Prince Michael Vorontsov: Viceroy to the Tsar 9780773562400

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Prince Michael Vorontsov

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Prince Michael Vorontsov Viceroy to the Tsar ANTHONY L.H. RHINELANDER

McGill-Queen's University Press Montreal & Kingston • London • Buffalo

©McGill-Queen's University Press 1990 ISBN 0-7735-0747-7 Legal deposit second quarter 1990 Bibliotheque nationale du Quebec

Printed in Canada on acid-free paper This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Rhinelander, A.L.H. (Anthony Laurens Hamilton), 1940Prince Michael Vorontsov Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-7735-0747-7

1. Vorontsov, Mikhail Semenovich, Kniaz, 1782-1856. 2. Soviet Union—Politics and government—1825-1855. 3. Soviet Union, Southern—Governors—Biography. I. Title. DK2O9.6.V6R44 1990 947'.O73'o92 C9O-O9I24-I

The typeface used in the text is ITC Garamond® Light with old style figures from the Adobe Garamond Expert Collection® set by the Instructional Communications Centre at McGill University.

Contents

Preface vii Plates and Maps ix Introduction 3 PART O N E

THE TRAINING

GROUND

1 Upbringing and Family Background 7 2 Active Military Service 13 3 Commanding the Occupation Army 26 4 Furlough 45 PART T W O

NEW R U S S I A

5 The Territory 57 6 Initiation 65 7 The Governor-General's Government 81 8 The Governor-General's Style 94 9 Garden of the Empire 107 PART T H R E E C A U C A S I A 10 The Territory 123 11 The Viceroyship: Theory 135 12 The Viceroyship: Practice 146

vi Contents 13 The Viceroy Himself 160 14 Caucasian Civil Society 169 PART FOUR

THE END OF A CAREER

15 End of Service 187 16 Retirement 199 Abbreviations 219 Notes 221 Bibliography of Works Cited 265 Index 275

Preface

Fellowships and travel grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, including participation on the CanadaSoviet Union cultural exchange program with the Soviet Academy of Sciences, have made this work possible, and to the council I express my deepest gratitude. I must also express my thanks to the knowledgeable and helpful staff at the Central State Historical Archive of the USSR, the Archive of the Institute of History of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, and the Pushkinskii Dom Archive, all in Leningrad; to the attentive staffs of the Saltykov-Shchedrin Public Library in Leningrad, the Lenin State Library in Moscow, the Tbilisi State Library in Georgia, and the Harriet Irving Library of the University of New Brunswick; and to the Earl of Pembroke for permission to use his family archives at Wilton House. I am particularly grateful to the administration of St Thomas University for its long-term and unfailing support. The work has also benefited from discussions with and advice from many knowledgeable scholars: Marc Raeff, inspiring teacher and valued friend; Firuz Kazemzadeh of Yale University, another inspiring teacher; Stephen Jones of the School of Slavonic and East European Studies in London and recently Mount Holyoke College; Ron Suny of the University of Michigan; Sergei Dmitriev of the Historical Faculty of Moscow State University; Petr Eroshkin of the Historical-Archival Institute in Moscow; Sergei Iskiul' and other colleagues at the Historical Institute of the Academy of Sciences in Leningrad; Ekaterina Indova and other colleagues at the Academy's Historical Institute in Moscow; Irakli Antelava, Otar Zhordania, and other colleagues at the Academy's Historical Institute in Tbilisi; Edward Lazzerini of the University of New Orleans; Muriel Atkin of George Washington University; Robert Parsons of the British Broadcasting Corporation, Reading; and my colleagues and students in the history departments of St Thomas

viii Preface

University and the University of New Brunswick. I have deeply appreciated these friends' interest, criticism, and advice. The inadequacies and errors that remain are my doing, not theirs. Some of the information presented in chapter n has been previously published in an article entitled "The Creation of the Caucasian Vicegerency," which appeared in the Slavonic and East European Review 59 (1981): 15-40; I am grateful to the editorial board of that journal for permission to reproduce that information. Some of the information presented in chapters 10, 12, and 14 has been previously published in an article entitled "Viceroy Vorontsov's Administration of the Caucasus," which appeared in Transcaucasia: Nationalism and Social Change. Essays in the History of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, ed. R.G. Suny (Ann Arbor: Michigan Slavic Publications, University of Michigan 1983), 87-104; I thank editor and publisher for permission to reproduce that information. For the transliteration of Russian and Georgian terms and names I have used primarily a somewhat modified form of the Library of Congress system. When certain names have had standard English versions, however, I have sometimes used those. It is impossible to be consistent in transliteration. My aim has been to avoid as much confusion as possible within any given context. For improvements to the shape and the style of the story I am much indebted to my parents, Laurie and Louisa Rhinelander, and especially to my wife, Linda Neilson. As for the writing, editing, and typing of this work, I must record my boundless admiration for and gratitude to the infinite patience and miraculous abilities of my word processor. I owe special thanks to the editors at McGill-Queen's for their many recommendations for improvements to the text. All illustrations have been photographed or drawn by myself. Biography is not the scholarly historian's favorite vehicle of expression, with good reason. It is at the same time too narrow and too broad. One person's career is too limited to explore political, social, economic, or cultural trends adequately. At the same time, the more important the person, the more varied the number of subjects the biographer must cover. No monograph, this. Furthermore, a biography is of necessity a narrative. Yet to be interesting the life-story must be woven into the context of the wider historical patterns of the time. Choosing a reasonable balance between narrative and analysis is a continual problem, never solved. The book is dedicated to my wife Linda, my severest critic and my inspiration.

Count Simon Vorontsov [Woronzow] (1744-1831), father of Michael Vorontsov. Portrait by Thomas Lawrence, c. 1821. Original in Hermitage Museum, Leningrad. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission. Lady Catherine Pembroke ("the Russian Countess," 1783-1856), sister of Michael Vorontsov, c. 1840. Portrait at Wilton House. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission.

Michael Vorontsov, c. 1821. Portrait by Thomas Lawrence. Original in Hermitage Museum, Leningrad; copy in Wilton House. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission.

Elizabeth (Lise) Vorontsova, nee Branicka (1792-1881), wife of Michael Vorontsov. Portrait by Thomas Lawrence, c. 1821. Original in Hermitage Museum, Leningrad; copy in Wilton House. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission.

George Herbert, eleventh Earl of Pembroke (1759-1827), brother-in-law of Michael Vorontsov. White marble portrait bust "in the Roman style," c. 1826, at Wilton House. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission.

Michael Vorontsov, 1856. Painter unknown. Portrait at the Hermitage Museum, Leningrad. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission.

Left: Elizabeth, Lady Herbert of Lea, wife of Michael Vorontsov's nephew, Sidney Herbert. White marble portrait bust "in the Roman style," at Wilton House. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission. Right: Sidney Herbert, Lord Herbert of Lea, nephew of Michael Vorontsov. White marble portrait bust at Wilton House. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission.

Michael Vorontsov, c. 1830. White marble portrait bust by Pietro Tenerani (1798-1869) "in the Roman style," at Wilton House. Photograph by A.L.H. Rhinelander, with permission.

Michael Vorontsov, c. 1845. Portrait by Jensen. Reproduced in Akty KAK 10 (1885), frontispiece.

The Russian Empire, 1801-54

W-£zgI 'BISSn}! M.9JSJ

Caucasia, 1844-54

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Prince Michael Vorontsov

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Introduction

In 1823 Emperor Alexander I appointed General Count Michael S. Vorontsov governor-general of "New Russia," the tsar's southern Ukrainian domain. Twenty-one years later, in 1844, not only was Vorontsov still the governor-general but his authority was extended even farther south by special decree of Emperor Nicholas I to include Caucasia.1 Russian imperialism under Vorontsov's rule transformed the southern part of the Russian empire into a land of promise. New Russia was transformed from a relatively empty borderland into the empire's garden and bread-basket and sanatorium; medieval, middle-eastern Caucasia was propelled into the modern western world. Vorontsov's personal responsibility for such lasting regional transformation is impossible to determine. Indeed, we must be careful not to overemphasize it. Yet there is no denying that he was a remarkably successful imperial administrator. That success we can trace to three broad factors: his mastery of the political system, his fabulous wealth and eminent social position, and, perhaps most important, his unorthodox personal philosophy. For in relation to his times his view of Russian social and economic life was modern, enlightened, liberal. In an age of paternalism, careerism, and venality, Vorontsov believed in public service, in a "work ethic," in the pursuit of economic well-being, in the importance of individual initiative. This outlook earned him considerable attention from his contemporaries. Some admired his style of leadership. Others hated him. Historians, too, have made mixed judgments in their occasional references to him, but they all admit that he was an exception for his times. In dismissing him as a foreign aberration, one Russian contemporary called him "more an English lord than a Russian dignitary," with

4 Introduction "ideas little corresponding to the spirit of our institutions or of our national life."2 Are we tempted to come to the same conclusion? Yet he spoke Russian, came from an old Russian family, and spent his entire adult life, from nineteen to seventy-two, in the Russian imperial service, most of it within the borders of the Russian empire. Even if we admit his strangeness in the Russian context, examining what made him conspicuous should help to define the crowd against whom he stood out. Most important, and justification enough if one be needed for a biography, Vorontsov had a demonstrable effect on the society and government of imperial Russia of the time of Nicholas I. His very effectiveness, within a bureaucratic system of legendary inefficiency and corruption, raises some important questions. How did he operate? How did he keep the loyalties of his clientele? What was his outlook, his philosophy, his administrative style? Was his particular philosophy the key to his system of government, and if so, why did he possess it when so many others clearly did not? How did he actually affect life in southern Russia? How sound were the views of his contemporaries and of the historians about him and his activities? What is his significance for the history of Russian imperialism? It is hoped that the following account will answer these and other questions about the Count and Most Illustrious Prince, FieldMarshal Mikhail Semenovich Vorontsov, governor-general of New Russia, viceroy of Caucasia.

PART O N E

The Training Ground

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CHAPTER ONE

Upbringing and Family Background

It was no coincidence that Michael Vorontsov appeared English to so many of his contemporaries. He spent his entire youth in England. He was born in St Petersburg on 19 May 1782. When he was only two and his sister Catherine only one, his mother died suddenly and unexpectedly. Shortly after that, in 1785, his father, Count Simon Vorontsov,1 was appointed by Empress Catherine to be ambassador to England at the Court of St James. Count Simon took the two children to England with him and remained there. He never remarried, so "Minga" and "Kat" were raised without a mother by nurses and governesses, under the direct influence of their father. Most Russian aristocrats were brought up without close paternal ties because their fathers were in constant service to the emperor away from home. This affected the social and cultural outlook, the psychology, of Russia's present and future leaders, although we are only now beginning to understand the extent.2 In contrast, the young Vorontsov had and maintained throughout his life personal and close ties with his father.3 Quite apart from his English upbringing, that attachment may help to explain his notable self-reliance, his famous equanimity. Michael Vorontsov did not inherit his father's thin-lipped, rather haughty aristocratic features. Though tall, as a youth he had an open, rather feminine face, dark wavy hair, weak blue eyes, a pointed nose, full and rather sensuous lips, a rounded though not weak chin. (His sister inherited their father's pointed chin.) From all accounts he was a quiet, modest, intelligent youth, well educated by private tutors in the classics, politics, history, and modern languages.4 His father introduced him to various influential men of politics and international affairs, people like Lord Wellington and Lord Cathcart, the Earl of Pembroke, Sir John Malcolm, and Robert

8 The Training Ground (later Sir Robert) Wilson.5 From them and his surroundings the young man absorbed certain notions that would remain with him throughout his life: acceptance of duty to sovereign and country, the gentlemanly qualities of politeness and civility. He also seems to have taken to heart the fundamental importance of individual liberties, whereby a man should be free to do as he pleases so long as he does not infringe upon the rights of others, what today we might call classical liberalism. Michael Vorontsov's father, a committed anglophile, never returned to Russia.6 His sister Catherine married an Englishman, the Earl of Pembroke, one of her father's old friends; she too never returned to Russia.7 But he himself did. In the summer of 1801 he embarked on a long career of over half a century in Russian service. He nevertheless retained a life-long fondness for England and the English. This Englishness, together with his family's well-known liberal reputation within Russia, gave him standing among the empire's pro-Western intelligentsia. Indeed, he need hardly have grown up in England to have been nurtured on liberalism. His father, Count Simon, was remembered and respected as one of Empress Catherine's liberal advisers.8 His liberalism, as well as his anglophilism, landed him in trouble with Emperor Paul i after 1796. Some of his Russian estates were confiscated, and he felt compelled to resign from Russian service. The stories of Emperor Paul's unbearable tyranny directed most heavily against the Russian aristocracy made Count Simon decide to remain in England. They also allowed him to persuade the younger Vorontsov not to return to Russia just yet, in spite of the latter's evident desire to do so.9 Fortunately for both Vorontsovs, the liberal Alexander i took over the throne from his murdered father in the spring of 1801. He restored Count Simon's estates and reinstated him in his ambassadorship. Only then did the latter decide that it was safe and fitting for his son to return to Russia. Even so, he was torn. He loved his son deeply and hated the thought of losing his company, but he recognized that his son's interests would be best served if he returned to the land of his forebears. "Your well-being," he began a long, intimate letter to his departing son, "is dearer to me than my own satisfaction, which would be never to be separated from you." Anxious lest his neophyte son be overwhelmed by the cultural shock that awaited him, or unduly influenced by the constitutional enthusiasts, he proceeded to give him some remarkably clear-headed advice about the nature of Russian politics. As he put it,

9 Upbringing and Family Background I should be wanting in my responsibility as a father and as a friend (for I do regard you as such, in recognition of the character and the good sense that nature has bestowed upon you) if I did not give you some advice to guide you upon your arrival and during your stay in the country to which you are now headed. For it is entirely different from the one you are now leaving. Although the new reign has rendered our compatriots happier than they have ever been, and although, emerging from the most atrocious slavery, they imagine themselves to have become free, in point of fact things will only turn out as they have in those other countries that no longer know true liberty [that is, Napoleonic Europe]. For such liberty is founded only upon such a constitution as Great Britain has the good fortune to possess, where men must obey only the laws, laws that apply equally to all classes, and where a man may thus preserve his dignity. In Russia there remain ignorance and evil habits, habits which are the consequence of that ignorance and of the style of government which, in degrading men, removes from them all loftiness of the soul, leads them to greed, to sensual pleasures, and to the vilest servility and sycophancy towards every person in power or favoured by the sovereign. The country is too vast for any one ruler, were he another Peter the Great, to be able to do everything by himself in a government without a constitution, without fixed laws, without permanent and independent courts of justice ... The actual situation of the country is no more than a suspension of tyranny. Our compatriots are like the Roman slaves during the Saturnalian celebrations: after it is over they must fall back into their accustomed state of slavery. So, my friend, be prudent and discreet in your every word and deed.10 Count Simon in his letter continued at some length in this vein, but he need not have worried on his son's account. The latter would turn out to be a model of discretion, an eminently successful practitioner within the Russian autocratic tradition, a conservative with liberal tendencies, ultimately of course a cynic like his father. Count Simon's advice to his son not to be taken in by the enthusiastic but impractical Russian liberals may have been provoked by from the young Vorontsov's travel arrangements. His travelling companion on the voyage was to be Nikolai Novosiltsev, a wellknown anglophile liberal who had also run afoul of Emperor Paul." Novosiltsev had sought refuge in England during the reign and was now anxious to return in order, as he hoped and indeed expected, to help his friend the young Alexander i institute a constitutional regime.12 Michael Vorontsov's father was not the only member to have established the family's liberal reputation in Russia. There was also

10 The Training Ground

his remarkable aunt, Princess Catherine Romanovna Dashkova (17431810, nee Vorontsova), known and respected as a writer, an art connoisseur, a teacher, a philologist, an editor, a naturalist, a musician, a surgeon, and even, from 1783 to 1794, head of both the Russian Academy and the Imperial Academy of Sciences. She had been one of Empress Catherine's closest liberal friends and advisers.13 But perhaps the best-known liberal of Michael Vorontsov's clan was his high-ranking uncle, the chancellor, Count Alexander Romanovich Vorontsov (1741-1805), known among other things for patronizing the liberal writer and activist Alexander Radishchev. The chancellor was also the prime author of the draft for a liberal charter of individual rights, which was being prepared for presentation to the new emperor at precisely the moment of the young Vorontsov's return, in the interval between Paul I's death and Alexander I's coronation.14 The proposed charter represented the reaction of certain aristocrats, the "Senate Party," to the shock of Emperor Paul's rule. The decades of Catherine's enlightened rule had led many Russian leaders to assume that enlightenment and liberalization would continue as a matter of course. Paul's breath-taking and disturbing arbitrariness had quashed that assumption and indeed justified, in the minds of many, his murder in March of 1801. The charter, while not proposing to limit the Russian autocracy by representative rule, did aim to institutionalize the supreme authority and, in particular, to secure absolute legal protection of individual rights of person and property. Its proponents hoped that the new emperor, acting in the spirit of liberalism that had been attributed to him - incorrectly, as it turned out15 - would adopt it as legislation at his coronation on 15 September. Whatever hopes they had, however, were dashed. Emperor Alexander rejected the charter. Legalization of individual rights, he felt, would have limited the autocracy. Giving a citizen redress against the monarch's will would render the monarch no longer autocratic. Alexander liked liberal ideas in principle — the dignity of man, inalienable rights - but not in practice. As Michael's father had known he would, when faced with the awesome responsibility for the fate of his subjects, the emperor decided that Russia was too large, the Russian economy too backward, Russian society too complex, the weight of tradition too great for anything but autocratic, if enlightened, absolutism to keep it all together. Despite the rebuff to the would-be reformers, the Vorontsov family kept its pre-eminent position in government and society. It was not a particularly old aristocratic family.16 It had first come to prominence in the 17405 with Mikhail Ivanovich Vorontsov, vice-chancellor under

11 Upbringing and Family Background

Empress Elizabeth i and one of her staunchest supporters. Thanks to her munificence he had become rich. He had engaged the great Italian architect Rastrelli to design a magnificent neo-classical palace for him in St Petersburg, which stands today at No. 26 Sadovaya Street. Mikhail's son Roman, the grandfather of our Michael Vorontsov, had married a rich Siberian heiress and thus become even richer. By 1801, Roman's sons Alexander and Simon owned an estate of some twenty-seven thousand serfs (the usual way of reckoning wealth in Russia at the time) and three-quarters of a million acres of land spread out in diverse estates across the empire, not to mention various palaces and mansions. The elderly Alexander had no children. At his death (which would come in 1805) all his interest in the property would go to his brother Simon. But Count Simon intended to live out his life in England. One compelling reason for wanting his son to return to live in Russia was to allow the latter to take a direct hand in the management of the estate. Michael Vorontsov was in line to inherit one of the great family fortunes of imperial Russia.17 The legacy of his family's service to the crown, together with his truly royal wealth, meant that he could socialize with the imperial family. Ever since Paul i passed his famous Law of Succession when he first came to the throne in 1796, the imperial family had become an increasingly stable and important element in Russian society. Paul enacted the law, practically his first piece of legislation, in order to define and consolidate the royal succession to the throne. He was reacting to a century and more of dynastic insecurity of which he himself became a victim when his mother, the usurper Catherine n, contemplated cutting Paul out of the succession. There was no love lost between mother and son, no sense of family around the imperious empress, and Paul was determined to re-establish its importance and legitimacy. As a consequence, not only did he entrench the dynasty by defining the succession to a hundred places, but the imperial family as such, all the relatives, found that they suddenly occupied a new niche in the Russian political structure. No longer were they a collection of favourites and hangers-on, mere social butterflies who might well be replaced wholesale when the next usurper took over, but a veritable army of imperial advisers with defined ranks and long-term responsibilities. Although Paul was not a Romanov through the male line - indeed, he was probably not even the biological son of Catherine's emperor-husband Peter in still the newly institutionalized imperial dynasty became known as the Romanov imperial family, a new and powerful factor in Russian imperial politics.

12 The Training Ground

Michael Vorontsov, as one of the favoured few, would be invited to the imperial family's weddings and baptisms. He would be invited to dine with the emperor and the other royal personages. His palaces would become favorite stopping-off places for touring royalty. This imperial hob-nobbing would be a great advantage in a system where whom you knew meant everything: in society, in business, in politics. His family's high social position, his enormous inherited wealth, and his own self-esteem provided Michael Vorontsov with a rare degree of individual security in the empire of the absolute tsars. These qualifications could not help but give him an optimistic view of the reality and the potential of Russian imperial society. They also gave him the confidence to be able to live and act according to his own personal philosophy, so long as he demonstrated unswerving loyalty to the crown - extraordinary advantages for a young Russian just entering imperial service.

CHAPTER TWO

Active Military Service

In 1762, reversing Peter the Great's law, Emperor Peter in granted members of the aristocracy the legal right not to have to serve in the military or civil service in order to keep their privileged aristocratic status. Very few took advantage of that right. Members of low-ranking, impoverished aristocratic families continued to serve in order to survive financially. Members of leading wealthy families, like the Vorontsovs, continued to fulfil social expectations by entering the emperor's service: noblesse oblige a la Russe. The question was never whether or not Michael Vorontsov would enter Russian service, only when. As was customary for the scions of high-ranking aristocratic families, the young Vorontsov was "entered" into service at the junior grade while still an infant, in absentio, so that by the time he began active service he had already had several promotions. The practice was the compromise between Peter the Great's ideal that all should serve in the ranks and work their way up on proven merit, and the social reality that the elite insisted on inheriting appropriate positions of leadership. At the age of four, for example, Michael Vorontsov was registered as a "junior quartermaster sergeant," and shortly thereafter as an ensign (praporshchik) in the elite Preobrazhenskii guards regiment. In 1798, aged sixteen, he was made a chamberlain (kamerger') to the court of Emperor Paul, though he remained in England and his father resigned his position as Russian ambassador.1 This is the point at which he appears to have begun to think seriously about returning to Russia to fulfil his service obligations. In 1799, at seventeen, he wrote his uncle Alexander that he hoped soon to be able to enter active service.1 As we have seen, he actually returned to Russia in the summer of 1801. On 2 October 1801, two weeks after Alexander I's coronation cer-

14 The Training Ground

emonies, Vorontsov signed up as a lieutenant (poruchik) in his regiment in St Petersburg.3 While duty in this elite corps satisfied the desires of some young aristocrats to dress up in fine uniforms and attend parties, Vorontsov found it tiresome and unsuitable for his aims in life. The following summer he requested a transfer to active service. He was shortly offered a commission in Caucasia, the empire's newest borderland. The ancient kingdom of eastern Georgia (or more properly KartliKakheti, the largest Caucasian state) had just recently been incorporated into the empire. The date of official annexation is 12 September i8oi,4 though negotiations had actually begun towards the end of 1799 under Paul i. The following September, when Vorontsov received his transfer, Alexander i had just appointed an ambitious and rather flamboyant Russian general of Georgian descent, Prince Pavel Tsitsianov, to be his commander-in-chief in Caucasia. Twenty-eight years Vorontsov's senior, Tsitsianov was also anxious to see active service and willingly accepted the post when offered it by the emperor.5 He was sent to replace General Karl Knorring, Emperor Paul's commander of his Caucasian forces, who was held by Alexander's advisers to be ineffective. The orders given to Tsitsianov were to consolidate the empire's military position and pacify the Caucasian peoples, two rather large tasks. The choice, from the point of view of empire-building, was brilliant. Despite his Russian outlook, Tsitsianov was not exactly a foreigner in Caucasia. His grandfather, Prince Paata Tsitsishvili, had emigrated to Russia from Georgia in 1724. His parents spoke Georgian at home. Thanks to this personal background, Tsitsianov understood both Georgian and Russian customs and spoke both languages. Because of his Russian military training, however, he did not feel bound to uphold Georgian traditions if they conflicted with Russian designs. The effectiveness of Russian imperial expansion and rule relied heavily on such co-opted and russianized non-Russians. The emperor, when he signed the manifesto that announced the incorporation of eastern Georgia (Kartli-Kakheti) in 1800, promised to uphold native customs and traditions. But he viewed the situation from afar. Tsitsianov, on the spot, soon showed that he had no such intentions. He understood the goals and particularly the means of the incorporation and administration of the territory. He was arrogant and prickly, a source of annoyance to some of his subordinates.6 He served barely four years before he was assassinated at Baku, in Daghestan. Nevertheless, by a skilful mix of arms and diplomacy, he succeeded in expanding Russian rule beyond eastern Georgia and throughout Caucasia.7 For action, Michael Vorontsov could not have chosen a better time

15 Active Military Service

or place. The annexation of Georgia represents one of the dramatic steps that Russia took in its steady climb to becoming a world imperial power. Tsitsianov's mission to consolidate the Russian hold on Caucasia constituted a challenge and a threat to both Persia and Turkey. For centuries Caucasia had been their territory. They had fought over it, although generally speaking, eastern Georgia, Azerbaijan, and eastern Armenia circled in a Persian orbit; western Georgia and western Armenia had come under the sway of the Ottoman empire. In the course of the eighteenth century, however, the Russian colossus had risen up over the Caucasian mountains, casting a shadow over Persian and Turkish dependencies to the south. In 1783, a treaty of friendship was signed between Empress Catherine and Erekle [Hercules], King of Kartli and Kakheti (eastern Georgia), promising mutual support. Erekle, worried about Persian encroachments on his little Christian kingdom, promised to support the empress's interests in Caucasia. Catherine made vague promises of support in the event of attack and extended imperial recognition to the Georgian nobility, a generous diplomatic gesture. The Persian shah, worried by the Russian threat, finally attacked King Erekle in 1795. No Russian troops materialized, in spite of Erekle's pleas for help and Catherine's earlier promises. The Georgian army fought valiantly but was overwhelmed by vastly superior numbers. Erekle's capital city, Tiflis, was overrun and sacked, thousands of his subjects dragged off into slavery or concubinage. His life-long efforts to consolidate his kingdom crushed, he fled to the hills where, aged and broken, he soon died. His successor, Giorgi (George) xii, still determined to escape Persian rule, had no choice but to approach the Russian emperor, now Catherine's son Paul i, and beg for his kingdom to be incorporated outright into the empire. Paul agreed, and his son Alexander i finally confirmed the incorporation in i8oi.8 Whatever the Georgian rulers may have hoped to gain out of voluntary union with the Russian empire, it is doubtful if they knew what was in store for them and their countrymen. The Russians would not behave like Persians or Turks, who generally ruled by collecting tribute without interfering in Caucasians' internal affairs. The Russian imperialists began a century of interference. The Russians thought that they were benefiting the natives of Caucasia by bringing them Western civilization. Over time the Russians did bring Western values to the Caucasians and, for better or for worse, it did change their lives forever. Unfortunately, it also kindled among some of them a smoldering hatred, such as that of the mostly Muslim peoples of northern Caucasia, who were not invited and did not volunteer to join the empire. Michael Vorontsov, though he served in Caucasia under Tsitsianov

16 The Training Ground

for less than two years, received a dramatic introduction to Russian imperialism. He arrived in Caucasia at the beginning of September 1803, having travelled the two thousand miles from the capital bearing two powerful introductions. His father had written Tsitsianov recommending his son to him, although expressing "great trepidation" at allowing his only son to serve in Caucasia.9 His uncle the chancellor, Count Alexander Vorontsov, had written too, with an even stronger request for special consideration. Caucasia, the chancellor realized, was the only place a person could find active service just then, and he urged Tsitsianov to use the young Vorontsov in a general capacity, as a volunteer. He should, advised the powerful uncle, be put to the country's good use; he should gain useful experience, and not be rewarded unless he deserved it. But the chancellor also, on his and his brother's behalf, requested Lieutenant-General Tsitsianov to look after the young lieutenant, "the only one we have."10 Tsitsianov promised in reply to take all possible care of the scion of the Vorontsov house." Such backing from Russia's senior statesmen did Vorontsov no harm. Rewards and promotions came fast. For showing "coolness and ability" in taking some Persian outer defence works at the fortress of Ganja in the fall of 1803, he was awarded the Order of St Anne, third class.12 He was commended by his chief to the emperor for "bravery and manliness" in the fighting in January 1804 against the Lek (Lezgian) guerrillas in the eastern Georgian highlands and awarded the Order of St Vladimir, fourth class, "for distinguished service."13 In March of that year Tsitsianov entrusted him with full negotiating powers in a delicate diplomatic mission: King Solomon of Imereti (the largest state in western Georgia) was being pried away from his Turkish loyalties. Tsitsianov, in a secret note, instructed Vorontsov to "complete this first important step in the matter of gaining Solomon's subjection" by "giving Solomon and his nobles assurances of the tsar's generosity."14 Vorontsov passed the test with flying colours. He negotiated a treaty of mutual friendship with the hitherto reluctant west Georgian king. Solomon promised fidelity (at least for the time being) to the Russian emperor. Tsitsianov was pleased with the young officer's achievement: in a report to the emperor he called him "a young officer full of noble sentiments, unexampled courage, zeal for the service of Your Imperial Majesty, and a desire to distinguish himself."15 He wrote in a similar vein to Michael Vorontsov's important uncle.16 In May 1804 Vorontsov accompanied his commander Tsitsianov to the Armenian capital of Erevan in a campaign to break the Persian hold on the Caucasian area south of Georgia. The fighting lasted

17 Active Military Service

several weeks. For "extraordinary bravery and good management" Vorontsov was awarded the Order of St George, fourth class, and promoted captain directly, thereby skipping two ranks.17 Again, for a person with Vorontsov's connections this rapid rise through the lower ranks was not unusual. Tsitsianov wrote to Vorontsov's uncle warmly congratulating him on his nephew's excellent service and well-deserved promotion.18 Vorontsov wrote Tsitsianov to thank him profusely for his recommendation, telling him how much he had learned from his commander, of his great respect for the latter's military and diplomatic ability, and how little he had deserved Tsitsianov's praise.19 This outpouring of mutual admiration was merely the scaffolding on the complex political structure within which Michael Vorontsov had to learn to operate. He appears to have been an apt student. In December of 1804 and the following January he was involved in skirmishes against guerrillas in Ossetia,20 an area of the Caucasus mountains astride the strategic Daryal Pass, the only line of communication between Georgia and Russia. Unfortunately, he came down with a serious fever and had to return to St Petersburg to convalesce.21 It brought his tour of Caucasia to a close, but it was a profitable one, not only in terms of awards and promotions. He was given an introduction to the reality of Caucasia and the Caucasians, an experience he would value when he returned for his second stretch of Caucasian service some forty years later as the emperor's own viceroy. He learned the importance in service of establishing and maintaining the right connections. In May 1805, fully recovered, Vorontsov rejoined his regiment in St Petersburg. In September, now Major Vorontsov, he landed by boat with his unit in Swedish Pomerania and led his men as far as Hanover.22 The regiment returned to the capital in the spring of 1806. He requested and was granted a short leave to go to England, where he spent the summer with his father and sister Catherine, who were anxious to learn of his experiences as a freshman in imperial service.23 Among other things, Vorontsov told them of his disappointment at having lost his small, engraved silver compass when he fell off a cliff fighting Lek guerrillas in the eastern Caucasian highlands. It had been a present from his father. The compass would have an interesting history. It would accompany a Lek guerrilla chief on his raids over the next thirty years. When he was finally killed by loyal troops, it would be found about his neck. Thanks to the engraving, it would be returned to Vorontsov. In later years Vorontsov would tell and retell the tale.24 In the meantime, father and sister were thankful that he had

18 The Training Ground

survived his ordeal, and immensely proud of his rewards. On their side, all the talk was about Catherine's recent engagement to marry an old family friend, the Earl of Pembroke. Although her fiance was nearly their father's age, her brother warmly approved. He was pleased to know that his sister would become mistress of Wilton House, the Pembroke family estate, a famous Tudor mansion with its treasures of art, its gardens and spreading lawns and magnificent trees, its woods and ponds and beautiful Palladian bridge, set in the rolling green Wiltshire countryside near Salisbury. At the end of August 1806 he returned to St Petersburg by way of Sweden to find his regiment again preparing to march, this time to aid Prussia against Napoleon's forces.25 King Frederick William in was militarily unprepared to face the French army. Alexander i was one of his few allies! After the Prussian army was practically annihilated at the battles of Jena and Auerstadt, towards the end of October (old style), General Bennigsen took the Rus'sian army across the Prussian border, Captain Vorontsov at the head of one company. The weather was deteriorating, the ground getting muddy, the days short. Bennigsen deployed his troops near the village of Pultusk, thirty miles north of Warsaw. This area, north of the Vistula river, is an area of lakes, rivers, swamps, and forests, better suited for defensive tactics than grand attacks. By the middle of December, Napoleon had captured the strategic fortress of Thorn, which had been defended by the remnants of King William's army. Napoleon dispatched three infantry and one heavy cavalry division under General Lannes to Pultusk to clear out the Russians and establish his conquest of Prussia. General Bennigsen was waiting for him on the evening of 13 December (os) / 25 December (ns), having deployed his 45,000 men and 114 guns. The French attack began the next morning, in rain and mist. The defenders held their ground and fighting continued all day. At dusk, Bennigsen felt confident enough to order a general attack. The French were overcome and forced to retreat. The Russians were keen to pursue the enemy, but the commander ordered Vorontsov and his other officers not to pursue them in the rain and the gathering darkness. The next day, with reports of Napoleon's regrouping, Bennigsen considered his position no longer tenable and ordered a withdrawal. For Vorontsov's part in the battle he was promoted colonel.26 The battle of Pultusk thus enters the history books as inconclusive, no clear victory for either side, but therefore significant because it represented a stalemate in the Franco-Russian struggle. Some contemporaries, looking back, see Pultusk as the turning point in Napoleon's military career: the end of his string of clear and impres-

19 Active Military Service

sive successes, the first of a series of "incomplete triumphs."17 At the time, however, he was still very much a fearsome power, an ascendent conqueror of Western Europe and, potentially, of Eastern Europe and Russia too. Emperor Alexander's forces kept fighting as they inched backwards. In June 1807, in command of the first battalion of his regiment, Colonel Vorontsov took part in the battle of Friedland.28 The Russians were forced to retreat. This allowed Napoleon to occupy Koenigsberg and everything as far as the Njeman River. He then concluded a truce with the Russians and proposed at the end of June (os) / early July (ns) the famous meeting with the Russian emperor on a raft in the middle of the Njeman by the town of Tilsit. Napoleon's aim at Tilsit was to conclude peace with Russia to enable him to strengthen his European position and destroy England's power for good. He envisaged - at least until England was humbled - a division of the world between Russia and France, between Napoleon i and Alexander i. Thus on 25 June 1807, at eleven o'clock in the morning, the two costumed emperors were rowed out in great pomp to the moored raft with its splendid white tent.Z9 Theatrically they embraced and swore fraternal friendship, each one imagining he was deceiving the other. Negotiations continued over the next few days in the town of Tilsit, declared for the time being to be neutral. It was a good deal more comfortable than a raft.30 Not all Russians were happy about the agreement, although in retrospect it turned out to have been wise. Many, Vorontsov included, understandably still saw Napoleon and the French as the enemy. Now they were told there was to be friendship and peace. For what had the Russians fought and died? Vorontsov was in a particularly difficult position. He was the commander of the battalion from the Preobrazhenskii regiment assigned to ensure security in Tilsit during the negotiations. He discreetly became ill and turned over command to his lieutenant. He shared his father's francophobe anglophilia. Count Simon, following the news of the Tilsit treaty, was apparently moved to declare that those Russians who had composed and signed it should have been made to return home mounted on asses.31 Although the peace after Tilsit only lasted five years, young ambitious officers like Vorontsov had to look elsewhere if they wished to further their military careers. The most promising theatre was the Turkish territory around the Danubian delta, at the western end of the Black Sea. Since 1806 the Russians had been in a state of war against Turkey, though fighting had been desultory. The situation changed in 1807. Over the next five years the Russian officer corps won its spurs by fighting Turkish troops, capturing fortresses called

20 The Training Ground

Bazarjika, Varna, Shumla, Plevna, Rushchuk, Kalafat, in countries called Moldavia, Wallachia, Bessarabia, Volynia. Here, generals like Prince Michael Kutuzov and Prince Peter Bagration learned the capabilities of the Russian army. General Prince Tsitsianov would have been among them but for his assassination at Baku on the Caspian in 1806. At the height of his career, having brought the emperor's standard by diplomacy and by the sword to the bulk of the Caucasian people, in what his enemies called a typically arrogant gesture Tsitsianov had attempted to stage a dramatic capitulation of the old Persian fortress-city of Baku on the Caspian. He had not, unfortunately, controlled all the players and was assassinated, a fitting end to the short but spectacular career of one of the empire's most energetic builders.32 Young officers like Alexei Ermolov, Nicholas Raevsky, Ivan Paskevich, and Michael Vorontsov, future military heroes, became Russian generals on these Russo-Turkish fields of battle. The Danubian war, in retrospect, was the training ground for the Russian officer corps that faced Napoleon's forces in 1812 in a battle of the titans. Vorontsov was promoted major-general in June of 1810, after the storming of Bazarjika. The victory proved to be decisive in this stage of the Russo-Turkish struggle. He was awarded a gold sword inscribed "for bravery" and a special rescript of appreciation from the emperor himself. For his leadership he won various other awards: the Order of St Vladimir, third class; St Anne, first class; and St George, third class.33 A friend, Comte A.F. de Langeron, the governor-general of New Russia, asked him to pick him up a Turkish sword the next time he captured a fort.34 In 1812 Russia suddenly, desperately needed all the experience of her military sons. In June, Napoleon assembled his Grande Armee of half a million men, the greatest army of modern times, and finally invaded the Russian empire by crossing the Njeman. His right wing, under General Karl von Schwarzenberg, constituted a virtually separate Austrian army. At the moment of invasion Vorontsov was in command of a grenadiers division in the Second Army, stationed in Volynia under the command of General Peter Bagration. Orders came from the Russian commander-in-chief, General Barclay de Tolly, to withdraw to the northeast without engaging Schwarzenberg's army. The army drew up for battle before the strategic city of Smolensk, but once again Barclay de Tolly gave the order to withdraw without fighting. Napoleon attacked and devastated Smolensk on the fifth and sixth of August, but was denied his decisive battle. To him, a campaign turned on one critical battle. It is hard to say who was more frustrated after Smolensk: Napoleon, who had not until now

21 Active Military Service

contemplated pushing deep into the Russian heart and was not prepared for a winter campaign; or Bagration and his subordinates, including Major-General Vorontsov, who were as eager as Napoleon for a test of steel and a taste of blood. The emperor gave in to the pressure of those around him who wanted the Russian army to take a stand and fight the enemy. He replaced Barclay de Tolly with General Michael Kutuzov, a man distrusted by many for his dissolute behaviour and yet recognized as having one of Russia's most brilliant military minds.35 Ironically, as the famous 1812 campaign approached its climax, Kutuzov, in the face of overwhelming odds, was also forced to adopt tactics of withdrawal. Vorontsov's troops were involved in a skirmish with a large French force on 24 August36 but managed an orderly retreat.37 Kutuzov drew up the army for battle at last, near the village of Borodino, in gentle rolling land a mere seventy miles before Moscow, within reach of the empire's heart. General Vorontsov and his four thousand grenadiers were placed on the front line at a redoubt on the left wing. The fighting began at light of dawn on 26 August. It was bloody. Casualties mounted alarmingly on both sides. Vorontsov's men were pounded by two hundred guns and attacked by five or six French divisions at once. Some years later he wrote up his memories of the famous battle: "Finding myself personally in the centre, seeing that one of the redoubts on my left flank had been lost, I took a battalion from the second general division and ordered it to retake the redoubt. There I was wounded, and the battalion practically annihilated. It 'was about eight o'clock in the morning, and it was my fate to be the first in a long list of generals carried out of the ranks on that terrible day."38 Vorontsov's left thigh had stopped a bullet.39 He was carried off the field and his division fought on without him against awesome odds. After another hour, only three hundred men of the original four thousand remained, only three of the original eighteen staff officers. The division was declared annihilated and the remaining men were reassigned elsewhere. "We did not achieve great things," he wrote later, "but in our ranks there were neither deserters nor any taken prisoner. If on the following day they had been able to ask me where my division was, I would have answered like Count Fuentes at Rocroi, pointing with a finger to the place assigned to us: 'Right there.'"40 At nightfall Kutuzov finally called a retreat. Napoleon's forces were in no condition to pursue. Each side had suffered terrible wounds, the French somewhat the worse. Yet neither side could claim victory.

22 The Training Ground

Bitterness in his heart, denied his crucial master blow, drawn further into Russia than he ever intended to take his summer-clad army, Napoleon had to watch the Russian army withdraw in orderly fashion towards Moscow. With them went his best chance of success. Vorontsov was lucky to have escaped Borodino with his life. His wound dressed and bandaged, ensconced for the moment in his family's Moscow mansion, he hastened to write his sister in England to reassure her of his health and to express to her his impressions of the battle. He said that his wound was not serious, that he expected to "be a fortnight in Moscow, and then be able to join the army again." He wrote that "history has no example of such fighting or of such a battle. The loss on our side [is] supposed to be 25,000 at least, probably more ... The battle lasted till 10 at night. The French are supposed to have lost 40,000, some say 50,000. No Generals killed with us, but many wounded, among whom we grieve to hear is the Brave Prince Bagration severely."41 He was right about the unprecedented casualties and about the French army's having suffered more casualties than the Russian, although his figures were a little out. The Russians suffered 42,000 casualties (out of 112,000) and the French 58,000 (out of 130,000). Several Russian commanders were in fact killed in battle or died soon after as a result of their wounds, including the famous Bagration. Vorontsov, for his heroic efforts, was awarded the Order of St Anne, first class, with diamonds.42 Only in retrospect did Borodino become the climax of Napoleon's invasion of Russia. In the last days of August most people - including Napoleon himself - expected one more great battle to defend the ancient capital of Moscow and Russia's honour.43 It would be a fight to the finish, the battle to decide the whole campaign. But at the historic meeting with his general staff at headquarters at Fili, with the emperor's approval, Kutuzov decided to abandon Moscow to Napoleon. Vorontsov, along with the other wounded and most of the civilian population, was evacuated to a safer location. Napoleon entered the city in triumph on 2 September and awaited Alexander's surrender. Vorontsov kept in touch with events through correspondence with well-placed acquaintances. He heard from Robert Wilson,44 an English friend of his father's, currently the official British military observer attached to the Russian armies and in daily communication with the emperor at headquarters. "Moscow is lost," Wilson wrote Vorontsov on 31 August, five days after Borodino, "but the Emperor will not make peace whilst one soldier will carry a musket against Bonaparte

23 Active Military Service

... You may rely on the Emperor's resolution - I will be impaled alive if he does not remain firm."45 Vorontsov probably shared many Russians' doubts about the success of this new Russian policy. At the height of war between nations, discretion hardly seems preferable to valour. But Wilson proved to be correct. Napoleon's triumph was Pyrrhic. Alexander's resolve held. On 7 October, Napoleon, frustrated in his bid to bring Russia to her knees, unable to maintain his army so far from his bases, abandoned Moscow. He ordered the historic retreat that turned to horrible rout and the destruction not only of the Grande Armee but also, as it turned out, of his own imperial career. In a generous spirit, Vorontsov converted one of his family's estates in Vladimir province, well to'the east of Moscow, into a hospital for many of the war wounded. He footed the bill himself. He was beginning to recognize the public responsibilities that came with an enormous fortune. Characteristically, he visited the recuperating men and officers, cheering them up, giving them new clothes and even, for the men, some cash.46 His own wound healed rapidly and he prepared to re-enter service. Relatively young, having just turned thirty but well-experienced, he was promoted lieutenant-general and given command of a division of the allied armies in the final campaigns of 1812-14 against Napoleon's steadily shrinking forces. He was filled with a sense of historical moment. In Frankfurt he wrote to his brother-in-law, Pembroke, to convey some of his impressions of "this Glorious Campaign. It is an Epoch in history and there is in it something above the ton of modern History and more like the idea true or false that Historians have given us of ancient grandeur. The fact is that this we have seen and nobody can doubt of the great Events that have happened in the last 6 months of 1812 and which were so little expected or hoped for." He went on to say that he found his present assignment a rather "tedious commission, ... for there is nothing more ennuyant than blockading, except indeed being blockaded."47 Yet finally he saw action. On 18-19 October 1813, he participated in the capture of Leipzig from the French, for which he was awarded one of Russia's most coveted orders, the Order of St Alexander Nevsky.48 On 6 March (ns) 1814 he was in command of the troops that engaged the French army at Craonne, led by Napoleon himself. One historian has called the battle of Craonne "one of the bloodiest engagements of the war, fought on the allied side almost entirely by the Russian army."49 General Blucher ordered Vorontsov to defend

24 The Training Ground

the plateau at Craonne with his 16,300 infantry and 96 cannon, to keep the French engaged until General Winzingerode with 10,000 men could cross the Ailette River and attack Napoleon's rear. The plan nearly succeeded. The Russian troops fulfilled their part. There were skirmishes and some fighting on 6 March, but the main French attack came the following day under General Ney. Vorontsov positioned his troops so that they caught the French in a crossfire, the deadliest position in war. When the French drive faltered, he ordered a counter-attack. The French troops panicked and fled in confusion across the plateau into a ravine that led to the valley below. Had Winzingerode's force attacked the French rear at that moment, as planned, Napoleon's army might have been crushed completely, saving the allies another year of effort. Unfortunately, Winzingerode was delayed. Blucher, when he realized the strategy had failed, ordered Vorontsov to abandon Craonne with his Russian troops and join his main forces at Laon. His lieutenant-general tried to argue. As at Pultusk seven years earlier it seemed absurd to abandon the field after having successfully defended it with so much blood and effort. Five thousand Russians had lost their lives, and an equal number of French. But Napoleon was regrouping his forces, preparing to march to Laon. Vorontsov acceded to Blucher's new plan and supervised a calm and orderly retreat. Like Pultusk, Craonne is considered an indecisive battle, but at the least it proved the powerful defensive capacity of the Russian infantry.50 In recognition of his outstanding performance, Vorontsov was awarded the Order of St George, second class, with large cross.51 Blucher's strategy proved sound. Two days later, on 9-10 March, the allied English, Russian, and Northern armies, now combined after the treaties of Chaumont, dealt Napoleon a decisive defeat. By 30 March the allies had reached Paris. While other troops were storming Montmartre, the last refuge of Napoleon's marshals, Vorontsov's men were capturing the strategic (though not heavily defended) fort of La Villette with its twelve guns, for which he later received a special commendation from the emperor. And on the thirty-first he and his men, together with the other allied armies, marched down the Champs Elysees in triumph.52 Napoleon soon abdicated unconditionally and was banished to Elba. The victorious allies gathered in the famous congress at Vienna to restore peace and stability to Europe.53 During the congress Vorontsov was posted to German territory as commander of Twelfth Division, comprising the northern corps of the Russian forces under the general command of his colleague and friend Ermolov in Paris.54 Ermolov was only a few years older than Vorontsov. They had

25 Active Military Service

met during operations on the Danube during the Turkish war and became life-long friends and confidants. A courageous and talented military leader, Ermolov was also brash and outspoken, and from the emperor's point of view not always reliable - which is why he turned to Vorontsov rather than Ermolov for the post-war task ahead.

CHAPTER THREE

Commanding the Occupation Army

Vorontsov's troops were not involved in the main actions in the spring of 1815 when Napoleon reappeared in France and attempted his comeback, which finally terminated in the battle against Wellington's army at Waterloo on 18 June. They nevertheless joined in the subsequent celebrations. On 10 and u September, with the Austrian and Prussian emperors and the Duke of Wellington, Alexander arranged a victory march-past of the allied troops on the Plain of Vertus, eighty miles east of Paris. A great pageant to celebrate the end to years of struggle, a monument to Alexander's theatrical taste, it represented the height of Russian paradomania. Some 150,000 Russian soldiers took part with their 540 cannon, dazzling the onlookers with their precision marching and wheeling.1 The members of the Quadruple Alliance - England, Austria, Prussia, and Russia - agreed to contribute 150,000 soldiers, under the general command of Wellington, to occupy France for the next few years and keep the peace until France paid off its reparations debt of 700 million francs (100 million of which for Russia).2 Vorontsov was promoted adjutant-general3 and invited by the emperor to command the Russian contingent.4 It was an honour. While Vorontsov had proven himself a capable military leader, so had many others. In choosing him, the Russian emperor passed over other candidates in Vorontsov's cohort, such as his friends and comrades-in-arms Generals Ermolov and Paskevich. Ermolov was headstrong and temperamental, too moody and rough for polite European society. Paskevich was a sycophant, a useful and reliable servant at home but lacking the savoir faire, the aristocratic mien, the Westernization required of a commander of Russia's first peacetime occupation of a Western foreign country. Vorontsov was an obvious choice. Not only was he a member of the emperor's

27 Commanding the Occupation Army

social circle; he was reliable. With his sophistication and finesse he could be expected to rein in the contingent of young Russian officers, all of whom had heard tales of the magical West, most of whom had never lived there in spite of their "Western" education. Unfortunately, it was impossible to isolate completely these young and curious officer-aristocrats. Throughout the years of war and peacetime occupation, from 1812 to 1818, they found ample opportunity to drink the Western waters. Nearly all of them spoke French, the language of their class. Officers' duties in the army of occupation were relatively few. It allowed them ample time for leaves for the pilgrimage to Paris. Not all were affected; some found the Western cities unattractive, extravagant, inhospitable. But some were truly intoxicated. They were touched by the burdens and restrictions that appeared to weigh so much more heavily on ordinary Russians than on their Western counterparts. When they returned to Russia they met with kindred souls who had stayed at home and re-fired their imaginations and their resolve. The roots of discontent among the elite against the autocracy extended well back into the previous century. Resentments checked by the war were now rebuilding. Many, within and without the army, came to see it as an instrument of change. These postNapoleonic, patriotic, frustrated malcontents whispered back and forth their impatience at being saddled with an unchanging emperor in a world they had helped to change.5 Thus the shared Napoleonic experience became the fertilizer, if not the seed-bed itself, for the exotic garden of Russian social and intellectual thought that blossomed in the decades that followed. As the system became ever more restrictive, the malcontents became idealistic reformers. Some became impassioned revolutionaries, like the Decembrists with their pathetic and abortive rebellion in 1825, the first in a long line of revolutionists. Their primary indignation sprang from the shame of serfdom. Other enlightenment ideals erupted like lava from this rage.6 Because Vorontsov came from a liberal family and because he was known to decry the ignominy of Russian serfdom - he, one of Russia's biggest serf-owners!7 - Russia's angry young men for a time looked to him for encouragement.8 But none was forthcoming. Vorontsov was unshakably devoted to the emperor. He was liberal only in the sense that he was willing to try to change the system from within, legally. He was for emancipation, but gradual emancipation. Meantime, until it should come, he accepted his responsibility to look after his own serfs humanely and well. One is reminded of the attitude of a famous liberal contemporary

28 The Training Ground

of Vorontsov's, Thomas Jefferson, who at this same time (1814) wrote about his black slaves as follows: "My opinion has ever been that, until more can be done for them, we should endeavour, with those whom fortune has thrown on our hands, to feed and clothe them well, protect them from ill usage, require such reasonable labour only as is performed voluntarily by freemen, and be led by no repugnancies to abdicate them and our duties to them."9 As one observer later in the century put it, Vorontsov was "a liberal for his times, but not a democrat."10 Perhaps a better description would be "enlightened conservative." Though Vorontsov's name is linked with the Decembrist movement, it is apparent from both the Decembrists' and his own writings that he never encouraged their secretiveness - indeed, he discouraged it - much less their rebelliousness, despite his dislike for serfdom." Was he responsible for allowing his officers to pick up revolutionary ideas? He personally had no use for revolutions or French politics. Frenchmen, to his mind, were unsuited for representative government; what they needed, he wrote his friend Count Alexander Langeron, a Frenchman himself in the emperor's service and the newly appointed governorgeneral of New Russia, was a Peter the Great.12 The latter replied from Odessa with a warning to "mind that our comrades do not become Jacobins, nor White Jacobins either, but that they remain good Russians. That would be much the best."13 But there was little that Vorontsov could do about it, beyond exhorting his officers to show loyalty to the emperor in executing their duties. Ironically, it was Vorontsov's own example as a just, humane, enlightened, though unshakably loyal military commander that seems to have had a greater effect on his officers and men and their view of the Russian system than their experience of actually living in the liberal West. Vorontsov's essential liberalism ill prepared them for the rude shock they received when they returned home. One historian has suggested that a possible reason for the large number of protests by unhappy military settlers in the south of Russia in the 18205 is that many of them had served under Vorontsov in France.14 It was not Western liberalism but the responsibility for administering the occupation army that Vorontsov found exciting. The thirty-five thousand Russian soldiers were quartered outside a score of small villages - Attigny, Givet, Rocroi, and others - nestled in the green and gently rolling farming country of northern France, along the border with the newly created United Netherlands.15 Vorontsov established his headquarters in the ancient citadel of Maubeuge on the old Roman road, thirty-five miles from the recent field of carnage at Waterloo.

