Currently, the Military-Historical Museum of Artillery, Engineering Troops and Signal Corps (VIMAIViVS) is located in the historical part of the northern capital in the so-called Kronverk - an auxiliary fortification of the St. Petersburg (Peter and Paul) fortress. Translated from German, Kronwerk means "strengthening in the form of a crown" and the structure really looks like a royal headdress from a bird's eye view. The main task of Kronverk was to protect the Peter and Paul Fortress from the attack of the Swedes from the north, however, none of these fortifications had time to take part in the hostilities. True, there is an opinion that in 1705 the Swedes unsuccessfully tried to seize the newly built Peter and Paul Fortress and it was this episode that prompted the construction of an earthen Kronverk in the northern part.
The new fortification was located on an artificial island, which was called the Artillery Island, and was supposed to prevent the attackers from concentrating their forces to attack the main fortress on the Hare Island. The fronts of the Kronwerk have a bastional outline of the French school with small orillons (from the French orillon - "eyelet"), allowing longitudinal fire from the fortification, that is, to protect the walls from flank attacks. In accordance with all the rules, in front of the fronts, ravelins were placed, or triangular fortifications separate from the main structure, located in front of the water channel. The escarps, counter-escarps and "kapunirs" of the Kronverk were at that time built of earth and wood.
Since 1706, stone began to be attracted for construction - the fences were protected from erosion by water with granite scarps. On the inner side of the Kronverk, casemates were also placed for housing, and under each flank (fortification located perpendicular to the front of the fortress) there were two-tier defensive casemates. Throughout the 17th century, the northern defender of the Peter and Paul Fortress was modernized and rebuilt at the initiative of both Peter I himself and his associates. One way or another, Count and General Burchard Christoph von Munnich, Prince Ludwig of Hesse-Homburg, Count Pyotr Ivanovich Shuvalov, as well as a military engineer and General-in-Chief Abram Petrovich Hannibal, great-grandfather of Alexander Pushkin, invested in the development of Kronwerk. Several decades after its construction, both the St. Petersburg Fortress and its northern defender became obsolete and became part of the magnificent St. Petersburg panorama. However, the main fortress overshadowed the Kronverk both in terms of historical value and literally - in order to see the fortification from the city center, it is necessary to bypass the Peter and Paul walls.
Peter the Great Museum
If we compare the age of Kronwerk, where the artillery museum is now located, with the age of the cannon assembly, it turns out that the first artillery pieces began to be collected back in 1703. That is, two years before the laying of the first wooden-earth Kronverk. And much earlier than the famous Kunstkamera, which Peter I founded in 1714, and which many mistakenly consider the oldest museum in Russia. Where were the first exhibits of the future artillery collection located? In the Peter and Paul Fortress in a wooden guesthouse by order of Peter I. And the first manager and curator of the exposition was Sergei Leontievich Bukhvostov, whom the Russian tsar in his youth called “the first Russian soldier”. In the amusing troops of the young Peter the Great, Bukhvostov once held the position of “amusing gunner”.
To fill the exposition required a lot of effort, since in the days of that time all their spent and obsolete weapons were melted down to create new cannons or bells. After all, copper, iron and bronze were not the most readily available materials. In the decrees of Peter I, one can see in this regard the requirements for the military leaders of all cities of Russia about the need for strict accounting, inventory and storage of all guns and maszhers (mortars). The most outstanding weapons were ordered to be sent to the exposition of the emerging museum in the Petropavlovsk tseikhgauz. So, in the early years, 30 guns with 7 mortars arrived from Smolensk at once. Often the tsar himself examined the weapons prepared for disposal, of which he sent the most interesting to the museum. And even at a turning point after the Battle of Narva, when the army was in dire need of weapons-grade metals, the guns accumulated in the Zeichhaus were not used for total melting down. The severity of the situation is evidenced by the numerous facts of melting down the bells seized from the existing temples and churches. The state took this step only after the approval of the church.
Over time, to replenish the collection with "inverter, curious and memorable" exhibits, they began to attract merchants who bought weapons abroad. A notable story in this regard is the example of the Swedish merchant Johannes Prim, who acquired an old Russian Inrog cannon for his collection in 1723 in Stockholm and brought this colossus to his homeland. The artillery council wrote then: "This cannon is not required for artillery and cannot continue to be valid, but it was bought only for curiosity and seeing that it is an old Russian one."
