Alexey Arakcheev - the leader of the conservative "Russian Party" in the 1820s
Count Alexei Andreevich Arakcheev is still one of the most negatively mythologized Russian figures to this day. stories, despite the fact that over the past two decades, a number of serious works have appeared on him, significantly changing the traditional ideas about this undoubtedly outstanding statesman [33 – 35, 24, 22, 13].
This article aims to show the reasons for the nomination of Alexei Arakcheev for the role of one of the prominent figures of the conservative "Russian party" 1820-s. The term "Russian party" [3, p. 201], or the party of “old Russians” [17, p. 402], was first recorded after the Peace of Tilzit 1807, in public opinion and in reports of foreign diplomats. Thus, Saint-Aignan (a French diplomat who was in St. Petersburg in 1807) wrote in a letter to Charles Maurice Talleyrand, apparently: “There is a Russian party consisting of a large number of nobles who do not want any innovations in management. People of this party live mostly in Moscow ”[cit. by: 18, p. 232].
In liberal historiography, the activity of the “Russian party” was characterized, as a rule, extremely negatively. As a typical example of this kind, let us quote the opinion of Mikhail Moroshkin, who described it as a group of self-serving feudalists, “left completely idle and recognized as incapable of government positions” [14, p. 502]. He argued that its members were characterized by “insulted ambition, envy, pride, and claims to extensive state and administrative talents, finally, simply exaggerated and self-serving fears for their feudal rights of people, the whole sphere of patriotism of these people, as experience has shown, was limited to uncontrolled disposal of their own peasants "[14, p. 502 – 503]. Such characteristics suffer extreme bias and one-sidedness. The activity of the “Russian party” was not limited to the protection of the self-interested interests of the feudalists. She was a union of defenders of Russian national interests and patriots of Russia. Conservative-nationalist ideology and moods objectively became a necessary condition for victory in the World War 1812 of the year and overcoming the hallomania of a part of noble society. Liberal historian Nikolai Bulich was right in his own way, saying: “The patriotic party won the people's war; she was convinced that her conservative principles triumphed, that the French revolution, deeply hated by her, was defeated ”[4, p. 590].
Opening the role of Arakcheev in this union, we can not touch the main milestones of his biography. Alexey Andreevich was born on September 23 of the year 1769 in the small village of Garusovo, Vyshnevolotsky district, Novgorod province. The Arakcheev family was not distinguished by generosity and nobility. He descended from Thomas Arakcheev, granted by the estate in Bezhetskaya Pyatina in 1607 year. The great-grandson of this ancestor Ivan Stepanovich distinguished himself in the war with Poland under Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich [15, p. 322], showing both “fighting and bravery”. Arakcheev's great-grandfather participated in almost all the wars of Peter the Great, and grandfather Vasily Stepanovich was killed in the 1735 year, during the campaign of the Russian army in the Crimea. Andrei Andreyevich Arakcheev’s father (+ 1796) served in the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment, retired with the rank of lieutenant, married Elizaveta Andreevna Vitlitskaya (1750 – 1820) and completely devoted himself to the household. Arakcheeva was educated by her mother, a devout, intelligent, domineering and energetic woman who held the whole family in strictness and obedience. She instilled in Arakcheev a desire for permanent work, strict order, accuracy and thrift. Literacy and arithmetic Arakcheeva taught rural deacon.
In 1785, Arakcheev entered one of the best cadet corps - the Petersburg artillery and engineering gentry corps. The corps taught arithmetic, geometry, started trigonometry, fortification and artillery, studied French, German and Latin. In the "upper" classes teaching was conducted only in foreign languages. From the "elegant" disciplines, cadets were taught dancing and fencing. The cadet was raised "in the fear of God and in the fear of the rod." Arakcheev gained a reputation as an excellent cadet "both in science and in behavior." He was particularly distinguished in the study of military-mathematical sciences, not having great inclinations towards the humanitarian cycle. He read French fluently, but he had a bad pronunciation, but spoke quite fluent German. With the rank of sergeant Arakcheev he was appointed teacher of arithmetic and artillery (1784). As a zealous cadet and at the same time a mentor to the younger Arakcheyev corps in 1786, he was awarded a silver medal for his distinction. In the 1787 year, at the end of the course, Arakcheev, as one of the best graduates with the rank of army lieutenant, was left in the corps as a teacher of mathematics and artillery. In 1789, Arakcheev received the rank of second lieutenant of artillery and was appointed commander of one of the best, specially selected artillery corps commands. At the same time, Arakcheev compiled the textbook “A Brief Artillery Note in Questions and Answers,” making a definite contribution to the development of military education in Russia.
In 1790, Arakcheev was appointed adjutant to the head of the corps, General Peter Melissino. In 1792, Melissino, in turn, appointed Arakcheev as a practice artilleryman to serve in the army of Gatchina as Grand Duke Pavel Petrovich. Convinced of Arakcheev's experience, the heir appointed him commander of an artillery company and made artillery captains and prime majors. In a short time Arakcheev led in perfect order all the Gatchina artillery. In 1793, Arakcheev was promoted to major artillery. In addition to supervising the Gatchina artillery, Arakcheev was assigned to arrange a school for junior officers. In 1794, Arakcheev was entrusted with the economic part of the Gatchina troops - the commissariat (clothing allowance, clothing and equipment) and food supplies. At the beginning of 1796, he was entrusted with the inspection of the Gatchina infantry, as well as the post of commandant of the city. In submission Arakcheeva were all Gatchina troops and residents of Gatchina. Arakcheev was also charged with setting up a Pavlovsk military orphanage. Then Arakcheev was given the rank of lieutenant colonel, and at the end of the year, the colonel of artillery. After Paul I ascended to the throne, Arakcheev was promoted to major general and received the Order of Saint Anna of I degree, appointed commander of the combined grenadier battalion of the Preobrazhensky Life Guards Regiment, received a rich Georgian patrimony in the Novgorod province (more than 2 thousand serfs). On the day of the coronation of Paul I, 5 on April 1797, Arakcheev was awarded the Alexander's cavalier and baronial title. Then he was simultaneously assigned to three positions: the commandant of St. Petersburg, the commander of the Preobrazhensky regiment and the quartermaster general of the whole army (1797). Arakcheev taught the military heir to the throne, Grand Duke Alexander Pavlovich, the future Alexander I.
Arakcheev's style of activity was distinguished by his thoroughness and extreme discipline, personal self-restraint, colossal will and incredible efficiency, rigorous exactingness, reaching cruelty (which, however, later memoirists incredibly exaggerated, having contributed to the creation of the negative myth about Arakcheev - the Gatchian kaprale) a monkey in uniform "," temporary worker "," Snake Gorynyche ", etc.) [On the negative myths that have developed around the name of Arakcheev, see: 8, p. 56 – 60].
Along with this, there are cases when Arakcheev punished officers for cruel treatment of soldiers. After a short opals in 1799, Arakcheev was appointed inspector of all artillery and was granted a title of count. In his coat of arms, the emperor himself wrote the motto: "He is betrayed without flattery." However, a second opal soon followed; Alexander І returned from Arakcheev’s exile. On the eve of March 11 1801, Arakcheev was summoned by Pavel I, but the conspirators prevented him from coming to St. Petersburg. Returned to the service Arakcheev was appointed inspector of all artillery (1803 – 1808). In this post, Arakcheev made a huge contribution to the reorganization of the whole artillery case in the Russian army. Under his leadership, first-class artillery was created, which showed itself well in the battles of 1805 – 1809 and played a significant role in the 1812 Patriotic War of the year. Military administrative activity, not strategy issues, was the real vocation of Arakcheyev, who, due to this circumstance, did not take part in the hostilities. Modern historians come to the conclusion that he was a brilliant military organizer, innovator and talented reformer [35, p. 117 – 128].
13 January 1808, he was appointed Minister of War. A. Martin writes about this: “The emperor was frightened by rumors of a coup d’état; but, putting the army, whose loyalty was the decisive factor in any attempts to overthrow the regime, Arakcheev controlled, he could sleep a little calmer ”[36, p. 53]. The rise of Arakcheev - a tough, precise and strong-willed performer - was a response to the dissatisfaction of Russian society with the conditions of the Tilsit world, the continental blockade, which humiliated the sense of national dignity. Arakcheev had to manage the War Ministry in wartime conditions. Russia continued to wage wars with Iran (1804 – 1813), Turkey (1806 – 1812), with Sweden (1808 – 1809), has been at war with Austria since 1809, and as a result of participation in the continental blockade with England. For two years (before January, 1810), Arakcheev managed to make a number of significant changes, especially in the recruitment and training of combat personnel. According to his projects, there were established recruit depot for the initial training of recruits before being sent to line units and training carabinier regiments for training non-commissioned officers and musicians. The divisional organization was finally introduced in the army. The military board received the right to independently resolve many issues, and the post of the duty general appeared, largely freeing the minister of war from the need to delve into all sorts of minor matters. Under the new staffing schedule, the artillery received a better structure and mobility; exams for fireworks, junkers and senior officers were introduced (up to the lieutenant, inclusive) during the occupation of various positions, training sessions and combat shooting were improved. Artillery units were allocated to a separate branch of the armed forces and consolidated into companies and brigades. The material part was also changed. Significant changes have occurred in factories producing weapon and ammunition, and in artillery arsenals Arakcheev was very interested in technical innovations and always remained in the know on this matter. At his suggestion, steam sawmills, mechanical laundries in hospitals were built in a number of districts, and a tugboat for the transport of construction materials appeared on Lake Ilmen and the Volkhov River since 1819. Since 1825, regular passenger flights of two ships began from Staraya Russa to the New Chudovo road. When he was a war minister, Arakcheev wrote several articles on the technology of making gunpowder, nitre, and the performance of live firing; with his direct participation, the Military Training Committee was established and the publication of the “Artillery Journal” began. The emperor entrusted to him the recruitment and dismissal, at his discretion, of the officials of the Commissariat and Provisional Departments to the 6 class inclusive. As a sign of special distinction of 30 August 1808, Alexander I ordered to rename the Rostov Musketeers Regiment into Arakcheev Regiment (from 27 January 1811 of the year to 28 April 1834 of the year - Grenadier Count Arakcheev Regiment).
