Secret Lives of the Tsars (15 page)

“Do you know that your emperor must be mad as a hatter?” a foreign diplomat remarked to a lady of the court. “No man could behave as he does otherwise.”

Peter III was making powerful enemies with his galling behavior, but perhaps none greater than his own wife. The couple had grown to truly loathe each other, and the emperor made no secret of his desire to rid himself of his detestable wife and marry instead his ugly mistress, Elizabeth Vorontzova.
*
4
He installed Elizabeth in his own apartments and made her head of the household while relegating Catherine to a distant side of the palace. As an additional humiliation, he ordered his wife to attend a public ceremony in which he awarded to his mistress one of Russia’s highest honors for women, the Order of St. Catherine, created by Peter the Great in tribute to his wife Catherine’s heroism during the Pruth River campaign against the Turks in 1711 (see
Chapter 3
). The bestowal of such an award to Elizabeth Vorontzova had a certain menacing significance, since it was given automatically to those who married into the royal family.

Peter’s malignant feelings toward Catherine were made viciously
apparent during a banquet celebrating a treaty with Prussia, in which the two nations, only recently enemies, agreed to ally themselves in an ill-advised war against Denmark. The emperor proposed a toast “to the imperial family,” after which all the guests rose, except Catherine. When Peter sent an adjunct to his wife’s end of the table to inquire why she remained seated, Catherine sent word back explaining that as a member of the imperial family being toasted, it would be improper for her to stand. For some reason this enraged the emperor. “Fool!” he screeched at his wife from across the table, shocking those in attendance into silence. A drunken Peter ordered Catherine’s arrest, but he was finally dissuaded from this course by the unhappy couple’s mutual relative, Prince George of Holstein, whom the emperor had placed in command of the Russian army.

“Peter III’s barbarous, senseless ferocity made it seem quite possible that he intended to eliminate his wife,” the French chargé d’affaires wrote afterward. The emperor was in essence declaring war upon Catherine, but in this he woefully underestimated his enemy.

“The Empress [Catherine] is in the most cruel situation and is treated with the most marked contempt,” the French ambassador Baron de Breteuil wrote to the French foreign minister, the Duc de Choiseul, early in 1762. “I have told you, Monseigneur, that she sought to fortify herself with philosophy, and I have said how ill this nourishment consorted with her character. I have learned since, beyond any doubt, that she is already very impatient with the Emperor’s conduct toward her and of the arrogance of Mademoiselle Vorontzova. Knowing as I do the courage and violence of this Princess, I cannot imagine that she will not sooner or later be moved to some
extreme. I know that she has certain friends who are trying to calm her but who would risk everything for her, if she required it.”

Indeed, while the emperor was charting his own self-destructive course, Catherine had been nourishing this circle of devoted allies. Among them was her new lover, Gregory Orlov, a handsome, battle-hardened Guards officer whose child Catherine secretly carried,
*
5
along with his four brothers—all of whom were well respected in the Russian military and would be instrumental in garnering its support. Catherine even had on her side the sister of her husband’s mistress, who had valuable contacts in the government and a shared revulsion to Peter III’s policies.

The scorned, mistreated wife certainly had plenty of support, but she and her backers, biding their time, had no real plan of attack—that is, until one of their number, Captain Passek, was arrested on June 27, 1762, after drunkenly disparaging the emperor in public. With the very real danger that he might betray them under torture, the plotters leapt to action. Meanwhile, the unwitting emperor, who left St. Petersburg several weeks before to prepare his troops for the upcoming war against Denmark, had ordered his wife to take up residence at the palace of Peterhof, where, he informed her, he would arrive on June 29, to celebrate his name day. No one knew what else he might have in store for Catherine.

Thus, in the early morning hours of June 28, Gregory Orlov’s
brother Alexis arrived at Mon Plaisir, a summerhouse on the grounds of Peterhof, where Catherine was staying. Urgently, he roused her out of bed. “It’s time to get up,” he said. “Everything is ready to proclaim you Empress.” With barely time to dress, Catherine was hustled out into a waiting carriage that immediately raced off toward St. Petersburg.

