Blood, tears and laurels. Historical miniatures

(Alexander Krokovsky; c. 1648 - 07/1/1718, Tver), Metropolitan. Kyiv, Galitsky and all Little Russia. The place and exact date of birth of I. are unknown. The date 1648 is given by Archpriest. F.I. Titov, who calls I. a peer of gr. B.P. Sheremetev and considers them possible fellow students. Until 1670, Krokowski graduated from the Kiev-Mohyla College, then studied in Rome at the College of St. Athanasius (course of philosophy and theology). He converted to Uniatism, but in 1683, upon arrival in his homeland, he returned to Orthodoxy.

Under the influence of Archimandrite Varlaam (Yasinsky; later Metropolitan of Kiev) became a monk at the Kiev Pechersk Lavra. From 1683 he taught poetics and rhetoric at the Kiev-Mohyla Collegium; in 1685-1689. He held the positions of professor of philosophy and prefect. On July 25, 1687, he signed the Kolomatsky Articles given during the election of Hetman I. S. Mazepa. In 1689-1690 I. acted as rector of the Kiev-Mohyla College. Diploma of the Kyiv Metropolitan. Varlaam dated January 20. 1692 was appointed rector. He opened a theology class and was the first to teach a full 4-year theological course (1693-1697). He resumed the student congregation (meeting), which was active during the time of the Kyiv Metropolitan. Petra (Tombs). He paid attention to the economic situation of the college. 11 Jan 1694 Tsars Peter I and John V, in response to I.'s proposal (with the support of Mazepa), confirmed the status of the college as a higher educational institution. She was given the rights of internal self-government and her own court; military and civil authorities were not supposed to interfere in governance. These rights were reaffirmed on September 26th. 1701 To the beginning XVIII century the number of students reached a record number of 2 thousand people. In 1713, I. invited Sheremetev to philosophical debates at the Kiev-Mohyla Academy. Aug 1 In 1719, the construction of a student dormitory (bursa) was completed, which was built entirely at the expense of I. In addition, he donated a significant number of his books to the library of the educational institution.

Simultaneously with the service in the college in December. 1688 I. was elected abbot of the Kyiv Desert Nicholas Monastery (the station wagon from Mazepa was issued on January 10, 1689). At the request of the abbot, February 23. 1692 Mazepa gave the monastery a universal for ownership of the village. Trostyanets. Since 1693, I. simultaneously ruled the Kyiv Brotherhood Monastery in honor of the Epiphany. On the initiative of I., at the expense of Mazepa, stone churches were built in both monasteries: in the Nikolaevsky Monastery - St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, and in Bratsk - Epiphany. On May 17, 1693, I. initiated the compilation by representatives of the Kyiv Town Hall of an inventory of the monastery estates with a clear definition of their boundaries. On June 15 of the same year, Mazepa, with his universal, confirmed all the possessions of the Bratsk Monastery (January 11, 1694 I. received a royal charter in Moscow with a similar confirmation), on June 16 - the rights of the Nikolaev Monastery to the villages of Maksimovka and Gorodishche. The Hetman's decree of July 30, 1694 ended the long-standing conflict between the Bratsky Monastery and the Mezhigorsky Monastery in honor of the Transfiguration of the Lord for the ownership of the mills on the river. Koturke. In 1702, I., already in the position of archimandrite of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, was forced to resolve a new conflict between these monasteries, which laid claim to lands in the Vyshgorod region.

On Nov. 1690 I. was one of the candidates for the post of archimandrite of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra, but Meletius (Vuyakhevich) was elected. Later, I. turned out to be a contender for service in the episcopal rank in the Pereyaslav diocese, the project for the creation of which was developed by Metropolitan. Varlaam and Mazepa. The latter mentioned I. as a future bishop in a letter dated March 9, 1695 to the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Adrian. In 1697, I. was elected rector of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra, and on June 29 of the same year in Moscow, Patriarch Adrian elevated him to the rank of archimandrite. In his new position, I. paid a lot of attention to the construction and decoration of churches. Under him, in 1698, the construction of a temple in the name of All Saints was completed at the expense of Mazepa. In 1700, a c. was built in the Near Caves at the expense of Poltava Colonel P. Gertsik. in honor of the Exaltation of the Precious Cross (consecrated on September 14 of the same year by Metropolitan Varlaam). In 1701, the construction of a fortress wall around the Lavra, 1190 m long and approx. thick, which began in 1698 with Mazepa’s funds, was completed. 3 m and height approx. 7 m with 4 towers and 3 gates. By order of Peter I of October 8. In 1706, construction of another rampart began around the monastery. At the request of I. November 30. In 1702, Preobrazhensky Zmievsky was assigned to the Lavra, and on January 2. 1703 - Pokrovsky Sennyansky mon-ri (both within the Belgorod diocese).

I. paid considerable attention to organizing the work of the Kiev-Pechersk printing house. A new stone building was built especially for it and equipment was purchased. With the direct support of I., approx. 40 books, including “The Book of Lives of Saints” by Met. Rostov Demetrius (Savich (Tuptalo)) (1689-1705), Kiev-Pechersk Patericon (1702), Altar Gospel (1707), etc. In addition, secular publications were printed here, for example. “Military article” (1705). I. wrote the preface to the “Kievo-Pechersk Patericon”, in which he praised the activities of Tsar Peter I and thereby supported the political reforms being carried out in the country.

Oct 19 In 1707, a council of the metropolitan clergy was held in Kyiv, at which I. was elected Metropolitan of Kyiv. The ordination took place in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin on August 15. 1708 with the participation of the locum tenens of the patriarchal throne of Ryazan, Metropolitan. Stefan (Yavorsky). 14 Sep. In 1708, I. was issued a charter from Peter I. In 1711, I. headed the consecration as bishop of Lutsk as abbot. Kirill (Shumlyansky). By his order, April 9. In 1714, the Onufrievsky Morovsky monastery was founded. I. continued the construction of the Kyiv St. Sophia Monastery, which was badly damaged in the fire of 1697. He actively defended the Kiev monasteries in their disputes with the city magistrate, as evidenced by the letter of Hetman I. Skoropadsky dated June 2, 1712.

12 Nov In 1708, at the Trinity Cathedral in the city of Glukhov, at the request of Peter I, the Metropolitan led the service, at which anathema to Mazepa was proclaimed. At the same time, I. did not himself preach a sermon condemning Mazepa, entrusting this to Fr. Afanasy Zarutsky, and did not sign the act of electing the new hetman Skoropadsky. I.’s death was accelerated by the “case” of Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich. The latter slandered the Metropolitan during interrogation, saying that he participated in the conspiracy. By order of Peter I, I. was summoned to testify in St. Petersburg, but died along the way, in Tver. Buried on August 24. in the Transfiguration Cathedral in Tver. D.N. Bantysh-Kamensky adhered to the version of I.’s poisoning, but did not provide any evidence. After I.'s death, until 1722, no one was appointed to the Kyiv department.

The development of I.’s philosophical views was influenced by the work of the Mogilev bishop. Joseph (Kononovich-Gorbatsky). I. belonged to the so-called. the Aristotelian-rationalist direction (its representatives are considered to be Archbishop Innocent (Gisel), Novgorod Archbishop Feofan (Prokopovich), Mogilev Archbishop George (Konissky), etc.). The manuscripts preserve records in Latin of I.'s lecture courses on rhetoric (1683), philosophy (1686) and theology (1693-1697). The course in rhetoric is secular in nature, using as examples the texts of I. himself, the Kyiv Metropolitans Peter (Mogila) and Sylvester (Kosov), Archimandrite. Innocent (Gisel), etc. In the philosophical course, there is a noticeable departure from Aristotelian philosophy and a tendency towards separating philosophy from theology. I. criticized Thomism and other movements of Western Christianity. thoughts, opposed the idea of ​​the primacy of reason over will. In addition, he is known for his works on history, for which ancient Russians were used as sources. chronicles, chronicle of M. Stryikovsky, “Synopsis” archim. Innocent, "Chronicle" abbot. Feodosius (Safonovich) and others. I. compiled a chronicler describing the events of world and Russian history, outlining the events of the 17th century. used his own memories. In 1698, having revised “The Tale of Glorious Miracles...” by Abbot. Feodosius, I. published an akathist for the Military Medical Center. Varvara.

Arch.: NBUV IR. F. 2. No. 260/152С; Disputes from logic / Transl. from Lat.: I. V. Paslavsky // LNB. V. r.; TsGIAC. F. 57. Op. 1. D. 40; F. 128. Op. 1 gram. D. 60; Op. 1a here. D. 28; F. 220. Op. 1. D. 210, 219; F. KMF-7. Op. 2. D. 3.

