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Alexander I of Russia

Alexander I (Russian: Александр I Павлович, romanizedAleksandr I Pavlovich, IPA: [ɐlʲɪkˈsandr ˈpavləvʲɪtɕ]; 23 December [O.S. 12 December] 1777 – 1 December [O.S. 19 November] 1825),[a][2] nicknamed "the Blessed",[b] was Emperor of Russia from 1801, the first king of Congress Poland from 1815, and the grand duke of Finland from 1809 to his death in 1825. He was the eldest son of Emperor Paul I and Sophie Dorothea of Württemberg.

Alexander I
Portrait by George Dawe, c. 1825-29
Emperor of Russia
Reign23 March 1801 – 1 December 1825
Coronation15 (27) September 1801
PredecessorPaul I
SuccessorNicholas I
Born(1777-12-23)23 December 1777
Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire
Died1 December 1825(1825-12-01) (aged 47)[1]
Taganrog, Russian Empire
Burial13 March 1826
Spouse
(m. 1793)
Issue
more...
Nikolai Lukash (illegitimate)
Names
Alexander Pavlovich Romanov
HouseHolstein-Gottorp-Romanov
FatherPaul I of Russia
MotherSophie Dorothea of Württemberg
ReligionRussian Orthodox
Signature
Military service
Branch/service Imperial Russian Army
Battles/wars

The son of Grand Duke Paul Petrovich, later Paul I, Alexander succeeded to the throne after his father was murdered. He ruled Russia during the chaotic period of the Napoleonic Wars. As prince and during the early years of his reign, Alexander often used liberal rhetoric, but continued Russia's absolutist policies in practice. In the first years of his reign, he initiated some minor social reforms and (in 1803–04) major liberal educational reforms, such as building more universities. Alexander appointed Mikhail Speransky, the son of a village priest, as one of his closest advisors. The Collegia were abolished and replaced by the State Council, which was created to improve legislation. Plans were also made to set up a parliament and sign a constitution. Alexander also was hostile towards European powers. Unlike his predecessors who tried to westernize Russia so it could compete with European nations, Alexander was a Russian nationalist and Slavophilist who wanted Russia to develop on the basis of Russian culture rather than European. The Slavophilism policy still remains the main foreign policy in Russia to this day.

In foreign policy, he changed Russia's position towards France four times between 1804 and 1812 among neutrality, opposition, and alliance. In 1805 he joined Britain in the War of the Third Coalition against Napoleon, but after suffering massive defeats at the battles of Austerlitz and Friedland, he switched sides and formed an alliance with Napoleon by the Treaty of Tilsit (1807) and joined Napoleon's Continental System. He fought a small-scale naval war against Britain between 1807 and 1812 as well as a short war against Sweden (1808–09) after Sweden's refusal to join the Continental System. Alexander and Napoleon hardly agreed, especially regarding Poland, and the alliance collapsed by 1810. Alexander's greatest triumph came in 1812 when Napoleon's invasion of Russia proved to be a catastrophic disaster for the French. As part of the winning coalition against Napoleon, he gained territory in Finland and Poland. He formed the Holy Alliance to suppress revolutionary movements in Europe which he saw as immoral threats to legitimate Christian monarchs. He also helped Austria's Klemens von Metternich in suppressing all national and liberal movements.

During the second half of his reign, Alexander became increasingly arbitrary, reactionary, and fearful of plots against him; as a result he ended many of the reforms he made earlier. He purged schools of foreign teachers, as education became more religiously driven as well as politically conservative.[3] Speransky was replaced as advisor with the strict artillery inspector Aleksey Arakcheyev, who oversaw the creation of military settlements. Alexander died of typhus in December 1825 while on a trip to southern Russia. He left no legitimate children, as his two daughters died in childhood. Neither of his brothers wanted to become emperor. After a period of great confusion (that presaged the failed Decembrist revolt of liberal army officers in the weeks after his death), he was succeeded by his younger brother, Nicholas I.

Early life edit

 
Confirmation of Alexander's wife Elizabeth Alexeievna
 
Portrait of Grand Duke Alexander Pavlovich, 1800, by Vladimir Borovikovsky

Alexander was born at 10:45, on 23 December 1777 in Saint Petersburg,[4] and he and his younger brother Constantine were raised by their grandmother, Catherine.[5] He was baptized on 31 December[6] in Grand Church of the Winter Palace[7] by mitred archpriest[8] Ioann Ioannovich Panfilov[9] (confessor of Empress Catherine II),[10] his godmother was Catherine the Great and his godfathers were Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor, and Frederick the Great.[11] He was named after Saint Petersburg patron saint - Alexander Nevsky.[12] Some sources[13] allege that she planned to remove her son (Alexander's father) Paul I from the succession altogether. From the free-thinking atmosphere of the court of Catherine and his Swiss tutor, Frédéric-César de La Harpe, he imbibed the principles of Rousseau's gospel of humanity. But from his military governor, Nikolay Saltykov, he imbibed the traditions of Russian autocracy.[14] Andrey Afanasyevich Samborsky, whom his grandmother chose for his religious instruction, was an atypical, unbearded Orthodox priest. Samborsky had long lived in England and taught Alexander (and Constantine) excellent English, very uncommon for potential Russian autocrats at the time.[citation needed]

On 9 October 1793, when Alexander was still 15 years old, he married 14-year-old Princess Louise of Baden, who took the name Elizabeth Alexeievna.[15] His grandmother was the one who presided over his marriage to the young princess.[16] Until his grandmother's death, he was constantly walking the line of allegiance between his grandmother and his father. His steward Nikolai Saltykov helped him navigate the political landscape, engendering dislike for his grandmother and dread in dealing with his father.[citation needed]

Catherine had the Alexander Palace built for the couple. This did nothing to help his relationship with her, as Catherine would go out of her way to amuse them with dancing and parties, which annoyed his wife. Living at the palace also put pressure on him to perform as a husband, though he felt only a brother's love for the Grand Duchess.[17] He began to sympathize more with his father, as he saw visiting his father's fiefdom at Gatchina Palace as a relief from the ostentatious court of the empress. There, they wore simple Prussian military uniforms, instead of the gaudy clothing popular at the French court they had to wear when visiting Catherine. Even so, visiting the tsarevich did not come without a bit of travail. Paul liked to have his guests perform military drills, which he also pushed upon his sons Alexander and Constantine. He was also prone to fits of temper, and he often went into fits of rage when events did not go his way.[18]

Tsarevich edit

Catherine's death in November 1796, before she could appoint Alexander as her successor, brought his father, Paul, to the throne. Alexander disliked him as emperor even more than he did his grandmother. He wrote that Russia had become a "plaything for the insane" and that "absolute power disrupts everything". It is likely that seeing two previous rulers abuse their autocratic powers in such a way pushed him to be one of the more progressive Romanov tsars of the 19th century. Among the rest of the country, Paul was widely unpopular. He accused his wife of conspiring to become another Catherine and seize power from him as his mother did from his father. He also suspected Alexander of conspiring against him, despite his son's earlier refusal to seize power from Paul.[19]

Emperor edit

 
Russia (violet) and other European empires in 1800

Ascension edit

Alexander became Emperor of Russia when his father was assassinated on 23 March 1801. Alexander, then 23 years old, was in the Saint Michael's Castle at the moment of the assassination and his accession to the throne was announced by General Nicholas Zubov, one of the assassins. Historians still debate Alexander's role in his father's murder. The most common theory is that he was let into the conspirators' secret and was willing to take the throne but insisted that his father should not be killed. Becoming emperor through a crime that cost his father's life would give Alexander a strong sense of remorse and shame.[20] Alexander I succeeded to the throne that day[21] and was crowned in the Kremlin on 15 September of that year.[citation needed]

Domestic policy edit

 
Equestrian portrait of Alexander I by Franz Krüger (1837, posthumous)

The Orthodox Church initially exercised little influence on Alexander's life. The young emperor was determined to reform the inefficient, highly centralised systems of government that Russia relied upon. While retaining for a time the old ministers, one of the first acts of his reign was to appoint the Private Committee, comprising young and enthusiastic friends of his own—Viktor Kochubey, Nikolay Novosiltsev, Pavel Stroganov and Adam Jerzy Czartoryski—to draw up a plan of domestic reform, which was supposed to result in the establishment of a constitutional monarchy in accordance with the teachings of the Age of Enlightenment.[22]

A few years into his reign the liberal Mikhail Speransky became one of the emperor's closest advisors, and he drew up many plans for elaborate reforms. In the Government reform of Alexander I the old Collegia were abolished and new Ministries were created in their place, led by ministers responsible to the Crown. A Council of Ministers under the chairmanship of the Sovereign dealt with all interdepartmental matters. The State Council was created to improve the technique of legislation. It was intended to become the Second Chamber of a representative legislature. The Governing Senate was reorganized as the Supreme Court of the Empire. The codification of the laws initiated in 1801 was never carried out during his reign.[23]

Alexander wanted to resolve another crucial issue in Russia, the status of the serfs, although this was not achieved until 1861 (during the reign of his nephew Alexander II). His advisors quietly discussed the options at length. Cautiously, he extended the right to own land to most classes of subjects, including state-owned peasants, in 1801 and created a new social category of "free agriculturalist," for peasants voluntarily emancipated by their masters, in 1803. The great majority of serfs were not affected.[24]

When Alexander's reign began, there were three universities in Russia, at Moscow, Vilna (Vilnius), and Dorpat (Tartu). These were strengthened, and three others were founded at St. Petersburg, Kharkiv, and Kazan. Literary and scientific bodies were established or encouraged, and his reign became noted for the aid lent to the sciences and arts by the Emperor and the wealthy nobility. Alexander later expelled foreign scholars.[25]

After 1815 the military settlements (farms worked by soldiers and their families under military control) were introduced, with the idea of making the army, or part of it, self-supporting economically and for providing it with recruits.[14]

Views held by his contemporaries edit

 
Imperial monogram of Alexander I

Called an autocrat and "Jacobin",[14] a man of the world and a mystic, Alexander appeared to his contemporaries as a riddle which each read according to his own temperament. Napoleon Bonaparte thought him a "shifty Byzantine",[14] and called him the Talma of the North, as ready to play any conspicuous part. To Metternich he was a madman to be humoured. Castlereagh, writing of him to Lord Liverpool, gave him credit for "grand qualities", but added that he is "suspicious and undecided";[14] and to Jefferson he was a man of estimable character, disposed to do good, and expected to diffuse through the mass of the Russian people "a sense of their natural rights".[26] In 1803, Beethoven dedicated his Opus 30 Violin Sonatas to Alexander who in response gave the famous composer a diamond at the Congress of Vienna where they met in 1814.

Napoleonic Wars edit

Alliances with other powers edit

Upon his accession, Alexander reversed many of the unpopular policies of his father, Paul, denounced the League of Armed Neutrality, and made peace with Britain (April 1801). At the same time he opened negotiations with Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor. Soon afterwards at Memel he entered into a close alliance with Prussia, not as he boasted from motives of policy, but in the spirit of true chivalry, out of friendship for the young King Frederick William III and his beautiful wife Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.[27]

The development of this alliance was interrupted by the short-lived peace of October 1801, and for a while it seemed as though France and Russia might come to an understanding. Carried away by the enthusiasm of Frédéric-César de La Harpe, who had returned to Russia from Paris, Alexander began openly to proclaim his admiration for French institutions and for the person of Napoleon Bonaparte. Soon, however, came a change. La Harpe, after a new visit to Paris, presented to Alexander his Reflections on the True Nature of the Consul for Life, which, as Alexander said, tore the veil from his eyes and revealed Bonaparte "as not a true patriot",[27] but only as "the most famous tyrant the world has produced".[27] Later on, La Harpe and his friend Henri Monod lobbied Alexander, who persuaded the other Allied powers opposing Napoleon to recognise Vaudois and Argovian independence, in spite of Bern's attempts to reclaim them as subject lands. Alexander's disillusionment was completed by the execution of the duc d'Enghien on trumped up charges. The Russian court went into mourning for the last member of the House of Condé, and diplomatic relations with France were broken off. Alexander was especially alarmed and decided he had to somehow curb Napoleon's power.[28]

Opposition to Napoleon edit

In opposing Napoleon I, "the oppressor of Europe and the disturber of the world's peace," Alexander in fact already believed himself to be fulfilling a divine mission. In his instructions to Niklolay Novosiltsev, his special envoy in London, the emperor elaborated the motives of his policy in language that appealed little to the prime minister, William Pitt the Younger. Yet the document is of great interest, as it formulates for the first time in an official dispatch the ideals of international policy that were to play a conspicuous part in world affairs at the close of the revolutionary epoch.[c] Alexander argued that the outcome of the war was not only to be the liberation of France, but the universal triumph of "the sacred rights of humanity".[27] To attain this it would be necessary "after having attached the nations to their government by making these incapable of acting save in the greatest interests of their subjects, to fix the relations of the states amongst each other on more precise rules, and such as it is to their interest to respect".[27]

A general treaty was to become the main basis of the relations of the states forming "the European Confederation".[27] While he believed the effort would not attain universal peace, it would be worthwhile if it established clear principles for the prescriptions of the rights of nations.[27] The body would assure "the positive rights of nations" and "the privilege of neutrality," while asserting the obligation to exhaust all resources of mediation to retain peace, and would form "a new code of the law of nations".[29]