In 1776, a three-story artillery arsenal of Count Orlov appeared on Liteiny Prospekt in St. Petersburg, in which the second floor was completely transferred to the needs of the museum from the Petropavlovsk Zeichgauz. By the end of the 18th century, the oldest museum in Russia was also becoming the largest military history museum in the world. True, it was closed for free access to visitors until 1808, when, together with the first visitors, a new life of the collection of military values begins. Catalogs, guidebooks are compiled, and the painstaking work of classification and restoration of exhibits is started. The memorable hall in the artillery arsenal of St. Petersburg at first coped with the influx of visitors, until the wars of the early to mid-19th century filled the collection with captured weapons. A unique collection of valuables demanded new areas, but then, unexpectedly, the building of the Oryol arsenal was handed over to the Ministry of Justice to house the court. It happened in 1864 and the entire collection of weapons for four years was kept in basements and warehouses unsuitable for this. It was at this moment that Russia could lose valuable exhibits from Peter's artillery collection. But very in time the Emperor Alexander II himself intervened in the matter, who in 1868 ordered to transfer the assembly of many thousands to the stone, by that time, Kronverk of the Peter and Paul Fortress. Since that time, the official name of the Petrine Museum has become the "Hall of Memorable Items of the Main Artillery Directorate".
Croverk became stone for a rather paradoxical reason - revolutions began in Europe that led to the overthrow of the royal dynasties. In this regard, Nicholas I decided to protect himself and the state from the "revolutionary infection" by building a mass of fortresses throughout Russia. In 1848, the construction of a two-storey building of the arsenal began on the site of the wooden-earth Kronverk. In 1860, all the work was completed and the powerful red-stone fortification received the official name "New Arsenal in Kronwerk". After 8 years, a place was found within the walls of the fortress for the exhibits of the Peter's collection, which by that time was more than 150 years old.
At the beginning of the 20th century, many trials fell to the lot of the artillery museum. At first, they wanted to move it to the Peter and Paul Fortress, and at the meeting place they planned to place the Mint. In 1917, when the Germans were rushing to the capital, the museum exhibits had to be evacuated to Yaroslavl. This was largely due to the huge amount of gun bronze, for which the Germans had special plans - for them it was a strategically important resource. The revolution did not spare the exhibits either. Both in Yaroslavl and in Petrograd, a lot of archival data, collections of banners, collections of trophies and documents were burnt. 1924 brought another disaster - a devastating flood that flooded a large part of the exhibition.
Recent history of the museum
After the Great Patriotic War and the period of the most difficult restoration of the museum, the collections of the collection were continuously replenished with new exhibits. These were both captured samples and the latest developments of the Soviet military industry, many of which bore the status of prototypes. It was in the post-war period that the museum finally focused on the artillery profile and the exhibits of the Quartermaster's collection and a lot of historical military-medical equipment were removed from the collection. Also, collections of headdresses, military uniforms, the Suvorov collection and religious items are scattered across small museums. In 1963, the Central Historical Military Engineering Museum joined the exposition in Kronwerk, and two years later the Military Museum of Communications.
Now the exposition of the Artillery Museum has more than 630 thousand exhibits, of which 447 are located on the outer site in the open air. The meeting itself, which I got to know in mid-August, leaves a rather contradictory impression. On the one hand, the museum is filled with unique equipment and weapons, many of which date back to the 16th-17th centuries. In total, there are 13 halls on a total area of about 17 thousand square meters. m. The building of Kronverk and in itself is of considerable historical value, and even its content and even more so. The museum is accessible - it is easy to find in St. Petersburg and it is open five days a week, and you can get to the open exhibition absolutely free of charge.
On the other hand, the decoration for a modern museum is quite modest. Especially when compared with the most modern hangars of the museum complex in the Patriot Park near Moscow. In many halls there is not enough elementary lighting of the exhibits, and the most valuable barrels of medieval cannons are piled like logs on the territory of the museum. In addition, the halls of the artillery assembly are in a permanent state of repair and you are unlikely to be able to visit them all at the same time. Firstly, the part will be closed for repairs, and secondly, there will not be enough time for a thorough inspection - the museum is open from 11.00 to 17.00. Despite this, the museum's collections and the atmosphere inside are unique. Nowhere in Russia can you find such a large collection of witnesses of the world cannon and military engineering history. Each hall of the museum requires separate attention and a separate narration.
