At the end of the story about the medals of the Catherine era, we will tell you about her last significant "manet" - the medal for the capture of Prague. But, since the short period of the reign of Paul I that followed did not "spoil" the Russian soldiers with well-deserved awards, first let's look a little ahead.
A nominal medal given to "Armenian Danilov for zeal and diligence in the cultivation of silk trees …"
The remarkable Russian poet Alexander Vvedensky (the epithet “great”, now applied to anyone, has already lost its original high meaning) in the 30s of the last century, once sadly joked in a circle of friends (and, alas, informers) that he was a monarchist, for it is only under a hereditary form of government that there is some chance that a decent person may accidentally be in power.
Looking back at the long line of Russian autocrats, it is difficult for us not to succumb to another sensation - an inexplicable regularity, a strange order of their appearance and succession, as if a pendulum was swinging and two opposing parties were replacing one another.
The "stranglers of freedom", martyrs and reactionaries were replaced on the throne by conventionally "good" monarchs who, on the whole, played a progressively transformative role in the history of our country. Take a look for yourself (for convenience, we have divided the two "parties" into pairs):
Peter III - Catherine II, Paul I - Alexander I, Nicholas I - Alexander II.
It is now difficult to prove the validity of such a division: in recent decades, when the triumphant glasnost lifted the prohibitions on speaking on any occasion, the languages of various obscurantists also untied. Today you can often find in our literature and media panegyrics to the madmen and tyrants of the past.
Now Nikolai Pavlovich, who, according to Fyodor Tyutchev, did not serve God and not Russia, “served only his vanity,” “not a tsar, but an actor,” who took from the hands of his elder brother Alexander the country - the winner of Napoleon, which only recently brought deliverance from Corsican monster to other European nations and in the end led her into the rotten swamp of the Crimean War, some respectfully referred to as "the knight of autocracy."
Isn't it too flattering, however, such an opinion about the self-styled censor Alexander Pushkin (Tyutchev, by the way, too), who imposed savage resolutions on the poet's works like this:
“It can be distributed but not printed”?
Something, your will, demonic, Daniilandreev's is hidden in his coming to power, and in parting with it - both were accompanied by bloody sacrifices. It is very likely that Nikolai's death was still not the result of official pneumonia after the flu, but of the poison he took in a state of deep depression from the hands of his life physician Friedrich Mandt.
Of course, the Decembrists killed by Nicholas (if not all, then certainly the sadist Pavel Pestel) were by no means the wonderful-hearted sufferers that their propaganda tried to present in Soviet times. On the other hand, the death of two of the greatest Russian artistic geniuses, Alexander Pushkin and Mikhail Lermontov, precisely during the reign of Nicholas, Alexander Pushkin and Mikhail Lermontov, tragically ridiculous and too similar in circumstances not to lead to suspicion, is also far from accidental and very symbolic.
But Emperor Paul, unlike his third son, seems to us, rather, a tragicomic figure. And the emphasis in the last word, some stubbornly puts on the first part of it. (Imagine that in 1916, in the depths of the Russian Orthodox Church, documents were even prepared for the canonization of this sovereign!)
Oddly enough, this perception of the personality of “Russian Hamlet” was initiated by himself, who spread the story of his meeting with the ghost of Peter I, who allegedly turned to his great-grandson (a formal relative, because he, most likely, was no longer Romanov by blood) with the words:
"Poor, poor Paul!"
Perhaps the most accurate characterization of Paul was by a certain anonymous contemporary (this epigram was attributed to the great Alexander Suvorov):
"You are not a crown bearer in Petrov's glorious city, But a barbarian and a corporal are on watch."
Little good can be said about him; his own mother did not want to allow him to govern the country, shrewdly kept him at a distance from herself. And she would not have allowed, if the cabinet secretary Alexander Bezborodko had not been destroyed, the will, according to which all power from Catherine passed after her death to the eldest of the grandchildren, bypassing their dangerous father to those around him. For friendly service, Bezborodko was promoted to chancellor by Pavel.
The military reform, which began immediately after Hamlet's accession to the throne, was reduced mainly to a stupefying drill. By demanding slavish subordination of lower-ranking commanders to higher-ranking ones, it deprived the former of any initiative - the scourge of our army in later times, in the Great Patriotic War, when only the bloody lessons taught by the Wehrmacht taught to fight not according to the template.