29 Commanding the Occupation Army He waded without hesitation into the administrative swamp confronting him. He had to oversee the organization of the thousand and one details necessary to keep his men fed and fit. Thanks to the long-standing tradition of the soldier's artel', or co-operative, the Russian army was used to being more or less self-sufficient.16 Unfortunately, being posted in a foreign territory limited the usefulness of that tradition. Thus Vorontsov had to keep up his soldiers' morale and preserve discipline in what were highly unusual surroundings for the average Russian soldier: a peasant in uniform.17 The officers might be given leave to go to Paris (or Brussels or Amsterdam) at regular intervals; not so the soldiers. They were lucky to secure visits to the local villages. Friction between them and the local inhabitants occurred from time to time and it was the commander's job to keep the peace - altogether a formidable challenge for the thirty-three-year-old Vorontsov, a vigorous test of his administrative and diplomatic abilities. He approached the task with some trepidation. He rapidly gained confidence, however, as he came to realize that his natural talents lay precisely in this area: in mediating conflicts between aggrieved parties, in finding a workable compromise between the most convenient and the most beneficial. He soon came to enjoy sorting out the day-to-day problems of running the affairs of this city-sized community. He worried that his budget was too low. Indeed, he had less to spend per soldier than the commanders of the other occupation armies. The Russian army had always been expected to make do, to feed itself off the land, to make its own clothes. Indeed, the "regimental economy" was traditionally remarkably self-sufficient. Feeding off the French land, however, posed problems. Vorontsov managed to secure surplus boots and overcoats from the British and have extra supplies sent from Russia through irregular channels.18 At one point he procured lye for making soap, salt, and particularly the rye flour for brewing the kvas that his men were so fond of by going directly to Wellington.19 There was always some new foul-up that needed sorting out. In February 1818, for example, he was informed that the officers' and men's pay was not arriving from Russia. He had to set up a temporary system of ration tickets and put up some of his own money for travel monies until the proper funds were transferred.*0 Nor were his duties limited to his army. In December 1816, for example, he reported that, acting on the emperor's instructions, Major-General Count Sievers had purchased a number of designs, models, and machines from the Conservatory of Arts and Crafts in

30 The Training Ground Paris for the engineering school in St Petersburg. The bill, including packing and shipping, came to 7,800 francs, which Vorontsov paid from his contingency fund but for which he requested recompense from the ministry of education.11 The following year he had to settle a delicate dispute with a Dutch nobleman, Count van der Gelder. After the recapture of the count's castle from the French in 1813, a Russian general, presumably as his spoils of war, had made off with two old cannon that had long stood guard by the castle keep. Although they no longer worked, they were of great sentimental value to van der Gelder, having been presented to his grandfather for heroism in a long-ago battle. The count, unable to obtain restitution from the general and deeply upset, had written to the emperor demanding justice. Vorontsov was ordered to investigate and settle the matter, either by restoring the count's cannon or, if necessary, finding replacements. Vorontsov managed, finally, to restore the originals.22 His civilian dealings even reached the level of international diplomacy on occasion. Although the occupying powers had agreed that in disputes with French civilians the offenders would be judged by their own courts according to their own laws, Vorontsov believed that the French courts were prejudiced against Russians. He was disturbed by an incident in which a cossack was killed by a French customs official. Although there was no evidence of provocation, the French tribunal acquitted the official. Vorontsov maintained that it would not have done so had the victim been a French citizen. Wellington was away in London at the time, so Vorontsov had to act on his own. He informed the French officials that if his demands for justice by the French courts in the cossack affair were not met, henceforth any Frenchman apprehended by the Russians for an offence against a Russian would be tried and punished according to Russian law, even if it meant the firing squad.23 The effect was immediate. Most Europeans had the general impression that Russians believed in ferocious punishments.24 The case was reopened and the evidence re-examined, to Vorontsov's satisfaction. Vorontsov remained unconvinced that he had made his point, however. A short time later a Russian artillery man was killed by some Frenchmen in a brawl near the border. Vorontsov sent two platoons to bring in the customs officers on duty at the time, who had, it appeared, stood nearby enjoying the spectacle instead of breaking it up and preventing the killing. Vorontsov placed them under arrest in the Russian compound. The unlucky Frenchmen, terrified but unharmed, were released after thirty-six hours with a warning that if it happened again they would be considered acces-

31 Commanding the Occupation Army series to the crime and tried and punished for it, Russian style. After that he had no more trouble with the French authorities. On the contrary, he was pleased to find them bending over backwards to be impartial.15 Unafraid to use the stick, he also knew the value of the carrot. He recommended to the emperor various helpful French officials for the awards list; Alexander was pleased to make the awards and the officials themselves even more pleased to receive them. Vorontsov saw that damages were paid for promptly and generously, and he received Wellington's personal commendation for the troops' exemplary behaviour.16 Thus, with Vorontsov's diplomatic guidance, the Russians made a favourable impression on the French. The troops' behaviour appeared to have improved mightily, though of course Europe was no longer in the grip of war. Earlier, marching westward through central Europe in pursuit of Napoleon, they had been reported to have reduced many villages to beggary.27 As a measure of how things had changed, Comte de Moustier, to take an example, wrote in August 1817 to ask if Vorontsov would do him the honour of enlisting his son, Antoine, in his corps while it was stationed in France. "You have," he wrote, "my deepest respect for what you have done for my country."28 Others of less noble bearing also entered Vorontsov's army. When the main Russian army had returned to Russia in 1815, 130 convicted deserters were left behind, assigned to serve in Vorontsov's corps under his supervision. He was pleased, nevertheless, and perhaps a little surprised, that "only a handful" of these deserted -while serving under him.29 It testified, at least in part, to high morale among the troops. Vorontsov worked hard to keep up morale. He understood that while an army may march on its stomach, it fights with its heart. He made a point of eating with his officers, of knowing their names, of observing them personally both on duty and off, of learning their particular abilities and character traits. As commander, he was never afraid to show his emotions to his men, his officers, his NCOS, down to the lowest-ranking private. During active duty, in the review before a battle, he would embrace them, uttering words of encouragement. Afterwards, according to survivors' accounts, he would warmly press their hands, tears in his eyes, transmitting gratitude and astonishment that human beings could show such loyalty and bravery and courage.30 Melodramatic, perhaps, but it worked. The devotion of his officers and men was legion. He was meticulous in following up his personal recognition of

32 The Training Ground

outstanding behaviour with recommendations to the emperor for awards and promotions and honours. In December 1816 he finally received a consignment of seventy-six gold medals from the inspectorate department of His Imperial Majesty's headquarters, engraved, with ribbons, for the exceptional bravery and leadership of the best of his officers and soldiers during the 1812-15 campaigns. These were awarded at a special formal ceremony before all the troops and invited dignitaries.31 Normal military procedure, publishing lists of awards and promotions: yet Vorontsov somehow managed to do it with dramatic effect. He made it clear in public ceremonies that he personally had made each of these recommendations to the emperor, and the emperor thankfully had concurred with each one.32 When he was preparing his corps to return home, he conveyed publicly to all the men at a special gathering the personal gratitude of their supreme commander in France, the Duke of Wellington, for their excellent service. He reported that the duke had informed him that it had been a most valuable three years for him personally to see how well the Russians had comported themselves.33 Soldiers, to comport themselves well, probably require a sense that their superiors are concerned for their well-being. Anyone familiar with the traditional Russian military situation might be tempted to laugh at the notion that officers were genuinely concerned for their soldiers' well-being.34 Yet Vorontsov was hardly traditional, and circumstances for improvement were favourable. He took pains to show his own dedication to their well-being and badgered his officers to do likewise.35 Furthermore, he believed that for most of the soldiers, the crash and smoke of their recent great battles having only just died away, isolated in their special compound surrounded by rustic villages nestled among green hills in this foreign land, life had to be simply boring. A handful of officers might later reminisce about the intellectual stimulation, but not the thousands of men. How to raise morale and ensure proper comportment? As he reported to the emperor, posting a Russian corps for so long, so far from home, so "removed from domestic communications and habits," was full of difficulties.36 Vorontsov decided that his men had to be encouraged to communicate with their family and friends at home. No regular system of mail delivery existed within the Russian armed forces. "The small number of individual letters that are sent to the army post offices in the field," observed Vorontsov, "particularly those sent to the lower ranks, almost invariably get lost."37 What Vorontsov proposed was highly unusual. In spite of the breaths of change that had wafted through the military structure in

33 Commanding the Occupation Army the early Alexandrine years, still the long-standing notion of permanent separation from home remained. Not long before a soldier in the Russian ranks had been positively forbidden to maintain contact with family and friends in his home village. He was in service for life; his regiment was his home.38 Like a monk the conscript was one of the living dead, but becoming a monk was usually a voluntary act. Traditions die hard, but these were modern times and Vorontsov was keen to try to change things. In 1793 the term of service had been reduced from life to twenty-five years. Although in practice it amounted to much the same thing, still the change represented a break in the tradition. Proposals for further reduction of the term were in the air, although none would actually materialize until the reform period of Alexander n. Vorontsov negotiated at length with the war ministry and eventually won permission to proceed with his plans. He soon had a postal system in operation for his division and encouraged his men to write home. He kept close track of the operations and, by the end of his corps' tour in France, boasted that his soldiers had sent 20,830 letters back to the empire. It was, in Vorontsov's estimation, one of the major reasons the soldiers behaved themselves so commendably.39 One problem's solution often gives rise to another problem. Such was the case with the new postal system. Many soldiers could not read or write. Even many of the NCOS were illiterate. The military system had no facilities, indeed had made no allowance, for schooling its men. To Vorontsov's way of thinking this was a practical defect in a modern army and called for remedial measures. Unhesitatingly, without waiting for instructions or approval from the ministry, he plunged into elementary education. He collected volunteer instructors from among the chaplains and officers, ordered basic materials, and assigned classrooms in his Maubeuge fortress. The number of men signing up for courses exceeded his resources, so he resorted to the new Lancastrian educational system. This "mutual instruction" system, named after the English Quaker educator Joseph Lancaster and widely employed in England, used the more advanced pupils in a class as monitors to teach the others and so allowed one instructor to teach effectively very large classes.40 It was, furthermore, cheap, and Vorontsov had only a small contingency fund to draw upon for the program. He secured the services of one Mr Henry, recently a resident of Odessa, an educator said to be familiar with the system, to establish four separate schools for his corps. As he reported with some pride to the emperor: This method of instruction in the above-mentioned four schools, with the

34 The Training Ground designated improvements, very rapidly reached a significant number of the lower ranks, as You may be pleased to note from the details attached herewith, and proved most beneficial in bringing about an increase in the literacy of the members of the lower ranks in a very short time. I flatter myself with the hope that the benefit which proceeds from this will be long felt among those forces where [schools] are not at present to be found. Meanwhile, I have taken steps, about which I am today corresponding in detail to Your Imperial Majesty's Chief of General Staff, Prince Volkhonsky, to prepare the means by which all those institutions in the army or generally in Russia may be provided with everything necessary to establish similar schools in whatever quantity required.41

Vorontsov was ahead of the times. His arguments for the wider application of his educational efforts fell on deaf ears. Army schools were not unheard of. By 1800 several schools had been set up to teach reading and writing to soldiers' sons. Yet it would take more than half a century before schools for soldiers were officially established in the imperial Russian army - not until the era of the "great reforms" of the emperor's just-born nephew and namesake, the future Alexander n. By the end of Alexander n's reign, many thousands of such youngsters under fifteen would be educated by the army, and it would be recognized that the education helped their prospects of advancement at least to the level of non-commissioned officer. Even then, the bulk of the army remained illiterate.42 The impulse behind those reforms of the i86os would derive from the sense of national crisis that followed defeat in the Crimean war. Alexander i and his top advisers, after the victory over Napoleon, had no such sense.43 Barely introduced to the mysteries of Russian imperial government and administration, Vorontsov had already received two important lessons. On the one hand, a person with sufficient prestige and perseverance could change and improve the system from within, the fundamental requirement of the sort of progressive conservatism that the Whig statesman Edmund Burke first propounded in England when Vorontsov was growing up there. On the other, such changes would be greatly restricted in their application, since the rest of the bureaucracy invariably did not see them as improvements. Indeed, it opposed change as a matter of principle, and its opposition could be heroic. As a neophyte administrator Vorontsov had much to learn. Fortunately for him, administering the affairs of the occupation army constituted an ideal introduction to the Russian imperial administration. For example, a fundamental problem facing most civilian imperial administrators was the discipline of subordinates. Yet soldiers,

35 Commanding the Occupation Army even in peacetime, were not clerks and civil servants. Retribution for infractions was swifter and more severe in the military than in the civil service: caning or running the gauntlet were both fierce and common. But disciplining soldiers in peacetime in an occupied foreign country was different from doing so in the field, or even in peacetime at home. Vorontsov took pains, as we have seen, to keep his men peacefully occupied. The particular surroundings made it vital that he do so. As he explained candidly in a report to the emperor at the end of his service abroad, The troops making up this corps have, for the most part, been in military service since 1805, so that their stay of three years in one place in peacetime, in an abundant and pleasant country and with a sufficient upkeep, has necessarily acted very strongly on many of them, even removing their desire to leave such a situation, all the more pleasant to them because it has immediately followed such a busy and difficult life. [Furthermore,] with the troops living in a land such as France, where domestic institutions and habits are so at variance with ours, and serving together as one army with soldiers from England, Prussia, Austria, and other powers, standing with them and by them, one is bound to expect a loss of discipline and subordination.44 He therefore isolated the men as much as possible from the natives. Rather than billet soldiers in private houses, he took over entire houses as barracks. When on manoeuvres with troops of the other occupation armies, the Russian soldiers were made to pitch their camp well away from the others. Leaving camp without a pass was forbidden. Only an exceptional pass would allow a soldier to cross the border from France into the United Netherlands.45 We begin to see the limits to Vorontsov's "liberalism." The men did break the rules from time to time. How to punish infractions is a test of the mettle of any official. Vorontsov turned out to have firm and definite ideas, some of which he undoubtedly inherited from his liberal-minded father.46 Though many foreigners as well as Russians believed that Russian punishments were too brutal, Vorontsov was convinced that the problem was one of just and consistent application of the law rather than the severity of the punishments allowed under it. He was prepared to mete out the strictest punishment the law would allow, including corporal punishment,47 to any in his command who were proven guilty of serious crimes - murder, robbery, burglary, insubordination. But for those found guilty of lesser or unpremeditated crimes, punishments were mitigated. As for those found not guilty, "they are in no way ever

36 The Training Ground

punished." As a result of this policy, claimed Vorontsov, robbery, for example, practically disappeared over the course of the occupation.48 Indeed, a perusal of the records for 1818 reveals only a score of courts martial for the corps of thirty thousand men for the entire year.49 Soldiers, said Vorontsov, were impressed by a system that combined swift but just punishment with reward for good behaviour. "A soldier must know," he explained, "that for good conduct in service, honesty, diligence, and a zeal to learn, he will be noticed and appreciated by his superiors." He maintained that under his system, over the course of the years of occupation, the conduct and discipline in the Russian corps became as good as or better than that in any of the other occupation forces. Furthermore, having had a chance to see the discipline among the troops of other nations, Russian soldiers had come to realize that the latters' service was "in no way less onerous than ours. Indeed, by way of example, I can state categorically that, especially in the English corps, corporal punishments have been far more frequent than with us."50 The improved discipline resulted in spite of the fact (wrote Vorontsov, but he was really arguing that it was because of it) that he had abolished the traditionally harsh methods of investigation and interrogation. Such methods, he declared, were "vile and barbaric," and any officer in his command found guilty of them would be court-martialled.51 He did not shrink from expressing his opinion on the matter to the emperor: In order to lessen the system's defects as well as preserve the spirit and hope of the best soldiers, I have always maintained that although severe and not weak punishment is necessary for the important offences, it must go hand in hand with effective measures to soften those inclinations that are inhuman and based on indiscriminate caprice, such indeed as those we yet find employed in our army for discovering the guilty. Very often this affects innocent and honest soldiers. This torture is quite opposed to God's laws and the supreme will of Your Imperial Majesty and often leads such persons to despair, and from that to drink and to those very crimes of which they were earlier unjustly accused.52

Vorontsov, unlike several of the emperor's closest military advisers, believed that abolishing such brutal behaviour would vastly improve discipline. He also recognized the powerful role that publicity could play in this effort. We have seen how he made a point of publicizing awards, promotions, and other honours. He did the same with punishments.53 In an order to the corps on 6 February 1818, "to be

37 Commanding the Occupation Army read aloud in every company and every squadron in the presence of all ranks," he related that four soldiers from First Musketeers company would be caned in front of the company for sneaking out at night from the town of Liessies, crossing the border illegally, committing thefts, and bringing the stolen goods back into the armory. The guilty soldiers, who had admitted their crime, would be punished. The stolen goods had been thrown into the river though why they were not returned to their rightful owners is not made clear.54 On another occasion, a month after the preceding incident, Vorontsov similarly informed the entire corps that the cossack Kurnosov would be made to run the gauntlet four times for attempting to smuggle contraband goods into camp, and that a Galician army officer's servant who had been found guilty of attempting to bribe the wayward cossack would serve time in the cell-block.55 A short time later the soldiers heard that their commander had received complaints from the inhabitants that they had been verbally abused by Russian sentries. He said that there would be no punishment this time but reminded everyone that although sentries were allowed to resist violence, even resorting to arms if necessary, they had to beware of causing any trouble, for which they would be strictly punished in future.56 Six days later he again had every soldier informed about the punishment meted out to the cossack who had been found guilty of raping a woman: the gauntlet, demotion, and transfer to another brigade.57 Publicizing punishments undoubtedly had an effect on the soldiers, but most of Vorontsov's efforts to instil discipline were directed at his officers. He reminded them repeatedly that they had duties, not just privileges, and that one of their most important duties was to set a good example for subordinates. The corps's minute books provide ample evidence. In one case, second lieutenant Zanfirov was put in a prison cell in the Maubeuge fortress for "having been found guilty of dishonest behaviour unbefitting an officer." The miscreant had not only embezzled some of the officers' funds but, upon questioning, had lied about it.58 In another instance Vorontsov issued an order to his officers, explaining at length how it was up to them to control their soldiers among the civilians. He mentioned complaints that he had received from residents of the village of Savigny about the behaviour of some Russian soldiers. He made it clear that it was the soldiers' officers who had been at fault for not following up and rectifying those complaints immediately instead of allowing the charges to remain unanswered and the behaviour to continue.59 In the incident involving the thieving musketeers mentioned above, not only were they punished but their commanding

38 The Training Ground officer was given a severe reprimand for not having prevented it.60 Similarly, when the corps was making ready to leave France, he called an officer of the Tver dragoons on to the carpet for the embarrassing behaviour of one of his soldiers. The soldier apparently had broken into a local tavern, drunk up some forty francs worth of wine, and left without paying. It had earned a complaint from the French government before Vorontsov could make amends. "Such behaviour cannot be allowed," he warned. "Officers must keep order precisely as it has been written down in the statutes."61 Vorontsov had long believed that the behaviour of the officers was the key to an efficient army. Many years earlier, when still a youth of seventeen living with his father in England, he had written a letter to his uncle Alexander expressing his conviction that the recent failures of the Russian troops in Holland "can only be attributed to the officers, for the Russian soldier has always been distinguished for his courage and his discipline."61 Now that he had attained stature and rank within the imperial army, he was in a position to do something about it. In the spring of 1815 we find him instructing his officers in the absolute necessity of setting an example to their soldiers. Officers, he proclaimed, might punish severely soldiers who disobeyed orders, but only if they themselves were fulfilling their duty before the enemy. They had to set an example of "obedience, perseverance, cheerfulness, and fearlessness ...; take a truly brave officer and his subordinates too will be heroes." Such bravery was demanded only in times of stress, not in good times, so officers had to train themselves to preserve a "heroic spirit." Any officer who did not feel certain that in time of need he would fulfil his heroic duty "should immediately retire from service and the society of officers of the Twelfth Division."63 He was not only concerned to make Russian officers arbiters of justice and courageous leaders. He also insisted that they be humane. He had seen and deplored the brutal treatment of soldiers by Russian officers. He understood the reason: officers tended to consider themselves aristocrats and look down upon their soldiers as peasants or even serfs. Vorontsov had a different philosophy. In order for an army to operate effectively, officers and men had to act as one. The men would be obedient if they respected their officers. The officers had to win that respect, not only by setting an example of courageous leadership but also by demonstrating a sense of justice and a proper concern for their men's well-being. In April 1815, for example, while stationed in northern Germany shortly after Napoleon's reappearance, Vorontsov issued a long and detailed set

39 Commanding the Occupation Army of guidelines for his officers to follow when dealing with their subordinates.64 It was more effective, he said, to appeal to a man's ambition than to his fear; better for an officer to be a father and a friend to his subordinates than a tyrant, "as often, to our shame, used to prevail, and still even now can be found in certain other regiments." He who put these rules into practice, he concluded, would "quickly discover how much his service will benefit thereby as well as his enjoyment of it. The officer who learns to show humility when leading humble people will also learn that there is nothing more flattering and agreeable than leading people who are motivated by noble sentiments. I shall honour all such officers as genuine assistants, comrades, and friends, and I shall eagerly seek every possible opportunity to recommend them for advancements and awards."65 Finally, in December 1818, in his summary report to the emperor about the three years of occupation, he reiterated the need for more humane treatment of soldiers by their officers: "From the very accession of Your Imperial Majesty to the throne, there were issued to inspectors and other authorities of the armies rules of mildness and humanity in dealing with the lower ranks, which the late Field Marshal Prince Barclay de Tolly, under the guidance of Your Imperial Majesty, strongly promoted." He informed the emperor that he, Vorontsov, had established this principle throughout his corps by giving his officers "three main messages: i) to be humane; 2) to distinguish clearly between habitual and first-time or unintentional offenders; and 3) to enter all corporal punishments immediately in log books issued for that specific purpose." He believed that his measures to encourage honesty and to discourage unjust and inhumane treatment by officers accounted for the excellent performance of the army entrusted to him.66 Emperor Alexander might have said at some point that officers should treat their men humanely. He expressed many lofty views over the course of his rule. In practical day-to-day affairs, however, he was pedestrian and inconsistent. Now that peace had descended on Europe after years of actual fighting, the martial spirit of Russian imperial leaders, far from disappearing, was redirected to the parade ground. Perhaps the spectacle of row upon row of red, white, and gold soldiers, goose-stepping in perfect unison, recaptured for Alexander and his brothers, Grand Dukes Constantine, Nicholas, and Michael, and his chief military adviser (indeed, unofficial prime minister), General Count Alexei Arakcheev, the aura of the great battles against Napoleon and kept alive for them the sense of Russia's

40 The Training Ground

greatness. A powerful drug, the parades never failed to thrill. As with drug addiction, attendant problems that could only be resolved by breaking the habit were brushed aside. Alexander closed his mind to the mindlessness and brutality that, given the Russian social structure, were required if his officers were to fashion the soldiers into a parading army in perfect form. Vorontsov chose an awkward time to lecture the emperor on the benefits of humane treatment. His promising career was nearly cut short over it following the appearance in Maubeuge of Grand Duke Michael on 19 May 1818. The grand duke was on a tour of Western Europe, with permission from his emperor-brother to review the Russian troops in France. Vorontsov was warned of the royal visit. His colleague and friend General Ivan Paskevich was appointed to accompany the grand duke and had written to Vorontsov to advise him to prepare for the review. "He knows his rules, military orders, procedures, etc., extremely well," warned Paskevich. He was afraid that Vorontsov "might have some trouble" but assured his friend that he would do everything possible at his end to make sure that things went well.67 Paskevich's fears were well founded. Michael was not impressed at the review. He found Vorontsov "lax in military training" and planned to report it to the emperor. Paskevich, true to his friend, intervened. He explained to the grand duke that a bad report to the emperor would damage Vorontsov's reputation and that the imperial army could not afford that. It needed him, "one of our best and most distinguished generals," he argued. Michael was persuaded and sent home a neutral report. Paskevich later reported the incident to his friend. "You are lax in military training," he admonished gently, "but all honest people respect you. To be loved by your subordinates is the best thing in the world - and you have found that."68 Paskevich was envious. He wished his subordinates would show him greater respect and admiration. But the two leaders had different styles. It was Vorontsov's habit, for example, to eat regularly with his officers, "two or three hundred at his table." He also made it his business to learn his officers' names and faces, to observe them carefully both on and off duty, to discern their personalities and capabilities.69 Paskevich, by contrast, did not mix well with others, no doubt from a sense of insecurity. He appeared stiff and vain and rubbed most people the wrong way. He was also reluctant to express his opinions to his superiors for fear of compromising his career. In 1816, in a letter to Vorontsov dated 4 April, he wrote that he had

41 Commanding the Occupation Army

seen and admired Vorontsov's guidelines for a more humane treatment of the lower ranks70 and would have liked to issue the same for his own corps but was afraid that the senior commander (OstermannTolstoi) would only tear them up. He preferred to wait and try to convince his commander in person of "the requirements of philanthropy."71 We should not be too hard on Paskevich. He possessed nowhere near Vorontsov's social standing and consequently could not have acted with the same self-confidence. He had, after all, stood up for Vorontsov before a grand duke, for which Vorontsov was much in his debt. The chill of displeasure about Vorontsov's evident refusal to apply spit and polish was strong enough to reach his father in London, who promptly advised his son to be much more careful to please the powers that be.72 Not that Vorontsov refused to make the effort to have his soldiers perform well on parade. From time to time he did issue orders to the officers and men of the occupation army to keep themselves spruced up. On 10 January 1818, for example, we find him exhorting soldiers individually to spend time studying "proper carriage and the correct method of presenting arms, as per the orders received from imperial headquarters and herewith distributed." But his heart was not in it. The very same directive included the caveat that "those of the lower ranks at present in quarantine recuperating from the eye disease should do no more than the very lightest studying according to the doctors' advice."73 Military discipline is either "harsh" (bad) or "firm" (good) depending on your point of view. General Alexander Suvorov, one of Russia's greatest military leaders, is said to have owed his enormous popularity not only to his informal manner, his studied eccentricity, and his ability to pepper his speech with folk idioms but to his exercise of a firm authoritarian paternalism, the ruling principle of Russian social organization. Gregorii Potemkin, by contrast, another of Catherine's great leaders, is said to have been more humane but much less popular because he did not exercise enough discipline.74 While military historians have not judged Vorontsov a particularly notable strategist, there is no doubting his popularity among all his military subordinates, from the officers down to the ordinary soldiers. He seems instinctively to have combined humanity and discipline in just the right balance. Vorontsov would never have made a martinet. His philosophy turned him too much in other directions. Let us pursue, for a moment, his concern for the health of his men. In the Vorontsov archive we find the following letter to him from a French doctor

42 The Training Ground of his acquaintance in the Russian service in St Petersburg, responding to an earlier letter: "All your observations are correct and lead me to believe that you have read the Institutions of Xenophon to Cyrus, who demonstrates that [learning] the means of guaranteeing the health of an army is an essential part of the education of anyone who is destined to command an army. What a difference, if one compares it with our modern military education, with all this business of manoeuvres, turning, presenting arms, backward marching, etc., which is so much the fashion of these days."75 The doctor agreed with Vorontsov "that the health of one's troops depends on good nutrition, on clothes, on cleanliness, on contentment, and on discipline without harassment." If we have regard for these, he wrote, no climate can be bad for an army; no doctors or medicines will be necessary. Caesar, he pointed out, never complained of the climate wherever he went because he knew the importance of preserving his soldiers' health. "Caesar's and Xenophon's system have been neglected," continued the good doctor to his like-minded friend, "and look today! Ten times as many soldiers in today's armies die from sickness as from arms, and this proportion is ten times higher in [the Russian] army than in any other."76 The traditional Russian army was notorious, not only for its poor medical facilities, inadequate food, insufficient clothing, and unhealthy barracks but for everything else, from its traumatic recruitment system to its inhuman punishments.77 Reforms had been proposed since Catherine's time, but piecemeal, ineffectual against the thick hide of tradition. Vorontsov, by a combination of upbringing and temperament, belonged to a different school from most of his colleagues. His command of the Russian occupation army could not have suited him better, far removed from the system of harsh discipline now emerging back in Russia, often referred to as the arakcheevshchina after the emperor's widely hated and much maligned chief adviser, General Arakcheev.78 Within limits, Vorontsov was allowed to run his corps as he has wished. His leniency and humanity even became part of the legend and mythology of the reformist left. The Decembrist D.I. Zavalishin, for example, writing his memoirs in the 18705, "remembered" that he and his friends admired Vorontsov's exceptional humanity in an otherwise inhumane regime; he also "remembered" that Vorontsov abolished corporal punishment,79 although, as we have seen from our examination of what Vorontsov actually wrote, he did no such thing. The historical fact is that the would-be reformers shared certain impressions, not that those impressions were based on historical facts. Leniency in the commander of his French forces was tolerable to the emperor for a number of reasons. Alexander i had established

43 Commanding the Occupation Army a good record of being liberal at a distance from home. In 1809 at Borga/Porvoo he granted the Finns autonomous parliamentary rule. In 1815 at Vienna he granted the Poles a constitutional monarchy. And he had, correctly, trusted Vorontsov to use his freedom wisely in liberal but faraway France. Besides, Vorontsov had been the ideal diplomat and representative of the Russian emperor to the West Europeans. But Vorontsov's tour was coming to an end. The Due de Richelieu, under the Bourbon restoration, had paid off the reparations debt levied on France by the allies. Occupation troops were no longer needed. On 14 October 1818 Vorontsov ordered all his officers to prepare for departure from France and a return march to Russia. Order books were to be brought up to date and presented for inspection. On his recommendation, the emperor had allowed him to distribute to each of his soldiers in recognition of good service a rouble, a pound of meat, and a glass of wine.80 He was less happy at having to pass on another directive from the emperor's headquarters: he had to warn all members of the corps against trying to smuggle things back into the empire. He knew that many soldiers would want to take things home for friends or for sale, so he announced that "customs inspection will be strict." Each person would be allowed to take into Russia only personal belongings for his own reasonable use, and they would be registered. All other items would be confiscated.81 No doubt it was felt that the less visible the demonstration of the differences between conditions abroad and conditions at home, the better. At least he was unstinting in his praise for the job his men had done. Vorontsov announced that the emperor had bestowed upon the corps his imperial esteem for "the good conduct which it has preserved, and the harmony with the inhabitants which it has maintained, and the fine comport and correct dress of the lower ranks." Any lingering sense of imperial displeasure at Vorontsov's "laxity" in training his troops appeared to be gone. Vorontsov extended his own thanks to his men: "Such Imperial recognition having been shown to the corps entrusted to me, it is my pleasant duty to extend my earnest thanks to the honourable division, brigade, regimental, and special commanders for the unremitting zeal with which they have managed to bring the sections entrusted to them to that condition which has earned the esteem of our Imperial Sovereign."82 17 October was the day set for departure. Vorontsov gave the officers some last-minute advice: May I remind the heads of all sections of their particular duty to exhort the soldiers to be polite to the inhabitants, to show respect to their

44 The Training Ground authorities, to conduct themselves in a friendly manner with foreign troops; and the various army officials to act everywhere as honourably as is expected of the officers. In a word, I hope that the corps of soldiers entrusted to me for this march will preserve that same fine conduct that during the past three years of our quartering in France earned us the esteem of our Sovereign Emperor and brought us the flattering compliments of the local government and the gratitude of the inhabitants.83 The army returned without incident. As it was about to cross the border, Vorontsov issued his last order: "Congratulating the corps entrusted to me on approaching the borders of the Empire, I hope that upon entering our country all ranks will redouble their efforts to distinguish themselves by their behaviour, their peaceful and quiet quartering, and continue on their own that same fine service which all have shown during our several years together in other lands."84 Kind and heartfelt words. His officers presented him with an inscribed silver vase.85 Men and officers together gave their beloved commander a rousing farewell cheer. Well they might. There could not have been an officer or a soldier present for whom Vorontsov had not afforded a brief vision of a modern world of justice and individual dignity. Now they had to return to the brutal military world of the arakcheevshchina, to a social and political world without enlightenment. Vorontsov appeared before the emperor, who had come to review the returning corps at the border, on 20 December 1818. He reported that his command was, as the emperor had predicted, full of difficulties "which became apparent upon taking on the post that I neither expected nor sought and the responsibility for the fate of 30,000 sons of [Russia]." He was pleased with the emperor's assurances of satisfaction with the behaviour of the corps abroad, and dared to believe that the regiments of the corps would "continue to show exceptional service in Russia in terms of their conduct, discipline, and subordination."86 Alexander presented him with the Order of St Vladimir, First Class, and granted his request for a well-earned leave of absence.87

CHAPTER FOUR

Furlough

Vorontsov returned to France. Now quit of his responsibilities he could enjoy the country he had helped to manage for so long. He went directly to Paris, arranged his lodging at a convenient hotel, and proceeded to pay his respects to friends and acquaintances. At a soiree in late January 1819 he was charmed by a beautiful, vivacious, intelligent young woman named Elizabeth Branicka. Lise, as she was called, was visiting Paris with her mother, Countess Alexandra Branicka, the Russian widow of an extremely rich Polish count. Lise was the great-niece on her mother's side of Prince Gregory Potemkin, the famous favourite of Empress Catherine n. For her, Vorontsov was a gift from heaven. At twenty-six she was in danger of becoming an old maid. He was young enough to give her children and important enough to ensure for her a comfortable and interesting, perhaps even exciting, life. With her bright blue eyes and dark curls, not to mention a large family fortune,1 Lise had many suitors, but so far her protective and discriminating mother had not approved of any of them. General Count Vorontsov, however, was a different matter. At thirty-seven his face was becoming thinner and sterner and losing its feminine cast. Middle age and high responsibilities had made him handsome. An undoubted Russian aristocrat in the emperor's personal favour, he was also a man of the world: at ease in French, English, or Russian society, brother-in-law of an English earl, well-educated, well-informed. Even more important for the old Countess Branicka, who was rumoured to be as avaricious as she was wealthy,* Vorontsov was heir to an immense fortune. There were no obstacles to the match. The countess gave her consent. The couple decided to marry in the spring. Vorontsov left Paris for London to seek his father's blessing too. The seventy-five-year-old Count Vorontsov was delighted that his son

46 The Training Ground had finally found a wife. Already his own brother Alexander had died, unmarried and childless, and had left him to manage the entire family fortune. Practically the entire estate would go to Vorontsov, the only son, which presented no problem for the father: Vorontsov had shown himself eminently responsible, with every intention of returning to settle down in Russia and take up the personal management of the family enterprise. But he needed an heir, and his only son was getting on. Without hesitation the old count gave his blessing and planned to come to Paris with his daughter, Lady Pembroke, for the wedding. It was set for the second of May. Vorontsov himself returned to Paris and his betrothed before the end of February.3 The wedding was a magnificent affair, a great social occasion. To be invited meant that one belonged to high cosmopolitan society. Two of the most eligible figures in Europe's international set made an illustrious couple. After the wedding, the couple spend the summer of 1819 touring England and Wales. Wilton House, the Pembroke seat, was their pied-a-terre as Vorontsov renewed his love for England and introduced his wife to the gentle English life. But by summer's end he felt duty calling. In September they took their leave of their English relatives and friends. They spent two weeks in Paris, a few days in Vienna, and at the end of October reached Lise's mother's estate at Belaia Tserkov', about fifty miles south of Kiev. His friend Count Langeron, the governor-general of New Russia, resided in Odessa and had invited him to visit, to see the thriving new city. Vorontsov had never been to Odessa and decided to go now. Lise decided to stay behind with her mother.4 He was much impressed. The city, one of the empire's youngest, was indeed thriving, laying its claim to be the economic centre of the entire region. Vorontsov, returning to Belaia Tserkov', determined to make southern Russia his permanent home. Meanwhile, however, Lise was six months' pregnant and wanted to go to St Petersburg to have the baby. They went, but the baby girl died a few days after birth early in the new year, 1820.5 It was the first in a series of family tragedies that clouded the bright prospects of the young Vorontsov couple. Although shortly afterwards, on 19 February, Vorontsov was appointed commander of Third Infantry Corps,6 he requested six months' leave (he would actually take two years) to take his wife south and abroad to mend their saddened hearts. As we have seen, Vorontsov held serious reservations about the phenomenon known as the arakcheevshchina, the paradomania so dear to the hearts of the emperor and his brothers. It was worse than

47 Furlough

ever in the capital. Vorontsov was glad for the excuse not to have to deal with it. They travelled first to Moscow, then to Vorontsov's estate at Andreevskoe in the wooded country west of Moscow, about fifty miles from Borodino. We can imagine that Vorontsov took his wife to see the site of that famous and terrible battle, already on the way to becoming a national shrine, the scene of Vorontsov's personal heroism. He did not mention it in his diary, only that the weather was perfect in the summer of 1820 as they made their way south.7 They travelled via Kiev to visit the Countess Branicka at her summer home at Alexandria, one hundred fifty miles southeast of Kiev as the crow flies, on the Ingulets River, old Zaporozhian cossack country. Wild territory only a generation or two earlier, by 1820, with the extension of Russian imperial rule, it had become a prime location for the empire's aristocratic country estates. As before, Vorontsov left his wife with her mother while he explored the intriguing southern territory. In July he visited his recently purchased estate at the village of Moshny, nearer Kiev than Alexandria but on the Dnepr River where the wooded bluffs looked east out over the river. The Dnepr had been medieval Europe's great trading route between Norsemen and Greeks. A thousand years later it was once again filling with river traffic as southern Russia became settled. Vorontsov determined to build a summer home right there for Lise and himself as soon as possible. He continued on to Odessa and from there did a tour of the "Bessarabian District,"8 the territory annexed to the Russian empire eight years previously by the treaty of Bucharest. In early August he reached Voznesensk, inland from Odessa on the Bug River, in time to see the emperor conduct a military review of some of the treasured military colonies.9 In an audience with the emperor he asked to be allowed to extend his leave so that he might take his wife abroad to visit his father in England. The emperor agreed but requested him before he left to review his new command, the Third Infantry Corps. He did so in St Petersburg in the middle of September, but he was disappointed with what he found. "I have noticed to my regret," he told his regimental officers, "that in practically every regiment there is complete disregard for the most important of our duties."10 It appeared that, with the complete turnover that had taken place within the regiments since 1818, his previous concerns and directives had been neglected. He reiterated for the officers' benefit his rules of conduct: "The most important, the sacred responsibilities of all officers in regard to their subordinates, are the maintenance of the

48 The Training Ground healthy, the care of the sick, and the strictest respect for rank." The first and second required judiciousness, sympathy, constant supervision, and good will. With regard to the third, the proper personal conduct of officers and their subordinates, Vorontsov rebuked them for their lax behaviour: "Rude manners towards officers is offensive and intolerable to noble, thoughtful officers. Comradeship enervates the required strength of the reprimand and opens the way to the destruction of discipline. On the other hand, harshness in dealing with the lower ranks serves to raise authority above the law and can only result either in weakening the law or in the corruption of authority." He reprimanded them further for their poor attitude towards the proper training of their subordinate officers: "First preserve; then train. That is the principle not to be avoided in any case. To kill nine and train the tenth is a rule belonging to another age."11 Vorontsov's reproaches must have struck most of them as undeserved. The example from the top, in his absence, had been harsh punishment for the slightest infraction of parade drill. Vorontsov saw military training in a different light. Training soldiers in the artful handling of weapons and in the signals used in battle was the business of recruit school; building an efficient fighting unit with high morale was the business of the officers. "Up to now," he concluded, "regimental commanders have concerned themselves solely with the training of the soldiers. They have forgotten that with which they must always be concerned: the training of officers, both commissioned and non-commissioned. How can we expect improvement in school when the teachers are learning with their pupils? These are the rules which must guide all the officers, from divisional commander right down to company commander."11 Vorontsov could do no more. Probably holding little hope that his strictures would be heeded in his absence but having fulfilled the letter if not the spirit of his sovereign's request, he rejoined his wife at her mother's. Almost immediately the couple left once again for abroad. They travelled through the Ukrainian countryside, through the beautiful Carpathians now clothed in fall colours, to civilized Vienna, capital of the great restored Austrian empire and one of their favourite cities in Europe. After that they toured northern Italy, which since the Treaty of Vienna had become the new kingdom of Lombardy and Venetia, under tight Austrian control. Venice, Verona, Milan, Turin, and then across the Alps and on to Paris, where their carriage accidentally overturned. Vorontsov hurt his shoulder, though Lise was unhurt. It delayed them a few weeks in Paris, but it proved to have its benefit. Vorontsov met H.H. Steven, the director of the famous botanical garden established in 1812 at Nikita on the south coast of

49 Furlough

the Crimea near Yalta,13 who was vacationing in Paris. He waxed lyrical to Vorontsov about that fabulous part of the world: its warm, almost tropical though amazingly dry seaside climate; its breath-taking mountain views along the Black Sea. He called it the future Russian Riviera. He was the selling agent for a property about fifteen miles along the coast to the west of Nikita, beyond the town of Yalta near the old Tatar village of Alupka. Vorontsov bought it, sight unseen.14 Moshny on the Dnepr might be a good place for a summer house. Alupka on the Black Sea was fit for a palace, and they intended to build one. Their lives were becoming more and more tied to southern Russia, their New Russia. Thoughts of home were not all good, however. In Paris, in November, Vorontsov heard the shocking news that the soldiers of the Semenovsky regiment in St Petersburg - the elite guards regiment in which the emperor himself was an honorary colonel - had mutinied. He wondered if he should return to Russia, if similar events might be threatening in his own regiments in Third Corps, but soon the news arrived that the mutiny had been quickly suppressed. The twenty-four ringleaders had been made to run the gauntlet; some four hundred soldiers had been transferred to Siberian and other remote garrisons, and the emperor - who was in Troppau at the time of the mutiny in October 1820 - had dissolved the regiment. Vorontsov was naturally concerned to know the causes of the uprising. He learned that it had begun when the soldiers of one company had refused to answer roll-call as a protest against the arbitrariness and brutality of its commander, Colonel Shvarts (Schwartz), an appointee of General Arakcheev and a replacement for a well-liked commander. The colonel had endeared himself to his men by pulling their moustaches and spitting in their faces. The regiment's officers, it seems, had spoken of their commander with open contempt in front of the soldiers, whereupon some of the latter had refused to obey orders. The offending soldiers had been jailed, whereupon the soldiers of the other companies in a show of solidarity openly disobeyed orders too, took over some barracks, and demanded their comrades' release. The mutineers sent representatives under a flag of truce to negotiate with the authorities, who promptly jailed the representatives. After a stalemate of several days, the mutineers eventually gave up. Punishments were severe. Stories increased about secret societies of disaffected officers plotting general rebellion against the illiberal Russian regime. The incident, to the surprise of some, did not spark off a larger uprising.15 Vorontsov was deeply concerned. To him the mutiny of the

50 The Training Ground Semenovsky regiment was the result of the very flaws in the present military system that he had been at pains to correct throughout his own service. He did not see the need to return in person, since his division was not directly involved. Nevertheless, he was moved to issue a blasting communication to the officers of his own corps who might have been in sympathy with the disgruntled and disrespectful Semenovsky officers. It began: "Gentlemen Officers! Each of you, being a member of that class to which the State has entrusted its security, should not and may not imagine that your obligations are limited solely to the technical occupations of platoon commander or divisional commander. Shame!" An officer's duty, he urged for the umpteenth time, was not just to know the right commands. It consisted, first, in keeping the strictest respect for rank and for the execution of the commands of superiors; second, in continuously caring for and supervising the well-being of subordinates; and last, in ensuring the moral as well as the technical training of the soldiers.16 Vorontsov must have wondered whether or not he was completely out of step with the times. His "new school" of military training, whereby discipline was joined to mutual respect between subordinates and superiors to produce a smoothly functioning machine whose sole purpose was to protect the state (and not to parade), seemed to have no supporters. He began to think seriously of transferring out of the military into the civilian service - or perhaps out of service altogether. Maybe he should retire to the Crimea and plant cabbages?17 He decided to put his worries behind him and enjoy his vacation. In mid-December he and Lise finally left Paris for England. Heavy ice in the harbour at Calais held them up for several days, but eventually, on the very last day of the old year, they reached the haven of Wilton House and the welcoming embrace of Vorontsov's sister Catherine, Lady Pembroke. Lise was pregnant again. They managed several sightseeing trips around the Wiltshire countryside and even once or twice went up to London. They went there in late spring 1821 for the delivery. Lise gave birth to a second baby girl, this child thankfully healthy. They named her Alexandrine.18 In July they attended the coronation of George iv. They attended the theatre in London. They saw the Newmarket races. And for the first of many times to come, Vorontsov "took the waters" at Leamington Spa, together with his father. He and Lise relaxed from time to time with Lord and Lady Pembroke at Wilton House with its gracious rooms, its spacious grounds, its woodland walks, its charming Palladian bridge spanning the stream at the top of the

51 Furlough rowing lake. They went up to London to visit his father in his elegant town house at No. 36 Harley Street. In October, Vorontsov was reluctantly persuaded by his father to sit for a portrait by the famous portraitist Sir Thomas Lawrence, who had recently finished a portrait of the elder Vorontsov.19 After that they brought to an end their second pleasant English sojourn, which this time had lasted nearly a year. In the late autumn of 1821, with their baby girl and a number of attendant servants, they departed for Paris.20 They wintered over in Paris until the following April. Lise had become pregnant yet again. With the baby due in July, they left for Russia as soon as the roads were passable. They stopped for a few days to visit Lise's brother-in-law, the Polish magnate Count Alfred Potocki, in his fabled castle at Lancut. Passing again through Vienna, they reached Alexandria at the beginning of June 1822, where Countess Branicka welcomed them all back, particularly her first grandchild. Vorontsov took his wife to Moshny to show her the spot he had chosen for a summer house overlooking the Dnepr. Then in July, leaving Alexandrine in her grandmother's care, he took Lise to St Petersburg for the delivery. While there he was granted an audience with the emperor.21 Vorontsov informed his sovereign that though he had returned to Russia and was willing to re-enter his majesty's service, he had decided against continuing in the military. They undoubtedly skirted in their conversation the sensitive issue of the arakcheevshchina: Vorontsov had already made his views about that sufficiently clear. The most obtuse person - and Alexander was far from obtuse would have realized that it was Vorontsov's disapproval that had led him, one of Russia's leading generals, to request a transfer to the civil service. Vorontsov had had a long period of inactivity. For three and a half years he had been free to reflect on his service, past and future. He had just, on 19 May of this year, 1822, reached the age of forty. It was a time to reflect on the fact that he had passed the middle point of life, the last opportunity to make corrections in the course to which he had set his sails. In the twin accidents of time and place he had been extremely fortunate. His active military career had coincided with an unusually active period in Russia's military history. It had allowed rapid advancement. His fairness and humanitarianism as a commander had won the respect and admiration of his officers and soldiers, but such assets in the field were sure to be liabilities on the parade-grounds of the arakcheevshchina. He did not share the court's militaristic mentality. It was imperative for him to transfer to a position in the civilian administration if he

52 The Training Ground wished to rurther his career, or even simply to enjoy it. Learning the mechanics of managing a peacetime occupation army of thirty to thirty-six thousand men and officers had been an education in "civilian" administration not available to most military generals. And he had excelled at it. Such lateral moves from military to civil service were common enough in the imperial system. Not only did the emperor have no objection to Vorontsov's transfer; he welcomed it. He could rely on Vorontsov's unshakable loyalty to his person and his regime. He could count on the man's general good sense to make him a genuine public servant rather than the all-too-familiar toady. For his part, Vorontsov had established the most important foundation of all in the Russian imperial system, with its institutionalized autocratic authority: a special personal relationship with the emperor. In Russia such patronage could substitute for the system of law and justice that provided officials in other European regimes some protection from the consequences of their actions. Vorontsov's great wealth, high social standing, influential family, and fine education might have made him relatively secure and self-confident. Yet even he needed no reminding that it was his relationship with the emperor that ultimately determined his place in the bureaucratic hierarchy.21 The incident in 1818, when his friend Paskevich saved his skin from Grand Duke Michael's frosty reception, had given him a warning. A successful official needed to establish a personal network high in the emperor's circle to protect him or at least warn him when jealous knives were drawn in his absence. This was even more important in the civil service than in the military. From the social-bureaucratic point of view, St Petersburg was a vipers' pit. The slithering that went on about the emperor's person for the warmth of his favour was repeated at every downward step in the great hierarchy. He who ignored it did so at his own peril. The peril was even greater for an official stationed at a distance from the capital, away from the emperor's magic circle. It would require the cultivation of friendly eyes and ears, clients to keep a distant patron au courant. Vorontsov had excellent connections both high and wide that he could, and would, cultivate. It would be worth the effort if it saved him from having to lock-step with the arakcheevshchina. He indicated to the emperor his preference for an administrative post in the south. If it was not too much to ask, perhaps the tsar would consider naming him to replace Count Langeron as governor-general of New Russia? Meantime, while awaiting the emperor's pleasure, he would attend to his domestic obligations. He informed the emperor that

53 Furlough he was the proud father of a baby boy, who would be christened Alexander in the emperor's honour. In August 1822 Vorontsov escorted Lise and the baby back to Alexandria, where they had left their year-old daughter in Lise's mother's care. After that he intended to explore a bit more the vast and intriguing new lands of southern Russia, which he had every reason to believe he would soon be running.23

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PART TWO

New Russia

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CHAPTER FIVE

The Territory

It was under Emperor Alexander's grandmother, Catherine the Great, that the Russian empire had rolled its dominion southward to include, finally, the northern shores of the Black Sea. Did her resolve to control that territory reflect a deep-seated Russian urge to return to the ancient Slavic domain? The name that she chose for it - "New Russia" - at least demonstrated her belief in its future importance to the empire. Her optimism for the territory that would eventually comprise the southern half of the present-day Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was justified, even if she did not live to see its promise fulfilled. A series of remarkable military and diplomatic successes under Catherine's rod extended the pax russica to this promising territory.1 The pendulum of the historic struggle between Turk and Russian began to swing the Russian way. The treaty of Kuchuk-Kainarji in 1774, concluding the six-year Russo-Turkish War, secured for Russia the mouths of the Bug and Dnepr rivers as well as the western approaches to the Crimea. It also opened the Black Sea and the Turkish straits to Russian navigation. The subsequent liquidation of the Zaporozhian cossack host in 1775 removed a potential internal obstacle to Russian government of the territory. Then, in 1783 the Crimea and the territory around the Sea of Azov were officially incorporated into the empire. It formally transformed the Crimean Tatars from Turkish vassals into Russian vassals, their huge peninsula from a historic northern bastion of a now-declining Ottoman empire into the southern bastion of a now-rising Russian empire. The treaty of Jassy in 1791, which represented a further swing of the pendulum, confirmed Russian dominion over the northwestern Black Sea coast as far as the Dnestr River. By the end of Catherine's reign in 1796 Russia had become an impregnable Black Sea power and had changed forever the European diplomatic arrangement.

58 New Russia

Catherine appointed Gregory Potemkin, her favourite and virtual co-ruler, viceroy of southern Russia until his death in 1791. He was the architect of the emasculation of the Zaporozhian cossacks and of the annexation of the Crimea. Relentlessly and skilfully, sometimes extravagantly, he pursued his mistress's twin dreams for the territory: a regular imperial administrative structure, and a profit for the empire after a generation of military expenditure.2 He had grandiose plans. He founded Ekaterinoslav and expected it to flower as the Athens of New Russia, complete with cathedral and university. It crumbled in the reality of the dusty frontier, a chimera, like the facades of the "Potemkin villages" he is alleged to have built to impress the empress and her visitor, the Austrian emperor. Yet Potemkin proved merely to have been ahead of his time. Furthermore, by century's end a foundation had been laid for the construction of the "enlightened" administrative and economic framework that Catherine so desired.3 A governmental framework was obviously of little use without a substantial population. Although the land was still relatively empty, Russian pacification had altered the prospect. It had cleared the way for the settlement of that huge fertile territory stretching from old Muscovy to the Black Sea, larger than France, larger even than Texas. People had always trickled into the relatively empty land. After 1775 the trickle became a steady stream. The rich land began to repay its settlers. They started to weave Europe's bread-basket. If the grain for the bread was to be exported, the empire had to have a proper seaport. In 1794, on the advice of her naval experts, Catherine declared the old Turkish fortress of Hadjibei, situated between the Bug and Dnestr rivers in the territory recently ceded at Jassy, the site of a new Russian seaport. Renamed Odessa after the Greek port city of Odessos, supposed to have existed in the neighbourhood in classical times, it was a promising location. It was the only natural Black Sea harbour suitable for ocean-going ships that also promised easy overland communication with the rest of the empire. With the resumption of trade through the straits in 1791, Odessa grew rapidly and soon outstripped the older Russian Black Sea ports, including Taganrog in the Sea of Azov.4 The continuing rapid growth of Odessa and its hinterland kept Potemkin's enthusiastic optimism alive among his successors.5 Notable among them was A.E. du Plessis, Due de Richelieu, the emigre statesman from revolutionary France who became Louis xvm's prime minister after the restoration (and whose success in paying off the allies' reparations debt, as we have seen, released Vorontsov's occupation army from duty in France). He was appointed governor-general of New Russia by Alexander I in 1803 and served until 1814.6

59 The Territory

By the time Richelieu took over, New Russia had been administratively divided into three provinces. Ekaterinoslav province, constituting the northerly and easterly sector, was for the most part the territory carved out of the steppe for the empire under the empresses Anna and Elizabeth in the first half of the eighteenth century. It also included the old cossack lands surrounding the great cataracts and the island Sich' or fortress at "the Bend" in the Dnepr River that only became an undisputed part of the empire in 1774, when Catherine and Potemkin demolished the cossack host. Kherson province, the westerly sector of New Russia and including the port city of Odessa, was essentially the territory won from Turkey in 1774 and 1791. Tauride province in the south of the territory comprised the old lands inhabited by the Crimean Tatars and the tribes of the Nogai Horde: the Crimean peninsula and the flat grasslands on the mainland to the north of it that were finally wrested away from Turkey in 1783. Richelieu's rule would add a fourth area in the extreme southwest of the territory: the Bessarabian region (oblasf) lying west of the Black Sea, formally annexed to the empire in 1812 by the Treaty of Bucharest, which ended the Russo-Turkish War. The historian can perceive in this vast territory the beginning of a great new productive human settlement. To the observer at the beginning of the nineteenth century, however, life in New Russia was still primitive. Odessa in 1799, though growing fast, was still only a bumptious frontier village with a population of 4,600, only 30 per cent of whom were women - and that figure excluded the garrison.7 The other Black Sea ports - Kherson, Mariupol', Taganrog, Kerch, Feodosii, Sebastopol' — were also tiny settlements. Ships, drawn by new opportunities for trade, introduced into these hapless human settlements the pasteurella pestis, the dreaded plague bacillus that lived in the stomachs of the fleas that infested the black rats that swarmed off the ships. From there the scourge spread inland to the unsanitary collections of huts that passed for villages scattered along the rivers - the Dnestr, the Bug, the Dnepr, the Molochnaia, the Kalmius' - adding to the regular horrors of cholera, drought, and locusts. Slow-moving horse-carts churned into mud or dust the few unpaved roads. Most of the vast prairie remained untilled. On paper the territory had been given a regular imperial administration. In reality a position in the sketchy frontier administration was a hardship post. The only official who could afford to rise above the lassitude and venality in this New Russia was the governor-general. And rise Richelieu did. He actively encouraged the immigration of settlers into all parts of the territory: religious sectarians (Old Believers, Mennonites), Jews (great numbers came particularly from

60 New Russia

the White Russian and Polish provinces, receiving the same basic rights as foreign settlers), Bulgarians, Greeks, Serbians, Rumanians, land-poor Western European peasants (Germans, Austrians, Poles, Dutch, Swiss), not to mention Russian peasants: indeed, anyone who would come. The turmoil of the Napoleonic wars in Europe produced a large floating population looking for new homes. Many, of course, turned to the New World, but for many others New Russia, recently pacified and underpopulated, was just as attractive.8 They brought with them not only their pots and pans, horses and families, but also their determination to remain independent on their new homesteads. Partly because of this attitude the percentage of enserfed peasants would remain significantly lower in New Russia than in the central provinces of the empire, right up to the emancipation in i86i.9 Thanks to Richelieu's efforts the population of New Russia, despite disease, drought, and privation, grew steadily from about 850,000 to over a million during his administration.10 The increase underpinned a steady economic growth. Forsaking the new Athens far up the Dnepr in old cossack country, Richelieu preferred to reside in Odessa, the St Petersburg of New Russia, a southern window on the West, a cosmopolitan city in the making. International diplomacy boosted Odessa's brash challenge to the old dowager, St Petersburg. Trade in the port of the real St Petersburg suffered from Bonaparte's continental blockade against English goods as well as from deteriorating relations with France after Tilsit in 1807. Thanks to the armistice signed with Turkey in that same year, however, 1808 was an exceptional year for trade in Odessa as the Turks bought Russian grain, oil, tallow, and other agricultural products denied them by the English blockade of the Dardanelles. Hostilities between Russia and Turkey soon recommenced, but a fair amount of trade between the two countries continued throughout the war, which was finally brought to an end with the Treaty of Bucharest in 1812. Furthermore, the diplomatic blockage of normal Baltic and Mediterranean trade routes created an alternate trade route into Western Europe. Businessmen were little concerned with diplomatic relationships, and Odessa was well suited to play a transit role. Odessan merchants purchased great quantities of cotton, dyes, and sugar abroad (particularly in America) and brought them overland through Turkey to the Black Sea. The Treaty of Gulistan in 1813, ending the Russian war with Persia, opened up a new east-west trade route avoiding Turkey. Goods could now be shipped from the Middle East through the Georgian capital of Tiflis (since 1801 in Russian

61 The Territory

hands) in Caucasia to the Black Sea port of Redut-Kaleh, thence across the Black Sea to Odessa and overland into Austria, eventually making their way into other West European countries, including France." Thus, despite the general contraction in European trade in the period 1812 to 1814 as a result of the Napoleonic wars, and in spite of the plague outbreak in New Russia in those years, Odessa grew dramatically to about 25,000 and put on a new appearance: new houses, a regular street plan,12 new public buildings (including a fine neo-classical theatre),13 gardens, even a lyceum. By the time Richelieu relinquished his post in 1814, Odessa had changed beyond recognition. Now the leading Black Sea port, its merchant houses were becoming rich and world-renowned. Its dockside activities and construction projects created a demand for labour. Its bustling streets and shops and bazaars resounded to a score of different languages. And for the increasing number of government officials it was no longer the hardship post it had once been. Odessa would soon develop into a cosmopolitan city with more charm, as its lyricist Isaac Babel put it, than any other city in the empire. In 1815 the enlightened Richelieu was called back to France. He was replaced as governor-general by another emigre French statesman, Count Alexandre de Langeron. Emperor Alexander was always painfully conscious of the scarcity of talent and imagination in his pool of officials. Indeed, he was apt to use that as a reason for holding back fundamental reforms. He welcomed talented and experienced foreigners, such as Langeron, who would serve him. Langeron was informed of his appointment near the end of 1815 in Warsaw, where he had accompanied the emperor for the ceremonies surrounding the granting of the constitution to Russian Poland.14 As governor-general he was fortunate in his attempts to continue his predecessor's encouragement of the New Russian economy. The amelioration in European affairs following Napoleon's demise, combined with poor harvests in Western Europe in 1815-17, opened Western markets to Russian products: 1816 and 1817 were boom years for the grain exports of the ever-growing number of New Russian farmers.15 Most exports were by now going through Odessa. In 1817 Langeron won for Odessa the status of duty-free port. It was granted the right for the next ten years to import specified goods from abroad freely without payment of Russian tariffs (in 1817 still relatively protectionist), provided they were sold within the boundaries of the free port. After a year or so, following the construction of a breakwater and various walls and checkpoint barriers to delimit the privileged area,

62 New Russia

the system began operation. No other single action, it seems, could have had a greater impact on the city's continued growth. Although after 1819, with better harvests in the West, the demand for Russian wheat dropped sharply in European markets, and in 1821 the Turkish government (in connection with the Greek uprising) restricted trade through the straits, the east-west transit trade through Odessa remained firmly established in all manner of goods: tallow, hides, caviar, metals, rope, fruit, oils, medicines, chemicals, sugar.16 Langeron had struck a spark. Vorontsov had met Langeron in 1811 during his military posting to the area and had corresponded regularly with him ever since. Much of their correspondence was taken up with military and diplomatic observations. In April 1816 Langeron wrote to Vorontsov at the latter's new headquarters in France: "I once fought a splendid lost battle at Fort Maubeuge - in 1794"; and discussing the Napoleonic phenomenon: "I agree completely with your ideas on the subject - that it only goes to show that the French are not made for a representative government." But when Langeron wrote to his friend about Odessa and New Russia, his words fairly danced on the page. "Odessa," he proclaimed, "will export this year one million chetverts of wheat at 40 r., which will mean 10 million silver roubles coming into the empire!" More than a thousand ships had put into port in the past year, and he had great hopes that his proposal to establish Odessa as a free port, if accepted, would do even more for business.17 A couple of months later he wrote to Vorontsov about Odessa's recent celebration in honour of a visit by Grand Duke Nicholas. "He spent four days as my guest," wrote Langeron, "and was very pleased with our city. He is a young prince, interested, very friendly, and well educated. Odessa particularly interested him: this city is taking on a prodigious growth. The balance of commerce this year will show a profit of more than 40 million for Russia."18 Grand Duke Nicholas ten years later would be Emperor Nicholas i, although when Langeron wrote to Vorontsov no one suspected as much, not even Nicholas himself. His older brother Constantine was next in line for the throne. The favourable impression that Odessa and New Russia made on Nicholas would last. It inclined him to give a ready ear throughout his long reign (1825-55) to proposals to promote the territory's economy. Langeron continued in the same letter: "I work with the greatest dedication in order to merit the confidence of our august Sovereign, but this work is huge and perhaps beyond my powers."19 And in a prophetic letter to Vorontsov written nearly two years later, when the latter was nearing the end of his posting in France, he repeated

63 The Territory his sense of having outlived his usefulness. He also raised the idea that Vorontsov should consider the possibility of succeeding him in New Russia: I flatter myself always that if there is no longer war I will see you replace me one day in this post which is beyond my powers and my talents, where I do as little harm as possible and where you would do much good. As for your philosophical project to live in the Crimea - no, my dear Count, you are not one of these gentlemen who live where they wish. You belong to those who must live for their Sovereign and their country, and I tell you this in advance, I do not foresee any rest for you. If you wish to own some property here or in the Crimea, I am at your service. But, even in the very possible event that you will take my place, I do not foresee that you will ever plant cabbages.20 The suggestion made an obvious impression on Vorontsov. The following year, 1819, a Russian acquaintance of Vorontsov's father, P.I. Poletika, wrote that he1 had heard of Vorontsov's "stated intention to establish himself somewhere in the south of Russia."11 Soviet historian Catherine Indova has expressed the opinion that Vorontsov moved to New Russia primarily to further his own capitalistic and mercantilistic plans.12 American historian Patricia Herlihy, following Indova's lead, has implied the same.23 It is possible. By 1822 he had taken charge of one of Russia's great private fortunes, and under his eagle eye the fortune grew. He did have a strong business sense, however unusual that may have been for a Russian aristocrat. One of his first business ventures, for example, was the First Transport Insurance Company, which he founded in 1823 and which proved to be quite successful.24 He had to settle in a convenient place from which to exercise personal supervision of his enterprises and estates. What better place than New Russia, where several of his estates lay? The income itself was substantial. The archival account books make fascinating reading. Between 4 May and 28 July of 1829, for example, he would receive a total of 15,893 ro ubles for the sale of oats from his estate New Vorontsovka.25 Office managers in several cities would keep track of his various estates and enterprises: Stieglitz in the Moscow office, for example, in the course of 1838 would send Vorontsov's Odessa office a total of 48,000 roubles.26 The accounts for Vorontsov's Odessa office for that same year demonstrate Vorontsov's commercial activity in Odessa itself: 800 roubles rental income from the New Russian Steamship Commission for office space; 675 roubles from trader Carruthers for shop space; 2000 roubles

64 New Russia

from merchant Roggier for the rent of two shops and a cellar; not to mention 984 roubles 40 kopeks from the sale at the market of produce from "the farm."27 It is only fair to recognize, however, that Vorontsov had other pressing concerns besides making money in looking for a place to settle. He had an immense private library of rare as well as recent works, which he enjoyed working in and which needed a permanent home. Perhaps most important of all, he had to worry about his health. He had never entirely recovered from a bad fever contracted in the Danube delta lowlands in 1811. If he were going to continue in the sovereign's service, he preferred it to be in a climate more salubrious than that of St Petersburg or Moscow. New Russia was enticing. The climate around St Petersburg and Moscow is similar to that of Maine and New Brunswick. The seasons in mainland New Russia, on the other hand, correspond to those of Nebraska, or to the temperature of Connecticut with one-third the precipitation, while the climate of the south coast of the Crimean peninsula corresponds to that of Virginia. In any event, Vorontsov was more than willing to replace Langeron and to accept the position of governor-general of New Russia when it was finally offered to him in February 1823. The appointment was made official in May of that year.18 Vorontsov would turn out to be a brilliant choice to govern southern Russia. He would remain governor-general for thirty years, even extending his governance to Caucasia. In the annals of Russian imperial rule that was an exceptionally long period and reflected exceptional trust and satisfaction on the emperor's part. True, he had an unusual and personal interest in economic matters. As Indova has well documented, he was one of the great land-owning entrepreneurs in the Russia of his day, increasing the income from his estate manyfold.29 Yet, in a paternalistic way, he showed himself as attentive to the prosperity and well-being of the imperial territory placed in his hands as to that of his own vast personal domain.

