Edward Radzinsky - Alexander II. Life and death

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Edward Radzinsky
Alexander II. Life and death

Preface
Memory of the future

The story of Alexander II is the final part of the “Three Kings” trilogy. The last Tsar Nicholas II, the first Bolshevik Tsar Joseph Stalin and, finally, the last great Russian Tsar Alexander II are its heroes. Fathers and victims of the great historical drama that played out in Russia at the end of the 19th - first half of the 20th century.

We are still looking for answers to painful questions: why from the Tsar, called Russian History "Tsar-Liberator", who destroyed the shameful Russian slavery, reformed all Russian life, by the end of his reign did Russian society turn away? Why did the fruit of the first Russian perestroika become the most powerful terrorist organization, hitherto unprecedented in Europe? Why was the great reformer killed by the children of his own perestroika?

But the mysteries of that time concern not only Russia. Russian terror, born during the time of Alexander II, anticipated the terror of our century. And in today’s newspapers you can read the same phrases, the same ideas that worried the Russian terrorists who had long since decayed in the earth in the days of Alexander II.

They were the first! And even the concept of “war on terror” belongs to the same Alexander II - his time.

So the most banal, but (alas!) eternal aphorism: “The main lesson of History is that people do not learn any lessons from History” was the epigraph to this book. However, like the entry in the diary of the Tsar’s brother, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich:

“Perhaps this is the most important era in Russia’s thousand-year existence.”

Introduction
"Caesar, fear the Ides of March"

The words spoken two thousand years ago in Ancient Rome became a dangerous prophecy for the Russian Caesars...

The greatest and most terrible of the Moscow tsars, Ivan the Terrible, will die in March - possibly poisoned...

In March, the last Russian Tsar, Nicholas II, will abdicate. March will mark the end of a three-hundred-year dynasty.

And the first Bolshevik Tsar Joseph Stalin will also die in March, possibly killed by his comrades.

And now on our calendar March 1, 1881... And this event will happen - one of the most mysterious in Russian history.

Petersburg. 2 hours 15 minutes... Emperor Alexander II leaves the Mikhailovsky Palace, where he was visiting his cousin.

The Emperor is due to turn sixty-three next month. But the king is still a great guy! In an overcoat with a beaver collar lined with a red lining, in gold epaulettes with his father’s monogram - tall, straight, with a guardsman’s bearing. The last handsome king of the Romanov dynasty.

The carriage stands on the ramp, against the backdrop of the marble columns of the palace, surrounded by security unprecedented for Russian sovereigns. Six Cossacks on horseback surround the carriage, another Cossack sits on the box with the coachman, and the carriage is followed by two more sleighs - with guards.

The imperial train - a carriage and two sleighs - leaves the Mikhailovsky Palace. The horses gallop merrily, the carriage rushes quickly, so that the guard's sleigh can hardly keep up with it.

The carriage is turning towards the Catherine Canal, and Russian History will now turn along with it.

Our Northern Venice is still covered with March snow... Snow is on the cobblestones along the canal. There are very few people: the March St. Petersburg wind, chilling to the bones, blew away the walking public from the canal. Policemen are walking along the sidewalk - they are supposed to guard the passage of the imperial carriage.

But for some reason they do not notice the young man hurrying towards the carriage. He is clearly nervous, and in his hand he has something suspicious, the size of a box of Landrin chocolates at that time, wrapped in a white handkerchief.

The young man waited for the approaching carriage and threw the package at the feet of the horses.

The echo of a powerful explosion swept through the canal.

A dead man lies on the cobblestone street - one of the Cossacks guarding the carriage, next to the dead man is screaming, a boy carrying a basket of meat is writhing in agony... Blood, scraps of clothing on the snow-covered cobblestones.

The imperial train stops. The Emperor, unharmed, gets out of the carriage. The young man threw the bomb late; he was obviously very nervous.

And then something incomprehensible begins... Both the guards and the sovereign know that the bomber is probably not alone. Both the coachman and the guards beg the sovereign to quickly leave the canal. But to the complete amazement of the guards, the sovereign, who had already survived several assassination attempts by that time, was in no hurry to leave! On the contrary, he begins to walk strangely along the Catherine Canal...