True, in addition to braids and brooches, under Paul, a very necessary and comfortable overcoat was introduced for the first time, replacing the traditional epanchu and allowing the lower ranks dressed in it to calmly load ammunition on themselves.
But as for the awards - orders and medals - here the new monarch did everything not to deprive the servants of these visual proofs of glory and personal courage. In the appropriate place, we wrote about how jealous Paul treated the inheritance of his unloved mother - the orders of St. George and St. Vladimir: they were no longer awarded. Instead of the two most "militant" orders, he widely began to practice the promotion of the "family" Annensky cross. Pavel tried to approve the Order of Malta in Russia, including as an award of the same name.
If the orders, albeit less significant, were still given to the officers, then for ordinary soldiers chased along the Gatchina parade ground until they fainted, not a single award medal was instituted. Suvorov's miraculous heroes for Saint Gotthard and the Devil's Bridge, sailors from the ships of Fyodor Ushakov, who participated in the Mediterranean campaign, were not considered worthy! The lower ranks at that time were entitled only to the insignia of the Annensky Order, and then the donation of the Maltese Cross.
However, the first one, up to 1864, was awarded not for a personal feat or participation in a specific battle, in a war, but for twenty years of blameless service. The second, established to replace the first in 1800, did not take root in Russia, and soon after the murder of Paul, it quietly ceased to exist. It is also good that the sign and donation at least freed the veterans from corporal punishment, so beloved by Paul and other "corporals" like him.
At the same time, this emperor, in an inexplicable impulse, could bestow a personalized medal on someone. The design here was standard, with the profile of Paul on the obverse (the author of these medals is master Karl Leberecht). Only the verbose legend on the reverse varied.
So, on one of the medals we read:
"To the Georgian nobleman of the Armenian nation Mikertem Melik Kalantirov for his successes in the cultivation of mulberry trees and the silk business." A similar "manet" went to another "silkworm", "Armenian Danilov" - "for zeal and diligence in breeding."
In the summer of 1799, a team of 88 sailors and builders set out from St. Petersburg to the port of Okhotsk with the task of organizing a permanent military fleet in the Pacific Ocean. The expedition was commanded by Lieutenant Commander Ivan Bukharin. Bukharin's detachment, no matter how in a hurry, reached Okhotsk only a year later. At the end of February 1800, he almost got stuck in Yakutsk: the horses died.
But thanks to the help of the Yakuts, all weapons and ship equipment were delivered to the ocean coast without loss. This is how a whole series of personal medals appeared, for example, "To the Yakutsk prince of the Kangal ulus to the head of Belin for the assistance rendered to Captain Bukharin." She and several others of the same type were given to the Yakut "princes" to wear on a black ribbon of the Order of Malta.
A tiny (only 29 mm in diameter!) Pavlovsk medal "For Victory" of unknown purpose has survived to this day in the form of a historical curiosity. Its reverse is so small that the inscription is hardly broken into three lines:
"FOR VICTORY".
Judging by the date on the obverse ("1800"), the medal could presumably be intended not even for soldiers, but for Suvorov and Ushakov officers. Be that as it may, there is no information about awarding it to anyone. There is no mention of this "baby" in the issues of the "Collection of Russian medals" in 1840, dedicated to the medals of Paul I.
Now we, having left "Poor Paul" to his terrible fate, will be transported to 1794. From Russia we will move to Poland in the ranks of the tried and tested Suvorov troops. However, first, as expected, we will conduct a reconnaissance.
From the middle of the 18th century, weakened by internal strife, Poland de facto lost its independence and found itself under the pressure of its stronger neighbors. From the west and north, Prussia pressed on it, from the south it was pressed by Austria, and from the east - gigantic Russia, which Poland once tried to swallow, but choked (a boa constrictor that swallowed an elephant can only be in Antoine de Saint-Exupery's tale about the Little Prince). Now the process was reversed.
However, the successive partitions of Poland were advantageous, rather, for Prussia, while Russia took part in them to some extent by force. At that time in St. Petersburg, many far-sighted people understood the danger of immediate proximity to the expansive Germans. Later, he was still allowed, which led to the catastrophic defeats of the First World War, which caused the February coup, which destroyed the empire.
Only one thing the then Russian autocrat could not allow the Poles in any way - the liberal May Constitution of 1791. This constitution, adopted by the Commonwealth not without the influence of revolutionary France, had an effect on Catherine like a red rag on a bull. As soon as she finished the victorious war with the Turks and brushed aside various other Swedes, she, urged to do so by the Polish magnates, united in the so-called Targowitz Confederation, moved regiments to Poland.