Lit.: IRI. T. 1. Part 1. P. 163; History of the Rus or Little Russia. M., 1846. P. 225; Filaret (Gumilevsky). Review. Book 1. P. 299; Zakrevsky N.V. Description of Kyiv. M., 1868. T. 2. P. 535, 541; Chistovich I. A. Feofan Prokopovich and his time. St. Petersburg, 1868. P. 21, 107; Stroev. Lists of hierarchs. Stb. 7, 13, 18, 21; Vostokov A. From the past of Kyiv // Kiev antiquity. 1889. T. 27. No. 10. P. 185-190; Storozhenko N.V. From family legends and archives // Ibid. 1892. T. 36. No. 2. P. 347-348; Mukhin N. F. Kiev-Brotherly School Monastery. K., 1893. S. 104, 113-129; [Lazarevsky A.] East. little things // Kyiv antiquity. 1894. T. 45. No. 5. P. 357-360; Jabłonowski A. Akademia Kijowsko-Mohilańska. Kraków, 1899/1900. S. 153, 157, 162-164, 167, 172-173, 175, 177-179, 181, 191-193, 197, 208, 211, 215, 217-218, 230, 243; Golubev S. T. Kiev Academy at the end. XVII and beginning XVIII century K., 1901. P. 54-55. Note; Letter from Queen Catherine to the Metropolitan of Kyiv. Joseph Krokovsky // Kyiv antiquity. 1902. T. 77. No. 5. Dep. 2. P. 86; Letter from Hetman Skoropadsky to Metropolitan. Joseph Krokowski 1712 // Ibid. 1904. T. 87. No. 11. Dep. 2. P. 51-52; Joasaph Krokovsky, Metropolitan. Kiev, Galician and Little Russia (1708-1718) // Kyiv EV. 1905. No. 51. Part unofficial. pp. 1296-1304; Titov F.I., prot. Russian Orthodox Church in the Polish-Lithuanian state in the 17th-18th centuries. K., 1905. T. 1. P. 275-288; T. 2. P. 456-470; aka. Imp. KDA in her three-century life and work (1615-1915): History. a note. K., 20032. P. 102, 105, 125, 134, 136, 145, 174-175, 178, 211, 213, 215-216, 218, 220, 223, 244, 478-479; Denisov. pp. 295, 299; Lototsky O. Autocephaly. Warsaw, 1938. T. 2. P. 443, 444; Paslavsky I. V. The problem of universals in “Logic” by Joasaf Krokowski // Philosophical Thought. 1973. No. 5. P. 60-65; aka. Criticism of metaphysics to Thomism in the natural philosophy of Joasaf Krokowski // Ibid. 1976. No. 5. P. 94-108; Mytsyk Yu. A. Ukr. brief chroniclers of the con. XVII - early XVIII century // Certain problems of domestic historiography and source studies: Sat. scientific works Dnepropetrovsk, 1978. P. 34-41; Zapasko Ya., Isayevich Ya. Catalog of old hands, seen in Ukraine, 1765-1800. Lviv, 1981. Book. 1. No. 716, 729, 744; Stratiy Ya. M., Litvinov V. D., Andrushko V. A. Description of courses in philosophy and rhetoric taught by professors at the Kiev-Mohyla Academy. K., 1982. P. 14; Zahara I. S. On the subject and tasks of logic at the Kiev-Mohyla Academy // Domestic Society. Thought of the Middle Ages: Historical Philosophy. essays. K., 1988. P. 300-309; Inventory of the Kiev Museum of the 70-80s. XVIII century K., 1989. P. 34-35, 39, 187, 190, 198, 290, 321, 325; Vlasovsky I. Drawing the history of the UOC. NY; K., 1990. T. 3. P. 18; Berlinsky M. F. History of the city of Kiev. K., 1991. P. 134, 138, 146, 177, 188, 190, 192, 242; Bidnov V. Church anathema to Hetman Ivan Mazepa // Starozhitnosti. 1992. No. 15. P. 10-11; No. 16/17. P. 9; 1993. No. 2. P. 28-30; Bantysh-Kamensky D. N. History of Little Russia. K., 1993. S. 488-489; Krizhanivsky O. P., Plokhii S. M. History of the Church and religious thought in Ukraine. K., 1994. Book. 3. P. 104; Bolkhovitinov E. Vibrani praci from the history of Kiev. K., 1995. P. 62, 68, 73, 188, 203, 205, 227, 251, 258, 296, 318, 331, 348, 363-365; Blazheyovsky D. Hierarchy of the Kiev Church (861-1996). Lviv, 1996. P. 371; Krivtsov D. Yu. Preface by Joasaph Krokovsky to the edition of the “Kievo-Pechersk Patericon” of 1702: Lit. Features and ideological trends // Probl. origin and existence of ancient Russian monuments. writing and literature: Sat. scientific tr. N. Novg., 1997. P. 72-106; Verovka L. S. Krokovsky Oleksandr, Yoasaf // Kiev-Mohyla Academy in names, XVII-XVIII centuries. K., 2001. P. 297-299; Stepovik D. History of the Kiev-Pechora Lavra. K., 2001. P. 183-185; Kagamlik S. R. Diyach Mazepinskoï dobi: (Metropolitan Yoasaf Krokovsky) // Ukrainian Church History. calendar, 2003. K., 2003. P. 104-106; she is the same. Kiev-Pechersk Lavra: Holy Orthodoxy. spirituality and culture (XVII-XVIII centuries). K., 2005. P. 285-287; Khizhnyak Z. I., Mankivsky V. K. History of the Kiev-Mohyla Academy. K., 2003. P. 57, 59, 77, 83, 87-88, 97, 103, 111, 126, 129-131; Pavlenko S. O. The sharpening of Hetman Mazepi: Companions and followers. K., 2004. P. 260-261; aka. Ivan Mazepa yak budivnichy ukr. culture K., 2005. P. 95-96; Prokop "yuk O. B. Spiritual consistory in the system of diocesan administration (1721-1786). K., 2008. P. 55.

V. V. Lastovsky

Iconography

Large ceremonial portrait of I. 1st quarter. XVIII century (after 1718) was in the metropolitan house at the St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv (in 1909 it was transferred to the TsAM KDA, since the 20s of the 20th century it has been in the collection of the NKPIKZ). I. is depicted in full bishop's liturgical vestments (sakkos, omophorion, miter, club), with a tall staff without a sulok in his right hand and with a small cross in his left, on his chest there is a cross and a panagia in the form of a double-headed eagle. The details of the vestment are richly decorated with floral patterns using folk art motifs. The figure on a dark green ornamented background is framed by a dark red draped curtain, on the right is a lectern with a standing crucifix (on it is a rosary), on the left is a folding chair. I. has a narrow face, a high forehead, sparse shoulder-length hair and a straight gray beard down to the middle of his chest. Under the image in the center is the coat of arms of I. with the initials of the name and title, on the sides in 4 columns is written a rhymed epitaph glorifying the wisdom and merits of the hierarch (the text is almost lost, published: Petrov. 1910. P. 536-538; Ukrainian Portrait. 2004 pp. 171-173).

In the Assumption (Great) Church. Among the images of the Lavra abbots of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra there was a portrait of I. 1st half. XVIII century (NKPIKZ). The Metropolitan is shown in a slight turn to the right, his hand with a rosary rests on a table with a crucifix and the Gospel. He is dressed in a bishop's mantle and a white hood with black trim, on his chest there is a cross and a panagia with the image of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, in his right hand - a rod; The bishop's coat of arms is placed in the upper right corner. I.'s facial features are recognizable - an elongated, even nose, a sparse gray beard and mustache, small eyes under dark eyebrows. Half-length versions of this portrait are known, 2nd floor. XX century (NKPIKZ), one of which was in the congregational hall of the KDA (mentioned see: Rovinsky. Dictionary of engraved portraits. T. 4. Stb. 293).

Lit.: For visitors to the portrait hall at the KDA: [Cat.]. K., 1874. S. 9. No. 25; Lebedintsev P. G., prot. Kiev-Pechersk Lavra in its past and present state. K., 1886. P. 62; Petrov N.I. Collection of old portraits and other things, transferred in 1909 to the Central Academy of Arts at the KDA from the Kyiv Metropolitan House // TKDA. 1910. No. 7/8. pp. 536-538. No. 36; Zholtovsky P. M. Ukrainian painting XVII-XVIII centuries. K., 1978. S. 193, 195; Beletsky P. A. Ukrainian portrait painting of the 17th-18th centuries. L., 1981. S. 119, 121; Catalog of preserved monuments of the Kiev Church and Archaeological Museum 1872-1922 / NKPIKZ. K., 2002. P. 44, 155. No. 95; Ukrainian portrait of the 16th-18th centuries: Cat.-album / Author-ukl. : G. Belikova, L. Chlenova. K., 2004. P. 171-173. No. 153; St. Demetrius, Metropolitan of Rostov: Research and materials. Rostov, 2008. P. 76.

E. V. Lopukhina

About the origin of Paul I

At the beginning of March 1772, in the abyss of the Indian Ocean, the man to whom the Russian Emperor Paul I owed his birth found his last peace. An escaped convict died on a French frigate a few miles from Ile de France. He died surrounded by former convicts with faces mutilated by the executioner: some had their nostrils torn out, some had their tongues cut off. However, in such company he could not help but feel at ease. After all, he spent twenty years behind bars: three and a half years in the dungeons of the Secret Chancellery, the remaining seventeen years in the Shlisselburg casemate.

He was sentenced to death, exiled to Siberia, was supposed to be buried alive in Nerchensk in an eternal settlement, but was sent to Kamchatka to prison. In the end, he was freed. But he couldn't bear it. He was not afraid of either the frosts of Siberia or the dampness of Shlisselburg. But he was unable to endure the tropical heat. According to maritime law, the body was thrown overboard.

In March 1772, Pavel was already eighteen years old.

Pushkin called Paul a “romantic emperor.” Indeed, the biography of this king is a more than romantic plot. But the story “before Paul,” that is, the biography of Catherine II’s unborn son, is a real adventure novel that could hardly have been created by a writer’s imagination.

Paul himself did not know what he owed to that man whose body rested at the bottom of the Indian Ocean. It is unlikely that the dead man himself could have guessed this. He was not Paul's father. And his name was Joseph.

Joasaph
On January 11, 1772, two French frigates, the Dauphiné and the Laverdi, left Canton. They headed for France. Their path lay through Ile de France (now St. Mauritius). When leaving the Canton mouth, three Chinese junks moored to the ships and fifty Russians boarded. Subjects of Emperor Pavel Petrovich. The year was 1772. Empress Catherine II reigned in Russia. Her son, the heir to the throne, was not yet 18 years old, and they had already sworn allegiance to him while his mother was alive.

The appearance of the “loyal subjects” of the non-existent Russian emperor should have alerted the captain of the frigate: the faces of the people boarding the ship were disfigured by the executioner. They wore Siberian furs - sable and marten. There was also money. Before setting sail, they robbed the treasury and captured a ship, then sold it to the Portuguese in Macau.

However, among those who swore allegiance to Paul were not only criminal rabble. Among them were navigation students with a navigator, and a clerk, and a corporal, and a merchant, and Cossacks, and a priest. There were also townspeople and soldiers, poll payers, Kamchadals and industrialists, their wives, and, of course, women without specific occupations. Only seventy people. In general, the company is motley. But they called themselves: “A company assembled for the name of His Majesty Pavel Petrovich.” The crown prince’s already tiny empire was now reduced to the size of a ship’s deck.

This more than strange formation arose in Kamchatka, in the town of Bolsheretsk, in a place of exiled settlers. It all started more than ordinary. Several exiles led by the Hungarian M.A. The Beniovskys planned an escape. In prison, he pretended to be an innocent victim for the interests of the heir Paul, showing everyone some kind of velvet envelope, which he seemed to have received from the sovereign himself. “Agitation” fell on fertile ground. Among those serving sentences in the Bolsheretsky prison there were also people who actually suffered for Pavel: demoted officers Vasily Panov, Semyon Guryev and Pyotr Khrushchev.

On April 26, 1771, the rebellious prison guards dealt with the head of the Bolsheretsk military team and brought the residents to the oath to the “legitimate sovereign.” Now in Bolsheretsk it was Pavel Petrovich. Moreover, on May 11 they drew up an “Announcement”, a kind of manifesto. It said that the “legitimate sovereign Pavel Petrovich” was unjustly deprived of the throne, Catherine’s government orders were presented in a black light, and she herself was certified with “vilifying words.” The “announcement” ended with the following maxim: “Viva and glory to Paul the First, the owner of Russia!”

The usurpers, freed from power, captured the galliot "St. Peter". The flag of Pavel Petrovich was raised on the ship. Everyone who boarded signed an oath of allegiance to Emperor Paul. But Paul’s newly-made subjects did not go to St. Petersburg. They set off for the shores of Japan. However, the Japanese did not allow them to go ashore. I had to swim further. "Saint Peter" ended up in the Portuguese colony of Macau. At the beginning of 1772, the “freedomists” from the Bolsheretsky fort reached Canton and, having chartered two ships, headed for France.

The most “high-ranking” among the loyal subjects of Emperor Paul the First turned out to be “Colonel Josaf Baturin”. This is what he signed in the “Advertisement”. In reality, he was only a second lieutenant of the Shirvan Infantry Regiment.