At just past seven in the morning, Catherine arrived at the headquarters of the first of three Guards regiments. The Orlovs had already prepared her way, and the reception she received there was rapturous. “Hurrah for our Little Mother Catherine!” the ranks cheered, with some kneeling before her and kissing the hem of her skirt. Also kneeling was the commander of the regiment, Cyril Razumovsky (brother of Empress Elizabeth’s lover), who proclaimed Catherine sovereign and, in the name of all the soldiers, swore allegiance to her. The group, now swelled by elated officers and soldiers riding along with Catherine’s carriage, next proceeded to the second Guards regiment, where the new empress was welcomed with equal enthusiasm. Finally, after a tense period of uncertainty, Peter the Great’s elite Preobrazhensky unit rose up for Catherine as well.

All of St. Petersburg seemed to turn out in celebration as the smiling empress made her way first to the Church of Our Lady of Kazan, where she received the priests’ blessings amid holy icons and pealing bells, then to the Winter Palace to be greeted by the various ranks of Russian society who wished to pay homage. It had been a heady day, for sure, yet there remained the problem of Peter III, who still remained at large, with a formidable force at his disposal.

After securing St. Petersburg and issuing a manifesto that detailed Peter’s crimes against Russia, as well as her justification for usurping his crown, the empress rode out on horseback
to Peterhof, there to confront whatever forces her husband had managed to rally (which were none, as it turned out). Dressed smartly in the uniform of one of the Guard regiments, sword in hand, her hair flowing freely under an oak leaf crown she had fashioned around her hat, Catherine was the very image of the warrior queen leading her loyal troops into battle. It was an awesome sight that left all who witnessed it cheering wildly for her success.

As his wife was being proclaimed in St. Petersburg, the fallen emperor—having no idea that he had in fact fallen—arrived at Peterhof as planned, mistress in tow. But, of course, Catherine wasn’t there. Incensed by her defiance of his orders, Peter began a frenzied search for his recalcitrant spouse, checking under beds and inside closets. Then he received word of what had happened that morning in the capital. It was a crippling blow, but rather than rally himself to confront Catherine, Peter collapsed in despair.

“Courage, Majesty! Courage!” one of his ministers counseled the sobbing ex-sovereign. “One word from you, one imperious glance, and the people will fall on their knees before the Tsar! The men of Holstein are ready! This moment we march on St. Petersburg!”

But there would be no such movement. Peter was a frantic mass of indecision. Between fainting spells, gasping sobs, and heaping gulps of brandy, he issued desperate orders and limpid manifestos, all without accomplishing anything. The ministers he sent to St. Petersburg to confront Catherine never returned, either joining her cause or put under arrest.

With few options remaining, the deposed emperor was finally persuaded to sail to the island fortress of Kronshtadt, from where he might be able to rally those forces still loyal to him. But there was no succor to be found there. Catherine’s
delegate, Admiral Talysin, had already persuaded the fortress’s commander that Peter III was no more. Accordingly, booms were set up to block his way.

“It is the emperor,” Peter cried out upon reaching the blockade.

“There is no emperor,” came the response from the fortress; “there is only the empress!”

Peter might have courageously forged on, as his officers urged him to do, but instead he joined the ladies aboard the schooner in their pitiful wails. He then ordered the ship to set sail for his summer residence, Oranienbaum, where, depleted, he fell into bed with Elizabeth Vorontzova—and left himself to the mercy of Empress Catherine II.

The ex-emperor was taken to Peterhof, but Catherine refused to see him. She had already obtained what she wanted from him, which was Peter’s signature on the letter of abdication she had drafted. It read: “During the brief period of my absolute rule over the Empire of Russia [six months], I have recognized that my strength was not sufficient to bear such a burden.… For this reason, after mature reflection, I solemnly declare, of my own free will, to all Russia and to the entire universe, that I renounce the government of the said Empire for as long as I shall live.” As it turned out, that would be a week.