In the course of the Russian-Swedish war of 1808 – 1809, Arakcheev, with his characteristic energy, was able to organize the supply of the operating armies with everything necessary: trained recruits, provisions, fodder, weapons, ammunition. He took the necessary measures to strengthen the Baltic coast of Russia from possible hostile actions on the part of England. But the most significant was the role of Arakcheev not only in material support, but also in the direct impact on the course of military operations. His perseverance forced generals Vladimir Knorring and Mikhail Barclay de Tolly to undertake the most difficult transition on the ice of the Gulf of Bothnia, move the fighting to the territory of Sweden and thereby decide the outcome of the whole campaign and the fate of Finland.
In 1810, Arakcheev, in protest against the liberal course pursued by Mikhail Speransky, and the behavior of the emperor, who hid from him the preparation of the "Establishment of the State Council", left the post of minister of war. On the recommendation of Arakcheev, Mikhail Barclay de Tolly was appointed Minister of War. Soon, at the categorical insistence of Alexander I, Arakcheev headed the department of military affairs in the State Council. According to the Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, Arakcheev in the field of the military did "very much" [5, p. 84].
In World War 1812, the role of Arakcheev increases dramatically. Already 14 June 1812, he was once again called for the management of military affairs. In the autobiographical marks made by him on the family copy of the Gospel, Arakcheev not without reason noted: "The whole French war was going through my hands, all the secret reports and the emperor's own handwritings" [30, p. 925 – 926]. He "served as almost the only secretary of the sovereign during World War II" [5, p. 219] and was the only speaker of Alexander I on almost all issues: military, diplomatic, army management, etc., doing a tremendous job, without which it was impossible to conduct military operations against Napoleon. His role was the same in the 1813 – 1814 campaign [24, p. 106]. In the summer of 1814, the emperor, for his success in organizing the Russian army, wanted to award Arakcheev with the rank of field marshal, but he categorically refused. Thus, Arakcheev is one of the key figures of the Patriotic War, worthy to stand alongside Mikhail Kutuzov and Mikhail Barclay de Tolly, Fyodor Rostopchin and Alexander Shishkov.
From the second floor. 1814 of the year, all matters relating to government and administration were considered and prepared for the most general report only by the office of Arakcheev. Submissions from all ministries and even the “opinion” of the State Council were often made through him. In August 1818, Arakcheev was appointed head of the office of the Committee of Ministers, and thus he received the official opportunity to influence crucial decisions. Arakcheev’s nomination became a visible symptom of the “rise of authoritarian tendencies in the internal politics of Alexander I” [36, p. 54]. Practically, it was Arakcheev who at the time, along with Alexander I, exercised general guidance of Russia's internal policy, taking upon himself the burden of executing unpopular decisions. Only he fully trusted the monarch.
In the 1817 – 1825 years on behalf of the monarch Arakcheev was engaged in the organization of military settlements with the title of chief chief of military settlements. Initially Arakcheev opposed the creation of military settlements, but then obeyed the will of the sovereign. The military settlements, according to the king, were to significantly reduce government spending on maintaining the army, eliminate recruitment kits in peacetime and thereby ease the economic situation of the country, create a prosperous military-agricultural class, provide cover for borders and reduce the redeployment of troops in the event of hostilities. Military settlements were established in the Novgorod, Mogilyov, Vitebsk, Sloboda-Ukrainian, Kherson and Yekaterinoslav provinces. In the management of military settlements, purely military functions (combat training of troops) were combined with economic functions (organization of construction and land reclamation works, transport, industry and agriculture). At the same time, extreme forms of coercion were used (forcible attachment of villagers to the land, depriving them of the right to engage in trade, labor and trade, regulation of many aspects of life, etc.), which led to the ruin of settlement peasants and quite large-scale uprisings.
Simultaneously with the creation of military settlements, Arakcheev developed on behalf of the king in 1818 a project for the liberation of the peasants. According to this project, serfs and yard people, with the consent of the landlords, were gradually redeemed by the treasury. In addition, the state was to redeem two acres of arable land for each audit soul. For the purchase of peasants and land, the government pledged to release annually 5 million rubles, covering the lack of money with special treasury notes. Arakcheev’s project was approved by Alexander I, but at the same time, despite his secrecy, he became known to the circles of the nobility and aroused strong opposition from them. As a result, Alexander I did not dare to submit it for discussion to the State Council.
During this period, Arakcheev intensified ties with the main leaders of the “Russian Party” [30, p. .229 – 230.]. So, in March, 1816, a personal acquaintance of Nikolai Karamzin, who arrived in the capital with the aim of obtaining an audience with the emperor for talks about publishing the History of the Russian State, with Arakcheev, took place. The circumstances of this event in the liberal and Soviet historiography are usually interpreted as morally unacceptable for the historiographer, who did not want, in principle, to meet with the "temporary worker." Nevertheless, after their meeting, Karamzin wrote: “I found a man in him with a mind and with good rules. Here are his words: “My deacon was my teacher: is it any wonder that I know little? My business is to fulfill the will of the Gosudarev. If I were younger, I would learn from you: now it is too late. ”Consequently, Graf Arakcheev undertook to facilitate my early meeting with the Sovereign; he even assured me that this postponement would not continue ”[cit. by: 16, p. 154]. Mikhail Pogodin assessed the role of Arakcheev in organizing the meeting of the historiographer with the tsar: “All efforts and all the mediation ended in nothing good-bye to Count Arakcheyev, who promised to issue an audience and the next day kept his word: Karamzin was received and showered with affection and favors” [16 , with. 156]. “To go to heaven, it was impossible to avoid purgatory, where the stern abbess sat,” Nikolai Schilder aphoristically noted [29, p. 7]. Despite the initial offense, described in detail and quite tendentiously described in the literature, Karamzin later respected Arakcheev. 14 September 1825 of the year he wrote: “A state man, grieved by a horrible domestic incident (by the murder of Arakcheev’s mistress Nastasya Minkina. - AM), refused all cases, as is heard: it is not easy to replace him with others. We have few people on the big stage ”[16, p. 415]. Estimates Arakcheeva made Karamzin, "a man with the mind and good rules," "state man", etc., were hardly hypocritical.
As a result of the meeting of Karamzin with Arakcheev, Alexander I honored the writer with the highest audience, following which the necessary funds were allocated for the publication of the History of the Russian State. Karamzin was awarded the Order of St. Anne I Class, and in 1824, he became a state councilor. According to the report of Alexander Golitsyn, the emperor ordered to print the “History of the Russian State” without censorship [20, l. 1].
In the same period, Arakcheev provided substantial support to Alexander Shishkov as president of the Russian Academy. Back in 1815, Shishkov submitted a petition to strengthen the funds of the Russian Academy, which he wanted to put in a position independent of the Minister of Public Education, but after two years, the matter did not move from the dead end. The Academy received from its treasury no more than 9 thousand rubles [31, p. 92]. Shishkov, on the other hand, asked for at least 60 thousand rubles a year and, moreover, to create a printing house and an extension of the hall to it at a time 90 thousand rubles. The extension was needed by Shishkov in order for “a well-arranged and decorated hall to serve for the opening of public readings, once in the house of Derzhavin, called“ Conversations of Russian Word Lovers ”(a literary-political association of Russian conservatives that existed in 1807 – 1814 years and led by Alexander Shishkov and Gavrila Derzhavin. — AM), where a large audience gathered and where similar readings, unfortunately not long lasting, brought considerable benefits and pleasure ”[31, p. 94]. Attempts to resort to the help of the emperor did not give any results, on the contrary, Shishkov even began to believe that he had fallen into a new disgrace: “His Majesty’s coldness to me became more noticeable from the hour, so I was never called to him. I endured it with contented indifference, being sure of my rightness and remembering one of my friends, the adage that an honest person has nothing less to lose than the need for a king than a king for an honest man ”[31, p. 94]. In this situation Shishkov in February 1817 of the year addressed a letter to Arakcheev. As a result, the case was instantly resolved. The day after receiving the letter, Arakcheev told Shishkov: “This is how soon I will execute your orders!” [31, p. 97]. In May, the 1817 of the new budget of the Russian Academy was approved by the emperor [31, p. 101]. In fact, along with the rest, it was a question of financial and organizational support from the state that Shishkov conceived the center for the consolidation of Russian conservatives.
We also note that in 1817, Arakcheev, when subscribing to the writings of Sergei Glinka, the publisher of the conservative journal Russian Gazette, “was pleased that“ the writer, known for useful works that he enriched in Russian literature, demands his petition: “Who is Russian? I would accept your participation in the situation, ”Arakcheev wrote and undertook to be the representative of S.N. Glinka before the then Minister of National Enlightenment, Prince A.N. Golitsyn "[23, p. 13].
Not surprisingly, in 1823 – 1824, Arakcheev delivered the emperor’s sanction as the de facto head of the conservative “Russian party” who succeeded in 1822 in banning Masonic lodges and dismissing Prince Alexander Golitsyn, minister of spiritual affairs and public education, who acted as an ecumenical guide and mystic-cosmopolitan course in confessional politics and education.
Due to a number of personal qualities, Arakcheev fully fit the role of the leader of the “Russian Party”. In his autobiographical notes, the Protestant Egor von Bradke, who knew Arakcheev well, stated: “In churchly he stood on the soil of immobile Orthodoxy; the activities of the Bible Society, the call of the clergy of other confessions, the influence of Mrs. Krudner and other mystics aroused him in disgust ”[1, p. 123]. An active freemason Nikolai Grech called him with disgust a "champion of Orthodoxy" [1, p. 266]. The testimony of Thaddeus Bulgarin is also important: “The main advantage of Count A.A. Arakcheeva was, in my opinion, that he was a real hack, as we say in popular speech. Everything Russian pleased him, and everything that, in his opinion, contributed to the glory of Russia, found patronage in him ”[1, p. 255]. Historian Peter Schebalsky noted: “Arakcheev was in any case not Galloman; many, noticing that he speaks only Russian and has all the signs of a middle-class Russian landowner, understood him even as a great patriot ”[30, p. 196 – 197]. According to the testimony of Grand Duchess Alexandra Feodorovna, Arakcheev defiantly spoke only in Russian [29, p. 82].