Among the Tsarevich’s “loyal subjects” there was no person who had a greater influence on Paul’s fate than this adventurer. According to Catherine II, Baturin was “all in debt, a gambler and known everywhere as a great scoundrel, but a very determined man.” The “track record” of the “decisive scoundrel” who played a decisive role in the fate of Paul turned out to be long and varied. He was brought up in the Land Noble Corps. He was released into the army as an ensign. But he was soon sentenced to death for obscene and discourteous words against his colonel von Ekin. Moreover, he declared “word and deed” against him, as well as against Prince Kozlovsky. The accusation turned out to be false. But Baturin was not executed. They removed their rank and sent them to Siberia for government work. Here he again declared “word and deed” against the same persons and again falsely. After serving his time, he joined the army as a soldier and rose to the rank of second lieutenant. In the second half of 1749, together with his Shirvan regiment, he ended up in the town of Raevo, near Moscow. It was here that the most interesting thing happened - an event that predetermined the entire subsequent life of the adventurer...

"Conspiracy in its entirety"
At the end of 1749, Empress Elizaveta Petrovna stopped kissing the hand of the heir. book Peter Fedorovich. Soon, on behalf of the Empress, he was threatened with the Peter and Paul Fortress and was unequivocally reminded of the fate of Tsarevich Alexei.

Elizabeth's threats were quite real, and most importantly, they were made for a reason. And Pyotr Fedorovich knew this very well.

In the summer of 1749, Pyotr Fedorovich heard from the lips of one of the regimental officers that he “does not recognize any other ruler but him, and that the Imperial Highness could count on him and the entire regiment in which he was a lieutenant.”

This remarkable conversation took place near Mytishchi, near Moscow. In the summer of 1749, when the grand ducal court was in Raevo, the main entertainment was hunting. Grand Duke Peter became close friends with his huntsmen who kept his dog pack, “he ate and drank with them, and when hunting he was always among them.”

Lieutenant Baturin, whose regiment was stationed near Mytishchi, also made a close acquaintance with the rangers. Joseph assured the rangers that he “showed great devotion to the Grand Duke” and claimed that the entire regiment was with him. The huntsmen reported this to Pyotr Fedorovich. The heir not only “willingly listened to this story,” but also wanted to find out details about this regiment through his rangers. Soon Baturin began to seek a meeting with Peter through the rangers. The Grand Duke did not agree immediately. He hesitated for a long time, but then “began to give in; Little by little it happened that when the Grand Duke was hunting, Baturin met him in a secluded place. He fell on his knees before Peter and swore “not to recognize any sovereign other than him, and that he will do everything that the Grand Duke orders.”

Pyotr Fedorovich was somewhat embarrassed by such an expression of devotion and even a little frightened. Later, when Baturin was already being tortured in the Secret Chancellery, Pyotr Fedorovich told his wife that “having heard the oath, he got scared, spurred his horse, leaving Baturin on his knees in the forest.” He claimed that the huntsmen who presented Joseph did not hear what he said. Peter assured his wife that he “no longer had any relations with this man” and that he even warned the huntsmen to beware lest this man bring them misfortune.”

However, Catherine was sure that after the meeting in the forest, several more meetings and negotiations took place between the rangers, the Grand Duke and “this officer.” “It’s difficult to say,” wrote Catherine, “whether he told me the truth; I have reason to think that he was detracting when talking about the negotiations that he may have been conducting, for even with me he spoke about this matter only in fragmentary phrases and as if against his will.”

After Joseph's oath in the forest, Peter Fedorovich kept everything that happened a secret and did not even share it with his wife. The huntsmen pretended that they had not heard what exactly Baturin said to the Grand Duke.

Joseph took the silence of the Grand Duke and his indulgence in meeting with him on a hunt as Peter’s formal consent. Baturin convinced a hundred soldiers of his regiment to swear allegiance to the Grand Duke, assuring that he had received the consent of Peter himself to enthrone him during the hunt. The grenadiers, whom Joseph tried to win over to his side, denounced him. One can imagine the heir’s fear when the huntsmen informed him that Baturin had been arrested and taken to the Secret Chancellery. Soon it came to the huntsmen. They also ended up in Preobrazhenskoye. They also approached the heir himself.

Under torture, Baturin confessed to his relations with the Grand Duke through the huntsmen. They were caught giving the heir the opportunity to meet with Jehoshaph. Fortunately, they were only “lightly” interrogated. The huntsmen did not want to slander Peter. They were soon released and sent abroad. But they managed to let the Grand Duke know that they had not named him.

In her memoirs, Catherine claimed that she knew nothing about this story and was absolutely not involved in it. True, this is highly doubtful. Not only her husband hunted in Raevo, but she herself did too. And it was for her that Baturin played a viva on the “postman’s trumpet” and shouted that he would be glad to see her husband on the throne. It is difficult to believe that this man, who demonstratively showed devotion to the grand ducal couple, did not interest her, and she did not make inquiries about who this daredevil was. However, from the point of view of the Secret Expedition, even if she ignored everything said and done by Joseph, she was still guilty, like her husband, of not reporting.

Catherine II
Ekaterina after arriving in Russia
However, there is reason to think that Peter was not just an indifferent listener to the half-crazed drunken officer, but showed a certain interest in what he was offering. In the first edition of her memoirs, Catherine claimed that when she reigned, she found Baturin’s investigative file among the papers of the late Elizabeth. It was very voluminous and, probably, the empress never read it. That is why she did not have a correct idea about this matter. In reality, although the case was started “recklessly and carelessly,” it “was a conspiracy in its entirety.” According to Catherine, Baturin wanted to elevate Peter Fedorovich to the throne, imprison the empress in a monastery and slaughter everyone who could interfere with his plans.

Shortly before her death, Catherine again began to write her notes. Here Baturin’s plans were presented as follows: “He planned, no more, no less, how to kill the empress, set fire to the palace and in this terrible way, thanks to the confusion, to elevate the Grand Duke to the throne.”

Contrary to what she wrote twenty years ago, the memoirist now asserted: “I have not read or seen this case.” Obviously, Catherine lied completely shamelessly. Now, twenty years later, she sought to exaggerate and present Baturin’s plans as more sinister and bloody than they actually were.

In fact, Joseph had no intention of killing Elizabeth Petrovna or imprisoning her in a monastery; his plans were to arrest the empress and keep her under arrest until Peter Fedorovich was crowned. The Empress would remain on the throne, but her nephew would have "one state administration and would keep the army in better order."

In other words, Baturin wanted to achieve co-government between Peter Fedorovich and Elizaveta Petrovna, that is, a female autocrat and a male heir, dividing power between them based on gender. In this case, the entire “male part” would go to Peter.

Baturin's case remains unclear. Many pages are missing, and important readings have disappeared. It is clear from the case that Baturin, in addition to the soldiers of his regiment, intended to use Moscow factory workers who were dissatisfied with their position to implement the plan. Preobrazhensky battalion, life companies. Josaf entered into relations with the Moscow merchant E.D. Lukin.

To carry out his plan, he intended to take 5,000 rubles from him on behalf of the Grand Duke. Baturin wrote a note to Pyotr Fedorovich from the merchant in Latin letters.

No matter how reckless Jehoshaph's adventure was, it discredited Peter. He entered into relations with the attacker. Not only did he not inform, but through his silence he expressed sympathy for his plans. The Baturin case revealed quite clearly: the heir dreams of power and is ready to succumb to proposals directed against Elizabeth.

But to take measures against Peter Fedorovich would mean destroying that fragile stability at the Russian court, when the daughter of Peter the Great sat on the throne, and she had an heir, the grandson of the great transformer. There was no one to replace the Holstein yet. That is why Elizabeth could not make a decision on this matter for a long time. This explains the subsequent fate of Joseph. After spending almost four years in the dungeons of the Secret Chancellery, he was finally transferred to Shlisselburg “to a strong detention” without any sentence and turned into a nameless convict and was doomed to complete silence for seventeen years. The Russian “iron mask” had a state secret. She owned “compromising evidence” on the heir. But no one was supposed to know this.

When Peter III reigned, the Senate condemned Baturin to eternal exile in Nerchinsk, but the emperor decided to leave him in Shlisselburg, giving him better food.” It seems that Baturin was a victim of devotion to the Grand Duke, and therefore his fate should have been made easier. But even in Nerchensk they should not have known about the secret life of the former heir to the throne.

In 1768, a note from Shlisselburg from Baturin fell into the hands of Catherine II. He reminded her how in 1749 in Raev he shouted that he wanted to see her husband on the throne, and played “Vivat” on the trumpet. Catherine exiled him to Kamchatka. But not because it reminded her of an episode of her youth. In the casemate, Baturin calculated from the stars that Peter III was alive and would return soon. The Empress, so as not to chat and write letters, sent him to a settlement. “To a hungry and cold place... without clothes or shoes.” The former "Whore" prisoner is called "crazy and not told to believe what he will say."

The rest is known. This is how the secret of Paul’s origin ended up at the bottom of the Indian Ocean. A mystery that no one has solved. They didn’t solve it not because they were looking in the wrong place. We moved along the wrong path, suggested by Catherine.

"To His Imperial Highness, Tsarevich and Grand Duke Pavel Petrovich"
On April 21, 1771, Catherine II began writing her autobiographical notes. Five days later, the Pacific epic of the Shlisselburg astronomer began in Bolsheretsk. The nameless convict, who turned into the “former Colonel Baturin,” sailed under the French flag along the waters of the Indian Ocean to France, and the Empress described her unhappy married life. She told how on his first wedding night Peter fell asleep and slept until the morning. When A.N. was married off in 1749. Rumyantsev, then she, like Catherine herself, remained a girl. Peter courted the Princess of Courland, but things could not go beyond winks “in view of the characteristics of this gentleman.”

She did not complete her story until the moment when Pavel was born in September 1754. The reader is left in the dark as to how Peter's transformation into a man took place.

But in the description of the wedding night there is one very important phrase: “Things remained in this situation for 9 years without the slightest change.” This must be understood in such a way that 9 years later, when Pavel was born, something very important changed. But what exactly, Catherine never said. She interrupted work on this edition of the Notes, never bringing it to this episode.

After Catherine's death, in her office, among the Empress's handwritten manuscripts, Paul found a sealed package. It was addressed to himself by his mother's hand. These were notes about the life of the empress, written by herself. Here Pavel read something interesting about his mother, about his father, about their relationship. And your birth. There were also a few words about the “decisive scoundrel” Joseph.

According to the notes, in the early 1750s, twenty-year-old Catherine reached the peak of her physical beauty and charm. “They said that I was as beautiful as day,” wrote Catherine. Naturally, she could not help but become the object of search for many gentlemen. The most outstanding of them was Sergei Saltykov. “He was as beautiful as day,” the empress recalled.

He was "as beautiful as day." She was "as beautiful as day." Could a romance not arise between them, the fruit of which would also become “as beautiful as day”?

But that did not happen. It didn’t happen because Peter’s wife was and remained a highly moral person. Despite all the humiliation and insults to which her underdeveloped husband subjected her.