CHAPTER SIX

Initiation

The territory, with its pleasant climate and enormous potential, was unquestionably appealing. Vorontsov looked forward to taking up his duties there. In June 1823 he accompanied his wife to Alexandria after wintering in the capital. They were deeply saddened by the recent, sudden, unaccountable death of their one-year-old son, Alexander. They took consolation in their remaining child, the little girl Alexandrine, now two; also in the fact that Lise was pregnant again. The baby was expected in October.1 They made several trips to Moshny, where construction had begun on their summer house. Following his bent for new machines, Vorontsov had a steamboat constructed there with the personal help of his friend Admiral Greig. It sported a new "St Petersburg thirtyhorsepower engine." He and Lise derived enormous enjoyment from touring up and down the broad Dnepr "to the astonishment of the inhabitants and watchers on boats and barges" as they ascended the river without tow or sail.2 Vorontsov determined to make steamboats on the rivers of New Russia a common sight. Assured of his wife's well-being, anxious to take up his new duties, he left the family at the end of the month and travelled by way of Ekaterinoslav, the old capital on the Dnepr, to the new capital on the Black Sea. There, in Odessa, he officially inaugurated his governor-generalship.3 He began immediately to examine the administrative machinery he was expected to operate. He was quite unprepared for what he found. As evidence came to light of an irregular, inefficient, blithely corrupt system, the promise of New Russia dimmed considerably in his eyes. Vorontsov had yet to discover that the imperial administration was by no means uniform throughout the empire. Such patterns and

66 New Russia

parallels as might be discovered were only very general ones, the result of overarching imperial concerns: defence the longest-standing, international prestige the most recent. The administration that evolved in Siberia, for example, was different from that devised for Bashkiria. Both were different from that in Caucasia, or Finland, or Poland. The imperial cloth was woven from a number of unique yarns in strange patterns. It reflected the way in which particular peoples in particular territories had been brought into the empire at particular times, in particular circumstances. A modern administrator's nightmare, it had its positive side. The very strength of the Russian empire was derived from the regime's historical willingness to reconcile itself to its various peoples' resistance to the standardization and centralization of their affairs. New Russia in many ways constituted a non-Russian territory. Before Vorontsov could improve its administration, he had to determine how this particular system actually worked. Then he had to separate legitimate claims for unique treatment from bogus excuses for indulgence. The territory of New Russia in 1823 was made up of three provinces and Bessarabia. The latter, in 1823, was still not a regular administrative unit but a viceroyship (namestnichestvo).4 It had been the source of particular administrative headaches. A recent imperial acquisition, ceded to Russia by Turkey in the treaty of Bucharest in 1812, it was inhabited by Moldavians, a distinctively non-Russian population whom today we would call Rumanians. Count Langeron had been instrumental in having it reclassified a viceroyship in 1816. The viceroy was directly responsible to the emperor through a special Bessarabian chancery rather than to the normal ministers for imperial affairs. The arrangement was supposed to allow the situation to be dealt with "more flexibly." Langeron had argued that the Bessarabian administration, a Turkish legacy, was so irregular, corruption so rampant, that without special attention nothing would change.5 When Vorontsov took over, nothing seemed to have changed in Bessarabia. The native Moldavian boyars had not taken kindly to their new rulers. Their Turkish overlords had allowed them a wider latitude, never attempting to integrate them into the rest of the Turkish empire. While the Russian empire could show a great degree of flexibility, its outlook in this respect was more Western than Eastern: eventually, by administrative, economic, or social pressures, subtle or not so subtle, new territories would be fashioned into integral if unique parts of the empire's body politic. Bessarabian leaders had shown no intention of becoming good imperial citizens. General Ivan N. Inzov, the acting Bessarabian viceroy since i8i8,6

67 Initiation

reported to Vorontsov an alarmingly confused situation. A former Freemason and holder of a medal from the Legion d'Honneur "for humanitarianism," a kindly, cultivated man who had spent most of his time in Bessarabia supervising with considerable success the resettlement of Bulgarian and other immigrants and who had recently been charged with keeping an eye on the young and indiscreet poet Pushkin,7 Inzov had to admit to his new superior that there was little law and order in his district.8 Vorontsov was not sent to New Russia merely to enforce obedience. Whereas some non-Russian territories could be left indefinitely in a semi-autonomous state after annexation, Bessarabia could not. Vorontsov in his youth had actively fought to win these Danubian floodlands for the emperor. He understood the area's strategic importance to the empire. The Turks might try to take it back. The Russian defensive position had to be secured beyond question. His official position, New Russian Governor-General and Plenipotentiary Viceroy of the Bessarabian District,9 gave him overall authority.10 As viceroy he was expected to use his special powers to incorporate the district into the regular New Russian territorial administration: he was to abolish the viceroyship as soon as possible. While the administration had to be adapted to suit the special needs of the native inhabitants, it also had to establish a foundation for proper Russian rule." He set to work with a will. In late July and early August of 1823 he toured the Bessarabian frontier and carried out an on-the-spot investigation of the administration. The confusion, he reported, was indeed "too great to be credible."12 He summoned the leaders of the Moldavian boyars and tactfully but firmly requested their co-operation. The emperor expected his aristocrats to fulfil their obligations, he explained, and the few who did not would be punished. If they would co-operate with the viceroy in his efforts to bring good order to the management of Bessarabian affairs, Vorontsov would see that they were given privileges befitting Russian aristocrats.13 This was crucial if Bessarabia was to become integrated into the imperial system. In Vorontsov's view a viable system could not be dictated but had to be allowed to take shape from within. Such growth could only be assured in the long run by enlisting the native aristocracy, "that class which both by our laws and by the nature of things plays such an important part in internal administration."14 Hoping to set this process in motion, he turned to the administration proper: the courts and the police. Most of the complaints that came to him concerned the police, particularly the city police in Kishinev. "Their abuses have long been known. A special commission even named names, but it did nothing

68 New Russia

and the police get worse every day," he wrote to Baron Kampenhausen in St Petersburg on 7 August 1823. He was obliged to place nearly all members of the police force under investigation. Even the chief of police for the district had been removed, pending the outcome of the investigation, replaced by an official in whom Vorontsov had some confidence. Seeing the miserable state of Kishinev's prisons and hospitals, he took some emergency measures to improve their situation. "And I hope that before too long these institutions will resemble a little more those in the other provinces of the empire."15 Vorontsov further condemned the terrible state of finances in Bessarabia. His attempts to review old accounts had failed. "A long impunity, a relaxation of all authority for many years" had made a complete accounting "simply impossible." In St Petersburg, he pointed out, it was recorded that one and a half million piastres had been spent on prisons and hospitals in Bessarabia. His investigation showed that not one piastre had actually been spent. He hoped St Petersburg would immediately send "a person who combines a love of doing good with great knowledge about finances, someone with energy and patience" whom he could put in charge of straightening out the finances.16 Vorontsov was a reasonably good judge of men. While Inzov lacked the temperament to be a a good governor, he had undoubted skills in other areas, skills that the territory sorely needed. Thus Vorontsov specified to St Petersburg that his remarks were not to be construed as a criticism of his predecessors in Bessarabia, particularly of General Inzov, whose "character, principles, and knowledge are completely praiseworthy." The new governor-general wanted the record to show that Inzov was being reassigned to the task of settling immigrants and supervising the colonies' affairs throughout New Russia because of his demonstrated skill, tact, and humanitarian concern.17 The fault, Vorontsov suggested, lay mainly with "abuses on the part of lower-ranking functionaries, especially those in the treasury department; they should be investigated and, if found guilty, severely punished."18 Incidentally, the noted diarist F.F. Vigel' was sent to Vorontsov shortly thereafter, highly recommended as being "judicious, truthful, and observant." Thanks to his rather intolerant nature and, possibly, his homosexual behaviour, however, he did not last long in the position.19 Such was Vorontsov's introduction to the wonders of the imperial bureaucracy. "I am struck by the harm," he continued in his letter to Kampenhausen, "which these functionaries have done by being

69 Initiation

so lax as to allow a general impunity, a primary cause of the disorganization." Vorontsov was new at his job, however, and his optimism showed through. "I have promised myself to correct the situation," he declared, so that when the emperor next visited the territory, "I can report to His Imperial Majesty that affairs here have taken a turn for the better, that the authorities are fulfilling their duties on their own initiative, with great exactitude, and demanding from those under them a different conduct from that which has been up to now the order of the day."20 Lofty sentiments. Considering his thoughts about systems only becoming viable if they grow from within, it is curious that he did not show more interest, for example, in the ongoing project to codify the customary laws of Bessarabia. General Inzov, at the end of 1820 and on Count Capo d'Istria's recommendation, had temporarily hired a somewhat dubious Moldavian scholar, one Dr Peter Manega, to start the codification. By the time Vorontsov arrived in New Russia in 1823, Manega appeared to have completed a draft of three volumes and to be working on a fourth, but he was still working on a yearly contract.21 Before he left to take up his new post as Vorontsov's colonial secretary, Inzov had praised Manega's work and recommended that he be hired permanently into the imperial civil service, at rank eight as collegiate assessor.22 Vorontsov abruptly rejected the suggestion. He had seen nothing of Manega's "wonderful work"; "his service," he reported to the minister of the interior in St Petersburg, somewhat unfairly since Inzov had told him about it, "is completely unknown to me."23 Perhaps Vorontsov's lack of interest, indeed apparent hostility, arose from a personality clash. Manega apparently regarded his own abilities too highly for Vorontsov's taste. It transpired that Manega had only a licentiate in law from the University of Paris, not a doctorate, so in fact had no right to be titling himself Doctor.24 Manega got huffy and refused to accept a lower-ranking position when it was eventually offered to him as a compromise.25 Manega slaved away at his codification until 1830, when his temporary, rankless salary was stopped and his work turned over to Speransky's codification commission in St Petersburg.26 Manega's work, written in French (since he knew no Russian) and, oddly, based entirely on the Napoleonic code, was apparently thrown out; he ended up as the librarian of the Kishinev public library.27 Besides, Vorontsov's main interests lay in establishing a "regular" administrative structure for Bessarabia as soon as possible. He set up a commission to draft the statutes for a permanent Russian provincial administration. Its preliminary report went to the committee

70 New Russia

of ministers for consideration. With his authority as "plenipotentiary viceroy" he could, theoretically, have simply presented the emperor with a completed project. Vorontsov undoubtedly decided that it would be wiser not to try to avoid regular government channels. By November 1824 that committee had approved his project in principle and had ordered the special Bessarabian chancery in concert with the viceroy to proceed with all due speed to complete the statutes so they could be written into the laws of the empire.28 The work proceeded speedily. On 29 February 1828, after debate in the committee of ministers and the state council, the emperor was able to approve the statutes defining the new, regular administration for the Bessarabian district, no longer a viceroyship but a constituent part of the governor-generalship of New Russia.*9 Later that same year, in the middle of May 1828, the emperor visited New Russia.30 We can assume that Vorontsov kept his promise to inform his august visitor that affairs in Bessarabia had taken a turn for the better since 1823. By then Vorontsov no doubt had abandoned his earlier, somewhat naive expectations of encouraging the "initiative" and "exactitude" of its lower-ranking functionaries. Reports of corruption and other irregularities continued to surface from time to time. Smuggling in particular seemed to thrive in "regularized" Russian Bessarabia. But enough glaring abuses were successfully arrested or hidden for the district to be taken off the governor-general's special-problems list. The list was long and all but daunting for the green governorgeneral. Only two years after his arrival he was ready to give up in despair in the face of the "chaos" that was confronting him throughout the territory. "Had I known the real difficulties that awaited me here," he reported to Emperor Alexander, "I would have begged Your Majesty not to give me obligations beyond my strength." He delivered a detailed report of the difficulties he had faced to the emperor in person in St Petersburg in March of i825.31 The problems posed by natural disasters alone were awesome. Deep spring snows and flash floods, summer droughts, and plagues of locusts, worse in the last two years than in living memory, had destroyed crops and decimated livestock. He had done his best to prevent widespread starvation by getting special grants from the treasury and by buying and distributing supplies of grain. Outbreaks of bubonic plague had ravaged the population in many areas. To mitigate its worst effects he had applied strict quarantine measures in affected areas, but such activities as smuggling and general ignorance had allowed the scourge to continue to demoralize the population.32 Preventive measures might mitigate nature's onslaughts, but man-

71 Initiation

made problems required positive action. Vorontsov was worried about "the complete decline of external and internal trade" that he perceived in New Russia in 1825. "It has caused increasing poverty among the skilled workers and commercial people," he reported, "and threatens to ruin the entire economy." The free-trade status granted earlier to Odessa and other trading centres in New Russia had now lapsed. In its place central government officials had instituted "protective" tariffs and duties that, Vorontsov argued, had probably not protected central Russian economic interests. They certainly had wrecked the lively trade and promise of prosperity of southern Russia under Odessa's lead. "It is unarguable," he argued, "that trade needs a rapid and free turnover to develop its potential ... Without a brisk trade, not only the merchants but the whole territory becomes poor."33 Vorontsov pressed his point and eventually won out. Free trade was restored. Other human problems that confronted him as chief of the territory's administration, however, were less tractable. He wrote, in the same report to the emperor in 1825, that he had never experienced "such severe disorganization and disorder." Only "the beneficent purpose of Your Imperial Majesty" together with his own "hatred for evil" had kept him trying to ensure obedience to the laws. Faced with an impossibly lax and corrupt bureaucracy, he had been forced to fine many civil servants and to put several on trial "for misdeeds and abuses," which, he hoped, would put "fear and a sense of responsibility into the rest." Yet such punishments, he pointed out, were not a long-term solution. Salaries in the civil service were simply too low. "This insufficiency is no doubt felt in all of Russia," he acknowledged, "but in the New Russian provinces, for want of people desiring to serve here, it is more felt and more important than in other places." The treasury had turned down his requests to raise salary levels, although he had proposed a method of raising the necessary monies through the imposition of additional "land duties" and "fees for processing court cases." In any case, unless an improvement were made, he did not see how he could establish order within the system. Furthermore, such increases could be neither small nor gradual. "It has been shown that large and sudden raises have much the greatest effect in improving the service rendered," he argued; only then "may we hope to fill positions with qualified persons whom need will not lead to temptation. Then we can turn our efforts to enforcing the laws ... without fear of their being corrupted by anyone."34 Vorontsov had finally been baptized into the real world of the imperial administration. Compared to this, the administrative problems he had faced as occupation commander in France were child's play.

72 New Russia

It was true that a gradual transformation of the Russian bureaucracy was actually taking place under Nicholas i. Professional bureaucrats were beginning to emerge from the cocoon of aristocratic privilege and self-indulgence. They were not the super-rich like Vorontsov. They came from the middling, often impoverished, aristocratic elite. They, too, were demonstrating a new dedication to state service, were starting to exhibit "a sense of moral commitment to the people."35 Unfortunately, they were few, and those few were concentrated in the capital. They did not go voluntarily out to the provinces. Out there, generations of clerks had learned that although authority was capricious, it could be appeased by a show of zeal unaccompanied by any real work. A reformer had little hope of success. On top of wanting to establish the territory's commercial prosperity and administrative efficiency, however, the emperor's new governorgeneral had shouldered another fundamental task. He hoped not only to unify the citizenry of New Russia but to integrate them into the regular life of the empire. His hope had far-reaching implications for the variegated population of New Russia. The heterogeneous patchwork of colonies that New Russia had become by the 18205 would have made the most optimistic builder of empires blanch. There were Smolensk peasant colonies like Tokmak and Gusarka around the Berda River; White Russian peasant colonies like lavkino and Dobroi around the Ingulets; and Jewish fanning colonies like Izrailevka and Ternovka on the Ingul. Greeks and Armenians, immigrants from the Crimea before it became part of the empire, had settled in colonies like Mariupol' and Mangut along the Kal'mius, in the easternmost region. Bulgarians and other immigrants from the Ottoman empire had clustered in colonies in Bessarabia, giving them names like Bolgrad and Chadyr-Lunga, or in the Crimea in places like BaltaChokrak and Balaklava. Central and West European colonists had scattered throughout the territory, likewise bringing names from their old homelands for their new villages: Strasbourg or Gross-Liebental in the western part of Kherson province, Leipzig or Borodino in Bessarabia, Schoenberg or Waldorf or Tiergarten in the eastern areas, Kronental or Zurichtal (Tsiurikhtal') in the Crimea. As for religious sectarians, Molokans and Dukhobors had colonized places like Efremovka and Spasskoe and Terpen'e in the Melitopol' district along the Molochnaia.36 The government had in addition established hundreds of military farming settlements, often called "military colonies," in New Russia. Situated mostly in Kherson province, around Voznesensk on the Bug and around Elisavetgrad and Alexandria in the north,37 these settlements were the result of an interesting, rather Utopian experiment

73 Initiation

begun by the liberal-minded Alexander i in 1810. One historian has called them "an early experiment in state-sponsored social engineering."38 The idea was to remove soldiers from the barracks and turn them into peasant reservists, settled with their families on designated crown lands in various parts of the empire. With their military training and obligations they were supposed to be like state-sponsored but tightly controlled cossacks, subject to military commanders appointed from the regular army on specific commissions. The scheme had some successes. Increased agricultural yields soon made the settlements financially independent. A hospital and resident doctor in each settlement made life more sanitary than in the majority of peasant villages. Tens of thousands of peasant-soldiers, including their sons and, remarkably, their daughters, were taught how to read and write. Yet these successes were more apparent than real. Paternalistically and often brutally imposed from above without regard for the desires of the peasant-soldiers themselves, open to abuse by those in charge, and bitterly opposed by nearly everyone, from soldier-settlers and their commanders to educated society, the military settlements were nothing short of a failure. The emperor bowed to public sentiment following a mutiny in 1831 of the inmates of a northern settlement against their commanders, and dissolved most of the system, although some aspects of it seem to have lingered on until finally abolished by Emperor Alexander n.39 Since these military settlers were purposely isolated from surrounding society and exempt from civil jurisdiction, Vorontsov for the moment had little to do with them. When most of the military colonies were abolished in 1831, many of the settlers would remain on their plots of land as more ordinary colonists and so join New Russian society. On the face of it the reason for sending colonists into New Russia had been economic. Behind the facade lurked social and political imperatives. In her time Empress Catherine had been much impressed by the land-is-wealth ideas of the French physiocrats. She felt that colonization of the vastly under-exploited steppe lands in the south promised future wealth for the empire. Her right-hand man, Potemkin, took great strides in laying the foundation for such colonization. Ever since, in every part of New Russia, from the old Dnepr cossack lands south to the Crimea, from the Azov region west to Bessarabia, the imperial government had heard only an empty land crying for a human population to work its resources. It had been practically impossible to persuade Russian aristocrats to establish working estates there. How were they actually to do so? Russian aristocrats were not New World ranchers. The traditional "estate" came with peasants

74 New Russia

already settled. And while peasants in the overcrowded towns and villages of central Russia hardly needed persuading to forsake their miserable strips of land for spreading acres of grain fields in the fruitful Ukraine, how could the system allow a general free migration? It would have torn apart the regime's carefully sewn and pressed social cloth. Peasants bound to the soil had become an essential link in the chain: man served master served tsar served God. And so it made good social and political, as well as economic, sense to invite refugees from other countries to colonize the land and make it fruitful. Sending sectarians and Jews to colonize the wide open spaces was equally "sensible." It not only put their energies to use building the empire's wealth. More important, especially under the reign of the ever-cautious Nicholas i, it distanced unreliable elements from the empire's central regions.40 Today's solutions become tomorrow's problems. Not for a minute did the regime intend to make New Russia a separate country, an Australian land of social outcasts. Its governors had somehow, without a specific blueprint or the help of some form of colonial office, to move slowly but surely to integrate the territory and its swelling, rainbow population into the Russian imperial polity. Meanwhile, as Vorontsov pondered the long-term problem, he was fortunate to have an official like General Inzov to whom he could reliably entrust the colonists' day-to-day affairs. Despite his complaints, Vorontsov did not give up or lose his optimism. The conditions he found in New Russia certainly disturbed him deeply. We should not be misled by the hyperbole in his reports, however. By painting the picture in the blackest colours, he was merely being canny. He had to convince his superior that if things did not turn out, it would not necessarily be his, Vorontsov's, fault. Indeed, he was enjoying his new position and intended to remain as long as possible. He had decided to make Odessa his official residence as governor-general. He had engaged the Italian architect Boffo to design for him a suitable mansion to be built on a choice piece of property at the end of the boulevard along Odessa's magnificent sea-front promenade.41 Alexander was pleased that Vorontsov would continue. He promoted him to the rank of General of the Infantry during his visit to the capital, announcing it on Easter Sunday, 29 March i825.4i That spring provided another source of satisfaction for Vorontsov and his wife. In the middle of April Lise gave birth to her fifth child, a girl whom they named Sophie. Among the letters of congratulations was one from the dowager empress Marie.43 Some, however, were whispering that the girl's real father was the famous poet

75 Initiation

Alexander Pushkin. Since the latter was said to have admitted the possibility44 and since Pushkin's subsequent behaviour has cast a shadow on Vorontsov's reputation to this day, we must consider the case. When Lise arrived in Odessa in the summer of 1823, she was thirty-one years old, ten years younger than Vorontsov, beautiful and vivacious. She loved to entertain. It was because of her, not her retiring, temperate husband, that the Vorontsov ballrooms and dining halls so often rang to the voices of merry-makers. She had borne her first child in 1820, but the baby girl had died a few days later. A second daughter, Alexandra, was born the following year, and a year later a son, Alexander. During her fourth pregnancy, in 1823 just after the couple arrived in Odessa, the boy Alexander died. Although another son, Simon, was born in October of that year, she was deeply depressed and found solace in giving gay parties.45 Invitations naturally went to Odessa's most celebrated resident artist, the young Pushkin. Pushkin had just arrived from Kishinev, the remote Moldavian city to which he had been banished in 1820 (at the age of twenty-one) for attacking serfdom, censorship, and even the emperor in his poems and epigrams. Vorontsov was pressured by a number of Pushkin's admirers to encourage the creative output of this young, promising, and indeed already celebrated poetic genius. An energetic supporter of the arts, Vorontsov had agreed to bring him to Odessa where he would keep him under his personal supervision. The transfer was made in October 1823. Vorontsov even offered him the use of his extensive personal library. Pushkin, a bon vivant as well as a poet, was more than willing to accept an invitation to join in Countess Vorontsova's social affairs. He fell passionately in love with her. Intrigues followed during the 1823-24 winter season, as well as obscure scandals involving other of the beautiful Countess's admirers. Vorontsov began to regret his decision. The affair reached such a pitch that, at the end of June 1824, the normally unflappable Vorontsov lost all patience and asked the emperor to have Pushkin's place of exile transferred to Mikhailovskoe, the poet's parents' isolated estate near Novgorod. He was sent off immediately. Pushkin, his ego bruised, proceeded to write a rude piece of doggerel verse about Vorontsov. Soviet schoolchildren still learn it today, and it has even influenced uninformed Westerners: Half a lord and half a merchant, Half a sage and half a dope;

76 New Russia Half a cheat - but yet there's hope That in the end he'll be complete.46 He no doubt hoped to capitalize on the scorn many Russians felt for Vorontsov's noted, rather un-aristocratic, entrepreneurial interests. The unpublished doggerel appears to have had a wide circulation.47 Pushkin's immortal fame has undoubtedly persuaded later observers to take his side in the matter.48 Yet Pushkin's behaviour hardly inspires respect. Precisely nine months after Pushkin's departure, on 3 April 1825, Elizabeth Vorontsova gave birth to another child, the girl Sophie. Whether or not Pushkin was the biological father, his boast of fathership was malicious, and, like the doggerel, it undoubtedly reached Vorontsov's ears. It helps to account for the cynical views about marriage that in later life he confided to his youthful secretary and confidant, Prince Alexander Dondukov-Korsakov.49 Yet he never spoke of the affair publicly or allowed it to affect Sophie's status as a Vorontsova.50 Unfortunately, this would not be the last time his wife's social life caused him difficulty in public. Of the five children born to them, three now survived in the Vorontsov family: Alexandrine; Simon, who was born in Odessa in October of 1823, a few months after the death of the boy Alexander;51 and Sophie. It was now that he decided to build a mansion in Odessa to house himself and his growing family in proper style. The result was a handsome limestone structure of classical Greek proportions, known as the Vorontsov Palace after it was competed in 1827. It set the classical tone for buildings constructed in Odessa throughout the nineteenth century. His wife Lise would always prefer living in Odessa, but for Vorontsov the most desirable spot on earth was the Crimean south coast. Ever since he had purchased the Alupka property, in the fall of 1820 in Paris, the idea of constructing a dream castle there had captivated his imagination. In the summer of 1822 he finally managed, to visit the property, and he found it as enchanting as he had been led to believe. He took Lise there in 1824. Together they decided where the palace should be situated51: looking south on to the purple sea, underneath the spectacular grey, craggy, four-thousand-foot-high mountain peak of Ai-Petri. The ruins of a Byzantine shrine to St Peter (from which the peak got its name) still perched, Greek-fashion, high upon the mountain.53 He intended to return there in the spring of 1825 after his audience with the emperor and the birth of Sophie. He was delayed by an unexpected illness, a serious eye disease. He thought it might have been a consequence of the malaria he had recently contracted in Bessarabia when he was there in February overseeing quarantine

77 Initiation

measures to contain a new outbreak of the plague. Doses of quinine had helped him to recover, although he had suffered two more, less serious bouts of fever in early March at his mother-in-law's at Belaia Tserkov', where he stopped on his way to the capital. Treatment for his eyes took two months, and it was not until June that he managed to return to his family at Belaia Tserkov'. There his eye malady grew extremely painful. The local doctors applied "leeches and other remedies."54 His eyesight never fully recovered from this initial attack. Indeed, it would become weaker and weaker as he grew older, until he was practically blind. When the pain subsided, he departed for Odessa, only to be knocked down there with another attack of fever. Recovered at last by the middle of August 1825, he took a boat from Odessa to Yalta and thence by horseback to his beloved Alupka. He purchased some more land adjoining his property: one piece from a foreign landowner, one Colonel Reveliotti, who accompanied him from the town of Gurzuf, another piece from Tatar landowners in Alupka. The additions included some of the village's terraced gardens along the coast, which extended Vorontsov's estate from the mountain, behind, right down to the seashore. He had a small house hurriedly constructed, a pied-a-terre for himself while the grand palace was being designed and built55. He decided to go abroad as soon as possible to locate an architect who could make his dream come true. In September 1825 he returned to Odessa to get Lise. She was pregnant yet again, expecting in May. Together they travelled to Taganrog where they had been invited to stay at the royal palace with Alexander and his wife, Empress Elizabeth. The empress was ill, attempting to escape the St Petersburg winter. The guests stayed for three weeks. Vorontsov persuaded the emperor to visit him in Alupka during his planned tour of the Black Sea coast. He wanted to show him the spot he had chosen for his palace, convinced that the emperor too should build a palace somewhere along that coast. It was more beautiful and more salubrious than the coast of the Azov Sea at Taganrog. In October Alexander did stop at Alupka and was impressed so impressed that he purchased a property at the village of Oreanda,56 between Alupka and Yalta. He would not live to build a palace there. It was the last time Vorontsov saw Emperor Alexander alive. The latter left Alupka for Sebastopol, where he caught a chill. He came down with a fever, possibly typhoid, since he had visited some soldiers stricken with it. By the time he returned to Taganrog, he was seriously ill.57 On 21 November, Vorontsov received notice by special courier that the emperor was dangerously ill, and set out

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immediately for Taganrog. He arrived four days later, discovering on the way that the emperor had already died, on the nineteenth. At Taganrog, Vorontsov, like everyone else in the late emperor's entourage, took an oath of allegiance to Grand Duke Constantine, oldest surviving Romanov brother and presumed successor. Vorontsov remained in Taganrog until the end of December consoling the widow. While he was there he learned that Constantine, for personal reasons, refused to assume the throne. He also learned that Emperor Alexander had known about and agreed to his brother's refusal, stipulating that the crown should pass to the next brother, Nicholas. Confusingly, but perhaps typically, Alexander had kept the change in the succession secret from everyone else, including the unprepared and unfortunate Nicholas himself. Eventually, reluctantly, Nicholas accepted the crown. Vorontsov, still at Taganrog, swore allegiance to Nicholas i, and then learned of the abortive rebellion in St Petersburg on 14 December, of the guards who refused to kiss the cross for Nicholas and instead demanded freedom for the serfs and a constitution for Russia.58 Vorontsov disliked the institution of serfdom. He would have liked to see steps taken towards its abolition, yet he adamantly rejected the notion of any Russian taking the initiative without the emperor's consent. He had no sympathy for the rebel Decembrists. Nor was it only a question of principle. He was worried for the safety of his family at Belaia Tserkov' when the news reached him in Odessa of the rebellion of the Chernigov regiment led by Lieutenant-Colonel Sergei Muraviev-Apostol. He may have had reason to worry. A British traveller in 1827 heard that the rebels had intended specifically to kill Countess Branicka and those staying with her and make off with the fortune in coins and notes she was said to keep in her mansion.59 The soldiers of the regiment, stationed in the Second Army in the Ukraine under the command of Count Witgenstein, had been persuaded by their officers — several of whom were involved in the mutiny of the Semenovsky regiment60 and transferred to the Ukraine as punishment - that the rebellion was in full swing in the capital and needed their assistance. The regiment set out for the capital but was met by loyal forces and attacked precisely at Belaia Tserkov'. Vorontsov was deeply relieved to learn that the rebels were defeated — relatively easily, as it turned out — and their leaders sent to the capital under close arrest.61 "Here in Odessa," he wrote with pride and satisfaction, "about which people have frequently spoken so slightingly, not one inhabitant, not a single official, has not only not

79 Initiation been arrested but not even been suspected of taking part in the conspiracy."62 He remained in Odessa for the month of February 1826, overseeing the construction of his Odessa mansion, now well on its way towards completion, and recovering from another acute attack of the painful and recurring eye disease. In March he finally returned to his family in Belaia Tserkov', where Lise was seven months' pregnant. She decided to have the baby there, so Vorontsov travelled to St Petersburg alone to pay his respects formally to the new emperor. He remained there attending to matters concerning New Russia as well as his own affairs until the middle of June. He had not returned when Lise gave birth to a son, Michael, but rejoiced in the news. Lise now had four children to mind: two boys and two girls.63 Also during this visit to the capital, Vorontsov was appointed by Emperor Nicholas to the council of state. He was also expected to take part in the special tribunal appointed to judge all those implicated in the "great conspiracy," which, he wrote, "has done such harm and had such criminal intentions."64 But another responsibility called him away from St Petersburg before the tribunal could complete its work. He was named Russian plenipotentiary to the Akkerman peace talks with Turkey. Certain disputes had arisen in working out the treaty intended to end the fighting in the Danubian region. At the end of June he stopped to see Lise and the new baby, now at Lise's mother's summer place at Alexandria. He told her that he had to conduct the Turkish negotiations but that they would not take too long. By way of reward the emperor had promised him a leave to go abroad as soon as the talks were completed. She could look forward to a another long visit to England. Vorontsov made a quick detour to Moshny and by the middle of July 1826 was in Odessa awaiting the Turkish diplomats. The talks went smoothly. Vorontsov held firm to the position that Russia had to have absolute control over the Black Sea forts in the Danubian principalities. The Turkish representatives finally gave in. Although the final treaty would not be drawn up and formally signed at Akkerman until 25 September, the last difficulties had been ironed out. Vorontsov persuaded the two Turkish dignitaries to remain in Odessa as his guests for a few days and regaled them sumptuously. He especially enjoyed taking them for a ride on a steamboat in the harbour. They admitted to him that they had never before travelled on such a modern contrivance. One of them, Hadi-Effendi, was much impressed and told his host that he could not comprehend the miraculous effect of the steam, whereupon the other, Ibrahim-

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Effendi, a Muslim clergyman, tried to explain to his colleague how a steam-engine probably worked. The former turned to Vorontsov and said: "My colleague Ibrahim thinks he knows everything. He doesn't know anything; he's an ass." Vorontsov was greatly amused.65 His job done, Vorontsov returned to his wife. By the end of September they were ready to leave for England with their four children and attendant servants. They travelled through Vienna and Paris, and finally reached England at the end of 1826, welcomed to Wilton House as always by Vorontsov's sister Catherine. They were distressed to find that Catherine's husband, George, the Earl of Pembroke, was seriously ill. Indeed, he died while they were in England. Vorontsov was able to help make the funeral arrangements, which was a great relief for Catherine. They paid several visits to Vorontsov's father in London, now eighty-three but still in good health. They revisited Wales and Bath and Brighton and other favourite spots. They remained abroad for a full year, simply touring.66 The trip provided Vorontsov with welcome time for reflection. He understood his primary task as governor-general of New Russia: to preserve law and order. With luck it would not be too difficult. He had already shown the inhabitants and civil servants in New Russia that he intended to rule with a firm hand. If he succeeded, the emperor would be pleased, which would normally be sufficient reward. But he was determined to do more. He wanted to play a positive role in the territory's social and economic development. He dreamt of making New Russia a productive and a just society, the model for a modernized Russian empire. How to accomplish it? The obstacles seemed nearly insurmountable. He had to maintain a tight grip on day-to-day affairs but at the same time encourage initiative and enterprise. He had to develop a style of leadership that provided New Russians with a sense of direction. He returned with his family to Russia late in the fall of 1827, thoroughly refreshed and ready to work.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Governor-General's Government

Vorontsov willingly applied his talents to bettering the living conditions of his fellow imperial subjects, Russian or non-Russian, Orthodox or non-Orthodox. With his belief in what we might call public service (but which he called service to the emperor), he stood out as a rarity among his fellow imperial officials. The first half of the nineteenth century in Russia often appears to have been an age of venality and self-interest. One historian has written that "the idea of office-holding as a public service was entirely alien to the [nineteenth-century] Russian bureaucracy."1 Another has suggested that, before the i86os, it was only society's acceptance of corruption in the bureaucracy that kept the administration running.2 Russian literature of the period, first and foremost the stories of Nikolai Gogol, made the clerk and the bureaucrat the object of the educated person's ridicule, the butt of jokes. In all likelihood functionaries were no more venal or self-interested than before. It seems rather that venality and self-interestedness in Russia in the early nineteenth century were starting to be defined as problems. Efficiency had become a new byword. Officials began to appear unmodern because the world was starting to change around them. New technologies were being eagerly embraced, but like wolves in sheep's clothing they produced unexpected and distressing results. They certainly improved the exploitation of the empire's human and material resources. At the same time they complicated life beyond measure. In their very application they created new physical, social, and intellectual problems that were beyond the capabilities of the old system of governance. The demands of professionalization and other efficiencies rapidly threatened to burst the bonds of political and social propriety. The new armies and industries, transformed by the new technologies, required effi-

82 New Russia

ciency above all. Serfdom, although in the past serving eminently useful social and political purposes, had become uneconomic — quite beside the fact that it was increasingly perceived as immoral. The old school had begun to show its inadequacies. It took on the appearance, to those who looked to the new horizons, of all but hopeless corruption and inefficiency. Many historical accounts have been captivated by such appearances. In their understandable attempts to simplify the complexities of human life and the evolution of changing attitudes, they have painted the rule of Nicholas i uniformly anti-modern. For illustration they have pointed to the apparently favourite watchword of the day, "official nationality," which has been taken to mean that only those citizens believing in Orthodoxy, autocracy, and "nationhood" were considered truly loyal, truly patriotic. It has been assumed that the ruling mentality behind that slogan darkened entirely the vast Nicholaevan land. Recently, fortunately, that simplistic view has begun to change. Historians have begun to take a deeper look at the period of Nicholas's reign and probe the currents of change welling up beneath the apparent monolith of his tsardom.3 With the advantage of hindsight we can see, where contemporaries could not, that it was precisely in this Nicholaevan period that a group of dedicated professional bureaucrats was starting to emerge in the central ministries. These young mandarins, moreover, were keen to promote rapid economic development in the empire. They sounded thoroughly modern, but we must remember the deep paternalistic influence that autocracy had on them. They liked the way their projects, once designed, got carried out. The notion of public consultation was foreign and indeed abhorrent to them. In fact they remained hostile to a civil, pluralistic, liberal society.4 Vorontsov, however, reflecting his particular background and circumstances, at least in his relative youth before he became old and cynical, seems genuinely to have wanted to encourage the development of a liberal civil society in Russia. Whatever the force of "official nationality" in and around the capital, the emperor's subjects in New Russia soon learned that their new governor-general did not intend to subject them to it. Vorontsov well knew the emperor's desire for his imperial society to be unified but was wary of apparent uniformity. Nor did he mistake uniformity for unity. As a military commander he had demonstrated a humanitarian attitude, resting on respect for the dignity of the individual. It had led him to reject the prevailing rather tyrannical parade-ground mentality. Now a governor-general in the civilian service, he was in an even better position to put his philosophy into practice. And he did. He might appear

83 The Governor-General's Government

"polite to each and every one, almost to the point of self-effacement,"5 but underneath the modest exterior he was shrewd and resolute, a formidable politician. By his style of governance he demonstrated with consistency that he sought more than the passive loyalty of the emperor's subjects entrusted to him. Not for him the Eastern or medieval notion of preserving life as it is; rather, the Western or modern notion of improving life. His first concern in the drive to enlist the energies of New Russians in their collective improvement was to show that a modern scientific government had to be run with fairness and even-handedness. In the summer of 1829, for example, plague broke out in Odessa. He placed Odessa under absolute quarantine: no movement was allowed into or out of the city. Within the city, only special district commissioners appointed to take messages and provisions to the inhabitants were allowed to appear in the streets. Twenty doctors carried out daily inspection of doors and windows and arranged the immediate transportation of infected persons to special isolation camps. The latters' clothes and rugs were burnt, their houses and their contents fumigated or if necessary burnt. He was besieged with special requests for exemption from the quarantine rules. He denied them all without exception, to the disgust and dismay of many high-ranking personages. The quarantine proved effective, however, with the result that casualties were minimal and the bacillus in the Odessa region died out in six weeks.6 Vorontsov explained patiently and in his usual didactic fashion to Odessans how, as recently as 1812, the methods and effects of quarantine had not been understood. The plague that year had tragically decimated the population of Odessa. Since then medical science had proven how only properly applied quarantine, by strictly controlling the movement of all persons in the affected area and by thoroughly cleansing infected houses, burning clothes, and so forth, could limit the infection and conquer the disease. Vorontsov could not of course have been expected to know that the plague was an infectious disease transmitted by fleas, nor that cholera (another regular visitor to New Russia) was a contagious disease transmitted by water (including airborne droplets of water). Yet he had the pragmatic, modern sense that a scientific cure demanded scientific application. Thus he explained that "plague is only communicated by touch, while cholera by air."7 Limiting people's movement and cleansing their effects had been proven to be effective in the control of the plague, so his government would exercise its authority impartially. It was a question, he said, of education. The emperor's subjects needed no longer dread the ancient scourge, no longer accept it

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passively as God's punishment for their sins.8 In the modern world man could improve his living conditions. His judiciousness could also be seen in the way he dealt with the riots in Sebastopol the following year. Inhabitants were in revolt over quarantine measures imposed following an outbreak of plague in June of 1830. A crowd of "sailors and women, drunken and angry," murdered the chief municipal authority, Lieutenant-Governor Stolypin. Vorontsov proceeded quietly but firmly to re-establish order. He opened an office for himself in the city and invited complaints about anything from anyone. He held a series of public hearings until it was determined who the ringleaders were. Those directly responsible for the murder were sentenced to be executed. The rebel sailors were posted elsewhere in the empire. All others who had taken part in the disturbances were pardoned with a warning - and a lecture explaining how plague spread and the reasons for quarantine. In response to common complaints he expanded the cordon sanitaire so people could still get to their gardens. Strict quarantine was re-established, along with calm. Once again, it was not long before the plague died out.9 Public health was only one of many areas where, in Vorontsov's view, a modern civil society required fair and just government. Equally important, in his view, was ensuring the security of person and property, for example in supporting the rights of the growing number of peasants to pursue their agricultural interests on their own. For many historical reasons, mainly because it was a relatively new imperial territory, serfdom was still relatively rare in New Russia. Vorontsov wanted to keep it that way. He himself used hired labour on his own New Russian estates and enterprises.10 Thanks specifically to his lobbying, the government promulgated a law in 1827 that allowed all persons then living in New Russia - including runaway serfs - to remain living at their present place of residence and continue their present calling." He also enforced restrictions against landowners who attempted to import serfs to populate their new estates in the territory, or to enserf peasants on those estates, which led some Russian landowners to complain about a loss of their natural rights in New Russia.12 Further in this regard, in 1828 he acted to prevent "certain persons" (unnamed) from deporting to Siberia apprehended fugitives who had no passports or established occupation. He instructed all provincial officials in New Russia that "according to the spirit of the law of 9 November 1827" such fugitives had to be inscribed in the supplementary registers of the New Russian province in which they wished to reside and thus turned into settled and productive citizens.13

85 The Governor-General's Government

Furthermore, he instructed his subordinates, such registration had to be done "not by police methods of force" but by methods of "persuasion and reasoning with the citizens themselves."14 The vision of masses of "settled and productive citizens" making the territory prosper seems to have been ever present in Vorontsov's mind. Typically, he responded enthusiastically to suggestions for increased economic colonization. He welcomed, for example, the proposal of the Russian consul on the Mediterranean island of Malta to send a group of farming families to Russia to resettle in the Crimea. The Crimea had traditionally had a flourishing fruit industry, mainly run by Greeks and Georgians, until Potemkin destroyed it in the previous century by enticing all the Greeks and Georgians away. The potential colonists from Malta were skilled in growing olives, peaches, oranges, grapes, and cotton. Vorontsov arranged for their immigration, ensuring that they brought suitable plant stocks with them.15 Thus a Maltese ingredient with its Arabic flavour was added to the pot. Vorontsov loved economic ventures, public as well as private. The Maltese settlement was a relatively straightforward economic venture. More complex motives lay behind his scheme to resettle some "Zaporozhtsy" in 1830. These descendants of Zaporozhian cossacks had become somewhat free-spirited fishermen. They inhabited the region of the mouths of the Danube on the border between Russia and Turkey and enterprisingly supplemented their income by smuggling Turkish goods into the empire. Vorontsov was concerned to halt the trade in contraband, but less for the illegality of it - he was a convinced free-trader — than because the smuggling avoided the elaborate system of quarantine that he had established to control plague and other communicable diseases in the area. He recognized that the Zaporozhians were hard-working and talented fisherman. His method was to look for a solution that solved the political problem but also treated the fishermen fairly and benefited the territory economically. He arranged to have them moved to new fishing grounds to the east, in the Crimea and the Kuban. There they could ply their trade without the temptations of less desirable activities.16 While the relocated fishermen were undoubtedly unhappy at least for a time with their forcible relocation, it was probably a more positive treatment than they would have received from many other Nicholaevan officials. The Maltese fruit growers and the Zaporozhian fishermen were only two communities in the human hodgepodge that now made up settled New Russia. As we have seen, it was an amazingly diverse population. A special body within the New Russian administration

86 New Russia

was set up to deal just with colonists' affairs: the Office of the Guardianship of the Colonists of the Southern Territory of Russia. The nominal head of the office since 1818 had been General Ivan Inzov, but as he had been chiefly tied up with Bessarabian affairs, he had had little time for the job. Vorontsov had immediately recognized his good fortune in having to hand someone who was not only experienced and reliable but who shared his humanitarian instincts. Shortly after his arrival in 1823 he had arranged to have Inzov relieved of his onerous responsibilities as Bessarabian viceroy and enabled to devote all his time to this "colonial office."17 Inzov spent the rest of his life in the position, until 1845, serving with distinction a supportive Vorontsov and, apparently, an appreciative population.18 Yet Vorontsov believed that a great potential lay hidden within such diversity, to be unlocked by a government policy that encouraged rather than limited the initiative of individuals. "Nothing hinders more all sorts of industry and of progress in civil life," he wrote, "than the obligation the authorities think they have, to interfere in everything, everywhere and always, often causing direct harm with its formalities and its waste of time, and which happens even when the authority has the best intentions possible."19 He even proposed to set up citizens' advisory groups so as to tap the energies of "those not in official service who are rich and public-spirited enough to want to do good work on their own."20 This attitude, although reformist, was not in fact shockingly unusual for the times. Historian Raeff points out that the government from the late eighteenth century had been actively searching for a compromise between the "statist ideology of cameralism and the laissezfaire ideology of liberalism." It had attempted to create conditions favourable to economic growth by encouraging private enterprise, promoting the formation of groups with common economic interests, and subsidizing industrial and commercial development throughout the empire. This, Raeff argues, was a policy of modernization that led directly to the rapid growth of the cotton- textile and other mass-consumption industries, which in turn led to the industrial take-off of the late nineteenth century.21 Southern Russia appears to have been fortunate that its governor-general in the second quarter of the nineteenth century held these reformist notions. Vorontsov would look for the strength of a particular group even though it might not appear to fit into a traditionally reliable category. The most notorious of these traditional fringe groups were the religious sectarians. Ever since the great church schism in the seventeenth century, they had been Russia's most resolute misfits. They

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had been sent or allowed to migrate to frontier territories like New Russia. The idea was to remove them from Russian society proper in hopes that the problem of non-conformity would go with them. Now that the lands of New Russia had been brought into the empire, the problem appeared all over again. Vorontsov was willing to grasp the nettle. He had no sympathy for the religious views of schismatics or sectarians. Although he strongly supported a policy of religious toleration as "the very best means ... for the return in their own time of these lost children of the Church,"22 he did not approve of the government's "active encouragement" of the growth of different sects "quite independent and differing from our customs and from the faith of the overwhelming majority here."23 But he vigorously upheld the sectarians' civil rights against those in the establishment that suspected their loyalty. The Dukhobors and Molokans, he argued in a report to the ministry of internal affairs in 1838, maintained full rights to land and property and the protection of the law. Just because they were apostates, he declared, so long as they obeyed the law and paid their taxes and were peaceful, Old Believers "remain unaffected in their ownership of their land and must have the right of buying and selling it exactly like other Russian subjects."14 To be sure, such individualism had to be kept within the bounds of law and order as defined by the state: "Putting aside the beneficial results of toleration in general, it must of course have its bounds and extend only to clear limits. It has no place, for example, when the social order and well-being collapses, where the directives of the government are not being carried out, and where, finally, criminal acts are taking place. It is in just such a position that the Dukhobors now find themselves."25 He was referring to a case in the criminal courts in 1838 in which certain Dukhobors had been convicted of a number of criminal acts, such as harbouring deserters from the army and other fugitives from justice, "and even finally in several murders," some of which apparently had involved burying people alive.26 He went so far as to suggest that if it could be proven that such crimes were the direct result of religious beliefs and practices, sectarians had to be ordered to amend those practices. Yet, with his overriding sense of fairness, even in this case he took pains to distinguish carefully between what transgressed the law of the land and what merely offended certain people's sense of propriety. The state might punish religious minorities for their crimes, but not for their apostasy. Toleration of Russia's Jews was an equally important principle for Vorontsov, despite the fact that it pointed him clearly against the

88 New Russia

mainstream of official nineteenth-century Russian attitudes.27 When he arrived in New Russia he uncovered a semi-official campaign to hound Jews out of the villages of southern Russia and into ghettos. He detested it. In 1825 we find him protesting to the ministry of finance about the unfair treatment of the Jews in New Russia, who had been "driven out of their villages and now, because of their poverty, have no means to survive in the towns."28 "An amalgam of prejudices against them relating to their civilian and commercial existence," he wrote to his father in England in 1826, combined with the more or less widespread hatred which people have held against them because of their faith, has brought against a peaceful, submissive, industrious people at this moment a singular and I daresay the most ludicrous action since the time of the Pharaohs. Because they are dirty and repellent in their customs and because their ancestors crucified our Lord, we are persecuting at this moment, are hindering, so to speak, from living, more than a million citizens who are not only inoffensive but the only workers, the only active people in our Polish provinces ... Driven out of the villages, repulsed from the cities, finding no relief from their sufferings - has the government foreseen their fate? Why has it not at least furnished these unfortunates with stones with which to tie around their necks as the only means of quitting a situation without parallel in history? Such, in a few words and without any exaggeration, is the case of hundreds of thousands of Jews in this country; they are reduced in large part by the inexplicable system of Mr Kankrin [the minister of finance since 1823], and in some way also by the pretentious devotees who speak against them in the name of Christianity ... Personally I find their customs repellent, but they are part of our population and I am convinced that their inconvenience has been exaggerated, that their usefulness is little understood, and above all that they are now being oppressed in a manner contrary to justice and the interests of state.29

Some people, he said, had insidiously suggested that allowing "too great an independence of religious beliefs leads to the idea of political independence." He rejected this view out of hand. Never, he wrote, "has the liberty of religious belief ever led to revolution. Just the reverse: it is persecutions that have always had that result. The less a man is constrained in his desires, in his habits, and in his religious opinions, the less he will stir himself to provoke a change that promises him nothing."30 On the practical side, Vorontsov pointed out to the St Petersburg senators in 1833, it was economically unwise to allow persecution of religious minorities: sectarians and Jews for the most part were model

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and productive citizens. But for him it went beyond mere economics. Religious persecution was simply unhumanitarian and un-Christian. "Our wise government," he declared to the minister of internal affairs in 1838, "has always been distinguished for its toleration, and in the area of administration entrusted to me, so far as I have been able, I have followed and do follow this principle ... Religion in my opinion and according to the principle of meekness of our Church, must be sacred for each person to decide and not compulsory."31 Religious toleration, he wrote to his father, together with civil protection before the law, was the basis for the present world strength of the empire: Did Peter the Great wish to weaken his power in proclaiming and in establishing religious tolerance? Did he wish to weaken his government? Did he weaken it? Was he wrong? Certainly not. His power became all the stronger because he was just, because he followed the desires of the different beliefs of his subjects. Our whole history establishes this principle in an irrefutable fashion. Religious toleration is also one of the great reasons for the prosperity of America. So different from the point of view of politics, government, and laws, these two countries yet have much in common. Our [Russian] southern provinces are populated, are enriched by the same principle and by the same means as that marvelous country that is practically at our Antipodes. Its toleration of all religious beliefs, and the limited contact between the administered and the administrators - this is just what we have encouraged here. At present we are going to regress if we continue to increase the need for this contact. But we shall regress even faster if we add to it also a return to religious intolerance. When I say return, I say wrong; for it has been centuries since we have had any religious intolerance, so in fact it will be an innovation in our government, and the most fatal innovation.32

Vorontsov's belief in religious toleration is refreshingly modern. As we might expect, and of special significance in the essentially nonRussian territory of New Russia, his philosophy extended to protecting the rights of non-Russian minorities against Russian encroachment. In 1833, for example, he flatly rejected the scheme of a Russian landowner, Admiral Mordvinov, to resettle some Russian peasants on what the admiral believed to be his estate in the Crimea. He claimed to have acquired the property from the estate of Prince Gregory Potemkin. The Baidar Valley, where the admiral proposed to settle the peasants, was already inhabited by Tatar peasants. Eventually Mordvinov's appeal reached the senate. Vorontsov presented his opinion that the Baidar Valley did not legally belong to Mordvinov

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in the first place, only about a thousand acres around the palace. In the second place, it could not morally have belonged to him. The Tatars' legal right to their land and property was established by reason of their ancient settlement.33 The governor-general's arguments carried the day, and the appeal was quashed. Mordvinov did not give up. He wrote Vorontsov a long, windy, caustic letter accusing him of offhandedness, negligence, and prejudice against himself, Mordvinov, in favour of Tatars.34 Vorontsov undoubtedly smiled when he read this. After a suitable cooling-off period he replied to Mordvinov, icily polite, setting out the principles of justice that prevented him from placing the rights of Russian settlers above those of indigenous peoples. He mentioned that, when the Crimea was annexed to the Russian empire, Empress Catherine had declared that Tatars' property rights would be respected. He rejected out of hand the legal validity of something Prince Potemkin wrote about the Tatars (to which Mordvinov referred in his letter), that they did not deserve the land they inhabited. As for his supporting the Tatars' property rights over Mordvinov's, he asked "how, indeed, could a poor Tatar possibly defend his property rights, knowing neither the law nor the proper forms to use nor the language?" He continued in the following didactic fashion: To ride roughshod over native property rights would be to declare formally that the doors of justice are closed to all who are poor and to all who are ignorant ... If it is true that our laws have not been able to protect the Russian serf peasant from the tyranny of his landlord, all the more reason why the free agriculturist of the Crimea should have the means of recourse to the justice of the Sovereign in order to defend his rights and save himself from the hardest of all oppressions, that of taking away that which he owns, that with which he makes a living. "It would only be a cruel joke," he concluded to the smoldering admiral, "if the government were actually to undertake to drive the Tatar farmers of the Baidar Valley out of their homes and lands. For these are political questions, decided only after long years, according to the good conduct and loyalty of the Tatars, and according to the wisdom of our government. In any event this has nothing to do with the case as it exists between you, Admiral, and the Tatars."35 Such unusual attention to the rights of individuals extended even to Vorontsov's wider politics. He had long been a friend of Count Capo d'Istria, a Greek patriot from Corfu for many years in the service of the Russian emperor. D'Istria had even served in New Russia: he had been chief adviser to the emperor on Bessarabian

91 The Governor-General's Government affairs from 1816 to iSii.36 Vorontsov had supported Capo d'Istria's cause for Greek independence from Turkish domination, even represented it to the Turks themselves, if we are to believe an item in an English newspaper of the time. In 1828, it was reported, Vorontsov was the guest of honour at a diplomatic reception in Constantinople. For his fairness to the Turks in recent negotiations he was presented with a gold box containing a key "to the Inn of the city." Before his Turkish hosts, Vorontsov announced that he would accept the gift, but only in order that the box might be melted down and "the gold in specie be sent to Count Capo d'Istria, for the benefit of his oppressed and unfortunate countrymen," whereupon the grand vizier threw a decanter at Vorontsov. It missed his head and Vorontsov kept his proverbial composure, but it broke up the reception.37 Such outspoken liberalism we might expect from an Englishman, even a good Burkean conservative. Vorontsov himself, as we know, had grown up in the England of Edmund Burke. But to hear it from the lips of a Russian, particularly such an established one, takes us by surprise. Yet, his liberalism notwithstanding, he was at the same time a traditionalist of the deepest blue. Proper respect for authority was as much a mark of his particular administrative style as his belief in individual rights. The most important indication of it was his unswerving, genuine, even passionate loyalty to the emperor and the imperial family and the autocratic principle they represented. He was horrified and repulsed by the attempted uprising of the Decembrists. He was pleased and honoured to be appointed to the tribunal set up to judge them. This commitment to legitimacy was not limited to the Russian situation. In France in 1816 he thought that Frenchmen were unsuited for democracy, that they needed a Peter the Great.38 In March of 1848, a time of revolutionary convulsion in France, he wrote to his friend Alexander Bulgakov, chief of the post in Moscow, of his "astonishment" at the accounts coming over the telegraph. "The French have always been extremely troublesome," he wrote, "discontented with the measure of liberty that they have enjoyed all these past years."39 In his next letter to Bulgakov he wrote: "We must pray to God that everything is calming down, and in any case thank the Emperor that he has not let Russian blood flow for foreign affairs and revolutions."40 A year later he wrote in the same vein: "I rejoice with all my heart at the magnificent and brilliant end to affairs in Hungary. We must all rejoice at the brilliant role that our Emperor has played and that he has made Russia play."41 This about Nicholas i, Gendarme of Europe, who had played a primary role in suppressing the Hungarian revolution. Vorontsov's traditionalism extended to his views of the imperial

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system itself. That he regularly complained of abuses in the system, or tried to improve its working, was no indication that he thought it unsound. In attempting to cure the corruption, energize the slackers, and encourage the responsible ones in the administrative network under him, he was only trying to prune the sickly branches on a healthy tree. If he had to cashier a particularly corrupt official, he gave the offender a widely publicized trial "so as best to instruct and discipline the others."42 It was unlike the normal tendency of Nicholas's government, which was to deal with abuses secretly, defensively. Unlike the emperor, perhaps, Vorontsov had confidence in the system. Give officials decent salaries and prompt rewards for responsible service, and the underground streams of corruption and inefficiency would dry up. Here is how he put this truly conservative conviction to the emperor in 1825: The regulations now in existence are based on fairness, corresponding to the spirit of the people, and consequently are good for us ... But we must have sincere and faithful executors of those laws; we must have persons who, themselves always obeying them, will see to their strict adherence by all others. Achieving this is impossible when governors, judges, the police, and clerks have salaries that are not only insufficient to keep them from temptation, but are often inadequate for bread to live on ... Only in that way can the government hope to find honest, unselfish civil servants to fulfil its beneficent intentions; only in that way can it introduce justice, order, and well-being, and achieve the goal to which it continually strives, in accord with the great and beneficent desires of Your Highness.43

He gave his approval and encouragement to other officials who were waging the same fight against administrative abuses. He wrote to his friend Bulgakov in Moscow that "it is certain that he who refrains from apprehending the guilty does a wrong to the innocent. It would be good to stay the hand of your police because, as I have always held, and pardon me for having to repeat it, the police in Moscow are detestable, unjust, oppressive, and thieves."44 A few months later he wrote again: "Everything that I hear ... confirms what you tell me about the activity and the integrity of Zakrevskii [the governor-general of Moscow], if only he can continue the same; your old capital has need of this and deserves an administration that is wise and firm and that gets rid of little and big abuses, and above all the proverbial brutality of its police, about which I have always heard the most insufferable details, the most contrary to the spirit of the times and of the Sacred Will of the Emperor."45 To improve the morale of New Russian officials, and thus better

93 The Governor-General's Government conform to the Sacred Will, Vorontsov studied his subordinates. He rewarded them for responsible behaviour, for jobs completed, for exemplary service in general. He recommended them for awards and promotions, which he publicly announced in the local gazettes, namely the Odesskii Vestnik and the Novorossiiskii Kalendar', publications that he had established precisely for such purposes in 1827 and 1832, respectively. He paid close attention to the qualifications of his officials so as to place them in positions where they could do best. A young official by the name of Marchenko was particularly skilful at drafting administrative statutes, so Vorontsov persuaded the committee of ministers to have him appointed to draft the new statutes for Bessarabia.46 He listened to his subordinates' suggestions. In 1826 he arranged for the civil governors of two New Russian provinces to switch with one another, explaining that "their individual talents are better suited to the particular demands of each province."47 Continuing his quest to increase the system's efficiency, Vorontsov introduced numerous practical innovations. He changed prevailing government policy in New Russia, for example, from constructing to renting government accommodations. As he explained to the emperor, it saved the government much money not only by reducing the need for capital expenditure but also by removing opportunities for speculation and misuse of government funds. He suggested that the policy be extended to the whole empire.48 Taking a longer view, the governor-general recognized the importance of training the youth of New Russia to become tomorrow's specialized, professional bureaucrats. Professionalizing the civil service, after all, had been one of the tenets of the government's program of modernization since Catherine it's reign. In all of the territory's provinces Vorontsov put his administrative and financial resources behind the consolidation of existing schools and the creation of new ones.49

CHAPTER EIGHT

The Governor-General's Style

Public chastisement for the worst abuses, acclaim for responsible behaviour, the careful matching of professional qualifications with job requirements, better control of the public purse, better schooling - these represented a reformer at work, or at least a reform-minded person. That Vorontsov made his intentions clear throughout his service in itself set him apart from the generality of the emperor's senior servitors. But was he successful? Did he actually change the system, did he improve it? His rule in New Russia had many practical results, which we shall explore in the next chapter. Even so, a person might argue that these "successes" showed only that the imperial system was flexible enough to allow a dynamic, dedicated, powerful person room to affect imperial life in some way, not necessarily to change the imperial system of rule (or misrule). Where Vorontsov was successful, eminently so, was in mastering the system so as to turn it to his own ends. Before looking at his accomplishments, then, let us examine his administrative style. From the very start in New Russia he was forced to learn the complex nature of his authority as governor-general. In the larger context, the 18205 and 305 and 405 constituted a watershed in the historical geography of the Russian imperial administration. The central bureaus and personnel began to extend their reach into all the empire's outlying provinces, including those of New Russia.1 The process exposed the ambivalence of the Russian imperial, territorial administration: on the one hand a desire to exercise vertical or functional (that is, ministerial) supervision in a particular non-central region; on the other a simultaneous and usually contradictory wish to exercise horizontal or comprehensive (that is, regional) supervision. The very position of governor-general perfectly represented this ambivalence. Under him were ministerial officials who reported to their

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central ministries, yet he was responsible to the emperor for the affairs of the whole area. It was a vexed question, reflecting the anachronisms of a modernizing but archaic autocracy.2 The governor-general wielded real power, thanks to his special avenue to the emperor, so scope for conflict with the central ministries was wide. Vorontsov did not shrink from battle and indeed could be a formidable opponent, as many officials in St Petersburg could testify. To his superiors and equals Vorontsov was outspoken, articulate, and canny; to his inferiors, he could be fierce.3 He learned fast how to use the reins of his authority. He often travelled to the capital to carry on New Russian business in person. The importance of the personal visit, in a system based on the emperor's personal will, could not be exaggerated. During one such visit he wrote a friend: "The life I am leading here is a terrible life ... it does not give me a moment to myself." What with seeing dozens of ministers and officials and committees, he was "discouraged by the uselessness of the visits and the absurdity of all the manoeuvrings."4 But he kept at it, and excelled. He might have appreciated administrative efficiency and integrity among his subordinates, promoting them on the basis of merit, but at the same time he was a master of the game of patronage. After all, it was the glue that bound the imperial system together. He regularly found positions for sons or proteges of his friends. His correspondence teems with recommendations of proteges of his own to other high officials. Such a clientele system was particularly important to a high official who had to operate physically removed from the centre of activity by a thousand miles and several days' travel. Vorontsov was ever conscious of that distance and the difficulties it imposed. "I have finished a good deal of business here," he remarked in passing in a letter to his sister in England written in St Petersburg in the summer of 1842, "including several things which are difficult and almost impossible from a distance."5 Even so, he was often able to turn it to advantage in dealing with the central authorities. The "newness of the territory," the "heterogeneity of the inhabitants," the "exceptional customs of certain classes and cities" were arguments strung out like fences at regular intervals to prevent the immediate application of certain ministerial regulations or directives. Some Greek and other merchants, for example, did not speak Russian. It took much time before they could be expected to understand all the ministry of finance's directives governing domestic trade.6 If Vorontsov did not get satisfaction, he went over the ministers' heads to the emperor, writing words calculated to win the latter's heart by appealing to his imperial vanity. Thus, in 1842:

96 New Russia I must confess that I very often have requested and do request aid, privileges, and sometimes even special monetary grants, but on the one hand, since the territory is so completely new, only recently settled, and only fifty years ago practically all in the barbaric hands of a sluggish Asian government, such aid, such privileges, such monetary grants are necessary; and on the other hand, such kindness soon bears its fruit and will richly reward such sacrifices. It is unnecessary here to remind You what the territory of New Russia was like when Catherine the Great united the greater part of it to Her Realm; nor to point out how empty were those steppes, how unused those seashores where now flourish an already sizable population, cities, and ports, which enliven with trade the entire great stretch from the river Don to the Danube and the Austrian borders.7 The passage introduced a plea to extend the special free-trading privileges of Odessa and other areas in spite of the arguments of the emperor's ministers for protective tariffs. "The number of those praying for the health of Your Imperial Majesty is already now uncrushable," he concluded.8 And if the emperor sympathized, which he nearly always seemed to do, the ministers had no choice but to acquiesce. Even when he was given the extra job of administering Caucasia in 1845, he let it be clearly understood that he was still the governor-general of New Russia, that he would still use his authority - now even greater as Caucasian viceroy - to intercede with the emperor to back up his New Russian lieutenant, LieutenantGeneral Fedorov.9 This backing up of trusted subordinates was typical of Vorontsov.10 It engendered a high morale among his staff, both civilian and military. Testimonial phrases like the following are scattered throughout their memoirs: "Count Vorontsov put us through a school rich in splendid lessons; those who have served under him have saved them as precious souvenirs;"11 "I am indebted to him for my service training, for my views on many of the state's goals in the present day, for his example in how to deal with people and affairs, which as far as possible I have used to guide myself in my own relations and affairs."12 At one point Vorontsov even explained to the emperor how effective he had found it to delegate authority to subordinates.13 Having won the loyalty of his staff by assigning to them real responsibilities, he could rely on them to keep him well informed. As a result he was almost never caught napping. Whether he wanted a new census carried out14 or special briefs drawn up on all conditions of life in the territory15 or detailed military and civilian information on areas outside but bordering on New Russia,16 his office became an efficient nerve-centre for the collection and analysis of data from