It was precisely because of all the properties listed above that he had the opportunity to play a very significant role in the history of church-state relations at the end of the reign of Alexander I. At the beginning of the 1820s, the so-called Orthodox opposition arose (a term introduced by the modern historian Yuri Kondakov) against the demonstrative patronage of the supreme power of representatives of non-Orthodox denominations, mystics, sectarians and masons, a sharp derogation of the status of the Orthodox Church in connection with the hobby of the emperor and Alexander I with the ideas of the supra-church “universal Christianity” (the official line in the religious sphere was pursued by Prince Alexander Golitsyn, Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Public Education).
The “Orthodox opposition” appeared as a result of the joint efforts of the “archaist” writers, supporters of Alexander Shishkov, and representatives of the Orthodox clergy, among which Archimandrite Innokenty (Smirnov), later Bishop of Penza and Saratov, Metropolitan Seraphim (Glagolevsky), Archimandrite Fotius (Spassky ). In addition, it included some representatives of the court circles, in particular, Anna Orlova-Chesmenskaya; at the final stage, a number of high-ranking officials joined her: Chief Prosecutor of the Holy Synod Peter Meschersky, Mikhail Magnitsky and others. The “Orthodox opposition” at the initial stage acted conspiratorially, trying to resist the influx of mysticism to the best of its ability and capabilities. Its representatives recognized only legal means of struggle, chief among which the complaint was considered personally to the emperor [10, p. 192].
In 1823, Arakcheev, with the approval of the emperor, secretly led the "Orthodox opposition." Liberal historians have argued that Arakcheev was guided solely by considerations of personal character, trying to further strengthen his position with the king. Removing Prince Alexander Golitsyn, who was responsible for the conduct of confessional policy, Arakcheev did not delve into theological intricacies. The main thing for him was the removal by hands of Orthodox conservatives of an influential rival. There is another point of view, according to which Arakcheev was an ideological patriot and a loyal son of the Orthodox Church [2, p. 125]. It was first expressed by Archimandrite Photius (Spassky), who described Arakcheev in his notes as follows: “About Count Arakcheev, you can briefly say that he, following the example of his ancestors, is devoted to the tsar, the church and the fatherland; the word Tsarevo was a law to him. Tsar Alexander, of all his subjects, no longer loved anyone, as Count Arakcheev, no more justly, or more precisely, did not fulfill the tsar's decrees, like Arakcheyev. To this one all the affairs of the state, the secrets of the heart of the Tsar, were more frank and known; therefore, the most imperial office with secret deeds was all in his hands, all affairs about the church and faith at that time were secretly entrusted to him ”[27, p. 180]. There is another proposition of Photius about Arakcheev, which is preserved in the copy, in particular, “A Note on Count Arakcheev,” written by him in 1824: “By knowing in every way that Count A.A. Arakcheev loves God with his whole heart, loves the king and sovereign emperor, faithful, truthful, sv. the Orthodox Church truly loves; contains the Orthodox faith; wise and intelligent. I will say briefly - he is the right eye of the king, the pillar of the fatherland, and such people will be born for centuries. In it except for good, I did not see anything. He can be trusted in everything, and with God's help everything can be done. Now both the people and all states love him more than before, and everyone is more truthful from him, even the enemy, than from anyone else. For what, God save him, for many years for the church and fatherland ”[27, p. 180]. Highly emphasized Arakcheev’s merit to the Orthodox Church and other active members of the “Orthodox opposition”, Mikhail Magnitsky. In a letter to Arakcheev of 31 on January 1826, he wrote: “I firmly believe that the Lord will in no case leave you, dear sir, for your great services to His holy church. He will surely strike her enemies; for the outcome of all affairs shows the miraculous preservation of the house of the Tsar and Russia ”[19, p. 679].
The unprecedented secret meetings of Archimandrite Photius (Spassky) with Alexander I in 1822 – 1824, during which Archimandrite gave a detailed account of the “Orthodox opposition” to the emperor, were organized by Arakcheyev. This can be seen, for example, from Arakcheev’s letter 9 of August 1824 of the year in which he wrote to Photius that upon his arrival at Tsarskoye Selo reported to the emperor about his meetings with Photius and that the sovereign was very pleased to hear his zeal in the Church of God and fatherland. “His Majesty,” continued Arakcheev, “once forever, Father Archimandrite, allows you to come to St. Petersburg when you need to, and as proof of his Majesty’s grace to you, the sovereign is pleased to see you personally in St. Petersburg before his departure on a voyage that's why I deigned to schedule your arrival in Petersburg, arranging it so that you could be between the 3 and 10 numbers of this month. ” Then, on August 5, Arakcheev wrote to Photius that “the sovereign will receive him after lunch, at the beginning of the 8 hour, in the Winter Palace” [9, p. 478 – 479].
House Arakcheeva on the Moika at the Winter Palace. Architect F. Demertsov
It is obvious that with the sanction of Arakcheev in 1823, the leaders of the “Orthodox opposition” launched an offensive against the “mystical party” of Alexander Golitsyn, using the so-called Gossner case [12, p. 252 – 315]. Pastor Johann of the Evangelist Gossner, who was considered one of the leaders of hernghters [32, p. 21], who emigrated to Russia from Germany as a result of religious persecution, was an active member of the Biblical Society. Gossner caused a special rejection of the Orthodox conservatives. His book, The Spirit of the Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ, in Reflections and Notes on the Entire New Testament, was omitted by the censor in May 1823. Yuri Kondakov asserts that the Gossner’s book “represented a unique, in its own way, libel against the Orthodox Church and its servants. The anti-Orthodox or anti-Christian character of the work of I.N. Gossner is beyond doubt ”[11, p. 144, 150]. In it, he ridiculed the rites of the Christian church, declared them sinful, criticized the clergy as an intermediary between God and man.
Such a book turned out to be extremely convenient for criticism from adherents of Orthodoxy, who were not slow to take advantage of the opportunity presented to them. The fact is that the book offered to translate Golitsyn from German, and he also missed it in print.
At the end of 1823, Phothia was visited by Mikhail Magnitsky and Alexander Golitsyn, who informed the archimandrite that Johann Evangelists Gossner's Gospel of Matthew, which criticized the Orthodox Church and the clergy contained the Gospel commentary, was being prepared for publication in St. Petersburg. It was decided to use this fact as a reason to appeal to the emperor, in order to eliminate Alexander Golitsyn from a ministerial post [12, p. 195].
In March 1824, the proof sheets of Gossner’s book, on Magnitsky’s initiative, were secretly bought from one of the staff of the printing house and handed over to St. Petersburg Metropolitan Seraphim (Glagolevsky), an active participant in the “Orthodox opposition”. Seraphim “decided to write an apology on the Gosner’s work himself, exposed the pastoral, proved and sent the emperor into his own hands in secret” [25, p. 190 – 191]. The action had a definite action, and on April 17 of 1824, Alexander I met many hours with Metropolitan Seraphim. On the eve of Arakcheev and Magnitsky, they were able to persuade the vacillating Seraphim to go to the palace, where he had to personally present to the emperor information about the harm that the Orthodox Church did to Prince Golitsyn, “open to him all the intrigues of the enemies of the church and the fatherland, which were cunningly hidden before him”. The conversation between the emperor and Seraphim lasted for an unprecedentedly long time, about five hours.
In an anonymous “Note on the seditions of the enemies of Russia”, some of the circumstances of this meeting were set forth: “He (Metropolitan Seraphim. - AM), removing his white hood from his head, put it at the emperor’s feet and said with firmness: I will not accept him until I will not hear from the mouth of Your Majesty the royal words that the Ministry of Spiritual Affairs will be destroyed and the Holy Synod will return its former rights, and that the Minister of Public Education will be placed differently and harmful books will be exterminated. In undoubted proof, the actions of the Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Public Education of the Metropolitan presented the Gossner’s book On the Gospel of Matthew to the emperor, which ended in printing; He uncovered those places that showed a bold uprising of the writer, not only against Russian Orthodoxy and autocracy, but even against all Christian religions. Convinced by the evidence of Seraphim, the emperor, handing him his hood, said: “Bishop, accept your hood, which you wear with dignity; and your saints and patriotic ideas will be fulfilled. ”[6, p. 387].
On the night of 22 on 23 on April 1824 of the year, on behalf of the emperor, Arafcheyev appeared to Seraphim. With him there was a note in which it was written “so that Fr. Foti certainly without a secret conversation about the works of faith and of sv. the church was. " During the meeting, according to Photius, Arakcheev "tried, on behalf of the king, to somehow agree throughout the metropolitan with Prince Golitsyn" [26, p. 229 – 230]. Then the Seraphim and Photius took a risky step, in fact presenting an ultimatum to the king, and in an unprecedentedly sharp form. Seraphim, "taking the white hood of his metropolitan, removed from his head, threw the nobleman Tsar's favorite on the table in front of his eyes and said:" Count! A faithful servant of the Tsar, inform this king that you see and hear; here is my hood to him; I don't want to be a metropolitan anymore, if things remain as they were; with Prince Golitsyn, I cannot serve as the clear enemy of the oath of the church and state ”[26, p. 230]. He was echoed by Photius: “Stand still, holy lord, do not agree in anything else, on sin and on the destruction of piety; let us be strong in word and deed; what is said to the king is true, stand in a word to the end; it is better for us to go for the righteousness of God in captivity, rather than for breaking our office and wickedness to hell. Now it remains the only way to do, if the king does not correct the work of faith and does not protect piety, like the pious king, take the holy Gospel in one hand and the other in the other. a cross, go to the Kazan Cathedral and proclaim the people: Orthodox! The faith of Christ is trampled upon; and they want to introduce some kind of demons; Prince Golitsyn, Gosner pastor and their other accomplices are doing everything! Listen to the count, tell the king that this may be done; all of Russia will know; There will be many wives and children who will stand up for the Blessed Virgin Mary, preserving their piety. She Our Lady will soon come to the rescue: everything, although with sorrow, but the devilish action will be destroyed; the enemy will fall, and the way of the ungodly will perish ”[26, p. 231 – 232].