The “beautiful” seducer, but devoid of strict moral qualities, began to try to seduce the “beautiful”, but completely abandoned by her legal spouse, Catherine. At first she did not see through the intriguer, devoid of moral principles, but showed a rare nobility of soul, despite the temptations; first of all, she thought about the seducer’s wife, and made every effort to force him to change his way of thinking.

Empress Elizabeth became aware of Saltykov’s harassment. Her Majesty’s distinctive feature was that when she wanted to scold, “she did not scold for what she could scold, but she seized on an excuse to scold for something that never even occurred to her that she could scold.”

Elizaveta Petrovna
Empress Elizaveta Petrovna
This time, Elizaveta Petrovna scolded Catherine because of her manner of dressing and because the Grand Duchess rode a horse like a man. The Empress told Chief Chamberlain M.S. Choglokova, who supervised the small court, that the Grand Duchess’s manner of riding prevented her from having children, and that her costume was completely indecent.” Choglokova replied: “Children cannot appear without a reason, and that although their Imperial Highnesses have been married since 1745, there was no reason.” Then Elizaveta began to scold Choglokova and said that she “will punish her for not trying to reason with the interested parties on this matter; In general, she showed strong anger...”

In other words, outraged by Saltykov’s harassment, the Empress scolded Choglokova due to the fact that the grand ducal couple still remained childless and threatened to punish her if the situation did not change. Then Choglokova decided to “literally carry out the orders of the empress.” Through the chamberlain Bressan, she introduced the Grand Duke to the widow of the artist Grotto. After persuasion, the “young and beautiful widow” agreed to do what was required of her. “Finally, thanks to her labors, Choglokova achieved her goal, and when she was confident of success, she warned the Empress that everything was going according to her wishes. She expected great rewards for her labors, but in this respect she was mistaken, because she was given nothing; Meanwhile, she said that the empire was indebted to her.”

At the beginning of winter, Catherine began to show “mild signs of pregnancy.” But they soon disappeared due to the tedious race when moving to Moscow. Meanwhile, Choglokova, “always busy with her favorite concerns about the succession to the throne,” invited Catherine to choose her own lover. She had to choose between Lev Naryshkin and Sergei Saltykov. However, Peter’s wife “pretended to be naive” and did not take advantage of the offer. For this, Choglokova “scolded her a lot.”

As we see, Choglokova, who provided her chambers for communication between Catherine and Saltykov, was nevertheless convinced that the romance unfolding before her eyes remained platonic, and she was even forced to push the Grand Duchess to take a decisive step. But it was not there. Despite her attachment to Saltykov, whose interest in Catherine began to gradually fade away, the Grand Duchess still remained faithful to her unloved husband.

In June 1753, after a three-month pregnancy, Catherine suffered a miscarriage. Finally, on September 20, 1754, she gave birth to Paul.

His father was Catherine’s husband, Pyotr Fedorovich. Thanks to his communication with the widow Grotto, he gained experience that he had previously lacked. This is the exact meaning of the text written by Catherine’s hand.

Apparently, this is exactly how Paul understood it. In any case, he did not destroy this important document, which shed light on its origin.

Only a malicious person could draw the conclusion from this story of Catherine that the father of Catherine’s child was Saltykov, and not her husband, who by this time had acquired the necessary practical skills. Moreover, it seems that the entire emotional story about Saltykov was introduced into the narrative primarily in order to especially emphasize the moral height of Pavel’s mother. After all, she did not become a victim of an insidious and unworthy seducer, despite the skillfully placed traps and almost open coercion on the part of Choglokoy!

This was the message to Paul that his mother left after her death.

Where could the assumption come from that Catherine hinted in this text that Saltykov was Pavel’s father?

In the early 1770s, a group of adventurers swore an oath to Paul to the population of the Kamchatka fort, and then the loyal subjects of the minor heir headed to Europe. Meanwhile, the crown prince’s coming of age, to whom the throne was to be transferred, was inexorably approaching. At this time, Catherine, who had begun work on her notes, was most interested in presenting Paul's origins as at least dubious. Therefore, Catherine then wrote about the physiological failure of her husband, who was unable to conceive a child. But in the mid-1790s, when the final edition of the memoirs was created, the situation had already changed significantly. The question of the dubious origin of the son has already lost its former political relevance. Now it was much more important for Catherine to present in her memoirs the image of an ideally morally pure woman. Therefore, the affair with Saltykov was described here in such a way as to emphasize the moral height of the Grand Duchess. However, the early edition remains. Since the first edition dealt with the physiological failure of Peter, and in the second the story of Paul’s birth was preceded by a detailed account of Catherine’s affair with Saltykov, hence the suspicion was born that the favorite had accomplished something that her husband was incapable of. But this is only an impermissible connection of two different texts. Meanwhile, the reasons for the birth of Paul must be sought in the case of Joseph.

"The Great Strife... Over the Bath"
Baturin was imprisoned in the Shlisselburg fortress in 1753. On September 20 of the following year, Paul I was born. A medal was made for this occasion. On the medal, a woman personifying Russia is preparing to take into her arms the newborn crown prince sitting on a pillow. In the cloud is a genius with a scepter in his hand and a star on his head. The inscription read: “The desired one has come.” It could not have occurred to anyone that there was some connection between Baturin’s imprisonment in Shlisselburg and the fact that the desired one finally came, nine years after his parents’ marriage. And there was a connection...

In the first week of Lent in 1750, Catherine asked permission to go to the bathhouse before fasting. M.S. Choglokova, on behalf of the queen, gave permission and added that it would not hurt Peter to go there either. The Grand Duke could not stand the heat of the Russian bath, and declared that “he would not even think of doing this.” He was outraged that they dared to address him with such speeches. And here the state lady Elizabeth expressed the most important thing, for the sake of which poor Peter was forced for the first time to do something that he physically could not bear. She asked the Grand Duke “if he knew that the Empress could imprison him in the St. Petersburg fortress for such speeches, for his disobedience to his will.”

At these words, Peter trembled and asked in turn, “whether she was speaking to him on her own behalf or on behalf of the Empress.” Choglokova did not directly answer this question, but stated that “she warned him about the consequences that his reckless behavior could have, and that if he wished, the Empress herself would repeat to him what she, Choglokova, had just told him, because His Majesty had already threatened him with the fortress more than once, apparently having his own reasons for doing so, and he should have remembered what happened to the son of Peter the Great because of his disobedience.”

Catherine was no less alarmed than his husband. She came to the conclusion: the threat to the Peter and Paul Fortress came from Elizabeth. Further reflection led the Grand Duchess to an important conclusion: the conversation took place in direct connection with the Baturin case and that the threats to Peter “were calculatedly aimed at making the Grand Duke feel all the unreasonableness of his behavior.” Catherine claimed that Peter, however, did not understand this, and continued to believe that he was threatened with the Peter and Paul Fortress and the fate of Tsarevich Alexei because of his reluctance to wash in the bathhouse. This is how this episode is described in the edition of the memoirs of the early 1770s. In the final edition of the Notes, in the story about this episode, there is another very important detail. It clearly shows what the real consequences of Baturin’s adventure were for the grand ducal couple.

“In the end she left and said that she would convey this conversation word for word to the Empress. I don’t know what she did, but she came back and the conversation took a different turn, for she said that the Empress said and was very angry that we don’t have children yet, and that she wanted to know which of us two was to blame for what I she would send a midwife, and a doctor for him, she added to all this many other offensive and meaningless things.... I did not know, - wrote Catherine, - how the empress judged this, but be that as it may, the question of one or the other subject."

In the text of the final edition of Catherine’s memoirs, this was the first mention that the issue of childlessness was raised in Elizabeth Petrovna’s conflicts with the grand ducal couple. Unlike the earlier edition, where Catherine makes it clear that her husband was simply unable to conceive a child purely physiologically before reaching the age of 25, the memoirist this time did not say a word about it. It turned out that the issue of childlessness became acute in connection with the disclosure of Baturin’s adventure. True, in this latest edition of the memoirs, the crafty memoirist tried to hide that the feud over the bathhouse and the threat to the fortress arose in connection with the case of Joseph.

However, in the early version, Catherine, describing the feud over the bathhouse, did not mention a word that during it the issue of childlessness came up. But from this text it is clear that it was put in place precisely because Peter Fedorovich was compromised by the case of Joseph. Although Catherine does not at all want the reader to understand why this particular question began to worry Elizabeth so much, it is quite obvious that Baturin’s adventure made it very relevant.

Catherine, true to her rule of presenting events in such a way that their true meaning is inaccessible to the reader, described this curious episode in this way.

We are talking about the beginning of 1750, that is, when Baturin was tortured in the Secret Chancellery. Outraged by the fact that Catherine had a beautiful new outfit, Elizabeth sent Choglokova with orders not to appear in this form again. “In addition,” the memoirist writes, she was angry with me because, having been married for four years, I had no children, that the fault for this was solely hers, that, obviously, I had a hidden flaw in my physique, which no one knew about. I didn’t know, and that’s why she would send me a midwife to examine me.”

Catherine replied regarding the toilet that she would follow exactly the orders of the empress, and as for the “second point”, the Grand Duchess showed complete submission here too. Since Elizabeth was the master of the situation, and she, Catherine, was in her power, she meekly submits to the royal will. Peter tried to protect his wife. He sharply objected to Choglokova “about the children and the examination.” At the end of the conversation, Choglokova stated that she would convey everything to Her Majesty.

Be that as it may, no medical examination of Catherine was carried out. Having described this scene, the memoirist more than “frankly” made it clear to the reader that only her husband, Pyotr Fedorovich, was to blame for “the fact that there were no children.” But even this seemed insufficient to Catherine. In order to strengthen the impression (God forbid, any of the readers might have a doubt: maybe the Grand Duchess herself could not conceive a child), she placed an expressive passage in her notes. P.N. Vladislavova, who was with the Grand Duchess, stood up for her, seeing her tears, found Elizabeth’s act unfair and therefore said to her ward: “How can you be to blame for the fact that you have no children, while you are still a girl; the empress cannot but know this, and Choglokova is a big fool for conveying such talk to you; Her Majesty should blame her nephew and herself for marrying him too young.”

Count I.I. Lestok
Count I.I. Lestok
So, the most important thing, Catherine said through the mouth of Vladislavova and added on her own behalf: “Meanwhile, I learned long later that Count Lestocq (life physician - M.S.) advised the Empress only to marry the Grand Duke when he was over 25 years old , but the empress did not follow his advice." Vladislavova promised the Grand Duchess to bring to the attention of the Empress “the true state of affairs, as she understood it.”

Obviously, Vladislavova is introduced into the story only to utter phrases that stigmatize Peter.