1807 loss to French forces edit

 
Napoleon, Alexander, Queen Louise, and Frederick William III of Prussia in Tilsit, 1807

Meanwhile, Napoleon, a little deterred by the Russian autocrat's youthful ideology, never gave up hope of detaching him from the coalition. He had no sooner entered Vienna in triumph than he opened negotiations with Alexander; he resumed them after the Battle of Austerlitz (2 December). Russia and France, he urged, were "geographical allies";[27] there was, and could be, between them no true conflict of interests; together they might rule the world. But Alexander was still determined "to persist in the system of disinterestedness in respect of all the states of Europe which he had thus far followed",[27] and he again allied himself with the Kingdom of Prussia. The campaign of Jena and the Battle of Eylau followed; and Napoleon, though still intent on the Russian alliance, stirred up Poles, Turks and Persians to break the obstinacy of the Tsar. A party too in Russia itself, headed by the Tsar's brother Constantine Pavlovich, was clamorous for peace; but Alexander, after a vain attempt to form a new coalition, summoned the Russian nation to a holy war against Napoleon as the enemy of the Orthodox faith. The outcome was the rout of Friedland (13/14 June 1807). Napoleon saw his chance and seized it. Instead of demanding harsh peace terms, he offered to the chastened autocrat his alliance, and a partnership in his glory.[27]

The two Emperors met at Tilsit on 25 June 1807. Napoleon knew well how to appeal to the exuberant imagination of his new-found friend. He would divide with Alexander the Empire of the world; as a first step he would leave him in possession of the Danubian Principalities and give him a free hand to deal with Finland; and, afterwards, the Emperors of the East and West, when the time should be ripe, would drive the Turks from Europe and march across Asia to the conquest of India. Nevertheless, a thought awoke in Alexander's impressionable mind an ambition to which he had hitherto been a stranger. The interests of Europe as a whole were utterly forgotten.[30]

Prussia edit

The brilliance of these new visions did not, however, blind Alexander to the obligations of friendship, and he refused to retain the Danubian principalities as the price for suffering a further dismemberment of Prussia. "We have made loyal war", he said, "we must make a loyal peace".[27] It was not long before the first enthusiasm of Tilsit began to wane. The French remained in Prussia, the Russians on the Danube, and each accused the other of breach of faith. Meanwhile, however, the personal relations of Alexander and Napoleon were of the most cordial character, and it was hoped that a fresh meeting might adjust all differences between them. The meeting took place at Erfurt in October 1808 and resulted in a treaty that defined the common policy of the two Emperors. But Alexander's relations with Napoleon nonetheless suffered a change. He realised that in Napoleon sentiment never got the better of reason, that as a matter of fact he had never intended his proposed "grand enterprise" seriously, and had only used it to preoccupy the mind of the Tsar while he consolidated his own power in Central Europe. From this moment the French alliance was for Alexander also not a fraternal agreement to rule the world, but an affair of pure policy. He used it initially to remove "the geographical enemy" from the gates of Saint Petersburg by wresting Finland from Sweden (1809), and he hoped further to make the Danube the southern frontier of Russia.[27]

Franco-Russian alliance edit

 
Meeting of Napoleon and Alexander I in Tilsit, a 19th-century painting by Adolphe Roehn

Events were rapidly heading towards the rupture of the Franco-Russian alliance. While Alexander assisted Napoleon in the War of the Fifth Coalition in 1809, he declared plainly that he would not allow the Austrian Empire to be crushed out of existence. Napoleon subsequently complained bitterly of the inactivity of the Russian troops during the campaign. The tsar in turn protested against Napoleon's encouragement of the Poles. In the matter of the French alliance he knew himself to be practically isolated in Russia, and he declared that he could not sacrifice the interest of his people and empire to his affection for Napoleon. "I don't want anything for myself", he said to the French ambassador, "therefore the world is not large enough to come to an understanding on the affairs of Poland, if it is a question of its restoration".[31][32]

Alexander complained that the Treaty of Schönbrunn, which added largely to the Duchy of Warsaw, had "ill requited him for his loyalty", and he was only mollified for the time being by Napoleon's public declaration that he had no intention of restoring Poland, and by a convention, signed on 4 January 1810, but not ratified, abolishing the Polish name and orders of chivalry.[33]

But if Alexander suspected Napoleon's intentions, Napoleon was no less suspicious of Alexander. Partly to test his sincerity, Napoleon sent an almost peremptory request for the hand of the grand-duchess Anna Pavlovna, the tsar's youngest sister. After some little delay Alexander returned a polite refusal, pleading the princess's tender age and the objection of the dowager empress to the marriage. Napoleon's answer was to refuse to ratify the 4 January convention, and to announce his engagement to the Archduchess Marie Louise in such a way as to lead Alexander to suppose that the two marriage treaties had been negotiated simultaneously. From this time on, the relationship between the two emperors gradually became more and more strained.[33]

Another personal grievance for Alexander towards Napoleon was the annexation of Oldenburg by France in December 1810, as Wilhelm, Duke of Oldenburg (3 January 1754 – 2 July 1823) was the uncle of the tsar. Furthermore, the disastrous impact of the Continental System on Russian trade made it impossible for the emperor to maintain a policy that was Napoleon's chief motive for the alliance.[33]

Alexander kept Russia as neutral as possible in the ongoing French war with Britain, Russia's own war with Britain barely any more than nominal. He allowed trade to continue secretly with Britain and did not enforce the blockade required by the Continental System.[34] In 1810, he withdrew Russia from the Continental System and trade between Britain and Russia grew.[35]

 
The French Empire in 1812 at its greatest extent

Relations between France and Russia worsened progressively after 1810. By 1811, it became clear that Napoleon was not adhering to his side of the terms of the Treaty of Tilsit. He had promised assistance to Russia in its war against the Ottoman Empire, but as the campaign went on, France offered no support at all.[34]

With war imminent between France and Russia, Alexander started to prepare the ground diplomatically. In April 1812, Russia and Sweden signed a treaty for mutual defence. A month later, Alexander secured his southern flank through the Treaty of Bucharest (1812), which ended the war against the Ottomans formally.[35] His diplomats managed to extract promises from Prussia and Austria that should Napoleon invade Russia, the former would help Napoleon as little as possible and that the latter would give no aid at all.[citation needed]

The minister of war, Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly, had managed the reform and improvement of the Imperial Russian Army before the start of the 1812 campaign. Primarily on the advice of his sister and Count Aleksey Arakcheyev, Alexander did not take operational control as he had done during the 1805 campaign, instead delegating control to his generals, Barclay de Tolly, Prince Pyotr Bagration and Mikhail Kutuzov.[35]

War against Persia edit

 
The Battle of Ganja during the Russo-Persian War

Despite brief hostilities in the Persian Expedition of 1796, eight years of peace passed before a new conflict erupted between the two empires. After the Russian annexation of the Georgian Kingdom of Kartli-Kakheti in 1801,[36] a subject of Persia for centuries, and the incorporation of the Derbent Khanate as well quickly thereafter, Alexander was determined to increase and maintain Russian influence in the strategically valuable Caucasus region.[37] In 1801, Alexander appointed Pavel Tsitsianov, a die-hard Russian imperialist of Georgian origin, as Russian commander in chief of the Caucasus. Between 1802 and 1804 he proceeded to impose Russian rule on Western Georgia and some of the Persian controlled khanates around Georgia. Some of these khanates submitted without a fight, but the Ganja Khanate resisted, prompting an attack. Ganja was ruthlessly sacked during the Siege of Ganja, with some 3,000 [38][39] – 7,000 [40] inhabitants of Ganja executed, and thousands more expelled to Persia. These attacks by Tsitsianov formed another casus belli.[citation needed]

On 23 May 1804, Persia demanded withdrawal from the regions Russia had occupied, comprising what is now Georgia, Dagestan, and parts of Azerbaijan. Russia refused, stormed Ganja, and declared war. Following an almost ten-year stalemate centred around what is now Dagestan, east Georgia, Azerbaijan, northern Armenia, with neither party being able to gain the clear upper hand, Russia eventually managed to turn the tide. After a series of successful offensives led by General Pyotr Kotlyarevsky, including a decisive victory in the Siege of Lankaran, Persia was forced to sue for peace. In October 1813, the Treaty of Gulistan, negotiated with British mediation and signed at Gulistan, made the Persian Shah Fath Ali Shah cede all Persian territories in the North Caucasus and most of its territories in the South Caucasus to Russia. This included what is now Dagestan, Georgia, and most of Azerbaijan. It also began a large demographic shift in the Caucasus, as many Muslim families emigrated to Persia[41]

French invasion edit

In the summer of 1812 Napoleon invaded Russia. It was the occupation of Moscow and the desecration of the Kremlin, considered to be the sacred centre of Holy Russia, that changed Alexander's sentiment for Napoleon into passionate hatred.[42][d] The campaign of 1812 was the turning point for Alexander's life; after the burning of Moscow, he declared that his own soul had found illumination, and that he had realized once and for all the divine revelation to him of his mission as the peacemaker of Europe.[33]

While the Russian army retreated deep into Russia for almost three months, the nobility pressured Alexander to relieve the commander of the Russian army, Field Marshal Barclay de Tolly. Alexander complied and appointed Prince Mikhail Kutuzov to take over command of the army. On 7 September, the Grande Armée faced the Russian army at a small village called Borodino, 110 kilometres (70 mi) west of Moscow. The battle that followed was the largest and bloodiest single-day action of the Napoleonic Wars, involving more than 250,000 soldiers and resulting in 70,000 casualties. The outcome of the battle was inconclusive. The Russian army, undefeated in spite of heavy losses, was able to withdraw the following day, leaving the French without the decisive victory Napoleon sought.[citation needed]

 
The retreat across the Berezina of the remnants of Napoleon's Grande Armée in November 1812

A week later Napoleon entered Moscow, but there was no delegation to meet the Emperor. The Russians had evacuated the city, and the city's governor, Count Fyodor Rostopchin, ordered several strategic points in Moscow to be set ablaze. The loss of Moscow did not compel Alexander to sue for peace. After staying in the city for a month, Napoleon moved his army out southwest toward Kaluga, where Kutuzov was encamped with the Russian army. The French advance toward Kaluga was checked by the Russian army, and Napoleon was forced to retreat to the areas already devastated by the invasion. In the weeks that followed the Grande Armée starved and suffered from the onset of the Russian Winter. Lack of food and fodder for the horses and persistent attacks upon isolated troops from Russian peasants and Cossacks led to great losses. When the remnants of the French army eventually crossed the Berezina river in November, only 27,000 soldiers remained; the Grande Armée had lost some 380,000 men dead and 100,000 captured. Following the crossing of the Berezina, Napoleon left the army and returned to Paris to protect his position as Emperor and to raise more forces to resist the advancing Russians. The campaign ended on 14 December 1812, with the last French troops finally leaving Russian soil.[citation needed]

The campaign was a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars.[citation needed] Napoleon's reputation was severely shaken, and French hegemony in Europe was weakened. The Grande Armée, made up of French and allied forces, was reduced to a fraction of its initial strength.[citation needed] These events triggered a major shift in European politics. France's ally Prussia, soon followed by Austria, broke their imposed alliance with Napoleon and switched sides, triggering the War of the Sixth Coalition.[citation needed]

War of the Sixth Coalition edit

 
Alexander, Francis I of Austria and Frederick William III of Prussia meeting after the Battle of Leipzig, 1813

With the Russian army following up victory over Napoleon in 1812, the Sixth Coalition was formed with Russia, Prussia, Great Britain, Sweden, Spain, and other nations. Although the French were victorious in the initial battles during the campaign in Germany, the entry of Austria into the war led to France's decisive defeat at the Battle of Leipzig in the autumn of 1813, which proved to be a massive victory for the Coalition. Following the battle, the Pro-French Confederation of the Rhine collapsed, thereby ending Napoleon's hold on territory east of the Rhine forever. Alexander, being the supreme commander of the Coalition forces in the theatre and the paramount monarch among the three main Coalition monarchs, ordered all Coalition forces in Germany to cross the Rhine and invade France.[citation needed]

The Coalition forces, divided into three groups, entered northeastern France in January 1814. Facing them in the theatre were the French forces numbering only about 70,000 men. In spite of being heavily outnumbered, Napoleon defeated the divided Coalition forces in the battles at Brienne and La Rothière, but could not stop the Coalition's advance and triumphant victory over Napoleon. Austrian Emperor Francis I and King Frederick William III of Prussia felt demoralized upon hearing about Napoleon's victories since the start of the campaign. They even considered ordering a general retreat. But Alexander was far more determined than ever to victoriously enter Paris whatever the cost, imposing his will upon Karl Philipp, Prince of Schwarzenberg, and the wavering monarchs.[43] On 28 March, Coalition forces advanced towards Paris and prepared to launch an assault.

