public opinion became increasingly anti-French as a result of an incident in Baden-the homeland of Empress Elizabeth. The Duc d’Enghien, a member of the French royal family, was kidnapped from Baden, taken to France, and executed by the French government. Alexander and the Russian court were outraged by this act. The following year the Third Coalition was formed by Britain, Russia, and Austria. On December 2, 1805, Napoleon defeated a combined Russian and Austrian army at the Battle of Auster-litz. The Russians suffered approximately 26,000 casualties. After two major losses by their Prussian ally, the Russians were again resoundingly defeated at the Battle of Friedland in June 1807. This battle resulted in about 15,000 Russian casualties in one day. Following the defeat at Friedland, the Russians sued for peace.
The terms of the resulting Treaty of Tilsit were worked out by Alexander and Napoleon while they met on a raft anchored in the Nieman River. According to the agreement, Russia and France became allies, and Russia agreed to participate in the Continental System, Napoleon’s blockade of British trade. A secondary Franco-Prussian treaty, also agreed upon at Tilsit, reduced Prussian territory, but perhaps saved Prussia. The Treaty of Tilsit was extremely unpopular with the Russian nobility, who suffered economically from the loss of exports to Britain. In addition, Russian and French foreign policy aims differed over the Near East, the Balkans, and Poland.
By June 1812, the Tilsit agreement had broken down, and Napoleon’s army invaded Russia. Initially, the Russian forces were under the command of Generral Barclay de Tolley. The Russians suffered several defeats, including the loss of the city of Smolensk, as Napoleon’s forces moved deeper into Russia. Alexander then gave command of the Russian army to Field Marshal Mikhail Kutuzov. Kutuzov continued the policy of trading space for time and keeping the Russian army just out of reach of Napoleon’s forces. Finally, under pressure from Russian public opinion, which was critical of the continuous retreats, Kutuzov took a stand on September 7, 1812, at the village of Borodino, west of Moscow. The ensuing Battle of Borodino was one of the epic battles of European history. Napoleon’s forces numbering about 130,000, faced about 120,000 Russian troops. During the one-day battle some 42,000 Russian casualties occurred, with about 58,000 casualties among the Napoleonic forces. Each side claimed victory, although the Russian forces retreated and allowed Napoleon to enter Moscow unchallenged.
Napoleon believed that the occupation of Moscow would bring an end to the war with Russia. Instead, Napoleon’s forces entered the city to find that most of Moscow’s inhabitants had fled and that Alexander refused to negotiate. To make matters worse, a few hours after the Napoleonic army arrived in Moscow, numerous fires broke out in the city, causing perhaps three-quarters of the city’s structures to burn down. Responsibility for the burning of Moscow has been disputed. Napoleon apparently believed that the fires were set on the orders of Count Fyodor Rostopchin, the governor-general of the city. The Russian public, on
ALEXANDER I
the other hand, blamed careless French looters. The burning of Moscow had the effect of creating a swell of Russian patriotism and solidifying the determination of the Russians to resist Napoleon’s forces.
After little more than a month in occupation, faced with insufficient food and shelter, Napoleon abandoned the burned-out shell of Moscow and retreated westward. The Russian army was able to maneuver the Napoleonic forces into retreating along the same route by which they had entered Russia, thus ensuring that there would be little or no fodder available for the horses and a shortage of supplies for the men. The shortage of provisions, combined with the onslaught of winter and continued harassment by Cossacks and peasant guerillas, resulted in the destruction of Napoleon’s army without Kutuzov subjecting the Russian troops to another pitched battle.
Alexander insisted upon continuing the war after the last French troops had left Russian soil. A new coalition was formed among Russia, Austria, and Prussia. Their combined forces defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813. By March 1814, Russian troops were in Paris. Alexander played a central role in the diplomatic negotiations that determined the form of the Bourbon restoration in France and the initial disposition of Napoleon on Elba. Alexander was also a key figure at the Congress of Vienna where the boundaries of the European states were redrawn.