The indication of the age of 25, when the Grand Duke may be able to conceive an heir, is also extremely interesting. Peter was born in 1728. He turned twenty-five years old in 1753. That is, at the time when Catherine conceived her first child, but the pregnancy ended in a miscarriage. Definitely, Catherine wanted to emphasize that before this age her husband was physically unable to become a father. It is very important that in this edition of the memoirs, this was the first conversation about childlessness, and it was allegedly caused by the fact that the Grand Duchess was too keen on outfits. It is also characteristic that here all the blame is placed on Peter. Since all the troubles and misfortunes that befell the grand-ducal couple always, under the pen of Catherine, look as if they were caused only by the behavior of her husband, then the same technique was used when explaining the reasons for the childlessness of the grand-ducal couple. As always, Peter is to blame for everything. At the same time, there is not a word that the dispute over the bathhouse occurred in connection with the Baturin case. And this is very significant.

In the “Chronological Notes” that Catherine prepared for her notes, she placed a reprimand about the outfit in different parts of her essay. In the first chronological row, “the reprimand at Maslenitsa about the outfit and about other things that are equally important, and by the way...” is placed after the feud over the bathhouse. But in the second row of chronological notes, these events have already changed places. Obviously, the memoirist did not describe what actually happened, but was looking for where this passage could be placed more effectively. However, it is not so important when the empress scolded the grand ducal couple because of childlessness, before the quarrel over the bathhouse, after this quarrel, or during it. Much more significant is that the empress’s indignation at the childlessness of Peter and Catherine was a consequence of Joseph’s adventure.

The Baturin case forced Elizabeth to acutely raise the question, if not about directly replacing the heir, then about creating a counterweight to him, which would, by the very fact of its existence, keep Peter and his wife from any action against Elizabeth. Such a counterweight could be a baby who for some reason was never born to an heir.

This became especially necessary after the Baturin affair also because the relationship between Elizabeth and Catherine worsened every year. It was in her that the empress began to see an immediate threat to her power. Meanwhile, the question involuntarily arises: was it really possible that during all the seven years that had passed since the wedding, Catherine was satisfied with the position of her wife-girl. Why did she herself put up with such an unnatural situation for a married woman? After all, in her “Notes” there is not even a hint that this more than a strange situation bothered her in any way. Except that this state of affairs suited her quite well.

What really happened?

Catherine II
Catherine II. 1763
From Catherine’s memoirs it is not difficult to conclude that after the Baturin story revealed Peter’s secret ambitious thoughts, attacks on the childlessness of the grand-ducal family intensified. “Everyone unanimously shouted that after 6 years of marriage I had no more children,” wrote Ekaterina. There can hardly be any doubt that while the supervision of Peter and Catherine was to become even more severe, extraordinary relaxations began. After all, it is very difficult to imagine that a year before the affair of Joseph, Peter would have been allowed to have an intrigue with the artist’s widow, and Catherine would have been introduced to some chamberlain of the grand ducal court. The grand ducal couple was forbidden to leave the palace without permission, even for a walk.

It is impossible to imagine that the Choglokovs, who supervised the small court, could be so blind, or hate each other so much, that all this would take place, for any other reason than Elizabeth’s desire to get a grandson, the future, as quickly as possible. heir.

Whatever Catherine’s relationship with Saltykov really was, who, it seems, hastened to run away as soon as from the point of view of the highest power there was no longer a need for him, one thing is obvious: it was the Baturin case that was the milestone after which Catherine could no longer put off birth of a child.

When Catherine sat down to write her memoirs, she very carefully hid how, literally from the first step in the Russian capital, she began to fight for the throne. Of course, she could not confess and talk about how her deliberate childlessness was a very important part of this struggle. However, it was necessary to somehow explain the child’s absence for such a long time. And she found an excellent explanation - the reason for this was Peter’s semi-infancy. Dead Peter could no longer object now. Moreover, by presenting her husband in such an unsightly light to the public, she led the reader to the idea that such a “freak” could not reign and was therefore overthrown.

This is exactly how “the desired one came” - this is truly “the desired one,” but not for Catherine and Peter!

MM. Safonov
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© Historical magazine “Gatchina through the centuries”

From the case of the chamberlain Alexander Turchaninov and his accomplices - ensign-Preobrazhensky Pyotr Kvashnin and Izmailovo sergeant Ivan Snovidov, arrested in 1742, it is clear that, indeed, there was a criminal “mob and conspiracy” with the aim of overthrowing and murdering Empress Elizabeth. The accomplices discussed how to “assemble a party,” with Kvashnin telling Turchaninov that he had already persuaded a group of guards. Snovidov “said that his party had about sixty people taken care of.” They also had a specific plan of action: “Divide those gathered in two and come to the palace at night and, seizing the guard, enter Her chambers and. V. and His Imperial Highness (Peter Fedorovich) to be killed, and the other half... to arrest the life-company, and whoever of them resists will be stabbed to death.” The ultimate goal of the coup was also clearly expressed: “To return Prince Ivan (the deposed Emperor Ivan Antonovich) and place him on the throne as before.”

Ioann Antonovich

These conversations cannot be considered ordinary drunken chatter - among the ten thousand guardsmen there were many dissatisfied with both the overthrow of Emperor Ivan Antonovich on November 25, 1741 and the rise to power of Elizabeth, and with the fact that the life companies - three hundred guardsmen who carried out this coup - received for their an easy “feat” of unprecedented privileges. Turchaninov, serving as a footman in the palace, knew all the entrances and exits from it and could become a guide to the Empress’s bedchamber. And this was very important - after all, it is known that on the night of November 9, 1740, Lieutenant Colonel K. G. Manstein, who entered the palace on the orders of B. X. Minikh with soldiers to arrest Regent Biron, almost failed the whole business: in search In the regent's bedchamber, he got lost in the dark palace passages. Only an accident allowed Turchaninov's conspiracy to be revealed.

Another conspirator, Second Lieutenant Joasaph Baturin, was an extremely active, fanatical and mentally unstable person. He was also distinguished by his penchant for adventurism and the ability to attract people with him. In the summer of 1749, Baturin drew up a coup plan, which provided for the arrest of Empress Elizabeth and the murder of her favorite A. G. Razumovsky (“chop him while hunting or look for him in another manner of death”). After this, Baturin intended to force the highest church hierarchs to hold a ceremony to proclaim Grand Duke Peter Fedorovich Emperor Peter III.

Pyotr Fedorovich

Baturin’s plans do not seem like the ravings of a crazy loner. He had accomplices in the guard and even in the lifeguard company. The investigation showed that he also negotiated with the workers of the Moscow cloth factories, who at that time were rebelling against the owners. Baturin and his accomplices hoped to receive money from Pyotr Fedorovich, distribute it to soldiers and workers, promising them, on behalf of the Grand Duke, to give them the salary he had withheld immediately after the coup. . Baturin expected, at the head of a detachment of soldiers and workers, to “suddenly raid the palace at night and arrest the empress and the entire court.” Baturin even managed to waylay the Grand Duke while hunting, and during this meeting, which horrified the heir to the throne, he tried to convince Pyotr Fedorovich to accept his proposals. As Catherine II, Peter’s wife, wrote in her memoirs, Baturin’s plans were “not at all comical,” especially since Peter hid from Elizabeth Petrovna a meeting with him on a hunt, which unwittingly encouraged the conspirators to be active - Baturin took the Grand Duke’s silence as a sign of his consent .

But the plot failed; at the beginning of the winter of 1754, Baturin was arrested and imprisoned in the Shlisselburg fortress, from where in 1767, having won over the guards, he almost made a daring escape. But this time he was unlucky: his conspiracy was exposed and Baturin was exiled to Kamchatka. There, in 1771, together with the famous Benyovsky, he staged a riot. The rebels captured the ship and fled from Russia, crossed three oceans, but Baturin died off the coast of Madagascar. His whole history suggests that such an adventurer as Baturin could, under a favorable set of circumstances, achieve his goal - to carry out a coup d'etat.

“...Baturin was a second lieutenant of the Shirvan regiment. After demotion and exile to Siberia, he pulled the soldier’s burden for a long time, again rising to the rank of second lieutenant, now in the Shuvalov regiment, stationed near Moscow. And again the arrest: the “crazy nobleman” tried to attract artisans to participate in the palace coup; 25 years before Pugachev, he started a popular revolt. During Elizabeth’s stay in Moscow, in the summer of 1749, Baturin, an officer of the regiment called to pacify the workers of the Bolotin cloth factory, planned, with the help of soldiers and eight hundred striking craftsmen, to imprison Elizabeth, kill Razumovsky and elevate Peter Fedorovich - later Peter III - to the throne. “His Highness could have protected every poor person against the strong,” said Baturin.

Catherine II, after the death of Joasaph Andreevich, wrote: “As for Baturin, the plans for his case are not at all funny. I didn’t read after or see his work, but they probably told me that he wanted to take the life of the empress, set fire to the palace and, taking advantage of the general embarrassment and confusion, install the Grand Duke on the throne. After torture, he was sentenced to eternal imprisonment in Shlisselburg, from where, during my reign, he tried to escape and was exiled to Kamchatka, and escaped from Kamchatka with Benyevsky, robbed Formosa on the way and was killed in the Pacific Ocean.”

“Moscow agitator” - Baturin was called in one of the Russian magazines at the end of the 19th century. The “agitator,” after being “closely held” in prison for another 16 years, from 1753 to 1769, served as a “nameless convict” in Shlisselburg. At night, Baturin looked for the star of his emperor in the prison window to talk to it. In 1768, Baturin wrote a letter to Catherine and for this, along the ancient route of convicts, through Siberia and the port of Okhotsk, he arrived in Bolsheretsk in 1770... - you can read all this in the book “The Image of a Distant Country” by A. B. Davidson and V A. Makrushina.

Alas... Much was completely wrong in this story. At least, the materials of the Central State Archive of Ancient Acts, which contains the case “On Second Lieutenant Joasaph Baturin, who planned to dethrone Empress Elizabeth in favor of Grand Duke Peter Fedorovich,” speak of something else.

Joasaph Andreevich was the son of a lieutenant in the Moscow Police Chief's Office. In 1732, he entered the Gentry Cadet Corps, and in 1740, he was released as an ensign into the Lutsk Dragoon Regiment and served here for seven years.

In February 1748, it so happened that the tenth company, in which Joasaph served, was left without a commander, and Baturin, on his own initiative, took command of the company, believing that he was fully worthy of it. But that was not the case - Colonel Elnin had already appointed a new company commander. Baturin received him with hostility and said to his regimental commander approximately the following: “It’s in vain, Mr. Colonel, you deign to offend me. I’m a good commander and I haven’t seen any unrest.” And, by the way, he added that if he is not appointed commander, then he will be forced to ask the inspector general, when he arrives at the regiment, for an audience and show the inspector general all the problems in the regiment, and also tell all the dragoon grievances. The colonel shouted furiously: “Arrest! Shackle! “Quiet” him!” “Tikhomirka” is a regimental prison where, in violation of the regulations, Colonel Elnin had once already detained warrant officer Tikhomirov.

“I don’t deserve this, to be forged and put in prison,” Baturin answered sharply and refused to hand over his sword to the colonel.
Then, according to military regulations, he was put under house arrest. Baturin was initially resigned, but the next day he came to the regimental office and, in the presence of all the chief officers, accused Colonel Elnin of treason.