Probably, on the part of Alexander I, this was a sounding of how serious the leaders of Orthodox conservatives are. Photius later claimed that Arakcheev had told him: “The Emperor Alexander told him to be on this secret advice on the Council, so that, as an old man, Seraphim did not show any weakness of spirit and concession in the matter, and the Seraphim would stand firmly; and as for the king, he is ready for everything. If the metropolitan does not stand in his firmness, then it will be publicly open to the tsar ”[26, p. 232].
Soon followed by the highest decree on the consideration of the book Gossner. 22 of April The Committee of Ministers condemned the Gossner’s book (it was decided to burn it in the Nevsky Monastery), ordered to start investigating those responsible for publishing it - translators, censors, printers, and bringing them to the Senate.
25 April 1824 issued a decree on the expulsion of Gossner from Russia, and the censorship of all religious books published in Russian, which Golitsyn previously carried out, was transferred to Metropolitan Seraphim (Glagolevsky) [11, p. 159; 27, p. 192].
A few days later, in the house of Anna Orlova-Chesmenskaya, Photius betrayed the anathema of Prince Golitsyn. The Minister of Spiritual Affairs, responsible for the situation in the Church, was excommunicated from this Church itself. It was a big scandal. Photius risked a great deal, since the right to make anyone anathema belonged only to the Holy Synod, and he, therefore, could become a victim of criminal prosecution. However, Photius only received the highest reprimand, which followed almost two months later, 14 on June 1824, during a personal audience with Alexander I, when Golitsyn had already lost the most important posts. Then Photius declared to the king: “I have done the will of God, and I fear nothing. Everyone would say evil to God and the king who says: anathema, do not seduce others and do not do evil ”[27, p. 194]. After that, Arakcheev invited Photius to his Georgian estate in order to “kindly accept him, entertain and inspire, so that he would not fear displeasure any longer for the curse of Prince Golitsyn” [28, p. 425 – 426].
On May 15, Prince Golitsyn’s 1824 was removed from the post of Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Public Education, and the Ministry itself was reorganized. On the same day, Alexander Shishkov, an active activist of the “Russian Party”, headed the Ministry of Public Education and the chief executive of the spiritual affairs of foreign religions, the Orthodox part went to the Synodal Procurator, and the reports of the Synod were now to be submitted through Arakcheev. 17 May 1824, Alexander I signed a rescript on the addition of Golitsyn title of president of the Bible Society; in this post, he was replaced by Metropolitan Seraphim, who was appointed chief censor of all essays and translations published in Russian.
Functions of Golitsyn in a secret order for some time passed to Arakcheev, he directed the activities of Metropolitan Seraphim, Fotius and Shishkov in the direction the king wanted. Arakcheev had a special relationship with Photius, to whom he announced the king’s decision that he would be allowed to “come to St. Petersburg at any time, whenever he pleases” [28, p. 428]. The emperor himself, according to the observation of a well-informed contemporary, “at that time, with a ripe soul, tended to favor Orthodoxy, lagged behind mysticism, in a word, became firmer and more strict in its rules and concepts about religion. Let us add to the fact that political events convinced him of the need to maintain legitimate authority everywhere and to oppose the beginninglessness of spiritual and civil in every way ”[21, p. 284].
In fact, the real power in the sphere of confessional relations, education and censorship passed to the adherents of Orthodoxy. Thus, the “Orthodox opposition” achieved the rejection of Alexander I of the priority of the mystical and cosmopolitan version of “universal Christianity” in confessional politics.
The role of Arakcheev in these events was very large. Now it is obvious that he contributed to establishing the foundations of the course that already in the reign of Nicholas I became associated with the formula of Count Sergei Uvarov: "Orthodoxy, Autocracy, Nationality."
Second floor 1825 of the year - the beginning of 1826 of the year became a turning point in Arakcheev’s political career. In June 1825 of the year, going south, after a period of long deliberation and hesitation, Alexander I ordered Arakcheev to deal with the Decembrist plot, the main figures of which had long been known to the king. However, on September 9, in Nizhny Novgorod, courtyards killed Nastasya Fedorovna Minkina, the housekeeper of the graph, who had been his favorite for more than 10 years. Arakcheev was so shocked by her death that he completely withdrew from public affairs and for the first time in his official work did not fulfill the most important assignment of the monarch. Well-informed contemporaries believed that if Arakcheev had carried out an investigation on time, then “the indignations of the December 25 guard would never have happened on Isaakievskaya Square, but those who had started a rebellion would have been arrested beforehand” [14, p. 7]. The second blow for Arakcheev was the unexpected demise of Emperor 82 on November 19 of the year.
Having taken the throne in an unprecedentedly difficult situation, Nicholas I made some concessions to the so-called public opinion and freed Arakcheev from managing the affairs of the Committee of Ministers. For some time only the post of chief over the military settlements of the chief remained behind him, but he did not stay long there. In April 1826, the new emperor granted Arakcheev's request for indefinite leave to travel abroad for treatment. There Arakcheev published a collection of letters to him of Alexander I. After returning from abroad, the count lived in Georgia constantly, occasionally leaving for friends and relatives, completely moving away from any kind of political activity.
In the last years of his life, Arakcheev is particularly involved in the organization of his estate, trying to penetrate into all aspects of economic life, he reads a lot of literature on economics. His peasants generally lived in abundance. Most of the houses of the peasants were covered with iron, a hospital was located in Georgia, where the peasants could receive free medical care, and at the initiative of Arakcheev they created a loan bank for the peasants, where they were obliged to take loans to buy seeds, livestock, etc. The roads in the estate were mostly paved, their serviceability was maintained by the peasants themselves. Arakcheev rather severely punished for drunkenness and negligence to the household. The Georgians themselves designed the best architects and artists of the time according to the designs.
After the death of Alexander I, Arakcheev made a will for 50 thousand rubles for writing a complete and reliable book about the life and activities of his patron, which should have been published a hundred years later, when this capital had to grow to at least 800 thousand rubles. Obviously, Arakcheev was not afraid of the court of history and waited for the time when the passions around his name would subside and he would be able to count on an objective assessment of his activities.
In 1833, Arakcheev introduced into the Imperial Safe Treasury with state bills 300 thousand rubles "for all time, inviolable". On interest from this money 12 pupils of the Novgorod cadet corps had to be kept constantly. The emperor ordered them to be called Arakcheev’s and wear the letters “GA” on their shoulder straps. After Arakcheev’s death, since he did not inscribe the name of the heir in the will, Nikolai I gave a special decree to the Georgian estate, as well as the money obtained from the sale of real estate and movable property in St. Petersburg by auction to St. Petersburg Cadet Corps, which became known as Arakcheevsky. A significant part of Arakcheev’s richest library, the 15 component of thousands of volumes, including in foreign languages, and its archive were transferred here. Arakcheev 21 passed away on April 1834 of the year in Georgia.
LITERATURE:
1. Arakcheev: evidence of contemporaries. - M .: New lit. Review, 2000. - 496 with.
2. Bogdanovich P.N. Arakcheev. Count and Baron of the Russian Empire. (1769 – 1834). - Buenos Aires, 1956. - 138 with.
3. Bochkarev V.N. Conservatives and nationalists in Russia at the beginning of the XIX century // World War 1812 of the year and Russian society. - M., 1911. - T. 2. - S. 194 – 220.
4. Bulich N.N. Essays on the history of Russian literature and education from the beginning of the XIX century. - SPb., 1912.
5. Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich. Emperor Alexander I. - M .: Bogorodsk printer, 1999. - 320 with.
6. Note about seditious enemies of Russia // Russian Archive. 1868. Stlb 1329 – 1390.
7. Confession of Sherwood the Faithful // Historical Gazette. 1896. No. 1.
8. Kandaurova T. The genius of evil and good. A word in defense of Arakcheev // Motherland. 2000. No. 3. C. 56 – 60.
9. Karnovich E.P. Archimandrite Fotiy, rector of the Novgorod St. George Monastery // Russian Antiquities. 1875. T. XIII. C. 439 – 489.
10. Kondakov Yu.E. Archimandrite Photius (1792 – 1838) and his time. - SPb .: Ros. nat b-ka, 2000. - 312 c.
11. Kondakov Yu.E. The religious and religious policy of Alexander I and the Russian Orthodox opposition (1801 – 1825). - SPb .: Nestor, 1998. - 224 with.
12. Kondakov Yu.E. Liberal and conservative trends in religious movements in Russia in the first quarter of the XIX century. - SPb .: Publishing House of the Russian State Pedagogical University named after A.I. Herzen, 2005. - 334 with.
13. Minakov A.Yu. Russian conservatism in the first quarter of the XIX century. - Voronezh: Voronezh publishing house. state Un-ta, 2011. - 546 with.
14. Moroshkin M.Ya. Jesuits in Russia from the reign of Catherine II to our time. - SPb .: Type. 2-th division of his own. E.I. Office, 1870. - H. 2.
15. New Encyclopedic Dictionary, ed. Arsenyev. Publishers Brockhaus FA and Efron I.A. - SPb. - T. 3.
16. Pogodin MP Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin, in his writings, letters and reviews of contemporaries. Materials for the biography, with notes and explanations. - M., 1866. - Part II.
17. Popov A.N. Episodes from the history of 1812. // Russian archive. 1892. No. 5. Stlb 398 – 418.
18. Predtechensky A.V. Essays on political history in the first quarter of the XIX century. - M .; L .: Publishing House of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, 1957. - 465 with.