Peter had allowed himself to be dethroned, King Frederick II later wrote, “like a child being sent to bed.” Now all he wanted was mercy, the company of his dog and mistress, as well as a ticket back to Holstein. And for that, the onetime commander of all those toy soldiers—stripped of his uniform, decorations, and sword—fell to his knees and groveled. The sight of Peter the Great’s grandson in such a pathetic state was too much for Count Nikita Panin, one of Catherine’s coconspirators,
who later wrote, “I consider it one of the greatest misfortunes of my life to have been obliged to see Peter at that moment!”

Ultimately it was decided that the former emperor would be sent to the island fortress of Shlisselburg, where the deposed Ivan VI still languished (see footnote on
this page
) and where, ironically, Peter III had only recently gone to visit him. But while his accommodations at Shlisselburg were being prepared, Peter was sent to a summer estate at Ropsha. There he spent the last week of his life, writing a series of pitiful letters to his estranged wife, now celebrating her glorious triumph in St. Petersburg.

In his first missive, Peter wrote: “I beg Your Majesty … to have the kindness to remove the guards from the second room, because the room I am in is so small I can hardly move in it, and as Your Majesty knows that I always walk back and forth in the room, that will make my legs swell. Also I beg you to not order the officers to remain in the same room [with me]; since I must relieve myself, that is impossible. Moreover, I beg Your Majesty to treat me [less] like the greatest criminal, not knowing to have offended you ever. Commending myself to Your Majesty’s magnanimous thoughts, I beg Your Majesty to let me [go] as soon as possible with the person mentioned [his mistress Elizabeth Vorontzova] to Germany. God will surely repay Your Majesty for it and I am your very humble servant.”

Peter followed this woebegone letter with another: “Your Majesty, if you do not absolutely wish to kill a man who is already wretched enough, then have pity on me and leave me my only consolation, which is Elizabeth [Vorontzova]. By that you will do one of the greatest works of charity of your
reign. Moreover if Your Majesty was to see me for an instant, I would have attained my dearest wish.”

Empress Catherine never responded, but a week into Peter’s captivity she received news from Ropsha that would haunt her for the rest of her reign. Her husband was dead, either killed deliberately by his captors, or, as Alexis Orlov claimed, accidentally during a drunken quarrel. Clearly the former emperor’s demise was convenient for the new regime, but there is little indication that this is what Catherine wanted. Indeed, it was a blot on her reputation just as she was embracing her new sovereignty.

“My horror at this death is inexpressible,” the empress confided to a friend. “This blow strikes me to the earth!” That may have been true, but few believed the official line that it was an acute hemorrhoidal attack that carried Peter away. Even fewer really cared.

*
1
There is a certain level of a usurper’s self-justification in Catherine’s
Memoirs
. Nevertheless, the unflattering portrait of her husband she presents is echoed in quite a number of other contemporary accounts.

*
2
Historians are torn on this issue, which has never been resolved. Certainly Paul grew up to behave much like Peter III, and his rather repulsive appearance as an adult could possibly argue against the dashing Saltykov being his father. On the other hand, the aversion Peter had for Catherine in the bedroom—and the possibility that smallpox had made him sterile—might indicate that he never impregnated her. And Catherine herself implies in her
Memoirs
that Saltykov was Paul’s father.

*
3
Catherine delivered a baby girl named Anne, who lived only three months.

*
4
“She has a dull mind,” the French ambassador Baron de Breteuil wrote of Elizabeth Vorontzova in January 1762. “As for her face, it is the worst possible. In all respects she resembles an inn servant of the lower sort.” Another correspondent provided an even less flattering portrait of Peter’s mistress: “She swore like a trooper, had a squint, stank, and spat when she talked.” According to some reports, she also liked to beat up her boyfriend when they drank.

*
5
After carefully concealing her pregnancy, Catherine’s son by Gregory Orlov was born in secret in April 1762. To distract Peter while she was in labor, the empress’s faithful valet, Vasili Shkurin, burned down his own home, knowing that the firebug emperor would race off to watch the excitement. The child was given the name Alexis Gregorovich Bobrinsky: the patronymic for his father, Gregory Orlov, and the surname for the estate where he was raised.