As if he was waiting for something.

And in this mysterious moment we will leave for a while - both the sovereign and the Catherine Canal.

Part one
Grand Duke

Chapter first
Hero's Pedigree

"Hard Rock"

Our hero’s father was Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich - one of the brothers of the then reigning Emperor Alexander I, his mother was the eldest daughter of the Prussian King William III, Frederica-Louise-Charlotte-Wilhelmina. Having converted to Orthodoxy, she also adopted a new name - Alexandra Fedorovna.

Our hero was born in Moscow, in the Kremlin - on “a wonderful spring day on April 17, 1818... on Holy Week, when the bells glorified the holiday of the Resurrection of Christ with their ringing,” his mother recalled in her memoirs.

But despite the happiness and celebration, our hero’s mother added amazing words after this: “I remember that I then felt something important and very sad at the thought that this little creature would one day become an emperor.”

Blood and violence accompanied the history of his ancestors, the kings of the Romanov dynasty. And the murder of their own sovereigns became a secret Russian tradition in the 18th century. Part of our hero's bloodline.

Marches of the guard to the palace of the kings.
Cook Empress

It all started with two events, initially completely unrelated.

At the very end of the 17th century, our hero’s great-great-grandfather, Peter the Great, created the Russian Guard. And the second event: at the very beginning of the 18th century, our great emperor began the conquest of the Baltic states.

It was then that a story happened, before which all fairy tales about Cinderella pale. Perhaps this was the most magical story of the magical 18th century.

In Livonia, in a wretched little room in the house of Pastor Gluck, lived a pretty cook, Marta, the daughter of a Livland peasant. Martha was married, although she lived without a husband. A visiting Swedish dragoon married her. The sly man indulged himself with a pretty cook and left to fight. But he never returned - either he died, or he forgot about Marta. So our beauty would have aged, cooking and washing in the parsonage, if... If Russian troops had not come and Marta had not been captured by Russians.

And then the magical journey of yesterday’s cook began - at first it was the bed of the commander, Count Sheremetev. Then her curvaceous body is placed in a higher bed - with the all-powerful favorite of Peter the Great, Prince Menshikov. And from there there was a direct (and very frequent) path - to the royal bed.

A popular print was even drawn about this event. It depicted the king seated at a banquet table. And the nobleman brought the busty, plump beauty to the king. The caption read: “A loyal subject yields to the king what is most precious.” So, not even a year had passed before the cook Martha, instead of the pastor’s kitchen, ended up in the royal palace.

Usually all these momentary passions quickly disappeared from the bedroom of the ardent Peter. But Martha remained in it forever. The beauty's charms and her kind character created the incredible: the All-Russian Emperor married... yesterday's cook. Martha was baptized, and under the name of Ekaterina Alekseevna, Peter crowned her empress.

In 1725, Peter became dangerously ill. The closest nobles gathered at the bedside of the dying king. According to persistent legend, the great emperor only managed to say with a stiff tongue: “Give up everything...”. But to whom give, he didn’t have time to say.

At the moment of the most important command, mocking Death took away the all-powerful king!

While the body was being dressed, the nobles gathered in the next palace hall to decide who to give “everything”, that is, the greatest empire stretching halfway around the world - from the Baltic to the Pacific Ocean. And then, in the same hall, they saw with amazement... guards officers! These were the commanders of the guards regiments created by the Great Peter.

To the indignant questions of the nobles, “How dare you?!”, the answer was a drum roll... from the street! And, looking out the window, the nobles saw the guards gathered in the courtyard. All exits from the palace were occupied by the guards. And the guards commanders shouted out the former cook as Empress of All Russia Catherine I. (If only a dragoon, the first husband of the new empress, had appeared at this time!)

Catherine I ruled merrily. The palace expenditure book remained from the new empress. In it, spending on jesters and feasts is quite commensurate with expenses for the entire state.

This is how the brainchild of Great Peter, the Guard, entered the political arena in the 18th century. And she never left her side for the entire century.

And soon the daring guard created another empress.