19. The reasons for the prosecution M.L. Magnitsky, described by himself // Russian Antiquities. 1901. T. 105. No. 3. March. 1826. C. 678 – 684.
20. RGALI. F. 1179, op. 2, units xr xnumx Uvarov S.S.
21. Sturdza A.S. On the fate of the Russian Orthodox Church in the reign of Emperor Alexander I // Russian Antiquity. 1876. T. XV. No. 2. C. 266 – 288.
22. Tomsinov V.A. The temporary worker (AA Arakcheev). - TEIS, 1996. - 272 with.
23. Fedorov BM The fiftieth anniversary of the literary life of S.N. Glinka / B.M. Fedorov. - SPb .: [B. and.], 1844. - 31 with.
24. Fedorov V.A. M.M. Speransky and A.A. Arakcheev. - M .: Publishing House of Moscow. Un-ta, 1997. - 256 with.
25. [Photius Spassky] Autobiography of Yuryevsky Archimandrite Photius // Russian Antiquity. 1895. August. T. 84. C. 169 – 220.
26. [Photius Spassky] Autobiography of Yuryevsky Archimandrite Photius // Russian Antiquity. 1895. November. C. 207 – 236.
27. [Photius Spassky] Autobiography of Yuryevsky Archimandrite Photius // Russian Antiquity. 1896. July. T. 87. C. 163 – 199.
28. [Photius Spassky] Autobiography of Yuryevsky Archimandrite Photius // Russian Antiquity. 1896. August. T. 87. C. 423 – 443.
29. Schilder N.K. Emperor Alexander the First. His life and reign. - SPb., 1898. - T. 4. - 651 with.
30. Schebalsky P.K. A.S. Shishkov, his allies and opponents // Russian Journal. 1870. T. 90. No. 11 – 12. Pag 1. C. 193 – 254.
31. Shishkov A.S. Notes, opinions and correspondence. - Berlin: Ed. N. Kiseleva and Y. Samarin, 1870. - T. 2.
32. Etkind A. “The Dying Sphinx”: the Golitsyn-Labzina circle and the Petersburg period of the Russian mystical tradition // Studia Slavica Finlandesia. - Helsinki, 1996. - S. 17 – 46.
33. Yachmenikhin K.M. Alexey Andreevich Arakcheev // Questions of history. 1991. No. 12. C. 37 – 50.
34. Yachmenikhin K.M. Alexey Andreevich Arakcheev // In Proc .: Russian Conservatives. - M., 1997.
35. Yachmenikhin K.M. "Arakcheev": historiographic myths // Conservatism in Russia and the world: in 3 h. - Voronezh, 2004. - H. 1. C. 117 – 128.
36. Martin A. Romantics, Reformers, Reactionaries: Russian Conservative Thought and Politics - DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1997. - 294 p.
This article aims to show the reasons for the nomination of Alexei Arakcheev for the role of one of the prominent figures of the conservative "Russian party" 1820-s. The term "Russian party" [3, p. 201], or the party of “old Russians” [17, p. 402], was first recorded after the Peace of Tilzit 1807, in public opinion and in reports of foreign diplomats. Thus, Saint-Aignan (a French diplomat who was in St. Petersburg in 1807) wrote in a letter to Charles Maurice Talleyrand, apparently: “There is a Russian party consisting of a large number of nobles who do not want any innovations in management. People of this party live mostly in Moscow ”[cit. by: 18, p. 232].
In liberal historiography, the activity of the “Russian party” was characterized, as a rule, extremely negatively. As a typical example of this kind, let us quote the opinion of Mikhail Moroshkin, who described it as a group of self-serving feudalists, “left completely idle and recognized as incapable of government positions” [14, p. 502]. He argued that its members were characterized by “insulted ambition, envy, pride, and claims to extensive state and administrative talents, finally, simply exaggerated and self-serving fears for their feudal rights of people, the whole sphere of patriotism of these people, as experience has shown, was limited to uncontrolled disposal of their own peasants "[14, p. 502 – 503]. Such characteristics suffer extreme bias and one-sidedness. The activity of the “Russian party” was not limited to the protection of the self-interested interests of the feudalists. She was a union of defenders of Russian national interests and patriots of Russia. Conservative-nationalist ideology and moods objectively became a necessary condition for victory in the World War 1812 of the year and overcoming the hallomania of a part of noble society. Liberal historian Nikolai Bulich was right in his own way, saying: “The patriotic party won the people's war; she was convinced that her conservative principles triumphed, that the French revolution, deeply hated by her, was defeated ”[4, p. 590].
Opening the role of Arakcheev in this union, we can not touch the main milestones of his biography. Alexey Andreevich was born on September 23 of the year 1769 in the small village of Garusovo, Vyshnevolotsky district, Novgorod province. The Arakcheev family was not distinguished by generosity and nobility. He descended from Thomas Arakcheev, granted by the estate in Bezhetskaya Pyatina in 1607 year. The great-grandson of this ancestor Ivan Stepanovich distinguished himself in the war with Poland under Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich [15, p. 322], showing both “fighting and bravery”. Arakcheev's great-grandfather participated in almost all the wars of Peter the Great, and grandfather Vasily Stepanovich was killed in the 1735 year, during the campaign of the Russian army in the Crimea. Andrei Andreyevich Arakcheev’s father (+ 1796) served in the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment, retired with the rank of lieutenant, married Elizaveta Andreevna Vitlitskaya (1750 – 1820) and completely devoted himself to the household. Arakcheeva was educated by her mother, a devout, intelligent, domineering and energetic woman who held the whole family in strictness and obedience. She instilled in Arakcheev a desire for permanent work, strict order, accuracy and thrift. Literacy and arithmetic Arakcheeva taught rural deacon.
In 1785, Arakcheev entered one of the best cadet corps - the Petersburg artillery and engineering gentry corps. The corps taught arithmetic, geometry, started trigonometry, fortification and artillery, studied French, German and Latin. In the "upper" classes teaching was conducted only in foreign languages. From the "elegant" disciplines, cadets were taught dancing and fencing. The cadet was raised "in the fear of God and in the fear of the rod." Arakcheev gained a reputation as an excellent cadet "both in science and in behavior." He was particularly distinguished in the study of military-mathematical sciences, not having great inclinations towards the humanitarian cycle. He read French fluently, but he had a bad pronunciation, but spoke quite fluent German. With the rank of sergeant Arakcheev he was appointed teacher of arithmetic and artillery (1784). As a zealous cadet and at the same time a mentor to the younger Arakcheyev corps in 1786, he was awarded a silver medal for his distinction. In the 1787 year, at the end of the course, Arakcheev, as one of the best graduates with the rank of army lieutenant, was left in the corps as a teacher of mathematics and artillery. In 1789, Arakcheev received the rank of second lieutenant of artillery and was appointed commander of one of the best, specially selected artillery corps commands. At the same time, Arakcheev compiled the textbook “A Brief Artillery Note in Questions and Answers,” making a definite contribution to the development of military education in Russia.
In 1790, Arakcheev was appointed adjutant to the head of the corps, General Peter Melissino. In 1792, Melissino, in turn, appointed Arakcheev as a practice artilleryman to serve in the army of Gatchina as Grand Duke Pavel Petrovich. Convinced of Arakcheev's experience, the heir appointed him commander of an artillery company and made artillery captains and prime majors. In a short time Arakcheev led in perfect order all the Gatchina artillery. In 1793, Arakcheev was promoted to major artillery. In addition to supervising the Gatchina artillery, Arakcheev was assigned to arrange a school for junior officers. In 1794, Arakcheev was entrusted with the economic part of the Gatchina troops - the commissariat (clothing allowance, clothing and equipment) and food supplies. At the beginning of 1796, he was entrusted with the inspection of the Gatchina infantry, as well as the post of commandant of the city. In submission Arakcheeva were all Gatchina troops and residents of Gatchina. Arakcheev was also charged with setting up a Pavlovsk military orphanage. Then Arakcheev was given the rank of lieutenant colonel, and at the end of the year, the colonel of artillery. After Paul I ascended to the throne, Arakcheev was promoted to major general and received the Order of Saint Anna of I degree, appointed commander of the combined grenadier battalion of the Preobrazhensky Life Guards Regiment, received a rich Georgian patrimony in the Novgorod province (more than 2 thousand serfs). On the day of the coronation of Paul I, 5 on April 1797, Arakcheev was awarded the Alexander's cavalier and baronial title. Then he was simultaneously assigned to three positions: the commandant of St. Petersburg, the commander of the Preobrazhensky regiment and the quartermaster general of the whole army (1797). Arakcheev taught the military heir to the throne, Grand Duke Alexander Pavlovich, the future Alexander I.
Arakcheev's style of activity was distinguished by his thoroughness and extreme discipline, personal self-restraint, colossal will and incredible efficiency, rigorous exactingness, reaching cruelty (which, however, later memoirists incredibly exaggerated, having contributed to the creation of the negative myth about Arakcheev - the Gatchian kaprale) a monkey in uniform "," temporary worker "," Snake Gorynyche ", etc.) [On the negative myths that have developed around the name of Arakcheev, see: 8, p. 56 – 60].
Along with this, there are cases when Arakcheev punished officers for cruel treatment of soldiers. After a short opals in 1799, Arakcheev was appointed inspector of all artillery and was granted a title of count. In his coat of arms, the emperor himself wrote the motto: "He is betrayed without flattery." However, a second opal soon followed; Alexander І returned from Arakcheev’s exile. On the eve of March 11 1801, Arakcheev was summoned by Pavel I, but the conspirators prevented him from coming to St. Petersburg. Returned to the service Arakcheev was appointed inspector of all artillery (1803 – 1808). In this post, Arakcheev made a huge contribution to the reorganization of the whole artillery case in the Russian army. Under his leadership, first-class artillery was created, which showed itself well in the battles of 1805 – 1809 and played a significant role in the 1812 Patriotic War of the year. Military administrative activity, not strategy issues, was the real vocation of Arakcheyev, who, due to this circumstance, did not take part in the hostilities. Modern historians come to the conclusion that he was a brilliant military organizer, innovator and talented reformer [35, p. 117 – 128].