 
The Russian Army entering Paris in 1814

Camping outside the city on 29 March, the Coalition armies were to assault the city from its northern and eastern sides the next morning on 30 March. The battle started that same morning with intense artillery bombardment from the Coalition positions. Early in the morning the Coalition attack began when the Russians attacked and drove back the French skirmishers near Belleville before being driven back themselves by French cavalry from the city's eastern suburbs. By 7:00 a.m. the Russians attacked the Young Guard near Romainville in the centre of the French lines and after some time and hard fighting, pushed them back. A few hours later the Prussians, under Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher, attacked north of the city and carried the French position around Aubervilliers, but did not press their attack. The Württemberg troops seized the positions at Saint-Maur to the southeast, with Austrian troops in support. The Russian forces then assailed the heights of Montmartre in the city's northeast. Control of the heights was severely contested, until the French forces surrendered.[44][45]

Alexander sent an envoy to meet with the French to hasten the surrender. He offered generous terms to the French and although having intended to avenge Moscow,[46] he declared himself to be bringing peace to France rather than its destruction. On 31 March[47] Talleyrand gave the key of the city to the tsar. Later that day the Coalition armies triumphantly entered the city with Alexander at the head of the army followed by the King of Prussia and Prince Schwarzenberg. Until this battle it had been nearly 400 years since a foreign army had entered Paris, during the Hundred Years' War.[citation needed]

On 2 April, the Sénat conservateur passed the Acte de déchéance de l'Empereur, which declared Napoleon deposed. Napoleon was in Fontainebleau when he heard that Paris had surrendered. Outraged, he wanted to march on the capital, but his marshals refused to fight for him and repeatedly urged him to surrender. He abdicated in favour of his son on 4 April, but the Allies rejected this out of hand, forcing Napoleon to abdicate unconditionally on 6 April. The terms of his abdication, which included his exile to the Isle of Elba, were settled in the Treaty of Fontainebleau on 11 April. A reluctant Napoleon ratified it two days later, marking the end of the War of the Sixth Coalition.[citation needed]

Postbellum edit

Peace of Paris and the Congress of Vienna edit

Alexander tried to calm the unrest of his conscience by correspondence with the leaders of the evangelical revival on the continent, and sought for omens and supernatural guidance in texts and passages of scripture. It was not, however, according to his own account, until he met the Baroness de Krüdener—a religious adventuress who made the conversion of princes her special mission—at Basel, in the autumn of 1813, that his soul found peace. From this time a mystic pietism became the avowed force of his political, as of his private actions. Madame de Krüdener, and her colleague, the evangelist Henri-Louis Empaytaz, became the confidants of the emperor's most secret thoughts; and during the campaign that ended in the occupation of Paris the imperial prayer-meetings were the oracle on whose revelations hung the fate of the world.[33]

Such was Alexander's mood when the downfall of Napoleon left him one of the most powerful sovereigns in Europe. With the memory of the Treaty of Tilsit still fresh in men's minds, it was not unnatural that to cynical men of the world like Klemens Wenzel von Metternich he merely seemed to be disguising "under the language of evangelical abnegation" vast and perilous schemes of ambition.[33] The puzzled powers were, in fact, the more inclined to be suspicious in view of other, and seemingly inconsistent, tendencies of the emperor, which yet seemed all to point to a like disquieting conclusion. For Madame de Krüdener was not the only influence behind the throne; and, though Alexander had declared war against the Revolution, La Harpe (his erstwhile tutor) was once more at his elbow, and the catchwords of the gospel of humanity were still on his lips. The very proclamations which denounced Napoleon as "the genius of evil", denounced him in the name of "liberty," and of "enlightenment".[33] Conservatives suspected Alexander of a monstrous intrigue by which the eastern autocrat would ally with the Jacobinism of all Europe, aiming at an all-powerful Russia in place of an all-powerful France. At the Congress of Vienna Alexander's attitude accentuated this distrust. Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh, whose single-minded aim was the restoration of "a just equilibrium" in Europe, reproached the Tsar to his face for a "conscience" which led him to imperil the concert of the powers by keeping his hold on Poland in violation of his treaty obligation.[48]

Liberal political views edit

 
Alexander I by Lawrence (1814-18, Royal collection)

Once a supporter of limited liberalism, as seen in his approval of the representative institutions in the Ionian Islands, Grand Duchy of Finland and the Constitution of the Kingdom of Poland in 1815,[49][50] from the end of the year 1818 Alexander's views began to change. A revolutionary conspiracy among the officers of the Russian Imperial Guard, and a plot to kidnap him on his way to the Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle, are said to have shaken his liberal beliefs. At Aix he came for the first time into intimate contact with Metternich. From this time dates the ascendancy of Metternich over the mind of the Russian Emperor and in the councils of Europe. It was, however, no case of sudden conversion. Though alarmed by the revolutionary agitation in Germany, which culminated in the murder of his agent, the dramatist August von Kotzebue (23 March 1819), Alexander approved of Castlereagh's protest against Metternich's policy of "the governments contracting an alliance against the peoples", as formulated in the Carlsbad Decrees of July 1819, and deprecated any intervention of Europe to support "a league of which the sole object is the absurd pretensions of "absolute power".[51]

 
Alexander I confirmed the new Finnish constitution and made Finland an autonomous Grand Duchy at the Diet of Porvoo in 1809.

He still declared his belief in free institutions with limitations. "Liberty", he maintained, "should be confined within just limits. And the limits of liberty are the principles of order".[52] It was the 1820 revolutions in Naples and Piedmont, combined with increasingly disquieting symptoms of discontent in France, Germany, and among his own people, that completed Alexander's conversion. In the seclusion of the little town of Troppau, where in October 1820 the powers met in conference, Metternich found an opportunity for cementing his influence over Alexander, which had been wanting amid the turmoil and intrigues of Vienna and Aix. During a friendly conversation over afternoon tea, the disillusioned autocrat confessed his mistake. "You have nothing to regret," he said sadly to the exultant chancellor, "but I have!".[53]

The issue was momentous. In January Alexander had still upheld the ideal of a free confederation of the European states, symbolised by the Holy Alliance, against the policy of a dictatorship of the great powers, symbolised by the Quadruple Treaty; he had still protested against the claims of collective Europe to interfere in the internal concerns of the sovereign states. He gave in on 19 November by signing the Troppau Protocol, which consecrated the principle of intervention.[15]

Revolt of the Greeks edit

 
Ioannis Kapodistrias, Russia's former foreign minister, was elected as the first head of state of independent Greece

At the Congress of Laibach, which had been adjourned in the spring of 1821, Alexander received news of the Greek revolt against the Ottoman Empire. From this time until his death, Alexander's mind was conflicted between his dreams of a stable confederation of Europe and his traditional mission as leader of the Orthodox crusade against the Ottomans. At first, under the careful advice of Metternich, Alexander chose the former.[27]

Siding against the Greek revolt for the sake of stability in the region, Alexander expelled its leader Alexander Ypsilantis from the Russian Imperial Cavalry, and directed his foreign minister, Ioannis Kapodistrias (known as Giovanni, Count Capo d'Istria), himself a Greek, to disavow any Russian sympathy with Ypsilantis; and in 1822, he issued orders to turn back a deputation from the Greek Morea province to the Congress of Verona on the road.[27]

He made some effort to reconcile the principles at conflict in his mind. The Ottoman Sultan Mahmud II had been excluded from the Holy Alliance under the principle that the affairs of the East were the "domestic concerns of Russia" rather than of the concert of Europe; but Alexander now offered to surrender this claim and act "as the mandatory of Europe," as Austria had acted in Naples, but still to march as a Christian liberator into the Ottoman Empire.[27]

Metternich's opposition to this assertion of Russian power, putting the Austrian-led balance of power above the interests of Christendom, first opened Alexander's eyes to the true character of Austria's attitude towards his ideals. Once more in Russia, far from the fascination of Metternich's personality, he was once again moved by the aspirations of his people.[27]

In 1823 the 1817–1824 cholera pandemic reached Astrakhan and the Tsar ordered an anti-cholera campaign that was imitated in other countries.

Personal life edit

 
Elizabeth Alexeievna with Alexander at the Congress of Vienna 1814 Cliche´- Medal by Leopold Heuberger
 
Alexander and Louise of Baden

On 9 October 1793, Alexander married Louise of Baden, known as Elizabeth Alexeievna after her conversion to the Orthodox Church. He later told his friend Frederick William III that the marriage, a political match devised by his grandmother, Catherine the Great, regrettably proved to be a misfortune for him and his spouse.[15] Their two children died young,[54] though their common sorrow drew the spouses closer together. Towards the end of Alexander's life their reconciliation was completed by the wise charity of the Empress in sympathising deeply with him over the death of his beloved daughter Sophia Naryshkina, the daughter of his mistress Maria Naryshkina,[15] with whom he had a relationship from 1799 until 1818. In 1809, Alexander I was widely and famously rumoured to have had an affair with the Finnish noblewoman Ulla Möllersvärd and to have had a child by her, but this is not confirmed.[55]

Death edit

With his mental health deteriorating, Alexander grew increasingly suspicious of those around him, more withdrawn, more religious, and more passive. Some historians conclude his profile "coincides precisely with the schizophrenic prototype: a withdrawn, seclusive, rather shy, introvertive, unaggressive, and somewhat apathetic individual".[56][57][58] In the autumn of 1825 the Emperor undertook a voyage to the south of Russia due to the increasing illness of his wife. During his trip he himself caught typhus, from which he died in the southern city of Taganrog on 19 November 1825 (Old Style). However, his death would not be widely known until December, due to Taganrog being far from the capital or any other large city. [59] His two brothers disputed who would become tsar—each wanted the other to do so. His wife died a few months later as the emperor's body was transported to Saint Petersburg for the funeral. He was interred at the Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral of the Peter and Paul Fortress in Saint Petersburg on 13 March 1826.[60]

Conspiracy about Death edit

Many believe that Tsar Alexander I faked his death and lived as a hermit by name of Feodor Kuzmich, although this fact is debated by historians and some reject the legend; however, popular writers often resurrect them.[61] The main claim for the belief that Alexander I faked his death involves the curious similarities between Alexander and Kuzmich. Svetlana Semyonova, president of Russian Graphological Society, analyzed both Alexander's and Kuzmich's handwriting and concluded that they were the same. Furthermore, there are rumors that Alexander's wife also faked her death a year after his death and became a nun in Saint Petersburg. The priest attending Feodor Kuzmich on his deathbed reportedly asked him if he was, in fact, Alexander the Blessed. In response, Kuzmich said, "Your works are wonderful, Lord ... There is no secret, which is not opened."[62]

Children edit

Children of Alexander I of Russia.[63][64]
Name Birth Death Notes
By his wife Louise of Baden
Maria/Maryia Alexandrovna, Grand Duchess of Russia 18/29 May 1799 27 July / 8 August 1800[65] Sometimes rumoured to be the child of Adam Czartoryski, died aged one.[citation needed]
Elisabeta/Elisaveta Alexandrovna, Grand Duchess of Russia 15 November 1806 12 May 1808 Sometimes rumoured to be the child of Alexei Okhotnikov, died aged one of an infection.[citation needed]
By Maria Narishkin
Zenaida Narishkina c. 19 December 1807 18 June 1810 Died aged four.[citation needed]
Sophia Narishkina 1 October 1805 18 June 1824 Died aged eighteen, unmarried.[citation needed]
Emanuel Narishkin 30 July 1813 31 December 1901/13 January 1902 Married Catherine Novossiltzev, no issue. *unconfirmed and disputed[citation needed]
By Sophia Sergeievna Vsevolozhskaya
Nikolai Yevgenyevich Lukash 11 December 1796 20 January 1868 Married Princess Alexandra Lukanichna Guidianova and had issue. Secondly, he married Princess Alexandra Mikhailovna Schakhovskaya and had issue.[66]
By Marguerite Georges
Maria Alexandrovna Parijskaia 19 March 1814 1874
By Helena Dzierżanowska
Gustaw Ehrenberg c. 14 February 1818 28 September 1895 Polish revolutionary and poet, best known for his poem "Gdy naród do boju", which became a famous revolutionary tune with the melody composed by Fryderyk Chopin.[citation needed][67]

Archives edit

Alexander's letters to his grandfather, Frederick II Eugene, Duke of Württemberg, (together with letters from his siblings) written between 1795 and 1797, are preserved in the State Archive of Stuttgart (Hauptstaatsarchiv Stuttgart) in Stuttgart, Germany.[68]

Honours edit

 
The bust of Alexander I at the yard of the Helsinki University in 1986

He received the following orders and decorations:[69]