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every corner of the region.17 Whenever he left Odessa, whether to go to Alupka to relax, to St Petersburg on special business, to Carlsbad for the restorative mineral waters, to England to visit relatives, or, especially, to Caucasia in 1845 to take on the nine-year viceroyship, he could rest confident that his apparatus would keep working smoothly in his absence. He was a hard and demanding chief. This does not imply that he was arbitrary or capricious, a characteristic often found in senior Russian officials. From the testimony of those who worked with and under him, he sought and welcomed advice when he was in process of arriving at a decision in any particular matter. And he was not much concerned with form. It made no difference to him if a report was written on grey or white paper, if an official delivered an oral report in uniform or out.18 He believed in the spirit of service, not the letter. Yet he was very much a disciplinarian. In the words of his private secretary, writing his memoirs some twenty years after his service: "Prince Vorontsov did not permit any contradiction or disobedience of his views or intentions. In this regard he was, as we have said before, an absolute despot. Although his dissatisfaction was always expressed with restraint or merely as quick, biting comments, his disapproval of a person's not understanding his orders or not fulfilling his wishes rankled long in the prince's mind. Much had to be done subsequently if such a person was ever to hope to change the prince's views about his worth and his capabilities."19 A reserved and decorous man himself, Vorontsov also insisted on public decorum and would use all his influence to maintain it. We have seen how he removed Pushkin from Odessa society for what everyone but Pushkin regarded as proper and compelling reasons. And he was obviously deeply hurt - as Pushkin knew he would be - by the poet's rascally public slander.20 Unfortunately, it was not the last time that his attractive and flirtatious wife would cause him public difficulties. A.N. Raevsky, the wild son of a famous Russian general, created an incident in 1828 that also became a public scandal. One day, when Countess Vorontsova was out for a walk in Odessa, Raevsky approached her and "pressed his endearments upon her" in front of her companions. Embarrassed and indignant, she complained to her husband. Vorontsov wrote "as a private person" to the town police chief, asking that the malefactor be warned never to approach the countess again; otherwise the issue would be taken to "a higher authority," which to any Russian meant only one thing. The chief confronted Raevsky, who, unrepentant and foolhardy, responded by writing an impudent letter. He said he was sorry to

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see Count Vorontsov felt the need to involve the police chief in his domestic affairs. Vorontsov promptly secured the emperor's approval to have the young offender exiled to Poltava.21 Raevsky's father, the old general, became upset by Vorontsov's methods of banishment. He wrote the emperor that he had no quarrel with Vorontsov's banishing his wayward son from Odessa for his unacceptable behaviour, a result of his "unfortunate passion for Countess Vorontsova." What he objected to was Vorontsov's using his influence to bring the wrong charges to bear against his son in order to send him away. Vorontsov, apparently, had given "speaking against the government and the military service" as the official reason, instead of acknowledging the real reason.22 The real reason, of course, was propriety. Lise does not appear to have shared her husband's rectitude. Perhaps her flirtatiousness was merely the frustration of a blithe spirit tied down by reserve and discipline and great responsibilities. Yet Vorontsov was deeply hurt. He kept up a solid front of respectability, but he covered the wound with a callous cynicism.23 Some saw Vorontsov's disciplinarianism as closed-mindedness, indicative of a touch of Machiavellianism in his character. So long as he could derive some use from others for his official or personal needs, it seems, he turned on the charm. According to DondukovKorsakov, "the moment the prince had no more use for someone or, for whatever reason, had nothing more to expect than he had got, then he would cut him off so easily he soon seemed to forget everything that had happened."24 All the same, it is hard to imagine someone as particular as Vorontsov not appearing egotistical and ruthless to anyone who threatened to upset his carefully crafted system. A smooth-running, well-disciplined apparatus was no small accomplishment, one in which Vorontsov took pride. Even so, he never lost sight of the fact that his mechanism was but one wheel in a larger machine. Gathering information from below was important, but if a Russian imperial official wished to remain in power, he had also to gather information from above. This Vorontsov did primarily by means of a prodigious informal correspondence. His secretary's list, for example, indicates that in the course of 1829 alone Vorontsov composed over seven hundred personal (that is, unofficial) letters.25 There was hardly anyone who was anyone in Moscow or St Petersburg to whom he did not write, exchanging semi-official news along with social chit-chat. He knew that the contents of many of his letters would eventually be relayed to the emperor by his correspondents. It was an established "diplomatic device" for saying much that could not be said in official correspondence.26

99 The Governor-General's Style

Vorontsov kept abreast of gossip in the capitals: who was saying what about whom, who was in or out of the emperor's good graces, what was the general opinion of his activities and accomplishments. He gave and received references and recommendations. To his closest friends he unburdened himself of his deepest worries and thoughts.27 To others he maintained a modest or at least a neutral stance, more anxious to learn others' views than to express his own. He even corresponded regularly and amicably with men who detested each other, such as his old marching cronies Ermolov and Paskevich. Neither could understand what Vorontsov saw in the other, making references like "your fine friend" or "certain persons who shall remain nameless." But Vorontsov was catholic. He wanted the range of public opinion. He wrote in whichever language he knew his correspondent preferred: French to his father and his friend Bulgakov and the majority of Russian officials (including the emperor), Russian to Ermolov and certain other officials, English to his sister and her son and other English friends and acquaintances. Fortunately, he had a trilingual secretary with a beautiful hand for this correspondence; his own handwriting was wondrously illegible. Vorontsov's father once wrote him, as a young man, to take care to improve his handwriting lest it become as bad as that of his uncle, Count Alexander Vorontsov.18 Although he did not heed the advice, he clearly enjoyed his correspondence, discussing informally the general problems of his administrative and military tasks. It remained an integral part of his masterful political style. Autocracy made this exchange of gossip necessary, even for a man of Vorontsov's social stature. He expressed candidly how he operated in this autocratic political system in a letter to the minister of finance, F.P. Vronchenko, written in December 1846. It followed a lengthy debate that, in this instance, he had lost: In the course of my many years' service I have always considered it my sacred duty, as soon as I was invited or allowed to give an opinion on some subject, to do so ... with complete frankness. On the other hand, as soon as a matter was settled, and in particular endowed with the Sovereign's confirmation, then I have always considered every objection and argument not only useless but also improper. Following this precept, I shall not enter into any review of the present matter since it has already been completely decided, and my duty will be to co-operate and to help to execute the will of the government, in so far as it depends on me, in the territory entrusted to me.29

It went far beyond just knowing when to stop talking. The auto-

100 New Russia

cratic principle of government had within it the element of unexpected, whimsical catastrophe. The meanest clerk knew that authority was capricious and had devised stratagems to adapt to it. Even Vorontsov, like all high officials, was well aware that he was not protected by any regular system of law in carrying out his duties. At any moment the imperial wrath could descend on the highest official, justified or not, because of a real blunder, a cabal of jealous rivals, or simply the emperor's whim. The higher one stood, the fewer the defences. If he hoped to be able at any given moment to avert disaster, a person had to know always how the wind was blowing. It was a reality of Russian official existence that Vorontsov kept ever in sight. He had, to be sure, an edge over other officials. His enormous wealth allowed him to entertain royally. His household expenses for 1827, for example, amounted to 65,837 roubles 27 kopeks for everything from books ordered from Paris to flour for the kitchen, from 50 kopeks for poppy seeds for the nightingale to 966 roubles for forty yards of firewood. Wages for the servants for the month of November in that year came to 827 roubles. His total "personal money turnover" (which included other things besides household expenses, such as the upkeep of his riding horses) in 1835, to pick a year more or less at random, amounted to 540,888 roubles30 - about a million and a half dollars in today's terms. No one could accuse of Vorontsov of being miserly with his extraordinary wealth. He entertained lavishly. He welcomed visiting foreigners especially.31 "More frequent invitations to dinner than we could accept of," commented a visiting English physician.32 Andre Moulisse, his French chef,33 was renowned for his dishes of fresh game and other gourmet delicacies. For dessert there were mounds of tropical fruits. The wines were invariably superb. Yet, amidst the glitter, Vorontsov himself cut a surprisingly spare and spartan figure. While his guests gorged themselves and danced until morning's light, he ate and drank little and often excused himself from his convivial guests to retire early. He rose at six o'clock every morning. He kept trim from daily exercise on horseback and continual activity. A perceptive English acquaintance found in him a welcome streak of "anti-humbug."34 For the lavish style of living was a public facade, less enjoyable for Vorontsov than simply necessary and useful. It was simply expected of the emperor's representative in New Russia. To disparage it as "extravagant, wasteful living" typical of the old-fashioned Russian gentry, as one recent historian has done,35 seems to miss the point of its purpose. Not only was Vorontsov rich enough to build residences grand

101 The Governor-General's Style

enough for the emperor to stay in, but his part of the empire had the climate and the vistas that had attracted visitors for millennia. Russian royalty was no exception. Alexander I's favorite retreat was at Taganrog on the Azov, and just before his death he had purchased some land for a new imperial retreat in the Crimea, at Oreanda. His successor Nicholas i visited New Russia many times during his reign. In 1841 the Grand Princesses Elena Pavlovna and Mariia Mikhailovna visited the Vorontsovs' beautiful palace at Alupka. Under Alexander n, Livadia, on the Crimean coast not far from Alupka, became the imperial summer residence. As Odessa's centenarians would note, "it goes without saying that in the business of acquainting the Emperor with the needs of the southern territory, and of Odessa in particular, Count Vorontsov played an important role."36 Using his social connection as a means of exercising his administrative lobby was only natural for Vorontsov. Indeed, the Vorontsovs were regularly included in the socializing of the imperial family. When their daughter, Sophie, was born in 1825, Mariia Feodorovna, the emperor's mother, sent the couple her personal congratulations.37 In the 18305 Nicholas i intervened personally to help Vorontsov's sister, Lady Pembroke, sort out the problem created by the bequest of her father's Finnish estate.38 In 1835 Vorontsov wrote to Bulgakov, with only a trace of forbearance, of the pleasure it had given him and his wife to have received a lap dog ("that pleasant little animal") as a present from Empress Alexandra Feodorovna.39 In March 1841 Vorontsov and his wife attended the wedding of the tsarevich, Alexander Nicholaevich, in St Petersburg.40 And in the summer of 1842 they attended the baptism of "the little Grand Duchess" (Alexandra Alexandrovna, first-born of the tsarevich) at Tsarskoe Selo, where they were "much pleased" to be informed that their daughter Sophie had been appointed a maid of honour to the empress; and, incidentally, where Vorontsov managed to talk to the empress about her plans to build a summer palace in the Crimea.41 We do not need to pry far below the surface to see how Vorontsov exploited this personal, social connection with the emperor and his family to further his official concerns. During one of Nicholas's visits to the Vorontsovs (in 1837, with the empress), the emperor "deigned to indicate his contentment with that which has been done here ... on the progress of all sorts which this country has made."42 In 1851 the Grand Dukes Nicholas and Michael stayed at the Vorontsov palace in Odessa and were lavishly entertained by their hosts. Vorontsov commented afterward: "As to the country, it can not but have pleased them, since it truly is a beautiful country, full of

102 New Russia

progress and hope."43 It helped that he himself was enthusiastic about the possibilities of his domain. The enthusiasm was doubtless infectious. But Vorontsov never failed to press an advantage. Whenever he visited the capital he managed to have a private audience with the emperor to discuss special problems, whether steamship lines in the Black and Azov seas,44 the discovery of coal deposits and its potential for the imperial economy,45 or some other pressing matter. It would be more accurate to say that he visited the capital whenever he wished to see the emperor, to keep his life line firmly tied. A report he delivered to Nicholas i in person in June 1842 is a good example. He had obviously prepared the ninety-six-page report specifically for this visit, though he introduced it modestly: "I do not wish to tire You out with details of these local places, small amongst the huge number of more important matters concerning the whole Empire, simply because I am now present in the capital." He also realized "that the Civil Governors and City Mayors yearly present to Your Imperial Majesty detailed accounts of everything concerning the areas entrusted to them." But he was taking advantage of his position as governor-general to make a special, general report to the emperor "because there are broader issues, important ones, in this new and fortunately situated territory, some of which concern it generally as a whole, others of which relate to the needs and concerns of the entire Empire." Furthermore, he reminded his sovereign, "I know how very interested You are, from Your many lively personal visits, in what goes on in New Russia and in its future." Over the preceding three months Vorontsov had visited all parts of the territory specifically to prepare this report, and he dared to present here "all which I consider worthy of Your attention, without being repetitive."46 This report was a model of Vorontsov's skill at diplomacy and ingratiation. Like all his reports to the emperor, it was easy to read. Simple sentences and concrete details enlivened the analysis. For example, on the agricultural situation in the spring of 1842: "In general in this territory, the greatest threat of all is drought. After a warm and dry winter, in several places rains have been abundant and beneficial. Grasses in most parts of the territory have now relieved fears of insufficiency, and haymaking has begun everywhere." It was important, when dealing with an emperor who was notorious for his hatred of long, dry reports, to develop points concretely, logically, persuasively. Vorontsov waxed eloquent about the "progress" that had been made in New Russia - growth of population, cities, economic activity - and skilfully painted a glowing picture of the territory as the success story of the empire: a million more inhabitants

103 The Governor-General's Style living there in 1842 than in 1823 (when Vorontsov had taken over), and "they are all blessing You, Most Merciful Sovereign." Turning a neat trick, Vorontsov congratulated the emperor on the supreme wisdom of his imperial policies in New Russia. Nicholas noted in pencil in the margin of the report: "Read with great satisfaction."47 This pencilled remark was high and sufficient praise from a sovereign for a loyal and valued servitor. By 1842 Vorontsov, aged sixty, had been in active service for forty-one years. He had polished his administrative style to a rare lustre. Yet he had made mistakes in the past. He would never forget the sudden, awful sting of the emperor's displeasure. In the very first year of Nicholas's reign, for example, he had blundered in recommending an officer for an award he already had. The embarrassing matter reached the committee of ministers, where the neophyte emperor showed his mettle by agreeing to forgive Vorontsov his mistake this time, "but henceforth let us not leave unpunished those responsible for mistakes, let Count Vorontsov take note."48 Chilling and sufficient words to the wise. A short time later, in 1827, when accusations had arisen over allegedly misspent funds for a new quarantine station at Kerch, Vorontsov had acted immediately - and successfully - to clear his own name from any "unjust aspersions on my honesty and devotion."49 But his most serious brush with the emperor's quick and terrible temper, the memory of which continued to vex Vorontsov years later, occurred in 1833. That summer New Russia suffered the worst drought in decades. Vorontsov toured the provinces in person, as was his custom, visiting the areas worst hit, reviewing the situation, and attempting to alleviate problems on the spot. Unfortunately, however, for a time it appeared to the emperor as if Vorontsov was neglecting his duties. In late summer the governor of Ekaterinoslav province sent alarming news about a critical food shortage, but there had been no news from Vorontsov since a brief report on 6 August.50 In the fall, alarmed by rumours of crop failures and starvation, infuriated at not having been kept informed, Nicholas sent Vorontsov a blasting personal letter on the duties of governors-general: "They must never neglect anything, neither in regard to the order and provisioning of their territory, nor in regard to their answerability before Me." He awaited "with great dissatisfaction" Vorontsov's full report.51 The letter actually crossed a detailed report from Vorontsov,52 who naturally tried to justify himself immediately. He said he had sent a request in August to the emperor through his private secretary for emergency grain supplies to be sent to Ekaterinoslav province for

104 New Russia

distribution, although he had been extremely busy touring the territory and could not know for sure what the grain situation would be until after the harvest had been brought in. He claimed that he himself had been stranded for an entire week aboard ship in a bad storm on the Azov Sea on his way to inspect the situation in the Taganrog district. He explained about the miserably slow postal system in New Russia, which was why he had decided to go to inspect in person rather than rely on the mail for reports from the governors under his authority. Finally, he protested that he had "never had an order to write directly to Your Imperial Majesty."53 He had, however, reported at regular intervals to the committee of ministers, even though he was in the field all summer.54 He had not known when the emperor would return from abroad, but the moment he found out (by chance) in Simferopol he sent a courier off to him with a full report. The courier, he added, got lost in White Russia on the way, so the report took much longer to reach the emperor than it should have done.55 Vorontsov went to great lengths to show that he had not been neglecting the "order and provision" of his territory. Obviously, however, he had not made certain that the emperor himself was kept fully and regularly informed.56 That was a grievous mistake. He had no choice but to offer to resign. He wrote Nicholas a long and humble letter, attempting to explain and justify his actions, hoping to pass some of the blame on to the committee of ministers: "I wrote from each place, where there was passage, with each post, to the ministry of internal affairs, fully believing that all my reports would be presented to Your Imperial Majesty whenever it was convenient, either directly or through the committee of ministers, from which the whole time I received my instructions." No matter how convinced he was of his innocence, he had to conclude his letter of resignation to the emperor in abject humility: "I turn to you, Most Merciful Sovereign, with a humble request: release me from my obligations, for which I already feel within me an incapacity. I shall continue to pray to the Almighty for Your Imperial Majesty, who daily shows such wisdom, justice, and mercy to the Fatherland. Your most faithful servant, Ct. Mikh. vorontsov."57 He also turned to his well-honed instrument of survival: his informal communications network. He wrote to his friend, Count Alexander Benkendorf, head of the Third Section (the security police) and one of Nicholas's few confidants, to determine the breadth and depth of the problem and to seek his advice.58 Benkendorf responded immediately to allay Vorontsov's fears. No, he should not resign. Yes, His Imperial Majesty was now convinced that Vorontsov had

105 The Governor-General's Style

acted correctly. No, the emperor had not turned against him. "Dear friend," he wrote, I cannot conceive on what you base such an idea. Ever since his accession to the throne he has been at pains to place you in the Counsel of the Empire ... Since then you have had shining examples of his satisfaction. I do not believe that anyone has received as flattering rescripts as you. Perhaps he might have wished to use you in different positions from those you have held, but keeping always in mind the importance of your services in the new empire, and the desire which you expressed not to change a post in which you were so agreeably established, the emperor not only has never disturbed you in it, but even in two cases has accepted your choices for your replacement during your absences, the duration of which has far exceeded the usual terms. This example is unique for you alone, and is irrevocable proof of the importance that he places in having a man such as yourself in a territory so far removed from the centre of His administration.59

Nicholas had indeed granted Vorontsov great latitude, which the latter had begun, it seems, to take for granted. The undercurrent of envy in Benkendorf s letter tells us much. The emperor was painfully aware of how few responsible and dedicated civil servants were willing to serve out in the provinces instead of gravitating to the central ministries. The emperor never actually came out and apologized for having unfairly accused Vorontsov of slackness. Emperors do not apologize. But he did refuse to accept Vorontsov's tendered resignation, returning the letter to him with the pencilled remark: "Now is no time for you to resign from service."60 For Vorontsov, that pencilled message and the various rewards61 as well as personal statements of confidence that Nicholas subsequently gave him constituted imperial absolution. But the memory and the shame of the affair continued to rankle in Vorontsov's mind. In 1855, in the sketches for his never-completed memoirs, he still felt the need to defend himself against the charges of inaction during the famine crisis in New Russia.62 Like Leon Trotsky seventy years later apologizing for the regime of his day, we can almost imagine Vorontsov attempting to articulate his faith in the imperial system in the same quasi-rational sense (though without the bitter irony): one could not be right against the emperor; one could be right only with the emperor, and through the emperor, for history had created no other road for the realization of what was right. Our example of the style of Vorontsov's imperial politics, therefore, would be incomplete if we were to assume that his acquittal was

106 New Russia

only, or even primarily, the result of his rational self-defence. Other imperial officials were accused of dereliction of duty, justly or not, and were permanently disgraced because they were never given a hearing. Obtaining a hearing in the autocratic system - which meant a hearing by the emperor himself - was often more difficult than the actual defence. For all the reasons we have discussed, Vorontsov had better chances than most for a hearing. Vorontsov was forgiven. A decade later, the incident long forgotten by him, Nicholas would write in a personal rescript to Vorontsov of "that flaming zeal for the good of your country that has always distinguished your long-standing and praiseworthy service. You have completely justified my expectations ... For your exemplary service to Crown and country you have earned my undying gratitude and favour."63 But in the last analysis Vorontsov was guilty: guilty because the emperor had not been kept fully informed at a time when his people were suffering, for whatever reasons. Vorontsov could personally be granted great responsibilities from time to time, could even exercise initiative in fulfilling his duties. But for even the emperor's highest, most responsible official to hint at assuming responsibility for the welfare of the emperor's subjects would be an insolent conceit. His Imperial Majesty's lieutenants were favoured minions, no more. Vorontsov understood that, none better. Only an unequivocal demonstration of subordination and self-criticism restored him to his former place in the sun.

CHAPTER NINE

Garden of the Empire

Does the foregoing analysis merely prove that Vorontsov was an orthodox imperial Russian servitor, just a very skilful practitioner of a highly regular political art? Possibly. And yet, judging by what he actually accomplished in New Russia, by the undoubted "modernizing" effect he had on nearly all aspects of life in southern Russia, it is tempting to conclude that he really was different from other imperial officials. His political skills might have allowed him to operate successfully within the system, but it was his personal philosophy that breathed new life into the old body politic. He believed in the desirability and the possibility of improving life for all citizens. New schools, technical institutes, scientific societies, museums, publications, libraries, theatres - like greenery in a parched land these cultural institutions appeared and took root under master-gardener Vorontsov's watchful eye. He entrusted them to hand-picked directors, officials who knew that their chief would back them up with all the resources he could squeeze from the system. Let us consider education, in Vorontsov's view one of the best long-term cultural investments the empire could make. When he had arrived in 1823 there was only one school of note in the whole territory: the Richelieu Lyceum in Odessa. It had been founded in 1805 as a private school for well-born boys by the then governorgeneral, the Due de Richelieu, who had personally put up five thousand francs to build the school library. In 1811 it was taken over by the government, in 1816 put under the administrative control of the new Kharkov University, and in 1817 (at Count Langeron's instigation) divided into an upper and a lower school with the latter being given the name Richelieu Lyceum in le Due's honour. The school worshipped his memory. When he died in France in 1822 the school went into mourning for three days. By the time Vorontsov

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arrived as governor-general in 1823, the Richelieu Lyceum had been given an independent existence and its own board of directors. It was an important school, reputedly one of the best in the empire, offering both academic and business courses. In 1826 Vorontsov was able to have the status of its director raised to that of a university rector in recognition of its importance to the territory. Eventually, in 1837, it would officially be given the status of a university, although in memory of the old due its name would remain the Richelieu Lyceum.1 The lyceum, however, was restricted to the sons of well-to-do Odessan families and a few government scholars. Besides the lyceum there were only a handful of private schools: a school for well-born girls in Odessa;2 the Greek Commercial School, founded in 1817 and supported entirely by the Greek merchants of Odessa for young Odessan Greeks going into business; a private school of some sort in Taganrog;3 and undoubtedly a few others. But there was no regular system of public schools. This was the goal that Vorontsov set himself as governor-general. By 1828 he had arranged for New Russia to be separated administratively from the Kharkov educational district. The new district boasted several new schools: an elementary school for Nogai children in Nogaisk, offering Russian as well as Tatar; one for the children of Crimean Tatars in Simferopol, attached to a new gimnaziia (secondary school); and new elementary schools in various cities in Bessarabia. Several new educational institutions had also appeared in Odessa itself. They gave a hint of the city's cosmopolitan atmosphere. Besides the well-born girls' school,4 the Greek school, and the lyceum itself, there were a Hebrew school for Jewish children, girls as well as boys, substantially supported by the Society of Odessan Jews; a city girls' school, for non-noble girls; a maritime academy, offering courses in navigation and other subjects for the city's sailors; and a School of Eastern Languages, offering courses in Turkish-Tatar, Greek, even Armenian and Georgian.5 In 1830, in recognition of the number of schools in Odessa, a special Odessa School District was established, entrusted to the director of the Richelieu Lyceum.6 The system continued to expand. In the 18305 a new gimnaziia was opened in Kishinev to serve the needs of Bessarabians, with a special school for Jewish boys attached to it. An Orthodox seminary was opened in Odessa, thanks partly to the efforts of Odessa's new archbishop. The Richelieu Lyceum continued to grow in size and fame, becoming, as we have seen, the university for New Russia.

109 Garden of the Empire

Besides a gimnaziia it boasted various faculties, including a language institute, a juridical school, a school of math and physical sciences, and a business school. Perhaps most important, each province by 1840 had been given its own educational district: Kherson, Ekaterinoslav, Tauride, and Bessarabia.7 Vorontsov was so impressed by the enthusiasm and public spirit of some of the territory's private citizens who had put up their own money to found or support special schools or institutes that he proposed to establish a sort of citizens' honours list to acknowledge this public service by non-officials.8 New Russians, it seemed, were keen to get ahead. An educational system needed a library. Vorontsov put the energetic A.I. Levshin, soon to be the mayor of Odessa, in charge of raising public and private funds with his strong personal backing. In 1828 Levshin raised 30,000 roubles in private monies, of which half was allocated for book-buying and 10,000 used to improve the city's printing office. The following year the emperor approved a bill to spend 2,000 roubles a year for book-buying for the library and 15,000 roubles a year for the salary of the librarian, who was also to supervise the Odessa museum and the library of the Agricultural Society of Southern Russia. On 15 April 1830 the Odessa Public Library opened its doors.9 Not content with a foundation, Vorontsov started work on the superstructure: the promotion of advanced scientific and scholarly pursuits. An archaeological museum was opened in Odessa in i825.10 Among other things it was used to house the important discoveries of Greek artifacts unearthed during the 1827—29 dig by the eminent French archaeologist-geographer de Blaremberg." Vorontsov had personally supported the expedition. It was only one among many undertaken during his term.12 In 1828 he founded the Imperial Agricultural Society for Southern Russia, aimed at disseminating the latest scientific discoveries and technological advances in agriculture.13 Of special interest to historians and archaeologists of the territory was the founding of the Imperial Odessa Society of History and Antiquities in 1839. Vorontsov again was personally instrumental in bringing it to life. Under the leadership of eminent scholars like N.N. Murzakevich its journal, Transactions, became a beacon of scientific and scholarly information. The journal, with primarily historical articles written by leading scholars, soon achieved a wide circulation.14 They published among other things several important historical manuscript documents from Vorontsov's own extensive library.15 To judge by the evidence, Vorontsov had the intelligent

110 New Russia

amateur's enthusiasm for science and technology. Fortunately for New Russia, he also had the authority to transform his enthusiasms into reality. Determined to enhance cultural life at a more public level, in 1827 he obtained funds and authorization to establish a newspaper, the Odessa Herald (Odesskii Vestnik). The paper soon became a daily, informing literate citizens not only about the weather and prices on the stock exchange but also about items of general historical, economic, and literary interest.16 In order to disseminate information more specifically about public programs, opportunities, and projects, he established the New Russian Calendar (Novorossiiskii Kalendar') in i832.17 He also put much store in the cultural benefits of the theatre. In 1831 he gave the languishing Odessa theatre a new lease on life with his novel idea of assigning to it the newly instituted quarantine fees levied on shippers in Odessa.18 His wife Lise got involved. "She is the spirit that has got the whole thing moving, even personally directing all the choruses and dances," wrote Vorontsov's private secretary to a friend in Moscow.19 By 1834 Odessa boasted a beautiful new home for its dramatic productions, the New Stock Exchange Theatre.20 Public interest in drama quickly revived. Those quarantine fees, while useful for drama, reflected Vorontsov's abiding concern for public health in New Russia. From the very start of his rule, to ameliorate if not eliminate the ravages of plague, cholera, typhus, and other diseases, he pushed continually to have more quarantine facilities constructed, more supervisors and medical personnel trained in their proper use. He made inhabitants take an oath (composed, presumably, by himself) in Russian or in Greek by which the individual swore not to remove from the territory any belongings - "even gold hidden in the ground" - until all danger of the plague was past.21 By the 18405 the system had become so effective - divisions of trained personnel ready to appear at a moment's notice, visiting ships without exception held in quarantine — that despite the population increase the incidence of disease was sharply limited.22 A quarantine system was obviously necessary. Trade with the outside world underpinned the New Russian economy. Without trade Odessa and the other New Russian port cities would not flourish. It was the rippling economic benefit of trade that had energized busy, cosmopolitan Odessa and had accounted for the construction of schools and libraries and other public buildings. Odessa had grown steadily before Vorontsov's arrival, and it continued to grow under his aegis. During the period of his governor-generalship its

Ill Garden of the Empire

population doubled, from about forty-seven thousand to about ninetysix thousand, making it the third largest city in the empire.13 Its enormous commercial turnover attracted everyone from day-laborers to merchants. The total population of New Russia in the Vorontsov years mushroomed from 1.6 million (male and female) to 2.6 million.24 Vorontsov, with his mercantilistic instincts, understood the power of trade and commerce. He has been criticized by many observers, from contemporary aristocrats to present-day Soviet historians, for his mercantilistic, entrepreneurial mentality. Even if we accept the arguments against the evils of capitalism, however, there can be little denying that at least in the period of his governor-generalship the people of New Russia benefited greatly from his attitude and the dramatic increase in economic activity that it encouraged. On his arrival in 1823 it had appeared that the tariff exemptions won by Langeron for the New Russian ports (except for Odessa) would be allowed to lapse. Other trading restrictions, furthermore, had just been imposed by St Petersburg in response to a protectionist lobby of central Russian merchants. Vorontsov had perceived a real threat to the territory's life-blood from "a system of obstacles and constraints that in its very principles destroys any possibilities for industry and commerce in Russia," as he wrote to his father in November 1826. "The administration of Russia," he continued, must be as large as its territory. In this spiritual and physical immensity, measures based on the rules of Asian cities are both absurd and fatal; to introduce them here is a paradox, a sacrilege of principle and anyway impossible to execute. What is it that gives Russia its grandeur? It is the great measures taken from Ivan the Terrible up to the present day. The admirable system of Peter the Great combined forces with the Enlightenment, surpassing its age in true liberality and in education, encouraging commerce, industry, all crafts, not by minute regulations, prohibitions, and obstacles, but by facilitating everything, by encouraging everyone, and by sacrificing momentary receipts of the exchequer for the general prosperity, which can never fail to fill the treasury in the end. Under the two empresses, Elizabeth and Catherine, came the advancement of civil liberty, the establishment of milder customs, the complete freedom to circulate within the interior, and the freedom of everyone in industry to follow his own inclinations ... [But now] everything is hampered, everything is held back, and if this continues the laws of nature will force us to regress rather than advance, and above all to run the most terrible risks - which will be fatal for everyone. Nothing can stop the evil nor turn aside the danger except a return to a system that is more generous, more in harmony with the country and its inhabitants;

112 New Russia and by providing this system with all the ameliorations of details, of administration, and of legislation that our actual situation demands and for which the Emperor [Nicholas i] has already, thank the Lord, shown an admirable inclination.25

Through the 18205 he had argued forcibly and, eventually, successfully to ministers, to state councillors, and finally, taking advantage of his extraordinary authority as governor-general, to the emperor himself, in favour of lifting the present trading restrictions in New Russia and thus preventing the introduction of what he saw as protectionist and destructive colonial schemes on the part of the central planners.26 In 1825, for example, he had written a long report directly to the emperor attempting to convince him of the disastrous effect that bureaucratic regulations and restrictions would have on the future development of the New Russian economy. On behalf of the local merchants and in rather strong language he had attacked what he called an "impenetrable system of regulations and fines" that had "allowed mere clerks to tyrannize the local merchants."27 Vorontsov was persuasive. Men of trade and commerce in New Russia had an advocate who not only understood the red tape but was powerful enough to cut it for them. His policy appeared to bear fruit. He reported to the emperor in 1842, almost boasting, that since 1823 the number of merchants in Odessa had increased from 280 to 1,633; the value of Odessa's imports from 8 million to 20 million roubles, its exports from 16 million to 48 million roubles. In the whole of New Russia over the same period, he reported an increase in government revenues from 20 million to 37 million roubles28 — music sweet to the ears of an emperor whose government was chronically short of funds. Yet Vorontsov knew that, for all his efforts and enthusiasm, private enterprise in Russia was weak and likely to remain so. The state had to provide the capital investment to improve the economic infrastructure. He therefore committed as much of the state's resources as he dared to improving facilities for communications and transport. The small, thirty-horsepower steamboat that he constructed for his wife at Moshny-on-the-Dnepr in 1823 was no mere toy for a gadgetloving man. From the desk of the governor-general's office in Odessa orders went out for a number of English steamboats. Steamship service on the Black Sea began in 1828 with the first steamship, the Odessa*9. It was not long before steamship lines interconnected the Black Sea ports: Batumi in Caucasia, the newly constructed harbours at Yalta in the Crimea and at Berdiansk in the Azov, Odessa, even Constantinople, and the towns and villages lying up the great rivers

113 Garden of the Empire

as well. In a letter to Alexander Bulgakov, for example, dated 27 February 1833, Vorontsov wrote that he was "awaiting impatiently" the arrival of a new steamboat from Constantinople; it had encountered a bad storm in transit.30 In 1844 the Calendar of New Russia, the official government publication, reported that the steamer Count Vorontsov was making regular runs between Ovidionopol and Akkerman, that a convention had been signed with Austria to establish communications between Russia and Austria along the Danube, and that the steamer-frigates Odessa and Crimea were now running regularly between Odessa and Constantinople.31 On 16 August 1847 Vorontsov reported to the emperor that, in view of the success of the one iron and two wooden ships from England' in opening up communications between Odessa and the west Georgian port of Redut-Kaleh, and of the great need for more such means of communications and transportation on the Black and Azov seas, he had ordered "two more English iron ships."32 His endless requests for funds to pave roads and dredge rivers to improve the territory's transportation network tried the patience of the department of roads and communications in St Petersburg. Already in 1826 Vorontsov was clamouring for special funds to improve the post roads in Bessarabia.33 He never stopped asking; indeed, his requests grew over the years. In his detailed summary report of 24 June 1842 to Emperor Nicholas on conditions in New Russia, he wrote at length of the need to improve transportation on the lower Don by constructing dams at strategic locations. The project was currently being considered by the department of roads and communications, wrote Vorontsov, hoping to enlist the emperor's support; "because the project is of such extreme significance, it would not be out of place even as a direct Crown expense." He went on to inform the emperor that efforts to deepen the estuary of the Dnepr, begun in the spring, were progressing well, but that plans to build locks around the Dnepr Falls, although promised as long ago as 1836, had remained in abeyance "to the great misfortune of Kherson and indeed to all the southern parts of the territory"; only one section, around the Kaidatskii Falls, had been completed, and work had not even begun on the second section.34 In 1847 Vorontsov wrote to Count Kleinmikhel, then head of the imperial department of roads and communications, regretting the department's decision to spend no more funds on improving navigation on the Dnestr. He wanted to order another steamboat from England to establish a run up the Dnestr, but the river first had to be dredged and otherwise improved. Vorontsov urged Kleinmikhel to reconsider, remarking on the value of the work done by the

114 New Russia

department's engineers in removing boulders from the river bed but noting that "much still remains to be done."35 Kleinmikhel wrote back that Vorontsov was quite right about the importance of improved navigation in the lower Dnestr. Indeed, the department "next year" was planning to remove "Old Chewer Rock," an enormous boulder and "one of the most hazardous and most fatal obstructions in the river." Furthermore, he, Kleinmikhel, had ordered a complete review of further necessary improvements in the river. He was informing Vorontsov of this, he said (no doubt through clenched teeth), "knowing the interest that you have for everything that serves the good and the utility of the country."36 If Kleinmikhel had hoped that Vorontsov's new duties as viceroy of Caucasia, which had called him away from Odessa to Tiflis, had taken his eagle eye off affairs in New Russia, he was much mistaken. A year later Vorontsov wrote Kleinmikhel that despite his position in Caucasia he was still governor-general of New Russia and had not forgotten its needs. He had been pleased to hear from the governor of Ekaterinoslav that work on the locks around the cataracts of the Dnepr was finally progressing, but now there was something else St Petersburg should know about: "one question vital for the development of the commerce and the industry of an entire zone of the empire is assuredly that of the improvement of the navigation of the Don."37 The governor-general's appetite was infinite. His efforts were also much appreciated by the inhabitants, who were quick to realize the economic benefits of a transportation network.38 Vorontsov also argued strongly and eloquently for the construction of railroads in the territory, foreseeing the leap forward they would give the empire's commerce and industry. In the spring of 1847 he sent a report, prepared by a Belgian engineer, to Count Kleinmikhel on the possibility of building a railroad from the capital to Odessa.39 A year later he wrote again to the head of the department of roads and communications to say it was "most annoying" to learn that the railroad project to Odessa had lost steam; he had urged the emperor to order a feasibility study for the line at least as far as Kremenchug.40 Vorontsov's urging appears to have had some effect, although new problems arose. Six months later, in March 1849,^ he wrote to Kleinmikhel from Tiflis of his distress upon learning that the chief engineer on the railroad feasibility study had died of a heart attack. He urged the high official to find an energetic replacement immediately, "since we now have the money and the approval to continue the study." He stressed the importance of the railway for New Russia's economic development, and the need to press forward. He even mentioned that the emperor himself had become so interested

115 Garden of the Empire

in the project that he was considering personally examining the land through which the line would run. But even Vorontsov could not overcome the inertia of the regime. In the summer of 1853 he wrote to Kleinmikhel again42 about the project, this time in despair that the project "of the greatest importance to the Empire, the construction of a railway from the Black to the Baltic seas to connect Moscow and St Petersburg with Kharkov and Southern Russia" was languishing. He had had expert advice from foreign entrepreneurs, such as Sir Charles Fox from England, on the incalculable importance of such a project for the prosperity of the empire in general and of New Russia in particular, an undertaking that would "immortalize the reign of our glorious Sovereign." He did not mention the crucial strategic role it could play in transporting military men and supplies to the theatre of the fast-approaching Crimean war, although armchair generals would perceive the deficiency after Russia's defeat. Word of Vorontsov's interest in railroads spread. In October 1856, in spite of the fact that he had retired from the position of governorgeneral of New Russia and indeed was on his deathbed, a certain Belgian engineer-entrepreneur by the name of Jean Demole wrote Vorontsov a letter describing a project to construct a railway from Odessa south into Bessarabia and asking for Vorontsov's support.43 Vorontsov died a few weeks later, presumably without having been able to do anything for M. Demole, but we can suppose that in his last moments he was pleased to know that others would carry his torch. St Petersburg, however, was not yet ready to make the huge capital investment. The empire, large and full of resources as it was, was chronically short of funds. It would take a shattering crisis like the Crimean War and a new generation of high officials, men who, like Vorontsov, understood the dynamics of risk and return, before the government would take what turned out to be a crucial step in the country's modernization. Fittingly, the man who would become one of the empire's most famous railway builders and promoters, Sergei Witte, spent his youth in Vorontsov's presence: in 1847 Vorontsov had recruited his father, Julius Witte, a respected and highly professional official in Saratov, to serve in his administration in Caucasia as the head of the Caucasian department of agriculture and mines.44 But actual construction of Vorontsov's pet scheme for a railway line to link Odessa and New Russia to St Petersburg and central Russia only followed in the decades after he left. Like railways, industry was slow to come to New Russia. Indeed, it was late coming to Old Russia. The empire did not have a proper "industrial revolution" until the second half of the nineteenth century.

116 New Russia

Vorontsov was one of those who helped to lay the groundwork for it. After visiting some smelly mineral springs in the Crimea, for example, reputedly an ancient source of curative mud for rheumatism and other maladies, he tried to find an entrepreneur to come in and set up a factory to bottle and sell the stuff.45 And almost single-handed Vorontsov inaugurated the methodical exploration and commercial exploitation of what would turn out to be one of the world's great coal deposits. "Progress to date in this field has exceeded even my previous expectations," wrote Vorontsov to Nicholas i in June 1842 after having made a personal tour of inspection of all sources of coal production in the territory. "From the very beginning of my administration here I have tried to discover the size and quality of the deposits of coal which we possess. I have repeatedly suggested and written, both to ministries and to local authorities, that the discovery of good quality, sizable coal deposits here would be, for the New Russian Territory as well as for the whole of Southern Russia, as valuable as the discovery of gold." Only in the last four or five years had those efforts paid off, only when peasants had been allowed to become amateur prospectors; now the experts had assayed New Russian coal and judged it to be among the best anthracite in the world. The extent and the rapidity of the recent coal discoveries, claimed Vorontsov, characteristically putting in a plug for small private enterprise, "shows us the necessity for allowing complete freedom for the original prospecting," though not, he admitted, for the subsequent exploitation. Left to their own devices, individual coal miners tended to make a mess of things. Later on, the help of government departments would obviously be necessary, "but the first discoveries will always be better and easier to produce by free enterprise." The economic importance of these discoveries was enormous, he advised the emperor; "everywhere, except perhaps in Odessa itself, the price of our native coal should fall below that of English coal, which until recently was the sole supplier of all our needs." Government departments and private individuals were everywhere turning from wood to this new source of heat and energy, which among other things promised to save the territory's rapidly diminishing forests. "In Odessa now all government stoves have been converted to coal, and in Rostov all private homes use nothing else." Furthermore, Vorontsov pointed out, beyond economic were important strategic implications: "we must not forget how important the coal industry is to England. Her trade in coal is considered the school and nursery of her navy." "Why then," he asked, "can we not hope for the same? Can we not increase our fleet, now so insignificant, on the Azov and Black seas with such a ready of supply of coal?"46

117 Garden of the Empire

A dozen years later, losing the Crimean War mainly because it was allowed to become a land war, the emperor would wish that he had heeded Vorontsov's advice. And Vorontsov typically had not let up with his pro-coal lobby. In November 1842 he sent a detailed report of the coal industry in New Russia to the minister of war, Alexander Chernyshev, with a glowing covering letter.47 By 1847 he was urging the exploitation of coal mining in both New Russia and Caucasia for an additional use: to fuel the new railways that would soon (he hoped) be lacing the empire together.48 The exploitation of New Russian coal deposits, particularly in the Donbas region, became the foundation for one of the world's great industrial complexes. Ironically, it was not the coal of Caucasia but its oil that would become another of the world's great industrial resources, but Vorontsov died some thirty years before that development took hold. Little or big, mud or coal, Vorontsov was ever eager to encourage enterprise.49 Fortunately for him he was not alone, although the occasional cock-crowing in his reports gives the impression that he thought he was. The reign of Nicholas i, covering the second quarter of the nineteenth century, was a period of rapid growth of the empire-wide economy. It was a time when many entrepreneurs started businesses, when something resembling a Russian business community began to emerge. Not only was there a strengthening of materialistic values in this period but, as a leading historian of modern Russia has pointed out, the newly emerging professionalized bureaucratic elite was beginning to see its mission "primarily as one of promoting economic progress."50 From a modem perspective, business and industry was the latchkey to the future. Nevertheless, the predominant occupation of the majority of New Russians remained agriculture, and would remain so for a long time to come. Vorontsov's economic promotion schemes did not ignore this area of life, fraught though it was with social problems, in particular the inefficient but traditional methods of working the land and sharing out its produce. We have seen already the keenness of his support for productive agricultural colonies. His efforts to limit and prevent the spread of serfdom in New Russia were perhaps based on moral concerns, yet they had a healthy impact on the agricultural production of traditional grains as well as new products. In 1835, he opened the great Exaltation of the Cross marketplace in Odessa.51 Designed to develop internal trade between Odessa and the interior provinces, it rapidly became one of the busiest, noisiest, most colourful markets in all the empire. He ordered the organization throughout the New Russian provinces of regular exhibitions of agricultural produce and livestock.52 He cocked his ear to reports of new labour-saving farm machinery. Like another famous enlightened

118 New Russia

gardener of his day, Thomas Jefferson, who until his death in 1826 used his estate at Monticello to experiment with new crops from around the world that might better fit the climate of Virginia than the traditional ones grown there,53 Vorontsov was continually ordering for New Russia new or hardier strains of plants and livestock, from tea and grapevines to silkworms and Merino sheep. He advocated increased investment in horse-raising, one of the territory's oldest and most famous industries.54 As a sort of public advertisement of New Russia's importance he had race-courses constructed in each of the provincial capitals. With prizes of two thousand roubles, horse-racing not only became a major amusement for New Russians but a real stimulus for the industry, boosting exports and doing much to improve the ancient stock of horseflesh.55 He established several experimental farms in the territory to test them in the New Russian climate, as well as to instruct agriculturists in improved methods of cultivation.56 A good gardener is concerned about appearances as well as productivity. Public gardens were laid out in all the major cities, imitating Odessa's famous botanical garden. Dusty Simferopol got not only a new garden but also a new and much needed water supply.57 In Odessa more parks were laid out, and cobblestones were installed on the main thoroughfares.58 In 1835 an English specialist, one Colonel Burnod, was contracted to investigate the possibilities of producing paving asphalt in the territory. Burnod examined the bituminous deposits on the eastern Kerch peninsula of the Crimea and declared them capable of producing "asphalte as good as Swiss or other imports."59 Vorontsov had to overcome what he termed the "indifference" of St Petersburg to commercial production,60 but eventually an asphalt laboratory and factory were constructed at Enikale under the colonel's direction. In 1839 he reported to Vorontsov that the factory had sent seventeen tons of finest quality asphalt to Odessa, where it was used to pave thirty-five yards along the front of the Hotel Richelieu, the terrace at General Naryshkin's house, and various other places. The quality of the asphalt, he boasted, was proved by the beautiful appearance of the paving.61 The many new buildings even more dramatically improved general appearances. Odessa, the capital, got most of the new construction.62 Situated atop limestone bluffs looking west and south out over the ever-changing seascape, well laid out according to a modern plan of a regular street grid and wide, tree-lined central avenues, the city was a perfect setting for impressive buildings. The archaeological museum built in 1825 was designed by the noted architect Boffo and situated at the end of the seafront. Thomas de Thomon, the architect

119 Garden of the Empire of St Isaac's Cathedral among other edifices in St Petersburg, was contracted to design a public building next to the museum. In 1827 Vorontsov had his own neo-classical palace, also designed by Boffo, built on the seafront too. He was so pleased that he contracted the same Boffo to design a grand stairway leading from the Odessa town plat down to the sea-wall. Finally opened in 1841, it became one of the most famous and most beautiful sights in Odessa: the Richelieu Steps (now called the Potemkin Steps), 192 steps of perfect proportions. Like all the new buildings in Odessa, they were constructed of stunning white blocks mined from the limestone strata lying beneath the city itself.63 Only the government or rich individuals could afford to build great new edifices. Vorontsov did not begrudge his own resources. In 1828, while his Odessa palace was still under construction, he hired the popular English architect Edward Blore to design his dream castle on the south coast of the Crimea at Alupka. Blore (1787-1879), a founder of the Royal Archaeological Institute, as architect to King William iv and to Queen Victoria completed the erection of Buckingham Palace. With Sir Walter Scott as his patron, Blore was the spirit behind the Gothic revival of the 18205 in England, completing nearly five thousand drawings, including one thousand of English and Scottish ecclesiastical architecture. The Moorish-Tudor-Gothic edifice he designed for Vorontsov would take twenty years to complete. For the work Vorontsov hired hundreds of masons, woodworkers, sculptors, and other craftsmen from abroad as well as locally, including some of his own serfs (to whom, however, he paid wages). Six great marble lions guarded the front entrance; five we should say, for the sixth, a masterpiece sculpted by the Italian V. Bonanni, was asleep. Making his dream come true cost Vorontsov undisclosed millions. A legend sprang up that when it was completed, he took the trunks full of bills and papers and burned them all so as not to leave history a sum total of his folly.64 The edifice, with its surrounding parks and seaside position, was breath-taking. Many today consider it the finest example of nineteenth-century architecture on Russian soil.65 Vorontsov foresaw that the Crimean south coast was destined to become the empire's most coveted vacation spot. He was tireless in trying, not without some success, to persuade some of his well-to-do fellow aristocrats to follow his example and build palaces of their own on the Crimean Riviera.66 In January 1839 he received the following enthusiastic letter from a visiting French horticulturist: "I can say that since 1805 I have not stopped travelling, and that I have seen a good many countries in Asia, Africa, and the whole of

120 New Russia

Europe, and yet I have not before found a land so interesting, so well situated, fertile, and suited for a whole assortment of foreign products, the moment one would wish to introduce them." His correspondent concluded by saying that the Crimea compared favourably to beautiful Italy, and that it was on its way to becoming "the garden of southern Russia."67 This was music to Vorontsov's ears. If the Crimea was to be the garden of southern Russia, New Russia would be the garden of the empire. Vorontsov had worked hard in his position of responsibility in the empire's spreading southern territory. He had satisfied his sovereign that he had done an excellent job in overseeing its settlement and development. He had now, by the early 18405, reached his sixties. It was time to retire to one of his magnificent residences, to enjoy life in this blessed land that he had helped to green, to pass the reins of administration on to someone else. He looked forward to it.

PART T H R E E

Caucasia

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CHAPTER TEN

The Territory

The emperor, as Benkendorf pointed out, had bestowed a remarkable favour on Vorontsov in allowing him to remain in service in the golden southern territory of New Russia for as long as he wished. The piper now had to be paid. In 1844, the emperor asked him to become his viceroy (namestnik) in scenic but troubled Caucasia, the mountainous territory lying to the south and east of New Russia. It was in the middle of a night near the end of November in 1844 that Vorontsov first received the emperor's summons. The exact date is unverifiable. His secretary recollected that was in December.1 But the emperor wrote the rescript on 17 November, and a courier on a personal and top-priority errand for the emperor, even in winter, could hardly have taken more than a week to cover the eleven hundred miles from St Petersburg to Odessa. Whatever the date, a royal courier bearing a personal message from the emperor awakened Vorontsov and his wife at their Odessa residence. He was invited to take over command of all Caucasian forces and to act as the emperor's all-powerful Caucasian viceroy. The emperor gave his reasons for his choice - "my unlimited trust ... your military exploits ... experience in civil matters ... flaming zeal for the state's interests" - and suggested that it ought to take Vorontsov only about three years to put things straight.2 Vorontsov was frankly appalled.3 His first reaction was to say no. Now sixty-two, practically blind from a progressive eye disorder, he was feeling generally worn out from his two decades of efforts as the governor-general of New Russia. Nevertheless, after some thought, and as Lise no doubt advised him, and as he later wrote his friend Ermolov, it was "impossible to refuse."4 He sent a message back by return courier: he had serious misgivings but, if the emperor's decision

124 Caucasia

remained firm, he had to accept. He asked only to be allowed to receive his instructions in person.5 Vorontsov, as we know, was not totally unfamiliar with Caucasia. He had served there as young officer under General Tsitsianov. But that had been a brief and very limited involvement. Now he was to return as the head of the entire Caucasian government, representing and answering to the Russian emperor. He had a great deal to learn about the territory: its history, how it came to be incorporated into the empire, how it had Tared under imperial rule for two generations. He would learn that Russia's first serious involvement in Caucasian affairs came during the reign of Catherine the Great when, in 1783, a treaty of friendship and mutual protection was signed with the kingdom of east Georgia. It would come as no surprise that it had occurred during her reign. Her reign was marked by incredible territorial expansion. Indeed, if Catherine deserves her tide of greatness, it is primarily because under her leadership Russia finally became a great empire, as powerful and as impressive as any West European state. Catherine herself supplied the drive, the intelligence, the charisma needed to assemble the energies and resources of a large collection of disparate peoples.6 Exuding new-found self-confidence, the ascendent Catherinian Russians started looking beyond their borders at weak neighbours. Their gaze was drawn southwards, seeking vantage points against the old Turkish and Persian empires, both now in serious decline. We have seen how Catherine's realm extended into New Russia, prying loose the Turkish fingers that grasped the north shore of the Black Sea, one by one until they lost their grip entirely. The ground to the east of New Russia, between the Black and the Caspian seas, then became the meeting ground of all three empires — Russian, Turkish, and Persian. Caucasia suddenly, dramatically, emerged from its ancient cocoon of neglect into that unfortunate and critical state called a power vacuum.7 Russia's primary motives for moving into Caucasia were thus the strategic considerations of an ambitious great power. The pull of Caucasia for Russia was not purely strategic, however. Another enticement for the burgeoning empire was the territory's economic potential. Caucasia sat at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, an enviable site for enterprising traders and merchants. It promised more warm sea ports on the Black Sea in addition to the ones being created in New Russia. Ancient legends spoke of the vast riches of gold, silver, and other minerals in the Caucasian mountains. A certain cultural magnetism was also at work. The Georgians were fellow Orthodox Christians, surrounded by Muslims,

125 The Territory

in need of a protector.8 These were all undoubted attractions, but it was the strategic vision of Russia standing astride the Caucasus range, a foot planted firmly in friendly Georgian soil, that put stars in the eyes of Catherine's imperial policy-makers. We have seen how General Tsitsianov set about conquering Caucasia, evidence of his own strategic viewpoint. He planted the Russian banner in eastern Georgia and rapidly extended military control across the isthmus, from the Caspian to the Black Sea. In doing so he extended Russian rule over many Caucasians who were not Georgians, not Orthodox Christians desiring protection. Some would, with justification, call it conquest. Therein lay the seeds of the thistle that germinated rapidly and later had to be grasped. To the Muslims of Caucasia, Russia represented a fundamentally alien culture. The more it pressured them to succumb to its soldiers and its tax-collectors, the more they determined to remain independent. Where Georgian Christians had previously felt surrounded by Muslims and had called to Christian Russia for protection, now the Muslim highlanders felt surrounded by Christians and were calling for the support of their powerful Muslim confreres to the south, their ancient protectors. To Russia, the ascendent empire, disobedient and refractory natives had to be neutralized, pacified, suppressed. It was purely a question of strategy. Vorontsov was fortunate to have seen the start of that militarydiplomatic process at first hand, for it gave him a perspective that he could not otherwise have had. Since that time, Caucasia had been hard on the Russian officials sent to administer it. It had destroyed the careers of men younger and more energetic than he. Nothing seemed to have gone smoothly for Russia there, least of all the military attempt to pacify the highland guerrillas. The more that the Russian soldiers pounded them, the stiffer their resistance. The terrain was a general's nightmare: narrow defiles where a handful of guerrillas could bottle up and even destroy an entire regiment, inaccessible mountain eyries where the enemy could apparently survive on stones and thin air. One of Nicholas's earliest acts as emperor had been to replace the doughty but distrusted General Alexei Ermolov with the unimaginative but reliable General Ivan Paskevich as chief of Caucasian military and civilian affairs. As luck would have it, both were old friends of Vorontsov's. They were also old enemies of each other. The replacement had not made them friendlier. Vorontsov knew both Ermolov and Paskevich from service dating back to the Danubian theatre in the Russo-Turkish conflict (1806-12). It is characteristic of the middle role that Vorontsov often played in

126 Caucasia

personal relationships that both should have considered Vorontsov a close and trustworthy friend but have been bitter enemies themselves. It was useful, however, since through his regular correspondence with them he could pick both their brains about the position he himself was to inherit in Caucasia. The three men had remarkably parallel careers. All three rose to generalship in military service against the Turks in 1810-11; all three distinguished themselves at Borodino and in the ensuing operations against Napoleonic forces; all three settled into service in non-Russian territories of the empire; all three, at one time or another, were given chief responsibility for Caucasia. The parallel between Vorontsov and Paskevich went even further: both were eventually raised to the dignity of prince as well as of field-marshal; as if that were not enough, they were exactly the same age and, even more remarkably, died in the same year (1856). In Caucasia, Paskevich had been successful in defining militarily, once and for all, the empire's border with Turkey and Persia. But he had failed, as much as had his erstwhile rival Ermolov, to quash the growing anti-Russian Murid guerrilla movement in the North Caucasian highlands, an area now completely within the borders of the empire. Nicholas became deeply disturbed. Until the highlands were pacified, all the trans-Caucasian territories remained at risk, vulnerable to renewed Persian or Turkish thrusts, rendering Paskevich's victories in Anatolian Turkey useless. Like most men of high responsibility but limited intelligence, Paskevich believed that only his intervention could achieve the desired solution. He intervened at every possible step. The threat to imperial security continued to grow as the "Paskevich plan" (really Nicholas's own plan) of outright conquest led instead to a war of attrition. In the mid-i83os a colourful and charismatic guerrilla leader, Shamil, had entered the stage. A Muslim imam, a native Avar highlander of great skill and daring, he had united a good many of the other highlanders into a fanatical band of holy warriors. Under his direction, which lasted altogether twenty-five years, the brushfire had become a conflagration. We still know little about the internal social dynamics of these isolated, unmodern, highland societies that were being thrust into the crucible of Russian, Persian, Turkish, and general European diplomacy.9 Vorontsov in 1845 obviously knew about the general threat that the rebellious highlanders posed to imperial security. For him as governor-general of New Russia, Caucasia had constituted his left flank. But he had had little specifically to do with the territory for the last forty years. Now he was faced with an extraor-

127 The Territory

dinarily challenging military confrontation, one that clearly could not be met by traditional means. Furthermore, as an administrator who appreciated an orderly system, he was in for a severe shock. For while earlier imperial officials in Caucasia had primarily viewed the situation within the strategic framework of military and diplomatic demands, increasingly they had had to deal with civilian problems. Like the problem of pacifying the inhabitants, these had also at times proved to be intractable. The administrative difficulties went back to 1801. Emperor Alexander i had promised then to preserve as much of the previous Georgian administration as possible, assuming that - at least for a time - the Russian administration could act as a general overseer while the system was gradually modified. But each particular Caucasian area had its traditional system of government; each was totally unfamiliar to the Russians. The emperor's promise forced the imperial administration into an untidy hodgepodge of ad hoc arrangements: special administrative districts; military districts, zones, and protectorates; even a road: the strategic Georgian Military Highway, threading the Daryal Pass through the often-hostile highlanders' territory, but of crucial importance since it was Russia's only reasonable communications link with its territories beyond the snow-capped mountains. Imperial administrators, deliberately and resignedly, allowed extensive elements of the previous internal administration of affairs to continue, calling them "temporary" and placing them under a tolerant Russian supervision. This procedure - for it cannot be called a policy - did not serve to expedite the gradual introduction of Russian imperial norms. On the contrary, it tended to make the temporary arrangements permanent. Even more than in New Russia, the heterogeneity of the loyal or at least pacific population of Georgians, Armenians, Azerbaijanis, and dozens of smaller ethnic groupings, each the product of a different culture, each fiercely proud, each brought into the empire under different conditions, caused an administrative muddle. Unlike other territories on the imperial periphery - New Russia, for example, or western Siberia - Caucasia could not be russianized by importing peasant settlers. Nor could the many different cultures be easily russianized, if at all. Some officials adopted a centralist approach, wanting in their frustration to solve the dilemma by introducing a thoroughly standardized administration. Most preferred to let well enough alone and follow the easy path of benign neglect.10 Caucasians could be forgiven for perceiving imperial policy as confused. Hindsight, however, reveals the significance of Paskevich's victories over the Turks in the late iSios. The threat of Shamil's rebellion

128 Caucasia

notwithstanding, those victories stabilized the international situation in this northwestern corner of the Middle East sufficiently to allow the Russian government to pay more attention to reorganizing the civilian administration of Caucasian affairs. The territory, or at least a significant portion of it, emerged from a primarily military jurisdiction.11 This civilian shift brought to a head an internal social problem that had started brewing the moment Russia annexed east Georgia in 1801. The old feudal state, as represented by the members of traditional Georgian aristocracy, was having to confront the new bureaucratic state, as represented by the imperial officials sent to administer the territory. It was losing out. The infamous Conspiracy of 1832, in which certain Georgian aristocrats attempted unsuccessfully to assassinate the leading imperial officials and re-establish Georgian independence, was its swan-song.12 Thenceforth, the Caucasian aristocracy rapidly accommodated itself to imperial rule. High officials both in St Petersburg and in Caucasia then proceeded to "regularize" Caucasian affairs by introducing an administrative structure corresponding more closely to that of the central provinces. At least that was the aim. A special temporary ministerial Committee for the Organization of the Trans-Caucasian Territory (soon officially referred to simply as the Caucasian committee) was established in 1833 to supervise proposals.13 In 1837 a special commission under Senator Baron P.V. Hahn (Gan in Russian) was struck to prepare detailed proposals for a new standardized, centralized structure.14 Baron G.V. Rozen, Paskevich's successor as administrator-in-chief of Caucasia, did not approve of Hahn's outlook, which was to standardize the Caucasian administration along strictly Russian lines. He preferred the gentler policy of allowing the slow evolution of Caucasian affairs. Unfortunately, his inability to contain, much less quell, the highland rebellion put him in a weak political position. During a personal tour of inspection of Caucasia in 1837, Nicholas was persuaded by Senator Hahn, just beginning his review of the Russian administration, that Rozen was to blame for the whole mess, administrative as well as military. Angrily, unfairly, the emperor dismissed the unfortunate Rozen. He was subsequently forced to retire from service in disgrace.15 Hahn's proposals were accepted by the Caucasian committee, then consisting of the ministers of war, finance, internal affairs, justice, and state domains, with Michael Pozen as its executive secretary.16 They were approved by the emperor on 10 April 1840^ and reorganization proceeded apace.18 At the same time the old temporary Caucasian committee was transformed into a new temporary Cauca-