13 January 1808, he was appointed Minister of War. A. Martin writes about this: “The emperor was frightened by rumors of a coup d’état; but, putting the army, whose loyalty was the decisive factor in any attempts to overthrow the regime, Arakcheev controlled, he could sleep a little calmer ”[36, p. 53]. The rise of Arakcheev - a tough, precise and strong-willed performer - was a response to the dissatisfaction of Russian society with the conditions of the Tilsit world, the continental blockade, which humiliated the sense of national dignity. Arakcheev had to manage the War Ministry in wartime conditions. Russia continued to wage wars with Iran (1804 – 1813), Turkey (1806 – 1812), with Sweden (1808 – 1809), has been at war with Austria since 1809, and as a result of participation in the continental blockade with England. For two years (before January, 1810), Arakcheev managed to make a number of significant changes, especially in the recruitment and training of combat personnel. According to his projects, there were established recruit depot for the initial training of recruits before being sent to line units and training carabinier regiments for training non-commissioned officers and musicians. The divisional organization was finally introduced in the army. The military board received the right to independently resolve many issues, and the post of the duty general appeared, largely freeing the minister of war from the need to delve into all sorts of minor matters. Under the new staffing schedule, the artillery received a better structure and mobility; exams for fireworks, junkers and senior officers were introduced (up to the lieutenant, inclusive) during the occupation of various positions, training sessions and combat shooting were improved. Artillery units were allocated to a separate branch of the armed forces and consolidated into companies and brigades. The material part was also changed. Significant changes have occurred in factories producing weapon and ammunition, and in artillery arsenals Arakcheev was very interested in technical innovations and always remained in the know on this matter. At his suggestion, steam sawmills, mechanical laundries in hospitals were built in a number of districts, and a tugboat for the transport of construction materials appeared on Lake Ilmen and the Volkhov River since 1819. Since 1825, regular passenger flights of two ships began from Staraya Russa to the New Chudovo road. When he was a war minister, Arakcheev wrote several articles on the technology of making gunpowder, nitre, and the performance of live firing; with his direct participation, the Military Training Committee was established and the publication of the “Artillery Journal” began. The emperor entrusted to him the recruitment and dismissal, at his discretion, of the officials of the Commissariat and Provisional Departments to the 6 class inclusive. As a sign of special distinction of 30 August 1808, Alexander I ordered to rename the Rostov Musketeers Regiment into Arakcheev Regiment (from 27 January 1811 of the year to 28 April 1834 of the year - Grenadier Count Arakcheev Regiment).
In the course of the Russian-Swedish war of 1808 – 1809, Arakcheev, with his characteristic energy, was able to organize the supply of the operating armies with everything necessary: trained recruits, provisions, fodder, weapons, ammunition. He took the necessary measures to strengthen the Baltic coast of Russia from possible hostile actions on the part of England. But the most significant was the role of Arakcheev not only in material support, but also in the direct impact on the course of military operations. His perseverance forced generals Vladimir Knorring and Mikhail Barclay de Tolly to undertake the most difficult transition on the ice of the Gulf of Bothnia, move the fighting to the territory of Sweden and thereby decide the outcome of the whole campaign and the fate of Finland.
In 1810, Arakcheev, in protest against the liberal course pursued by Mikhail Speransky, and the behavior of the emperor, who hid from him the preparation of the "Establishment of the State Council", left the post of minister of war. On the recommendation of Arakcheev, Mikhail Barclay de Tolly was appointed Minister of War. Soon, at the categorical insistence of Alexander I, Arakcheev headed the department of military affairs in the State Council. According to the Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, Arakcheev in the field of the military did "very much" [5, p. 84].
In World War 1812, the role of Arakcheev increases dramatically. Already 14 June 1812, he was once again called for the management of military affairs. In the autobiographical marks made by him on the family copy of the Gospel, Arakcheev not without reason noted: "The whole French war was going through my hands, all the secret reports and the emperor's own handwritings" [30, p. 925 – 926]. He "served as almost the only secretary of the sovereign during World War II" [5, p. 219] and was the only speaker of Alexander I on almost all issues: military, diplomatic, army management, etc., doing a tremendous job, without which it was impossible to conduct military operations against Napoleon. His role was the same in the 1813 – 1814 campaign [24, p. 106]. In the summer of 1814, the emperor, for his success in organizing the Russian army, wanted to award Arakcheev with the rank of field marshal, but he categorically refused. Thus, Arakcheev is one of the key figures of the Patriotic War, worthy to stand alongside Mikhail Kutuzov and Mikhail Barclay de Tolly, Fyodor Rostopchin and Alexander Shishkov.
From the second floor. 1814 of the year, all matters relating to government and administration were considered and prepared for the most general report only by the office of Arakcheev. Submissions from all ministries and even the “opinion” of the State Council were often made through him. In August 1818, Arakcheev was appointed head of the office of the Committee of Ministers, and thus he received the official opportunity to influence crucial decisions. Arakcheev’s nomination became a visible symptom of the “rise of authoritarian tendencies in the internal politics of Alexander I” [36, p. 54]. Practically, it was Arakcheev who at the time, along with Alexander I, exercised general guidance of Russia's internal policy, taking upon himself the burden of executing unpopular decisions. Only he fully trusted the monarch.
In the 1817 – 1825 years on behalf of the monarch Arakcheev was engaged in the organization of military settlements with the title of chief chief of military settlements. Initially Arakcheev opposed the creation of military settlements, but then obeyed the will of the sovereign. The military settlements, according to the king, were to significantly reduce government spending on maintaining the army, eliminate recruitment kits in peacetime and thereby ease the economic situation of the country, create a prosperous military-agricultural class, provide cover for borders and reduce the redeployment of troops in the event of hostilities. Military settlements were established in the Novgorod, Mogilyov, Vitebsk, Sloboda-Ukrainian, Kherson and Yekaterinoslav provinces. In the management of military settlements, purely military functions (combat training of troops) were combined with economic functions (organization of construction and land reclamation works, transport, industry and agriculture). At the same time, extreme forms of coercion were used (forcible attachment of villagers to the land, depriving them of the right to engage in trade, labor and trade, regulation of many aspects of life, etc.), which led to the ruin of settlement peasants and quite large-scale uprisings.
Simultaneously with the creation of military settlements, Arakcheev developed on behalf of the king in 1818 a project for the liberation of the peasants. According to this project, serfs and yard people, with the consent of the landlords, were gradually redeemed by the treasury. In addition, the state was to redeem two acres of arable land for each audit soul. For the purchase of peasants and land, the government pledged to release annually 5 million rubles, covering the lack of money with special treasury notes. Arakcheev’s project was approved by Alexander I, but at the same time, despite his secrecy, he became known to the circles of the nobility and aroused strong opposition from them. As a result, Alexander I did not dare to submit it for discussion to the State Council.
During this period, Arakcheev intensified ties with the main leaders of the “Russian Party” [30, p. .229 – 230.]. So, in March, 1816, a personal acquaintance of Nikolai Karamzin, who arrived in the capital with the aim of obtaining an audience with the emperor for talks about publishing the History of the Russian State, with Arakcheev, took place. The circumstances of this event in the liberal and Soviet historiography are usually interpreted as morally unacceptable for the historiographer, who did not want, in principle, to meet with the "temporary worker." Nevertheless, after their meeting, Karamzin wrote: “I found a man in him with a mind and with good rules. Here are his words: “My deacon was my teacher: is it any wonder that I know little? My business is to fulfill the will of the Gosudarev. If I were younger, I would learn from you: now it is too late. ”Consequently, Graf Arakcheev undertook to facilitate my early meeting with the Sovereign; he even assured me that this postponement would not continue ”[cit. by: 16, p. 154]. Mikhail Pogodin assessed the role of Arakcheev in organizing the meeting of the historiographer with the tsar: “All efforts and all the mediation ended in nothing good-bye to Count Arakcheyev, who promised to issue an audience and the next day kept his word: Karamzin was received and showered with affection and favors” [16 , with. 156]. “To go to heaven, it was impossible to avoid purgatory, where the stern abbess sat,” Nikolai Schilder aphoristically noted [29, p. 7]. Despite the initial offense, described in detail and quite tendentiously described in the literature, Karamzin later respected Arakcheev. 14 September 1825 of the year he wrote: “A state man, grieved by a horrible domestic incident (by the murder of Arakcheev’s mistress Nastasya Minkina. - AM), refused all cases, as is heard: it is not easy to replace him with others. We have few people on the big stage ”[16, p. 415]. Estimates Arakcheeva made Karamzin, "a man with the mind and good rules," "state man", etc., were hardly hypocritical.
As a result of the meeting of Karamzin with Arakcheev, Alexander I honored the writer with the highest audience, following which the necessary funds were allocated for the publication of the History of the Russian State. Karamzin was awarded the Order of St. Anne I Class, and in 1824, he became a state councilor. According to the report of Alexander Golitsyn, the emperor ordered to print the “History of the Russian State” without censorship [20, l. 1].