Ancestry edit

See also edit

Notes edit

  1. ^ During Alexander's lifetime Russia used the Julian calendar (Old Style), but unless otherwise stated, any date in this article uses the Gregorian Calendar (New Style)—see the article "Old Style and New Style dates" for a more detailed explanation.
  2. ^ Благословенный, Blagoslovennyy
  3. ^ It was issued at the end of the 19th century in the Rescript of Nicholas II and the conference of The Hague (Phillips 1911, p. 557 cites: Circular of Count Muraviev, 24 August 1898).
  4. ^ On the historiography, see Lieven 2006, pp. 283–308.
  1. ^ Bushkovitch, Paul (2012). A concise history of Russia. New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 154. ISBN 978-0-521-54323-1.
  2. ^ Maiorova 2010, p. 114.
  3. ^ Walker 1992, pp. 343–360.
  4. ^ "Читать". Литмир – электронная библиотека. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  5. ^ . Archived from the original on 22 June 2011. Retrieved 1 January 2009.
  6. ^ "Vikent - Детство и юность императора Александра I". vikent.ru. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  7. ^ "Alexander I of Russia". history.wikireading.ru. from the original on 28 July 2021. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  8. ^ "HTC: Liturgical Ranks". www.holy-trinity.org. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  9. ^ "Александро-Невская Лавра - Панфилов Иоанн Иоаннович". lavraspb.ru. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  10. ^ "Читать". Литмир – электронная библиотека. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  11. ^ "Александр I". www.museum.ru. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  12. ^ "Александр I Павлович". myhistorypark.ru (in Russian). Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  13. ^ McGrew 1992, p. 184
  14. ^ a b c d e Phillips 1911, p. 556.
  15. ^ a b c d Phillips 1911, p. 559.
  16. ^ Sebag Montefiore 2016, p. 353.
  17. ^ Sebag Montefiore 2016, pp. 354–356.
  18. ^ Sebag Montefiore 2016, p. 357.
  19. ^ Sebag Montefiore 2016, p. 384.
  20. ^ Palmer 1974, ch 3.
  21. ^ Olivier 2019.
  22. ^ Palmer 1974, pp. 52–55.
  23. ^ Palmer 1974, pp. 168–72.
  24. ^ McCaffray 2005, pp. 1–21.
  25. ^ Flynn 1988, p. [page needed].
  26. ^ Lipscomb, Bergh & Johnston 1903, p. [page needed]; Jefferson to Priestley, Washington, 29 November 1802
  27. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Phillips 1911, p. 557.
  28. ^ Esdaile 2009, pp. 192–193.
  29. ^ Phillips 1911, p. 557 cites Instructions to M. Novosiltsov, 11 September 1804. Tatischeff, p. 82
  30. ^ Phillips 1911, p. 557 cites: Savary to Napoleon, 18 November 1807. Tatischeff, p. 232.
  31. ^ Phillips 1911, pp. 557, 558 cites: Coulaincourt to Napoleon, 4th report, 3 August 1809. Tatischeff, p. 496.
  32. ^ Zawadzki 2009, pp. 110–124.
  33. ^ a b c d e f g Phillips 1911, p. 558.
  34. ^ a b Nolan 2002, p. 1666.
  35. ^ a b c Chapman 2001, p. 29.
  36. ^ Tedsnet.
  37. ^ Kazemzadeh 2013, p. 5.
  38. ^ Avery et al. 1991, p. 332.
  39. ^ Baddeley 1908, p. 67 cites "Tsitsianoff's report to the Emperor: Akti, ix (supplement), p. 920".
  40. ^ Mansoori 2008, p. 245.
  41. ^ Yemelianova 2014.
  42. ^ Phillips 1911, p. 558 cites: Alexander speaking to Colonel Michaud. Tatischeff, p. 612.
  43. ^ Sebag Montefiore 2016, p. 313.
  44. ^ Mikaberidze 2013, p. 255.
  45. ^ Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky 1839, pp. 347–372.
  46. ^ Montefiore 2016, p. 313.
  47. ^ Maude 1911, p. 223.
  48. ^ Phillips 1911, p. 558 cites Castlereagh to Liverpool, 2 October 1814. F.O. Papers. Vienna VII.
  49. ^ Richard Stites (2014). The Four Horsemen Riding to Liberty in Post-Napoleonic Europe. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199981489.
  50. ^ Julia Berest (2011). The Emergence of Russian Liberalism: Alexander Kunitsyn in Context. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 9780230118928.
  51. ^ Phillips 1911, p. 558 cites: Despatch of Lieven, 30 Nov (12 Dec.), 1819, and Russ. Circular of 27 January 1820. Martens IV. part i. p. 270.
  52. ^ Phillips 1911, pp. 558, 559 cites: Aperçu des idées de l'Empereur, Martens IV. part i. p. 269.
  53. ^ Phillips 1911, p. 559 cites: Metternich Mem.
  54. ^ Palmer 1974, pp. 154–55.
  55. ^ Mäkelä-Alitalo 2006.
  56. ^ Nichols 1982, p. 41.
  57. ^ Cox 1987, p. 121.
  58. ^ Truscott 1997, p. 26.
  59. ^ Bushkovitch, Paul (2012). A concise history of Russia. New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 154. ISBN 978-0-521-54323-1.
  60. ^ Palmer 1974, ch 22.
  61. ^ Raleigh, Donald J.; Iskenderov, Akhmed Akhmedovich (1996). The emperors and empresses of Russia : rediscovering the Romanovs. Internet Archive. Armonk, N.Y. : M.E. Sharpe. ISBN 978-1-56324-759-0.
  62. ^ "Святой праведный старец Феодор Томский". † Православие в Томске. Retrieved 3 November 2023.
  63. ^ Palmer 1974, p. [page needed].
  64. ^ McNaughton 1973, pp. 293–306.
  65. ^ Manifesto
  66. ^ Genealogy of Nikolai Lukash. Retrieved 20 January 2021
  67. ^ Ehrenberg, Gustaw. "Szlachta w roku 1831". Wolne Lektury. Retrieved 14 February 2023.
  68. ^ "Herzog Friedrich Eugen (1732-1797) - Briefwechsel des Herzogs mit dem kaiserlichen Hause von Russland, 1795-1797 - 3. Schreiben der jungen Großfürsten Alexander und Konstantin und Großfürstinnen Alexandrina, Anna, Katharina, Elisabeth, Helene, Maria". Hauptstaatsarchiv Stuttgart. Retrieved 22 November 2021.
  69. ^ Russian Imperial Army - Emperor Alexander I Pavlovich of Russia (In Russian)
  70. ^ Almanach de la cour: pour l'année ... 1799. l'Académie Imp. des Sciences. 1799. pp. 45, 52, 61, 85.
  71. ^ Per Nordenvall (1998). "Kungl. Maj:ts Orden". Kungliga Serafimerorden: 1748–1998 (in Swedish). Stockholm. ISBN 91-630-6744-7.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  72. ^
  73. ^ Liste der Ritter des Königlich Preußischen Hohen Ordens vom Schwarzen Adler (1851), "Von Seiner Majestät dem Könige Friedrich Wilhelm II. ernannte Ritter" p. 10
  74. ^ Angelo Scordo, (PDF) (in Italian), p. 9, archived from the original (PDF) on 4 March 2016
  75. ^ M. & B. Wattel. (2009). Les Grand'Croix de la Légion d'honneur de 1805 à nos jours. Titulaires français et étrangers. Paris: Archives & Culture. p. 513. ISBN 978-2-35077-135-9.
  76. ^ Teulet, Alexandre (1863). "Liste chronologique des chevaliers de l'ordre du Saint-Esprit depuis son origine jusqu'à son extinction (1578-1830)" [Chronological list of knights of the Order of the Holy Spirit from its origin to its extinction (1578-1830)]. Annuaire-bulletin de la Société de l'histoire de France (in French) (2): 113. Retrieved 20 May 2020.
  77. ^ J ..... -H ..... -Fr ..... Berlien (1846). Der Elephanten-Orden und seine Ritter. Berling. pp. 124–125.
  78. ^ Shaw, Wm. A. (1906) The Knights of England, I, London, p. 51
  79. ^ Bayern (1824). Hof- und Staatshandbuch des Königreichs Bayern: 1824. Landesamt. p. 6.
  80. ^ Guerra, Francisco (1819), "Caballeros Existentes en la Insignie Orden del Toison de Oro", Calendario manual y guía de forasteros en Madrid (in Spanish): 42, retrieved 2 November 2020
  81. ^ "Ritter-Orden: Militärischer Maria-Theresien-Orden", Hof- und Staatshandbuch des Kaiserthumes Österreich, 1824, p. 17, retrieved 2 November 2020
  82. ^ "Militaire Willems-Orde: Romanov, Aleksandr I Pavlovitsj" [Military William Order: Romanov, Alexander I Pavlovich]. Ministerie van Defensie (in Dutch). 19 November 1818. Retrieved 2 November 2020.
  83. ^ Luigi Cibrario (1869). Notizia storica del nobilissimo ordine supremo della santissima Annunziata. Sunto degli statuti, catalogo dei cavalieri. Eredi Botta. p. 102.
  84. ^ Bragança, Jose Vicente de; Estrela, Paulo Jorge (2017). "Troca de Decorações entre os Reis de Portugal e os Imperadores da Rússia" [Exchange of Decorations between the Kings of Portugal and the Emperors of Russia]. Pro Phalaris (in Portuguese). 16: 9. Retrieved 2 November 2020.
  85. ^ Staatshandbuch für das Großherzogtum Sachsen / Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (1819), "Großherzogliche Hausorden" p. 8
  86. ^ Aleksandr Kamenskii, The Russian Empire in the Eighteenth Century: Searching for a Place in the World (1997) pp 265–280.
  87. ^ a b c Berlin 1768, p. 22.
  88. ^ a b c d Berlin 1768, p. 21.
  89. ^ a b Berlin 1768, p. 110.

References edit

  • Avery, Peter; Fisher, William Bayne; Hambly, Gavin; Melville, Charles (1991). The Cambridge history of Iran: From Nadir Shah to the Islamic Republic. Cambridge University Press. p. 332. ISBN 978-0-521-20095-0.
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  • Berlin, A. (1768). "Table 23". Genealogie ascendante jusqu'au quatrieme degre inclusivement de tous les Rois et Princes de maisons souveraines de l'Europe actuellement vivans [Genealogy up to the fourth degree inclusive of all the Kings and Princes of sovereign houses of Europe currently living] (in French). Bourdeaux: Frederic Guillaume Birnstiel. p. 23.
  • Chapman, Tim (2001). Imperial Russia, 1801–1905 (illustrated, reprint ed.). Routledge. p. 29. ISBN 978-0-415-23110-7.
  • Cox, Robert W. (1987). Production, Power, and World Order: Social Forces in the Making of History. Columbia University Press. p. 121.
  • Esdaile, Charles (2009). Napoleon's Wars: An International History. Penguin. pp. 192–193.
  • Flynn, James T. (1988). University Reform of Tsar Alexander I, 1802–1835.
  • "Jefferson to Priestley, Washington, 29 November 1802". The Thomas Jefferson Papers Series 1. General Correspondence. 1651–1827. Library of Congress.
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  • Lieven, Dominic (2006). "Review article: Russia and the defeat of Napoleon". Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History. 7 (2): 283–308. doi:10.1353/kri.2006.0020. S2CID 159982703.
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Attribution:

Further reading edit

  • Hartley, Janet M. et al. eds. Russia and the Napoleonic Wars (2015), new scholarship
  • Lieven, Dominic. Russia Against Napoleon (2011) excerpt
  • McConnell, Allen. Tsar Alexander I: Paternalistic Reformer (1970) online free to borrow
  • Palmer, Alan. Alexander I: Tsar of War and Peace (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1974)
  • Rey, Marie-Pierre. Alexander I.: the Tsar who defeated Napoleon (2012)
  • Troyat, Henri. Alexander of Russia (Hodder & Stoughton, 1984)
  • Zawadzki, Hubert. "Between Napoleon and Tsar Alexander: The Polish Question at Tilsit, 1807." Central Europe 7.2 (2009): 110–124.

External links edit

  •   Media related to Alexander I of Russia at Wikimedia Commons
Alexander I of Russia
Cadet branch of the House of Oldenburg
Born: 23 December 1777 Died: 1 December 1825
Regnal titles
Preceded by Emperor of Russia
1801–1825
Succeeded by
Preceded by Grand Duke of Finland
1809–1825
Preceded by King of Poland
Grand Duke of Lithuania

