Peter the Great-The Tsar of Russia

   Peter the Great - The Emperor of Russia (Part-3)

Peter the Great - Tsar of Russia

   Peter asked Alexei Petrovich to retire to a monastery and threatened to treat him as a criminal in case of his refusal. Alexei did not refuse and sent his acceptance immediately. Peter was puzzled and in the meantime, he reached Copenhagen at the head of a victorious army. In August 1716, he wrote to Alexei from Copenhagen to again retire to a monastery or report to him in the battlefield. Alexei decided to go to Copenhagen and as soon as he crossed Russia’s boundaries and he instead of heading towards Copenhagen, reached Vienna and beseeched his wife’s brother-in-law, Charles VI, to grant him refuge. Charles sent him, near Naples for safety. But Peter would not tolerate his son’s escape. On the one hand, he assured Alexei Petrovich forgiveness if he returned to him and, on the other hand, he threatened to occupy the Roman Empire by force in case Charles did not surrender and extradite Alexei.

   Alexei Petrovich was left with no option. Charles dared not incur the wrath of the Tsar. Thus, Alexei returned to Moscow on January 31, 1718. On February 3, Peter assembled high clergy and state officials and Alexei name all those who had helped him in his escape to Vienna, if he wanted to attain Peter’s forgiveness. Alexei had nothing to hide as he was not hatching a conspiracy against his father. He disclosed the requisite names. He also agreed to renounce his right to the throne in favor of Catherine’s son, Peter.

   Peter was in his fury and he alleged that Alexei’s mother, Eudoxia Lopukhina, was involved in this plot. He asked for the nuns from the convent in which Eudoxia was incarcerated and had them flogged mercilessly to pressurize them into admitting that she was really involved. But the nuns failed to company.

   Peter was bent upon humiliating Eudoxia and her son, Alexie Petrovich. He charged her of an illegitimate affair with an army officer named Glebov. Glebov was impaled and his friend, the Bishop of Rostov, was broken on a wheel. Eudoxia Lopukhina was banished to a remote Siberian convent to ultimately die of cold and hunger.
   Matters moved fast in the mind of the maniac Tsar Peter the Great, and Alexei was thrown into a solitary cell of the fortress of Peter and Paul on June 14, 1718. Once again Peter gathered an assembly of clergy and state officials who invariably left the judgment on Peter as “the heart of the Tsar is in God’s hands”.  On June 19, Peter ordered Alexei Petrovich to be put through the torture chamber and whipped. On June 24, a court of 127 high state officials was assembled which found Alexei, in a stage-managed trial, guilty of sedition against the Tsar and sentenced him to death.

   Now the final moment came and Alexei was tortured to death on June 26, in the presence of Peter and Catherine. His death was made public on June 29, and his body buried the next day.

Catherine-Wife of Peter the Great

   Poor Alexei Petrovich at no time conspired against Peter. There was no plot against him. All this talk of sedition and show of justice was a shame. The basic truth remains that Peter hated Alexei only because he hated his mother Eudoxia Lopukhina, and fuel was added to his brutal fire by Catherine who was totally bent upon removing Alexei from the path of his son inheriting the crown. She filled Peter’s heart with ill-will. But providence did not spare her and let her go unpunished. Her infant son, for whose sake innocent Alexei was murdered, died all of a sudden a year later.


Catherine:

   In 1705, when Peter’s armies invaded Livonia in Sweden, his military officers found a prize in the person of a hearty peasant girl, Catherine, the maid-servant of a Lutheran pastor. She moved from lower to higher officers at a fast speed and arrived in St. Petersburg palace as the mistress of Peter’s intimate subordinate, Menshikov. It was at Menshikov’s place that Peter was introduced to her and Peter soon got her transferred to his palace in 1703. In the next three years, she gave birth to two children who were adopted by Peter. It was in 1712 that Peter married Catherine and she bore him eleven children, most of them died in childhood.

   Catherine wielded great influence upon Peter and it was for this reason that men like her former lover, Menshikov, sought her support. Catherine was aware of her importance and she never granted a favor without substantial presents from favor-seekers. In December 1721, the title of Empress was conferred upon Catherine and her coronation took place on May 7, 1724, among great pomp and show.

   In November, 1724, Peter had before him unarguable proof of Catherine’s love affair with William Mons who was in Peter’s chamberlain and the brother of his former mistress, Anna Ivanova Mons. Peter personally investigated the affair and found William Mons guilty of seducing Catherine. William Mons was charged with cheating, sentenced to death and beheaded.




   Now it was Catherine’s turn to face death. She was already in dishonor. But Peter’s illness and subsequent death caused by acute venereal disease on February 10, 1725, came to her reserve. She had no male child left who would wear the crown which ultimately came to her own head. Fortune had always been smiling upon her. She reigned over Russia for more than two years and it was because of her wish that after her death Peter-II, the grandson of Peter and the son of the ill-fated Alexei Petrovich, was crowned as king. Catherine was died in 1727. But, Catherine continued to be the king-maker for a long time as she had mentioned in her will that in case Peter-II died childless the crown would pass to her daughters. Catherine’s will, though not carried out immediately, and materialized eleven years after the death of Peter-II when her daughter Elizabeth was crowned as Russia’s empress. But Catherine’s brood did not end up here. Her elder daughter Anne’s son was crowned as Peter-III. And the Catherine legend was put to a dishonorable end by another Catherine, Catherine-II. Catherine-II was the legendary empress of Russia – Catherine the Great.





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