In the same period, Arakcheev provided substantial support to Alexander Shishkov as president of the Russian Academy. Back in 1815, Shishkov submitted a petition to strengthen the funds of the Russian Academy, which he wanted to put in a position independent of the Minister of Public Education, but after two years, the matter did not move from the dead end. The Academy received from its treasury no more than 9 thousand rubles [31, p. 92]. Shishkov, on the other hand, asked for at least 60 thousand rubles a year and, moreover, to create a printing house and an extension of the hall to it at a time 90 thousand rubles. The extension was needed by Shishkov in order for “a well-arranged and decorated hall to serve for the opening of public readings, once in the house of Derzhavin, called“ Conversations of Russian Word Lovers ”(a literary-political association of Russian conservatives that existed in 1807 – 1814 years and led by Alexander Shishkov and Gavrila Derzhavin. — AM), where a large audience gathered and where similar readings, unfortunately not long lasting, brought considerable benefits and pleasure ”[31, p. 94]. Attempts to resort to the help of the emperor did not give any results, on the contrary, Shishkov even began to believe that he had fallen into a new disgrace: “His Majesty’s coldness to me became more noticeable from the hour, so I was never called to him. I endured it with contented indifference, being sure of my rightness and remembering one of my friends, the adage that an honest person has nothing less to lose than the need for a king than a king for an honest man ”[31, p. 94]. In this situation Shishkov in February 1817 of the year addressed a letter to Arakcheev. As a result, the case was instantly resolved. The day after receiving the letter, Arakcheev told Shishkov: “This is how soon I will execute your orders!” [31, p. 97]. In May, the 1817 of the new budget of the Russian Academy was approved by the emperor [31, p. 101]. In fact, along with the rest, it was a question of financial and organizational support from the state that Shishkov conceived the center for the consolidation of Russian conservatives.
We also note that in 1817, Arakcheev, when subscribing to the writings of Sergei Glinka, the publisher of the conservative journal Russian Gazette, “was pleased that“ the writer, known for useful works that he enriched in Russian literature, demands his petition: “Who is Russian? I would accept your participation in the situation, ”Arakcheev wrote and undertook to be the representative of S.N. Glinka before the then Minister of National Enlightenment, Prince A.N. Golitsyn "[23, p. 13].
Not surprisingly, in 1823 – 1824, Arakcheev delivered the emperor’s sanction as the de facto head of the conservative “Russian party” who succeeded in 1822 in banning Masonic lodges and dismissing Prince Alexander Golitsyn, minister of spiritual affairs and public education, who acted as an ecumenical guide and mystic-cosmopolitan course in confessional politics and education.
Due to a number of personal qualities, Arakcheev fully fit the role of the leader of the “Russian Party”. In his autobiographical notes, the Protestant Egor von Bradke, who knew Arakcheev well, stated: “In churchly he stood on the soil of immobile Orthodoxy; the activities of the Bible Society, the call of the clergy of other confessions, the influence of Mrs. Krudner and other mystics aroused him in disgust ”[1, p. 123]. An active freemason Nikolai Grech called him with disgust a "champion of Orthodoxy" [1, p. 266]. The testimony of Thaddeus Bulgarin is also important: “The main advantage of Count A.A. Arakcheeva was, in my opinion, that he was a real hack, as we say in popular speech. Everything Russian pleased him, and everything that, in his opinion, contributed to the glory of Russia, found patronage in him ”[1, p. 255]. Historian Peter Schebalsky noted: “Arakcheev was in any case not Galloman; many, noticing that he speaks only Russian and has all the signs of a middle-class Russian landowner, understood him even as a great patriot ”[30, p. 196 – 197]. According to the testimony of Grand Duchess Alexandra Feodorovna, Arakcheev defiantly spoke only in Russian [29, p. 82].
It was precisely because of all the properties listed above that he had the opportunity to play a very significant role in the history of church-state relations at the end of the reign of Alexander I. At the beginning of the 1820s, the so-called Orthodox opposition arose (a term introduced by the modern historian Yuri Kondakov) against the demonstrative patronage of the supreme power of representatives of non-Orthodox denominations, mystics, sectarians and masons, a sharp derogation of the status of the Orthodox Church in connection with the hobby of the emperor and Alexander I with the ideas of the supra-church “universal Christianity” (the official line in the religious sphere was pursued by Prince Alexander Golitsyn, Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Public Education).
The “Orthodox opposition” appeared as a result of the joint efforts of the “archaist” writers, supporters of Alexander Shishkov, and representatives of the Orthodox clergy, among which Archimandrite Innokenty (Smirnov), later Bishop of Penza and Saratov, Metropolitan Seraphim (Glagolevsky), Archimandrite Fotius (Spassky ). In addition, it included some representatives of the court circles, in particular, Anna Orlova-Chesmenskaya; at the final stage, a number of high-ranking officials joined her: Chief Prosecutor of the Holy Synod Peter Meschersky, Mikhail Magnitsky and others. The “Orthodox opposition” at the initial stage acted conspiratorially, trying to resist the influx of mysticism to the best of its ability and capabilities. Its representatives recognized only legal means of struggle, chief among which the complaint was considered personally to the emperor [10, p. 192].
In 1823, Arakcheev, with the approval of the emperor, secretly led the "Orthodox opposition." Liberal historians have argued that Arakcheev was guided solely by considerations of personal character, trying to further strengthen his position with the king. Removing Prince Alexander Golitsyn, who was responsible for the conduct of confessional policy, Arakcheev did not delve into theological intricacies. The main thing for him was the removal by hands of Orthodox conservatives of an influential rival. There is another point of view, according to which Arakcheev was an ideological patriot and a loyal son of the Orthodox Church [2, p. 125]. It was first expressed by Archimandrite Photius (Spassky), who described Arakcheev in his notes as follows: “About Count Arakcheev, you can briefly say that he, following the example of his ancestors, is devoted to the tsar, the church and the fatherland; the word Tsarevo was a law to him. Tsar Alexander, of all his subjects, no longer loved anyone, as Count Arakcheev, no more justly, or more precisely, did not fulfill the tsar's decrees, like Arakcheyev. To this one all the affairs of the state, the secrets of the heart of the Tsar, were more frank and known; therefore, the most imperial office with secret deeds was all in his hands, all affairs about the church and faith at that time were secretly entrusted to him ”[27, p. 180]. There is another proposition of Photius about Arakcheev, which is preserved in the copy, in particular, “A Note on Count Arakcheev,” written by him in 1824: “By knowing in every way that Count A.A. Arakcheev loves God with his whole heart, loves the king and sovereign emperor, faithful, truthful, sv. the Orthodox Church truly loves; contains the Orthodox faith; wise and intelligent. I will say briefly - he is the right eye of the king, the pillar of the fatherland, and such people will be born for centuries. In it except for good, I did not see anything. He can be trusted in everything, and with God's help everything can be done. Now both the people and all states love him more than before, and everyone is more truthful from him, even the enemy, than from anyone else. For what, God save him, for many years for the church and fatherland ”[27, p. 180]. Highly emphasized Arakcheev’s merit to the Orthodox Church and other active members of the “Orthodox opposition”, Mikhail Magnitsky. In a letter to Arakcheev of 31 on January 1826, he wrote: “I firmly believe that the Lord will in no case leave you, dear sir, for your great services to His holy church. He will surely strike her enemies; for the outcome of all affairs shows the miraculous preservation of the house of the Tsar and Russia ”[19, p. 679].
The unprecedented secret meetings of Archimandrite Photius (Spassky) with Alexander I in 1822 – 1824, during which Archimandrite gave a detailed account of the “Orthodox opposition” to the emperor, were organized by Arakcheyev. This can be seen, for example, from Arakcheev’s letter 9 of August 1824 of the year in which he wrote to Photius that upon his arrival at Tsarskoye Selo reported to the emperor about his meetings with Photius and that the sovereign was very pleased to hear his zeal in the Church of God and fatherland. “His Majesty,” continued Arakcheev, “once forever, Father Archimandrite, allows you to come to St. Petersburg when you need to, and as proof of his Majesty’s grace to you, the sovereign is pleased to see you personally in St. Petersburg before his departure on a voyage that's why I deigned to schedule your arrival in Petersburg, arranging it so that you could be between the 3 and 10 numbers of this month. ” Then, on August 5, Arakcheev wrote to Photius that “the sovereign will receive him after lunch, at the beginning of the 8 hour, in the Winter Palace” [9, p. 478 – 479].
House Arakcheeva on the Moika at the Winter Palace. Architect F. Demertsov
It is obvious that with the sanction of Arakcheev in 1823, the leaders of the “Orthodox opposition” launched an offensive against the “mystical party” of Alexander Golitsyn, using the so-called Gossner case [12, p. 252 – 315]. Pastor Johann of the Evangelist Gossner, who was considered one of the leaders of hernghters [32, p. 21], who emigrated to Russia from Germany as a result of religious persecution, was an active member of the Biblical Society. Gossner caused a special rejection of the Orthodox conservatives. His book, The Spirit of the Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ, in Reflections and Notes on the Entire New Testament, was omitted by the censor in May 1823. Yuri Kondakov asserts that the Gossner’s book “represented a unique, in its own way, libel against the Orthodox Church and its servants. The anti-Orthodox or anti-Christian character of the work of I.N. Gossner is beyond doubt ”[11, p. 144, 150]. In it, he ridiculed the rites of the Christian church, declared them sinful, criticized the clergy as an intermediary between God and man.
Such a book turned out to be extremely convenient for criticism from adherents of Orthodoxy, who were not slow to take advantage of the opportunity presented to them. The fact is that the book offered to translate Golitsyn from German, and he also missed it in print.
At the end of 1823, Phothia was visited by Mikhail Magnitsky and Alexander Golitsyn, who informed the archimandrite that Johann Evangelists Gossner's Gospel of Matthew, which criticized the Orthodox Church and the clergy contained the Gospel commentary, was being prepared for publication in St. Petersburg. It was decided to use this fact as a reason to appeal to the emperor, in order to eliminate Alexander Golitsyn from a ministerial post [12, p. 195].
In March 1824, the proof sheets of Gossner’s book, on Magnitsky’s initiative, were secretly bought from one of the staff of the printing house and handed over to St. Petersburg Metropolitan Seraphim (Glagolevsky), an active participant in the “Orthodox opposition”. Seraphim “decided to write an apology on the Gosner’s work himself, exposed the pastoral, proved and sent the emperor into his own hands in secret” [25, p. 190 – 191]. The action had a definite action, and on April 17 of 1824, Alexander I met many hours with Metropolitan Seraphim. On the eve of Arakcheev and Magnitsky, they were able to persuade the vacillating Seraphim to go to the palace, where he had to personally present to the emperor information about the harm that the Orthodox Church did to Prince Golitsyn, “open to him all the intrigues of the enemies of the church and the fatherland, which were cunningly hidden before him”. The conversation between the emperor and Seraphim lasted for an unprecedentedly long time, about five hours.