129 The Territory

sian committee. The membership remained unchanged, although now it was officially given a chairman: the minister of war, Alexander Chernyshev.19 It was charged specifically with overseeing the introduction of the new administration. The task proved more difficult than anticipated. Disturbing reports of difficulties with the new Caucasian administration arrived in the capital late in 1841. A peasant rebellion broke out in the spring of that year in the old west Georgian country of Guria (later made a county of the province of Kutaisi). Local officials, including Russians, complained of an over-centralized, inflexible administration. Shamil took advantage of the general disorder to intensify the struggle in the highlands. It is said that the arrogant and self-important Hahn prepared his recommendations without going thoroughly into the details of the existing Caucasian administration. It was soon generally accepted that he had personally created a hopelessly unworkable structure by neglecting the basic differences between the administrative demands of Russia proper and the particular needs of Caucasia.10 He fell from power into disgrace, blasted by the emperor's fury.21 Hahn may have been impractical, may have put his own career above all else, may have been arrogant and overbearing." Yet to judge from his detailed accounts of the confused financial operations being conducted in Caucasia,23 it would be safer to surmise that he did not neglect those differences; rather, the deeper he went into them, the more he became convinced that nothing short of a complete overhaul would have the slightest beneficial effect. His fall is an instructive example of the snares and pitfalls that awaited unwary imperial servitors.24 An exasperated emperor ordered another detailed review of the Caucasian situation. The Caucasian committee promptly, in the spring of 1842, dispatched a subcommittee of two - chairman Chernyshev and secretary Pozen - to investigate.25 Both men were good examples of the highest government officials of Nicholas's reign.26 Conservative, loyal, pure instruments of the emperor's will, they had used their enormous influence skilfully and tenaciously to preserve the status quo and to avoid confronting problems that later observers (if few contemporaries) recognized as fundamental and vital.27 Their only aim and practical rule had been to please the emperor, because to do so meant to rise to or stay at the top. Those at the top controlled access to the emperor - the one person in theory who could consider fundamental revisions, the one person in practice who kept the system from changing. They concluded that the present administration was entirely unsat-

130 Caucasia

isfactory and required restructuring. Chernyshev advised turning over all higher posts in the Caucasian civilian administration to military officers. He wrote: But no territory can attain either the full development of its strengths or the desired degree of well-being without an administration that corresponds to the real needs of its inhabitants and is adapted to the morals, spiritual outlook, and customs of the people. The Russian position is based on strength, and until the entire population is quieted the civil government must necessarily be closely tied to the military ... As a conclusion to all these proposals the chief idea remains that from now on until the complete pacification of the territory, taking into account the militaristic attitudes of the local tribes here, their mores, customs, even their prejudices, it will be necessary for the present to entrust the highest posts in the trans-Caucasus, including civilian positions, primarily to military personnel.28

Pozen recommended giving more authority to the Caucasian High Commissioner (Kavkazskii Glavnoupravliaiushchii) by placing the whole area under the closer attention of the imperial government. Nicholas jotted several acerbic but approving remarks in the margins of their report, including a note to execute their various specific proposals. The report was read and discussed on 25 August 1842 in the committee of ministers and sent to the Caucasian committee "for the execution of the emperor's will."29 The result was yet another phoenix-like regeneration of the Caucasian committee in the summer of i842.3° The change this time was politically motivated. Pozen, as secretary of the preceding committee, shared responsibility with the now-out-of-favour Hahn for actually drafting the statutes; Chernyshev had been present when the proposals were accepted. Not wanting to share any blame for the failure of the "Hahn" statutes, they helped the committee to shed its skin.31 Positioned immediately above the committee was a new instrument of the imperial will: the Temporary Section of His Imperial Majesty's Own Chancery for Matters Concerning the Civil Administration of the Trans-Caucasian Territory, better known as the Sixth Section.32 The stated aim in setting up these two bodies, the Sixth Section and the Caucasian committee, was "to establish a solid structure of government in Caucasia as soon as possible, one that corresponds to the conditions of the territory and the real needs of its inhabitants." The raison d'etre was to give "more unity and speed" to the implementation of all Caucasian matters.33 Pozen, while remaining a member of the Caucasian committee, became the director of the Sixth Section. Its explicit purpose was

131 The Territory

to ensure the emperor's close personal supervision of Caucasian affairs. All matters concerning Caucasia - that is, those "not demanding new legislation but exceeding the authority of ministers and high commissioners who are in some way concerned with Caucasia"34 were still to be referred to the Caucasian committee, but closely monitored by the Sixth Section. Those requiring new legislation were to be referred to the section, which would prepare the legislation under the emperor's supervision and send it back to the Caucasian committee, either for final resolution or for preliminary review before being transmitted to the council of state. The section was fully staffed and ready for business by the end of October i842.35 Although the old Hahn structure was declared inadequate, the 1840 statutes were nevertheless allowed to stand. Despite their full review powers, Chernyshev and Pozen were content merely to allow temporary relaxations of the statutes to relieve the most obvious bottlenecks. Presumably it was a move to gain time. Over the following two years the Caucasian committee and the Sixth Section attempted to lay down ways of gradually extending a firmly regular provincial administration to all areas of the Caucasian administration. By November 1842 a law theoretically strengthening the powers of the Caucasian high commissioner was drafted and promulgated.36 Meanwhile, Rozen's replacement, General Golovin, had been equally unsuccessful in pacifying the highlanders. Russian casualties were rising alarmingly.37 So he was replaced as high commissioner by General A.I. Neidgardt; General Grabbe as chief-of-staff of Caucasian forces (subordinate to Neidgardt) by General V.O. Gurko. According to one contemporary observer, Caucasia did not gain by the change. "Neither Neidgardt nor Gurko knew anything about the territory. They came prejudiced against everything done in the transCaucasian territory before them but powerless to improve things."38 Over the two years from 1842 to 1844, Hahn's work was scrutinized in detail. Almost every area was found in need of restructuring. A "systematic plan of further investigation" was drawn up.39 Pozen and Chernyshev seemed to be satisfied that the situation was showing promise of improvement. But, as another observer with an evident penchant for the dramatic put it, "the trans-Caucasian territory, it appeared, had the power to destroy all reputations and all careers. Having destroyed Ermolov, Rozen, Golovin, Hahn, Grabbe, and a multitude of lesser-ranking persons, it soon saw to the ruination of Neidgardt and even of Pozen himself."40 As Vorontsov would be quick to perceive, the root of the problem lay in the ultimate desire of the highest government officials to keep control firmly in their offices and committees in St Petersburg. As

132 Caucasia Pozen had written in November 1842 to the minister of finance, Egor Kankrin, the emperor had agreed to the suggestion of the Caucasian committee "to treat all measures concerning the administration of the trans-Caucasian territory as experimental, not putting them into the form of permanent laws."41 Later, in a report on the activity of the Sixth Section and the Caucasian committee for the years 1842 to 1844, he wrote that the measures taken in St Petersburg had only "general aims and main features," leaving details to be decided by the local Caucasian authorities.42 But Caucasian problems needed Caucasian solutions. Therein lay the terrible dilemma that had faced the Russian imperial administration from the very beginning of its Caucasian adventure. This touches the central nerve of the Russian imperial system. Chernyshev and Pozen expressed a theoretical appreciation of the empire's cultural diversity; in practice they showed a fundamental preference for centralization and standardization. They believed in the power of extraordinary committees, set up above the regular institutions of government by the emperor's special fiat, to illuminate problematic areas of administration and to get around the unwieldy regular departments. The Caucasian committee and the Sixth Section, in the opinion of their respective chairmen, could achieve stability in Caucasia by means of super-centralization. In this instance, however, the emperor himself was not convinced. For two decades Nicholas had listened to the sanguine plans of his highest advisers for stabilizing the Caucasian situation. He had been forced to rely on his Caucasian committee. The latter had accepted Hahn's arguments about standardizing the civil government and had recommended applying his proposed reforms, but they had proved inadequate and Hahn himself had fallen into disgrace. Then Golovin had been replaced by Neidgardt. Chernyshev and Pozen, tinkering from the top, had declared everything to be progressing well, but nothing had actually changed. Neidgardt had been no more successful than his predecessors in suppressing the highlanders. In a report dated 28 July 1843 Nicholas read Neidgardt's opinion that it would take "not months but years" before there could be any real improvement. Neidgardt continued: "On the one hand one can see progress everywhere, but very slow; on the other hand, one can see the impossibility of moving fast or making sudden changes. The best thing now is to preserve peace and trust among the inhabitants ... These reasons to my sorrow convince me that Russia must yet for some time sacrifice her strengths and capital for the trans-Caucasian territory."43 Nicholas scribbled "very interesting" in pencil on the first page of the report. But it was a bitter pill for him to swallow. Hopes of

133 The Territory profiting from a stable Caucasian colony-cum-province were receding into the dim future. The stubborn rebellion of a handful of backward highlanders was unsettling. What was he to do? He needed to find a Russian bogatyr' (story-book hero) to save the day. In the autumn of 1844 he received Neidgardt's request to resign. He called upon a trusted general, D.A. Gershtentsveig,44 to serve as his new Caucasian commander-in-chief. Gershtentsveig (1790-1848) was a hero of the Napoleonic wars, a co-suppressor (with Paskevich) of the 1830-31 Polish uprising, and since 1835 the director of the few remaining military colonists in New Russia. He was in ill-health, however, and firmly declined the invitation.45 Nicholas's impatience increased. He would now go to any lengths to find someone who could take control. The military situation previously had seemed to demand a military figure. Perhaps the solution was to find a proven civil administrator instead. He lit upon the governor-general of New Russia, Count Vorontsov. Why had he not considered him earlier? Vorontsov was an ideal candidate. He had served brilliantly in New Russia. His particular interest in the economy had done much to improve the productivity of the territory. Odessa had emerged from insignificance to eminence as a great and thriving port, one of the empire's most important cities. The Crimea was blossoming again under his guardianship. At the same moment in 1842 that Chernyshev and Pozen had been reporting the patent and discouraging failure of imperial policies in Caucasia, Vorontsov had been submitting glowing reports of incredible success in New Russia. As for the task of ending the Murid war, Vorontsov had a creditable military record. Besides his military exploits in the Napoleonic campaigns, in 1828 he had commanded a special mission to capture Fort Varna deep in Turkish territory, which had helped to end the fighting with Turkey. After the fighting Vorontsov had congratulated the men occupying Fort Varna for their "glorious, excellent, and brave service" and for having "instilled terror in the Turkish empire," and returned to his post as governor-general of New Russia.46 For his role in the mission the emperor presented him with a ceremonial gold sword, inscribed with the words "For Bravery."47 Vorontsov, furthermore, had been regularly consulted and had proven his loyalty and devotion to duty in hundreds of ways. In 1844, at sixty-two, Vorontsov was unquestionably a senior statesman of the empire. On numerous occasions Nicholas had shown his deep appreciation for Vorontsov's service.48 While he had never joined the charmed circle of the emperor's closest confidants, he could certainly be called a close family friend. Thus, by November 1844, Nicholas had decided he must have

134 Caucasia

Vorontsov to correct the situation in Caucasia. Like Gershtentsveig, however, Vorontsov was ready for well-deserved retirement and likely to refuse the unenviable position. The emperor was prepared to go to great lengths to persuade him to accept. He decided to offer him the position not only of Caucasian commander-in-chief but also that of his "viceroy in the Caucasian territory with unlimited plenary powers [s neogranichennym polnomochiem]."49 The exalted position, though vague and undefined, could not practically be refused by a loyal servant of the tsar. And thus Vorontsov accepted. The entire fifty-year process of attempting to make the Caucasian territory part of the Russian empire had proved one thing: despite a general desire for cultural and social integration, there was no consistent, articulated Russian imperial policy, not across the empire, not even in one specific territory like Caucasia. Each different grouping was treated differently, and when Petersburg's plans failed, benign neglect reigned. The aim of the empire was no more than the empire itself.50 Conservative, traditionalist regimes, it has been pointed out, do not have ideologies, not in our modern sense.51 The emperor threw up his hands and, with a peculiar combination of desperation and inspiration, sent in a substitute for himself to work miracles. His exasperated command to set everything straight in Caucasia, militarily and administratively, once and for all, was impossible. The new position of Caucasian viceroy was a challenge indeed.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The Viceroyship: Theory

The term "viceroy" (namestnik) was sufficiently venerable in Russian history but in practice had been used only occasionally since Muscovite times. Peter Bartenev, noted editor and commentator writing in 1873, expressed the view that such powers as were eventually granted to Vorontsov had "never been granted anywhere in Russia up to this time; really only Potemkin under Catherine exercised such plenary powers."1 The only official who could formally claim the status of viceroy in 1844 was Paskevich, since 1832 the emperor's special viceroy for Polish affairs. Paskevich is particularly remembered for his ruthless policy of russification during his term in Poland, which began in 1831 when he arrived from Caucasia and continued until 1856.* A plot to assassinate him was uncovered in Warsaw in 1844 and thwarted.3 Paskevich's terms of reference were wide: he could report directly to the emperor, although certain matters, such as justice and education, were decided in St Petersburg. But Polish traditions, conditions, and the general situation vis-a-vis Russia were fundamentally different from those in Caucasia, and the situation could hardly have served as a precedent for setting up the Caucasian viceroyship. Officials might have also have referred to the imperial experience in Bessarabia in 1812-16, before Vorontsov's arrival, as a precedent to justify the creation of a viceroyship in Caucasia in 1842-44. Compare the "need" of both areas as expressed by the relevant St Petersburg officials: "an administration wisely adapted to customary laws, to habits, to traditions" (the special ministerial committee on Bessarabia in May i8i6),4 and "an administration that corresponds to the real needs of its inhabitants and is adapted to the morals, spiritual outlook, and customs of the people" (Chernyshev to Emperor Nicholas, ii August 1842).5

136 Caucasia

Furthermore, Vorontsov himself, as we have seen, had actually been a "viceroy" from 1823 to 1828, the "plenipotentiary viceroy of Bessarabia." But that area was of far less importance than Caucasia. Furthermore, Vorontsov's task there had been to include Bessarabia in the regular administration as quickly as possible and to eliminate its special position as a viceroyship, which, as we have seen, he did.6 But such comparisons were never made. None of the documents establishing the Caucasian viceroyship refers to imperial experience in either Poland or Bessarabia. Hence, when Nicholas said that he would make Vorontsov his personal viceroy in Caucasia, the term lacked proper definition. Otherwise the phrase "with unlimited plenary powers," which the emperor added to the title, would have been superfluous. Historians have suggested many reasons for Nicholas's creation of the viceroyship. Some have implied that it was because of the Gurian (west Georgian) peasant revolt in 18417 but the available documents do not make any reference to that as a reason. A Georgian historian went further than that, adding: "Such reforms [as Hahn had introduced] and policies of persecution and russification were ended only with the appointment of Prince Vorontsov as Caucasian viceroy in 1845. "8 Whether or not Vorontsov's viceroyship represents the end or the beginning of "russification," of course, depends entirely on how one defines that slippery term. Other historians have made a case for the need to suppress the highland rebellion as the primary impetus for creating the viceroyship.9 They may be correct in their assessment of the effect of the viceroyship in regard to the rebel highlanders: that because it removed the direct involvement of the St Petersburg bureaucrats in Caucasian affairs, it constituted a crucial step in their pacification; yet such reasoning was not expressed beforehand. The simplest reason of all for the creation of the viceroyship seems the most likely: that the emperor used it primarily to entice Vorontsov to the position without considering its long-term effects. After all, nearly all the Caucasian heads of government in the last half-century had also been commanders-in-chief of the Caucasian armed forces.10 Vorontsov as commander-in-chief of Caucasian forces would still have had the authority to deal with the rebels as he did. The real difference in military policy in Caucasia seems to stem from Vorontsov's personal military and administrative style. The significance of the viceroyship was that it gave him extraordinary civil powers to deal with the problem of the modernization of the peaceful majority of Caucasians: their integration into Russian imperial society. Although the decision to establish a Caucasian viceroyship was

137 The Viceroy ship: Theory

therefore sudden and unplanned, our historical sense nevertheless permits us to see it as a natural step. Ever since Emperor Paul i began it, the process of incorporating the Caucasian territory had been slow, costly, and complicated. If there was any pattern to the policy, it was to bring Caucasian affairs more and more directly under the emperor's personal supervision. From the start, the territory had been ruled by a high commissioner, or literally an "administrator in chief (glavnoupravliaiushchii), who had usually also been the territory's "commander in chief" (glavnokomanduiushchii). The vagueness of the title had reflected the vagueness of the chief officer's lines of authority. He had signified the rule of thumb for Russian imperial rulers, the pattern of actual practice: so long as a region remained quiet and secure, no one bothered much what went on inside it. Historically, over the long run, in so far as one can imagine a conservative, traditionalist, autocratic regime having an imperial "policy," the most consistent Russian policy was that of benign neglect. Under Ermolov, however, things had begun to get out of hand. The highlanders' insurrection had threatened the region's security. Paskevich, a more trusted servitor and closer to the emperor than Ermolov, had been sent in, but that had not helped. Then the Caucasian committee had been set up in the 18305. It had dealt only with Caucasian matters and, because it was composed of regular ministers, had deliberated under the emperor's very nose. Still the connection had not been secure. His advisers had tried tying the territory down with a "regular" Russian administrative net, but that had only seemed to worsen the situation. What intractable Caucasia required was a flexible structure. In the imperial system it was not standardization that mattered anyway, but centralization. A viceroyship could supply both centralization and flexibility. A viceroy would take the place of the emperor himself, working in conjunction with the emperor's special Caucasian committee, to ensure that he was directly informed from below and his will directly transmitted from above. One historian has also concluded that the change to a viceroyship in Caucasia was the result of a long process, but for different reasons. He writes of the "reinforcement, little by little," of the powers of the governor-general until the logical appointment of a viceroy in 1845." In fact such gradual reinforcement is conspicuously lacking over the years. Indeed, the development of the Caucasian administration, including the creation of the viceroyship, except for the general pattern we have suggested above, would seem to testify more to the diversity, the complexity, and the contradictoriness of Russian imperial rule than to its smooth evolution from "territorial,

138 Caucasia

regional principles" to "functional, linear principles."12 This even applies to the reform of 1883. It is true that in that year the viceroyship was removed, but it is also true that only twenty-two years later (in February I9O5)13 it was restored in toto and maintained until the fall of the imperial regime in February 1917, in tacit recognition of the impossibility of making such a unique, non-Russian territory an integral part of the regular imperial administrative system. The same historian has suggested that the removal of the viceroyship represented the fulfilment of the long-term goal of imperial policy "to abolish distinctions separating Russia proper from its frontier marches, a plan which began to be applied in the reign of Nicholas n."14 A more accurate conclusion would seem to be that the reinstatement and indeed defence of the Caucasian viceroyship (by Emperor Nicholas n) showed only that, beyond of course the general security of the empire, the government had no long-term imperial policies. The purpose of the empire was the empire itself - no less, but no more. Whatever the case, the implication, to Vorontsov, was clear. He was being offered an exceptionally powerful position in the administration, inferior to no other Russian official, enabled and expected to refer directly to the emperor himself. But he had to get his instructions in person in order to ensure his authority. In answer to his reluctant agreement Vorontsov received a second personal note from the emperor, dated 8 December. Nicholas was pleased with Vorontsov's "noble self-doubts" and especially his willingness to serve his emperor in spite of them. He was "even more convinced that My choice has fallen on one who is the most capable of comprehending and fulfilling My intentions." He reiterated his complete trust in Vorontsov, his great hopes for the future of Caucasia, and invited him to a personal audience to receive his instructions in detail, "the sooner the better."15 Vorontsov left the next day for St Petersburg, still filled with misgivings about not being up to the task.16 Like any other wellinformed person of the time he knew the frightful problems that the North Caucasian highlanders presented for Russian troops. Better than most he also knew the uncomfortable dilemma that had long confronted centralist administrators running the non-Russian Caucasian territory. His experiences in New Russia had made him instinctively seek instructions from the emperor in person. Caucasia was even further removed from the capital. The post from St Petersburg to Tiflis went only twice a week and took many days, sometimes weeks; even, in winter, months. If he was to stand a chance of success he had to secure an unassailable political base in St Petersburg. Vorontsov's

139 The Viceroy ship: Theory political instincts warned him to get his prerogatives - the enticing but dangerously vague authority of the emperor's "own viceroy with unlimited plenary powers" - spelled out as precise terms of reference, approved personally by the emperor, before he ventured upon his new post. He arrived in St Petersburg in the middle of January 1845. Chernyshev meanwhile had instructed all government departments to gather together relevant materials concerning Caucasia for Vorontsov on his arrival. He had also instructed Pozen to prepare a memorandum for Vorontsov reviewing all past and especially recent (since 1841) actions taken with regard to the organization of the Caucasian administration, including "present directions and future requirements."17 Pozen prepared an eighty-five-page memorandum as well as a draft of an imperial rescript that would grant Vorontsov his powers as Caucasian viceroy.18 The memorandum gave a brief history of the Russian administration in Caucasia since 1801. It concentrated on the 1840 Hahn reforms, the difficulties Golovin had encountered in attempting to apply them, and the review and corrective measures taken by Chernyshev and Pozen himself in 1843. Pozen stated that their priority had been "to quiet the territory" and to worry about longer-term reorganization later. Since then the "new" Caucasian committee and the Sixth Section had worked on the necessary reorganization and improvement. In Pozen's view, a satisfactory "systematic plan" had been drawn up outlining the future development of the Caucasian administration. Areas designated as needing attention "to meet the special needs of the territory and its inhabitants" were policing, the definition of Caucasian social classes (particularly the native aristocracy - an old and continuing bone of contention, ever since 1801, when the Russian government had promised that Georgian aristocrats would share the rights and privileges of Russian aristocrats), finances, justice (including a codification of local laws and customs), and education. There was no mention of the role of a viceroy in the reorganization. Most telling was Pozen's draft of the new viceroy's powers. It granted him essentially the same powers that previous Caucasian high commissioners had exercised, whereby his decisions would be subject to ratification by the ministers or, if the matter stood outside their jurisdiction, by the Caucasian committee and the Sixth Section. Pozen, clearly, had no intention of letting responsibility for Caucasian matters slip from his hands. He sent the memorandum and draft rescript to Vorontsov upon his arrival.19 By 23 January, Vorontsov had read the papers and noted the changes that he wished to see in the rescript. Essentially he

140 Caucasia

wanted broader executive powers for the viceroy than Pozen had allowed. He indicated his willingness to discuss the changes with Chernyshev and instructed his personal secretary, Michael Shcherbinin, to show Pozen his proposals. Let us narrow our focus for a moment and reconstruct the events of the next few days in some detail. It is a fine illustration of the crucial play of politics in the statutory creation of the viceroyship. On Wednesday morning, 24 January, Shcherbinin showed Pozen Vorontsov's proposed changes. Pozen apparently remarked that Vorontsov wished to arrogate to himself royal authority. Shcherbinin responded by referring to the emperor's words that Vorontsov was to be the emperor's own viceroy with unlimited plenary powers. Pozen may well have been referring specifically to the fact that Vorontsov had neglected (inadvertently, as it turned out) to state that matters requiring new legislation would have to be referred to the emperor. To the loyal Shcherbinin, however, the remark indicated resentment at Vorontsov's being given autonomous administrative authority. He gave his report of the conversation to Vorontsov later in the day, no doubt slightly coloured to discredit Pozen. He told his chief that, in his opinion, he (Vorontsov) should ensure that his authority as Caucasian viceroy was entirely clear before he left the capital; otherwise he would encounter "the greatest difficulties and obstacles to fulfilling your obligations to obey the emperor's will." Vorontsov needed no prompting.20 He happened to have been invited to dine with the emperor that evening. During dinner he informed Nicholas of his difficulties with Pozen. The emperor instructed Vorontsov to demand a full explanation from Pozen in Chernyshev's presence.21 He also informed Vorontsov that it was his continuing intention to grant him full plenary powers as viceroy.22 The following morning, 2,5 January, Vorontsov invited Chernyshev, Pozen, and Shcherbinin to a meeting at his residence. Confronted with Shcherbinin's story, Pozen denied that he had said what had been attributed to him. Shcherbinin stuck to his version. Vorontsov asked Chernyshev to settle the matter. Pozen finally declared that he was placed in an impossible position and would be unable to act effectively in his role as head of Sixth Section. He excused himself from the meeting and went home. There he wrote a letter officially resigning from both the Sixth Section and the Caucasian committee, as well as service altogether, which he forwarded to Chernyshev.23 Pozen had held a senior position in the war ministry since 1829,24 almost as long as Chernyshev had been the war minister (since

141 The Viceroy ship: Theory

1828). But survival, not loyalty, was the key to imperial politics. Chernyshev at this juncture recognized that he had to choose between Vorontsov and Pozen. He knew instinctively that the former would be a better political ally than the latter and so abandoned his erstwhile comrade-in-arms. He sent the letter of resignation on to the emperor with his approval. If Pozen hoped the emperor would refuse his resignation, he was rudely disappointed. As one contemporary observer of the contest remarked, Pozen could now only be seen "either as an opponent of the famous Vorontsov, who stood at that time in the eyes of both the government and the public at the highest rung of civil greatness, or as ungrateful for everything that he, Pozen, had achieved up to this time by the grace of the emperor; and ungratefulness in the mind and heart of Emperor Nicholas was the blackest of all sins." The emperor accepted the resignation, and Pozen was summarily retired from service for good. He was no match for Vorontsov. The same observer remarked that the conflict had been inevitable, fostered by jealousy between Vorontsov's clique of subordinates and Pozen. He also noted that the latter had managed throughout his career to antagonize half the civil service so that, as far as many officials were concerned, engineering the powerful Pozen's removal from office was Vorontsov's greatest service to his country.25 The way was now clear for Vorontsov to arrange the viceroyship to suit himself. He and Chernyshev together agreed on a final draft of the viceroy's rights for the emperor to sign.26 That same afternoon (25 January) Chernyshev wrote a long explanatory letter to the emperor accompanying the draft, explaining clearly the nature of Vorontsov's request.27 He carefully pointed out to the emperor the implications of the draft. The viceroy would hold ministerial authority, able to interpret and decide on the spot all affairs concerning the administration of the Caucasian territory without being subject to ratification by any ministers (except in a regular review of the empire's finances by the minister of finance). He could refer directly to the emperor, or indirectly to him through the chairman of the Caucasian committee (Chernyshev), in matters involving proposals for new legislation. This need to refer legislative matters to the emperor was the missing item that the unfortunate Pozen had pointed out in Vorontsov's earliest draft of the viceroy's powers. Vorontsov recognized the accuracy of Pozen's observation and corrected the draft, even though political considerations had required the elimination of a "potentially dangerous rival."28 The viceroy would also have his military authority extended to all Russian military activity in northern Caucasia known as the "Cau-

142 Caucasia

casian Oblast'," including the strategic Caucasian military line. This was vital to Vorontsov in light of the emperor's command to pacify the Caucasian Highlanders. Chernyshev's support of the project might seem surprising, but the existence of a powerful Caucasian viceroy did not threaten his authority as it did Pozen's. Although Vorontsov would be in charge of Caucasian military affairs virtually on a par with Minister of War Chernyshev, in practice Vorontsov would be forced to run Caucasian affairs in close communication and co-operation with Chairman of the Caucasian Committee Chernyshev. Chernyshev apparently prided himself on the way he had handled Caucasian affairs over the last decade and a half. As Ermolov wrote to Vorontsov: "The minister of war profits by all this; he even says that Georgian affairs have rested in his hands for fifteen years and that he can with justice boast that up to your appointment as viceroy he administered them splendidly!"29 From now on he could take credit for Vorontsov's successes, if any, but none of his failures. We might also expect that other high officials would have objected to the obvious decentralization of affairs that the Caucasian viceroyship represented. We know, for example, that Count L.A. Perovsky, minister of the interior from 1841 to 1852, was in favour of rapidly introducing Russian institutions into all the non-Russian parts of the empire.30 Even the powerful minister of the interior, however, had to step aside when the autocrat made up his mind to do something. The business was concluded with remarkable dispatch. The same afternoon Nicholas approved the draft in all its details. Before evening Chernyshev delivered to Vorontsov the final draft of the rescript defining his extraordinary powers. He included a letter indicating the emperor's tentative approval and his decision to settle the matter finally with Vorontsov and the whole Caucasian committee the following Saturday, 29 January.31 The meeting took place as scheduled in the presence of Vorontsov and the emperor, with the notable absence of Pozen. The rescript became final.32 Nicholas gave his official approval on 30 January, and copies of both the rescript and the minutes were sent to all ministers and other high officials.33 At some point during the next few days the decision was made to abolish the Sixth Section, replacing it with a chancery within the Caucasian committee.34 It is not clear whether or not abolition of the section was Vorontsov's idea, but it would seem plausible.35 In the absence of the section's erstwhile director, no voice was raised in protest. Its staff of fourteen officials and fourteen clerks was assigned either to the Caucasian committee or to various other departments.36

143 The Viceroy ship: Theory

The rescript of 30 January 1845 thus established Vorontsov's enormous and extraordinary authority as the emperor's Caucasian viceroy. As we might expect, however, the document constituted a personal, not an institutional, delegation of imperial authority: "Count Mikhail Semenovich!" it read. "All those matters which in the previously existing order have been referred by the chief authority of the Trans-Caucasian Territory to the decision of the ministers are henceforth delegated to you to decide on the spot"37 - that is, not to the Caucasian viceroy but to Vorontsov personally. The rescript's conclusion left no room to misunderstand the reason for the delegation of such extraordinary authority: "Having thus delegated to you every means to apply with complete authority your indefatigable activity and long-term experience in matters of state administration for the benefit of the territory entrusted to you, I am sure that your actions in this new field will likewise be accompanied by those same successes with which up to now your lengthy service to crown and to country has always been distinguished."38 One historian has implied that the emperor established the viceroyship as a permanent position, with Vorontsov simply the first to occupy the post.39 It seems clear, however, that at this stage the emperor intended the position to continue only so long as Vorontsov himself occupied it. For the moment the exceptional authority of the Caucasian viceroy was temporary, tied to the activity of one man alone. St Petersburg society lionized this singular man, the viceroy. Shortly after the announcement of the creation of the viceroyship on 6 February 1845, a party was given in his honour at the exclusive English Club in St Petersburg. Two hundred distinguished guests subscribed to make it a glittering affair. I.N. Skobelev toasted the guest of honour as a "worthy successor in the glorious tradition of bogatyry." An old club member, N.F. Plautin, gave another toast, in \vhich he mentioned that in view of Vorontsov's "difficult labours" in previous service and his advanced age, he deserved "public thanks" for agreeing to the monarch's request to continue his service in Caucasia, to which Vorontsov replied that he did not deserve the acclaim; he was only doing his duty by obeying the emperor's command. An account of the celebration, including these remarks, was sent to a Moscow journal, the Russkii Invalid. It was caught by the censors and landed on the emperor's desk. Nicholas read it and exclaimed in pencil in the margin, next to Plautin's remarks: "Absolutely improper. Only I can thank someone, no one else." And next to Vorontsov's reply: "Sensible Russian answer, befitting the Count

144 Caucasia

- a real servant of the Tsar." Needless to say, the account was not published as intended.40 Vorontsov's admirers might have been tempted to think that it had been his success and popularity among southern Russians that had qualified him for the position of viceroy.41 They were clearly wrong. One historian has recently stated that Nicholas i chose Vorontsov to be his Caucasian viceroy because he was primarily a "convinced monarchist and zealous promoter of the colonizing policies of the autocracy."4* While the label of zealous colonizer is an over-simplification, the observation that Vorontsov was a "convinced monarchist" is accurate. It was the crucial factor in his being chosen. As he wrote to his friend Ermolov in Moscow, whom he would visit on his way back to Odessa, "I am given complete freedom, and that is necessary. The Tsar has not denied me anything. God grant that I can fulfil his trust. Without his [the emperor's] support I cannot hope to succeed in anything."43 As we shall see, Vorontsov eventually managed to institutionalize the viceroyship so that the position could be handed on to succeeding officials. Nevertheless, his position as one of the emperor's special favourites remained a crucial factor in his use of the viceroyship as an instrument of imperial rule. No amount of favouritism, however, would have allowed Vorontsov in far-off Caucasia to keep his special status vis-a-vis the emperor. He would be situated nearly two thousand difficult, frequently impassable miles away. Petersburg officialdom would have had no difficulty in choking off his link to the sovereign. The viceroy had to have a spokesman in the capital, a close, fully co-operative, powerful colleague to act as his alter ego. Vorontsov had found such an advocate in Chernyshev. He assiduously cultivated the working partnership. It, too, became a major ingredient of Vorontsov's successful application of theory to practice as viceroy of Caucasia. Chernyshev's career, like Paskevich's, also showed a strong parallel to Vorontsov's. Both Chernyshev and Vorontsov distinguished themselves in the Napoleonic wars; both applied their efforts at several points in their careers to the administration of non-Russian (or non-central) areas of the empire; both settled into civilian careers and achieved considerable political influence. In 1845 both were in their sixties; both were in their fifth decade of imperial service; both could count themselves among the empire's senior officials, senior favourites of the emperor. Indeed, a close comparison of the careers of Vorontsov, Chernyshev, Paskevich, and Ermolov too would be an interesting and useful historical investigation into the history of the Russian empire: all four contemporaries were distinguished products

145 The Viceroyship: Theory of the Napoleonic wars; all four were intimately connected at various times with Caucasia; all four were, in different ways to be sure, architects of the Russian empire. Even before Vorontsov took up his duties in Caucasia, Chernyshev demonstrated his dedication to the mutually beneficial partnership. In mid-February, just after Vorontsov left the capital, Chernyshev secured the emperor's approval for the Caucasian committee to review all recent Caucasian matters to decide, in the light of Vorontsov's new powers, whether or not they should be referred to the viceroy for reconsideration.44 Chernyshev also wrote to all ministers and other high officials to inform them of this; also that under the new law of 3 February i84545 the Sixth Section had been replaced by the chancery of the Caucasian committee.46 He curtly informed the minister of finance, P.P. Vronchenko, in future to send Caucasian material to him "as chairman of the Caucasian committee - not as minister of war."47 And in the spring and summer of 1845, while Vorontsov was fully occupied leading a "final" military campaign against Shamil's highlanders, Chernyshev continued to defend the viceroy's interests successfully - and, moreover, the precedence of the Caucasian committee over the committee of ministers.48 The symbiosis between the two officials was complete. Vorontsov was fully equipped for his extraordinary undertaking. Chernyshev would do everything in his power to satisfy the emperor that the new arrangement was the best possible long-term system for ruling Caucasia. On the eve of Vorontsov's "final campaign" into the mountains, for example, Chernyshev prepared for Nicholas an interesting report. (He had just read, as if by coincidence, an article about Algeria in a French journal.) He entitled it "A Comparative Survey of the Administrations of the French in Algeria and Ours in the Trans-Caucasus." He wrote that "for a time the trans-Caucasian territory was viewed as a colony, although only in financial matters. At the present time this view has completely changed." One of the chief reasons, he continued, was that decisions of the French high commission in Algeria had to be referred to Paris, whereas decisions of the Caucasian high commission (the highest body of Caucasian government, immediately under the viceroy) were "confirmed by the Caucasian viceroy."49 The emperor had brought the viceroyship into existence, but two of his senior officials had wrought it to suit themselves. Whatever the outcome of the immediate campaign, the empire in its Caucasian reaches would be well served.

CHAPTER TWELVE

The Viceroyship: Practice

Early in the spring of 1845 Vorontsov left Odessa for Caucasia. Lise stayed behind, waiting to join him when he had the situation sufficiently under control. Crowds of Odessans turned out to line the boulevard from his mansion to wave good-bye to their much admired and respected governor-general. Although he was not resigning his post, it was understood that in practice his new position in Caucasia would demand all his attention. They were celebrating an extraordinary period of modernization in the life of southern Russia, which in their minds was directly associated with his rule.1 In Caucasia, his first task was to lead a large and "final" military campaign against Shamil and his highland rebels. Vorontsov had advised against such a campaign. Even though he had not been in the territory recently, his Caucasian experience had taught him long ago that Russia would never be able to crush the spirit of the highland peoples of Caucasia. Nor were grand military campaigns his style. Though he knew that imperial success depended ultimately on military might, he preferred the diplomatic touch. The emperor, however, remained impatient and inflexible, adamant that one final, crushing blow be delivered in order to establish his authority throughout Caucasia. Rather than travel the Georgian military highway through the Daryal Pass, still choked with snow and anyway liable to guerrilla attack, Vorontsov made his way from Odessa by boat along the bold eastern shore of the Black Sea. He inspected various strategic sites on the coast to assess the possibility of tightening the interception of Turkish supplies being smuggled to Murid highlanders in the mountain fastnesses of Chechnia and Daghestan. He landed at the fortified harbour of Poti and travelled inland through the west Geor-

147 The Viceroyship: Practice gian lands of Mingrelia (Samegrelo) and Imereti. On 22 March he reached the east Georgian capital of Tiflis, the centre of the Caucasian administration.2 The Russian army was demoralized. The last few years had seen a series of futile Russian military expeditions into the mountains, a string of victories for Shamil's followers, mounting Russian casualties.3 Vorontsov's appointment was calculated to raise the army's spirit. It did just that. One Russian officer recorded in his memoirs the impression created by Vorontsov's arrival: We all hoped and waited anxiously for something that would raise our low spirits. These wishes were finally answered by the news of the appointment of Count Michael Vorontsov as the commander-in-chief of the Caucasian army ... In Caucasia the news of his appointment produced a tremendous impression. The army hailed the hero of Craonne and of so many other battles deliriously; the old Georgians greeted him who as a young man had fought by their sides during Tsitsianov's glorious victories; commerce and industry believed they saw the opening of a new era with the intercourse that would be established between New Russia and the Caucasian provinces; the Caucasian Russians counted on being delivered from direct dependence on Petersburg, which was the object of their never-ending complaints and which created for them a situation little in agreement with their frondeur spirit, their ideas of liberty, of emancipation, and of opposition to everything that they themselves did not originate. Such an attitude is pronounced in that land; it seems to come down from the mountains. One breathes it with the air in the bosom of such a free and grandiose nature. The Moslem peoples of Caucasia, for their part, were not ignorant of the fact that Count Michael Vorontsov had proven himself the unceasing champion and protector of their brothers, the Crimean Tatars. The enemy himself became affected and awaited with curiosity his advent, about which only the newsmongers in the bazaars of the towns, auls, and stanitsas knew anything. In fact, everyone, and the lower classes most of all, welcomed Vorontsov as the idol of the people of Asia, the man who combined an immense fortune with almighty power ... Never had Tiflis seen such a courteous greeting, nor beheld more goodness and kindness combined with such majesty in the person of the all-powerful sardar [commander].4 Vorontsov remained in Tiflis for a month, making preparations for the great campaign. A few others might have shared his personal doubts about the wisdom of it. To most it was a time of mounting excitement and anticipation.5 The armies marched in May. The campaign dragged on through June and into July. The further they penetrated Shamil's territory in

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the mountain fastnesses of Chechnia, the slower they moved. Fighting was sporadic: no outright pitched battles, isolated daring exploits, some previous Murid strongholds captured, but nothing conclusive. At least Vorontsov had lost nothing of his old charisma before his soldiers on the field of battle. In the admittedly overdone account by one of his loyal officers, Count Vorontsov displayed extraordinary energy; he exhibited that sort of authority that excites, electrifies, and sweeps one along, an authority that only superior men ever attain, one that imposes itself on the many, bowed humbly as if to an irresistible charm. Never was Count Vorontsov more handsome than in those moments when many of us would catch ourselves despairing of the army's safety. It was enough to look at him to recover new strength and to face the danger cheerfully, for he always regarded danger with a calm and serene eye. So few tents remained, preserved by a few leaders, that the enemy could easily count their number. Count Vorontsov had his own tent set up on the camp's most exposed point so that the enemy might freely choose it as their target. After three days the area all around it had been torn up by bullets. On the morning of the iyth [of July] the Count made a tour of the outposts to show himself to all the troops and to thank them for their gallantry. He made this tour on his white horse at a walk in order to be recognized by everyone, his own men as well as the enemy. As he passed in front of the troops they presented arms and welcomed him with fanfares and cheers repeated a thousand times; they were only interrupted from time to time by the report of enemy artillery which did not fail to follow the Count with its bullets and grenades throughout the two hours of his military promenade. Rarely have I seen such a thrilling sight.6

Finally, in August, after being lured by Shamil into a trap at Dargo from which he only barely managed to escape after terrible losses of men and equipment, Vorontsov called off the campaign and returned to Tiflis. Except for the apparently miraculous fact that he was not killed in the fighting, the campaign was a dismal failure. That Vorontsov emerged personally unscathed may have been less a miracle than a deliberate act on Shamil's part, who would have scored an untold triumph against the tsar by capturing his viceroy alive and holding him for bargain or ridicule or both.7 Some good came from it. Vorontsov won extraordinary personal loyalty from the army, the more because it was well known that he had tried to persuade the emperor not to go through with it. True to his penchant for glasnost', he had introduced during the campaign the novelty of writing dispatches from the front for publication in newspapers in St Petersburg and Tiflis.8 It proved to be

149 The Viceroy ship: Practice

popular so long as the campaign continued. But now that it was over, in spite of Vorontsov's enhanced personal standing, the previously heightened expectations of the officers and troops sank to a new low. Shamil's followers were elated - though not as elated, it must be said, as if the mighty Vorontsov had been killed or (much better) captured. Wishing to save face, Nicholas declared himself satisfied with the results ("You have completely justified my expectations") and raised Vorontsov to the hereditable dignity of "prince of the empire" as a reward for his "exemplary service to Crown and Country."9 More important, he tacitly recognized his mistake and allowed Vorontsov henceforth to pursue the struggle against the highlanders in his own fashion. Vorontsov, back in his element, responded. He moved to change a half-century of military policy. He abandoned grand campaigns in favour of a cordon sanitaire, a gradual strangulation of the resistance by isolating strategically chosen villages and areas from Shamil's command. Although he did undertake various other military actions, such as the campaign to capture the village of Salty in the summer of 1847,10 they tended to be limited to specific targets, and the aim was to negotiate with and pacify rather than destroy the highland insurrectionists." Instead of confronting the rebels with force, Vorontsov used diplomacy, including economic enticements, to drive a wedge between the rebel leaders and more and more of their supporting highland population. He won considerable influence among the "pacified" Daghestanis and other highlanders by cleverly restoring to traditional tribal leaders the proprietary and social rights that Shamil and his Murid leaders had removed in their fanatical drive to build a political fighting unit.12 The new strategy was applied gradually but consistently over the next few years of Vorontsov's administration. It took a lot of the glory out of the Russian effort. It also limited the gore. It greatly reduced the casualties on both sides and gradually lessened tensions. The Crimean War intervened in 1853-54 and afforded Shamil a brief respite, but it is significant that his influence had already waned so far that he was unable to contribute to the Allies' war effort. All Russia's available Caucasian resources could be diverted to the larger effort. When peace was restored in 1856, it took only three years before Shamil was finally forced to surrender at the village of Gunib on 25 August 1859. He was removed to St Petersburg and treated well but forbidden to return to his native land. Although highland rebels would appear sporadically thereafter, the threat from the Russian point of view was over. Vorontsov's flamboyant and ambitious successor in Caucasia, Gen-

150 Caucasia

eral Alexander Bariatinsky (viceroy from 1856 to 1862), would manage to restore some of the drama to military operations there. There has been some dispute about why he was able to effect ShamiTs capitulation so speedily. Some contemporary observers believed it was because he allowed the army to revert to a more direct confrontation with the rebels.13 Others claimed it was the effect of a decade and a half of Vorontsov's policies of cordon sanitaire.14 A modern historian has suggested that Shamil was finally defeated because of the new and superior rifles issued to Russian troops after the Crimean War.15 Another has maintained that the key to the Russians' success over the highlanders lay in the reorganization of the Caucasian army: vertically, along territorial lines, replacing the traditional horizontal approach, that is, according to the order of battle. The same historian has asserted that the guiding genius behind this reorganization, which dramatically increased the efficiency of the army in Caucasia at least in terms of its cost, was the new chief of staff for 1856-61: General Dmitry Miliutin.16 From the point of view of the emperor, and indeed most Russians, the throttling of the highland rebellion alone justified the creation of the viceroyship. Vorontsov, however, was concerned with more than the establishment of military dominion over Caucasia. He wanted to reform the Caucasian administration. He aimed to apply some of his New Russian medicine to improve life in this spectacular but isolated and rather neglected corner of the empire. The first matter was to test the power of his viceroyship. The rescript of 30 January 1845 constituted enabling legislation. He soon discovered that it needed refinement in its application to Caucasian reality. The problem was not just the "scoundrels aplenty" that he discovered in the Caucasian civil service.17 After his experience in New Russia he expected as much. Rather, it was the problem, foreseen but as yet undefined, of exercising complete executive control over all branches of the imperial administration in Caucasia. In September he arranged another audience with the emperor, this time in SebastopoP during an imperial tour of the Crimea.18 Nicholas once again expressed his utter confidence in Vorontsov. It was reaffirmed that in all matters he had a free hand - free from the interference of St Petersburg officials. Ermolov conveyed to his friend the "personal highest praise" of Tsarevich Alexander for Vorontsov and his activity.19 Rearmed, Vorontsov applied himself to further delineation of the viceroy's authority. In December he informed Chernyshev that unforeseen problems had arisen since his arrival. Having to do with the relationship between the viceroy and the emperor's ministers, "they

151 The Viceroy ship: Practice

should best be settled now, in detail," he wrote, "in order to avoid future difficulties and not to waste time." He outlined his proposals.10 The first point reflected his increased awareness of the crucial importance for the viceroyship of his partnership with Chernyshev. Normal procedure, asserted Vorontsov, should be for the viceroy to refer any question he was unable to decide, for whatever reasons, to the chairman of the Caucasian committee. The chairman should then be able to decide whether to take the matter directly to the emperor, to seek the opinions of the ministers, or to submit it to his committee for review. (This would not, however, prevent the viceroy from writing for advice directly to the emperor, or his ministers, if he considered it necessary or useful.)21 Vorontsov's second point reiterated the need to remove absolutely Caucasian affairs from ministerial purview. Referring to the rescript of 30 January 1845 which bespoke a grant of ministerial authority, he proposed that the viceroy "may refer to ministers if he feels it is necessary; not even for temporary measures must the Caucasian viceroy refer to ministers for anything." Ministers should be required to circulate to the viceroy directives about matters relating to the whole empire, and the viceroy would try "if he deems it possible" to apply them to his territory, informing the chairman of the Caucasian committee about the application, but "without exception the Caucasian viceroy is not required to accept the decision of ministers in any matters." Vorontsov provided examples of the sorts of problems that had arisen: confiscation of goods at customs, public prosecutions, appeals to decisions of the Caucasian High Commission, even the right of review and control of the territory's expenses "except in the largest questions of the finances of the whole empire."22 His third point re-emphasized the fact that the viceroyship had its own imperial foundation, set firmly in the capital. Any request from ministries or other departments for details of Caucasian affairs could only be relayed to the viceroy through the chairman of the Caucasian committee, and then only after detailed discussions with him. This included even the "most general questions" demanded by the ministry of finance for its empire-wide, overall budgeting operations.23 Bold proposals, but Vorontsov knew that he must have it his way if he was ever to set the Caucasian administration on its feet. He justified the necessity for thus defining these "extraordinary powers" of the Caucasian viceroy primarily on the basis of expediency. Caucasia was far removed from the capital: "Obligatory, constant reference to a place thousands of versts away, where local [Caucasian] conditions and details are not understood, will only hurt the rapid and correct course of business, and thus the best interests of our

152 Caucasia

August Monarch." Vorontsov concluded his report on a personal note to Chernyshev: an expression of his hope and expectation that much could and would be settled through regular correspondence between the two of them.14 His hopes were not misplaced. Chernyshev received Vorontsov's report on Christmas Eve 1845. Precisely one week later, on New Year's Eve, he made his own report to the emperor. He said that on his advice and that of the heir-apparent, Tsarevich Alexander, Vorontsov had spelled out proposals to establish precisely relations between the viceroy and the ministers. Chernyshev, for his part, agreed with Vorontsov's idea of excluding ministers from exercising any direct influence in the Caucasian territory. He added that "such indeed was my opinion in 1842 at the time of my survey and review of the Trans-Caucasian territory."25 This was misleading. At the time Chernyshev had made no such suggestion, merely that all higher government positions should be entrusted to military officers. But by now he too had become fully committed to the autonomous nature of the viceroyship. He especially appreciated his crucial role in ensuring that autonomy. He attached for the emperor's approval a draft of a statute that he had prepared incorporating Vorontsov's suggestions.26 Nicholas approved the draft on 6 January 1846 with only slight changes. He further specified details of the territory and included the cis-Caucasian territory within the viceroy's domain. The statute, entitled Regulations Regarding the Terms of Office of the Caucasian Viceroy, was entered into the books. Six hundred copies were printed and distributed to government offices.27 One aspect of the statute deserves emphasis. The rescript of 30 January 1845 had granted Vorontsov personally the powers of the Caucasian viceroy. The statute of 6 January 1846, the Regulations, institutionalized the position. Vorontsov is nowhere mentioned by name. This was no casual slip of the pen. It meant that Nicholas, taskmaster, was finally satisfied that at least one of his extraordinary institutions of corrective administration was operating effectively. Vorontsov, characteristically, did not wait to hear from Chernyshev whether or not the emperor had accepted his proposals.28 He had found the civil engineers in Caucasia lax. As he wrote to his friend Ermolov: "I have absolutely been plagued by chaos in all possible matters, both things being committed and things being neglected, ... and [by] terrible abuses in various areas, among others in the engineering office [of the department of communications]."29 He had asked the local engineers to undertake certain bridge repairs and a general review of all means of communications in the Caucasian

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territory, but had been told that he had to await approval from St Petersburg. He launched a campaign to bring local engineering projects under his control. He wrote to Chernyshev of "the great hindrance to the progress of this work in having to refer to the high commissioner of the department of communications in St Petersburg regarding all details." He requested authority over the department's Caucasian office.30 The result demonstrated the efficiency of his remarkable partnership with Chernyshev, who responded immediately to allay Vorontsov's concerns. The day after receiving the viceroy's letter, he wrote back to say that he had shown the letter to the emperor, that authority over the communications department's Caucasian office had already been granted under the general authority of the recently promulgated Regulations, that the emperor had agreed to the drafting of another statute that delineated that authority in every precise detail, and that General Kleinmikhel, the high commissioner of the communications department, had been instructed to see to the immediate transfer of all Caucasian operations to Vorontsov's authority.31 Vorontsov, however, still was not completely satisfied. He voiced to Chernyshev his objections to some of the terms of the transfer affecting his authority. According to the statute delineating his authority over the communications department, the viceroy was required to refer to its high commissioner any questions that might exceed his authority as viceroy.32 This, objected Vorontsov, contradicted his given terms of office as stated in paragraph four of the Regulations: in all cases where matters exceeded his authority, unless he approached the emperor directly, he received the emperor's decision only through the chairman of the Caucasian committee. He wrote about the matter to Chernyshev "so that you may explain the necessity of my being able to fulfil exactly the imperially confirmed'regulations of my terms of office."33 Chernyshev probably sighed loudly, but he had contracted to back the viceroy completely. In the treacherous world of the imperial officialdom, loyalty had significant rewards. Once again he acted to preserve and consolidate Vorontsov's jealously guarded autonomy, and the high commissioner of communications was firmly slotted below the viceroy in the imperial pecking order.34 In the massive but carefully regulated bureaucracy, any significant realignment of the wheels inevitably required dozens of alterations further along in the administrative machinery. One of the new statutes, for example, outlined the viceroy's relationship with the ministry of state domains. The minister, Count Pavel Kiselev, was only too happy to slough off Caucasian business. He suggested with enthusiasm that

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all his ministry's Caucasian affairs be turned over to the viceroy. Let the latter set up a Caucasian office of state domains, let him prepare his own budget, let him deal with all the problems of settlements on Caucasian crown lands, with the collection and payment of monies for surveying the lands of state-owned, peasants, with the maintenance and administration of their famine relief fund. It would be a headache removed.35 But again, this was not Vorontsov's intent. He replied that this would be going too far: he did not wish to have to prepare budget estimates and conduct the review of that ministry's Caucasian finances. Those operations belonged to the ministers in the capital. Though he might rank as their equal, he was nevertheless only the executive supervisor of centrally determined imperial policies.36 This distinction between procedural and policy authority became clearer when Vorontsov asked Chernyshev to spell out precisely how he should submit the accounts of his newly detached Caucasian departments to the government inspectorate, the empire's bookkeeper. Rearranging matters took the patient Chernyshev several months and frequent and detailed communications with the inspectorate and the ministry of finance. First he had to locate all the connections, then carefully sever the old links, and finally forge new ones. Nicholas's officials were not unfamiliar with this sort of artificial operation. The emperor was well known for setting up extraordinary executive bodies that cut across and even sought to cut out the regular bureaucracy. The departments of his own "chancellery" were the best examples. Confronted with the idea that the emperor had established an autonomous viceroyship, the officials of the finance ministry, like those in state domains, at first appeared willing to turn over complete financial responsibility for Caucasian affairs to the viceroy. To a man of closer horizons, and Russia's imperial experience had seen many power-hungry, self-serving officials in the past, the offer of such virtually unlimited power would have been tempting. But Vorontsov was not after personal power. Nor was the viceroyship meant to be a satrapy, despite Caucasia's historical membership in the despotic world of the Orient. Indeed, if the empire had a mission in Vorontsov's eyes, it was to demonstrate to the peoples of the Orient that Russia was a civilizing power. In this instance he wanted executive authority over Caucasian finances, but not the power to set budgets or otherwise determine financial policy.37 Meeting the viceroy's requirements essentially meant that the treasury had to work out a method of preparing the overall budget for Caucasian expenses and of keeping track of Caucasian accounts in

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St Petersburg, while allowing the viceroy to control the actual outlay of funds in Caucasia. The system was a complicated hybrid and sat unhappily with many St Petersburg officials.38 In the end, though, Vorontsov had his way, thanks to the consistent support of his spokesman in the capital, Chernyshev. A statute promulgated in December 1846 settled the exact relations between the viceroy and the ministry of finance. All communications and directives - and monies - from the ministry had to go through the viceroy, to whom all finance ministry officials in Caucasia were responsible. In the context of a general accounting of the empire's finances, however, the inspectorate had direct access to all the Caucasian books.39 We can begin now to perceive the outlines of Vorontsov's outlook as a mature imperial administrator. Despite his emphasis on the viceroyal authority, he did not wish merely to create a miniature St Petersburg in Tiflis. He believed strongly that the raison d'etre of the viceroyship was to make the imperial government in Caucasia more effective. This he proposed to do by channelling all operations of the imperial administration through the viceroy. He did not hesitate, of course, to use his personal relationship with the emperor to further his ends, which both happened to believe were also the territory's ends. In January 1845 ne had dinner with the emperor and thereby ensured that he got the authority he wanted for the viceroy. In September 1845 he met the emperor in Sebastopol to secure a personal reaffirmation of his support. In the summer of 1849 he met the emperor in Warsaw where every evening for a week the two played cards together, exchanging gossip but also information about imperial affairs in Caucasia.40 And in September 1850 he entertained the heir-apparent on a visit to Caucasia, using the occasion to secure additional funds for road building as well as the more general benefits of future imperial support.41 The future Alexander n got the full treatment, including a great party thrown for him by the world's greatest party-givers, the Georgian aristocrats. He was impressed by Tiflis and by the "fascinating mixture of European and Asiatic peoples." For the Caucasians' part, Vorontsov wrote that the royal visit "left the most precious memoires in the breasts of all the inhabitants, who were universally captivated by the courteousness and friendliness of our charming prince"42 - money in the bank for Caucasia for the next generation. Yet this intercession with the sovereign will was only Vorontsov's style of statesmanship. Ultimately he wanted to integrate Caucasia into the imperial system. By having financial accountability kept in the capital, integration of the residue of the Caucasian administration could be carried out gradually and much more effectively later on.