1815–1825

alexander, russia, this, name, that, follows, eastern, slavic, naming, conventions, patronymic, pavlovich, family, name, romanov, alexander, russian, Александр, Павлович, romanized, aleksandr, pavlovich, ɐlʲɪkˈsandr, ˈpavləvʲɪtɕ, december, december, 1777, dece. In this name that follows Eastern Slavic naming conventions the patronymic is Pavlovich and the family name is Romanov Alexander I Russian Aleksandr I Pavlovich romanized Aleksandr I Pavlovich IPA ɐlʲɪkˈsandr ˈpavlevʲɪtɕ 23 December O S 12 December 1777 1 December O S 19 November 1825 a 2 nicknamed the Blessed b was Emperor of Russia from 1801 the first king of Congress Poland from 1815 and the grand duke of Finland from 1809 to his death in 1825 He was the eldest son of Emperor Paul I and Sophie Dorothea of Wurttemberg Alexander IPortrait by George Dawe c 1825 29Emperor of RussiaReign23 March 1801 1 December 1825Coronation15 27 September 1801PredecessorPaul ISuccessorNicholas IBorn 1777 12 23 23 December 1777Saint Petersburg Russian EmpireDied1 December 1825 1825 12 01 aged 47 1 Taganrog Russian EmpireBurial13 March 1826Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral Saint PetersburgSpouseLouise of Baden m 1793 wbr Issuemore Nikolai Lukash illegitimate NamesAlexander Pavlovich RomanovHouseHolstein Gottorp RomanovFatherPaul I of RussiaMotherSophie Dorothea of WurttembergReligionRussian OrthodoxSignatureMilitary serviceBranch service Imperial Russian ArmyBattles warsWar of the Third Coalition Battle of Austerlitz War of the Sixth Coalition Battle of Leipzig Battle of ParisThe son of Grand Duke Paul Petrovich later Paul I Alexander succeeded to the throne after his father was murdered He ruled Russia during the chaotic period of the Napoleonic Wars As prince and during the early years of his reign Alexander often used liberal rhetoric but continued Russia s absolutist policies in practice In the first years of his reign he initiated some minor social reforms and in 1803 04 major liberal educational reforms such as building more universities Alexander appointed Mikhail Speransky the son of a village priest as one of his closest advisors The Collegia were abolished and replaced by the State Council which was created to improve legislation Plans were also made to set up a parliament and sign a constitution Alexander also was hostile towards European powers Unlike his predecessors who tried to westernize Russia so it could compete with European nations Alexander was a Russian nationalist and Slavophilist who wanted Russia to develop on the basis of Russian culture rather than European The Slavophilism policy still remains the main foreign policy in Russia to this day In foreign policy he changed Russia s position towards France four times between 1804 and 1812 among neutrality opposition and alliance In 1805 he joined Britain in the War of the Third Coalition against Napoleon but after suffering massive defeats at the battles of Austerlitz and Friedland he switched sides and formed an alliance with Napoleon by the Treaty of Tilsit 1807 and joined Napoleon s Continental System He fought a small scale naval war against Britain between 1807 and 1812 as well as a short war against Sweden 1808 09 after Sweden s refusal to join the Continental System Alexander and Napoleon hardly agreed especially regarding Poland and the alliance collapsed by 1810 Alexander s greatest triumph came in 1812 when Napoleon s invasion of Russia proved to be a catastrophic disaster for the French As part of the winning coalition against Napoleon he gained territory in Finland and Poland He formed the Holy Alliance to suppress revolutionary movements in Europe which he saw as immoral threats to legitimate Christian monarchs He also helped Austria s Klemens von Metternich in suppressing all national and liberal movements During the second half of his reign Alexander became increasingly arbitrary reactionary and fearful of plots against him as a result he ended many of the reforms he made earlier He purged schools of foreign teachers as education became more religiously driven as well as politically conservative 3 Speransky was replaced as advisor with the strict artillery inspector Aleksey Arakcheyev who oversaw the creation of military settlements Alexander died of typhus in December 1825 while on a trip to southern Russia He left no legitimate children as his two daughters died in childhood Neither of his brothers wanted to become emperor After a period of great confusion that presaged the failed Decembrist revolt of liberal army officers in the weeks after his death he was succeeded by his younger brother Nicholas I Contents 1 Early life 2 Tsarevich 3 Emperor 3 1 Ascension 3 2 Domestic policy 3 3 Views held by his contemporaries 3 4 Napoleonic Wars 3 4 1 Alliances with other powers 3 4 2 Opposition to Napoleon 3 4 3 1807 loss to French forces 3 5 Prussia 3 6 Franco Russian alliance 3 7 War against Persia 3 8 French invasion 3 9 War of the Sixth Coalition 4 Postbellum 4 1 Peace of Paris and the Congress of Vienna 4 2 Liberal political views 4 3 Revolt of the Greeks 5 Personal life 6 Death 7 Conspiracy about Death 8 Children 9 Archives 10 Honours 11 Ancestry 12 See also 13 Notes 14 References 15 Further reading 16 External linksEarly life edit nbsp Confirmation of Alexander s wife Elizabeth Alexeievna nbsp Portrait of Grand Duke Alexander Pavlovich 1800 by Vladimir BorovikovskyAlexander was born at 10 45 on 23 December 1777 in Saint Petersburg 4 and he and his younger brother Constantine were raised by their grandmother Catherine 5 He was baptized on 31 December 6 in Grand Church of the Winter Palace 7 by mitred archpriest 8 Ioann Ioannovich Panfilov 9 confessor of Empress Catherine II 10 his godmother was Catherine the Great and his godfathers were Joseph II Holy Roman Emperor and Frederick the Great 11 He was named after Saint Petersburg patron saint Alexander Nevsky 12 Some sources 13 allege that she planned to remove her son Alexander s father Paul I from the succession altogether From the free thinking atmosphere of the court of Catherine and his Swiss tutor Frederic Cesar de La Harpe he imbibed the principles of Rousseau s gospel of humanity But from his military governor Nikolay Saltykov he imbibed the traditions of Russian autocracy 14 Andrey Afanasyevich Samborsky whom his grandmother chose for his religious instruction was an atypical unbearded Orthodox priest Samborsky had long lived in England and taught Alexander and Constantine excellent English very uncommon for potential Russian autocrats at the time citation needed On 9 October 1793 when Alexander was still 15 years old he married 14 year old Princess Louise of Baden who took the name Elizabeth Alexeievna 15 His grandmother was the one who presided over his marriage to the young princess 16 Until his grandmother s death he was constantly walking the line of allegiance between his grandmother and his father His steward Nikolai Saltykov helped him navigate the political landscape engendering dislike for his grandmother and dread in dealing with his father citation needed Catherine had the Alexander Palace built for the couple This did nothing to help his relationship with her as Catherine would go out of her way to amuse them with dancing and parties which annoyed his wife Living at the palace also put pressure on him to perform as a husband though he felt only a brother s love for the Grand Duchess 17 He began to sympathize more with his father as he saw visiting his father s fiefdom at Gatchina Palace as a relief from the ostentatious court of the empress There they wore simple Prussian military uniforms instead of the gaudy clothing popular at the French court they had to wear when visiting Catherine Even so visiting the tsarevich did not come without a bit of travail Paul liked to have his guests perform military drills which he also pushed upon his sons Alexander and Constantine He was also prone to fits of temper and he often went into fits of rage when events did not go his way 18 Tsarevich editCatherine s death in November 1796 before she could appoint Alexander as her successor brought his father Paul to the throne Alexander disliked him as emperor even more than he did his grandmother He wrote that Russia had become a plaything for the insane and that absolute power disrupts everything It is likely that seeing two previous rulers abuse their autocratic powers in such a way pushed him to be one of the more progressive Romanov tsars of the 19th century Among the rest of the country Paul was widely unpopular He accused his wife of conspiring to become another Catherine and seize power from him as his mother did from his father He also suspected Alexander of conspiring against him despite his son s earlier refusal to seize power from Paul 19 Emperor edit nbsp Russia violet and other European empires in 1800Ascension edit Alexander became Emperor of Russia when his father was assassinated on 23 March 1801 Alexander then 23 years old was in the Saint Michael s Castle at the moment of the assassination and his accession to the throne was announced by General Nicholas Zubov one of the assassins Historians still debate Alexander s role in his father s murder The most common theory is that he was let into the conspirators secret and was willing to take the throne but insisted that his father should not be killed Becoming emperor through a crime that cost his father s life would give Alexander a strong sense of remorse and shame 20 Alexander I succeeded to the throne that day 21 and was crowned in the Kremlin on 15 September of that year citation needed Domestic policy edit nbsp Equestrian portrait of Alexander I by Franz Kruger 1837 posthumous See also Abolition of serfdom in Livonia The Orthodox Church initially exercised little influence on Alexander s life The young emperor was determined to reform the inefficient highly centralised systems of government that Russia relied upon While retaining for a time the old ministers one of the first acts of his reign was to appoint the Private Committee comprising young and enthusiastic friends of his own Viktor Kochubey Nikolay Novosiltsev Pavel Stroganov and Adam Jerzy Czartoryski to draw up a plan of domestic reform which was supposed to result in the establishment of a constitutional monarchy in accordance with the teachings of the Age of Enlightenment 22 A few years into his reign the liberal Mikhail Speransky became one of the emperor s closest advisors and he drew up many plans for elaborate reforms In the Government reform of Alexander I the old Collegia were abolished and new Ministries were created in their place led by ministers responsible to the Crown A Council of Ministers under the chairmanship of the Sovereign dealt with all interdepartmental matters The State Council was created to improve the technique of legislation It was intended to become the Second Chamber of a representative legislature The Governing Senate was reorganized as the Supreme Court of the Empire The codification of the laws initiated in 1801 was never carried out during his reign 23 Alexander wanted to resolve another crucial issue in Russia the status of the serfs although this was not achieved until 1861 during the reign of his nephew Alexander II His advisors quietly discussed the options at length Cautiously he extended the right to own land to most classes of subjects including state owned peasants in 1801 and created a new social category of free agriculturalist for peasants voluntarily emancipated by their masters in 1803 The great majority of serfs were not affected 24 When Alexander s reign began there were three universities in Russia at Moscow Vilna Vilnius and Dorpat Tartu These were strengthened and three others were founded at St Petersburg Kharkiv and Kazan Literary and scientific bodies were established or encouraged and his reign became noted for the aid lent to the sciences and arts by the Emperor and the wealthy nobility Alexander later expelled foreign scholars 25 After 1815 the military settlements farms worked by soldiers and their families under military control were introduced with the idea of making the army or part of it self supporting economically and for providing it with recruits 14 Views held by his contemporaries edit nbsp Imperial monogram of Alexander ICalled an autocrat and Jacobin 14 a man of the world and a mystic Alexander appeared to his contemporaries as a riddle which each read according to his own temperament Napoleon Bonaparte thought him a shifty Byzantine 14 and called him the Talma of the North as ready to play any conspicuous part To Metternich he was a madman to be humoured Castlereagh writing of him to Lord Liverpool gave him credit for grand qualities but added that he is suspicious and undecided 14 and to Jefferson he was a man of estimable character disposed to do good and expected to diffuse through the mass of the Russian people a sense of their natural rights 26 In 1803 Beethoven dedicated his Opus 30 Violin Sonatas to Alexander who in response gave the famous composer a diamond at the Congress of Vienna where they met in 1814 Napoleonic Wars edit Alliances with other powers edit Upon his accession Alexander reversed many of the unpopular policies of his father Paul denounced the League of Armed Neutrality and made peace with Britain April 1801 At the same time he opened negotiations with Francis II Holy Roman Emperor Soon afterwards at Memel he entered into a close alliance with Prussia not as he boasted from motives of policy but in the spirit of true chivalry out of friendship for the young King Frederick William III and his beautiful wife Louise of Mecklenburg Strelitz 27 The development of this alliance was interrupted by the short lived peace of October 1801 and for a while it seemed as though France and Russia might come to an understanding Carried away by the enthusiasm of Frederic Cesar de La Harpe who had returned to Russia from Paris Alexander began openly to proclaim his admiration for French institutions and for the person of Napoleon Bonaparte Soon however came a change La Harpe after a new visit to Paris presented to Alexander his Reflections on the True Nature of the Consul for Life which as Alexander said tore the veil from his eyes and revealed Bonaparte as not a true patriot 27 but only as the most famous tyrant the world has produced 27 Later on La Harpe and his friend Henri Monod lobbied Alexander who persuaded the other Allied powers opposing Napoleon to recognise Vaudois and Argovian independence in spite of Bern s attempts to reclaim them as subject lands Alexander s disillusionment was completed by the execution of the duc d Enghien on trumped up charges The Russian court went into mourning for the last member of the House of Conde and diplomatic relations with France were broken off Alexander was especially alarmed and decided he had to somehow curb Napoleon s power 28 Opposition to Napoleon edit In opposing Napoleon I the oppressor of Europe and the disturber of the