Second campaign of the guard.
Empress Nymph

After the death of Catherine I, her daughter Elizabeth “lived in utter insignificance.” The aged associates of Peter the Great invited the descendants of Peter the Great’s brother, Ivan, to rule the country.

The Prince and Princess of Brunswick arrived in Russia. Their son, the infant Ivan Antonovich, was declared emperor. And since he was still in the cradle, his mother, Princess Anna Leopoldovna, became the ruler of the foolish child.

The newcomers from Brunswick did not understand how dangerous our guard was. But the daughter of Great Peter understood.

Elizabeth was born before her mother's marriage to the emperor. And only after marriage was married - declared the legitimate daughter of Peter. The child of love was miraculously beautiful. A shock of red hair, divine porcelain skin with a slight pink blush. And the shapes are the most seductive - magnificent height, high breasts, slender long legs. A certain German diplomat, seeing her, fainted from her beauty.

She was mad in passion. Martha's blood threw her into the arms of commoners. Cossack Rozum, a handsome singer whom she saw in the court church, immediately captured her heart. Elizabeth turned the rootless Cossack Rozum into Count Razumovsky, and he became her lover for many years.

In the portraits, the strong, strong-willed chin of the nymph is striking - the chin of her merciless father! While giving herself over to love, red-haired Elizabeth did not forget about power. The true daughter of Peter did not want to live in oblivion. A strong-willed chin demanded to take a risk. And she turned to the guards.

On a cold November night in 1741, a sleigh was traveling along Nevsky Prospect, surrounded by three hundred guardsmen. And in the sleigh... our nymph!

The sleigh was heading towards the royal palace.

On the way to the palace, the guards cheerfully arrested the half-asleep nobles who lived on the palace embankment. So, with jokes and jokes, they sent the main associates of the ruler Anna Leopoldovna from bed to prison.

Approaching the palace, in order to avoid unnecessary noise, the nymph left the sleigh. And the guards carried our beauty in their arms to the palace. In the strong arms of the grenadiers, Elizabeth appeared in the serenely sleeping palace. When the guard tried to hit the drum, they ripped the drum open with a sword. The palace was captured without resistance.

- It's time to get up, sister! – Elizabeth woke up the ruler of the empire. The night revolution has won. The legitimate ruler was sent to the fortress along with her family. Our nymph took the baby emperor with her in the sleigh. The child burst into laughter, joyfully reaching out to the guards. Elizabeth kissed him: “Poor child!” And, sighing, she sent the “child” into eternal captivity - to the Shlisselburg fortress. And yesterday’s All-Russian Emperor (a sort of Russian version of the French “Iron Mask”) will grow up in a prison cell, not knowing who he is, why he ended up in the cell. There, in the fortress (already under Catherine the Great), the guards will kill him, and his unfortunate parents will rot in captivity.

The next morning, Elizabeth declared herself empress and... colonel of the guards regiment. She respected the guard.

This is how our guard made a second victorious campaign against the royal palace. But it turned out not to be the last.

The discovery of our hero's great-grandmother

Empress Elizabeth I ruled the country like a Russian landowner - capriciously and eccentrically, cruelly and at the same time kindly.

Our nymph did not have a legal spouse or children. And Elizabeth came up with the idea of making her nephew heir to the throne. This was the son of her elder sister and the Holstein prince - Karl Peter Ulrich, who in Orthodoxy became known as Grand Duke Peter Fedorovich.

Elizabeth found him a wife - a German princess.

Sophia Frederica Augusta was the daughter of one of the countless German princes in the service of Frederick the Great.

Little Sophia was sent to distant Russia. On the way to St. Petersburg she was taken through Riga. There, in a prison castle, the unfortunate Brunswick family, overthrown by Empress Elizabeth, was kept in custody.

The shadow of the Guards coup met this impressionable and smart girl already on the borders of Russia.

In St. Petersburg, yesterday's Lutheran Sophia Frederica, having converted to Orthodoxy, becomes Grand Duchess Ekaterina Alekseevna.

Thus begins the Russian life of this 14-year-old girl - the future Empress Catherine the Great, the great-grandmother of our hero.

