting the introduction of the overcoat, which later saved thousands of soldiers from the cold of the War of 1812; for the first time in Europe, badges were introduced for privates. The widespread construction of new barracks began, new units such as engineering, courier, and cartographic units appeared in the army. Enormous influence was given to the drill of the army; for the slightest offense, officers were expected to be demoted, which made the situation among the officers nervous.

Assassination of Emperor Paul 1

The murder of Pavel occurred on the night of March 11-12 in 1801; 12 guards officers took part in the conspiracy. Having burst into the emperor's bedroom, during the conflict that arose, Emperor Paul 1 was beaten and strangled. The masterminds of the assassination attempt were N. Panin and P. Palen (they were not directly involved in the murder). The reason for the rebels' discontent was the unpredictable, especially in relation to the nobility and army officers. The official cause of Pavel's death was apoplexy. Subsequently, almost all evidence incriminating the conspirators was destroyed.

The results of Paul's reign are perceived ambiguously; on the one hand, it is a petty and absurd regulation of everything, an infringement of the rights of the nobility, which strengthened his reputation as a tyrant and tyrant. On the other hand, there is a heightened sense of justice of Paul, and rejection of the era of the hypocritical reign of his mother Catherine, as well as innovative ideas and isolated positive aspects of the reforms he carried out in the empire.

There are many different rumors about the birth of Paul I, which were born in the palace corridors. The official version says that his parents were Peter III and Catherine II. The future emperor was under the care of Empress Elizaveta Petrovna from birth. She herself assigned him nannies, teachers and mentors. Under her constant gaze, he studied history, mathematics, foreign languages and geography. All the teachers noted that the heir was perfectly gifted by nature and was very smart.

At the age of 19, Pavel was married for the first time. His “chosen one” was Princess Augusta Wilhelmina Louise of Hesse-Darmstadt, who was named Natalya Alekseevna at baptism. The first wife died in childbirth. In 1776, Sophia Dorothea of ​​Württemberg, who was a relative of the Prussian king, became the new wife. Most likely, under the influence of his wife, Pavel began to like German customs.

Relations between Paul and his mother Catherine II were always cool. He believed that she was responsible for the death of his father Peter III. Catherine, in order to remove her son away from the court, gave him the Gatchina Palace, which, in fact, became a place of exile for the heir.

Isolated from the court, Pavel created his own “mini-court” and “army” in Gatchina. He organized shows and exercises.

In 1777, Pavel had a son, Alexander, who was immediately taken from his parents by his grandmother, and was raised by people appointed by Catherine.

PaulI- Russian Emperor

Paul became emperor at the age of 42. He did not have any special skills in conducting government affairs, which he compensated for with his brilliant abilities.

The first event held in the status of emperor was the coronation of the late Peter III and his reburial in the Peter and Paul Cathedral, next to Catherine II.

Paul's domestic policyI

The first document promulgated after Paul's coronation was the Act of Succession to the Throne. According to him, the direct descendants of the king in the male line became heirs, and women could claim it only in the absence of a direct descendant.

Paul I reformed the Senate, which could no longer cope with the increased volume of business, and demanded that everyone work faster public services. The emperor did not find much support among the noble class, since with some of his decisions he tried to alleviate the situation of the peasantry.

In addition, he began an attack on the privileges of the nobility and abolished some provisions (the ban on the use of corporal punishment against nobles) of the “Charter of Grant to the Nobility.” He believed that nobles had to serve and could not demand resignation if they had served for less than a year. Noble meetings were cancelled.

But the biggest dissatisfaction was caused by reforms in the army. Paul's admiration for the Prussian army order also influenced the Russian troops. Prussian regulations were taken as a basis, and even the inconvenient Prussian uniform replaced the Russian one. Drill and strict discipline were enforced in the army.

Paul's foreign policyI

From the very beginning, Paul I considered his main foreign policy task to be the fight against France, where the revolution took place. Having united, Türkiye, Great Britain, Sicily and Austria organized an anti-French coalition.

Placed in charge allied forces, liberated Northern Italy and made the famous crossing of the Alps. But soon, dissatisfied with the actions of the allies, Paul terminated allied relations with Austria and switched to another enemy - England. Paul, like many, was irritated that the bulk of world trade was concentrated in the hands of the British. A new coalition of the united fleets of Russia, France, Sweden and Denmark was taking shape.

After the capture of the island of Malta by the British fleet, Paul had no doubts, and he broke all relations with England. Malta was important to him as a promising base for the Russian fleet in the Mediterranean; moreover, Paul I was also the Grand Master of the Order of Malta.

At this time, the preconditions were being prepared for a rapprochement with Napoleon. Both emperors began to prepare a joint campaign in India, which was English colony. Units of the Don Army were even sent to Bukhara and Khiva in order to subsequently move to India.

Generally foreign policy Both contemporaries and subsequent analysts evaluate Paul I negatively.

End of Paul's reignI

Over time, all the actions of Paul I found more and more dissatisfied. On the night of March 11-12, 1801, the conspirators broke into the emperor's chambers and demanded his abdication. Pavel refused, and in the ensuing fight he was killed.

His son, Alexander I Pavlovich, was proclaimed the new Russian emperor. With the death of Paul I, an era ended palace coups in Russia.