world s peace Alexander in fact already believed himself to be fulfilling a divine mission In his instructions to Niklolay Novosiltsev his special envoy in London the emperor elaborated the motives of his policy in language that appealed little to the prime minister William Pitt the Younger Yet the document is of great interest as it formulates for the first time in an official dispatch the ideals of international policy that were to play a conspicuous part in world affairs at the close of the revolutionary epoch c Alexander argued that the outcome of the war was not only to be the liberation of France but the universal triumph of the sacred rights of humanity 27 To attain this it would be necessary after having attached the nations to their government by making these incapable of acting save in the greatest interests of their subjects to fix the relations of the states amongst each other on more precise rules and such as it is to their interest to respect 27 A general treaty was to become the main basis of the relations of the states forming the European Confederation 27 While he believed the effort would not attain universal peace it would be worthwhile if it established clear principles for the prescriptions of the rights of nations 27 The body would assure the positive rights of nations and the privilege of neutrality while asserting the obligation to exhaust all resources of mediation to retain peace and would form a new code of the law of nations 29 1807 loss to French forces edit nbsp Napoleon Alexander Queen Louise and Frederick William III of Prussia in Tilsit 1807Meanwhile Napoleon a little deterred by the Russian autocrat s youthful ideology never gave up hope of detaching him from the coalition He had no sooner entered Vienna in triumph than he opened negotiations with Alexander he resumed them after the Battle of Austerlitz 2 December Russia and France he urged were geographical allies 27 there was and could be between them no true conflict of interests together they might rule the world But Alexander was still determined to persist in the system of disinterestedness in respect of all the states of Europe which he had thus far followed 27 and he again allied himself with the Kingdom of Prussia The campaign of Jena and the Battle of Eylau followed and Napoleon though still intent on the Russian alliance stirred up Poles Turks and Persians to break the obstinacy of the Tsar A party too in Russia itself headed by the Tsar s brother Constantine Pavlovich was clamorous for peace but Alexander after a vain attempt to form a new coalition summoned the Russian nation to a holy war against Napoleon as the enemy of the Orthodox faith The outcome was the rout of Friedland 13 14 June 1807 Napoleon saw his chance and seized it Instead of demanding harsh peace terms he offered to the chastened autocrat his alliance and a partnership in his glory 27 The two Emperors met at Tilsit on 25 June 1807 Napoleon knew well how to appeal to the exuberant imagination of his new found friend He would divide with Alexander the Empire of the world as a first step he would leave him in possession of the Danubian Principalities and give him a free hand to deal with Finland and afterwards the Emperors of the East and West when the time should be ripe would drive the Turks from Europe and march across Asia to the conquest of India Nevertheless a thought awoke in Alexander s impressionable mind an ambition to which he had hitherto been a stranger The interests of Europe as a whole were utterly forgotten 30 Prussia edit The brilliance of these new visions did not however blind Alexander to the obligations of friendship and he refused to retain the Danubian principalities as the price for suffering a further dismemberment of Prussia We have made loyal war he said we must make a loyal peace 27 It was not long before the first enthusiasm of Tilsit began to wane The French remained in Prussia the Russians on the Danube and each accused the other of breach of faith Meanwhile however the personal relations of Alexander and Napoleon were of the most cordial character and it was hoped that a fresh meeting might adjust all differences between them The meeting took place at Erfurt in October 1808 and resulted in a treaty that defined the common policy of the two Emperors But Alexander s relations with Napoleon nonetheless suffered a change He realised that in Napoleon sentiment never got the better of reason that as a matter of fact he had never intended his proposed grand enterprise seriously and had only used it to preoccupy the mind of the Tsar while he consolidated his own power in Central Europe From this moment the French alliance was for Alexander also not a fraternal agreement to rule the world but an affair of pure policy He used it initially to remove the geographical enemy from the gates of Saint Petersburg by wresting Finland from Sweden 1809 and he hoped further to make the Danube the southern frontier of Russia 27 Franco Russian alliance edit nbsp Meeting of Napoleon and Alexander I in Tilsit a 19th century painting by Adolphe RoehnEvents were rapidly heading towards the rupture of the Franco Russian alliance While Alexander assisted Napoleon in the War of the Fifth Coalition in 1809 he declared plainly that he would not allow the Austrian Empire to be crushed out of existence Napoleon subsequently complained bitterly of the inactivity of the Russian troops during the campaign The tsar in turn protested against Napoleon s encouragement of the Poles In the matter of the French alliance he knew himself to be practically isolated in Russia and he declared that he could not sacrifice the interest of his people and empire to his affection for Napoleon I don t want anything for myself he said to the French ambassador therefore the world is not large enough to come to an understanding on the affairs of Poland if it is a question of its restoration 31 32 Alexander complained that the Treaty of Schonbrunn which added largely to the Duchy of Warsaw had ill requited him for his loyalty and he was only mollified for the time being by Napoleon s public declaration that he had no intention of restoring Poland and by a convention signed on 4 January 1810 but not ratified abolishing the Polish name and orders of chivalry 33 But if Alexander suspected Napoleon s intentions Napoleon was no less suspicious of Alexander Partly to test his sincerity Napoleon sent an almost peremptory request for the hand of the grand duchess Anna Pavlovna the tsar s youngest sister After some little delay Alexander returned a polite refusal pleading the princess s tender age and the objection of the dowager empress to the marriage Napoleon s answer was to refuse to ratify the 4 January convention and to announce his engagement to the Archduchess Marie Louise in such a way as to lead Alexander to suppose that the two marriage treaties had been negotiated simultaneously From this time on the relationship between the two emperors gradually became more and more strained 33 Another personal grievance for Alexander towards Napoleon was the annexation of Oldenburg by France in December 1810 as Wilhelm Duke of Oldenburg 3 January 1754 2 July 1823 was the uncle of the tsar Furthermore the disastrous impact of the Continental System on Russian trade made it impossible for the emperor to maintain a policy that was Napoleon s chief motive for the alliance 33 Alexander kept Russia as neutral as possible in the ongoing French war with Britain Russia s own war with Britain barely any more than nominal He allowed trade to continue secretly with Britain and did not enforce the blockade required by the Continental System 34 In 1810 he withdrew Russia from the Continental System and trade between Britain and Russia grew 35 nbsp The French Empire in 1812 at its greatest extentRelations between France and Russia worsened progressively after 1810 By 1811 it became clear that Napoleon was not adhering to his side of the terms of the Treaty of Tilsit He had promised assistance to Russia in its war against the Ottoman Empire but as the campaign went on France offered no support at all 34 With war imminent between France and Russia Alexander started to prepare the ground diplomatically In April 1812 Russia and Sweden signed a treaty for mutual defence A month later Alexander secured his southern flank through the Treaty of Bucharest 1812 which ended the war against the Ottomans formally 35 His diplomats managed to extract promises from Prussia and Austria that should Napoleon invade Russia the former would help Napoleon as little as possible and that the latter would give no aid at all citation needed The minister of war Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly had managed the reform and improvement of the Imperial Russian Army before the start of the 1812 campaign Primarily on the advice of his sister and Count Aleksey Arakcheyev Alexander did not take operational control as he had done during the 1805 campaign instead delegating control to his generals Barclay de Tolly Prince Pyotr Bagration and Mikhail Kutuzov 35 War against Persia edit Main articles Russo Persian War 1804 1813 and Treaty of Gulistan nbsp The Battle of Ganja during the Russo Persian WarDespite brief hostilities in the Persian Expedition of 1796 eight years of peace passed before a new conflict erupted between the two empires After the Russian annexation of the Georgian Kingdom of Kartli Kakheti in 1801 36 a subject of Persia for centuries and the incorporation of the Derbent Khanate as well quickly thereafter Alexander was determined to increase and maintain Russian influence in the strategically valuable Caucasus region 37 In 1801 Alexander appointed Pavel Tsitsianov a die hard Russian imperialist of Georgian origin as Russian commander in chief of the Caucasus Between 1802 and 1804 he proceeded to impose Russian rule on Western Georgia and some of the Persian controlled khanates around Georgia Some of these khanates submitted without a fight but the Ganja Khanate resisted prompting an attack Ganja was ruthlessly sacked during the Siege of Ganja with some 3 000 38 39 7 000 40 inhabitants of Ganja executed and thousands more expelled to Persia These attacks by Tsitsianov formed another casus belli citation needed On 23 May 1804 Persia demanded withdrawal from the regions Russia had occupied comprising what is now Georgia Dagestan and parts of Azerbaijan Russia refused stormed Ganja and declared war Following an almost ten year stalemate centred around what is now Dagestan east Georgia Azerbaijan northern Armenia with neither party being able to gain the clear upper hand Russia eventually managed to turn the tide After a series of successful offensives led by General Pyotr Kotlyarevsky including a decisive victory in the Siege of Lankaran Persia was forced to sue for peace In October 1813 the Treaty of Gulistan negotiated with British mediation and signed at Gulistan made the Persian Shah Fath Ali Shah cede all Persian territories in the North Caucasus and most of its territories in the South Caucasus to Russia This included what is now Dagestan Georgia and most of Azerbaijan It also began a large demographic shift in the Caucasus as many Muslim families emigrated to Persia 41 French invasion edit Main article French invasion of Russia In the summer of 1812 Napoleon invaded Russia It was the occupation of Moscow and the desecration of the Kremlin considered to be the sacred centre of Holy Russia that changed Alexander s sentiment for Napoleon into passionate hatred 42 d The campaign of 1812 was the turning point for Alexander s life after the burning of Moscow he declared that his own soul had found illumination and that he had realized once and for all the divine revelation to him of his mission as the peacemaker of Europe 33 While the Russian army retreated deep into Russia for almost three months the nobility pressured Alexander to relieve the commander of the Russian army Field Marshal Barclay de Tolly Alexander complied and appointed Prince Mikhail Kutuzov to take over command of the army On 7 September the Grande Armee faced the Russian army at a small village called Borodino 110 kilometres 70 mi west of Moscow The battle that followed was the largest and bloodiest single day action of the Napoleonic Wars involving more than 250 000 soldiers and resulting in 70 000 casualties The outcome of the battle was inconclusive The Russian army undefeated in spite of heavy losses was able to withdraw the following day leaving the French without the decisive victory Napoleon sought citation needed nbsp The retreat across the Berezina of the remnants of Napoleon s Grande Armee in November 1812A week later Napoleon entered Moscow but there was no delegation to meet the Emperor The Russians had evacuated the city and the city s governor Count Fyodor Rostopchin ordered several strategic points in Moscow to be set ablaze The loss of Moscow did not compel Alexander to sue for peace After staying in the city for a month Napoleon moved his army out southwest toward Kaluga where Kutuzov was encamped with the Russian army The French advance toward Kaluga was checked by the Russian army and Napoleon was forced to retreat to the areas already devastated by the invasion In the weeks that followed the Grande Armee starved and suffered from the onset of the Russian Winter Lack of food and fodder for the horses and persistent attacks upon isolated troops from Russian peasants and Cossacks led to great losses When the remnants of the French army eventually crossed the Berezina river in November only 27 000 soldiers remained the Grande Armee had lost some 380 000 men dead and 100 000 captured Following the crossing of the Berezina Napoleon left the army and returned to Paris to protect his position as Emperor and to raise more forces to resist the advancing Russians The campaign ended on 14 December 1812 with the last French troops finally leaving Russian soil citation needed The campaign was a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars citation needed Napoleon s reputation was severely shaken and French hegemony in Europe was weakened The Grande Armee made up of French and allied forces was reduced to a fraction of its initial strength citation needed These events triggered a major shift in European politics France s ally Prussia soon followed by Austria broke their imposed alliance with Napoleon and switched sides triggering the War of the Sixth Coalition citation needed War of the Sixth Coalition edit Main article War of the Sixth Coalition nbsp Alexander Francis I of Austria and Frederick William III of Prussia meeting after the Battle of Leipzig 1813With the Russian army following up victory over Napoleon in 1812 the Sixth Coalition was formed with Russia Prussia Great Britain Sweden Spain and other nations Although the French were victorious in the initial battles during the campaign in Germany the entry of Austria into the war led to France s decisive defeat at the Battle of Leipzig