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Some of the residue of the former administration might still appear to be, in Vorontsov's words, "chaos,"43 but there was no doubt that in his view the extraordinary authority of the Caucasian viceroy as it now stood could gradually and finally bring stability to the entire Caucasian situation. It did not take Vorontsov long to discover that the root of this chaos, the major obstacle to smooth administration, was the legacy of Senator Hahn's over-zealous reforms of 1841. In his attempt to solve the problem of irregularities in the administration by eliminating them, Hahn had divided the entire territory into two provinces: the Caucasian province (guberniia) in the east and the Caspian region (oblasf) in the west, lumping all areas under Russian control into one or the other. Russian style, he had divided each province into counties (uezdy), each county into rural sectors (uchastki). In each province he had set up departments to carry out the directives of the ministries in St Petersburg. The departments had offices in each county, and at the bottom of the neat hierarchical chain a "police official" (politseiskii chinovnik), it was intended, would execute departmental orders and refer problems back to the proper superior. All officials, in Hahn's system, were required to be Russian, meting out justice in Russian according to Russian law and procedures.44 Traditional native administrators had been ousted and scores of Russian officials imported to fill the new positions. Attempts to execute the reforms had produced a howl of protest throughout the land and, according to one historian, inspired several riots.45 The outcry had also led to the Chernyshev-Pozen investigation. Those two officials shelved most of Hahn's reforms by temporarily restoring various old offices and practices under special military districts or "inspectorates" supervised by staff officers. Superfluous Russian officials were freed to go back to Russia, although many appear to have preferred to remain in Caucasia. In Tiflis, it was reported to Vorontsov, some enterprising ex-clerks were causing trouble for the government by freelancing. In a new Caucasian version of public service they were selling, to natives mystified by Russian regulations and procedures, their expertise in drawing up official petitions.46 The St Petersburg officials in the Caucasian committee and the Sixth Section, as we have seen, had been in the middle of deciding what to do with the shelved Hahn reforms when Emperor Nicholas had cut the Gordian knot with the sword of the viceroyship. The problem of reorganizing the administration was dumped squarely into Vorontsov's lap. Not one to procrastinate, Vorontsov began by breaking up Hahn's unwieldy territorial divisions, showing in the process his diplomatic touch. The "Caucasian province," essentially Georgia, was redivided into its two traditional parts: Kutaisi province,

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corresponding to western Georgia (the three traditional principalities of Imereti, Mingrelia, and Guria); and Tiflis province, corresponding to eastern Georgia (the two traditional principalities of Kakheti and Kartli). The "Caspian region" Vorontsov redivided into Derbent, Shemakha, and Erevan provinces, which corresponded to the traditional divisions among the Daghestani, Azerbaijani, and Armenian peoples. Within the provinces, many of the counties were redrawn to correspond more closely to traditional territorial units.47 At a stroke Vorontsov accomplished two important objectives. First, he effectively re-established order and respect for the administration by restoring territorial integrity to traditional groupings of Caucasians. At least for the moment this re-dra wing of administrative boundaries removed a major source of anti-Russian feeling. Hahn's reforms had created much bitterness among Armenians by quashing their hopes for a restoration of greater Armenia; Vorontsov's re-establishment of an Armenian province revived their hopes and won him popularity.48 It is not clear from Vorontsov's writings whether or not he perceived the threat that a strong Armenian (or any other Caucasian) nationalism must ultimately pose to the integrity of the empire. Even if he did, his actions made it clear he believed that a Russian imperialism that sought diplomatically and from within - "organically," some would call it - to russianize non-Russians was a possible path to a peaceful future for all the peoples of the empire. The second accomplishment constituted a subtle step towards russianizing the natives. The new Caucasian provinces were named in the Russian manner, after their capital cities: Province of Tiflis for east Georgia, Province of Erevan for Armenia. It ended a deference to traditional territorial autonomy that even Hahn's reforms had preserved. It was hoped that Caucasians would gradually start thinking of themselves as provincials in an integrated state rather than as subject peoples within an empire. Vorontsov preferred a quiet and gradual russianization. The holusbolus but superficial imposition of Russian-looking forms were not for him, or for the non-Russians over whom he had been put in authority. He threw out the strictly hierarchical structure that Hahn had outlined for each province, replacing it with a simpler and less centralized scheme. In place of the separate departments of civil and criminal justice in each provincial county, for example, he instituted "provincial courts" (gubernskie sudy) for each of the now much smaller provinces. He reserved a proportion of the seats on each court for Caucasians who could demonstrate a knowledge of local traditions as well as an ability to speak Russian. This was welcomed everywhere, particularly in eastern, Muslim regions. Before Hahn's reforms, Caucasian cases had been tried by courts

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martial in all areas except eastern Georgia.49 Now cases were referred to the provincial court by county justice boards consisting of appointed Russian officials and native assistants elected by the county's aristocratic inhabitants. The court's decisions were subject to the approval of the provincial governor. The latter could, if he wished, refer them to the central Council of the Caucasian High Commission (Sovet glavnogo upravleniia kavkazskogo kraia), which served as the Caucasian court of appeal. It was chaired by the viceroy's deputy, the Chief Authority of the Civil Administration. Its membership consisted of most of Vorontsov's top officials and advisers.50 Advisory boards to provincial governors had been set up all over the empire since Alexander i's regional reforms. They allowed governors to govern with the aid of civil servants who had specialized training and expertise. Vorontsov in Caucasia, both with his provincial boards and with his viceroyal chancery and council, was taking advantage of this new administrative instrument that had made the whole imperial administrative machinery run more smoothly.51 For executive action, he took advantage of his viceroyal powers to set up a board (pravlenie) in each province with broad executive responsibility for matters formerly assigned to ministerial departments. Provincial board directors were members of the newly enlarged Chancery of the Caucasian Viceroy, which became the chief Caucasian executive body, also chaired by the viceroy's deputy.52 On 30 November 1845 Vorontsov wrote Chernyshev to say, typically, that he would prefer a smaller staff for his chancery than that proposed but with higher salaries for each: he had found he could get more work done with fewer but better assistants and clerks.53 Vorontsov had his way. He was officially granted permission on 10 February 1846 to establish a chancery of the Caucasian viceroy of seventy-two officials with a budget of 53,675 roubles per year for salaries.54 At the same time he substantially reduced the size of other chanceries (such as the chancery for the Caucasian high commission). The exercise brought more business directly under the eye of the viceroy, not unlike His Imperial Majesty's own chancery in the capital. The viceroy's chancery met regularly. Any matters that required further deliberation were referred to the viceroy's central council. The council could refer matters to the viceroy, who finally appealed to the emperor if he felt he could not make a decision himself.55 The members of this council appear to have been enthusiastic about their responsibilities. As one member wrote in his memoirs, "What was best of all was that we were responsible to no one, since all decisions of the council were executed merely by the approval of the viceroy."56

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Vorontsov's ulterior motive was to make the viceroy only the emperor's supervisor of the Caucasian section of his empire, to integrate the local administration into the larger structure. He was after the institutional authority of a viceroyship, not the personal authority of a viceroy. Regarding educational matters, for example, on Vorontsov's urging a law was promulgated removing jurisdiction over educational matters and institutions in Caucasia from the Khar'kov educational district, subordinating them entirely to the Caucasian viceroy. He then set up a Caucasian school board to see to the special problems of education in the territory, as the board in Khar'kov could not possibly had done.57 In a practical sense, however, certainly in the eyes of his subordinates, he had merely replaced the St Petersburg government with the Tiflis government. Local matters were decided without reference to the capital. The viceroy had become the emperor's surrogate. The members of his council and his chancery, both Russians and Caucasians, had with the viceroy's support become the driving force behind the Caucasian system, much the way the imperial administration was driven by the emperor's will acting through his chanceries, his committees, his ministries. A senior Russian bureaucracy with an evident sense of professionalism was just starting to emerge during Nicholas's reign, the result more of the exigencies of modernization than of Nicholas personally. Vorontsov had managed to engender a relatively businesslike or "systematic"58 attitude among his officials too. Persons who served in high positions under him often later expressed in memoirs a strong awareness of the professionalism that Vorontsov, for one, expected from his officials.59

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The Viceroy Himself

It is hard to judge the extent to which Vorontsov's "imperial dynamism" in Caucasia depended on his personal administrative style. Going by the memoirs of those who worked close to him, the influence of his personality was all-important, just as it had been in his administration of New Russia. The person closest to Vorontsov in an official capacity during the Caucasian years, his constant companion and general confidant, was his private secretary, the youthful Prince Alexander DondukovKorsakov. Although the latter was sharply critical of certain sides of the aging Vorontsov's character and personality, he remained nevertheless a great admirer of the viceroy and made every attempt to give a fair and reasonable account of what it was about Vorontsov's modus operandi that made him such an effective administrator.1 Three or four years after writing his memoirs about service under Vorontsov, Dondukov-Korsakov was appointed Caucasian viceroy himself. First of all, Vorontsov was a champion of local habits, customs, traditions. In Caucasia, he was particularly fond of the Georgians and their culture. Dondukov-Korsakov even suggested (although he was not specific) that, towards the end of his rule as viceroy, Vorontsov went to extremes by supporting the interests of certain Georgian persons and families to the exclusion of more general concerns, even compromising his earlier passion for Georgians as a whole.2 This support for local peculiarities engendered complaints, spoken and unspoken, from Russian bureaucrats who thought all procedures in the Russian empire should be standardized. For many Caucasians, however, it was electrifying. Secondly, he had the alert sort of mind, even when nearing seventy, that kept him on top of things going on in the world around him. He daily devoured and digested the news from St

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Petersburg and from abroad, read aloud to him because of his very poor eyesight. Like many blind or near-blind people, he had an excellent memory. He was able, so we are told by his personal secretary, to stop in the middle of dictating a complicated diplomatic letter to deal with some other piece of business and resume dictation even hours later exactly where he had left off. He could remember the smallest details long after hearing a document read. Much more important, Vorontsov demonstrated a wide and practical mind, even when he did not know all the details of a particular matter. He had the enviable trait of being able to cut through extraneous matter to go straight to the heart of an issue. His thinking, in Prince DondukovKorsakov's opinion, usually shed new light on the matter at hand and "often changetd] one's original opinions and convictions: the best proof of the governmental mind of Prince Vorontsov."3 Thirdly, he was eminently accessible. This trait was perhaps the most important in gaining Caucasians' trust. His unfailing courteousness, an apparent sympathy for each interviewee, exercised an immense charm. He stood in utter contrast to "all those formal, unapproachable officials who try to hide their shallowness with the formalities and dignities of office," wrote Dondukov-Korsakov. He was even polite and charming to those he disliked. DondukovKorsakov recounted how he noticed Vorontsov being excessively polite to General Beliavsky, the military governor of Kutaisi province in 1848, even though he privately considered him a stuffed shirt and a tactless Imbecile. When Dondukov-Korsakov remarked that such comportment seemed to verge on purposeful dissimulation, the viceroy replied, "You're too young. You'll learn sooner or later." The memoirist went on to suggest that it was Vorontsov's constitutional inability to endure emotional scenes that accounted for his extraordinary self-control. "You could only detect the prince's irritation by a slight trembling of his voice, a certain grimace of his mouth, a slight narrowing of his eyes - but never by his spoken words." Some people naturally mistook his extreme politeness for agreement and later accused him of not keeping his promises.4 It was natural for an old man to think of himself, to want to be left in peace, and Vorontsov was no exception, but he managed to hide it from nearly everyone. To the very end of his life he was polite and attentive to every visitor. Last, he had a gift for winning the loyalty and affection of those who worked closely with him, his assistants. He was fair and generous, appreciative of initiative, quick to reward outstanding service whether military, diplomatic, or strictly administrative. He attracted to his service an interesting coterie of assistants. Some were grizzled,

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hard-bitten veterans of the Caucasian experience, glad to see a leader who meant business and had influence in St Petersburg. His most conspicuous assistants were the scions of aristocratic Russian families, looking for excitement and adventure, drawn to his service by his name and his reputation.5 Even in old age, Vorontsov was indulgent and permissive with his flock. "For the younger persons around him and those closest to him, one could not imagine a milder, more attentive, or a better chief," remembered Dondukov-Korsakov. Their youthful carousing around Tiflis until the wee hours only amused him. Once, having been woken up by some of Dondukov-Korsakov's friends who had hired a group of musicians to enliven their partying in the square outside the viceroy's palace, Vorontsov, instead of shooing them angrily away as one might have expected an elderly and very important man to do, merely smiled and remarked to Giovanni, his valet: "Thank God my youngsters know how to enjoy themselves." Another time, for fun, they frightened the wits out of the cowardly Dr Andreevsky, Vorontsov's personal physician, who had accompanied the viceroy on a mountain expedition against Hadji Murat. His tormentors slashed his tent and strewed grenade fragments over the bed when he was out. The poor doctor, when he saw his apparent brush with death, after a few moments of shock developed something of a hero's swagger. Vorontsov was vastly amused, but feigned concern and never let on to the doctor that he knew it was a practical joke. Dondukov-Korsakov, who was in on the joke if not its instigator, wrote that years later in retirement Dr Andreevsky proudly showed him the fragments and told him how, but for the luck of his being out of the tent at the moment, he would have been killed for sure. Dondukov-Korsakov had the sense not to spoil the old man's illusions. The viceroy disliked undue seriousness in young people, feeling that if they worked hard they had a right to play hard. He even enjoyed listening to the stories of their love affairs. When they needed help in their personal lives, he immediately came to their aid "with the delicacy of a genuine grand seigneur!'6 The easy charm that Vorontsov displayed to the outside world, however, was beguiling. He was deeply and chillingly sceptical of human nature, if we are to believe Dondukov-Korsakov, who attributed it to keen disappointments in his younger days. He vigorously defended the right of every person to his chosen faith. In 1816, for example, he wrote to his sister Catherine, approving of her recent conversion to Church of England from Russian Orthodoxy for reasons of personal conviction. "I cannot believe there can be any difference in God's eyes between such and such a sort of the Christian religion."

163 The Viceroy Himself He went on to state, "I believe few people have more respect for true religion than I have."7 As governor-general of New Russia he defended the rights of Jews and sectarians to their religious views, so long as they fulfilled their civilian obligations. And in multi-confessional Caucasia he was a consistent protector of religion. Yet he himself, to his wife's great distress, was only a nominal Christian. Dondukov-Korsakov attributed this "lack of religious feeling," which he found both embarrassing and distressing, to an "education in Voltairean convictions." He recalled how once during Lent, just before Good Friday, Lise and her close friend, the Princess Choiseuil, were so touched in church by a lesson about Christ's terrible suffering that they both broke down in tears. Vorontsov's method of comforting them was to say to them, "Consolez-vous, mes enfants, peut-etre que tout cela n'est pas vrai," which naturally made the princess weep all the more inconsolably.8 In his private life Vorontsov was rigidly methodical, coldly efficient. Though it was surely his systematic nature that allowed him to get the viceroyship up and running in such a short time, people often joked about it. In Tiflis one could, it was said, set one's clock by the regularity of the viceroy's daily activities. By Dondukov-Korsakov's reports, Vorontsov began his iron schedule at 7:00 a.m., having the newspapers and journals read to him and dictating letters. At 8:30 he had breakfast with whomever of his family was around (including his secretary), for which he always had "two eggs with English toast." At 9:00 sharp he was back in his study receiving reports, dictating his own reports and letters, and hearing petitioners, which activities continued 'without break until the afternoon. At 2:00 p.m. Jim, his English groom, would come in to inquire which horse the viceroy would be riding that day, and by 3:00, rain or shine, unless there was an extraordinary crush of business, he was off for his daily exercise on horseback. He was sometimes accompanied by Jim or a cossack, sometimes by his wife the vicereine, if she was in Tiflis: for Princess Vorontsova did not care for the climate, preferring the cosmopolitanism of Odessa or the salubrious Crimean air at Alupka. Sometimes he rode alone. By 6:00 in the evening he was back in the viceroy's palace, changed and impatiently awaiting dinner.9 Shcherbinin, his former private secretary, used to joke that having such a formidable constitution as Vorontsov's was not worth it if it meant one had to starve as he did for sixty years.10 Vorontsov was methodical about his dinner, too. The soup he often ate with a spoon in each hand. The main course was usually roast beef with "English" (roast?) potatoes. And until he finished everything he did not speak to or appreciate being spoken to by

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anyone, though there were usually ten to twenty guests present. Though he drank only water, guests were served excellent wines: Georgian reds from Kakheti, sparkling Crimean champagne from his vineyard at Alupka. After dinner, guests were served brandy. Vorontsov would have one glass of a very special, very old sherry, which he had inherited from his grandfather and which he never shared since there was not much left in his cellar. Over coffee in the great parlour Vorontsov would smoke one Spanish cigarillo. He never touched his work in the evening. He once confided to Dondukov-Korsakov that he had a rule for healthy living: rise early, take exercise during the day, and always avoid business during the evening: "It can brutalize one and turn one into a chinovnik [bureaucrat]." At 8:00 p.m. precisely he would sit down to play preference, whist, or hombre with his wife, if she was there, and other regular partners. At n:oo he took one cup of tea. And at the stroke of midnight he would rise from the card table and retire to bed. A day in the life of a methodical man. This is not to say that Vorontsov was entirely devoid of human passion, if we can put any faith in a story about him that circulated in Tiflis a short time after his arrival. It was recounted by the famous Russian storyteller Nikolai Leskov (d. 1895), who claimed to have heard it from someone who had heard it first hand. In other words, it is gossip, but nevertheless it has a ring of truth. It relates to his oenological interests. It seems that Vorontsov, shortly after he took up residence in Tiflis, decided to have some French Tokay varietal grapevines planted experimentally in a vineyard near Tiflis. A professional Hungarian grape-grower named Csesenyi arrived to tend the transplants. He brought along his young, blond, and beautiful wife Irma. Vorontsov, interested as usual in learning about Western technology, befriended the foreign couple. His wife being absent at the time, he asked Irma Csesenyi to take on the duties of entertainment hostess. She did so happily and, apparently, with style and grace. Before long, the old grape-grower, her husband, died suddenly, the result, it was said, of drinking too much Georgian wine too fast. The distraught widow considered returning home. The viceroy in kindly fashion persuaded her to stay. He generously offered her the use of the "Arabian pavilion," a guest-house on the grounds of his Tiflis mansion. "Regulating his own life as well as that of those closest to him with the accuracy of an infallible chronometer," as Leskov wrote that his confidant expressed it, Vorontsov fell into the habit of meeting the young lady on the terrace at seven o'clock every evening, where he smoked his evening cigar and comforted

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her in her grief. As Leskov told it, Vorontsov did not comfort with words so much as with tender, soul-warming gazes. It was soon noticed that on Sundays, and occasionally on Thursdays, Vorontsov went inside the widow's little house. The door was closed and the orange silk curtains of the bedroom drawn. Guests were soon complimenting Irma on her new emerald necklace. According to Leskov's source, Irma was not only "tall, wellshaped, and generously endowed by nature" but also very fit. She enjoyed riding horseback, so Vorontsov instructed Jim, the groom, to give her the pick of his mounts. He had a Hungarian uniform of velvet and silver made for her, which apparently showed off her shapely legs. With her matching silver spurs she became a familiar sight around Tiflis. For protection she was accompanied by one of Vorontsov's twelve young well-bred adjutants. The source of Leskov's story was actually one of these fortunate souls, although not, it seems, the luckiest. Irma's favorite escort was Baron Richard "Richard the Lion-Hearted" to his jealous comrades. He had been banished from the capital for an unknown, or at least unmentioned, scandal. Scandal seems to have plagued the unfortunate baron's steps. One day he found himself removed from Vorontsov's entourage and quick-marched off to the front. Leskov's witness, inquiring of Irma if she knew the reason for the baron's unexpected departure, was shocked by an abusive and unladylike outburst from the lady directed at Vorontsov. The viceroy, she fumed, had no feelings. He was hard as a stone and treated her like a thing instead of a woman. One day recently, she related, she had been in her house with Baron Richard. She happened to be naked. "Vorontsov likes me that way, too," she said. The baron was similarly disposed. In a departure from his normal schedule, for it was neither Sunday nor Thursday, Vorontsov happened to walk into the house. The bedroom door opened, and the reclining couple were badly startled by Vorontsov's voice saying "Cornet, you are not in uniform." Vorontsov went back outside, said Irma, and, though it was not his usual time, smoked a cigar while waiting for her gallant to appear. The latter was sent away summarily. She said that Vorontsov apologized for having disturbed her but still punished Richard too severely. "He treats me just like a cup," she complained. The tale has a happy ending. Irma stayed on in the viceroy's pavilion until Vorontsov's death. She received fifty thousand roubles from his will, married his ex-valet, and with the money and her new husband opened a hotel in the old town of Feodosia in the Crimea.11

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Vorontsov's well-organized private world was obviously important to him. He was firm and demanding in making sure things went his way, a tyrant of his domain. In public it was quite the other way. He detested crowds; they made him nervous and constrained. Much to his wife's disappointment, he assiduously avoided parties and other large non-official gatherings. Yet in an intimate gathering of friends he became open and expansive. He loved to recount his past experiences, particularly amusing ones, especially at the expense of pompous and foolish bureaucrats he had known. He was a good listener too, and liked nothing better than the stories and jokes of his close friends.12 Our memoirist obviously cherished those remembered intimate moments when Vorontsov opened up. "In such moments," wrote Dondukov-Korsakov, "if no other business was preoccupying the prince, he would look at me, and the most poignant expression would appear on his face. In it I could divine how much cold reason and a bitter experience of life had distorted a lofty spirit and a loving and tender heart ... As much as his heart was able to love, he loved me." It appears that, in his last years, Vorontsov had found in Dondukov-Korsakov someone in whom to confide: a young man, sensitive and sensible, of his own station. DondukovKorsakov wrote that in return he spoke frankly and directly to Vorontsov, never hiding the truth for the sake of flattery. Apparently, at times he upset Vorontsov, but only momentarily; the latter "always returned an hour or a day later, shook my hand and said 'thank you, my friend.'"13 We must take the secretary's tale with the caution due any such self-serving memoir, yet in a sense Vorontsov may well have intended to groom Dondukov-Korsakov for his job. In any case, twenty-eight years after Vorontsov retired as Caucasian viceroy, Dondukov-Korsakov was in fact appointed to the position. At that time, in 1882, he was given the title of high commissioner and the viceroyship was temporarily abolished; it was reinstated in 1905, coincidentally under Vorontsov's second cousin once removed, Count Ilarion I. Vorontsov-Dashkov. Vorontsov was also impressed by tales of derring-do. The Caucasian wars had produced many legendary warriors. He had recommended many Russian and Caucasian champions for glittering awards. An example he often pointed to was the valiant, generous, but reserved Colonel Genig (Goenig), whom Vorontsov helped out in his penurious retirement.14 Vorontsov himself had set a fair example of courage under fire. Acts of cowardice, however, earned his lasting disgust, and he could not abide boasting or any other sort of fanfare. Knowing how he had operated as a young commander in France,

167 The Viceroy Himself

we might expect as much. It was the modest and intelligent but dedicated and courageous fighting man who commanded his respect. Indeed, his expectations of those serving under him were high. His private secretary was expected to accompany him wherever he went on official business, and often on unofficial business too. From time to time he toured the Caucasian territory in a famous "yellow cart," a sort of low phaeton that was drawn by four horses instead of two on account of the frequently steep roads. Sun or dust or wind, Dondukov-Korsakov had continually to read aloud to his chief from his newspapers and journals. Vorontsov sat with his feet up on the low bench that ran the length of the carriage, eyes closed. He often appeared to nod off, but the moment his long-serving secretary stopped reading, he would wake up and tell him to continue. The viceroy let it be known that he welcomed petitions. Wherever he stopped he was met by groups of inhabitants. He received masses of requests, which he gave to his secretary to read aloud. Giovanni, his valet — actually a Russian named Ivan Dontsov whom Vorontsov for unexplained reasons had renamed - who was also expected to accompany the viceroy on these trips, would hop out at each stop to fetch something to wet the parched throat of the hard-working secretary. When they stopped for the night, Vorontsov immediately had horses saddled up for himself and his secretary for an inspection tour of the area. Only after dinner was Dondukov-Korsakov able to settle down to his strictly secretarial task. He was expected to sort out and send written acknowledgment of the requests, where the petitioner's address was legible, and earmark the practical ones, a resume of which he was to send to the relevant office when they got back to Tiflis. Some were pathetic, like the regular petition from "an old Tatar" for recompense for two buffalo stolen in 1820. Most proved to be unexecutable, such as complaints about certain decisions made by the Russian Senate in Ermolov's time; these were usually repeated on the viceroy's next trip. Dondukov-Korsakov recalled that the job usually took him all night when he would have far preferred to be off visiting friends and aquaintances, of which he appears to have had a great many. When he was not working, he was out carousing till dawn. His boss, he reported, did not mind, so long as he was ready to leave at six o'clock the next morning.15 Vorontsov clearly enjoyed setting an example of fortitude for his inferiors. Dondukov-Korsakov reported that, when travelling or on campaign, Vorontsov would cheerfully put up with the meanest accommodations. "Even the worst meals his provincial hosts could offer - stew, porridge, mutton, rice - he ate without complaint and even with apparent satisfaction," wrote his secretary. "I have never

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met a person of his years who could put up with every sort of privation with such forbearance, with so little fastidiousness, who was less demanding or more even-tempered than Prince Vorontsov."16 Little demanding of his hosts, perhaps. Vorontsov drove his own assistants and servants hard. His secretary Dondukov-Korsakov (and, before him, Shcherbinin), Baron Nicolay17 and various other aides, his son Simon, his wife Lise, his mistress Irma, his valet Giovanni, his groom Jim, his cook Andre - all were expected to share his enthusiasms, his dedication, his regularities, and his irregular but exemplary privations. Whether or not they did so without complaint, there was no question that they admired and respected him deeply.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Caucasian Civil Society

Though we turn now from considerations of Vorontsov's personality to larger issues, it is important to remember his talent for creating a personal corps of dedicated servitors. It enabled him to form in Caucasia a smoothly functioning central governing body. Such an institution, however, was not in itself sufficient, in his eyes, to bring about the eventual integration of Caucasia into the empire. Ultimately all elements of Caucasian society - including Georgian peasants, Armenian shopkeepers, Azerbaijani shepherds, even the yet distrustful, not to say hostile, highlanders of Daghestan and Chechnia and Kabarda - had, in his view, to be made willing and contributing parts of imperial society. That would come only when there was sustained regional social and economic and even cultural development. Such development could come only after he had enlisted native help. His primary goal, therefore — indeed the primary goal of any good senior administrator in a distinct region of the empire - was to secure the confidence and co-operation of the native inhabitants. He had to start with the native elite and expand outward, gradually catching up more and more of the general population, and so gradually and eventually make them all feel comfortable and productive as loyal citizens of the empire. That, at any rate, was the aim. Vorontsov built outward by drawing upon the small but increasing number of native Caucasian graduates of secondary schools to fill the middling and lower positions in his administration.1 He saw his chance in the very Achilles heel of Russian imperial recruitment: the near impossibility of finding competent minor officials to serve in the provinces. For although the empire was badly undergoverned throughout its reaches, its central departments were, ironically, seri-

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ously overstaffed. In short, the nineteenth-century system of Russian government was notoriously inefficient. Nicholas had a ready ear for methods to cut out the fat from his bureaucracy. Reducing its size might not improve its efficiency but at least it would help to cut down the staggering cost. Vorontsov had always been miserly with his staff, combining departments whenever possible, denying requests from his chief officials for "badly needed but not absolutely necessary additional staff," as he put it.2 He seized the moment as a stone to kill two birds. He would pursue his imperial goal of building up a native Caucasian civil service by means of the emperor's cost-reduction drive. Lermontov's romantic tales notwithstanding, civil service in Caucasia had always been considered - by Russians, by St Petersburg - a hardship post. An unpleasantly hot, often unhealthy climate in the summers, far removed from the genteel culture and pleasant amenities of the capital, surrounded by apparently uncivilized Oriental peoples speaking alien tongues, the Russian official of modest background and limited means suffered in Caucasia. He had to be bribed to go, bribed to stay: he received an immediate grant equal to one-half his official yearly salary upon acceptance of a Caucasian posting; if he stayed for five years, he received an automatic 25 per cent increase in salary. Yet these perks, Vorontsov suggested to the emperor, had not achieved their aim and should be abolished, at a great savings to the treasury. Minor Russian officials in Caucasia were not known for their dedication or their ability. Quite the contrary. Many could best be sent home. Meanwhile, he pointed out, there were increasing numbers of trained Caucasian graduates of imperial institutions for whom service in Caucasia was not a hardship. They were used to the climate, they spoke the languages, they understood and appreciated the culture. And they would accept the minimum rates of pay.3 Nicholas bit at the baited hook. He relayed to Vorontsov his "pleasure and satisfaction" at such efforts to cut administrative costs. He sent the viceroy's proposals on to the ministers of finance and internal affairs and to the Caucasian committee with his approval in principle. Discussion of these proposals outlived both Nicholas i and Vorontsov and continued through the 18505 and i86os and into the 18705, sometimes getting hot as policy-makers discussed whether or not it would be fair to those hired under such agreements if they were terminated.4 One might suspect that St Petersburg preferred Russian civil servants to native ones, but if so, such opinions are not expressed in the documents. Meanwhile, the process of accommodating native officials proceeded apace.5

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This was only a start. Vorontsov had other plans for winning the Caucasians' confidence, for securing their co-operation with the imperial regime. The issue of the Georgian law code is a good example. Educated Georgians had long voiced the principle that they should be judged according to Georgian, not Russian, law. Thanks to a long literary tradition, not to mention an ancient historical existence as a distinct culture in the Oriental world, Georgian governments at various times had produced written law codes. The last had been the code of the remarkable King Vakhtang vi, composed between 1705 and 1708. A Russian translation of the code had been made under High Commissioner Ermolov and published in St Petersburg in 1828, but it remained inaccurate and incomplete. The legal code of the Russian empire made provision for additions to or variations from Russian law within specified territories according to the proven traditions of the inhabitants. The provision is testimony to the keen awareness of the empire's multicultural inheritance on the part of Russian statesmen, foremost of whom was the great legal codifier Michael Speransky. Most imperial administrators in Caucasia, however, had been indifferent if not actually hostile to the notion of encouraging Caucasians to preserve forever their differences from the imperial norm. Vorontsov certainly had no intention of engraving in stone Georgia's separate cultural and national identity. Rather, he was convinced that the attractions and benefits of Russian imperial culture, acting with increased rigour in recent years, had rendered most aspects of old, pre-imperial Georgian culture simply irrelevant to modern life. His novel but entirely sensible solution was to entrust a definitive review of the entire Georgian code to a committee composed exclusively of Georgian officials and scholars. His expectations were justified. After a thorough investigation the all-Georgian committee pronounced the majority of old Georgian laws irrelevant to present-day conditions. For historical purposes a complete and official version of the Vakhtang code of 1708 was published in St Petersburg, in Georgian, in 1846. But the committee judged only twenty statutes in all still valid and worthy of recognition. Vorontsov approved the choice of statutes and sent them to the emperor. They were eventually written into the tenth volume of the imperial code of laws, applying uniquely to the Georgian provinces of the empire.6 A good start. Vorontsov spied another chance to gain the Caucasians' trust and co-operation in the thorny and hitherto unresolved problem of determining inherited aristocratic status. The empire had traditionally made allowances for the elite of non-Russian societies, from Tatars to Finns, upon incorporation to count themselves alongside Russian's own aristocrats. Such had been guaranteed Geor-

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gian aristocrats by treaty in 1783. But which Georgian families had a rightful claim to traditional aristocratic distinction? Written proof rarely existed, and for the middle- and lower-ranked Georgian gentry (the aznaurni) proving status became a problem. Besides that, which other, non-Georgian Caucasian leading families could claim to be aristocratic? Climbing into the ranks of the imperial aristocracy through service to the emperor was difficult if not practically impossible. If one could show aristocratic status, one could claim a far more advantageous position as official or officer. Attempts over the years to find a solution had failed miserably, swamped in a welter of unprovable claims. Vorontsov dealt with this issue much as he did with the old Georgian law codes. He turned the matter over to the respective provincial aristocratic assemblies. Within a short time Caucasian peers proved able to adjudicate all claims to their dignity, and the family names were written into the imperial register.7 Wooing of the Georgian social elite had an administrative justification, but it led Vorontsov into the thicket of Georgian social relations. He was aware that it was only a question of time before all forms of serfdom would be abolished throughout the empire. From an administrative point of view, the emancipation when it came should be easier to apply if there were only "lords" and "serfs." Thus, in an effort to overcome litigation that had tied up the Caucasian judicial system, as well as to make native social patterns approximate Russian norms, he upheld the claims of certain Georgian aristocrats (mainly west Georgian aznaurni) to certain peasants who claimed to be no longer enserfed.8 Although the decision caused hardships for a number of Georgian peasants, at least until emancipation eventually arrived, it won for him and his regime the loyalty of Georgian lords, and winning the loyalty of native leaders was his overriding imperial goal. If this policy had negative aspects, Vorontsov also had a positive plan to woo the native elite. He opened wider the door to the emperor's service. Many Caucasian aristocrats, particularly Georgians but also Armenians and others, had from the beginning of Russian hegemony entered, and distinguished themselves in, the tsar's military service. A few of them had managed to enter the imperial civil service. Vorontsov's present aim was to get many more to do so. They had first to be trained, however, and for this he had to have an educational system of approved schools. Vorontsov, in writing the emperor, claimed to have a sufficient number of qualified Caucasians for the civil service. In fact the number soon proved inadequate and he desperately needed more.9

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At Vorontsov's arrival, one could hardly speak of an educational "system" in Caucasia. Officially included within the Kharkov educational district, education in Caucasia had been neglected. The only decent school was a gimnaziia, or secondary school, in Tiflis, originally founded in 1802 as the Tiflis Aristocratic School. Previous proposals for building more schools throughout the territory had come to naught. Vorontsov came fresh with the experience of constructing an educational system in New Russia. His first step was to have Caucasian educational affairs removed from the Kharkov district in New Russia and temporarily placed under his direct supervision.10 He then commissioned a study of the entire Caucasian school system, such as it was: its drawbacks, the obstacles to its development, the requirements for putting it on a par with other educational districts in the empire.11 The result, in 1848, was the creation on a trial basis of a separate Caucasian educational district.12 Meanwhile the viceroy's new school supervisor implemented the commission's other suggestions. A new gimnaziia was constructed in Kutaisi to serve the needs of west Georgians. The Tiflis gimnaziia, which had been accepting west Georgians, could now take in more east Georgian and Armenian students. In the gimnazii, courses in Georgian, Armenian, and Turkish, as well as Caucasian history, were introduced into the curriculum, along with Russian and Russian history. This would have been unheard of a generation earlier, when Paskevich & Co. seemed intent on forcing Caucasians into a tight Russian mould, thinking, speaking, and acting in Russian. At a lower level a system of district schools was established. The 1848 statute spelled out the purpose of the district schools: to prepare certain children for government service at the lower ranks; to provide the children of "urban and other free classes" with the opportunity of obtaining a "necessary and practical education"; and to prepare other children for entrance into the gimnaziia. In addition to the district schools, four two-grade "parish" schools were set up in highland districts, offering basic literacy courses. Other measures established schools for girls, for Muslims, and for those wanting to learn trade skills.13 Vorontsov even managed to secure sixty government scholarships to enable Caucasian gimnaziia graduates to study at Russian institutes of specialized or higher learning. For gimnaziia graduates who wanted to attend Russian universities but were judged too weak in certain areas, such as Russian language, he arranged places at special preparatory boarding schools attached to those universities.14 Vorontsov was determined that education play a pre-eminent role in the process of gaining the Caucasians' confidence and loyalty.

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Evidently Emperor Nicholas also thought that schools were the best means to this end, to judge by his remarks to Chernyshev in 1844, as reported by General Neidgardt.15 At least during the years of Vorontsov's viceroyship, education appears to have played just such a role. True, many more schools were built for Georgians than for Armenians, more for Armenians than for Azerbaijanis or highlanders. Vorontsov undoubtedly felt that Georgians were better suited to take advantage of the civilization that the empire offered. Nevertheless, the reforms were judged to be enough of a success across the whole territory that the emperor approved a law in 1853 permanently establishing the Caucasian school system as part of the regular imperial school system.16 Thus, by the end of his rule as viceroy, Vorontsov could boast of a new educational system. Thanks in part to his experience in New Russia he had managed to put it in place relatively quickly. His efforts promised a small but steady stream of qualified Caucasians to satisfy the administration's ever-increasing demand for civil servants. More and more Caucasians were learning to read and write Russian, the language of imperial administration. Yet, in the following decades, as nationalism pervaded the thinking of many non-Russians throughout the empire, the advantages of learning Russian paled before the enticements of establishing national languages as the primary means of communication and enlightenment. Imperial governors invariably came to regard such tendencies as threats rather than possible solutions to the goal of imperial stability.17 In Caucasia, especially in Georgia, just as a native intelligentsia emerged, just as society was beginning to modernize and be presented with unimagined possibilities, the imperial government became increasingly inflexible. As a result, education tended less to gain nonRussians' "confidence and loyalty" (Vorontsov's hope) than to produce self-confidence and a critical spirit.18 We must not lose the perspective of Vorontsov's time, however. In 1852 Dimitri Kipiani, a leading Georgian intellectual and the recently appointed superintendent of the Tiflis School for Aristocrats, was complaining loudly because the hours of language instruction in Russian were limited to only twenty-two hours a week for Georgian students, whereas in Russia proper Russian students had twenty-four hours of Russian grammar. It should, he argued, be just the reverse.19 The success that Vorontsov had in building up the Caucasian school system, like much else he did to quicken Caucasia's cultural life, resulted from his considerable experience in New Russia. In Caucasia, too, he ordered public libraries and museums constructed.20 He established Caucasian branches of the Imperial Geographical

175 Caucasian Civil Society

Society and Imperial Agricultural Society.21 He arranged to have an official yearly calendar printed for the Caucasian territory, listing among many other things the various Caucasian religious festivals and holidays: Orthodox, Catholic, Gregorian, and Muslim (both Sunni and Shiite).22 He encouraged drama groups, which seemed to have an immediate response among the dramatically inclined Georgians. "A certain George Eristoff," he wrote in January 1850 to a friend in Moscow about Giorgi Eristavi, Georgia's most important nineteenthcentury playwright, "who has been educated in Russia, has just composed and produced a comedy in which he has shown in an admirable manner the customs of the country. There is certainly something of Moliere in this piece, and like Moliere he himself played the principal role, and to perfection ... It is a source of some astonishment to me to see such an accomplished ensemble of Georgian actors and actresses, for it is the first time in Georgia's existence that there has been able to be any sort of national representation."23 The list goes on. On his urging an Italian opera company came to Tiflis on tour, "which has enchanted the Georgians," he claimed.24 He established new presses "to print the best known and loved Georgian works"25 as well as newspapers in all Caucasian languages.26 He ordered parks and gardens to be laid out in the principal Caucasian cities.27 He prompted construction and reconstruction in large parts of the capital, Tiflis.28 He even, "in order to give the inhabitants the convenience of knowing the exact time and correcting with accuracy all the clocks in the City," gave orders that a cannon should be fired off in Arsenal Square in Tiflis every day at noon sharp. It was the latest in scientific method: "The timing is to be done according to a Chronometer which will be set by the sun."29 Caucasia, or at least its leading edge, was finally being given a taste of what it meant to be part of Western civilization. It would of course take generations before the taste became an appetite. But eventually it did. It is no exaggeration to say that Georgian culture in the last half of the nineteenth century underwent a renaissance. By the beginning of the following century many Georgians, and a few other Caucasians, had risen above parochial and territorial interests to see their place in the world at large. They were prepared to join those Russian and other cosmopolitan citizens of the empire who tried to ride the whirlwind that swept across modern cultural and political life. Vorontsov's cultural efforts understandably bore more fruit more quickly than his economic ventures. It took only a handful of dedicated intellectuals to light the torch of cultural regeneration,

176 Caucasia

especially in the age of the printed word. Economic arousal required changes in the traditional patterns of whole populations. Yet, as we would expect, he was keen to improve the territory's economic life and took some important steps to that end. In the view of DondukovKorsakov, it was "thanks to the enlightened and liberal part that Vorontsov took personally in these questions" that the territory's commerce and industry were "drawn out of their previous ruts."30 He ordered steamboats for Caucasia, as he had for New Russia. Typical among the archival documents is a receipt (in English) dated 10 October 1848, acknowledging receipt of a deposit of £2,500 toward the cost of a new vessel "of 260 horses power" as per a contract dated 7 October 1847, and a receipt for the final balance of £5,520 pounds.31 Regular steamship communications were established along the Black and Caspian coasts and up the various rivers.32 He had his Caucasian department of communications widen old roads and construct new ones to improve the minimal transportation infrastructure.33 He encouraged merchants and civic leaders to organize bazaars and trade fairs and trading companies. At every opportunity he sought to reduce the traditional amount of red tape. In DondukovKorsakov's view, "every single individual benefited in his affairs from the prince's influence"; in him "everyone had a powerful protector from clerkly and bureaucratic controls, which have always acted as a brake upon our private enterprise in Russia."34 He regained for Caucasia a tax-free status for many items of transit trade,35 knowing from his experience in New Russia how much benefit that could bring to the general economy of a territory. Unfortunately, east-west trade after decades of neglect and constriction had shifted to Turkish routes. Tiflis would not begin to rebuild its old significance as a commercial centre until after an east-west railway was constructed in the 18705. Vorontsov also ordered and funded mineral explorations to learn more about Caucasia's famous mineral wealth. The initiative revealed new coal deposits in Imereti and Daghestan; some experiments in refining petroleum were also undertaken in the area around Baku.36 (It was not until the 18705 that the industry started seriously to exploit the fabulous petroleum resources; Vorontsov as usual had an eye for economic potential.) He tried to introduce a manufacturing industry into Caucasia, but even he had to admit the failure of his efforts to have sugar and silk factories set up near Tiflis.37 He criticized the Armenians, who might be world-famous traders, he admitted, but who did not make great industrialists; he thought they exercised a backward, medieval influence on the economy with their fiercely monopolistic guilds (amkrebi)?* Yet he refrained from at-

177 Caucasian Civil Society

tempting to abolish them, partly because he did not wish to antagonize the powerful Armenian business interests, but also because Russian merchants were proving to be uninterested in the Caucasian market.39 He also criticized the Georgians for their inherited contempt for the business life: the aristocrat knew only the martial arts, the peasant only the rustic.40 Still, he had to work with the clay he was given. First, as military commander of Caucasian forces, he supervised the training and rapid promotion of capable Georgian military officers. The effort proved its worth. Increasing numbers of talented Caucasian officers stepped forward to shoulder responsibilities of defending the empire, including Caucasian territory. It has been suggested that the loyal russianized Georgians formed the keystone to the defence of the Russian position in Caucasia in the Crimean war; that their heroic efforts convinced the Western allies at the Paris conference in the spring of 1856 to allow the emperor to keep his Caucasian territories.41 Second, as viceroy with a keen interest in modern agriculture, he took special pains to introduce new methods and machines to as many of the two million or so Georgian farmers as would learn. He had numerous "Crown orchards" and experimental farms set up, although not all of them, it appears, were a lasting success.42 Still, he followed with enthusiasm the results of planting new species of fruits and vegetables. Orange and lemon trees were imported from Crimean nurseries, which, it will be remembered, he had been instrumental in setting up in the first place. Cotton was introduced into the open lands of eastern Georgia and Azerbaijan. Tea was introduced into western Georgia and throve, becoming an important cash crop. Olive trees were brought in from Italy and Malta, improved mulberry stock and even silkworm eggs from Italy and France.43 With its unique climate, Caucasia with its specialized agricultural products promised to fill an important niche in the imperial economy: one more knot in the net that was slowly gathering Caucasia into the life of the empire. Among Vorontsov's botanical introductions were new grapevine varieties from France. Growing grapes was hardly an innovation in Georgia. Archaeologists claim that Caucasian viniculture dates back at least to 2000 BCE. Some say that we owe a great debt to the ancient Georgians for one of our civilization's essential ingredients, even the name itself. It is claimed that the Greeks discovered ghvino in Georgia. Certainly, by the nineteenth century, there were great Georgian vineyards, like Tsinandali belonging to the Chavchavadze family, known for their delicate, fragrant red and white wines. Vorontsov felt that it might be useful to introduce different varieties.

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He brought in old Csesenyi to help him. He announced that he would give to anyone who would plant them grape vines from his Crimean gardens.44 It must be admitted that his undertakings were often limited and not as successful as he hoped. There is no denying, however, that they quickened the tempo of cultural and economic life in Caucasia. Vorontsov personified the old-fashioned Russian tendency to encourage local, non-Russian contributions to the imperial enterprise. His rule demonstrated the constructive possibilities of a flexible, regional approach that sought to utilize rather than neutralize regional forces for change. It satisfied the government's desire to consolidate its dominion in Caucasia. It even, for a time, satisfied the desires of many Caucasians to live more secure and more productive lives. The generations of Caucasians who manned the civil service in the years following appeared to hold to a tradition of responsible regional government.45 Bariatinsky, viceroy from 1856 to 1862, claimed that he won independence from the Caucasian committee in St Petersburg, which is something that Vorontsov had already done in 1845; also that he "modernized" the Caucasian bureaucracy,46 although it might be more accurate to say that he refined and enlarged Vorontsov's basic system. Certainly, Vorontsov's immediate successors continued the thrust of his policies. Caucasians, nevertheless, remember Vorontsov as their most decent Russian administrator. Given scope, it appears that, at least in one particular place at one particular time, an enlightened Russian imperial statesman of the mid-nineteenth century could produce a dynamic Russian imperialism. What about the impact of Vorontsov's rule on the Caucasian inhabitants? Is it legitimate to claim that the transformed regime in turn transformed Caucasian society? Our pursuit of the details of Vorontsov's life restrict us mainly to exploring his actions and the reasons for them. Caucasian social and cultural history is fascinating but complex, and the changes wrought in that society and culture by the imperial administration lie beyond our scope.47 In passing, however, let us cast a quick glance down those beckoning corridors. One is the impact of Russian rule on Caucasian peasant society. As we have seen, it was for administrative reasons that Vorontsov chose to increase certain lords' rights at the expense of certain peasants' rights. He imposed certain restrictions on the movement of Caucasian (chiefly Georgian) serfs and decided against certain groups of peasants who claimed to be free in favour of certain landowners who claimed to be their masters.48 The action annoyed some people, like Count Paul Kiselev, the minister of state domains. Although the Russian serfs were not emancipated until 1861, Kiselev

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had in the course of his ministry under Nicholas "freed" all the state-owned serfs, and like most high officials (including the emperor himself) did not want to see any regression anywhere in the empire in the painful but slow movement towards complete emancipation. He accused Vorontsov of tightening the bonds of serfdom in Georgia while the rest of the imperial government, agonizingly, was trying to move in the opposite direction. There was irony in the accusation. As we have seen, Vorontsov was no supporter of serfdom. As serf-owner, he had bided his time until the emperor should declare emancipation, but meanwhile had tried to be as humane and just a lord as possible. The detailed reports to him from one of his agents, Karl Keppen, on the conditions of peasants on his estates in various provinces showed a real concern for their well-being. Vorontsov had instructed Keppen to give him a "real picture ... combining the good of the peasants with the advantage of the landowner." Keppen's subsequent reports contained specific and general complaints as well as suggestions for improvements, most of which Vorontsov appears to have acted on.49 A traveller described the Lancastrian school that Vorontsov had established for the peasants of one of his villages in New Russia, and how Vorontsov visited it from time to time to check on its progress (and to show it off to visitors).50 In another instance, Vorontsov stipulated that if the peasants on his estate in Saratov wished to improve their living conditions by moving to different locations and taking up different occupations, they were to be allowed to do so.51 As governor-general of New Russia he had been largely effective in keeping serfdom from spreading into the southern territories. As viceroy he had taken several steps to protect Caucasian peasants. He worked to improve the conditions of the state peasants in Caucasia.52 He oversaw the conversion of church-owned serfs into state peasants.53 He and his council acted to ensure the Georgian serfs right to purchase his freedom at a sale of his lord's possessions - if, for example the estate was put up for public auction to pay for debts.54 And Vorontsov personally intervened to try to prevent some of the most pernicious aspects of Russian serfdom from appearing or growing in Caucasia: the right of landlords to banish serfs to Siberia, to choose whom they wished for the army draft (instead of deciding by random draw), or to convert peasant serfs into household serfs.55 But for all Vorontsov's good intentions, Russian definitions simply did not apply in Caucasia. Muslim social leaders had never traditionally "owned" the peasants who worked their lands. Yet in order to win their support the viceroy had "recognized" that ownership

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in order to create a more recognizably Russian social structure — and to win the support of the Muslim social elite. Georgian society, too, had unique traditions. Unlike Russia, Georgia had experienced a Western type of feudalism. Its kings never managed to centralize government by controlling the powerful landed nobility. Though politically decentralized, Georgian society had been bound firmly together by contractual ties among its various classes, including nobles (tavadebi), gentry (aznaurni), clergy, and various sorts of serfs. The krepostnoe pravo ("serfdom") of Russia was very different from the batonqmoba ("serfdom") of Georgia. Vorontsov enlisted the aid of Georgian lords to help him place Georgian lord-serf relations on what he saw as a clearer footing. He may actually have served to strengthen somewhat their authority over their serfs, yet in the end his efforts probably facilitated the eventual emancipation of Georgian and other serfs in Caucasia, which was finally introduced in 1864 and 1865, a few years after its implementation in the central Russian provinces.56 It has been argued, however, that his actions left Caucasian peasants even more seriously beggared than Russian peasants for the remainder of the nineteenth century.57 How much this was due to Vorontsov's actions and how much to particular Caucasian conditions is hard to judge, but it is clear that Vorontsov played an influential role in shaping modern Caucasian peasant society. It has also been argued that the emancipation 'of Georgian serfs fatally compromised the authority of Georgian lords and began their decline, which they quite naturally resented.58 The middling, relatively impoverished junior Georgian aristocrats (the azaurni, or gentry) began to take over from the old-line aristocrats (the tavadebi, or nobles) as the social elite thanks to the opportunities granted by education and the civil service. Dimitri Kipiani was a good example of the latter. A civil servant under Vorontsov, he later became deeply involved in the implementation of emancipation in Georgia. As marshal of the Tiflis aristocracy from 1864 to 1870, he eloquently and fearlessly, although in the end fruitlessly, led the aristocrats' fight to retain their lands during the emancipation. His articulate memoirs show the agonies of adjustment that rapid social change was bringing to the traditional aristocratic class as a whole.59 Yet no flower fades without another blossoming in its place. In Caucasia, as in Russia proper and indeed all over the empire in the latter half of the nineteenth century, the steady decay of the aristocratic way of life was fertilizing a vigorous new civil society and culture, even if the old regime ultimately proved too rigid and diffident to tend the garden properly. Vorontsov's role in the process

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of turning the Armenian and Georgian elites into Russianized civic leaders is generally recognized to have been crucial.60 The Georgians had become loyal, if impoverished, servitors; the Armenians a powerful bourgeoisie. Both leading Caucasian groups had clearly staked their future on the Russian empire. Seen in this light, Vorontsov had an important, shaping role. Yet again we must ensure a proper perspective, for it can also be argued that Vorontsov's actions were no more than a culmination of a long process of russianization. Before Vorontsov arrived, the imperial Caucasian regime had already quashed the feudal contracts binding Georgian vassal gentry to nobles (and some churchmen) and begun to mould a new, uniform aristocracy in the Russian image.61 Merchants and churchmen were no longer allowed to own serfs: only aristocrats, the officially favoured class, could do so. The right of Georgian lords to own priests as serfs, like the right to inherit certain public offices, had been abolished soon after the Russians took over. The affairs of the Georgian church had been firmly taken over by the Russian church after barely a decade of Russian rule.62 The old Georgian law of entail had been amended before Vorontsov's arrival, so that estates previously held undivided by aristocratic clans had been split up, Russian style.63 Russian-sponsored schools had already changed forever the traditional career patterns of the social elite, not to mention their intellectual outlook. It was not Vorontsov's invention, the europeanization of the native leaders. The modern Caucasian aristocrat had already learned that he had to be able to communicate in Russian, had to have at least a superficial European education and polish, had to view the position of Caucasia in relation to the world at large. The cost of living and entertaining in a European manner had already begun to eat into the fortunes of many old aristocratic Caucasian families, and it was irresistibly encouraged by the viceroy's elegant lifestyle. Some historians have suggested or implied that Vorontsov deliberately set out to impoverish old families in Caucasia, thereby reducing their independence and increasing their dependence on the state.64 This interpretation is not only too convenient; there is no evidence to support it. Since impoverishment of old landed families was taking place all over the modernizing Western world in the nineteenth century, including Russia proper, it would seem appropriate to look to deeper social forces than merely to the example of a few balls and dinners given by a very decorous man over the course of a few years. Certain old Caucasian families did become impoverished, and their decline had very real social, economic, and cultural results,

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but to suggest that the process began under Vorontsov, that he intended it, or that he was pleased to see it happen would be unfair. Under the Russian imperial influence, Caucasian society had undergone light-years of change in just a few generations. Although the various elements of Caucasian society at the end of the eighteenth century on the eve of incorporation into the Russian empire had had vague but tranquil expectations, the incorporation began immediately to transform Georgian and Armenian society fundamentally and irreversibly. Vorontsov merely screwed down the lid on the coffin of old traditions while he simply and consciously sped up the process of the russianization of Caucasian society. The same can be said in economic matters, where he appeared to have such a modernizing effect. It is true that his opposition to commercial monopolies, as well as to Russian colonialism, as well as his positive encouragement of free-market enterprise, began to open up hitherto unknown possibilities for economic productivity; his experimental farms and new plants began to change peasants' means and reasons for tilling the ancient soil, giving new life to the original Greek meaning of the name Georgia: land of farmers. But a half-century of peace secured by Russian arms had already established the economic foundation for that. Armenian merchants and craftsmen, previously strictly regulated by the Georgian monarchy, had quickly occidentalized themselves, turning from Eastern to European commerce.65 Furthermore, seen from a hundred years on, actual exploitation of Caucasian human and material resources did not begin in earnest until many years after Vorontsov left. A proper perspective, then, suggests that while Vorontsov's actions were important, it would be an exaggeration to say that they constituted an economic watershed - the picture that he tended to paint in his various reports. His cultural impact is even harder to judge. Georgian culture, in particular, blossomed in the 18705, i88os, and 18905. Georgian writers, actors, and scholars ushered in what can only be called a great age, second only to Georgia's first golden age of the twelfth century. Armenian culture, too, started to flower with the appearance of new writers and intellectuals. The phenomenon owed something to Vorontsov's active patronage of the arts in his years as viceroy, although just how much remains a question. Caucasians themselves have acknowledged his influence. Ivano Javakhishvili (1876-1940), who would become rector of Tiflis University from 1919 to 1926 and the doyen of Soviet Georgian historians, wrote in a Russian encyclopedia around 1914 that it had been Vorontsov's

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cultural policies that secured Georgians' trust for the imperial regime and given Georgian intellectuals exhilarating hope for a future of "an unhindered cultural and national progress of the Georgian people even under Russian authority."66 Akaki Tsereteli (Dsereteli), Georgia's most famous modern poet, once gallantly told Vorontsov's widow that "as long as the memory of Georgia itself shall survive, so long shall the name Vorontsov live."67 Vorontsov must also be given some credit (or blame) for the upsurge in Caucasian national feeling and aspirations. By befriending the Armenian patriarch Nerses v, Vorontsov secured that individual's enormous influence in keeping the Armenian population "generally loyal."68 By re-establishing an Armenian province, however, he did more to kindle nationalistic feelings than to assuage them. Armenian nationalists became deeply concerned to reunite Turkish and Russian Armenia. The failure of their quest planted one of the twentieth century's most poisonous plants. The Georgian cultural reawakening led to nationalistic sentiments as Georgian patriots be-came concerned with preserving Georgian culture in the face of pressures (intentional or otherwise) in favour of Russian acculturation. The last verse of one of Akaki Tsereteli's most famous poems, Ghamura (The Bat), written around 1870, struck this popular note: "Shame on him who would consider / Denying his mother tongue, / Betraying his own people, / Dreaming of flying high all on his own!"69 Increasing Caucasian nationalism is usually presented as a negative reaction to oppressive russification in the half-century following Vorontsov's viceroyship.70 Nationalists certainly claimed to be reacting to oppression.71 The picture needs some balancing, however. From a more dispassionate distance, Caucasian nationalism appears to have been as much a result of what the government did for Caucasians as against them. Certainly many Russians honestly felt that, for non-Russians, becoming russianized meant being liberated from the cramp of a limited, underprivileged existence.72 There was no denying that Caucasians gained much by joining imperial society. The Georgians seemed to acquire all the prerequisites of nationhood: a self-conscious identity based on a distinct, relatively unified language and common culture; an educated, professional bureaucracy; a strong sense of "we" as opposed to "they."73 The urban Armenians, taking advantage of a century of peace, became not only a prosperous bourgeoisie but also, through their control of municipal affairs, particularly in Tiflis, the political rivals of the Georgian bureaucrats.74 Russian Armenia became the touchstone for Armenian nationalist aspirations. Even the Azerbaijanis produced an intellectual elite that, by the beginning of the twentieth century, would have

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pretensions to creating a national awareness among their Muslim brothers.75 Why, then, were calls to break away from the Russian fold so rare? The famous Georgian politician in the Russian revolution, Irakli Tsereteli, although he grew up in Georgia in the period of alleged Russian oppression, renounced anti-Russianism (of the type that his newspaper-editor father expressed) as short-sighted. Like most other Georgian reformer-revolutionaries, he favoured federation with the Russian peoples, not separation from them.76 Although nationalistic sentiments are easy to find, their causes are complex and darkly obscure. Georgian nationalism was caused as much by rivalry with the Armenian bourgeoisie as by Russian imperial policy. Vorontsov's conspicuous policy of enticing Georgian aristocrats into imperial service actually served to blunt, or at any rate to postpone, Georgian nationalist aspirations.77 In the long run, while Caucasians might have become more articulate, most of them also become aware of the benefits of union with the Russian empire. It was an ambivalent legacy, but one that reflected the very ambivalence of Russian imperialism.

PART FOUR

The End of a Career

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CHAPTER FIFTEEN

End of Service

Vorontsov lived moderately and kept fit. Though he turned seventy in May of 1852, his figure was spare and the dignity of his carriage still impressive. But age was beginning to take its toll. The southern climate had inflicted upon him a few serious fevers from time to time, although quinine and the ministrations of his private physician had so far managed to cure him. His most serious physical failing was his eyesight. Since the first attack in 1825, and with recurring frequency ever since, his eyes had caused him great discomfort and considerable pain.1 It is hard to determine the precise nature of the disability from Vorontsov's own descriptions of his ailments. It may have been a bacterial or even a chlamydial infection of the cornea. In any event, he was forced to dictate virtually everything, from official memos to the most private letters. At all times of day or night in New Russia he had called upon the beautiful hand and often the reading eye of his long-serving secretary, Michael Shcherbinin. Since coming to Caucasia, with Shcherbinin moving up to an administrative position, he had taken on Prince DondukovKorsakov as his private secretary. Both Shcherbinin and DondukovKorsakov were treated like members of the family. When they were not available, Vorontsov conscripted the hand and eyes of his son Simon or his wife Lise in order to keep up the flow of correspondence.1 His curse is the historian's blessing: his proper handwriting was nearly indecipherable. The mineral waters at Carlsbad (present-day Karlovy Vary) seemed to have a salubrious effect on the disease that attacked his eye. He went there for a cure as often as he could get abroad. The crush of business, however, prevented frequent cures and worsened his sight. In October 1847, recovering from a particularly bad attack in which he nearly lost his right eye altogether, he wrote to his friend

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Alexander Bulgakov that although his recovery had been helped by his wife, who had joined him in Tiflis, as well as by the fine autumn weather, it had been "hindered by business and paperwork, of which there is a frightening pile, mainly because for over a month I have been unable to sign things. I hope now to get through it soon so I shall be able to get a real rest at Alupka and one or two good cures at Carlsbad. The last two cures there, in 1843 and 1844, did a lot of good and made a tremendous improvement."3 The famous surgeon Dr Pirogov had actually told Vorontsov during this last bout in 1847 that he would probably lose his sight altogether. But his personal physician, the rude and ugly but obviously competent Dr Andreevsky, had rescued him by an experimental but successful eye injection of silver nitrate. According to Dondukov-Korsakov, the treatment was completely unknown before then, although a few years later Vorontsov discovered that it had been used successfully among French soldiers suffering from similar eye disorders. Dr Andreevsky, of slashed-tent fame, is described in DondukovKorsakov's memoirs as not only gross, tactless, and rude but a bothersome busybody who used Vorontsov's complete faith in his medical abilities unashamedly to win favours for himself and his friends.4 A few years later, in the spring of 1851, Vorontsov was commiserating with Bulgakov. Both men had been walking the earth for sixty-nine summers. "Old age," Vorontsov wrote cheeringly, "is not really disagreeable, except when one has the infirmities of old age, but no one resembles an old man less than you."5 His hubris affronted the gods. A few weeks later, visiting Alupka, he fell seriously ill and never quite recovered.6 Although the following year he received the emperor's personal and effusive thanks as well as the dignity of adding "Most Illustrious" to the tide of Prince,7 Vorontsov understood that his end was approaching. Princess Vorontsova now devoted her time entirely to her husband's needs and happiness, to making him as comfortable as possible in his declining health. She took over from Dondukov-Korsakov the job of reading aloud her husband's newspapers and journals and correspondence. It was a demanding chore, not only since Vorontsov's appetite for news was as voracious as ever, but also since much of the reading still had to be done while travelling around the territory. For the princess's comfort, Vorontsov had substituted a rather grand sleeping carriage for the "yellow cart" he used to ride in. DondukovKorsakov nevertheless sympathized with the effort required of the princess, who by now needed reading spectacles and was no longer young, but observed that "it made up for everything in the past,"

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referring to her reputed marital unfaithfulness many years earlier, "if it indeed really happened as people said; but I do know the princess was dedicated to her duty." The author mentions that Princess Vorontsova was then eighty-four which indicates that he wrote his memoirs around 1877. He tells us that he visited her whenever he was in Odessa, and that she treated him like a son.8 A work-horse plods on until he dies in his traces, though in old age his pace slows and he needs more and more rest. At the end of 1852 Vorontsov asked permission from his considerably younger imperial master for an extended leave to take the waters abroad. "Complete rest and release from all affairs of government," he submitted, "might, so far as my advanced years permit, restore my health and strength to allow me to continue the complex and often rather taxing service to which I have been appointed in Caucasia."9 Early in the new year, in 1853, Vorontsov received word that his request for leave had been granted. As soon as the mountain passes were clear of snow he set out from Tiflis for his much-deserved rest. Fate, however, decided to deny him his deserts. In late May he reached the fortress-outpost of Vladikavkaz, "Ruler of Caucasia." Vladikavkaz was the Russian citadel that since 1784 had guarded the northern end of the tortuous mountain trail through the Daryal Pass, called, rather grandly, the "Georgian Military Highway," which linked Georgia to the empire. But he got no further. There he received word that negotiations between Russia and Turkey, in which Russia had sought a protectorate over Orthodox churches in Constantinople "and elsewhere," had broken down. Emperor Nicholas had decided to send his troops to occupy the Danubian principalities in order to put pressure on the sultan.10 It could only mean war. His first worry was for the military position in Caucasia, particularly Russia's ability to repel a Turkish attack on the easterly end of the Black Sea. A defeat would reflect poorly on his own viceroyship of the last decade, particularly his reorganization of the Caucasian army.11 Duty called. He abandoned his plans for a rest and turned back to Tiflis.12 The Russian and Ottoman empires had been struggling to control the lands around the Black Sea since the time of Catherine the Great. Vorontsov himself, first as governor-general of New Russia and then as viceroy of Caucasia, had presided over the consolidation of the Russian presence not only to the north of the Black Sea but also around each end: to the west in Bessarabia and the Danubian lowlands, to the east in Cherkesy (Circassia), Abkhazia (Abkhazeti), and western Georgia. Contemporaries sensed that Russia was ascendant, Turkey in decline, and that it was only a matter of time before

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Russia put her claim to the territory south of the Black Sea and the all-important exit to the west, ancient Constantinople and the Bosphorus. Would the Western powers stand by while Russia opened a passage to the warm Mediterranean? Or would they treat it as they had treated Peter the Great's efforts to open a western window on the cold Baltic a century earlier? Control of the Balkans and the "Turkish straits" was one of the elements in the delicate balance of power in Europe. Russia's attempt to exert control over it threw off that balance and caused violent readjustment. It was no secret to Russians that English public opinion supported the Turkish side in this diplomatic contest known to history as the "Eastern Question." Anglophiles like Vorontsov, however, were puzzled why this should be. England and Russia should stand together against Turkish despotism, as they had done in Greece. A sense of shared civilization, a legacy perhaps of the Napoleonic wars, had turned all Europeans into hellenophiles. The record indicated, at least on the surface, increasing harmony and co-operation. In 1826 England and Russia signed the St Petersburg Protocol, agreeing jointly to ensure Greek autonomy. In 1827 they were joined by France in the treaty of London in their resolve to protect the Greeks. Later that year the three powers even fought the Battle of Navarino to back up their resolution. Although in 1828 and 1829 the Russians declared war on Turkey and, thanks to the efforts of men like Paskevich in Caucasia and Vorontsov in the Danube, defeated her, the terms of the treaty of Adrianople (September 1829) were decidedly lenient. In a letter to his English niece, Elizabeth Herbert, Vorontsov praised her for her pro-Greek remarks but gently reproached her for her pro-Turkish sentiments. He mockingly justified to her the Russian action against the Turks in the cause of peace: "I suppose, however, that all fighting will soon be finished, and that your good friends the Turks will acknowledge that even an indifferent peace is better than a very bad war."13 The sense of puzzlement did not diminish over time. When, in the 18305, the major threat to Turkish stability appeared to be Egypt, not Russia, Austria and Prussia joined England and Russia in the treaty of London (1840), forcing a settlement on the Egyptians in favour of the Turks. Then, in 1841, Russia joined the four other major Western powers in a peace pact known as the Straits Convention, which closed the Turkish straits to ships of war. In 1844 Emperor Nicholas himself visited London to discuss the Eastern Question. In an effort to preserve the European peace the two powers agreed to consult one another should the Ottoman government collapse. As late as April 1853 England and Russia appeared to be in basic

191 End of Service agreement about each other's concerns in the Near East. As in the Balkans sixty-one years later, however, the flames of local issues rapidly engulfed the broader peaceful interests of the European powers, and a European war ensued. To contemporaries like Vorontsov, the hostilities were based on misunderstandings, a tragic mistake. Vorontsov's own opposition to the war was well known, even in England.14 His close friend, aide, and confidant Baron Nicolay articulated their dismay at English support for the Turkish belligerents in a letter to Vorontsov's nephew, Sidney Herbert, in November 1853. Russian-Turkish fighting had begun, but England had not yet formally declared war. Herbert was then secretary of war in Lord Aberdeen's cabinet; Nicolay was about to become counsellor at the Russian embassy in London.15 Nicolay wrote to Herbert: Dear me, in what wretched times we live; nothing like old England, as my father says. [His father was Baron Pavel A. Nicolay, an old friend of Vorontsov's father.] He is quite melancholy about this state of things and I am quite at a loss to guess to what purpose You are bullying us in this way, unless You mean to adopt the Mahometan creed and are anxious therefore to fight for the blessed shrine at Mecca! I have seldom read articles so impudent and false as those published by the Morning Chronicle. It is our sworn enemy. Whenever there is an engagement between the two contending armies, of course we get licked, and the Turks are heroes, besides the most good-natured, humane and enlightened nation of the world. Never a word of atrocities committed by them, but anything You like in that way heaped upon our backs! I try hard to guess the reason of this system and I begin to think that there is a parry in England who wish by all means to go to war, as they can't suppose that out of fear of such a contingency we shall give up the ground we stand upon. We have never questioned Your right of influence in Portugal, the Brasils, Montevideo, Africa, India, etc. We don't say a word to the extraordinary facility You have got of absorbing whole tracts of land in Asia. But then don't quarrel if we also have a corner where our influence must be predominant, in spite of all Your exertions. We need no conquest, and know very well that it is no advantage to us to spread out any further. We are as candid as can be in our avowals, stating precisely what we want and what we must have, and I confess I see nothing in it contrary to the dignity of England. All that uproar about our encroachments, our conquering propensities, is humbug; but in the meanwhile You may at last place us in such an extraordinary dilemma that You will drive us precisely to undertake what we are so anxious, and You pretend to be anxious, to avert. In the meanwhile the Turks will get licked, in spite of the Morning Chronicle ...