HOLY ALLIANCE AND MYSTICISM
In September 1815, Russia, Austria, and Prussia signed the Holy Alliance at Alexander’s urging. The Holy Alliance envisioned a Europe in which Christian principles would form the basis for international relations. Although the Holy Alliance had no practical effect, it provides a picture of Alexander’s state of mind at that time.
Alexander had been a religious skeptic since his days as a student of Samborsky and LaHarpe. However, in November 1812, Alexander joined the Russian Bible Society headed by his friend Prince Alexander Golitsyn. The Russian Bible Society sought to translate and distribute Russian language scriptures. During 1814 Empress Elizabeth introduced Alexander to the mystic Johann Jung-Stilling. However, Alexander’s immersion into mysticism began in earnest when he met Livonian Baroness Julie von Krudener in 1815. The height of her influence occurred in September 1815, when Alexander staged a massive review of Russian troops on the plain of Vertus in France. As part of the ceremony, seven altars were erected and a Te Deum was celebrated. The Holy Alliance was signed a few weeks later. Alexander lost interest in von Krudener when he returned to Russia late in 1815.
MILITARY COLONIES AND LATTER YEARS
Alexander relied increasingly on Arakcheyev to oversee the day-to-day business of running the Russian empire. Arakcheyev’s notable, though dubious, achievement was the creation of military colonies. The military colonies were an experiment in regimented agriculture. The underlying idea was to create a military reserve by organizing villages of peasant-soldiers who would be ready to fight when needed but who would also be self- supporting. The peasants were to wear uniforms, live precisely regimented lives in identical cottages, and farm their fields with parade ground precision. Individual preference was not taken into consideration when marriage partners were selected, and women were ordered to bear one child per year. Brutal penalties deterred deviations from the rules.
The last years of Alexander’s reign were marred by uprisings in Arakcheyev’s military colonies and the rebellion of the Semenovsky Regiment. Alexander’s government became increasingly repressive. Censorship was intensified, tighter control was placed over the universities, and landlords were given more power over the fate of their serfs. Under the influence of Archimandrite Photius, Alexander moved away from mysticism and closer to the Russian Orthodox Church. Masonic lodges were closed, and the Russian Bible Society was blocked from its goal of distributing Bibles in Russian. The reign which had begun with the hope of liberal reforms had moved full circle and ended as a bastion of repression.
In the fall of 1825 Alexander accompanied Empress Elizabeth to Taganrog when her doctors ordered her to leave St. Petersburg and move to a warmer climate. Alexander became ill on October 27 while touring the Crimea. He died on December 1, 1825, in Taganrog. Although Alexander’s body was returned to St. Petersburg for burial, the closed casket gave rise to rumors that Alexander had not died. A legend developed that a Siberian holy man by the name of Fyodor Kuzmich was Alexander living incognito.
ALEXANDER II
See also: CATHERINE II; ELIZABETH; HOLY ALLIANCE; NAPOLEON I; PAUL I; SPERANSKY, MIKHAIL MIKHAILO-VICH
Grimstead, Patricia Kennedy. (1969). The Foreign Ministers of Alexander I: Political Attitudes and the Conduct of Russian Diplomacy, 1801-1825. Berkeley: University of California Press. Lincoln, W. Bruce. (1981). The Romanovs. New York: The Dial Press. Palmer, Alan. (1974). Alexander I, Tsar of War and Peace. New York: Harper and Row. Riasanovsky, Nicholas V. (1984). A History of Russia, 6th ed. New York: Oxford University Press. Troyat, Henri. (1982). Alexander of Russia, Napoleon’s Conqueror, tr. Joan Pinkham. New York: Dutton.
(1818-1881), tsar and emperor of Russia from 1855 to 1881.
Alexander Nicholayevich Romanov is largely remembered for two events-his decision to emancipate the serfs and his assassination at the hands of revolutionaries. That the same tsar who finally ended serfdom in Russia would become the only tsar to be assassinated by political terrorists illustrates the turbulence of his time and its contradictions.
EDUCATION AND THE GREAT REFORMS