in the autumn of 1813 which proved to be a massive victory for the Coalition Following the battle the Pro French Confederation of the Rhine collapsed thereby ending Napoleon s hold on territory east of the Rhine forever Alexander being the supreme commander of the Coalition forces in the theatre and the paramount monarch among the three main Coalition monarchs ordered all Coalition forces in Germany to cross the Rhine and invade France citation needed The Coalition forces divided into three groups entered northeastern France in January 1814 Facing them in the theatre were the French forces numbering only about 70 000 men In spite of being heavily outnumbered Napoleon defeated the divided Coalition forces in the battles at Brienne and La Rothiere but could not stop the Coalition s advance and triumphant victory over Napoleon Austrian Emperor Francis I and King Frederick William III of Prussia felt demoralized upon hearing about Napoleon s victories since the start of the campaign They even considered ordering a general retreat But Alexander was far more determined than ever to victoriously enter Paris whatever the cost imposing his will upon Karl Philipp Prince of Schwarzenberg and the wavering monarchs 43 On 28 March Coalition forces advanced towards Paris and prepared to launch an assault nbsp The Russian Army entering Paris in 1814Camping outside the city on 29 March the Coalition armies were to assault the city from its northern and eastern sides the next morning on 30 March The battle started that same morning with intense artillery bombardment from the Coalition positions Early in the morning the Coalition attack began when the Russians attacked and drove back the French skirmishers near Belleville before being driven back themselves by French cavalry from the city s eastern suburbs By 7 00 a m the Russians attacked the Young Guard near Romainville in the centre of the French lines and after some time and hard fighting pushed them back A few hours later the Prussians under Gebhard Leberecht von Blucher attacked north of the city and carried the French position around Aubervilliers but did not press their attack The Wurttemberg troops seized the positions at Saint Maur to the southeast with Austrian troops in support The Russian forces then assailed the heights of Montmartre in the city s northeast Control of the heights was severely contested until the French forces surrendered 44 45 Alexander sent an envoy to meet with the French to hasten the surrender He offered generous terms to the French and although having intended to avenge Moscow 46 he declared himself to be bringing peace to France rather than its destruction On 31 March 47 Talleyrand gave the key of the city to the tsar Later that day the Coalition armies triumphantly entered the city with Alexander at the head of the army followed by the King of Prussia and Prince Schwarzenberg Until this battle it had been nearly 400 years since a foreign army had entered Paris during the Hundred Years War citation needed On 2 April the Senat conservateur passed the Acte de decheance de l Empereur which declared Napoleon deposed Napoleon was in Fontainebleau when he heard that Paris had surrendered Outraged he wanted to march on the capital but his marshals refused to fight for him and repeatedly urged him to surrender He abdicated in favour of his son on 4 April but the Allies rejected this out of hand forcing Napoleon to abdicate unconditionally on 6 April The terms of his abdication which included his exile to the Isle of Elba were settled in the Treaty of Fontainebleau on 11 April A reluctant Napoleon ratified it two days later marking the end of the War of the Sixth Coalition citation needed Postbellum editPeace of Paris and the Congress of Vienna edit Main articles Treaty of Paris 1814 Treaty of Paris 1815 and Congress of Vienna Alexander tried to calm the unrest of his conscience by correspondence with the leaders of the evangelical revival on the continent and sought for omens and supernatural guidance in texts and passages of scripture It was not however according to his own account until he met the Baroness de Krudener a religious adventuress who made the conversion of princes her special mission at Basel in the autumn of 1813 that his soul found peace From this time a mystic pietism became the avowed force of his political as of his private actions Madame de Krudener and her colleague the evangelist Henri Louis Empaytaz became the confidants of the emperor s most secret thoughts and during the campaign that ended in the occupation of Paris the imperial prayer meetings were the oracle on whose revelations hung the fate of the world 33 Such was Alexander s mood when the downfall of Napoleon left him one of the most powerful sovereigns in Europe With the memory of the Treaty of Tilsit still fresh in men s minds it was not unnatural that to cynical men of the world like Klemens Wenzel von Metternich he merely seemed to be disguising under the language of evangelical abnegation vast and perilous schemes of ambition 33 The puzzled powers were in fact the more inclined to be suspicious in view of other and seemingly inconsistent tendencies of the emperor which yet seemed all to point to a like disquieting conclusion For Madame de Krudener was not the only influence behind the throne and though Alexander had declared war against the Revolution La Harpe his erstwhile tutor was once more at his elbow and the catchwords of the gospel of humanity were still on his lips The very proclamations which denounced Napoleon as the genius of evil denounced him in the name of liberty and of enlightenment 33 Conservatives suspected Alexander of a monstrous intrigue by which the eastern autocrat would ally with the Jacobinism of all Europe aiming at an all powerful Russia in place of an all powerful France At the Congress of Vienna Alexander s attitude accentuated this distrust Robert Stewart Viscount Castlereagh whose single minded aim was the restoration of a just equilibrium in Europe reproached the Tsar to his face for a conscience which led him to imperil the concert of the powers by keeping his hold on Poland in violation of his treaty obligation 48 Liberal political views edit nbsp Alexander I by Lawrence 1814 18 Royal collection Once a supporter of limited liberalism as seen in his approval of the representative institutions in the Ionian Islands Grand Duchy of Finland and the Constitution of the Kingdom of Poland in 1815 49 50 from the end of the year 1818 Alexander s views began to change A revolutionary conspiracy among the officers of the Russian Imperial Guard and a plot to kidnap him on his way to the Congress of Aix la Chapelle are said to have shaken his liberal beliefs At Aix he came for the first time into intimate contact with Metternich From this time dates the ascendancy of Metternich over the mind of the Russian Emperor and in the councils of Europe It was however no case of sudden conversion Though alarmed by the revolutionary agitation in Germany which culminated in the murder of his agent the dramatist August von Kotzebue 23 March 1819 Alexander approved of Castlereagh s protest against Metternich s policy of the governments contracting an alliance against the peoples as formulated in the Carlsbad Decrees of July 1819 and deprecated any intervention of Europe to support a league of which the sole object is the absurd pretensions of absolute power 51 nbsp Alexander I confirmed the new Finnish constitution and made Finland an autonomous Grand Duchy at the Diet of Porvoo in 1809 He still declared his belief in free institutions with limitations Liberty he maintained should be confined within just limits And the limits of liberty are the principles of order 52 It was the 1820 revolutions in Naples and Piedmont combined with increasingly disquieting symptoms of discontent in France Germany and among his own people that completed Alexander s conversion In the seclusion of the little town of Troppau where in October 1820 the powers met in conference Metternich found an opportunity for cementing his influence over Alexander which had been wanting amid the turmoil and intrigues of Vienna and Aix During a friendly conversation over afternoon tea the disillusioned autocrat confessed his mistake You have nothing to regret he said sadly to the exultant chancellor but I have 53 The issue was momentous In January Alexander had still upheld the ideal of a free confederation of the European states symbolised by the Holy Alliance against the policy of a dictatorship of the great powers symbolised by the Quadruple Treaty he had still protested against the claims of collective Europe to interfere in the internal concerns of the sovereign states He gave in on 19 November by signing the Troppau Protocol which consecrated the principle of intervention 15 Revolt of the Greeks edit Main article Greek War of Independence nbsp Ioannis Kapodistrias Russia s former foreign minister was elected as the first head of state of independent GreeceAt the Congress of Laibach which had been adjourned in the spring of 1821 Alexander received news of the Greek revolt against the Ottoman Empire From this time until his death Alexander s mind was conflicted between his dreams of a stable confederation of Europe and his traditional mission as leader of the Orthodox crusade against the Ottomans At first under the careful advice of Metternich Alexander chose the former 27 Siding against the Greek revolt for the sake of stability in the region Alexander expelled its leader Alexander Ypsilantis from the Russian Imperial Cavalry and directed his foreign minister Ioannis Kapodistrias known as Giovanni Count Capo d Istria himself a Greek to disavow any Russian sympathy with Ypsilantis and in 1822 he issued orders to turn back a deputation from the Greek Morea province to the Congress of Verona on the road 27 He made some effort to reconcile the principles at conflict in his mind The Ottoman Sultan Mahmud II had been excluded from the Holy Alliance under the principle that the affairs of the East were the domestic concerns of Russia rather than of the concert of Europe but Alexander now offered to surrender this claim and act as the mandatory of Europe as Austria had acted in Naples but still to march as a Christian liberator into the Ottoman Empire 27 Metternich s opposition to this assertion of Russian power putting the Austrian led balance of power above the interests of Christendom first opened Alexander s eyes to the true character of Austria s attitude towards his ideals Once more in Russia far from the fascination of Metternich s personality he was once again moved by the aspirations of his people 27 In 1823 the 1817 1824 cholera pandemic reached Astrakhan and the Tsar ordered an anti cholera campaign that was imitated in other countries Personal life edit nbsp Elizabeth Alexeievna with Alexander at the Congress of Vienna 1814 Cliche Medal by Leopold Heuberger nbsp Alexander and Louise of BadenOn 9 October 1793 Alexander married Louise of Baden known as Elizabeth Alexeievna after her conversion to the Orthodox Church He later told his friend Frederick William III that the marriage a political match devised by his grandmother Catherine the Great regrettably proved to be a misfortune for him and his spouse 15 Their two children died young 54 though their common sorrow drew the spouses closer together Towards the end of Alexander s life their reconciliation was completed by the wise charity of the Empress in sympathising deeply with him over the death of his beloved daughter Sophia Naryshkina the daughter of his mistress Maria Naryshkina 15 with whom he had a relationship from 1799 until 1818 In 1809 Alexander I was widely and famously rumoured to have had an affair with the Finnish noblewoman Ulla Mollersvard and to have had a child by her but this is not confirmed 55 Death editWith his mental health deteriorating Alexander grew increasingly suspicious of those around him more withdrawn more religious and more passive Some historians conclude his profile coincides precisely with the schizophrenic prototype a withdrawn seclusive rather shy introvertive unaggressive and somewhat apathetic individual 56 57 58 In the autumn of 1825 the Emperor undertook a voyage to the south of Russia due to the increasing illness of his wife During his trip he himself caught typhus from which he died in the southern city of Taganrog on 19 November 1825 Old Style However his death would not be widely known until December due to Taganrog being far from the capital or any other large city 59 His two brothers disputed who would become tsar each wanted the other to do so His wife died a few months later as the emperor s body was transported to Saint Petersburg for the funeral He was interred at the Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral of the Peter and Paul Fortress in Saint Petersburg on 13 March 1826 60 nbsp Death of Alexander I in Taganrog 19th century lithograph nbsp Alexander I Palace in Taganrog where the emperor died in 1825 nbsp The funeral procession from Taganrog to St PetersburgConspiracy about Death editMany believe that Tsar Alexander I faked his death and lived as a hermit by name of Feodor Kuzmich although this fact is debated by historians and some reject the legend however popular writers often resurrect them 61 The main claim for the belief that Alexander I faked his death involves the curious similarities between Alexander and Kuzmich Svetlana Semyonova president of Russian Graphological Society analyzed both Alexander s and Kuzmich s handwriting and concluded that they were the same Furthermore there are rumors that Alexander s wife also faked her death a year after his death and became a nun in Saint Petersburg The priest attending Feodor Kuzmich on his deathbed reportedly asked him if he was in fact Alexander the Blessed In response Kuzmich said Your works are wonderful Lord There is no secret which is not opened 62 Children editChildren of Alexander I of Russia 63 64 Name Birth Death NotesBy his wife Louise of BadenMaria Maryia Alexandrovna Grand Duchess of Russia 18 29 May 1799 27 July 8 August 1800 65 Sometimes rumoured to be the child of Adam Czartoryski died aged one citation needed Elisabeta Elisaveta Alexandrovna Grand Duchess of Russia 15 November 1806 12 May 1808 Sometimes rumoured to be the child of Alexei Okhotnikov died aged one of an infection citation needed By Maria NarishkinZenaida Narishkina c 19 December 1807 18 June 1810 Died aged four citation needed Sophia Narishkina 1 October 1805 18 June 1824 Died aged eighteen unmarried citation needed Emanuel Narishkin 30 July 1813 31 December 1901 13 January 1902 Married Catherine Novossiltzev no issue unconfirmed and disputed citation needed By Sophia Sergeievna VsevolozhskayaNikolai Yevgenyevich Lukash 11 December 1796 20 January 1868 Married Princess Alexandra Lukanichna Guidianova and had issue Secondly he married Princess Alexandra Mikhailovna Schakhovskaya and had issue 66 By Marguerite