As the investigation found out, Baturin’s denunciation turned out to be false - the only witness, warrant officer Fyodor Kozlovsky, refused to confirm Baturin’s accusation that Elnin had insulted the late Empress Anna Ioannovna, “of blessed memory, eternally worthy,” who, for well-known reasons, did not spare anything for the Duke of Courland.

But... “for those dishonest actions of his, it was ordered that Baturin be deprived of his ensign rank and patent, sent to government work for three years, and after that, to the regiment until he served as a dragoon.” And it was here that a fatal hitch occurred, probably while waiting for the verdict to be approved at the highest level - and Baturin was even released from custody, having been given bail. Then he received the rank of second lieutenant in accordance with the “regulus” for length of service. And all this was like a ladle of cold well water, which was splashed out without a trace onto the hot stones of the soul of a second lieutenant without rank, a prisoner-executive, an ambitious man, the likes of whom one can only look for in Russian history. But the order came to take Baturin under guard again.

This arrest had fatal significance for Joasaf Andreevich - immediately ensign Timofey Rzhevsky of the Vyborg Regiment and sergeant of the Perm Dragoon Regiment Alexander Urnezhevsky appeared at the secret chancellery and reported that Baturin was inciting them, with the support and financial assistance of Grand Duke Peter Fedorovich, to raise the factory people of Moscow and “the life company of the Preobrazhensky battalions located in Moscow,” and then, they say, “we will arrest the entire palace - ... Alexei Grigorievich Razumovsky, where we will not find his like-minded people - we will chop everyone into small pieces for something from him, Alexei Grigorievich “There will be no coronation for His Imperial Highness for a long time, and the Empress will not be allowed out of the palace until His Highness is crowned.”

What did ensign Baturin of the Lutsk Dragoon Regiment have against Empress Elizabeth? Nothing. He agreed that “Her Imperial Majesty would have full power as it now is, and His Highness, by order of Her Imperial Majesty, would have only one government and would maintain the army in better order...”. That is, Baturin needed a person on the throne who would move forward his, Baturin’s, military career.

All of Baturin’s anger was directed only against Count Razumovsky. What was it that irritated him so much? The fact that Razumovsky, the son of a simple Cossack, a singer in the imperial choir, ended up at the helm of power, the favorite of the empress? Let's say. But what exactly - envy of the successes of a lucky lover or a just feeling of civil indignation at all these sycophantic favorites close to the throne, a feeling that all true sons of the Fatherland experienced, possessed Baturin? Did he think about Russia, about the stagnation, spiritual and economic, that the country was experiencing?

And here is the answer of Baturin himself: “... he, Baturin, wanted to show his excellency his service, but he was not allowed to see his excellency and was expelled from his excellency’s chambers by a court lackey with dishonesty and he, Baturin, thought that it was so dishonest for him His Excellency ordered the deportation.”

Just like that, I would have caressed you, kissed you - and no bloody conspiracies for you.

For four years Baturin sat in the dungeon of the secret chancellery under a strong guard, awaiting confirmation, but it did not follow - apparently, Elizabeth agreed with the verdict - and in 1753 Joasaph Andreevich was transferred to the Shlisselburg fortress, in solitary confinement, for perpetual detention...

After 15 years spent in solitary confinement, he and the young soldier Fyodor Sorokin handed over a letter, which the “colonel” asked to hand over personally to the Tsar or Tsarina.

This was in 1768, when Catherine II was already ruling.

After reading Baturin's letter, the empress became very angry. How dare they remind her of who was her husband for so many years and with whom it was finished once and for all, whose bones had long since rotted, just as the memory itself should have rotted, but someone’s false rumors creep and creep that he alive and - on you! - will appear at God's judgment...

On May 17, 1769, Chief Prosecutor Vyazemsky, fulfilling the monarch’s will, put before Catherine a decree on the fate of Baturin, which ordered “to send him to the Bolsheretsky prison forever and have his food there through his work, and, moreover, to closely watch him so that he leaves from there.” could not; however, no one should trust any of his denunciations, and no less, and his disclosures.”

“So be it,” Catherine wrote, but fate will not soon put an end to Baturin’s wanderings.

Baturin was sent from Okhotsk to Kamchatka separately from everyone else on the galliot "St. Catherine", so most likely he knew nothing about the intentions of Benyevsky, Winbland, Stepanov and Panov to capture the galliot "St. Peter" and flee abroad on it.

But in the Bolsheretsk revolt, Baturin took an active part, for which he eventually received the much-desired and long-awaited rank of colonel, in which he was listed in the register of the crew of the rebellious galliot, second on the list after his leader.

And one more inaccuracy in the notes of Catherine the Great - Baturin was not killed in the Pacific Ocean during
robbery of Formosa, and died on February 23, 1772 while moving from Canton to France.

Anisimov "Russian torture"

Where is Belarus, and where are the filibuster seas? Meanwhile...

An adventurer and a pirate, some consider him a Russian pirate, others a Hungarian, others a Pole, some consider him an Austrian count, the natives of Madagascar believe that he is a descendant of local kings, the Belarusians call him a Corsair of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and their fellow countryman. His pedigree is vague: in some sources he is mentioned as a Hungarian, in others it is specified that his ancestor, a nobleman of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, simply emigrated to Hungary.

The personality is mysterious and overgrown with legends, but the truth is of course simpler.

August Benevsky, grandson of a Polish-Jewish emigrant who converted to Christianity and became related to the Hungarian gentry. Thus, Polish, Jewish, possibly Belarusian and Hungarian blood flowed in his veins. Moritz August Benevsky was born in 1741 in Slovakia, graduated from the military academy, and in his youth he entered the Austrian army. When Poland began to be threatened, Benevsky hurried to his homeland and received the title of count and the rank of colonel in Poland.

During the reign of Empress Catherine II, Poland finally lost its independence. The Poles repeatedly rebelled for independence. There were also many Jews among the rebels. The uprising, called the Bar Confederation, was a protest of the nobility of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth against their king Stanislav August Poniatowski, the confederates declared the king deposed, and Catherine II, in response to this, sent troops into the lands of her western neighbor.

In one of the battles, the general of the Bar Confederation, who fought against Tsarist Russia, was captured by the Russians. Mauricius-August Benevsky. He became a general for a reason, although he came from a poor Polish-Hungarian nobility. There was a time when every young nobleman could become a hero. During the war, the desire of the Poles to become independent became increasingly evident.

“Germans and Muscovites will not be able to stand it when we draw our broadswords. That slogan will raise all of us and our Fatherland.” Ya. Dombrovsky.

Benevsky was an ardent Polish patriot. According to the laws of that time, the captured general was returned with edged weapons and awards and was allowed to return to his native estate. Benevsky was seriously wounded, and neither a signature nor an honest word was taken from him about non-participation in the war in the future. He even managed to remarry a beautiful lady in one of the Poltava estates while he was recovering from his wound (quite a lot of space is devoted to this in comics dedicated to Benevsky, published in Poland). Perhaps one of his descendants, the composer from Stavropol Vasily Benevsky, became famous as the author of the music of the requiem song with the words “We did not bow the glorious St. Andrew’s flag to the enemy, we ourselves blew up the Koreyets, we sunk the Varyag.”

Having risen to his feet, Mauricius again embarked on the path of struggle with Russia.

In one of the battles, the Zaporozhye Cossacks “tangled the noses” of his horse and handed the general over to the Russians. For repeated disobedience, the general was exiled to Kazan. Sitting in a provincial town when the whole world was thundering with events was clearly not to Benevsky’s liking. Mauricius created a group of fugitives from captured Swedes and Austrians. But - again a failure. Benevsky tries to escape again. For escaping three times, he was awarded a long journey to Kamchatka.

His appearance here was like “a ray of light in a dark kingdom.” The exiles, including nobles, officers, guards forced to monitor the exiles, who, it would seem, had nowhere to escape from this “end of the earth” - everyone was happy about the extraordinary newcomer. And he was good at everything - he played chess like a grandmaster, talked about cities and countries, spoke six languages, and turned out to be an excellent teacher of all sciences...

It is now clear that he was also a great adventurer. So, judging by his memoirs, he climbed Klyuchevskaya Sopka, fell into the crater, from where they pulled him out with hooks (the poor fellow didn’t even know what a volcano crater looked like), he allegedly traveled around all the Aleutian Islands (which, in essence, he had no idea there was no strength or opportunity). However, Benevsky's influence in Kamchatka was great, and it especially increased during the smallpox epidemic that swept Kamchatka in 1768-1769. The Bolsheretsky fort suffered less damage thanks to preventive measures taken under the leadership of Mauricius Benevsky.

Guard Lieutenant Pyotr Khrushchov was close to Beniovsky, “with whom they drew up a plan for their salvation.” Khrushchev sheltered Beniovsky, who arrived in 1770, in his apartment. Khrushchov himself spent nine years in exile. His guilt is indicated in the Code of Laws, 1762: “October 24. Manifesto. Lieutenant Pyotr Khrushchov of the Izmailovsky Life Guards Regiment was convicted and accused of vomiting lèse-majesté...”

The situation of the settlers became critical: “In the winter of 1768 - 1769, smallpox raged in Kamchatka, abducting 5,767 foreigners and 315 Russian visitors. Following this disaster, a widespread shortage of fish was discovered, which replaces bread for the local residents.” “Meanwhile, the winter of 1769 and 1770 came, and with it famine. It is difficult to describe all the disasters suffered by the Kamchadals... They used leather bags, stray dogs, carrion and, finally, the corpses of their relatives who died of starvation for food.”

On April 27, 1771, an uprising led by Benevsky took place in Kamchatka in the Bolsheretsky fort. The exiles, having united with industrialists, killed the Kamchatka commander Captain Nilov, occupied the office, and disarmed the residents. After which the question of escape, which was only possible by sea, really became a question. There was a need for a reliable and experienced team and, above all, for seafarers. At that time, there were five of them in Bolsheretsk: the commander of the galliot “St. Peter”, navigator Churin, and navigator students Bocharov, Izmailov, Zyablikov, Sofin.

To give the rebellion the character of a political protest, Ippolit Stepanov and Beniovsky “made an announcement to the Senate in which, briefly mentioning that the legitimate sovereign Pavel Petrovich was wrongly deprived of the throne, they presented in black form all the most important orders of the empress.” Beniovsky also wrote his Manifestum, Anno 1771, April, in Latin. All participants in the uprising, except Sofiin, and the Cossacks who later became sailors were sworn in to Tsarevich Paul.