The ensuing Russian-Polish war of 1792 proceeded in minor clashes, minor skirmishes with dozens, rarely a couple of hundred killed. Polish historiography proudly calls these clashes "battles". At Ovs, Mir, Borushkovtsy, Brest and Voishki, the Russians easily gained the upper hand. And the Poles recorded the "battle" near Zelentsy (in Russian historiography "near the Settlement") on the territory of modern Ukraine (Khmelnytsky region) as an asset.
On June 7 (18), the corps of Jozef Poniatowski met there in battle with the Russian detachment of Major General Count Irakli Morkov. The Poles fought desperately, even pushed the enemy back for a while. Yes, immediately and hastily retreated.
A man of extraordinary valor, the future leader of the Moscow militia in the Patriotic War of 1812 and a participant in the Battle of Borodino, Irakli Ivanovich Morkov was awarded the Order of St. George II degree for this battle. He received two previous degrees of the same order for the storming of Ochakov and Izmail. "The bravest and most invincible officer" - this is how Suvorov had already certified his subordinate.
Here's what the rescript said about the new award:
"In respect of diligent service, brave and courageous deeds that distinguished him during the defeat of the troops of the opposite faction in Poland on June 7, 1792 at the village of Gorodische, where he commanded the vanguard and prudent orders, art, courage and boundless zeal, he won a complete victory."
All this, however, did not prevent the Poles from immediately loudly declaring themselves complete victors at Zelentsy. Still would! After all, for almost a hundred years before that, they had never succeeded not only once in defeating the Russians, but even in seriously opposing them on the battlefield! On this occasion, the uncle of General Jozef Poniatowski, King Stanislaw August, hastily instituted a special medal Vertuti Militari, which was immediately turned into the order of the same name.
Order of the Vertuti Militari
The history of this order is not our topic. At one time, we did not mention him when talking about Polish orders in the Russian Empire, because unlike their "brothers", the Orders of the White Eagle and St. Stanislaus, Vertuti Militari, although it entered our award system after Poland joined Russia in 1815, but did not remain in it for long and was in a special position. Emperor Alexander I did not like him, he did not favor his Russian subjects.
And under Nicholas I, a curious situation arose: the Vertuti Militari massively awarded the participants in the suppression of the Polish uprising of 1831, but at the same time the rebels were giving each other the same order (the design was only slightly different)! Therefore, having put an end to the rebellion, the award was also abolished.
Vertuti Militari was rebuilt in Poland several times, the last one in 1944. He was then awarded not only by the soldiers of the Polish Army, but also by Soviet soldiers, officers, generals, marshals: Georgy Zhukov, Ivan Konev, Alexander Vasilevsky and, of course, Konstantin Rokossovsky.
After the Great Patriotic War, the Poles also handed it over to some Soviet politicians. Such an order was, for example, in the extensive collection of Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev. However, in 1990, the new Polish authorities posthumously deprived Brezhnev of the order - to fight against the shadows and overcome Russia in the pages of pseudo-historical writings, Poles are always great.
As for the medal, as soon as it was minted and handed over (they managed to distribute 20 out of 65 gold and 20 out of 290 silver), the war ended predictably. The inconstant king Stanislav went over to the side of the magnates, abolished the Constitution and strictly forbade both the medal and the order, which he himself only instituted. Under the peace treaty of 1793, Russia annexed the Right-Bank Ukraine and part of the Belarusian lands with Minsk.
However, in the spring of next year, an uprising began under the leadership of Tadeusz Kosciuszko. From Krakow, it was instantly transferred to Warsaw, where the Russian garrison under the command of Catherine's diplomat, the freshly baked Count General Osip Igelstrom was taken by surprise. Instead of staying on the alert in a peaceful country all the time, Igelström was engaged in amorous affairs with the frivolous beauty Countess Honorata Zaluska.
He even ordered to cover the street, where the countess's house stood, with straw, so that Honoratochka would not be woken up by the carriages rumbling on the pavement. Such courtly knightly care saved Igelström's life: Zaluska found a way to take the count out of the unrest-ridden capital. The soldiers abandoned by him to the mercy of fate and peaceful Russians, who happened to be in Warsaw at that moment, were less fortunate.