192 The End of a Career Let us hope, my dear friend, that the winter that is just setting in will cool heads and bring matters back to a sound and natural state.16

Herbert responded to Nicolay's letter with a sharply worded attack on Russian actions and motives against and in Turkey. Nicolay wrote again, towards the end of December, of his dismay at the approaching crisis: My dear Herbert, Your long and interesting letter reached me a few days ago and I cannot refrain from an answer, in the hope that I may succeed in bringing You round to a less hostile view of our difference with Turkey. Indeed, I was equally grieved and surprised in seeing an old friend like You, linked by so many ties to this country, so completely at variance with me upon a point of honor for my country and following up the general stream of opinion in Your country, so hostile to Russia on account of the distrust that pervades as to the real object we have in view. I really cannot conceive a good reason for the opinion Your govt and Yourself have adopted as to the whole affair, unless You believe indeed that our govt had other objects in view than those we avowed, and that this whole business has been got up for the sake of depriving Turkey of some provinces that might suit us! Now, from the beginning we have disclaimed such intentions and at every different stage of the question the Emperor has solemnly pledged His word that He did not in the least intend to frustrate Turkey of any of its rights and dominions. Surely You ought to know the Emperor well enough to rest assured that He is a man of word and that no artful motives have ever crossed His noble mind. You cannot place Turkey on the same level with the other civilized Christian Powers, and You must admit that it is rather an anomaly in our days that so many millions of Christians should be at the mercy of Infidels whose religion approves of any persecution they may think proper to lavish on their conquered subjects ... You regret the point to which matters have come, You admit that we are on the eve of a struggle, which will bring ruin and misery upon our countries, and You accuse us of having wantonly compromised the peace of the world. But be just, my dear Herbert, and You must admit that all this might have been much sooner avoided if You had afforded us the occasion of proving the sincerity of our assurances ... I am as sad as You are, my dear Herbert, to see that our two countries, linked by so many ties of old friendship, should have come to such extremities, and shed blood in such a cause. Really, I cannot, and won't believe the thing possible and shan't, to the last, give up all hope of seeing matters settled by mutual agreement ... This is almost a treatise, my dear Herbert, but I felt anxious to give You

193 End of Service a full statement of our view of the case. If I have not succeeded in altering Your opinions, I hope You will at least read my letter with the indulgence of an old friend and do justice to the motives that have guided my pen.17

The idea of England and Russia coming to war against each other made Vorontsov, too, sick at heart. Not only domestic ties had made him an anglophile. From his perspective, England and Russia were the two greatest forces for civilization in Europe, in the world. Did not England stand for justice and prosperity, for the civilized political process, for a liberalism that classically had defended the dignity of the individual? Vorontsov had personally demonstrated how, in the new territories of New Russia, a modernizing Russia could promise economic prosperity in part by encouraging individual initiative. He had demonstrated in Caucasia how an enlightened, English-style imperial policy, respecting the cultural individuality and dignity of the native peoples, had not only produced a deeper, more reliable loyalty to the Russian empire, but had also introduced the benefits of Western civilization. A war would mean the end of an age, for Englishmen as well as for Russians. But war was in the cards. What would become known as the Crimean War was at first limited to Russian-Turkish hostilities in Caucasia. Turkey fired the first shot. In October 1853 her forces attacked the Russian position at Shekvetili in the southwest.18 The position held, but reports came in of foreign agents landing on the Abkhazian coast. They aimed to stir up Shamil's recently but only temporarily pacified Muslim guerrillas, a serious behind-the-lines threat.19 Vorontsov was desperately short of men and arms, but St Petersburg's attention seemed focused on the Danubian region and no reinforcements arrived.20 Overstrained and exhausted, he suffered a nervous breakdown and was bed-ridden.21 War or no war, he had to retire. He wrote the emperor on 29 November 1853 requesting release from his service. No answer. On 10 December he sent his son, Simon, to the capital to deliver his request in person. Meanwhile, the family friend Baron Nicolay had informed Vorontsov's English nephew of his "Uncle Minga's" serious condition and asked him to break the news gently to his aging mother, Vorontsov's sister.22 A little later he wrote that Prince Woronzow [Vorontsov] is not much improving, though not the worse for that. This state of things has greatly affected his health, more morally than physically, and I believe that he has made up his mind to retire from public life, feeling that he is no more able to serve his country as actively

194 The End of a Career as he should like to do. I am sure that Your dear mother is sharing his feelings on the subject and will approve of his intention. Simon is expected here daily, almost hourly. Good-bye, my dear Herbert, and believe me, Yours most sincerely, Nicolay RS. Simon is just arrived. I have not been able to see him but I hear there are better news from his father.23

The better news was that Vorontsov was somewhat recovered after an enforced period of inactivity. Still, he knew he had to remove himself from the strain of office. The message to the emperor read as follows: "The requirements of continual activity and [giving] orders on all sides have completely worn me out so that even if we were presently at peace and everything were in its customary order even then I should be in no condition to continue my service." He trusted his request had not angered the emperor, but pleaded that to stay on would hasten him to the grave. He recommended his senior officer, General Read, to be acting Caucasian viceroy until a permanent replacement could be found.24 Early in the new year, 1854, Vorontsov heard that the emperor had granted him a leave, although not retirement and only for six months. Nicholas, evidently, did not believe that Vorontsov's health was beyond repair. Meanwhile, the military situation, at least in Caucasia, was looking more hopeful. After the defence of Shekvetili, the emperor's troops under the excellent leadership of the Caucasian Princes Andronikov and Bebutov had taken the offensive and captured the fortress of Akhaltsikhe.25 Reinforcements had finally arrived in Caucasia in the form of the Eighteenth Infantry Division and two dragoon regiments.26 Vorontsov's health had somewhat recovered, although in his own words he was still "unable to get about."27 Altogether, he wrote a friend, the situation was considerably better than when hostilities began.28 The emperor accepted Vorontsov's nomination of General Read as acting viceroy, having consulted with Chairman Chernyshev. The latter had advised him not only to make Read acting viceroy but to grant him the full viceroyal authority exercised by Vorontsov.29 Nicholas further requested Vorontsov as follows: "In order to lessen as much as possible the worst disadvantages of your absence, although only temporary, in this our most difficult time, to provide your temporary successor with the most complete instructions, both in military as well as in civilian matters, a copy of which I wish to have myself for my own guidance."30 The order to provide instructions was a happy one for the historian.

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It made Vorontsov sit down and articulate at length the strengths and weaknesses of the Caucasian administration, something he might not have done otherwise. He set out to explain to his successor the workings of his viceroyship, "both in usual times as well as in the present extraordinary circumstances." He outlined the Caucasian administration at length, reviewing the various offices and chains of command. He explained the usefulness of the chairman of the Caucasian committee in St Petersburg as a conduit for imperial business. The key to the success of the system, however, at least in Vorontsov's mind, was the authority of the viceroy: his responsibility to the emperor alone, "necessary for a territory so far removed, so complex, and so diverse, and in which military and frontier matters involve such incessant warfare." He reviewed the military situation in Caucasia. He hammered at the importance of keeping the peace among the highlanders: if the Western powers were to launch a naval attack in the Black Sea, Russian ports on the Abkhazetian coast had to be secure against attack from behind. Even so, he admitted, if there were all-out war in the Black Sea, then "the outlook for our coastal line is very poor. Our land communications in the area are poor or non-existent and our defence of the ports is weak ... I have told the Emperor my opinions in all frankness, and all depends on his decision." One thing was sure: the Russian Black Sea fleet had no hope of standing up to the French and English fleets. "God grant that war between us will not be, and our coastal line can then be safe. In the contrary situation, we cannot possibly save this line."31 Vorontsov wished General Read success.32 He made his farewells. In what was a rare gesture for Russian officials, he left thirty thousand roubles of his own money with the Caucasian treasury department just in case he did not manage to return, "since everyone is mortal, especially at my age and health."33 The sum was a surety against any unrecoverable debts that might result from "worthwhile ventures" for which he might be accounted personally responsible (drama troupes, libraries, printing houses, beautification schemes). And he set off again for a doubly deserved rest. His Muscovite friend and listening post, Alexander Bulgakov, had written him that some people were surprised that the great Vorontsov was retiring just now, at the hour of his country's greatest need. His pride was wounded. "I ought to have the right," he responded, "after the manner in which I have served during a half-century, and after all that I have done during the nine years that I have served here, to take a rest and to see if a season and a cure at Carlsbad with a complete rest and a total absence of affairs and of troubles

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can restore me to a state where I can return to continue my service." He hoped his friends, at least, would realize that he had not made the decision "lightly or without profound sadness," but he had been forced to admit that he was "completely incapable of carrying on such complex matters." He could only hope that a few months' rest would restore his health. He would try, he wrote, to return to Caucasia in the autumn, "but if not, not."34 The fears about war proved all too real. The crisis burst again just as he was leaving Caucasia, in March 1854. England and France formally entered the war on the side of Turkey. This time he did not turn back. He had done everything possible: Caucasia would have to survive without him. He travelled to St Petersburg, met his wife, who because of the fighting in the south had left Odessa, and they travelled on to Carlsbad. In July he was pleased to learn that his Caucasian forces were gaining ground against the Turks in the "Asiatic theatre," partly thanks to the military leadership of General N.N. Murav'ev, partly thanks to the outstanding performance of the Caucasian (mostly Georgian) officers and soldiers fighting for the Russian emperor. But news on the western front was less happy. There, in the summer of 1854, the Russians were forced to evacuate the Danubian principalities in favour of Austria, the latest belligerent on the allied side. It started a new pot boiling in the Balkans, a Russian-Austrian conflict that would continue for generations with catastrophic consequences in the twentieth century. He was joined at Carlsbad by his sister, whom he had not seen for several years.35 The joy in seeing each other mitigated the sad realization that politics had sundered the family as they had sundered England and Russia. For the two elderly Russians, inheritors of the famous anglophilism of their cosmopolitan father, it was a cruel blow. Somewhat refreshed but by no means healthy, in mid-September Vorontsov returned to Caucasia as agreed. The allied troops had landed on the shores of the Crimea (2 September), at which point the conflict became the Crimean war. There was little he could do, however. His health again confined him to bed. His Caucasian troops held the line against the Turks. Fortunately the French and the British did not attack the Caucasian ports or seriously attempt to enlist Shamil to weaken the Russian position in Caucasia.36 They concentrated their energies on trying to dislodge the Russians from Sebastopol in the Crimea. A battle at Balaclava on 13 October, known for a charge of the English light brigade, was a victory for the

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Western allies. Balaclava was but a few miles along the coast from Alupka. The Russian forces held on to Sebastopol tenaciously.37 Although most commentators have judged the Crimean war wasteful and unnecessary, it did have some positive results. Besides serving as a literary inspiration for Tolstoy, not to mention Tennyson, it provided the opportunity for the ambitious, thirty-four-year-old Florence Nightingale to establish her humanitarian reputation and become the model for Dunant's Red Cross. Coincidentally, she and her thirty-seven nurses were sent out in October 1854 through the offices of Vorontsov's nephew, Sidney Herbert.38 In Russia it ushered in the emancipation of the serfs and other important reforms. To Vorontsov, however, it was a modern tragedy threatening to destroy humane European culture. Potentate that he was, he had been unable to do anything to prevent it. Physically and emotionally unstrung to the point of complete collapse, he appealed to the emperor for permission to retire for good.39 Nicholas finally accepted the request and granted his retirement. Vorontsov's resignation raised again the question of a successor. Whom to appoint? General Read had been transferred to service in the Crimea. Should the position of viceroy itself be continued, or had Vorontsov standardized the administration to such a point that it could be included in the regular administration? The emperor turned to his trusted counsellor Chernyshev, who was himself about to retire from service. Chernyshev, consulting Vorontsov in the last act of their fruitful partnership, recommended to his master that the viceroyship be continued. The present system was yet immature. The territory's affairs were not yet sufficiently standardized to withstand redivision among the regular ministries without reproducing the sort of chaos that had prevailed in the old days before Vorontsov and Chernyshev. If Vorontsov's successor was not given the same authority, it would be taken in Caucasia as an indication that the emperor did not have the same confidence and trust in him that he had had in Vorontsov, that he did not have the same concern for his Caucasian subjects.40 The emperor was persuaded. On 29 November 1854 he signed a ukase appointing the respected veteran of Caucasian battles, General N.N. Murav'ev, Caucasian viceroy with all of Vorontsov's rights.41 Murav'ev arrived in Tiflis on 18 February 1855.42 Vorontsov made ready to leave. Whenever he made ready to leave Caucasia, it seemed, something momentous happened. He was not disappointed this time. News arrived that the emperor had died, on 20 February. This time, however, nothing could make him stay. He swore alle-

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glance to his new sovereign, Alexander n, and on 4 March 1855 took his final leave of Caucasia and of Russian service. The viceroyship would continue after Vorontsov's departure, but not without question. In 1856 Prince Bariatinsky took over the viceroyship from General Murav'ev with full viceroyal authority. The appointment in 1862 of the emperor's youngest brother, Grand Duke Michael, to the post (apparently) inadvertently neglected to mention that his special authority as Caucasian viceroy remained the same as that of his predecessor.43 On the recommendation of the Caucasian committee, Alexander n agreed to a special rescript stating that the viceroy's authority would continue as before,44 but in 1865 the whole issue of the advisability of continuing the viceroy's extraordinary authority was raised again. The Caucasian committee prepared a long report outlining the history of the creation of the viceroyship in 1844-46 and its continuation with subsequent viceroyal appointments, and recommended its continuation. The report was read in the Committee of ministers and eventually approved.45 In 1882, with Grand Duke Michael's retirement from the post, the Caucasian viceroyship was abolished46 - until it was reinstated in 1905.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Retirement

Once again Vorontsov travelled to St Petersburg, met his wife, and proceeded west with her. Towards the end of May by prearrangement they met Vorontsov's sister in Dresden. Situated in the broad green valley of the Elbe, its cupolas, towers, spires, and the copper-green roofs of its palaces rising above the trees, Dresden was one of nineteenth-century Europe's most beautiful cities, the "German Florence." From there it was but two days' carriage ride south through the rugged and spectacular Bohemian countryside to German-speaking Carlsbad, jewel in the Hapsburg crown, health retreat for Europe's rich, her powerful, her artistic elite. Lady Pembroke was worried about her brother. "My poor Minga," she wrote to her son Sidney, who had resigned as colonial secretary a few months previously at the height of the war against Russia (partly, it seems, because of the family's Russian connections),1 is in a very deteriorated state of nerves ... He is much weakened since we [last] parted, the more I watch him the more I find him less well, less strong (in voice particularly) and more awfully thinner than he was even on our first meeting last year at Carlsbad. His appetite too has decidedly failed but this they ... think the artificial Carlsbad waters which he has just begun are likely to restore. Despite this he has (contrary to last year) a restless anxiety for news, and a constant allusion to the events of the day, all of which he would naturally have to check in the presence of one who like you had taken a part in those events and whose opinions would be directly opposed to his - so that I honestly confess I look with dread to the possibility of your visit, despite all his love and warmth of feeling for you ... They [Vorontsov and his wife] desire me to tell you that they hope some day or other to see you again under other circumstances

200 The End of a Career and in happier times. It is painful to think how much more he has to bear just now from all that has passed, far beyond the trials of last year 2

Even in the depth of their countries' hostility Vorontsov put family before politics. The previous summer he had sent a note to his nephew Sidney from Scheveningen, having accompanied his sister there after their reunion, saying that despite the war and the deep political disagreement between the two he welcomed the idea of meeting Sidney and his wife the following year in Holland if Sidney could manage it: "I begged your mama however to tell you that I should be very sorry if you got in some dispute or trouble on account of your visit here, pray think of that, as for us we can have nothing but pleasure and enjoyment in seeing you. God bless you. Minga."3 In the summer of 1855, retired from the emperor's service and despite his sister's misgivings, Vorontsov persisted in wanting to meet Sidney and his wife. Back in 1846, when Sidney and his fiancee Elizabeth A'court had invited Vorontsov to their wedding at Wilton House, he had had to send his regrets. But he had enclosed a warm personal note to the couple saying he dearly wished he could come and visit, "for you make all together a united family such as I never met with anywhere." Lise, Simon, and Sophie had also sent their love. Shcherbinin, who had 'written the note for the viceroy, had also sent best wishes and regards. In a postscript in his own hand Vorontsov had retold Sidney how happy the news had made him and to assure his bride that "nobody in the world can wish her more happiness and for long continued years than I do."4 Again he and Lise accompanied his sister to Holland. She left for England. It was the last time they would see each other. But before long Sidney and Elizabeth arrived to gladden the aging Vorontsov's heart. Sidney later wrote to his mother of his pleasure at having been able at last to introduce his wife to the Vorontsovs: "I longed always for her to see him, and she is as I expected enchanted with him, and I longed too that he should know my wife ... I must ask you to tell my dear Minga what joy and pleasure it has been to me to see him again and my aunt too, and how happy his affectionate reception of [Elizabeth] has made both her and me ... I still hope we shall have better times and see him in England."5 Vain hope. Though Sebastopol finally fell (30 August os / n September ns), and peace was not far off, Vorontsov did not have long to live. He and his wife returned to St Petersburg. In November he was heartened to hear that his Caucasian troops under the valiant

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Murav'ev had taken the strategic fort of Kars in Turkish Armenia, but Caucasia was a minor theatre. The Russian imperial army in general was in no shape to continue the war. Alexander n, unlike his father, was anxious to re-establish peace with the European powers. In January 1856 the Russian government agreed to talk peace, and on 13 February the Congress of Paris convened. Hostilities were winding down, but much damage had been done to the empire, to the imperial regime. The war had laid bare for all to see not only the folly of war against her old Western allies but more seriously the inadequacy of the traditional Russian social and political structure to meet the demands of the modern world. Serfdom, in particular, had produced poor recruits with low morale. General economic and technological backwardness, especially in the area of transportation, had led to extensive and needless Russian casualties. Vorontsov had been governor-general of New Russia, including the Crimea, in the thirty years leading up to the outbreak of the war. We have seen how he personally and proudly tried to transform the territory into a modern, prosperous, integral part of the empire. Was he, instead, a failure? Should we lay the blame for the inadequacy of the Russian conduct of the war at his door? In a sense, yes. He had not concentrated imperial investment in military installations. His concern had been to build a peacetime economy, one based on agriculture and commerce. The technology he introduced applied to new methods and machines for farming, new ways to exploit the natural resources of the area. By 1853 there were stockpiles of coal to fire the boilers in Russian steamships but no trains to transport troops and materiel to the theatre of war. We cannot blame Vorontsov for the absence of railroads. He had long believed in the benefits of railway building; how could a frequent visitor to England not? But the obstacles had exceeded even his powerful reach. In a letter to his friend Bulgakov in 1851 he articulated the frustrating stymie: What you write about the pettifoggery and difficulties that one meets in making use of the new railway is new proof of what I have always thought about it. We are not yet ready to take full advantages of such a device. In America or in England it all works so smoothly, which is not to mention the full freedom of all individuals to circulate everywhere without passports and restrictions of that sort, something which could not occur with us: we have something that halts and obstructs everything, namely, formalities and the love and the need for an officialdom without measure and without pity. Nothing hinders more all sorts of industry and progress in civilian life

202 The End of a Career than this perceived necessity for authority to interfere in everything, everywhere and always, often causing direct harm with its formalities and its waste of time, and which happens even when the authority has the best intentions possible.6

Only the accession of Alexander n provided the necessary momentum for internal reform. He was known as a reformer because he presided over and encouraged the last great readjustment of the imperial establishment to modern reality. He was personally responsible for it. He was the first Russian ruler since Muscovite days to come to the throne prepared, which explains why he was able to encourage reform. Nicholas, lacking any administrative experience himself in 1825, as a result had never felt in control of his sprawling, inefficient government. He had made his son from an early age take part in the business of running the country, giving him what he had never had. By the age of thirty-seven, in 1855, Alexander had learned to distinguish between sycophants and collaborators, between vested interests and the public interest. Like the anglophile, septuagenarian, ex^governor-general of New Russia, ex-viceroy of Caucasia, he was no radical; both were committed to conserving the essentials of the Russian imperial polity. But also like Vorontsov he was anxious to release the productive energies of his subjects through practical projects and reforms. Like Vorontsov he saw the enormous potential of railways for the Russian economy. Under his rule the iron road would finally begin to bind the trackless open spaces. Like Vorontsov he knew the Russian serf had to be freed from bondage and turned into a productive farmer, and he was willing to see the process through. Like Vorontsov he knew the bureaucracy had become a hindrance to progress and had to be made efficient. Vorontsov had been born too soon. He had missed all but a hint of the welcome reforms to come. The old regime had all but burned him out. Like Ulysses' faithful dog Argus, he stayed alive just long enough to welcome the master home. Vorontsov was given a glimpse of the new era. At the start of 1856, in the last year of his life, he was asked one final imperial favour: would he consent to give the emperor the benefit of his enormous experience and accumulated wisdom? Alexander requested Vorontsov's critical comments on a brief recently prepared by the eminent Baron Wrangel, legal consultant, on the practical methods for actually reforming the imperial administration. The old flame burned up once more. Vorontsov could not refuse. In his thirty-two-page brief Wrangel, in almost Prussian fashion, had suggested that what the Russian imperial system lacked was

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discipline. Administration, in his view, was a science. Top administrators had to learn to be more methodical, had to set a good example: a good department head had to be in his office before his subordinates came in the morning. Better training of senior civil servants would cure the present evils of laxity, corruption, and general inefficiency in the imperial service.7 This could not have struck the emperor as either very original or very useful. There was a corpus of better trained, more conscientious civil servants coming into positions of responsibility then, the result of the general educational and professionalizing measures taken under Alexander i and Nicholas i.8 These highly trained and motivated civil servants were out to make the autocracy work more effectively. They would carry through the reforms under Alexander n, but not in the superficially disciplinarian manner that Wrangel proposed. Vorontsov's brief was shorter than Wrangel's, only twenty-two pages long. But he managed to take a few shots at some of his pet targets of inefficient government. He agreed with Wrangel's complaints about self-servingness: "A great number of rewards are simply given according to rank and without any special reason - it is one of the plagues of our administration in Russia in general. Nowhere else on earth is it possible for people to receive rewards for no special reason every two years." He condemned the barbarous behaviour of some officials: "The terrible custom of torture is severely prohibited by law, but is nevertheless not extirpated from civil affairs and among the police and in the military exists even in plain sight." He attacked government wastage: "This was the start of those huge government buildings and houses, quite unnecessary and even unsuitable for their designated usage, which are standing all over Petersburg and have cost the treasury such an enormous, ruinous expense." He censured corruption: "Many of those officials at present treat these crown enterprises as their own and say that they are serving Sovereign and Country when in reality they serve only themselves." He saved his choicest remarks for the bloated, overcentralized, glacially slow civil service: The enormous number [of bureaucrats] weighs heavily on our finances. An overcentralization of matters in the capital requires the appointment in all ministries of a great many more serving persons (I should say persons pretending to serve) than necessary. This is because all matters and proposals, even the most petty and those that could far better be decided in the provinces themselves, are referred to the capital and are examined in the ministries, that is in the departments and sections and even by the division

204 The End of a Career heads. Each matter is delayed and weighed down by this order of business ... Even though an official may be completely unfamiliar with the special requirements and conditions that led to a proposal, yet he will consider it his absolute duty to write down notes, opinions, and difficulties in order to prove that he is busy, not serving for free, and knows how to get involved in the details of every question. Just recently we have seen [a demonstration of] how no one in the whole of Russia can build a single two-storey building, or even a one-storey building with more than five windows, without the examination and approval of the plans in the capital ... Each official considers that his duty, or rather his private interest, demands that he show his zeal by expressing his personal opinions and by demanding some sort of new and completely irrelevant details, and all this with a horrible waste of time, sometimes several years ... I could give several precise examples of the above that would astonish anyone who had no understanding of the great harm done by superfluous centralization and especially the completely superfluous number of officials in service.9

Yet if Alexander expected something useful from Vorontsov by way of positive suggestions, he was disappointed there too. Whether the elderly prince had had too little time to prepare it, or his mind was no longer as clear as it once had been, his presentation was more superficial and anecdotal than broadly analytical. He mentioned his own remedial efforts in the past, some of which had been successful and some not. His proposals were either too general or two narrow to serve as a blueprint for fundamental reform: to clear out unreliable persons from the civil service, to publicize criminal investigations, to reduce the size of the civil service, to turn Crown factories over to private entrepreneurs, to rent rather than construct office space. He did not seem to share WrangePs views about the value or even the possibility of creating a more conscientious group of senior civil servants. He was no tyrant, to be sure. As ever, his integrity was unquestionable, his concern for the dignity of the individual intact. But as an adviser to a reforming emperor he had grown too old under the previous system. Alexander asked three other people besides Vorontsov to comment on Wrangel's brief.10 Two of them wrote briefs similar to Vorontsov's. Many of the emperor's top officials, it seems, were ready enough to admit the need for reform but were incapable of designing positive, practical building blocks to build its foundation. The third brief, however, was a brilliant exception. It was submitted by General Dmitry Miliutin, Vorontsov's junior by thirty-four years. Reminiscent of Michael Speransky, adviser to Alexander i, Miliutin showed that priceless quality of mind that any executive bent on

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reform had to find in a counsellor: the ability to grasp and simplify an enormous amount of detail, to cut through the brush and scrape away the topsoil and so lay bare the essential root of any matter. It must have been be a joy for Alexander to read.11 Miliutin wrote mainly of the Russian legal system. He believed that only reform of the law could reshape the present overcentralized, overloaded, inefficient bureaucracy. While Speransky's prodigious codification of the Russian laws of the 18205 had laid the necessary groundwork, Miliutin suggested that more was needed before it could have the desired effect. Laws were too numerous, too complex. Laws relating to the bureaucracy were written in hundreds of variations in order to distinguish among the fine gradations of ranks and duties. The distinctions, however, served only to perpetuate the overall complexity. Regarding society, observed Miliutin, the government had always wanted to control citizens' lives in all details. Thus no one - entrepreneur, doctor, writer, architect, peasant - was allowed to do anything the administration had not foreseen. "On all of them, through thousands of laws, is visible the hand of the administration." Regarding judicial process, he continued, there was much confusion of general laws with specific or temporary laws. Laws also had to be simplified so as to apply to everyone. "Too often our laws," he remarked, "are looked on only as a bridle for the lowly, for the masses; high authorities often thus feel themselves exempt from or above the law." Regarding the bureaucracy, said Miliutin, it was no wonder that so many were seen to be serving themselves, as Wrangel and Vorontsov had pointed out. Who wanted to "slave away under dull and empty bureaucrats?" The civil service needed to replace many if not most of its mere clerks with trained specialists, experts, professionals. Furthermore, he claimed, the laws were so complex that no one could understand them. In Miliutin's mind, Russia desperately needed a codex of the laws, a short, simplified edition that the lowest official could understand, put out at modest cost so the poorest official could afford it. Russia needed fewer, more permanent laws, and not those written by chancery officials who did not know the law and had no experience in applying it. Miliutin disagreed sharply (if respectfully) with Wrangel, who believed that the top officials should be responsible for proposing all legislative changes. "Not administrators," he exclaimed; "they only have the bureaucratic point of view; rather, those people whom the laws will affect." The best judges of commercial laws were the

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merchants themselves; the best judges of laws affecting particular regions of the empire were those regions' inhabitants, not central officials. "God willing," Miliutin concluded, "little by little the habits of our administration will change and will open up the possibility of establishing another, more rational order: of placing definite boundaries between the actions of administrative, of judicial, and of legislative authorities." This would result in a new process of legislation where all interested parties would be able to voice opinions beforehand and thus avoid conflict and constraint later. In Miliutin's mind it could not be left to individual department chiefs to attempt reform: "there must be a general government reform if we are to achieve a fundamentally new system." Miliutin took a few quick, but typically direct, shots at other birds. He disagreed with Wrangel's proposals for sudden awards and punishments determined by an attentive chief. That only preserved the whimsical at the expense of the rational. Awards should be in certain established categories, for certain set achievements, and should be in the form of permanent or lump-sum salary increments. And rather than attempting to root out and severely punish infractions, far better in the long run to make all government actions public and to remove the present constraints on public opinion. "Secrecy and formality and the non-expression of public opinion - these are the most powerful agents promoting corruption among civil servants." As for the Crown enterprises, he agreed with Wrangel: they should all go. He said they treated their employees like serfs. "This terrible system is contrary to both morality and the economic interests of the government and should be stopped immediately."12 Miliutin's proposals, he believed, would result in a less centralized, vastly smaller, infinitely more efficient civil service. He would pursue this theme of decentralization in the next few years as chief of staff in Caucasia (1856-61), and again later as war minister (1861-81) when he undertook to reform the entire imperial army.13 In sum, however, in the task in hand, it was reform of the legal system that Miliutin pointed to as the best path to modernization. Russia's laws and regulations had to be simplified. Russians, particularly official Russians, needed to develop a legal consciousness. The emperor and the majority of his highest officials were understandably slow to see the need for fundamental change in the legal system. Traditionally, laws had been seen as specific solutions devised by the autocracy for specific situations, judicial process as the mechanical steps needed to ensure their proper application. The judiciary had thus been seen as no more than an arm of the administration.14 Vorontsov had never looked to a broad legal cure for the evils

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of the Russian bureaucracy. In the words of his secretary, DondukovKorsakov, "The complex code of our laws the prince despised deeply; he knew it but little and always believed that if you needed a law you could always find it in one book or another. He took especial pleasure in not executing a law or even in acting against [a particular law] if he felt that in a certain matter it was useful for the larger issue. At that time [in Caucasia] it was possible to do so. Everyone kept quiet about it, and everything was covered up by the Tsar's confidence in the viceroy and [support for] his authority in Caucasia."15 Dondukov-Korsakov went on to tell a story to illustrate Vorontsov's general contempt for laws that he felt did not apply to him. Once, in 1850, the viceroy visited Odessa with some of his aides. They purchased some goods in the free port to bring back to Tiflis. "The prince," wrote Dondukov-Korsakov, "was the protector of the free traders. The Odessa freeport was his creation. He hated customs." The group entered Caucasia through Redut-Kaleh, where the author and his colleagues had worried about how to get their goods past customs. Vorontsov told them not to worry but to put his name on their things. He would claim them as his luggage, which was never searched. Later, when they went to retrieve their smuggled items from the viceroy's palace, Vorontsov was amused. He told them, "when the devil in his evilness to mankind invented customs duties, God in his goodness invented contraband."16 This not very edifying example demonstrates some of the paternalism that had rubbed off on Vorontsov after a half-century of operating within the imperial absolutist system. Still, within that context, he had proven himself reform-minded: in the occupation army in France, in New Russia, in Caucasia. For a classical liberal of the Burkean mould, however, reform could only come from within. The time had not been right for the fundamental changes he would have liked to see. In many ways he was born fifty years too soon. He had lived under five Russian sovereigns; only now, at the very end of his life, did he see an emperor ruling who was actually starting to do what the others had only dreamt of doing. Vorontsov had to exit the stage having done the best he could, regretful that it had not been enough. He had to leave it to others to usher in the modern era, energetic men of vision like Dmitry Miliutin, Dmitry Zamiatnin, Miliutin's younger brother Nicholas, and various others, to abolish the great immorality of serfdom, to reform the antiquated armed forces, to carry through basic reforms of the legal and judicial system of the sort Vorontsov was asked to consider in early 1856. This new generation of reformers would be the last

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to operate within the autocratic system. After them, the forces of change would lie outside the government. One month after submitting his brief, in the middle of March, Vorontsov's professional regrets were overlaid by a shattering personal blow. He received word from his nephew that his sister had died, peacefully. "She had your picture," his nephew wrote, "(the one painted at Berlin) brought into her room and placed opposite the bed. She gazed on it with the greatest affection, and once or twice when lying back in bed she clasped her hands, suddenly crying out 'O my Minga! My Minga!'"17 She had died peacefully, surrounded by all the family - all except her brother, who now felt mortally bereft. Before she died she had persuaded Vorontsov to consider writing his memoirs. She felt that, considering all he had seen and done in his long, active life, his reminiscences would be not only be interesting but valuable for posterity. He dragged his feet, unable to abandon his long-cultivated reserve, writing back to her that although he had begun sketching something, "this is not a memoir, nor is it the story of my life, for I have never written such, nor have I ever had any intention of doing so." After her death he managed to draft a few more brief, diary-like pages of "important events" in his life, but only got as far as 1833 before he gave it up.18 His health was rapidly failing. The fact that the Crimean War had officially ended with the Treaty of Paris (18 March) was of some comfort, particularly since Russia had kept her gains in Caucasia. But in the long run it had been a disaster for Russia, as Vorontsov had known from the start it would be: the start of his country's decline as a modern world power. Troubles seemed to be piling up against him like swells from a pitiless sea. In June his self-esteem was wounded when the honour of the Vorontsov family was impugned. His aristocratic genealogy had been called into question. Furthermore, there had been an ugly and shocking request for a bribe to smooth things out. Vorontsov grew up with the understanding that his family stretched honourably back into the mists of Russian history. Not only were his father and his uncle important Russian statesmen; so too was their father Roman, and his father Illarion, and his father Mikhail, and so on before them, through the famous Muscovite boyar Vorontsovs of the sixteenth and fifteenth centuries, back to Kievan times and a "Varangian" chieftain named Afrek who was said to have arrived in the year 1027 with his suite of three thousand to serve Grand Prince Yaroslav. It was all spelled out on a family document under a hand-coloured rendition of the family coat of arms with the motto "Semper Immota Fides" (Forever Steadfast Loyalty).*

209 Retirement

In 1840 P.V. Dolgorukov had published a four-volume work of the genealogy of the Russian peerage.20 Vorontsov and his immediate forebears were listed but only as far back as a Feodor Vorontsov in the seventeenth century, who was not listed as a boyar. The ravages of Ivan the Terrible were reported to have terminated the sixteenth-century boyar family of Vorontsov. Vorontsov, assuming a mistake on Dolgorukov's part, had written to the head of the Vorontsov Moscow office to put all the family archives into order and to "search among them for documents about the genealogy of the counts Vorontsov." Unfortunately, no documents. Vorontsov hired specialists to continue the search. Still no success.21 In 1854 Dolgorukov began issuing a revised edition of his by-now official genealogy of well-born Russians. The break in the Vorontsov line was still there. In October 1855 Vorontsov wrote to Dolgorukov, pointing out the continuing error. He included several genealogical tables showing descent from the Varangian chieftain Afrek, based on "Miller's mss. presently in the Rumiantsev museum."22 Now, towards the end of June 1856, Vorontsov received a reply from Dolgorukov. The latter said that he had examined scrupulously the documents Vorontsov had sent him but so far it was impossible to determine the authenticity of the documents that might prove a connection between the eighteenth- and the sixteenth-century Vorontsovs. There was yet time to publish an appendix in the revised fourth volume, now nearly ready for the printers, however, if irrefutable proof could be found. He wrote: "The feelings of respect and admiration that I profess for your Highness have made me well disposed to try to be agreeable, but I shall be obliged to print the article in a manner completely opposite to that which you would wish, my Prince, if you cannot send me the supplementary documents that would clarify the obscure passages, would make it possible to get around all the difficulties. Time is flying: you must hurry with sending me these documents."23 Dolgorukov's letter was bad news. For an aristocrat in the nineteenth century, pedigree was worth more than gold. It was seen as the honour of the family name. By way of illustration, certain rich Americans of the time were not above purchasing mythical family trees, shields, even old European castles, in order to demonstrate aristocratic roots, to show that the family's wealth was socially legitimate. We might wonder at this quest for social legitimacy. Vorontsov had fabulous wealth, high social standing in his own right. Ogarkov, in 1892, wondered why a man of Vorontsov's stature could not simply say he was his own ancestor.24 He did not understand the mentality of the social elite. But there was worse in store for Vorontsov than Dolgorukov's report.

210 The End of a Career

As he read the letter, a separate note addressed to him but written in a different hand and included in the envelope, fell to the floor. He picked it up. Aghast, he read the following unsigned message: "His Highness, Prince Vorontsov, has one sure way of getting his genealogy printed in the Russian Genealogical Book if he wants it - that is to make a present to Prince Peter Dolgorukov of the sum of fifty thousand silver roubles; then everything will be as he wishes. But there is no time to lose."25 Vorontsov was fury itself. He would have no part of this chantage. He wrote a proudful letter to Dolgorukov accusing him of unspeakable behaviour, promising furthermore to press a suit against Dolgorukov's book if it appeared without Vorontsov's version of his family's genealogy. Dolgorukov of course replied indignantly that he had no knowledge of who might have made the extortion attempt and that if Vorontsov pressed his suit he would "bring a countersuit, demanding only facts and irrefutable proofs. The public will judge."26 For an old, failing man, such matters were poison. Dolgorukov would publish his book unchanged. Vorontsov would not live to press the suit. His son, Simon, did bring suit against Dolgorukov in 1860, but in France rather than in Russia. It was for libel against his father but not in the Russian Genealogical Book, It was for another book that Dolgorukov had written entitled The Truth about Russia (Pravda o Rossii), published in Paris in 1861. The book was typical of a number of books and articles written at this time, critical of the Russian system, published outside Russia to avoid the censors and smuggled back to an eager reading public. Eventually, in 1862, Vorontsov fils won judgment. No damages had been sought, but Dolgorukov had to pay five-sixths of the court costs and publish a retraction in five magazines of Vorontsov's choosing; the remaining sixth had to be paid by Le Courier de dimanche, the paper that had published a review of Dolgorukov's book.27 Vorontsov's doctors had prescribed complete rest and inactivity, but he had to rise to fulfil one last imperial duty. On 26 August he attended the coronation of Alexander n in Moscow. Those gathered for the festive occasion heard the reading of the honours list. The emperor personally presented Vorontsov with a field-marshal's baton, symbol of the highest service position in the empire.28 There was also much talk at the coronation of the emperor's recent historic announcement about emancipation. In March he had issued a public warning to the lords of the land: they had best begin to abolish serfdom from above lest it abolish itself from below. It had been the first public indication by a Russian ruler that eman-

211 Retirement

cipation was to come to Russia's fifty-two million serfs. Everyone had expected it of the new emperor, yet it took all by surprise. Vorontsov, basking in a setting sun, had been waiting for it, biding his time until the signal should come from the top. He would not quite live to see it done. He returned to Odessa at the beginning of October. The city turned out to greet him, the ancient field-marshal, their former and still much-loved governor.29 His health was deteriorating noticeably. He attempted once to go riding, as had been his habit, but was too weak to manage it. Throughout October he still managed a daily ride by carriage, but he was saddened that he was unable to pay one last visit to his beloved Alupka in the Crimea. By the end of October his appetite had disappeared and he could no longer move his limbs, although his mind remained lucid. He became weaker and weaker, confined to his bed, attempting to smile at those fussing over him but knowing his days were nearly over.30 He had an intermittent fever, which his physician attempted unsuccessfully to alleviate with sulphate of quinine pills. On 3 November he was struck by what his physician described as an attack of nervous apoplexy, or a stroke. He remained alive, in reasonable comfort and closely attended by his wife and his doctor, until 6 November, a Tuesday, when in the afternoon he had a second stroke. By 4:25 P.M. he was dead. In the opinion of the bereaved, his face maintained "an expression of energy and kindness."31 Four days later a funeral service was held in the Odessa Cathedral, and his body in full panoply was laid to rest in a sarcophagus prepared there.32 From early morning until late at night masses of people from Odessa and all over New Russia crowded in to pay their last respects.33 Even people well down the social scale appear to have felt they had personally benefited from Vorontsov's administration. The emperor shortly gave his permission to have a statue of Vorontsov built in Odessa, paid for by public subscription. He personally contributed three thousand roubles.34 In Caucasia, public response was similar. A necrology appeared in Kavkaz remarking not only on Vorontsov's military achievements in Caucasia but also on his general contribution to improving Caucasian life.35 He was remembered and revered as a protector of local customs and traditions.36 At a time when Finns were smarting under restrictions placed on publications in Finnish by St Petersburg,37 Georgians were being encouraged to publish works in their language. Caucasians, for the first time since incorporation, had been made to feel citizens of the empire. The Caucasian committee, acting on the request of the current

212 The End of a Career

Caucasian viceroy, A.I. Bariatinsky, petitioned the emperor for permission to construct a memorial statue to Vorontsov in Tiflis as follows: "Not only does the Georgian aristocratic class deeply respect the name of the late Prince Vorontsov, but also all the aristocratic servitors here. All those who have served under his authority, and equally persons of other positions, are filled with similar feelings for the efforts of the late viceroy and are ready to make the necessary sacrifice to erect a statue to his memory in Tiflis."38 Alexander n again granted his permission, and again personally subscribed with another three thousand roubles. He ruled that the subscription had to be extended to everyone in the trans-Caucasian territory, regardless of class.39 By May 1858 there were over twelve hundred subscribers, ranging from Major-General Jafar-Kuli-AgaJevanshir in Shemakha, who had contributed three hundred roubles, to G. Desadze in Tiflis, who could only manage five kopeks.40 In 1860 the memorial commission contracted a St Petersburg artist, the sculptor Pimenov, to do a bronze statue. It would stand in a small square at the end of the bridge across the Kura-Mtkvari, on the left bank of the river that tears its way through Tiflis.41 The bridge had already been renamed in his honour.42 Though the artist died before the statue was finished, his assistants completed it according to his model. In the summer of 1866 it was shipped by steamer from St Petersburg. The boat went by way of London, as if to allow Vorontsov one last visit to his beloved England. Eventually it reached the west Georgian port of Poti. The statue, some twelve feet long and weighing over 2,500 pounds, hauled overland through Georgia to the capital at Tiflis in the early spring of 1867 by a team of mules, made a great procession. The emperor's youngest brother, Grand Duke Michael, Caucasian viceroy since 1863, set the unveiling ceremony for 25 March. It was the anniversary of the day of Vorontsov's arrival in Tiflis in 1845. The celebration, with seventy-five-year-old Princess Lise Vorontsova guest of honour, was a famous party in the tradition of great Caucasian celebrations.43 The princess would die at a great age in 1881, a few weeks after the assassination of Alexander n. A visiting Englishman saw the statue on his tour of Georgia in 1887; he remarked that one morning Vorontsov appeared dressed in an old Lek sheepskin hat, and that everyone seemed to think it a good joke.44 Pimenov's statue in Tiflis unfortunately was destroyed, but the one in Odessa still stands today. The statues, particularly considering their voluntary public foundation, were practically a curiosity in Russian history. When poor old Plautin had made his toast of "public thanks" at the English Club back in 1845, he had been chastised by Nicholas i: only the

213 Retirement

emperor could thank a servitor; even the best at his best was only doing his duty to the emperor. Statues of former Russian emperors abounded, but not usually of their minions. Occasionally statues of important generals like Suvorov or Kutuzov were erected by the state to commemorate an important victory - or to remind fractious natives to keep their place, like that of Paskevich in Warsaw in iSyo.45 No public subscriptions were taken in Paskevich's case. Considering the Polish uprising in 1863, not to mention Paskevich's charming reputation for moulding the unfortunate Poles into Russian-speaking subjects, it would have been an embarrassment to try. The two friends, who incidentally died in the same year, were as different in death as they had been in life. Vorontsov's statues, both their funding and their celebration, constituted an expression of genuine public opinion, "public thanks" to an individual as individual rather than as emperor's servitor. It is interesting to see how Vorontsov's name has fared over time since his death. In the decades after his death a veritable river of praise flowed for the man and his works. Stories (unverified) of his personal greatness circulated. He was said to have personally paid the debts that his junior officers had run up in France in the occupation. He was said to have personally distributed his entire salary of fifty thousand roubles as governor-general and as viceroy among the secretaries and clerks employed under him.46 The obituary in the English Guardian claimed that Vorontsov had "that rare quality of securing the affection and raising the tone of all around him"; that thanks to his rule in Caucasia "the natives have been raised to a level with the Russians, and all have been alike treated with respect and urbanity"; that Vorontsov was like "a chapel in a palace - the only refuge of sanctity" in his country under the late emperor, Nicholas i.47 Vorontsov's ex-secretary Michael Shcherbinin, hoping perhaps to become his master's Boswell, published a biography of Vorontsov in 1858. He outdid himself in extolling the statesman's "belief in religious laws and sacred feelings of duty" and his "unlimited love for humanity and his striving for everything noble"; Vorontsov's vast library, he asserted, "demonstrated his thirst for enlightenment and inquisitiveness into all branches of science, literature, and art."48 A more perceptive reviewer of Shcherbinin's book for the Caucasian Russian-language newspaper Kavkaz found it disappointing. He complained that it gave only "the usual, official information - no insight into the personality, or the times." Vorontsov, continued the reviewer, had been the sort of person who "put principles into living practice," who "lived to serve." His administration had been "characterized by

214 The End of a Career

Christian love, temperance, gentleness." He had "preferred to free ten guilty than punish one innocent." And he had been, concluded the reviewer, successful. Only under his rule had Caucasians begun to realize the advantages that Russian imperial rule offered over "Eastern despotism." Because of "his nature, his education, and his understanding of progress" he had been able to bring out the riches of places like the Crimea, Bessarabia, New Russia, and the TransCaucasian territory. He had "understood the practical truths of his times" better than anyone else. He had been a "true European."49 Vorontsov's name continued to glow brightly abroad, especially in England. In 1887 an English georgiophile exploring Georgia informed his English readers that "it flatters our national pride to remember that that statesman [Vorontsov] was English by birth [which was wrong] and education, if not by blood."50 Another biographical account appeared in 1892. Although briefer, it too had only praise for Vorontsov. It spoke of his foresight at attracting settlers to New Russia, his progress in turning the feral south coast of the Crimea back into the garden it once had been, and his success in dealing with Caucasians by giving administrative responsibilities to natives in preference to Russians.51 Also in 1892, the appropriate volume of the Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary appeared and added its accolade in the entry for Vorontsov: the "half-wild New Russian territory" had awaited only Vorontsov's "skilful hand" for its modernization; Caucasia needed only Vorontsov's presence for a "sharp change for the better" in the military and civilian situation.52 The official publication of a centenary celebration of the city of Odessa in 1894 continued with more fulsome praise for Vorontsov's great 'works earlier in the century. It mentioned how, with the "breadth of his plans and understanding of all sides of matters," he gave Odessa the economic and cultural leadership of the whole of southern Russia, linking it to central Russia as well as to Western Europe, giving it schools, libraries, operas; and all the public amenities of a great city. It described how he established the basis for the exploitation of the region's noted resources and how he encouraged and supervised Odessa's (and all of New Russia's) enormous population growth. His three decades of rule, it proclaimed, in commercial as well as in civilian matters had been nothing short of a period of "unbroken progress."53 While this was obviously the general sentiment at the time, it was not universal. Prince Peter Dolgorukov, still smarting from the judgment that had gone against him in the libel suit, had a very different view. In his words, "Vorontsov was a man with an outstanding mind,

215 Retirement

gifted with brilliant abilities both military and administrative. But he was to the ultimate degree vain and power-loving. He insisted that all around him bow down to him and fulfil his wishes unquestioningly. True, this almightiness was softened by outstanding politeness, elegant form, amiableness in manners ... He was distinguished with a broad intellect, yet he was the falsest person in the world ingratiating, two-faced, and on top of that exceptionally revengeful."54 Dolgorukov was not the only one of Vorontsov's contemporaries to express reservations about his career. In 1873 the author of an article appearing in the popular journal Russkaia starina accused Vorontsov of, at least in one instance, flagrantly misusing his power.55 Admittedly, the article was immediately followed by a spate of articles attacking the author for writing "falsehoods" about Vorontsov - a case of pure jealousy or unfounded personal grievance, they suggested.56 His ardent defenders had all served in positions of responsibility under him, in either civilian or military positions, and to them, even granting his few personal quirks, he had been a saint among devils. Other contemporaries criticized Vorontsov on more profound grounds. When Baron Korf in his memoirs described Vorontsov as "more an English lord than a Russian dignitary," he did not mean it as a compliment. Echoing Dolgorukov's sentiments, he went on to explain that Vorontsov "had many ideas little corresponding to the spirit of our institutions or of our national life ... And whenever discussion touched his rights, his authority, anything essential to him, he became prickly and arrogant so that his actions approached rudeness, even to the point of obliterating his customary courteousness."57 The dawn of the twentieth century brought criticism of anything to do with the overweening authority of "tsarism." Leo Tolstoy's characterization of Vorontsov appearing in 1904, for example, was highly uncomplimentary. In his popular and gripping story "Hadji Murat" the novelist depicted the viceroy as ambitious and vain, clever and cunning, devious and thoroughly political.58 Some criticism also appeared in England. In 1908 a noted English historian of the Caucasian wars expressed his opinion that Vorontsov in his military operations in Caucasia had shown persistence but little talent in the field.59 Two years later, however, an equally noted English historian sang unrestrained praise in his biographical sketch of Vorontsov for the eleventh edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica in 1910. Vorontsov "brilliantly withstood Napoleon in person"; "he may be said to have been the creator of Odessa and the benefactor of the Crimea"; his campaign against Shamil was "brilliant."60

216 The End of a Career And in 1912 in Russia, a retired Russian statesman wrote in his memoirs that for someone growing up in post-Vorontsovian Caucasia, Vorontsov had been remembered with much respect as having given a firm civil basis to the Russian administration there.61 Then, in 1914, a young Georgian historian, who would become the leading Georgian historian after the 1917 revolution, wrote an article about Georgia in a Russian encyclopedia, stating that Vorontsov's rule as viceroy in Caucasia had put an end at last to "a policy of persecution and russification"; that he had given crucial moral and material support to the artists and intellectuals who developed modern Georgian culture.62 More recent historiography, while still sparse, is generally critical. In the contemporary Soviet view, Vorontsov is suspect on three counts: as a high tsarist official; as one of the biggest land- and serf-owners; and as a zealous "capitalist." Thus, a noted Soviet historian of southern Russia in 1970 described him archly as "the widely educated, energetic, and greatly far-sighted defender of the interests of the ruling class."63 The Great Soviet Encyclopedia in 1971 gave Vorontsov grudging respect, telling us that, despite his extensive ownership of serfs, at least he introduced hired labour in place of serf labour in many instances; that, despite his own economic undertakings, he showed a certain amount of public spirit in creating favourable conditions for the development of capitalism in commerce and agriculture in New Russia; and that in Caucasia he cleverly used quarrels among the feudalistic native princes to bring their lands into the empire, a positive step. "Forgetting the fact that M.S. Vorontsov was a courtier of the tsar and a careerist," concluded that author, "his intellect, his education, and his well-known liberalism differentiated him from the rest of the tsar's administrators."64 In 1979 a Soviet expert on the Vorontsov family holdings and economic activities described Vorontsov as a hypocrite for having encouraged the Decembrists-to-be by voicing his desire to emancipate the Russian serfs but subsequently failing to set free his own eighty thousand serfs, by going from rich to richer on their labouring backs for the sake of mercantilistic greed.65 In the West, two American historians, in 1965 and 1973 respectively, claimed that, despite Vorontsov's apparent liberalism, his administration failed to realize the real economic needs of southern Russia, particularly of New Russia, that it failed to invest in what we might call an economic infrastructure that would have allowed the southern economy to achieve a self-sustaining growth.66 An American military historian, writing in 1981 about Emperor Nicholas's mostly unsuccessful attempts to conquer the Caucasian

217 Retirement

highlands, stated that Vorontsov failed to reorganize the military administration in Caucasia, which was a "critical mistake." He nevertheless attributed the removal of St Petersburg bureaucrats from direct involvement in Caucasian affairs to Vorontsov's viceroyship and termed it a "critical step toward the final conquest."67 Most recently, Vorontsov's star has seemed to wax a little brighter again. In 1983 some Western experts met to discuss the Russian and Soviet experience with Muslim guerrilla warfare; one of their conclusions was that the present-day Soviet leaders might have saved themselves some of the difficulties they encountered in Afghanistan if they had read their own history and employed some of Vorontsov's tactics in dealing with rebel highland guerrillas in Caucasia.68 A British-Canadian historian of Russian military life in 1985 appraised Vorontsov's activity during the Napoleonic wars and the occupation of France as enlightened, humane, and sensible in comparison to his contemporaries.69 The American author of a modern urban history of Odessa published in 1986 has concluded that although Vorontsov "manifested conflicting, even contradictory, qualities," he showed "exceptional leadership" and decidedly influenced social and economic life of New Russia with his "liberal regime."70 And a British historian of the development of Georgian national thought has written that Vorontsov was noteworthy in promoting Georgia's socio-economic and cultural life, even if it was an example of "an occasional eccentric deviation" from the Russian imperial norm.71 Most recently, the American author of a thorough-going social history of Georgia published in 1988, in reviewing Vorontsov's role as Caucasian viceroy, has judged him to have had a significant impact in two interrelated respects: in overseeing the final metamorphosis of the social elites among the Georgians and the Armenians into estates of the Russian imperial type, and in successfully carrying out the last steps in the administrative integration of Caucasia into the empire.72 So much for how Vorontsov has fared at the hands of commentators since his demise. Let us return to a reminiscing contemporary who knew Vorontsov particularly well: Alexander Dondukov-Korsakov. Although in his memoirs (around 1877) he puts his finger on many unflattering aspects of Vorontsov's character - his egoism, his coolness and lack of passion, his cynicism - he nevertheless makes it clear that Vorontsov was a brilliant imperial administrator for his time. Dondukov-Korsakov's account reflects the relatively liberated feeling of the 18705: that a forward-looking person like Vorontsov had had some of his "good qualities" repressed by "the exigencies of the time and of his position,"73 an oblique reference to the constraints of serving what was seen as a tyrannical master in Nicholas i.

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Indeed, to most Russians, looking back into what appeared to be the dark Nicholaevan era from the brighter age ushered in by Alexander n, Vorontsov's image shone with extraordinary brightness. For Vorontsov was an anachronism. A reform-minded pragmatist with no serious reformer-tsar to lead the way, a man of humanitarian instincts in Russia's most inhumane age, a believer in individual initiative in a crowd of paternalists, a public servant among careerists, Vorontsov was yet a product of the Russian system. He rose rapidly through it and was rewarded lavishly by it. He can be credited with having helped that system to survive as a going concern. No radical he, but one of its mighty bulwarks in the post-Catherinian, postNapoleonic era. Yet his political style was English: that of the Tory age of George in, or perhaps even that of the Whig reform era. Vorontsov was indeed "more an English lord than a Russian dignitary," and the shock of the rupture of relations between the two countries hastened his death. His career personifies the anachronisms of Russian imperial rule. At a time of increased specialization among government bureaucrats he was important because of the generalization of his function. With his extraordinary authority as governor-general of New Russia and as viceroy of Caucasia, which he used with consummate skill, he reflected the absolute authority of his sovereign, who was the supreme generalist in the Russian system. He typified the influential imperial official who did not want to see a strong, professionalized bureaucracy develop to impose itself between him and his sovereign. It was this autocratic principle that prevented the full and modern systematization of law and bureaucracy throughout the empire.74 It is well to realize that few if any high Russian officials saw this basic contradiction between a modern and a patriarchal system of government. Vorontsov would not be the last statesman in the nineteenth century to argue that the autocracy could continue in the conditions of a modern industrialized world.75 By upholding the autocratic principle he prevented that modernization, but he also held the empire together. He was a peculiar jewel in the Russian setting. Or was it the setting that was peculiar and Vorontsov the ordinary jewel?