At that time, there were ninety exiles and seventy soldiers in the Bolsheretsky prison. The exiles enjoyed relative freedom: it was impossible to escape from Kamchatka. More precisely, it was impossible to escape by land - but the sea remained. Benevsky and several other exiles - Baturin, Panov and Stepanov - managed to persuade their comrades to undertake this adventure

The rebels captured warehouses where furs, weapons and treasury were stored. The goods were paid for with receipts from Benevsky, who called himself in them “the most illustrious resident of the Polish Republic and Her Imperial Majesty the Roman Chamberlain, military adviser and registrar.” Having broken out the small galliot “St. Peter” from the coastal ice, the fugitives went out to sea and went south along the Kuril Islands. The ship, loaded with valuable furs and the annual Kamchatka harvest, moved south. There was no map and the rebels used descriptions from Lord Anson's book,

He himself sought to get to Europe, but the intentions of seventy other travelers were not so definite. Although Benevsky showed his companions a green envelope, assuring that it contained a letter from Tsarevich Paul to the Austrian Emperor asking for his daughter’s hand in marriage, disagreements soon began on the galliot. A conspiracy had matured on the ship - about fifteen people who had once joined Benevsky’s “freedom” agreed to cut off the anchor rope as soon as the exiles went ashore and take away the captured ship. Having learned about this, Benevsky landed the three main conspirators on a desert island, leaving them with a supply of rye flour. A few months later they were removed from the island by a fishing vessel.
Having almost sunk during a strong storm, on May 28, “St. Peter” reached the island of Shikoku. Stocking up on provisions and water, he moved along the Japanese coast, unable to land on the shore - the Japanese pursued a policy of strict isolation. It was then that Benevsky sent several letters ashore, warning the Japanese against possible Russian expansion. These letters, in which there was not a word of truth, went down in Japanese history as “von Bengoro’s warnings.”

On August 16, the galliot anchored in a bay off Taiwan. When the next day Panov and several miners went to the shore for water, they were attacked, killing Panov and two other people. Benevsky fired a cannon at the village and sank boats passing by.
Having buried the dead, the rebels moved on and soon found themselves in a storm again. Benevsky lost his orientation, and only the Chinese junk he met showed him the right path. On September 12, 1771, the Saint Peter entered Macau Bay.
Benevsky quickly sold the no longer needed vessel. The team grumbled, but he gave the dissatisfied their share and released them on all four sides. Everyone else was able to pay for the trip to Europe with the proceeds. In January 1772, the fugitives on Chinese junks reached Canton, where chartered French ships were already waiting. On March 16, 1772, they arrived in Ile-de-France, where the local governor told Benevsky about Madagascar. “With his stories about some of the features of this huge and beautiful island,” Benevsky later wrote, “he aroused in me a great desire to get to know it better.”
Along the way, several more people died of illness, including Benevsky’s old comrade, Joasaph Baturin. On July 7, the fugitives reached France, becoming the first Russians to visit Macau, cross the equator and swim across the Indian Ocean. After negotiations with the French government, Benevsky received the task of conquering Madagascar..

On March 23, 1773, the squadron led by Benevsky with settlers and troops set off for Madagascar, where it arrived in early February 1774.

After a long search, I chose as a stronghold the territory to the north, at the mouth of the Antanambalana River on the shore of Antungila Bay. One part of the island was ruled by the betzileo (king) Andriamanalimbetan (this luxurious name meant “Lord of 10,000 warriors and large lands”), the other by the great king Andrianampuinimerna. The new “wazaha” (in Malgash “white man”), having learned the interests of various tribes, took them into account in his activities and everything ended successfully.

Overcoming the hostility of the Malagasy and the opposition of the colonial authorities from Ile-de-France, who saw the Pole as a dangerous competitor. Incredibly, a Kamchadal colony appears off the coast of Africa, in the Indian Ocean.

Despite the difficulties, success in Madagascar still accompanied Benevsky. As you know, he founded his village of Louisberg at the mouth of the Antanambalana River, in the Gulf of Antongil. He treated the Malagasy humanely. He considered the natives his equals and tried to prove to them his good attitude in every possible way. This explains the fact that he quickly found a common language with them. “Beniewski’s views were ahead of his era, and the treatment of the Malagasy was fairer and better than the treatment of other Europeans arriving on this island,” wrote a history expert. Madagascar, the Englishman W. Ellis in his work “Three Travels to Madagascar,” published in 1859.
There were also armed clashes. Governors. on the Ilede-France they incited the population of Madagascar against Benevsky. In addition, the powerful Sakalava tribe living in the western part of the island saw Benevsky as an enemy who could interfere with their aggressive plans against other tribes. But Benevsky did not lack devoted allies, who sought his protection from the attacks of the Sakalava. Over the course of two years, he conducted two defensive campaigns that ended in victory. The first took place in the area of ​​the Valley of Health, where the village of Ambinanitelo is now located, and repelled the attack of the Safirobai, incited by the governors from Ile-de-France and the Sakalavas. The second campaign was conducted further, in the north-west, and was decisive in the formidable campaign of the Sakalava against Benevsky. The winner did not pursue the vanquished, but sought first of all to establish friendship and trade relations.
An outstanding date in the life of Benevsky was the day of October 10, 1776, when the Malagasy from the eastern and northern parts of the island recognized him as their great ampansakabe king, and the western region of Madagascar recognized him as the “great ruler”.
.

The proclamation of Benevsky as the great king of Madagascar dealt a significant blow to French colonial policy.

He was soon recalled to France, where he was unable to secure a new expedition and moved to England. He lived there for eight years, during which time he wrote his fictional memoirs, which became a real bestseller after their publication in 1791.

Beniovsky gained great fame in Europe; Madame Genlis, a French writer, popular in Russia, described him as a short man with a handsome face and good manners, very resourceful. Dexterous, energetic and courageous, he was one of those talented adventurers, of which there were many in Europe in the 18th century.
France is seething. The Great French Revolution is coming. Beniewski joins forces with his fellow Polish Confederation members in a union, with Tadeusz Kościuszko, Kazimierz, Pułaski, and Jan Dąbrowski. The French, however, tried to send the freedom-loving Poles further away, to their American colonies. Here the formidable Polish generals showed their might in the struggle to liberate the United States from England.

Mauricius-August Benevsky is still considered one of the national heroes of the United States.

In October 1784, in Baltimore, he finds investors for his new Madagascar project. He wants to create an independent democratic republic of Madagascar there, modeled on American democracy.

It was an interesting time, a turning point in South African history. The power of the Dutch East India Company was sharply weakened. The influence of the recently so powerful Holland was also declining. At this time there was a war for the southern tip of Africa. In 1780, England declared war on Holland and sent a fleet with 3 thousand sailors and soldiers to capture Kapstadt, but the French were ahead of the British and landed two months earlier. A French garrison stood on the Cape from 1781 to 1783. Kapstadt at that time was already a large and diverse port. Although its permanent population consisted of only a few thousand people, ships of almost all flags visited there. On this piece of African land, inhabited by the Dutch Boers during 130 years of domination, people from all corners of the earth met. Barras, the future head of the Directory and patron of the young Napoleon, served in the French garrison there. On the Cape he was a simple soldier. Benevsky and his comrades could also see the future duchess, Talleyrand’s wife, there. Barras met her, then seventeen-year-old Catherine Grand, who had just arrived from India, in Kapstadt. Returning with her to France, he lost her to Talleyrand, as the Creole Josephine Beauharnais, the future emperor of the French. There were also descendants of Russians, not only Kamchatka residents of Benevsky, here, for example, such Russified Dutch as Jan Swellengrebel, the father of Hendrik Swellengrebel, the Cape governor in 1737 - 1749, or runaway sailors, and in general, God knows how people got here. After all, some 20 years later Golovnin met Ivan Stepanov’s son Sesiomov, nicknamed Ganz-Rus, who had long since settled on Cape Ivan Stepanov, a native not even from capital cities, but from Nizhny Novgorod.

For almost ten years, Benevsky has been trying to find new “sponsors” for his adventures, writing exciting books about adventures in the distant waters of the Indian Ocean, which become bestsellers, published in English, French and German, but everything is useless. Then, having given up on the Old World, he “naturalizes” on the shores of the New World, on the shores of a young, dynamic, adventurous and greedy America. The proclamation of US independence finds him in Baltimore, where he is in the service of the wealthy commercial house Besson & Son as a financial administrator, and simply is engaged in extorting money from unscrupulous debtors.
In America he made acquaintances with large businessmen. Moreover, he became a personal friend of B. Franklin. He convinced them all of the prospects of conquering Madagascar, and now General Benevsky, until recently the French governor of the island of Madagascar, is sailing to recapture it from the French. After a ten-year absence from the Amnasakeb, Benevsky reappears on the island, now at the head of an American expedition on a well-armed and equipped privateer, the brig Captain Pratt. In January 1785, "Captain Pratt" arrives in Madagascar and fires its powerful cannons at the French fort. A landing force lands on the shore, but fails to capture the fortifications. At the beginning of 1786, desperate to capture Madagascar unceremoniously, Benevsky changed tactics and began his openly pirate epic. For those who may find it strange that the hero of our story has descended into sea robbery, I will say that privateering, sea robbery on ocean highways, at that time was a completely “noble” craft, which was “protected” by both the British royal government and the French government of Louis XVI, and subsequently the government of revolutionary France. The freedom-loving United States did not remain aloof from this extremely profitable “business”. Having concluded a deal with an American “share partnership,” Benevsky, under the Stars and Stripes, robs French and Dutch ships sailing between India and the Dutch East Indies, Indochina and the Philippines. The French are sending an entire squadron to capture the newly minted corsair, but Benevsky is not so easy to fall into their hands. The latest prey of the successful filibuster is the French galleas "Angeblois", on which, according to the governor of the French colony in India, Marius de la Gueller, there was gold and diamonds for a truly fantastic amount - several billion francs...
Until now, along with the legends about the treasures of Morgan and other pirates, there are legends about the countless treasures of Benevsky, hidden by him on Oak Island. However, most likely these are just legends.

There is another version, more probable:

In June 1785, on the merchant ship Interpid, Benevsky arrived in Madagascar with a small detachment. Benevsky returned to Madagascar wounded and gray-haired. The colony was no longer the same - blackened. Russia declared an amnesty for the fugitives, and most of them returned. And those who felt guilty started families, married Malgas women, gave birth to black children and forgot what European clothes and shoes were...

From the walls of Louisbourg he was greeted with a gun salute - and the captain of the Interpid, without understanding what was what, set sail from the island, leaving Benevsky and his comrades to their fate. After two months of hunger and disease, which decimated the already small detachment, Benevsky begins to gather the Malagasy around him.

Restoring friendly relations with the Malagasy after almost a ten-year absence, Benevsky began to painstakingly create the foundations of his state. First of all, he built a fortified village above the sea near Angonza and Antongil Bay. He sent an official message to the rulers of Ile-de-France about his arrival with the assurance that he was ready to cooperate with the French colony and grant it the preferential right to supply products to the island. The French did not want such a balance of power. They sent an armed detachment against Benevsky under the command of Captain Larcher. His campaign was successful. If a state was never formed in Madagascar under the leadership of Benevsky, then an unforeseen event was entirely to blame for this.

The French colonialists begin a war against the world's first African democratic state. Clashes proceeded with varying success, but in the spring of 1786 Benevsky was forced to retreat to Louisbourg with the remnants of his army - two whites and thirty natives. On May 23, the French launched an attack on the Republican fort. There was only one shot in this war. He was struck by the governor of the fort - an adventurer, but a great man, Mauricius Augustus Benevsky.