Subsequently, she will talk about her life at that time in the famous “Notes”, which will be read after her death by all subsequent kings from the House of Romanov. And, as we will learn later, they will read it with horror.

With an indifferent feminine gaze, Catherine described the beauty of Empress Elizabeth, and, of course, the object of everyone’s envy – the Empress’s incomparable, slender, long legs. They were usually hidden by hideous crinolines and skirts. But the nymph, who became the empress, figured out how to show her charms to the world. As Catherine describes, nightly masquerades are held in the palace, to which the Empress orders the ladies to appear in men's attire. And then all her ladies-in-waiting turn into pitiful, plump, short-legged boys, and Elizabeth herself reigns over them as a tall, long-legged handsome man.

But little Catherine gradually understands the true reason for these night masquerades. Fear of the Guard - memory of night revolution - hides this palace fun that lasts until dawn.

And the story of Elizabeth, who seized power, becomes a tempting example for a smart girl. Already at the age of 15, having realized the insignificance of her husband, Catherine begins to bribe the courtiers with gifts - she creates her own party.

And he learns, learns from the empress her mercilessness.

Elizabeth skillfully walked towards her goal. And she went to her to the end, like her father. Having started a war with Frederick the Great himself, the empress put thousands of soldiers on the battlefield.

But in endless unsuccessful battles she achieved the main thing - she bled Frederick’s army dry. The nymph was already preparing to finish off the greatest commander of Europe, but... Again the same mocker - death! - will take Elizabeth on the eve of a great victory.

At the same time, while deciding the fate of Europe, the empress remained an illiterate Russian landowner. She was sure that it was possible to travel to England by land. And, being incredibly brave, she was ridiculously... timid! Once, in the presence of Catherine, the Empress scolded her minister with her usual fury. And, to soften her dangerous anger, a jester with a hedgehog appeared. Seeing the hedgehog from a distance, the empress turned pale. And with a mad cry: “It’s a mouse! This is a real mouse!” - the Empress of All Rus', picking up her skirts, took off running! Having crushed the Great Frederick and her nobles, Elizabeth was deathly afraid of mice!

But, observing these absurdities in the behavior of the empress, little Catherine remembered the main thing: Elizabeth managed to seize the throne. Studying the hidden history of Russia, a smart girl discovers the main law of the empire: unlimited autocracy in Russia, it turns out, limited. Limited by the will of the guard. Just like in Ancient Rome, when the Praetorian Guards placed the all-powerful Caesars on the throne. So it was not for nothing that the Russian kingdom proudly called itself the Third Rome.

But Catherine’s unfortunate husband Peter did not understand this.

The third march of the guard to the palace is gallant

Catherine's husband, Emperor Peter III (our hero's great-grandfather), ascended the throne after the death of his aunt.

Peter and Catherine were the first from the Romanov dynasty to move into the newly built Winter Palace. (The late Empress Elizabeth ordered the Italian Rastrelli to build this palace, but she never managed to live in it.)

The new Winter Palace will become the symbolic home of the tsars from the Romanov dynasty.

Built on the embankment of the ever-rebellious Neva River, its ceremonial halls and main façade face the river and the Peter and Paul Fortress.

Tsars were buried in this fortress; the most dangerous enemies of the dynasty sat in its casemates. This strange view from the royal palace - of the prison and family cemetery - subsequently puzzled foreign travelers. However, not only them. The nephew of the hero of our book, Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich (who was first settled in the Winter Palace), recalled: “We arrived in St. Petersburg during a period of ordinary fogs that London would envy.

“Your room is pleasant because,” our teacher explained to us, “that when the fog clears, you will see opposite, across the Neva, the Peter and Paul Fortress, in which all the Russian sovereigns are buried.”

I felt sad. Not only was it necessary to live in this capital of fogs, but this neighborhood of the dead was still missing!

For Catherine's husband, Emperor Peter III, this view of the prison was a fatal omen.

In the portraits, Alexander II's great-grandfather Peter III is depicted as a powerful warrior in armor. In fact, Emperor Peter III, who prayerfully adored the army, was weak, frail and... kind! The compassionate emperor, having ascended the throne, immediately returned from exile all the victims of past coups - the victims of the guard's campaigns against the palace.