In an anonymous “Note on the seditions of the enemies of Russia”, some of the circumstances of this meeting were set forth: “He (Metropolitan Seraphim. - AM), removing his white hood from his head, put it at the emperor’s feet and said with firmness: I will not accept him until I will not hear from the mouth of Your Majesty the royal words that the Ministry of Spiritual Affairs will be destroyed and the Holy Synod will return its former rights, and that the Minister of Public Education will be placed differently and harmful books will be exterminated. In undoubted proof, the actions of the Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Public Education of the Metropolitan presented the Gossner’s book On the Gospel of Matthew to the emperor, which ended in printing; He uncovered those places that showed a bold uprising of the writer, not only against Russian Orthodoxy and autocracy, but even against all Christian religions. Convinced by the evidence of Seraphim, the emperor, handing him his hood, said: “Bishop, accept your hood, which you wear with dignity; and your saints and patriotic ideas will be fulfilled. ”[6, p. 387].
On the night of 22 on 23 on April 1824 of the year, on behalf of the emperor, Arafcheyev appeared to Seraphim. With him there was a note in which it was written “so that Fr. Foti certainly without a secret conversation about the works of faith and of sv. the church was. " During the meeting, according to Photius, Arakcheev "tried, on behalf of the king, to somehow agree throughout the metropolitan with Prince Golitsyn" [26, p. 229 – 230]. Then the Seraphim and Photius took a risky step, in fact presenting an ultimatum to the king, and in an unprecedentedly sharp form. Seraphim, "taking the white hood of his metropolitan, removed from his head, threw the nobleman Tsar's favorite on the table in front of his eyes and said:" Count! A faithful servant of the Tsar, inform this king that you see and hear; here is my hood to him; I don't want to be a metropolitan anymore, if things remain as they were; with Prince Golitsyn, I cannot serve as the clear enemy of the oath of the church and state ”[26, p. 230]. He was echoed by Photius: “Stand still, holy lord, do not agree in anything else, on sin and on the destruction of piety; let us be strong in word and deed; what is said to the king is true, stand in a word to the end; it is better for us to go for the righteousness of God in captivity, rather than for breaking our office and wickedness to hell. Now it remains the only way to do, if the king does not correct the work of faith and does not protect piety, like the pious king, take the holy Gospel in one hand and the other in the other. a cross, go to the Kazan Cathedral and proclaim the people: Orthodox! The faith of Christ is trampled upon; and they want to introduce some kind of demons; Prince Golitsyn, Gosner pastor and their other accomplices are doing everything! Listen to the count, tell the king that this may be done; all of Russia will know; There will be many wives and children who will stand up for the Blessed Virgin Mary, preserving their piety. She Our Lady will soon come to the rescue: everything, although with sorrow, but the devilish action will be destroyed; the enemy will fall, and the way of the ungodly will perish ”[26, p. 231 – 232].
Probably, on the part of Alexander I, this was a sounding of how serious the leaders of Orthodox conservatives are. Photius later claimed that Arakcheev had told him: “The Emperor Alexander told him to be on this secret advice on the Council, so that, as an old man, Seraphim did not show any weakness of spirit and concession in the matter, and the Seraphim would stand firmly; and as for the king, he is ready for everything. If the metropolitan does not stand in his firmness, then it will be publicly open to the tsar ”[26, p. 232].
Soon followed by the highest decree on the consideration of the book Gossner. 22 of April The Committee of Ministers condemned the Gossner’s book (it was decided to burn it in the Nevsky Monastery), ordered to start investigating those responsible for publishing it - translators, censors, printers, and bringing them to the Senate.
25 April 1824 issued a decree on the expulsion of Gossner from Russia, and the censorship of all religious books published in Russian, which Golitsyn previously carried out, was transferred to Metropolitan Seraphim (Glagolevsky) [11, p. 159; 27, p. 192].
A few days later, in the house of Anna Orlova-Chesmenskaya, Photius betrayed the anathema of Prince Golitsyn. The Minister of Spiritual Affairs, responsible for the situation in the Church, was excommunicated from this Church itself. It was a big scandal. Photius risked a great deal, since the right to make anyone anathema belonged only to the Holy Synod, and he, therefore, could become a victim of criminal prosecution. However, Photius only received the highest reprimand, which followed almost two months later, 14 on June 1824, during a personal audience with Alexander I, when Golitsyn had already lost the most important posts. Then Photius declared to the king: “I have done the will of God, and I fear nothing. Everyone would say evil to God and the king who says: anathema, do not seduce others and do not do evil ”[27, p. 194]. After that, Arakcheev invited Photius to his Georgian estate in order to “kindly accept him, entertain and inspire, so that he would not fear displeasure any longer for the curse of Prince Golitsyn” [28, p. 425 – 426].
On May 15, Prince Golitsyn’s 1824 was removed from the post of Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Public Education, and the Ministry itself was reorganized. On the same day, Alexander Shishkov, an active activist of the “Russian Party”, headed the Ministry of Public Education and the chief executive of the spiritual affairs of foreign religions, the Orthodox part went to the Synodal Procurator, and the reports of the Synod were now to be submitted through Arakcheev. 17 May 1824, Alexander I signed a rescript on the addition of Golitsyn title of president of the Bible Society; in this post, he was replaced by Metropolitan Seraphim, who was appointed chief censor of all essays and translations published in Russian.
Functions of Golitsyn in a secret order for some time passed to Arakcheev, he directed the activities of Metropolitan Seraphim, Fotius and Shishkov in the direction the king wanted. Arakcheev had a special relationship with Photius, to whom he announced the king’s decision that he would be allowed to “come to St. Petersburg at any time, whenever he pleases” [28, p. 428]. The emperor himself, according to the observation of a well-informed contemporary, “at that time, with a ripe soul, tended to favor Orthodoxy, lagged behind mysticism, in a word, became firmer and more strict in its rules and concepts about religion. Let us add to the fact that political events convinced him of the need to maintain legitimate authority everywhere and to oppose the beginninglessness of spiritual and civil in every way ”[21, p. 284].
In fact, the real power in the sphere of confessional relations, education and censorship passed to the adherents of Orthodoxy. Thus, the “Orthodox opposition” achieved the rejection of Alexander I of the priority of the mystical and cosmopolitan version of “universal Christianity” in confessional politics.
The role of Arakcheev in these events was very large. Now it is obvious that he contributed to establishing the foundations of the course that already in the reign of Nicholas I became associated with the formula of Count Sergei Uvarov: "Orthodoxy, Autocracy, Nationality."
Second floor 1825 of the year - the beginning of 1826 of the year became a turning point in Arakcheev’s political career. In June 1825 of the year, going south, after a period of long deliberation and hesitation, Alexander I ordered Arakcheev to deal with the Decembrist plot, the main figures of which had long been known to the king. However, on September 9, in Nizhny Novgorod, courtyards killed Nastasya Fedorovna Minkina, the housekeeper of the graph, who had been his favorite for more than 10 years. Arakcheev was so shocked by her death that he completely withdrew from public affairs and for the first time in his official work did not fulfill the most important assignment of the monarch. Well-informed contemporaries believed that if Arakcheev had carried out an investigation on time, then “the indignations of the December 25 guard would never have happened on Isaakievskaya Square, but those who had started a rebellion would have been arrested beforehand” [14, p. 7]. The second blow for Arakcheev was the unexpected demise of Emperor 82 on November 19 of the year.
Having taken the throne in an unprecedentedly difficult situation, Nicholas I made some concessions to the so-called public opinion and freed Arakcheev from managing the affairs of the Committee of Ministers. For some time only the post of chief over the military settlements of the chief remained behind him, but he did not stay long there. In April 1826, the new emperor granted Arakcheev's request for indefinite leave to travel abroad for treatment. There Arakcheev published a collection of letters to him of Alexander I. After returning from abroad, the count lived in Georgia constantly, occasionally leaving for friends and relatives, completely moving away from any kind of political activity.
In the last years of his life, Arakcheev is particularly involved in the organization of his estate, trying to penetrate into all aspects of economic life, he reads a lot of literature on economics. His peasants generally lived in abundance. Most of the houses of the peasants were covered with iron, a hospital was located in Georgia, where the peasants could receive free medical care, and at the initiative of Arakcheev they created a loan bank for the peasants, where they were obliged to take loans to buy seeds, livestock, etc. The roads in the estate were mostly paved, their serviceability was maintained by the peasants themselves. Arakcheev rather severely punished for drunkenness and negligence to the household. The Georgians themselves designed the best architects and artists of the time according to the designs.
After the death of Alexander I, Arakcheev made a will for 50 thousand rubles for writing a complete and reliable book about the life and activities of his patron, which should have been published a hundred years later, when this capital had to grow to at least 800 thousand rubles. Obviously, Arakcheev was not afraid of the court of history and waited for the time when the passions around his name would subside and he would be able to count on an objective assessment of his activities.
In 1833, Arakcheev introduced into the Imperial Safe Treasury with state bills 300 thousand rubles "for all time, inviolable". On interest from this money 12 pupils of the Novgorod cadet corps had to be kept constantly. The emperor ordered them to be called Arakcheev’s and wear the letters “GA” on their shoulder straps. After Arakcheev’s death, since he did not inscribe the name of the heir in the will, Nikolai I gave a special decree to the Georgian estate, as well as the money obtained from the sale of real estate and movable property in St. Petersburg by auction to St. Petersburg Cadet Corps, which became known as Arakcheevsky. A significant part of Arakcheev’s richest library, the 15 component of thousands of volumes, including in foreign languages, and its archive were transferred here. Arakcheev 21 passed away on April 1834 of the year in Georgia.
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