Abbreviations

Akty KAK: Akty Sobrannye Kavkazskoiu Arkheograficheskoiu Kommissieiu AKV. Arkhiv Kniazia Vorontsova IRLI: Archive of the Institute of Russian Literature, Pushkinskii Dom, Leningrad LOII: Archive of the Leningrad Branch of the Institute of History of the Soviet Academy of Sciences MERSH: Modern Encyclopedia of Russian and Soviet History PSZ: Polnoe sobranie zakonov rossiiskoi imperil RBS: Russkii Biograficheskii Slovar' TSGIASSSR: Central State Historical Archive of the USSR, Leningrad WHA: Wilton House Archives, Wilton, England os: old style (Julian calendar) ns: new style (Gregorian calendar)

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Notes

INTRODUCTION

1 Until recently, "the Caucasus" has been used in English to refer to the entire region. Technically, however, the Caucasus (Kavkaz, in Russian) refers to the Caucasian mountain range itself. The territory immediately to the north of it is the North Caucasus, to the south (from the Russian point of view) the Trans-Caucasus. In this work, however, we follow currently accepted practice, which is to use the term "Caucasia" instead of the Caucasus. See Society for the Study of Caucasia Newsletter i, no. z (1988): 11-12. 2 Korf, "Iz zapisok," 52. C H A P T E R O N E : FAMILY B A C K G R O U N D

1 Semen Romanovich, in its Russian form. 2 For a controversial but stimulating discussion of the rootlessness, alienation, and other cultural and social effects of eighteenth century aristocratic life, see Raeff, Origins. 3 Their regular correspondence testifies to their intimate friendship; much of it was published in AKV, vols. 17 and 37. 4 Herlihy (Odessa, 118 and 119), no doubt misled by an over-enthusiastic memoirist (of whom there were many), although she gives no reference to the information, asserts that Vorontsov took a degree at Cambridge University. The Alumni Cantabrigienses has no record of his ever matriculating, much less taking a degree. It is possible that he contemplated doing so (he would have been old enough to do so in 1800), but in 1801 Alexander i came to the throne and gave the young Vorontsov his much-awaited chance to return to Russia. 5 Ogarkov, Vorontsovy, 64-73; Vorontsov's diary: archive of the Leningrad

222 Notes to pages 8-10

6

7

8 9

10 n 12

13 14 15

Branch of the Institute of History of the Soviet Academy of Sciences [henceforth LOII], f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. i, d. 1278, 11. 1-3. Also various letters from Cathcart, Malcolm, and Wilson to Vorontsov: ibid., op. 2, d. 304, 11. 21-2; d. 469, 11. i-i ob.; d. 548, 11. ii ob.-i2. He settled down after retirement in London until his death in 1832. Woronzow Road, London NW 8, near Regent's Park, was named in his honour after he left five hundred pounds in his will for the parish poor in Marylebone (Bebbington, London, 351). In 1808, after a two-year engagement, she married George Herbert, eleventh Earl of Pembroke and eighth Earl of Montgomery. His son Robert by his first marriage inherited the title when George died in 1827. The twelfth earl preferred to live in Paris (where he appears to have wasted a large portion of the Pembroke family fortune). George and Catherine's son Sidney (whose title was Lord Herbert of Lea), until his death in 1861, had to rent the family estate of Wilton House from his half-brother Robert. The "Russian countess," as Catherine is known today, continued to live with her son in the mansion after her husband died in 1827 until her own death in 1856. (See Wilton House, passim?) He even opposed the partitioning of Poland, which annoyed Catherine since in certain matters she was far from liberal. In a letter to his uncle, Count Alexander Vorontsov, dated 27 September / 8 October 1799, the seventeen-year-old Vorontsov wrote that he hoped soon to be able to enter active Russian service: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 333, 11. i-i ob. Vorontsov had apparently become used to using both old-style (os) and new-style (ns) dates on his letters to Russia. Hereafter, dates for events occurring in Russia are given according to the Russian, or Gregorian, or old-style (os) calendar in use there; and for events in the West according to the Western, or Julian, or new style (ns) calendar in use there; unless there is ambiguity, in which case both dates are given. Letter from Count Simon Vorontsov to his son, dated London, 3 May 1801: AKV 17, no. 5, pp. 5-6. Letter from Count Simon Vorontsov to his son, dated London, 5 May 1801: AKV 17, no. 7, p. 16. Novosiltsev became a member of Alexander's four-member "Unofficial Committee," which enthusiastically but in the end futilely tried to institutionalize the young emperor's liberal leanings. See the biography by Lozinskaia, Vo glave. For an English translation of the project, see "Project." At first Alexander i excited the imagination of fellow Russians eager for fundamental liberal reforms. As time went on he retreated from his earlier liberalism and became not only conservative but something of

223 Notes to pages 10-16 a mystic, which proved to be frustrating for the would-be reformers and unfortunate, not to say disastrous, in the long run for the smooth modernization of Russian society. 16 That is, according to the semi-official book of the Russian peerage published by Prince Peter Dolgorukov (Rossiiskaia?) Vorontsov himself disagreed with Dolgorukov's account and initiated what became a celebrated if bitter dispute; Vorontsov's view was that his clan sprang from a German prince who came to Russia in 1027 to serve the Kievan grand prince. Dolgorukov pointed out that without clear proof connecting Vorontsov's immediate ancestors of the eighteenth century with the aristocratic Vorontsov boyar family of the sixteenth, the genealogical descent was untenable. Search as he might, Vorontsov was never able to bring that proof to light. See chapter 16 below. 17 At his death, Vorontsov's estate would be worth approximately 80,000 serfs. For a discussion of the Vorontsov estate, see Indova, Krepostnoe, 21-34. CHAPTER TWO: MILITARY SERVICE

1 "Formuliarnyi spisok," vi. 2 Letter, 27 Sept. / 8 Oct. 1799, London: LOII, f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. 2, d. 333, 11. i-i ob. For treatment of os / ns dates, see chap, i, no. 9. 3 "Formuliarnyi spisok," vi. 4 PSZ, first series, no. 20007. 5 For biographical information on Tsitsianov, see the sketch in MERSH 40, 5i-56 See, for example, Tuchkov, Zapiski. 7 For a sharply critical view of Tsitsianov and his policies, particularly as they affected the Caucasian Muslims, see Atkin, Russia and Iran, chap. 5. 8 For the history of Georgia in the period before and at incorporation into the empire, see Lang, The Last Years. 9 Letter from S.R. Vorontsov to Tsitsianov, 26 Aug. 1803: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1279, 11. 4-7 ob. 10 Letter from A.R. Vorontsov to Tsitsianov: ibid., 11. 25-6 ob.; Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 9. 11 Letter from Tsitsianov to S.R. Vorontsov: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1279, 11. 20-1 ob. 12 "Formuliarnyi spisok," vi. 13 Ibid.; Tsitsianov's report to Alexander i: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1279, 11. 29-32 ob. 14 Secret orders from Tsitsianov to Vorontsov, 8 Mar. 1804: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1279, 11. 50-4 ob.

224 Notes to pages 16-21 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29

30 31 32

33 34 35

36

Report from Tsitsianov to the emperor, 10 Mar. 1804: ibid., 1. 58. Letter from Tsitsianov to A.R. Vorontsov, 29 May 1804: ibid., 11. 72-3. Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 22; "Formuliarnyi spisok," vii. Letter from Tsitsianov to A.R. Vorontsov, 4 July 1804: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1279, 11. 70-1. Letter from Vorontsov to Tsitsianov: ibid., 11. 79-80. "Formuliarnyi spisok," vii. Vorontsov's diary: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1278, 1. 4 ob. Ibid.; "Formuliarnyi spisok," vii. Vorontsov's diary: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1278, 1. 5 ob. Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 15. Vorontsov's diary: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1278, 1. 5 ob. "Formuliarnyi spisok," vii. Josselson, The Commander, 28-33; als° "Pultusk," Brokgauz. "Formuliarnyi spisok," vii; Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 24-32. Sir Fitzroy Maclean suggests in all seriousness that Vorontsov's elderly and respectable francophobe father, Count Simon, was actually hiding under the floorboards of the raft, his feet dangling in the river, in order to overhear the conversation and report it to the English (Maclean, To Caucasus, 74). This statement, however, like all the author's statements, is unsupported; indeed the book lacks any scholarly apparatus and appears to be based uncritically on unreliable sources. Troyat, Alexander, 101-3. Ibid., 104, 108. No first-hand account exists in Russian since Tsitsianov's aide was also killed, and the two had daringly approached the city gates alone. The author of what appears to be the most balanced account claims that the assassins were Persian agents, anxious to prevent the khan from surrendering Baku to Tsitsianov. (Potto, Utverzhdenie i: 144-53.) "Formuliarnyi spisok," viii. Letter from Langeron to Vorontsov, 30 July 1811: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 718, 1. 8. See, for example, letters from Count Langeron to Vorontsov in which he calls Kutuzov "a great thief. You have to be on your guard with him every moment. You could not trust him with anything because of that, not an expedition, not a detachment, although he has ability" (letter of 19 July 1811: ibid, 1. 2 ob.). And "I am delighted that Kutuzov is looking to enter another division, although it will be dangerous anywhere because of his horrible immorality and his penchant for drinking. However, he is courageous and intelligent" (letter of 30 July 1811: ibid., 1. 7 ob.). 5 September (ns).

225 Notes to pages 21-7 37 Letter from Lady Catherine Pembroke to Elizabeth Montgomery, 8 Oct. 1812, Wilton House Archives, Wilton, England [hereafter WHA]. 38 Excerpt of a letter from Vorontsov to A.I. Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky, written Dec. 1836, printed in Borodino, 342. 39 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 22; although according to Bogdanovich, Istoriia, 183, he received a bayonet wound. 40 Borodino, 342, 343. 41 Letter from Lady Catherine Pembroke to Elizabeth Montgomery, 8 Oct. l8l2, WHA.

42 "Formuliarnyi spisok," ix. 43 See, e.g., the letter from Lady Catherine Pembroke to Elizabeth Montgomery, dated 8 Oct. 1812, WHA. 44 1777-1849; later Sir Robert. 45 Letter from Wilson to Vorontsov, 31 Aug. 1812 (os): LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 304, 1. i ob. 46 Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 66. 47 M.S. Vorontsov, letter to Lord Pembroke, 25 Mar. 1813, WHA. 48 "Formuliarnyi spisok," ix. 49 Lobanov-Rostovsky, Russia, 304. 50 Ibid., 304-6; ms by M.I. Bogdanovich on the Crimean War: Archive of the Institute of Russian Literature, Pushkinskii Dom (hereafter IRLI), f. 265 (Russkaia Starina), op. 2, d. 547, 1. i ob. 51 "Formuliarnyi spisok," x. 52 Ibid. 53 For an interesting eyewitness account of the allies' (especially the Russians') campaigns during 1814, in English translation, by one of Alexander I's aides-de-camp, see Mikhailofsky-Danilefsky, History. 54 "Formuliarnyi spisok," x. CHAPTER THREE: COMMANDING

THE

OCCUPATION ARMY

1 2 3 4 5

Lobanov-Rostovsky, Russia, 353; Keep, Soldiers, 164-5. Lobanov-Rostovsky, Russia, 354. "Formuliarnyi spisok," x. Note dated 26 Oct. 1815: LOII, f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. i, d. 246, 1. 16. Keep, Soldiers, 256-7, argues that it was the injured pride of the army officers that merged with an emerging Great Russian national consciousness to create the radical state of mind that came to be known as Decembrism. 6 See Keep, Soldiers, 257-72, for a good review of the formation of the Decembrist groups within the military.

226 Notes to pages 27-9 7 Now that he had taken over the management of his father's vast estates with some 27,000 male serfs, much augmented after the death of his distinguished uncle in 1805. 8 Ogarkov, Vbrontsovy, 70-1; Rozen, "Mikhail," 64-5; Orlov, Kapituliatsiia, 226, 281. 9 "Thomas Jefferson: An Exhibition," Charlottesville, Va, Feb. 1987. 10 Avaliani, "Gr. M.S. Vorontsov," 47. For more on Vorontsov's preference for gradual emancipation, see his letter to V.N. Karazin, 14 Apr. 1820, printed in Pis'ma, 253. There is also a curious, lengthy, but unaddressed and unsigned document in the Vorontsov archival deposit entitled "On the Condition of the Peasants in Russia," written in 1818, purporting to demonstrate how the direction of legislation under Emperor Alexander i had been unremittingly, if gradually, towards emancipation of the serfs throughout the empire, which "does not leave room for doubt about the great intentions of the Liberator of Europe, and towards which He, with the help of the Almighty, is gradually drawing nigh." It is known that Alexander toyed with the idea of emancipation throughout his reign, so perhaps the latter document is a draft of something he had considered and rejected, a copy of which was sent to Vorontsov, possibly by the author (Karazin? Menshikov? one of the Turgenev brothers?) for his information. (LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 400, 11. 218-47 °b.) There is no evidence to support the recent assertion that "in 1820 he was one of the principal sponsors of the move made for the emancipation of peasants," nor that "he is also known to have favored a constitution for Russia at that time" (Struve, "An Anglo-Russian," 126, n. 37). 11 See a subsequent letter from Vorontsov to Karazin, 25 May 1820, in the Central State Historical Archive of the USSR in Leningrad [hereafter TSGIASSSR], f. 1409 (Sobstvennaia E.I.V. Kantseliariia), op. i, d. 3246,11. i-i ob. 12 Reference to Vorontsov's remarks in Langeron's letter of 11/23 Apr. 1816: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 718, 1. 53. 13 Ibid., 1. 53 ob. 14 Keep, Soldiers, 299. 15 Vorontsov's semi-monthly State of the Corps reports: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 253. The number of troops dropped to about 30,000 in 1817, when two brigades were sent back home: ibid., 1. 35. 16 Keep, Soldiers, 179, 188. 17 Bushnell, "Peasants," argues that the normal Russian soldier, because of his economic preoccupations within the regiment, remained a "peasant in uniform" throughout the nineteenth century, even after the military reforms of the 18705. 18 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 11. 29 ob.-30.

227 Notes to pages 29-35 19 Ibid., 11. 30 ob.-3i. Many such details are included in Vorontsov's final report to the emperor as commander of the occupation corps, dated 20 Dec. 1818: ibid., 11. 25-41 ob.; the report was published in full in Vorontsov, "Otchet." 20 Order no. 4, 21 Feb. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 249, 1. 5. 21 Report of 22 Dec. 1816: ibid,, op. i, d. 221, 11. 95-102 ob. 22 Report of 9 Oct. 1817: ibid., 11. 268-76. 23 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: ibid., op. 2, d. 58, 1. 32. 24 Rothenberg, The Art, 197. 25 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 1. 32 ob. 26 Ibid., 11. 31, 31 ob., 36. 27 Keep, Soldiers, 220. 28 Letter of 5 Aug. 1817: ibid., op. i, d. 221, 1. 224. 29 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: ibid., op. 2, d. 58, 11. 29-29 ob. 30 See, for example, Benckendorf, Souvenir, 83-4. 31 Report of 31 Dec. 1816: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 221, 11. 51-51 ob. 32 For example, Order no. 28, 28 Oct. 1818: ibid., d. 249, 11. 30-30 ob. 33 Order no. 32, 3 Dec. 1818: ibid., 11. 35-35 ob. 34 See Keep, Soldiers, passim, for the best illustration of this. 35 Vorontsov, "Pravila." 36 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: ibid., op. 2, d. 58, 1. 25. 37 Ibid., 1. 26 ob. 38 Keep, Soldiet-s, 156. 39 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 11. 26 ob.-27. 40 See the article by J.C. Zacek on "The Lancastrian School" and its introduction into Russia. 41 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 11. 34-5. 42 Keep, Soldiers, 203-4. 43 On the slow progress of reformist ideas in the military under Catherine n, Paul i, and Alexander i, see Keep, Soldiers, 158-77. 44 Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 1. 25 ob. 45 Ibid., 1. 26; 1. 26 ob.; Order no. 2, 10 Jan. 1818: ibid., op. i, d. 249, 1. 3. 46 Vorontsov's father, Count Simon, for example, in 1774 proposed mitigating the arbitrariness, although not necessarily the severity, of punishments given to soldiers: he argued against officers' striking their men, or against punishments that taught soldiers to hate their rifles (Keep, Soldiers, 170). 47 Keep, Soldiers, 173, led astray by a memoir written some sixty years after the fact, erroneously claims that Vorontsov abolished corporal punishment in the occupation army in France. His conclusion that Vorontsov's behaviour as military leader stood in stark contrast to the malpractice common elsewhere in the imperial army, of course, remains accurate.

228 Notes to pages 36-44 48 49 50 51 52 53

54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78

79 80 81 82 83

Report of 20 Dec. 1818: ibid., op. 2, d. 58, 11. 28-28 ob. Ibid., op. i, d. 249, passim. Report of 20 Dec. 1818: ibid., op. 2, d. 58, 1. 27 ob.; 1. 29. Vorontsov, "Pravila," 500. Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 1. 27 ob. Again it is interesting to note that Vorontsov's father, when he was a young army officer, argued for the publicizing of individual punishments as a particularly effective way of instilling general discipline (Keep, Soldiers, 170). Order no. 3, 6 Feb. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 249, 1. 4. Order no. 5, 13 Mar. 1818: ibid., 1. 6. Order no. 8, 30 Apr. 1818: ibid., 1. 9. Order no. 10, 5 May 1818: ibid., 11. ii-u ob. Order no. i, 7 Jan. 1818: ibid., 1. 2. Order no. 18, 6 Sept. 1818: ibid., 1. 19. Order no. 3, 6 Feb. 1818: ibid., 1. 4. Order no. 30, 13 Nov. 1818: ibid., 11. 32-32 ob. Letter to A.R. Vorontsov, London, 27 Sept./8 Oct. 1799: ibid., op. 2, d. 333, 1. i ob. Vorontsov, "Nastavleniia." Vorontsov, "Pravila." Ibid., 501-2. Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 1. 28. Letter of 16 Apr. 1818: Shcherbatov, General-fel'dmarshal, 335-6. Letter of i Oct. 1818: ibid., 336-8. "Vorontsov," 42. See, for example, Madatova, "Imperatritsa," 388. Letter of 4 Apr. 1816: Shcherbatov, General-fel'dmarshal, Appendix, 63-4. Ibid., i: 340. Order No. 2, 10 Jan. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 249, 1. 3. Keep, Soldiers, 211-12. Letter of 20 Feb. 1810: ibid., op. 2, d. 303, 11. i-i ob. Ibid. Keep, Soldiers, passim. Keep, Soldiers, 165, suggests that "some alarmist and routine-minded generals" applied the harsh, post-Napoleonic parade-ground discipline specifically as a corrective to the spoiling effects of the troops' Western experiences. Zavalishin, Zapiski, 187-8. Order no. 23, 14 Oct. 1818: ibid., op. i, d. 249, 1. 24. Order no. 19, n Sept. 1818: ibid., 11. 20-20 ob. and 22. Order no. 25, 16 Oct. 1818: ibid., 1. 27. Order no. 26, 17 Oct. 1818: ibid., 1. 28.

229 Notes to pages 44-51 84 85 86 87

Order no. 33, 17 Dec. 1818: ibid., 11. 32-32 ob. "Formuliarnyi spisbk," x. Report of 20 Dec. 1818: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 1. 28 ob. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 69. CHAPTER FOUR: FURLOUGH

1 The fortune came from the estates of both the Polish count and Prince Potemkin. The latter did not leave any of his estate directly to Lise (pace Maclean, To Caucasus, 74), since Lise was not yet born when Potemkin died in October 1791. Nor was Lise's dowry anywhere near "thirty million roubles" and "two hundred thousand serfs" (ibid.), but probably less than 10 per cent of that ("Formuliarnyi spisok," vi). The gossip of the day surrounding such a favoured couple was obviously highly creative. 2 Hommaire de Hell, Travels, 12. 3 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 69. 4 Ibid., 70. 5 Ibid. 6 "Formuliarnyi spisok," x. 7 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 70. 8 Actually the Bujak, or southern Bessarabia, the present-day Moldavian SSR.

9 10 11 12 13 14

15 16 17 18 19

Vorontsov, "Memoires," 70. Order dated 21 Sept. 1820: LOII, f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. 2, d. 26, 1. i. Ibid., 11. i ob.-2 ob. Ibid., 1. 2 ob. See Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800, 249. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 71. Herlihy, Odessa, 118, states that Vorontsov purchased the Due de Richelieu's old property in Crimea, but beyond the remark in a letter from his father written in August 1822 that the due's old property was for sale, there is no evidence to support that conclusion. Vorontsov, diary entry: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1278, 11. 23-4 ob.; McConnell, Tsar, 161-2; Keep, Soldiers, 227. He dispatched the note on 22 Nov. os (4 Dec. ns): LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 26, 11. 3-3 ob. Reference by Langeron in a letter to Vorontsov, Odessa, 18 May/9 June 1818: ibid., f. 36, op. 2, d. 718, 1. 56. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 71. The originals of both portraits now hang in the Hermitage in Leningrad. Maclean, To Caucasus, 74, misleadingly suggests that Vorontsov was unmarried ("leading the life of a Regency buck") when the portrait

230 Notes to pages 51-62

20 21 22 23

was done, and that it was "a sensation," apparently implying that he was a socialite, or worse. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 71-2. Ibid., 72. See the suggestive remarks of Marc Raeff in his review article "The Bureaucratic Phenomena," passim but espec. 405-6. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 72. CHAPTER FIVE: NEW RUSSIA

1 For a good survey of the expansion of Russian control over the southern borderlands during Catherine's reign, see LeDonne, Ruling, 2913152 See M. Raeff, "In the Imperial," 220 et passim. 3 Ibid., 221-9. 4 The best English-language source on the economic and social development of the Black Sea area in general and Odessa in particular in the late eighteenth and throughout the nineteenth centuries is Herlihy, Odessa. An excellent Russian-language investigation of the Russian involvement in and the general development of the Black Sea area in the latter half of the eighteenth century and first half of the nineteenth century is E.I. Druzhinina's four monographs: Kiuchuk, Severnoe, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800, and luzhnaia Ukraina v period. 5 Herlihy, Odessa, chap. 3, surveys the economic development of the lands of New Russia that nourished Odessa in the first half of the nineteenth century. 6 See ibid., chap. 2. 7 Druzhinina, Severnoe, 256. 8 Herlihy, Odessa, 24-34; also see Druzhinina, luzhnaia, chap. 3. 9 Druzhinina, Severnoe, 367. 10 "Novorossiiskii krai," Brokgauz; for detailed population statistics for New Russia throughout the period, see Kabuzan, Zaselenie. 11 Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800, 19, 334-6. 12 See the plans of the city in 1794 and 1814 compared, in ibid., 333. 13 See illustration in ibid., 197. 14 Letter from Langeron to Vorontsov, Dubno, 14/26 December 1815: LOII, f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. 2, d. 718, 1. 51 ob. 15 Herlihy, Odessa, 97; Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800, 337. 16 Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800, 334-52. 17 Letter to Vorontsov, Odessa, 11/23 April 1816: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 718, 1- 53-418 Letter to Vorontsov, Odessa, 24 June/6 July 1816: ibid., 1. 55.

231 Notes to pages 62-7 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27

Ibid., 1. 55. Letter to Vorontsov, Odessa, 18 May/9 June J8i8: ibid., 1. 56. Poletika, "Pis'mo," 442. Indova, Krepostnoe, 34-5. Herlihy, Odessa, 117-18. Company financial statement for 1823-43: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 151, 11. 16. LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 925, 1. 14 ob. Ibid., d. 951, 1. 81. Ibid. See Vorontsov's office managers' reports in ibid., d. 904, and various estate accounts in ibid., dd. 951-7. 28 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 73. 29 Indova, Krepostnoe, 30, suggests that by 1830 Vorontsov had increased the income from family estate by 250 per cent over what it had been in 1800. CHAPTER SIX: INITIATION

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8

Vorontsov, "Memoires," 72. Ibid., 73. Ibid. For details of the administrative boundaries, see Kabuzan, Zaselenie, chap. 2. Documents relating to the establishment of the Bessarabian vicegerency are found in TSGIASSSR, f. 1308 (Kantseliariia po upravlenii Bessarabskoi oblasti), op. i, dd. i (especially 11. 3-4 ob. and 13) and 2 (especially 11. 5-7 ob. and 56-61 ob.); the law establishing it is published in PSZ, 2.6 May 1816, No. 26289. Various documents to or about Inzov regarding his appointment: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 55, 11. 3-4 ob., 7-8, 10, 14-31, and 32-3. "Inzov, I.N.," RBS-, note to Inzov from Count Capo d'Istria dated 6 June 1920: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 55, 11. 3-4 ob. Letter from Vorontsov to Baron Kampenhausen, Kishinev, 31 July 1823: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, Op. I,, d. 65, 11. 3-3 Ob.

9 Copy of ukase making the appointment dated 7 May 1823: ibid., 1. i. 10 Personal rescript from Alexander i to Inzov, dated 7 May 1823: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 64, 1. 2. 11 Excerpts from minutes of the meetings of the Committee of Ministers of 12 Aug. and n Sept. 1824: ibid., d. 14, 11. 1-2. 12 Letter from Vorontsov to Baron Kampenhausen, Kishinev, 7 Aug. 1823: IRLI, f. 517 (Kampengauzen, B.B., Baron), d. 19, 1. i. 13 Documents on the establishment and activities of a special commission to review the rights of the Bessarabian aristocracy: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 29.

232 Notes to pages 67-73 14 Vorontsov's report to Alexander i "On the Condition of the New Russian Territory," Mar. 1825: LOII, f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. 2, d. 59, 1. 75 ob. 15 IRLI, f. 517, d. 19, 1. i ob. 16 Ibid., 11. i ob.-z. 17 Documents relating to Inzov's reassignment: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 64, 11. 1-7; also Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800, 178. 18 Letter from Vorontsov to Baron Kampenhausen, Kishinev, 7 Aug. 1823: IRLI, f. 517, d. 19, 11. 3 ob. 19 Shtraikh, "Filipp," 31. 20 Letter from Vorontsov to Kampenhausen, 7 Aug. 1823: IRLI, f. 517, d. 19,

1- 421 Correspondence of Inzov with the ministry of the interior, dated 29 Oct. 1820 & 23 Feb. 1823: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 57, 11. 1-8; for more about Manega and his chequered career, see Kasso, "Petr." 22 Letter from Inzov to Interior Minister Kochubei dated 13 July 1823: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 57, 11. 12-13. 23 Letter from Vorontsov to Interior Minister Lanskoi, 5 Nov. 1823: ibid., 1. 15. 24 Kasso, "Petr," 3. 25 Letter from Vorontsov to Interior Minister Bludov, 19 May 1834: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 57, 11. 56-56 ob. 26 Letter from Count von Pahlen to the director of the interior ministry, 5 Oct. 1831: ibid., 18-20 ob. 27 Kasso, "Petr," 16-19. 28 Excerpts from minutes of the meetings of the Committee of Ministers of 12 Aug. and n Sept. 1824: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 14, 11. 1-2. 29 PSZ, no. 1834 (29 Feb. 1828); the details of the project as it was worked out are in TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 14. 30 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 81. 31 Vorontsov's report to Alexander i "On the Condition of the New Russian Territory," Mar. 1825: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 11. 74-96 ob. 32 Ibid., 1. 75. 33 Ibid., 11. 76 ob. -77. 34 Ibid., 11. 75 ob. -76 ob.; 11. 79-82.

35 Raeff, Understanding, 162. 36 Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800-. see map following 364. 37 Ibid. 38 Keep, Soldiers, 276. Keep also suggests they are better seen as a result of state paternalism, aimed at buttressing the autocratic power, than as a result of liberalism (231). 39 Keep, Soldiers, 306-7. For good accounts of the colonies, see Pipes, "The Russian," and Keep, Soldiers, 276-95.

233 Notes to pages 74-6 40 As with the colonization of other relatively underpopulated areas by other Western powers, the native inhabitants tended to get pushed aside. Fisher, The Crimean, chap. 9, touches briefly on the impact of the heavy-handed, if essentially ignorant, Russian colonization policy on the indigenous Tatar population in the Crimea, although on Vorontsov's partially successful attempts to stand up for their rights, see below. 41 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 74. Morton, Travels, 201-4, gives a traveller's firsthand impression of the interior of Vorontsov's new mansion. 42 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 75. 43 Published in AKV 28, 372. 44 For lengthy discussions of the affair, see Chereiskii, Pushkin, 74 ff; and Tsiavlovskaia, "'Khrani.'" 45 Family details from Vorontsov, "Memoires," 6973. 46 The verse, beginning "Polu-milord," can be found in Pushkin, Polnoe, 185; see also his "Pevets-David," ibid., 186. 47 Ibid., 418-19. 48 The editor of an English edition of Pushkin's verse in 1964, for example, wrote that it was "thanks to the determination of the intolerable and intolerant governor-general Vorontsov to be rid of him" that Pushkin was exiled from inspirational Odessa to an isolated location in northwestern Russia (Fennell, Pushkin, xii). He forgets that, whatever Vorontsov's personal reasons for getting rid of the unwanted philanderer from Odessa, his explicit reasons for doing so were to remove the young poet from the temptations of social life in order to give him more time to develop his extraordinary talent (IRLI, f. 220 [Leskov, N.S.], d. 8, 1. 16). It proved beneficial. This last place of exile proved to be at least as inspirational as Odessa, giving rise to two of Pushkin's most celebrated works: his verse novel Eugene Onegin and his historical drama Boris Godunov. Herlihy, Odessa, 119, appears also to reflect this bias by implying that Pushkin's "scornful verse" demonstrates the general dislike of Vorontsov in Odessa as well as in Russian society. 49 "Well, my friend," Dondukov-Korsakov remembered the sexagenarian Vorontsov telling him when he was a carefree bachelor in the late 18405 or early 18505, "once you are married you learn that it is no great thing" (Dondukov-Korsakov, "Kniaz'," 143). 50 Sophie later married Count A. P. Shuvalov; their son Paul eventually inherited Vorontsov's title of "Most Illustrious Prince" when Vorontsov's son Simon died sans issue in 1882; see "Rodoslovie." 51 Vorontsov, "Memoires," 73. 52 Ibid. 53 Pal'chikova, Alupka, 20.

234 Notes to pages 77-85 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61

62 63 64 65 66

Vorontsov, "Memoires," 75. Ibid., 76. Ibid., 77. McConnell, Tsar, 184-5. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 77. Morton, Travels, 148. See chap. 4, above. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 77; for brief discussions of the various aspects of the movement and translations of documents illustrating the Decembrists' plans as well as the subsequent official investigation and trial, see Raeff, ed., The Decembrist. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 78. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 79-80. Ibid., 80. CHAPTER SEVEN: THE GOVERNOR-GENERAL'S GOVERNMENT

1 2 3 4 5 6

7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Pipes, Russia, 287. Torke, "Continuity," 474. One of the best examples is Lincoln, In the Vanguard. See Raeff, Understanding, 162-71. Korf, 52. Vorontsov's instructions dated 15 June 1829, and various reports: LOII, f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. 2, d. 41, 11. 3-69; letter from Vorontsov to M. Sicard dated 30 July 1829: ibid., 11. 70-1 ob.; instructions from Nicholas i to Vorontsov dated i Aug. 1829: ibid., 11. 1-2 ob.; also Vorontsov, "Memoires," 86-8. Letter from Vorontsov to A.S. Sturdza dated 24 Nov. 1837: IRLI, f. 288 (Sturdza, A.S.), op. i, d. 165, 11. 3-6 ob. Letter from Vorontsov to Benkendorf dated 23 Sept. 1829: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 11. 17-24. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 89-95. Various estate accounts for 1840: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 932, 11. 4-5, 9-10; Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina v period, 29. PSZ, no. 1521 (9 Nov. 1827). Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina v period, 90; Kabuzan, Zaselenie, 197-8. Instructions to the governors of Kherson, Ekaterinoslav, and Tauride provinces, 3 Mar. 1828: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 11. 158-68. Instructions to the governor of Kherson province, 21 Mar. 1828: ibid., 11. 160-160 ob.

235 Notes to pages 85-93 15 Various documents dating from 1834 to 1837 regarding the Maltese colonists: ibid., d. 44, 11. 2-45. 16 Two letters from Vorontsov to the chief of the imperial staff, 7 Feb. and 16 May 1830: ibid., d. 59, 11. 140-43. 17 Imperial rescript, 7 May 1823: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 64, 11. 1-2. 18 "Inzov, I.N.," RBS-, see also Druzhinina, luzhnaia Ukraina 1800, 177-8. 19 Letter from Vorontsov to A.I. Bulgakov dated 3 Dec. 1851: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, 11. 232 ob.~3. 20 Draft proposal by Vorontsov, n.d. (probably 1824 or 1825): ibid., op. 2, d. 59, 11. 24-5 ob. 21 Raeff, Understanding, 119-20. 22 Report to the minister pf internal affairs, 13 Aug. 1838: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 54, 1. 3. 23 Letter from Vorontsov to his father dated 21 Nov. (ns) 1826: ibid., d. 58, 1. 46 ob. 24 Report to the ministry of internal affairs dated 13 Aug. 1838: ibid., d. 54, 1. 2 ob. 25 Ibid., 1. 3. 26 Ibid., 1. 3 ob. 27 See Baron, The Russian Jew; Johnson, A. History, 357-65. 28 Note dated 12 May 1825: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 1. 113. 29 Letter dated 21 Nov. 1826: ibid., d. 58, 11. 48-9 ob. 30 Report of 13 Aug. 1838: ibid., 11. 45 ob.-6. 31 Ibid., d. 54, 11. 2 ob., 6-6 ob. 32 Letter of 21 Nov. 1826: ibid., d. 58, 11. 46-46 ob. 33 Report to Senate, 19 May 1833: ibid., d. 52, 11. 1-27. 34 Letter from Mordvinov dated 17 Oct. 1833: ibid., 11. 28-39 °b35 Letter to Mordvinov dated 15 Dec. 1834: ibid., 11. 56 ob.-59. 36 Introductory note to the archival file: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i. 37 Unidentified newspaper clipping: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 97, 11. 1-2 ob. 38 See chap. 3. 39 Letter to A.Ia. Bulgakov dated 8 Mar. 1848: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, I. 129 ob. 40 Letter dated 26 Mar. 1848: ibid., 1. 134. 41 Letter dated 14 Aug. 1849: ibid., 1. 161 ob. 42 Brief submitted to Alexander n, 20 Feb. 1856: IRLI, f. 265 (Russkaia Starina), op. 2, d. 3574, 1. 20. 43 Report on conditions in New Russia, dated Mar. 1825: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 11. 80-2. 44 Letter to A.Ia. Bulgakov dated 8 July 1848: ibid., op. i, d. 1296, II. 139-139 ob. 45 Letter to Bulgakov dated 5 Nov. 1848, ibid., 11. 145-6. 46 The new statutes defined the "regular" administration that replaced the

236 Notes to pages 93-6 Bessarabian viceroyalty, formally abolished in Mar., 1828: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 14. 47 Communication from Vorontsov to Prince Alexander Golitsyn dated 15 Oct. 1826: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 49, 11. n-ii ob.; also Vorontsov's report to Emperor Alexander i, Mar. 1825: ibid., d. 59, 1. 76. 48 Report to Nicholas i on conditions in New Russia, 24 June 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409 (Sobstvennaia E.I.V. Kantseliariia), op. 2, d. 6529, 11. 10-12; also brief submitted to Alexander n, 20 Feb. 1856: IRLI, f. 265, op. 2, d. 3574, 11. 23 ob.-4. 49 For a comprehensive contemporary review of educational undertakings during Vorontsov's administration, see Mikhnevich, "Istoricheskii." CHAPTER EIGHT: THE G O V E R N O R - G E N E R A L ' S STYLE

1 Orlovsky, "Recent," 466. 2 See LeDonne, "La Reforme," 21-2. 3 According to Dondukov-Korsakov ("Kniaz'," 133), "when something touched his authority he was an absolute despot." Korf ("Iz zapisok," 52) wrote much the same thing: "whenever discussion touched his rights, his authority, anything essential to him, he became prickly and arrogant." Dolgorukov wrote that he was "vain," "power-loving," and "exceptionally revengeful" (IRLI, f. 220 ["Leskov, N.S.], d. 8, 11. 11-15). 4 Letter to A.Ia. Bulgakov dated 17 Aug. 1849: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, 1. 161. 5 Letter to Lady Pembroke dated 29 Aug. 1842: WHA. 6 Brief to the ministry of finance dated 12 May 1825: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 11. in-12. 7 Report to Nicholas i on conditions in New Russia, 24 June 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409 (Sobstvennaia E.I.V. Kantseliariia), op. 2, d. 6529, 11. 43-4. 8 Ibid., 11. 45-8. 9 Note from Vorontsov to Count Kleinmikhel, 23 Sept. 1848: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 482, 1. 10; briefs from Vorontsov to the ministry of finance in 1845 and 1846: ibid., d. 335, 11. 1-5 ob.; and Vorontsov's letter to the chief procurator of the Holy Synod, 12 July 1848: ibid., d. 665, 11. 1-2. Herlihy; Odessa, 121, states that Vorontsov resigned as governorgeneral of New Russia in 1844; in fact he resigned in 1854, when he resigned as Caucasian viceroy. 10 Dondukov-Korsakov ("Kniaz'," 147-8) illustrated how Vorontsov would present favourites to the emperor for special benefactions and usually immediate promotions. n Benckendorf, Souvenir, 164.

237 Notes to pages 96-101 12 Dondukov-Korsakov, "Kniaz'," 124. For other examples, see Shcherbinin, Biografiia; Fadeev, Vospominaniia; Andronikov, "Kniaz'," 983-4. 13 Report from Vorontsov to Nicholas i dated 24 June 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 6529. 14 Request to Nicholas i dated i May 1826: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 4714, 11. i-i ob. 15 Undated, unsigned statistical description of Kherson province: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 541. 16 E.g., a survey by Jean Bottianov of Turkish Moldavia in 1845: ibid., d. 498; a statistical description of Moldavia during 1834-42 under the reigning prince Michael Sturdza: ibid., d. 509; or the detailed military reports from General N.N. Raevskii on the Black Sea coastal region of Caucasia in 1838-40: IRLI, (Raevskii, Nik. Nik.), razriad n, op. i, d. 342, 11. i—121. 17 Both his private secretaries, Shcherbinin in New Russia and DondukovKorsakov in Caucasia, testified to this activity in their memoirs. 18 Dondukov-Korsakov, "Kniaz'," 139. 19 Ibid. 20 See discussion in chap. 6, above. 21 Chereiskii, Pushkin, 339; "Stolknovenie," 402. 22 "Stolknovenie," 403. 23 Dondukov-Korsakov, "Kniaz'," 125, 143. 24 Ibid., 144. 25 LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1063. 26 Dondukov-Korsakov, "Kniaz'," 120-1. 27 Particularly his father until he died, in 1832; after that Alexander la. Bulgakov, the latter correspondence collected in LOII, f. 36, op. i, dd. 1296, 1297. 28 AKV 37, no. 3. 29 LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 335, 11. 8 ob.-^. 30 Ibid., op. i, d. 923, 11. n, 26, 31, 35; d. 930, 11. 78-9. 31 E.g., the American John Stephens, the English physicians Robert Lyall and Edward Morton, and the Frenchman Hommaire de Hell, who, like other visiting foreigners, were dazzled by the princely behaviour of this approachable, English- and French-speaking dignitary and usually left enthusiastic if highly unreliable memoirs (Stephens, Incidents; Lyall, Travels; Morton, Travels; Hommaire, Travels) 32 Lyall, Travels i, 193. 33 LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 932, 1. 133 ob. 34 Letter from Sir John Malcolm dated 5 Aug. 1816: ibid., op. 2, d. 548, 1. 12. 35 Herlihy, Odessa, 121.

36 Odessa, Hi. 37 Letter dated 20 Apr. 1825: Mariia Feodorovna, "Dva pis'ma," 372-3.

238 Notes to pages 101-4 38 The large estate was situated near Vyborg; it was at first thought to belong "by Finnish law" to Vorontsov, not to Catherine, until the matter was settled in 1835 and Catherine was allowed to sell it (Lady Catherine Pembroke, various papers dated 1834-38, WHA). It was sold for 106,000 roubles, for which she eventually received some £2,400 (Statement of Russian Funds on 19 April 1848, WHA). Her total inheritance from her father, who died in 1832, amounted to £10,660 (ibid.). 39 Letter to A. la. Bulgakov, dated 27 July 1835: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, I. 17 ob. 40 Letter to Bulgakov, dated n Mar. 1841: ibid., 1. 85. 41 Letters from Vorontsov to his sister, Lady Pembroke, dated 3 July and 29 Aug. 1842: WHA. 42 Letters to Bulgakov, dated 20 Sept. and 14 Oct. 1837: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, 11. 60-2 ob. 43 Letter to Bulgakov, dated 24 Sept. 1851: ibid., 11. 221-6. 44 Report to Nicholas i, dated 16 Aug. 1847: TSGIASSSR, f. 1268 (Kavkazskii Komitet), op. 2, d. 6373, 1. 2. 45 Report to Nicholas i, dated 24 June 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 6529, II. 4-4 ob. 46 Ibid., 11. 2-3 ob. 47 Ibid., 11. i, 5 ob., 48. 48 Letter from Vorontsov to minister of interior VS. Lanskoi, dated 6 Oct. 1826; minutes of the meetings of the committee of ministers, 6 Nov. and 23 Nov. 1826; Nicholas I's remarks on those minutes; and Lanskoi's report of the emperor's remarks: TSGIASSSR, f. 1308, op. i, d. 81, 11. 1-5 ob. 49 Report from Yorontsov to Nicholas i, 28 December 1827: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 4729, 11. 10-13. 50 Letter from Benkendorf to Vorontsov dated 12 Nov. 1833: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 57, 1. 45 ob. 51 Imperial rescript to Vorontsov dated 18 Oct. 1833: ibid., d. 42, 11. 1-2. 52 Acknowledged in a note from A. Taneev (the emperor's personal secretary) to Vorontsov dated 23 Oct. 1833: ibid., d. 57, 1. 32. 53 This was contradicted by Benkendorf, who wrote to Vorontsov in November that an order had been given to Vorontsov on 25 July to report directly to the emperor on all actions taken to cope with the difficulties in New Russia (ibid., d. 57, 1. 45). 54 Vorontsov listed the dates of his reports to the committee of ministers as: 9, n, and 30 Aug., 4, 6, 15, 21, and 29 Sept., 2, 6, 9, 16, and 23 Oct. (ibid., d. 57, 1. 6). 55 Vorontsov's letter to the emperor dated 8 Nov. 1833: ibid., d. 57,

11. 1-7. 56 Taneev (letter of 23 Oct. 1833) reminded Vorontsov that until 23 October

239 Notes to pages 104-10

57 58 59 60 61 62 63

the emperor had received no communication from Vorontsov since August (ibid., d. 57, 1. 32). Letter dated 8 Nov. 1833: ibid., d. 57, 11. 5 ob., 7. Vorontsov always signed his name with a lower-case v. Letter dated 28 Oct. 1833: ibid., 1. 45. Letter dated 12 Nov. 1833: ibid., 11. 46 ob.-48. Ibid., 1. i. Sbornik, 70-1, 83; also "Formuliarnyi spisok," vi. Vorontsov, "Memoires," 100-1. Imperial rescript dated 6 Aug. 1845: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 42, 11. 3-4. CHAPTER NINE: GARDEN OF THE EMPIRE

1 Mikhnevich, "Istoricheskii," 331-40, 346. 2 Also founded by the Due de Richelieu, in 1804: Mikhnevich, "Istoricheskii," 358. 3 Ibid., 322, 358-9. 4 In 1828 the administration of the girls' school was turned over to Fourth Section of the emperor's own chancery on the basis of similar institutions in Moscow and St Petersburg: Mikhnevich, "Istoricheskii," 358. 5 Ibid., 319-43, passim; "Khronologicheskoe," 64; Ogarkov, Vorontsovy, 75. 6 Mikhnevich, "Istoricheskii," 342-3. 7 Ibid., 320-1, 328, 346-58, 360. 8 Undated draft, probably 1824 or 1825: LOII, f. 36 (Vorontsovy), op. 2, d. 59, 11. 24-5 ob. 9 Odessa, xlix-1; "Khronologicheskoe," 64. 10 U.S.S.R., 618. n Various letters from de Blaremberg to Vorontsov, 1827-29, with drawings: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 253, 11. 1-19. 12 See, for example, Hommaire de Hell, Travels, introduction; and Vorontsov's brief (about rich archaeological treasures in the Crimea) to the ministry of internal affairs, 25 Apr. 1825: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 11. 102-102 ob. 13 Odessa, xlix; "Khronologicheskoe," 64. 14 Zapiski. It is still much consulted today in important libraries around the world. 15 Letter from Vorontsov to Murzakevich dated i Mar. 1852, Tiflis: IRLI, f. 603 (Murzakevich, N.N.), op. i, d. 85, 11. 17-17 ob.; also Odessa, liv; and "Khronologicheskoe," 65. 16 Dement'ev, ed., Russkoe, 196; Odessa, xlviii. The newspaper continued publication until 1893. In its first year it appeared twice a week, then daily from 1828 to 1855; three times a week from 1855 to 1864; and again daily from 1864 to 1893.

240 Notes to pages 110-12 17 Odessa, xlvix; Mikhnevich, "Istoricheskii," 348. 18 Vorontsov's instructions to General Read, 6 Nov. 1854: TSGIASSSR, f. 1268 (Kavkazskii Komitet), op. 7, d. 415, 11. 103 00-104; the instructions were published in Akty KAK 10, no. 71. 19 Letter from M.P. Shcherbinin to A.I. Bulgakov dated 23 Feb. 1834: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, 1. 34 ob. Shcherbinin's wife was also involved in helping to get the theatre going (letter from Vorontsov to Bulgakov dated 18 Dec. 1833: ibid., 11. 28-33). 20 Letter from Vorontsov to A.Ia. Bulgakov, dated 18 Dec. 1833: ibid., 11. 28-34 ob.; letter to General Kleinmikhel, dated 23 Aug. 1849: ibid., op. 2, d. 482, 1. 17 ob. 21 Ibid., op. 2, d. 41, 11. 3-4. 22 Various documents dated variously in 1829 regarding plague threats and countermeasures taken: ibid., op. 2, d. 41, 11. 1-69; report from Vorontsov to Emperor Nicholas i, dated 5 Jan. 1834: TSGIASSSR, f. 1263 (Prilozheniia k Zhurnalam Komiteta Ministrov), op. i, d. 905, 11. 356-9; letter from Vorontsov to Bulgakov, dated 22 Nov. 1837: LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, 1. 67; letter from Vorontsov to A.C. Sturdza, dated 24 Nov. 1837: IRLI, f. 288 (Sturdza, A.C.), op. i, d. 165, 11. 3-5 ob.; Vorontsov, "Memoires," 75, 86-8, 95; Odessa, Hi. 23 Kabuzan, Zaselenie, 210 and 242; the figure given for 1823 is 25,333 males; for "the end of the 505": 50,547 males, 95,676 males and females; the figure 47,000 is estimated by using the same male-to-female ratio as obtained for the later figures. See also Statisticheskiia ... za 1840; ibid, za 1856; Vorontsov's report on conditions in New Russia to Nicholas I, dated 24 June 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409 (Sobstvennaia E.I.V. Kantseliariia), op. 2, d. 6529, 11. 45-45 ob. Herlihy, Odessa, 121, gives population figures for Odessa as 30,000 (males only?) in 1823 and 77,778 (both sexes?) in 1844 "when he resigned" (although in fact Vorontsov resigned only in 1854, at the same time he resigned his position as Caucasian viceroy; he died two years later, in 1856); the same author (123) confusingly gives the city's population in 1815 as 35,000, which would mean a 14 per cent decline from 1815 to 1823. 24 TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, Op. 2, d. 6529, 11. 47 ob.~48.

25 Letter to S.R. Vorontsov dated 2 Nov. 1826: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 58, 11. 44-7 (.listy misnumbered in the file). 26 Vorontsov's briefs to the minister of finance dated 12 May 1825 (LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 11. 109-13 ob.), 28 Aug. 1826 (ibid., 11. 114-15 ob.), December 1828 (ibid., 11. 123-33), with a copy of the legislation signed by Alexander i on 16 Apr. 1817 establishing Odessa as a free port for a period of thirty years (ibid., 11. 177-8 ob.); his report to Alexander i dated (no day or month) 1825: (ibid., 11. 74 ob.-96. ob.); his reports to Nicholas i dated December 1827 (ibid., d. 58, 11. 1-4 ob.), 18 Jan.

241 Notes to pages 112-17

27

28 29 30 31 32

33

1828 (ibid., 11. 50-4 ob.), ii Jan. 1835 (ibid., d. 43, 11. 1-4 ob.), and 18 Feb. 1835 (ibid., 11. 5-9 ob.). Vorontsov's report to Alexander i of 1825 (no day or month given): ibid., d. 59, 11. 88-88 ob. Needless to say, Vorontsov was not a great favourite among the "clerks" of whom he was so contemptuous. See Dondukov-Korsakov, "Kniaz'," 133. Vorontsov's report to Emperor Nicholas i dated 24 June 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 6529, 11. 45 ob.-48. "Khronologicheskoe," 64. LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, 1. 22 ob. "Khronologicheskoe," 65-6. TSGIASSSR, f. 1268, op. 2, d. 6373, 11. 2-5 ob. The file contains a receipt in English dated 18 Sept. 1848 acknowledging the deposit of £2,500 towards the cost of a new vessel "of 260 horses power," and another receipt of 10 Oct. 1848 acknowledging Vorontsov's payment of the total cost of the ship of £5,520: ibid., 1. 27 ob. See also Ogarkov, Vorontsovy, 75. Report to the emperor dated 5 Oct. 1826: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 4729, 11. 1-2 ob.

34 TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, Op. 2, d. 6529, 11. I5~2O.

35 36 37 38 39 40

LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 482, 11. 4-4 ob. Letter dated 9 June 1847: ibid., 11. 6-7. Letter dated 23 Sept. 1848: ibid., 11. 10-11 ob. Odessa, xlv. LOII, f. 36., op. 2, d. 482, 11. 5-5 ob. Letter of 23 Sept. 1848: ibid., 11. 12.

41 Letter of 18 Mar. 1849: ibid., 11. 14-19.

42 Letter of 7 Aug. 1853: ibid., 11. 20-1 ob. 43 Letter dated Odessa, 10 Oct. 1856: ibid., op. 2, d. 410, 11. 1-2. 44 Letters from the chancery of the Caucasian viceroy to the Caucasian committee dated 24 Feb., 19 Mar., and 21 Mar. 1847: TSGIASSSR, f. 1268, op. 2, d. 495, 11. 1-3. See also Witte's memoirs about the early influence of his Caucasian, Vorontsovian surroundings: Witte, Vospominaniia, i. 45 Brief to the ministry of internal affairs, 25 Apr. 1825: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 1. 103. 46 Report to the emperor dated 24 June 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 6529, 11. 25 ob.-42. 47 Letter dated 27 Nov. 1842: LOII, f. 113 (Russkoe Istoricheskoe Obshchestvo), karton 18, no. 96. 48 Letter from Vorontsov to N.V. Kukol'nin dated Tiflis, 31 Oct. 1847: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 507, 11. 1-6. 49 With hindsight, some historians have found fault with Vorontsov's eco-

242 Notes to pages 117-20 nomic ventures: for example, his emphasis on agricultural production rather than industry, or on river and lake steamers rather than on an improved horse-based overland transportation system. See Lynch, "The Conquest," 143-98; Herlihy, "Odessa," 184-95. 50 Raeff, Understanding, 167. He goes on to discuss, among other things, the paradox of this bureaucratic elite's being modern and economically progressive and yet paternalistically reluctant to allow Russian society in general to develop as a result of rising productivity and increased prosperity; in his words, it developed a "hostility to the real civil society, to pluralism, administrative autonomy, common law, and liberalism in politics and culture" (170-1). Thus the bureaucratic elite parted company with the liberal, pluralistic, autonomy-minded governor-general of New Russia.

51 Odessa, Iv. 52 "Khronologicheskoe," 66. 53 Joyce, "Thomas," 42-53. 54 Letter from Vorontsov to Nicholas I dated 31 May 1826: TSGIASSSR, f. 1409, op. 2, d. 4716, 1. i. 55 Ibid, and Vorontsov, "Memoires," 98. 56 Ogarkov, Vorontsovy, 76. 57 Vorontsov's brief to the minister of internal affairs dated 25 Apr. 1825: LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 59, 11. 101-2. 58 Odessa, xliv. 59 LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 290, 1. 16 ob. 60 Ibid., 1. 25. 61 Ibid., 11. 37 ob.-39. 62 Herlihy, Odessa, 130—44, describes many of the improvements to the city in this period. 63

U.S.S.R., 6l6.

64 Stewart, "Welcome," 38. 65 On Vorontsov's palace at Alupka, see Alupkinskii palats-muzei; Alupkinskii dvorets-muzei; Stewart, "Welcome"; Vorontsov, "Memoires," 71-6, 84, 88; Lyall, Travels, 315, 318-19; of especial interest, although unfortunately belying the legend, are the account books of its construction: LOII, f. 36, op. i, dd. 922, 929. The palace, beautifully preserved, is now a much-visited resort. 66 Letters from Vorontsov to A. Bulgakov, dated 8 Feb. 1835 (LOII, f. 36, op. i, d. 1296, 11. 45-45 ob.), 25 Sept. 1848 (ibid., 11. 143-4), J Aug. 1849 (ibid., 11. 157 ob.-i58); op. 2, d. 37. By the i88os and 18905 the whole south coast of the Crimea was filled with the mansions and summer homes of the empire's leading families. 67 Letter to Vorontsov, dated Odessa, 16 Jan. 1839 (author illegible): LOII, f. 36, op. 2, d. 37, 1. 4.

243 Notes to pages 123-6 CHAPTER TEN:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

8 9

CAUCASIA

Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 212. Akty KAK 10, i. Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 214. Letter from Vorontsov to Ermolov dated 24 Jan. 1845: Russkii Arkhiv, 1890, no. 2, 162-3. Shcherbinin, Biografiia, 214. The best history of Catherine's reign is DeMadariaga, Russia. For a first-rate investigation of Caucasian politics in the light of Russian and Persian politics and relations in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, see Atkin, Russia. For an investigation of the Russian annexation of west Georgia in terms of Russian-Ottoman relations, see Armani, "The Russian." Lang, The Last, studies the situation before and at incorporation into the empire. Shamil was the best-known of the North Caucasian highland guerrilla fighters. His campaign of rebellion, sometimes called the "Murid War" or "Muridism," spawned countless memoirs (mostly from the Russian side, although some from foreigners fighting against the Russians) and has attracted several studies, of which The Russian Conquest of the Caucasus by the British historian J.F. Baddeley, despite its paternalistic and very anti-Russian point of view, is still considered the best. A colourful if not particularly scholarly account of Shamil's career is Blanch, The Sabres. An American military historian, E.W. Brooks, has written recently about the Russian failure to put down the rebellion as an example of the ineptness of Emperor Nicholas's military regime (Brooks, "Nicholas i"). Even more recently an American expert in Soviet affairs, P.B. Henze, has reviewed the rebellion in the historical context of Muslim resistance to Russian rule (Henze, "Fire"); the article, for unexplained reasons, copies its title from Luigi Villari's well-known memoir of his visit to turbulent Caucasia in the early twentieth century (Villari, Fire). Shamil was eventually captured in 1859 and brought to Russia to live in honourable and splendid captivity, after which the rebellion lost energy. From the i86os onwards the people of northern Caucasia were quiet, resigned to a relatively benevolent Russian rule. The confrontation as a historic whole, with the government's increasing determination in the 18205 and 18305 to control the Caucasian highlanders, from Daghestan in the east, Chechnia in the middle, and Circassia (Cherkesy) in the west, the highlanders' increasingly determined struggle to resist being controlled, and the attitude on both sides changing considerably over time (for the confrontation extended for nearly two-thirds of the nine-

244 Notes to pages 127-9

10 11

12

13 14 15

16

17

18

19

teenth century), still needs an objective historian to give it a thorough, balanced treatment. The seesawing is examined more closely in Rhinelander, "Russia's Imperial Policy." S.F. Starr in his thoughtful and provocative essay on the nature of Russian imperialism (Starr, "Tsarist Government"), misled by an unreliable source, states that Georgia remained under exclusive military jurisdiction up until the time of the arrival of Vorontsov "as governorgeneral" in 1845. The best account of the conspiracy is Jones, "Russian Imperial Administration." See also Suny, The Making, 71-2, and "Russian Rule," 54-8; Parsons, "The Emergence," 47-51; Lang, The Last Years, 278-84. TSGIASSSR, Putevoditel' (Leningrad 1956), 42. Drafts of the project: TSGIASSSR, f. 561 ("Ministerstvo finansov: sekretnyi chast'"), op. i, d. 206, 11. 1-717; and ibid., d. 219, 11. 1-266. See Akty KAK 8, nos. 57, and 9, pt. i, nos. i and 2; Ermolov's letter to Vorontsov of 24 Nov. 1845: AKV 36, letter no. 46, 273-5; Vorontsov's answering letter to Ermolov dated 10 Dec. 1845, in which he wrote that he had "already had an opportunity here to confirm how much injustice was done to him, a result of Hahn's abominations and denunciations": Russkii Arkhiv, 1890, no. 2, letter no. 4, 174-5; and Ermolov's next letter to Vorontsov, dated 24 Dec. 1845, in which he again expiated on the "wretched and unfair treatment" that Rozen, "a good and loyal servant of the tsar," had received at Hahn's hands: AKV 36, no. 47, 276-8. In 1835 the Caucasian committee had consisted only of the ministers of war, finance, internal affairs, and justice; in 1837 a "Director of Business" - that is, an executive secretary - had been added; in 1838 the minister of state domains had also been made a member: undated document: TSGIASSSR., f. 1268 ("Kavkazskii Komitet"), op. i, d. 115, 11. 1-4 ob. "Review of Measures Proposed and Undertaken with Regard to the Organization of the Trans-Caucasian Territory" (no date or author, but probably written by M.P. Pozen for Vorontsov in January 1845): ibid., d. 6713, 1. 16. For a more detailed discussion of these reforms, see below in chap. 12. For the most detailed account of the reorganization, see Esadze, Istoricheskaia, 68ff. Letter from Chernyshev to Nicholas i on the future formation of the "Committee to Organize the Trans-Caucasian Territory," dated 1840: TSGIASSSR, f. 1268, op. i, d. 115, 11. 5-5 ob.; PSZ, no. 13413 (24 Apr. 1840). The members were appointed personally rather than ex officio, as previously. Officially one new member was named, the chairman of

245 Notes to page 129

20

21 22 23

the legal department of the council of state and director of the Second Section His Imperial Majesty's Own Chancery, D.N. Bludov, but he had previously been a member as minister of internal affairs until 1838 and a member pro tern as chairman of the legal department of the council of state from 1839, so he was not really an addition to the committee. Hahn was appointed a member of the committee in May 1841, but was removed in August 1842 ("Gan, P.V.," in RBS, iv, 226-9; also, Korf, "Iz zapisok," 47). On Chernyshev, see Brooks, "Aleksandr," for a brief but comprehensive review of Chernyshev's career; it might be noted, however, that the committee was "newly recreated" rather than "newly created" in 1840, an error repeated in the same author's "Nicholas i," 241. For a careful analysis of Chernyshev's role in reforming the Cossack hosts in the nineteenth century, see Menning, "A.I. Chernyshev." "Review of Measures [January 1845]": TSGIASSSR, f. 1268, op. i, d. 6/ia, 11. 15-33; letter from A.P. Ermolov to Vorontsov dated 24 Dec. 1845: AKV 36, no. 47, 277. See also Ivanenko, Grazhdanskoe, chap. 12; Mil'man, Politicheskii, 109 ff.; Eroshkin, Istoriia (1977), 198-9. Korf, "Iz zapisok," 25-56; also Ermolov's letter to Vorontsov of 24 Dec. 1845, quoted above. See biographical sketch of Hahn in MERSH 13, 221-3. Documents dating from 1837 to 1839, collected by Hahn in his review: TSGIASSSR, f. 561, Op. I, d. 177.

24 It is also a good example of the difficulties that face a historian attempting to reconstruct actions when the actors do their best to cover them up or otherwise misrepresent them. The account of Chernyshev's career by B. Alekseevsky (RBS 20, 293-306) is unsubstantiated and particularly misleading. Alekseevsky suggests that Hahn was concerned to free the Georgian serfs but was thwarted personally by Chernyshev for unsavoury reasons. That Hahn might have desired to do so is plausible (see Hahn's letter to P.D. Kiselev dated 5 July 1847: TSGIASSSR, f. 958 ["Kiselev"], op. i, d. 137), but his solution - a declaration that serfdom had never existed in Georgia and that therefore all peasants, as merely tax-paying farmers, were free to leave their erstwhile masters - was hardly acceptable to even the most disinterested Russian official in a Russian administration that needed and sought the support of the Georgian serf-owning aristocracy. Anyway, to judge by Baron Korfs recollections (Korf, "Iz zapisok," 49), Hahn's dismissal was initiated by two high-ranking generals in Caucasia and not by Chernyshev and Pozen, who apparently tried to protect him, although they were quick subsequently to sever their connections with him once he had fallen into disgrace. 25 Letter from Chernyshev to Nicholas i dated n Aug. 1842: TSGIASSSR,

246 Notes to pages 129-30

26 27

28 29

30

31

32

f. 1268, op. i, d. ipfib, 11. 1-14; also "Review of Measures (Jan. 1845)": ibid., d. 6713, 11. 22 ob.-33. A typo in Suny, The Making, renders Pozen "Rozen" at this point; Rozen of course had been Golovin's predecessor as Caucasian high commissioner. For an interesting discussion of the type, see Lincoln, "The Ministers," 308-23. Brooks, "Aleksandr," suggests that Chernyshev can be considered the military architect of the Crimean debacle. Menning, "A.I. Chernyshev," gives a more positive assessment of Chernyshev's military influence under the emperors Alexander i and Nicholas i. Letter from Chernyshev to Nicholas i dated n Aug. 1842: TSGIASSSR, f. 1268, op. i, d. i9