Pavel (Paul) I (1754-1801), Emperor

Categories / Capital/Personalia
PAVEL (PAUL) I (1754, St. Petersburg - 1801), Emperor (from 1796). Son of Emperor Peter III and Catherine II. His first wife was Augusta Wilhelmina Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt (Natalia Alexeevna upon conversion to Orthodoxy) (1755-76); his second wife was Maria Fedorovna. He fathered ten children, Emperors Alexander I and Nicholas I among them. In 1761-73, he was Duke of Holstein-Gottorp; in 1761, he became Tsesarevitch, and also the General Admiral and Colonel of the Cuirassiers Life Guards Regiment (1762). He was Grand Master of the Order of St. John (1798). Since birth he was disliked by his mother; in 1762, after a Palace revolution and the murder of his father, she dethroned him, and put him under constant observation. Because of these events he imagined himself as a Russian Hamlet, had a suspicious, unbalanced temper, and a strictly negative attitude to Court rules, which he had to conceal carefully. Until taking the crown, he preferred to live in his countryside palaces (mainly in Gatchina), where he had his own court and a few of his own military units, which were formed on the Prussian model (the so-called Gatchina Army). After taking the crown, he centralised state authority, reinforced political control over society, and forced the Prussian model on the army. Pavel I revoked the Charter to the Gentry, established the Rathaus instead of municipal Government boards, and designed rules to bring public and private city life under strict regulations. Fearing for his life, he preferred fortified palaces (see Gatchina Palace). The Mikhailovsky Castle, the construction of which he personally took part of, was built in the same spirit. However, Pavel I lived in it only for 40 days. His large scale and groundless dismissal of officers and generals, his cruelty and meticulous faultfinding, and an inconsistent foreign policy, resulted in a conspiracy among the Guards led by the Governor General of St. Petersburg, Count P.A. V. der Pahlen. On the night of 12 March 1801, Pavel I was killed in his bedroom at the Mikhailovsky Castle. He owned Kamenny Island (presented to him in 1763), Pavlovskoe village (1777, see Pavlovsk) and the Gatchina Grange (since 1783). He was buried at the SS. Peter&Paul Cathedral. A Memorial mausoleum to the Husband-Benefactor was constructed in Pavlovsk at the expense of Empress Maria Fedorovna (1808-09, sculptor I.P. March, architect J.-F. Thoma de Thomon). In 1852, a monument to Pavel I was erected in Gatchina (sculptor I.P. Vitali; its copy is installed in Pavlovsk in 1872).

References: Эйдельман Н. Я. Грань веков. М., 1986; Цареубийство 11 марта 1801 года. Репр. воспр. изд. 1907 г. М., 1990; Гатчина при Павле Петровиче, цесаревиче и императоре. СПб., 1995; Император Павел Первый и орден Св. Иоанна Иерусалимского в России: Сб. ст. СПб., 1995; Несин В. Н., Сауткина Г. Н. Павловск императорский и великокняжеский, 1777-1917. СПб., 1996; Сорокин Ю. А. Павел I: Личность и судьба. Омск, 1996; Тартаковский А. Г. Павел I // Романовы: Ист. портреты. М., 1997. Кн. 2. С. 121-222.

Y. A. Kuzmin. Alexander I, Emperor
Catherine II, Empress
Maria Fedorovna, Empress
Martos Ivan Petrovich
Natalia Alexeevna, Grand Princess
Nicholas I, Emperor
Pahlen von der Peter (Peter Ludwig) Alexeevich
Paul (Pavel) I, Emperor
Peter III, Emperor
Thomas de Thomon Jean-Francois
Vitali Ivan Petrovich
Эйдельман Н. Я. Грань веков. М., 1986
Несин В. Н., Сауткина Г. Н. Павловск Императорский и Великокняжеский, 1777-1917. СПб., 1996
Цареубийство 11 марта 1801 года. Репринт. воспр. изд. 1907 г. М., 1990
Император Павел Первый и орден Св. Иоанна Иерусалимского в России: Сб. ст. СПб., 1995
Сорокин Ю. А. Павел I: Личность и судьба. Омск, 1996
Тартаковский А. Г. Павел I // Романовы: Ист. портреты. М., 1997
Гатчина при Павле Петровиче, цесаревиче и императоре. СПб., 1995 Cuirassier Life Guards His Majesty’s Regiment
Mikhailovsky Castle
SS. Peter and Paul Cathedral
1754
1796
1798
1800
1801