Peter III (1728-1762), the Emperor

Categories / Capital/Personalia
PETER III (1728-1762, Ropsha, St. Petersburg Province), Emperor (from 1761). Born Prince (from 1739, Duke) Karl Peter Ulrich von Holstein-Gottorp. Grandson of Emperor Peter the Great. Named heir to the throne after the accession of his childless aunt, Empress Elizaveta Petrovna (1742), when he was taken to St. Petersburg, christened, and given the Orthodox name of Peter Fedorovich. He married the future Empress Catherine II (1747). From 1743, he owned Oranienbaum (where a park was reconstructed), the Novy Palace (1751-52), the Ekaterinburg Fortress (1746), the Peterstadt Fortress (1756-57), as well as other buildings constructed for him. When in St. Petersburg, he lived in Elizaveta Petrovna's palaces; in 1762, he moved to the yet-unfinished Winter Palace. He was dethroned on 28 June 1762 in a Palace coup headed by his wife, sent to Ropsha and killed soon after. He was originally buried in the Alexander Nevsky Lavra, and, in 1796, reburied at the SS. Peter&Paul Cathedral by order of Pavel I.

References: Мыльников А. С. Он не похож был на государя...: Петр III: Повествование в док. и версиях. СПб., 2001.

G. V. Kalashnikov. Catherine II, Empress
Elizaveta Petrovna, Empress
Orlov Alexey Grigorievich, Count
Paul (Pavel) I, Emperor
Peter I, Emperor
Peter III, Emperor
Potemkin Grigory Alexandrovich, Gracious Prince of Tauride
Мыльников А. С. Он не похож был на государя...": Петр III: Повествование в док. и версиях. СПб., 2001 Winter Palace
SS. Peter and Paul Cathedral
1742
1761
1762
1796
1762