Here is what the well-known fiction writer, journalist and critic, the addressee of Pushkin's most evil epigrams, Thaddeus Bulgarin, later wrote about this:
“The Russians, fighting their way with bayonets through the crowds of rebels, had to leave Warsaw. The retreating Russians were fired upon from the windows and from the roofs of houses, logs and anything that could cause harm was thrown at them, and out of 8,000 Russians, 2,200 people died."
Silver medal "For labor and courage during the capture of Prague on October 24, 1794"
This is if you count only the military. Although the Poles killed any Russian without mercy: officials, diplomats, merchants, their wives and children.
April 17, 1794 went down in the history of Russian-Polish relations as the Warsaw Matins, because the massacre of our compatriots took place on Maundy Thursday, Easter week. The Orthodox were taken by surprise during the morning worship service, which greatly helped the pogromists in their bloody work.
Immediately, Russia took retaliatory measures, the main of which turned out to be a call from Kherson to Alexander Suvorov, who was vegetating there in disgrace.
The elderly field marshal Pyotr Rumyantsev, the commander-in-chief of the Russian troops on the western borders of the empire, judged everything correctly: we must act quickly so as not to let the uprising flare up. It was impossible to imagine a better candidate than the conqueror of Ishmael.
Russian troops moved from different directions to Poland. The Prussian army approached Warsaw from the west, but the Germans acted hesitantly and soon lifted the siege.
Suvorov, without notifying Petersburg, entrusted Rumyantsev with the main task: to put an end to the enemy with a lightning strike. He rushed forward with his usual swiftness, disarming the surrendering and scattering the more persistent. On September 4, he took Kobrin, on the 8th, near Brest-Litovsk, defeated the troops of General Karol Serakovsky and on the 23rd approached the Warsaw suburb of Prague, on the right bank of the Vistula.
On the same day, on the eve of the assault on the strong position of the Poles, one of the famous Suvorov orders for the army was issued:
“Walk in silence, not say a word; Approaching the fortification, quickly rush forward, throw the fascinator into the ditch, go down, put ladders to the shaft, and the arrows hit the enemy on the head. Climb briskly, couple by couple, to defend comrade comrade; if the ladder is short, - bayonet into the shaft, and climb another, third along it. Do not shoot unnecessarily, but beat and drive with a bayonet; work quickly, bravely, in Russian. Keeping our own in the middle, keeping up with the bosses, the front is everywhere. Do not run into houses, begging for mercy - spare, do not kill unarmed, do not fight with women, do not touch youngsters. Who will be killed - the kingdom of heaven; to the living - glory, glory, glory."
Medal "For the capture of Prague"
At first, the troops acted like that. But, having breaks and drove the armed Poles outnumbering them across the Vistula, our people, in a frenzy, set to work on the unarmed. The Cossacks were especially fierce. However, ordinary soldiers from the regiments that suffered during the Warsaw Matins, disobeying the instructions of the commander, gave full vent to their rage. Suvorov, fearing for the fate of Warsaw, even ordered the destruction of the bridge across the river from our side, which the Poles themselves had previously tried unsuccessfully to undermine.
The current Polish historians, of course, attack Suvorov, which distinguishes them from the frightened Warsaw citizens of the end of the 18th century: they immediately surrendered and later blessed their Russian savior, who received the highest military rank of Generalissimo in Russia for curbing the rebellion.
At the same time, the Empress granted him a “diamond bow to the hat,” and grateful Warsaw citizens presented Suvorov with a gold snuff box decorated with diamond laurels with the inscription:
"Warsaw - to its deliverer, on November 4, 1794".
The uprising was over: under Matsejewicz, Kosciuszko was defeated and captured by generals Ivan Ferzen and Fyodor Denisov, the Polish king Stanislav, under the escort of dragoons, went to Grodno under the supervision of the Russian governor, and soon abdicated on the day of the name day of the Russian empress, his former patroness and old patroness. mistresses.
The officers of the victorious army, from those who did not receive the orders, received gold crosses to wear on the St. George ribbon (we will tell about this kind of awards separately later). The soldiers were presented with silver medals of an unusual shape - square, with rounded corners. On the obverse there is the monogram of Catherine II under the imperial crown, on the reverse there is a small inscription in eight lines:
"FOR - WORK - AND - CHARITY - AT TAKING - PRAGUE - OCTOBER 24 - 1794".
This mass medal was awarded, by the way, not only for the storming of Prague, but also for other battles in 1794. It was supposed to be worn on the red ribbon of the Order of the Holy Blessed Prince Alexander Nevsky. And, of course, with no less pride than the Poles of their Vertuti Militari.
