man of the earth, he was generally supportive of Chancellor Bestuzhev’s na«155»
Terrible Tsarinas tionalist ideas. In such times, when some states are at war and others are preparing for it, and when forging alliances is the principal occupation of all the foreign ministries, it was difficult to see clearly where Russia’s best interests lay. What is clear, in any case, is that the hostilities between Russia and Sweden (recklessly started in 1741 under the regency of Anna Leopoldovna) came to an end. The Russians, led by Generals Lascy and Keith, won several victories over the Swedes and a peace agreement was signed on August 8, 1743. Via the treaty of Abo, Russia gave back some recently conquered territories but held onto most of Finland. With the Swedish conflict settled, Elizabeth hoped that France would prove less hostile to the idea of an accord. But, in the meantime, St. Petersburg had signed a pact of friendship with Berlin, which Versailles took very badly. Once again, every attempt would have to be made to assuage, reassure, and persuade them of Russia’s good faith.
It was on the background of this unsettled international context that an affair erupted that neither Bestuzhev nor Elizabeth had been prepared for in the least. In mid-summer, St. Petersburg was rocked by rumors of a plot being fomented among the highest nobility, intended to overthrow Elizabeth I, at the instigation of the Austrian ambassador Botta d’Adorno. This disloyal and disruptive coterie was said to be considering offering the throne to the Brunswick family, gathered around little Ivan VI. As soon as Elizabeth got wind of this, she ordered the impudent Botta d’Adorno arrested. But, having a good nose for danger, he had already left Russia. He was said to be on his way to Berlin, on the way to Austria.
This diplomatic felon may have escaped, but his Russian accomplices were still around. The most compromised were those who were close (or distant) relations of the Lopukhin clan. Elizabeth didn’t forget that she had had to slap Natalya Lopukhin for
«156»
An Autocrat at Work and Play having the temerity to wear a rose in her hair. Moreover, her rival had been the mistress of Loewenwolde, recently exiled to Siberia.
But there were other members of the conspiracy who were even more despicable. At the top of the list Elizabeth put Mrs. Mikhail Bestuzhev, nee Golovkin, sister of a former vice-chancellor and sister-in-law of the current chancellor Alexis Bestuzhev, and widow, by her first marriage, of one of Peter the Great’s closest associates, Yaguzhinsky.
While waiting for the Russian culprits to be arrested and tried, she hoped that Austria would punish its ambassador severely. But, while King Frederick II expelled Botta as soon as he arrived in Berlin, the empress Maria Theresa, having welcomed the diplomat in Vienna, merely scolded him. Disappointed by the feeble reactions of two foreign sovereigns whom she had believed were more solid in their monarchical convictions, Elizabeth took revenge by locking up the princely couple of Brunswick and their son, young Ivan VI, in the maritime fortress of Dunamunde, on the Duna, where she could keep a clos er eye on them than in Riga.
She also considered dismissing Alexis Bestuzhev, whose family was so compromised. Then, no doubt under Razumovsky’s influence in favor of moderation, she allowed the chancellor to retain his post.
However, she needed victims on whom to vent her fury, and she chose to make Mrs. Lopukhin, her Ivan son and some of their close relatives take the brunt of it. For Natalya Lopukhin, a slap in the face was no longer punishment enough; this time, she was in for horrible torture - and her accomplices as well. Under the knout, the clippers and the branding iron, Lopukhin, her son Ivan, and Mrs. Bestuzhev, writhing in pain, repeated the calumnies that they had heard from the mouth of Botta. In spite of the lack of material evidence, a hastily convened emergency court (made up of several members of the Senate and three representatives of the
«157»
Terrible Tsarinas clergy) sentenced all the “culprits” to the wheel, quartering, and decapitation. This exemplary sentence offered Elizabeth the opportunity to decide, during a ball, that she would spare life of the miserable wretches who had dared to conspire against her, and would limit their punishment to public “lesson.” When this extraordinary measure of leniency was announced, everyone present cheered Her Majesty’s angelic kindness.
On August 31, 1743, a scaffold was erected in front of the palace of Colleges. Standing before an enormous crowd of curious onlookers, Mrs. Mikhail Bestuzhev was brutally stripped by the torturer. As she had managed to find the time to slip him a jewelstudded cross just before he began, he barely stroked her back with the whip and slid his knife over her tongue without scratching the flesh. She suffered these apparent blows and wounds with heroic dignity. Less sure of her nerves, Mrs. Lopukhin struggled desperately when the torturer’s assistant ripped off her clothes.
The multitude was stunned to silence by the suddenly revealed nudity of this woman who was even more appealing in her distress. Then some of witnesses, impatient to see the rest, began to howl. Panicking at this outburst of raw hatred, the poor woman struggled, insulted the torturer and bit his hand. Furious, he grabbed her by the throat, forced open her jaws, held up the sacrificial weapon and presented the laughing crowd with a bloody scrap of meat. “Who’ll take the tongue of the beautiful Mrs.
Lopukhin?,” he cried. “It is a lovely piece, and I am selling it cheap! One ruble for the tongue of the beautiful Mrs. Lopukhin!”4 This was a common type of joke from executioners in those days, but this time the public paid more attention than usual, for Natalya Lopukhin had just fainted from pain and horror. The torturer revived her with a large knout. When she came to her senses, she was thrown into a carriage and shipped off to Siberia! Her husband would soon join her in Seleguinsky, after being severely
«158»
An Autocrat at Work and Play whipped, himself. He died there a few years later in a state of total abandonment. As for the Bestuzhevs, Madame lingered on for many miserable years in Yakutsk, suffering a life of hunger, cold and the indifference of her neighbors (who were reluctant to compromise themselves by looking after someone who had been rejected) while, in St. Petersburg, her husband Mikhail Bestuzhev (brother of Chancellor Alexis Bestuzhev) went on with his diplomatic career, and their daughter was a reigning beauty at Her Majesty’s court.
In settling the Botta matter, Elizabeth thought she had gained control over the volatile situation within her empire.
Alexis Bestuzhev, having preserved his ministerial prerogatives in spite of the disgrace that had befallen most of his kin, had reason to think that his prestige had even been enhanced. However, in Versailles, Louis XV persisted in his intention to send La Chetardie on a reconnaissance mission to the tsarina, who (according to his advisors) would not mind engaging in a playful new fencing bout with a Frenchman whose gallantries she had once found amusing. But she was so flighty that, according to the same “experts on the Slavic soul,” she was liable to be upset over a trifle and to over-react to any misstep. To spare the sensitivities of this sovereign so susceptible to changing humors, the king gave La Chetardie two letters of introduction to Her Majesty. In one, Versailles’s emissary was presented as an ordinary person interested in everything that related to Russia, and in the other, as a plenipotentiary delegated to represent the king to “our very dear sister and absolutely perfect friend Elizabeth, empress and autocrat of all the Russias.”5 La Chetardie could decide on the spot which formula was best suited to the circumstances. With this double recommendation in his pocket, how could he help but succeed?
Traveling as quickly as possible, he arrived in St. Petersburg on the very same day when the empress was celebrating the tenth