A magnificent ball was held for those returning from Siberian exile. All these yesterday's temporary workers, great intriguers, lovers of former empresses, who destroyed each other, were now dancing together in the thousand-meter marble White Hall of the Winter Palace.

And one of the returnees said to the new emperor: “You are too kind, Your Majesty. Russians don’t understand kindness, here you have to rule either with a whip or an ax, only then everyone here is happy.”

And another returnee told Peter III the same thing: “Your Majesty, kindness will destroy you!”

But it was not kindness that destroyed our hero’s great-grandfather. He was ruined by his disdain for the guards. The simple-minded emperor was cruelly mistaken: he sincerely believed in the unlimited power of Russian autocracy. And he did what he wanted.

He dreamed of serving the one who was his idol and the idol of all enlightened Europe - Frederick the Great. While the Russian army was preparing to finish off the Prussian king, he ordered to immediately conclude peace with him.

And soon rumors spread in the guards barracks: the emperor decided to do away with the Russian guard, disband it and recruit a new guard in his homeland, in Holstein. Rumors harmful to the emperor.

It was not difficult to figure out who spread these rumors. At this time, Peter III and his wife Catherine became enemies... Both the great-grandfather and great-grandmother of our hero were already plotting against each other. He was preparing to send her to a monastery, and she was preparing to send him to the next world.

But Catherine turned out to be much more capable.

In the Winter Palace, she secretly received her lover, guardsman Grigory Orlov. Her lover had four brothers, and all are daring brave men and favorites of the guard. Through her bed, Catherine added the entire guard to the conspiracy.

The small body of Alexander’s great-grandmother and the magnificent body of the handsome guardsman... True, the joke of her furious flesh almost let her down - Catherine became pregnant. Peter found out about this through spies. And he decided to wait for the birth - to convict his wife of treason and imprison him in a monastery... But when the birth approached, Catherine ordered the valet to set fire to his own house. Childish Peter loved fireworks and fires. And together with his retinue he immediately drove off to look at his favorite fiery spectacle... And at this time the newborn, wrapped in a beaver fur coat, had already been taken out of the palace. And when Peter returned, the bleeding little iron woman calmly greeted him... and even treated him to coffee.

Finally, the day came for the third (this time morning) coup staged by the guard.

As fate would have it, the coup happened on the unfortunate emperor's Angel Day.

Catherine then lived in a palace in Peterhof, and the court and the emperor were in another country palace - in Oranienbaum. In the afternoon, Peter went to Peterhof to visit his wife on the occasion of his holiday. But Catherine was not in Peterhof.

Early in the morning, guardsman Alexei Orlov, the brother of her lover Grigory, rushed a carriage from St. Petersburg for Catherine.

Alexei Orlov is a giant who killed a bull with his fist, a famous duelist and Don Juan. As a contemporary said about him: “I would not entrust him with either a wife or a daughter, but I could accomplish great things with him.”

Alexey Orlov found Ekaterina in bed. The guard woke her up with the famous words: “The time has come for you to reign, mother.”

But Catherine hesitated.

And then (as the legend says) Alexey Orlov “poured great determination into her womb.”

And now a carriage with the daring Alexei Orlov on the box is rushing our hero’s great-grandmother to St. Petersburg. The same guard was already waiting for her in the capital. And the guard unanimously swore allegiance to yesterday's German princess. The brainchild of Peter the Great - the glorious guard - joyfully prepared to overthrow the grandson of Peter the Great!

And this unprecedented campaign took place - completely in the style of the century, which was called gallant. On horseback, in a guards uniform, in a hat decorated with oak leaves, is the charming Catherine. She led the march of the Imperial Guard against the Emperor of All Rus'.

Next to her is another beauty in uniform - Catherine’s young associate, Princess Dashkova.