He was then forty-five years old; in Madagascar there are still streets and squares named in his honor; in today's independent Malagasy Republic they even write about Beniovsky in a short encyclopedia. And always with respect. They consider his activities to be part of their history; in Poland and Hungary, Beniovsky is considered their fellow countryman.

Despite the frenzied slander campaign that was waged against him for a century and a half by chauvinist circles in France, Benevsky’s good name and fame prevailed. His diaries were of great service. At the end of the eighteenth century they were translated into many European languages ​​and were very popular. Many poets, writers, playwrights from all countries took themes for their works from Benevsky’s life.

The poem "Bieniewski" (1840-1846) by the great Polish romantic Juliusz Słowacki (1809-1849) is a recognized masterpiece of Polish poetic classics, the pinnacle artistic achievement of romanticism and by far the best and most famous of Słowacki's poems.

In 1939, Wladyslaw Smolski’s drama “The Song of Beniovski” was staged at the Julian Słowacki Theater in Krakow. Vaclav Seroszewski's story "Beniovsky" was published many times. In 1967, an interesting collection of documents about Beniovsky was published in Warsaw.
The opera “Exiles from Kamchatka” was written in France. Music by F. Boualdier, libretto by A. Duval. Mutiny at the end of the world. The premiere took place at the Parisian Opera-Comique on June 8, 1800, in Liege in 1802, in Braunschweig and Brussels in 1803, and in 1824 the Opera-Comique resumed its production. This opera attracted such attention that parodies of it were immediately staged in the Paris Vaudeville Theater and the Troubadour Theater in 1800.
Then, already in our century, books by Jean d'Esme and Prosper Coultru were published in Paris under the same title: “Emperor of Madagascar.” But in the large encyclopedia “Grand Larousse” it only says: “He kidnapped the governor’s daughter and fled to China, where he left the seduced girl, and arrived in Paris. Was assigned to Madagascar." In Germany, several novels and dramatic plays appeared in the 18th-20th centuries, starting with Kotzebue's drama "Count Beniovsky or the Kamchatka Conspiracy." Beniovsky's "Travels and Memoirs" never published in Russian. French, English and other Western publications, of course, reached St. Petersburg, Moscow, and even the provinces, but it is quite possible that they did not make such a favorable impression. Many descriptions of Russia, the long journey to Kamchatka, life in The exile that was read in the West looked like fiction to the Russians - starting with the “governor” Nilov and his daughter, who, according to Beniovsky, was madly in love with him and even helped in the conspiracy against her father.
Every Russian reader understood that there was a lot of lies, or rather fantasy - Nilov, as they knew, did not have a daughter in Kamchatka. Such and much more noticeable embellishments of his person and offensive remarks about the frivolity of women and the stupidity of officers alarmed readers and generally affected their attitude towards “Travel and Memories” and towards Beniovsky’s personality itself. In addition, statements discrediting the Russian nobles (and they were the readers of Beniovsky’s memoirs) detracted from the previous admiration for his intelligence, talent and courage. And yet, various materials about Beniovsky have been published in Russia more than once.

After 1917, Seroshevsky’s story was translated in our country, and children’s writer N. G. Smirnov wrote the historical novel “The State of the Sun” - it was published in 1928.
Concluding his novel, Smirnov wrote: “Everyone who reads Bespoisk’s notes must admit that he was an amazing person in terms of his ability to command people, convince them, and inspire them to heroic deeds. He made mistakes most of his life, and despite this, people still followed him. In his notes written for sale, Bespoisk did not want to accurately indicate his true goals, plans and hopes.”
Beniovsky attracts interest in our country even now. Smirnov's novel was republished in 1972. In 1969, an article by V. A. Balyazin, “The Kamchatka exile - the king of Madagascar,” appeared in the journal “Questions of History.” And the famous historian of navigation and shipping, Admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union I. S. Isakov, collected a large bibliography of works about Beniovsky and, shortly before his death, handed it over to the writer and fleet historian Yu. V. Davydov.
If you ask the question - who did his many admirers and critics in many countries of the world see in Beniovsky, then the answer seems to be quite simple. This man was primarily seen as an adventurer. And in the Soviet “History of the Discovery and Exploration of Africa,” just published in 1973, he is called “a famous Polish-Hungarian adventurer.” But here, we must remember that the word “adventurer” has very different meanings in different languages. In English and French it is devoid of that derogatory, contemptuous connotation that it has in Russian. In our country, even if there is some romance in this word, it is the vicious romance of a resourceful, even gifted, but unprincipled person who violates the moral norms of behavior accepted by society. “Adventure” in Ozhegov’s dictionary is “an undertaking of dubious integrity, undertaken with the expectation of random success.”
Beniovsky was superior in talent, enlightenment and sensitivity to social injustice to many of the adventurers. It contains, possible only in those centuries, a bizarre mixture of desperate adventurism with lofty intentions of helping the enslaved.
From Benevsky and his comrades - Russians, Poles, French, Americans and Malagasy, who became one people, a tribe was preserved betsimizarak- (If you trace the name in Hebrew: be- possibly from, from Benevski, and possibly Betsi - from bnei Zion, Mizrak - Mizrahi, can be translated as Eastern Sons of Zion, or Sons (descendants, or followers, such as bnei Akiva, bnei Noah) Benevsky. The Malgashi do not know history in the European sense of the word. They perceive events within the framework of their own family or clan, and then in the form of a religious cult of ancestors.
His Malagasy friends spread a rumor that Benevsky was a descendant of the influential royal Ramini family in Madagascar. As if he was the grandson of the last king, whose daughter was once kidnapped and brought to Ile-de-France and gave birth to a son there. This son was supposedly Benevsky. Friendly tribes quickly picked up this news (of course, the hero himself did not really refute these rumors), and thus the cult of ancestors was used to strengthen the friendship of the little ones with Benevsky.

Heraldist and genealogist, younger brother of Nikolai Barsukov. His second brother, Ivan, is known as the author of the book “ Inokenty, Metropolitan of Moscow and Kolomna, according to the writings, letters and stories of his contemporaries"(Moscow, 1883) and the publisher of "Creations" Innocent (Moscow, 1887).

Alexander Platonovich Barsukov
Date of Birth	December 4 (16)(1839-12-16 )
Place of Birth	With. Ivanovka, Tambov Governorate
Date of death	April 15 (28)(1914-04-28 ) (74 years old)
A place of death	Saint Petersburg
A country	Russian empire Russian empire
Scientific field	archaeography, heraldry, genealogy
Alma mater	Mikhailovsky Voronezh Cadet Corps

Biography

In 1868 he moved to the civil service in the Holy Synod, and then to the Senate, where until his death he was the manager of the armorial department of the department of heraldry. During his leadership of the Armorial Department, six parts of the General Armorial were compiled here (XIV - 1890, XV - 1895, XVI - 1901, XVII - 1904, XVIII - 1908 and XIX - 1914). The decorations of city coats of arms previously introduced by B.V. Köhne were removed, thanks to which they were simplified.

He was a historian of conservative views, firmly convinced of the enormous state benefit of his activities. In an analysis of P. N. Petrov’s study “History of the families of the Russian nobility” (St. Petersburg, 1886, part I), he wrote that the development of genealogies of Russian nobles is extremely necessary “to clarify the important role of our family surnames in the destinies of Russia”; these works, he believed, “have a beneficial effect on public self-awareness.” From 1883 to 1909 he was a member of the archaeographic commission.

Selected works

• Autographs of famous and remarkable people (From the archive of S. Yu. Witte) / With a preface. and note. A. P. Barsukova. - St. Petersburg. : type. Stasyulevich, 1905. - 126 p.
• Barsukov A.P. Voivodes of the Moscow State of the 17th century (according to government acts). - St. Petersburg. : type. V. S. Balasheva and Co., 1897. - 17 p. - (Ot. from issue 11 of the “Chronicles of the Activities of the Archaeological Commission”).
• Barsukov A.P. All-Russian Patriarch Joachim Savelov: Read. at the meeting on December 21. 1890. - St. Petersburg. : Society of Spirit Lovers. Enlightenment, 1891. - 16 p. - (Appendix VI to the Reports on the meetings of the Island (Monuments of Ancient Writing and Art. 83)).
• Barsukov A.P. Coat of arms of August Schlozer: Chit. at the meeting on February 15. 1891. - St. Petersburg. : Society of Spirit Lovers. Enlightenment, 1891. - 7 p. - (Appendix VII to the Reports on the meetings of the Island (Monuments of Ancient Writing and Art. 83)).
• Barsukov A.P. Report extract 121 (1613) on fiefs and estates. - M.: Universitetsk. typ., 1895. - 24 p. - (From “Readings in the Imperial Institute of History and Russian Antiquities at Moscow University” for 1895).
• Barsukov A.P. Historical notes. - St. Petersburg. , 1893?. - 7 s. - (Reading by A.P. Barsukov in the Imperial Society of Lovers of Ancient Writing on April 17, 1892): I. Prince Gr. Gr. Romodanovsky. II. Alexey Fed. Turchaninov).
• Barsukov A.P. Review of sources and literature of Russian genealogy (About the book by P. N. Petrov “History of the families of the Russian nobility”). - St. Petersburg. : type. Imp. acad. Sciences, 1887. - 96 p. - (Appendix to the 54th volume of Notes of the Imperial Academy of Sciences; No. 4).
• Barsukov A.P. Stories from Russian history of the 18th century: According to architect. documents. - St. Petersburg. : type. t-va "Society" benefit", 1885. - 284 p. - (Contents: Joasaph Baturin; Prisoner of the Spaso-Euthimiev Monastery; Prince Grigory Grigoryevich Orlov; Gatchina legends about Orlov; Batyushkov and Opochinin; Shklov adventurers).
• Barsukov A.P. Sheremetev family. - St. Petersburg. : type. M. M. Stasyulevich, 1881-1904. - T. 1-8.
• Barsukov A.P. Genealogy of the Sheremetevs. - St. Petersburg. : type. M. M. Stasyulevich, 1899. - 36 p. - (From the 7th book of “The Sheremetev Family”).
  • . - 2nd ed., rev. and additional - St. Petersburg. : type. M. M. Stasyulevich, 1904. - 42 p. - (Appendix to the 8th book of “The Sheremetev Family”).
• Barsukov A.P. Russian noble meeting in Moscow, according to surviving archival documents: With adj. Rules Ros. noble collection 1803 and the Charter of 1849 - M.: Synod. typ., 1886. - 34+32 pp.
• Barsukov A.P. Information about the Yukhotsky volost and their former owners, the princes of Yukhotsky and Mstislavsky: With appendix. Art. about yuhot. falcon. washers. - St. Petersburg. : ed. gr. S. D. Sheremeteva, 1894. - 78 p.
• Barsukov A.P. The village of Chirkino, Kolomna district. - St. Petersburg. : type. M. M. Stasyulevich, 1892. - 16 p.
• Barsukov A.P.