Alexander's unfortunate great-grandfather immediately became lost. The shameless flight of the courtiers immediately began around. But the famous Field Marshal Minich remained faithful to him. This seventy-year-old warrior offered to sail to Kronstadt - an impregnable sea fortress. To sit in Kronstadt, gather loyal troops and from there go to recapture St. Petersburg. Peter was delighted. He was just as easily inspired as he fell into despair... They equipped a galley and a small yacht. The remnants of the frightened yard were put on these ships - everyone who had not yet managed to escape. Ladies in luxurious dresses, gentlemen in ceremonial uniforms - all this company, sparkling with precious stones and gold, sailed towards the Kronstadt fortress. But the great great-grandmother of our hero had already foreseen everything - Kronstadt was captured by her supporters. And the soldiers from the walls of the fortress order the rightful emperor to leave.

And Peter immediately loses his will - he sobs.

The old field marshal, overwhelmed with indignation, shames him: “Can’t Your Majesty really be able to die like an emperor in front of his army! If you, Your Majesty, are afraid of a saber strike, take the crucifix in your hands, and they will not dare to harm you!”

But the emperor did not want to die, he obediently surrendered!

Catherine imprisoned her husband on the charming Ropsha manor. She kept the letters of the imprisoned emperor from captivity. Subsequently, his great-grandson - our hero - will read them.

In these letters, the Emperor of All Rus' “lowestly begs” to be allowed to relieve himself without security, “lowestly asks” to be allowed to take a walk... He humbly signs his letters to his wife, the Prussian princess who usurped the throne of his ancestors: “Your servant Peter.”

But Catherine does not answer - apparently she is waiting for the jailers to figure out how to end this gallant revolution. And they guessed it.

What happened that night? There are many versions. Here is one of them, the most likely:

“Alexey Orlov, the brother of Catherine’s lover, a giant with a cruel scar across his entire cheek, two meters tall, brought yesterday’s emperor a glass of wine and poison. The unfortunate man drank, and the flame immediately spread through his veins. All this aroused suspicion in the deposed Sovereign, and he refused the next glass. But they used violence, and he used defense against them. In this terrible struggle to drown out his screams, they threw him to the ground and grabbed him by the throat. But since he defended himself with all the forces that the last despair gives, and they avoided inflicting wounds on him... (after all, it was necessary later to expose his body for farewell. - E.R.), they threw a gun belt around the emperor’s neck. And Alexei Orlov stood with both knees on his chest and blocked his breath. And he gave up the ghost in their hands.”

In St. Petersburg it was announced that the emperor “died of hemorrhoidal colic.” In Europe the phrase has become a household word. And subsequently, when Catherine invited D’Alembert to St. Petersburg, the famous French encyclopedist refused. And he wrote to Voltaire: “Unfortunately, I am susceptible to hemorrhoids, and in Russia this disease, apparently, is fatal.”

And, as retribution, the great great-grandmother Alexandra herself will die pitifully... The blow overtook her in the toilet. With difficulty the servants dragged her out of the restroom. The body was heavy, and the servants aged with her.

The Empress was laid out in her room on the floor, on a mattress, the doctors forbade her to be disturbed... And on this miserable mattress, on the palace floor, the Great Lady will die. From the French encyclopedists, Voltaire, Frederick the Great, all European monarchs to the Crimean Khan and the nomadic Kirghiz - all minds were occupied by this woman. The threads of the main political game in Europe were in her hands... “And when she pulled, Europe shook like a cardboard clown,” wrote a contemporary. Her nobleman was right, who proudly said: “Not a single cannon in Europe dared to fire without our permission!”

And so she died - on the floor... “Do not lay up treasures for yourself on earth...” Only a faithful maid remained near her. The Empress wheezed loudly. And this wheezing was heard in the next room, where her son, the grandfather of our hero, the new Emperor Paul I, came up with the idea of setting up an office for himself. And the courtiers, now rushing to the office of the new ruler, ran past the bedroom of the helpless ruler. And out of curiosity they opened the door and brazenly stared at the dying woman...

At the eleventh hour, an English doctor entered Paul’s office and announced that the empress was dying.

Only a few candles were burning in Catherine's bedroom. In the twilight, Paul and the courtiers waited for the most mysterious moment. The clock struck a quarter past ten when the great-great-grandmother of our hero breathed her last - she went to the Court of the Almighty.