GeorgesMaria Alexandrovna Parijskaia 19 March 1814 1874By Helena DzierzanowskaGustaw Ehrenberg c 14 February 1818 28 September 1895 Polish revolutionary and poet best known for his poem Gdy narod do boju which became a famous revolutionary tune with the melody composed by Fryderyk Chopin citation needed 67 Archives editAlexander s letters to his grandfather Frederick II Eugene Duke of Wurttemberg together with letters from his siblings written between 1795 and 1797 are preserved in the State Archive of Stuttgart Hauptstaatsarchiv Stuttgart in Stuttgart Germany 68 Honours edit nbsp The bust of Alexander I at the yard of the Helsinki University in 1986He received the following orders and decorations 69 nbsp Russian Empire 70 Knight of St Andrew Knight of St Alexander Nevsky Knight of St Anna 1st Class Grand Cross of the Order of St John of Jerusalem nbsp Sweden Knight of the Seraphim 16 November 1799 71 Grand Cross of the Sword 1st Class 15 January 1814 72 nbsp Kingdom of Prussia Knight of the Black Eagle 30 November 1779 73 Iron Cross 1813 2nd Class nbsp Two Sicilies Knight of St Januarius 1800 74 France nbsp French Empire Grand Eagle of the Legion of Honour 7 July 1807 75 nbsp Kingdom of France Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour 1815 Knight of the Holy Spirit 1815 76 nbsp Denmark Knight of the Elephant 2 July 1808 77 nbsp United Kingdom Stranger Knight of the Garter 27 July 1813 78 nbsp Kingdom of Bavaria Knight of St Hubert 1813 79 nbsp Spain Knight of the Golden Fleece 30 May 1814 80 nbsp Austrian Empire Knight of the Military Order of Maria Theresa 1815 81 nbsp Netherlands Grand Cross of the Military William Order 19 November 1818 82 nbsp Kingdom of Sardinia Knight of the Annunciation 5 November 1822 83 nbsp Kingdom of Portugal Grand Cross of the Sash of the Three Orders 10 February 1824 84 nbsp Saxe Weimar Eisenach Grand Cross of the White Falcon 85 Ancestry editAncestors of Alexander I of Russia8 Charles Frederick Duke of Holstein Gottorp4 Peter III of Russia 86 9 Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia2 Paul I of Russia citation needed 10 Christian August Prince of Anhalt Zerbst 87 5 Catherine II of Russia 87 11 Princess Johanna Elisabeth of Holstein Gottorp 87 1 Alexander I of Russia12 Charles Alexander Duke of Wurttemberg 89 6 Frederick II Eugene Duke of Wurttemberg 88 13 Princess Marie Auguste of Thurn and Taxis 89 3 Duchess Sophie Dorothea of Wurttemberg citation needed 14 Frederick William Margrave of Brandenburg Schwedt 88 7 Princess Friederike of Brandenburg Schwedt 88 15 Princess Sophia Dorothea of Prussia 88 See also editAleksey Arakcheyev Archimandrite PhotiusNotes edit During Alexander s lifetime Russia used the Julian calendar Old Style but unless otherwise stated any date in this article uses the Gregorian Calendar New Style see the article Old Style and New Style dates for a more detailed explanation Blagoslovennyj Blagoslovennyy It was issued at the end of the 19th century in the Rescript of Nicholas II and the conference of The Hague Phillips 1911 p 557 cites Circular of Count Muraviev 24 August 1898 On the historiography see Lieven 2006 pp 283 308 Bushkovitch Paul 2012 A concise history of Russia New York Cambridge University Press p 154 ISBN 978 0 521 54323 1 Maiorova 2010 p 114 Walker 1992 pp 343 360 Chitat Litmir elektronnaya biblioteka Retrieved 27 July 2021 Alexander I Archived from the original on 22 June 2011 Retrieved 1 January 2009 Vikent Detstvo i yunost imperatora Aleksandra I vikent ru Retrieved 27 July 2021 Alexander I of Russia history wikireading ru Archived from the original on 28 July 2021 Retrieved 27 July 2021 HTC Liturgical Ranks www holy trinity org Retrieved 27 July 2021 Aleksandro Nevskaya Lavra Panfilov Ioann Ioannovich lavraspb ru Retrieved 28 July 2021 Chitat Litmir elektronnaya biblioteka Retrieved 28 July 2021 Aleksandr I www museum ru Retrieved 27 July 2021 Aleksandr I Pavlovich myhistorypark ru in Russian Retrieved 27 July 2021 McGrew 1992 p 184 a b c d e Phillips 1911 p 556 a b c d Phillips 1911 p 559 Sebag Montefiore 2016 p 353 Sebag Montefiore 2016 pp 354 356 Sebag Montefiore 2016 p 357 Sebag Montefiore 2016 p 384 Palmer 1974 ch 3 Olivier 2019 Palmer 1974 pp 52 55 Palmer 1974 pp 168 72 McCaffray 2005 pp 1 21 Flynn 1988 p page needed Lipscomb Bergh amp Johnston 1903 p page needed Jefferson to Priestley Washington 29 November 1802 a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Phillips 1911 p 557 Esdaile 2009 pp 192 193 Phillips 1911 p 557 cites Instructions to M Novosiltsov 11 September 1804 Tatischeff p 82 Phillips 1911 p 557 cites Savary to Napoleon 18 November 1807 Tatischeff p 232 Phillips 1911 pp 557 558 cites Coulaincourt to Napoleon 4th report 3 August 1809 Tatischeff p 496 Zawadzki 2009 pp 110 124 a b c d e f g Phillips 1911 p 558 a b Nolan 2002 p 1666 a b c Chapman 2001 p 29 Tedsnet Kazemzadeh 2013 p 5 Avery et al 1991 p 332 Baddeley 1908 p 67 cites Tsitsianoff s report to the Emperor Akti ix supplement p 920 Mansoori 2008 p 245 Yemelianova 2014 Phillips 1911 p 558 cites Alexander speaking to Colonel Michaud Tatischeff p 612 Sebag Montefiore 2016 p 313 Mikaberidze 2013 p 255 Mikhailovsky Danilevsky 1839 pp 347 372 Montefiore 2016 p 313 Maude 1911 p 223 Phillips 1911 p 558 cites Castlereagh to Liverpool 2 October 1814 F O Papers Vienna VII Richard Stites 2014 The Four Horsemen Riding to Liberty in Post Napoleonic Europe Oxford University Press ISBN 9780199981489 Julia Berest 2011 The Emergence of Russian Liberalism Alexander Kunitsyn in Context Palgrave Macmillan ISBN 9780230118928 Phillips 1911 p 558 cites Despatch of Lieven 30 Nov 12 Dec 1819 and Russ Circular of 27 January 1820 Martens IV part i p 270 Phillips 1911 pp 558 559 cites Apercu des idees de l Empereur Martens IV part i p 269 Phillips 1911 p 559 cites Metternich Mem Palmer 1974 pp 154 55 Makela Alitalo 2006 Nichols 1982 p 41 Cox 1987 p 121 Truscott 1997 p 26 Bushkovitch Paul 2012 A concise history of Russia New York Cambridge University Press p 154 ISBN 978 0 521 54323 1 Palmer 1974 ch 22 Raleigh Donald J Iskenderov Akhmed Akhmedovich 1996 The emperors and empresses of Russia rediscovering the Romanovs Internet Archive Armonk N Y M E Sharpe ISBN 978 1 56324 759 0 Svyatoj pravednyj starec Feodor Tomskij Pravoslavie v Tomske Retrieved 3 November 2023 Palmer 1974 p page needed McNaughton 1973 pp 293 306 Manifesto Genealogy of Nikolai Lukash Retrieved 20 January 2021 Ehrenberg Gustaw Szlachta w roku 1831 Wolne Lektury Retrieved 14 February 2023 Herzog Friedrich Eugen 1732 1797 Briefwechsel des Herzogs mit dem kaiserlichen Hause von Russland 1795 1797 3 Schreiben der jungen Grossfursten Alexander und Konstantin und Grossfurstinnen Alexandrina Anna Katharina Elisabeth Helene Maria Hauptstaatsarchiv Stuttgart Retrieved 22 November 2021 Russian Imperial Army Emperor Alexander I Pavlovich of Russia In Russian Almanach de la cour pour l annee 1799 l Academie Imp des Sciences 1799 pp 45 52 61 85 Per Nordenvall 1998 Kungl Maj ts Orden Kungliga Serafimerorden 1748 1998 in Swedish Stockholm ISBN 91 630 6744 7 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Posttidningar 30 April 1814 p 2 Liste der Ritter des Koniglich Preussischen Hohen Ordens vom Schwarzen Adler 1851 Von Seiner Majestat dem Konige Friedrich Wilhelm II ernannte Ritter p 10 Angelo Scordo Vicende e personaggi dell Insigne e reale Ordine di San Gennaro dalla sua fondazione alla fine del Regno delle Due Sicilie PDF in Italian p 9 archived from the original PDF on 4 March 2016 M amp B Wattel 2009 Les Grand Croix de la Legion d honneur de 1805 a nos jours Titulaires francais et etrangers Paris Archives amp Culture p 513 ISBN 978 2 35077 135 9 Teulet Alexandre 1863 Liste chronologique des chevaliers de l ordre du Saint Esprit depuis son origine jusqu a son extinction 1578 1830 Chronological list of knights of the Order of the Holy Spirit from its origin to its extinction 1578 1830 Annuaire bulletin de la Societe de l histoire de France in French 2 113 Retrieved 20 May 2020 J H Fr Berlien 1846 Der Elephanten Orden und seine Ritter Berling pp 124 125 Shaw Wm A 1906 The Knights of England I London p 51 Bayern 1824 Hof und Staatshandbuch des Konigreichs Bayern 1824 Landesamt p 6 Guerra Francisco 1819 Caballeros Existentes en la Insignie Orden del Toison de Oro Calendario manual y guia de forasteros en Madrid in Spanish 42 retrieved 2 November 2020 Ritter Orden Militarischer Maria Theresien Orden Hof und Staatshandbuch des Kaiserthumes Osterreich 1824 p 17 retrieved 2 November 2020 Militaire Willems Orde Romanov Aleksandr I Pavlovitsj Military William Order Romanov Alexander I Pavlovich Ministerie van Defensie in Dutch 19 November 1818 Retrieved 2 November 2020 Luigi Cibrario 1869 Notizia storica del nobilissimo ordine supremo della santissima Annunziata Sunto degli statuti catalogo dei cavalieri Eredi Botta p 102 Braganca Jose Vicente de Estrela Paulo Jorge 2017 Troca de Decoracoes entre os Reis de Portugal e os Imperadores da Russia Exchange of Decorations between the Kings of Portugal and the Emperors of Russia Pro Phalaris in Portuguese 16 9 Retrieved 2 November 2020 Staatshandbuch fur das Grossherzogtum Sachsen Sachsen Weimar Eisenach 1819 Grossherzogliche Hausorden p 8 Aleksandr Kamenskii The Russian Empire in the Eighteenth Century Searching for a Place in the World 1997 pp 265 280 a b c Berlin 1768 p 22 a b c d Berlin 1768 p 21 a b Berlin 1768 p 110 References editAvery Peter Fisher William Bayne Hambly Gavin Melville Charles 1991 The Cambridge history of Iran From Nadir Shah to the Islamic Republic Cambridge University Press p 332 ISBN 978 0 521 20095 0 Baddeley John F 1908 The Russian Conquest of the Caucasus London Longmans Green and Company p 67 Berlin A 1768 Table 23 Genealogie ascendante jusqu au quatrieme degre inclusivement de tous les Rois et Princes de maisons souveraines de l Europe actuellement vivans Genealogy up to the fourth degree inclusive of all the Kings and Princes of sovereign houses of Europe currently living in French Bourdeaux Frederic Guillaume Birnstiel p 23 Chapman Tim 2001 Imperial Russia 1801 1905 illustrated reprint ed Routledge p 29 ISBN 978 0 415 23110 7 Cox Robert W 1987 Production Power and World Order Social Forces in the Making of History Columbia University Press p 121 Esdaile Charles 2009 Napoleon s Wars An International History Penguin pp 192 193 Flynn James T 1988 University Reform of Tsar Alexander I 1802 1835 Jefferson to Priestley Washington 29 November 1802 The Thomas Jefferson Papers Series 1 General Correspondence 1651 1827 Library of Congress Kazemzadeh Firuz 2013 Russia and Britain in Persia Imperial Ambitions in Qajar Iran I B Tauris p 5 ISBN 978 0 85772 173 0 Lipscomb Andrew Adgate Bergh Albert Ellery Johnston Richard Holland eds 1903 Jefferson to Harris Washington 18 April 1806 The Writings of Thomas Jefferson Issued under the auspices of the Thomas Jefferson memorial association of the United States Lieven Dominic 2006 Review article Russia and the defeat of Napoleon Kritika Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 7 2 283 308 doi 10 1353 kri 2006 0020 S2CID 159982703 Makela Alitalo Anneli 5 May 2006 10 November 2005 Mollersvard Ulrika 1791 1878 kansallisbiografia National Biography of Finland ISSN 1799 4349 Maude Frederic Natusch 1911 Napoleonic Campaigns The Allies March on Paris In Chisholm Hugh ed Encyclopaedia Britannica Vol 19 11th ed Cambridge University Press p 223 Maiorova Olga 2010 From the Shadow of Empire Defining the Russian Nation through Cultural Mythology 1855 1870 University of Wisconsin Press p 114 Mansoori Firooz 2008 17 Studies in History Language and Culture of Azerbaijan in Persian Tehran Hazar e Kerman p 245 ISBN 978 600 90271 1 8 McCaffray Susan P 2005 Confronting Serfdom in the Age of Revolution Projects for Serf Reform in the Time of Alexander I Russian Review 64 1 1 21 doi 10 1111 j 1467 9434 2005 00344 x JSTOR 3664324 McGrew R E 1992 Paul I of Russia 1754 1801 Oxford Oxford University Press ISBN 978 0 19822 567 6 McNaughton C Arnold 1973 The Book of Kings A Royal Genealogy in 3 volumes Vol 1 London Garnstone Press pp 293 306 Mikaberidze Alexander 2013 Russian Eyewitness Accounts of the Campaign of 1814 Frontline Books p 225 ISBN 978 1 84832 707 8 Mikhailovsky Danilevsky Alexander 1839 History of the Campaign in France In the Year 1814 Smith Elder and Company pp 347 372 Montefiore Simon Sebag 2016 The Romanovs 1613 1918 Orion Publishing Group Ltd ISBN 978 0 297 85266 7 Nichols Irby C 1982 Tsar Alexander I Pacifist Aggressor or Vacillator East European Quarterly 16 1 33 44 Nolan Cathal J 2002 The Greenwood Encyclopedia of International Relations S Z The Greenwood Encyclopedia of International Relations Cathal Vol 4 illustrated ed Greenwood Publishing Group p 1666 ISBN 978 0 313 32383 6 Olivier Daria 19 December 2019 Alexander I Emperor of Russia Encyclopedia Britannica Palmer Alan 1974 Alexander I Tsar of War and Peace New York Harper and Row ISBN 978 0060132644 Raleigh Donald J ed 1996 The Emperors and Empresses of Russia Rediscovering the Romanovs M E Sharpe p 252 Sebag Montefiore Simon 2016 The Romanovs 1613 1918 Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group Annexation of Georgia in Russia Empire 1801 1878 Tedsnet Retrieved 10 February 2020 Truscott Peter 1997 Russia First Breaking with the West I B Tauris p 26 Walker Franklin A 1992 Enlightenment and Religion in Russian Education in the Reign of Tsar Alexander I History of Education Quarterly 32 3 343 360 doi 10 2307 368549 JSTOR 368549 S2CID 147173682 Yemelianova Galina 26 April 2014 Islam nationalism and state in the Muslim Caucasus Caucasus Survey 1 2 3 23 doi 10 1080 23761199 2014 11417291 S2CID 128432463 Archived from the original on 26 April 2014 Retrieved 28 April 2015 Zawadzki Hubert 2009 Between Napoleon and Tsar Alexander The Polish Question at Tilsit 1807 Central Europe 7 2 110 124 doi 10 1179 147909609X12490448067244 S2CID 145539723 Attribution nbsp This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain Phillips Walter Alison 1911 Alexander I In Chisholm Hugh ed Encyclopaedia Britannica Vol 1 11th ed Cambridge University Press pp 556 559 Further reading editSee also Bibliography of Russian history 1613 1917 Hartley Janet M et al eds Russia and the Napoleonic Wars 2015 new scholarship Lieven Dominic Russia Against Napoleon 2011 excerpt McConnell Allen Tsar Alexander I Paternalistic Reformer 1970 online free to borrow Palmer Alan Alexander I Tsar of War and Peace Weidenfeld amp Nicolson 1974 Rey Marie Pierre Alexander I the Tsar who defeated Napoleon 2012 Troyat Henri Alexander of Russia Hodder amp Stoughton 1984 Zawadzki Hubert Between Napoleon and Tsar Alexander The Polish Question at Tilsit 1807 Central Europe 7 2 2009 110 124 External links edit nbsp Media related to Alexander I of Russia at Wikimedia CommonsAlexander I of RussiaHouse of Holstein Gottorp RomanovCadet branch of the House of OldenburgBorn 23 December 1777 Died 1 December 1825Regnal titlesPreceded byPaul I Emperor of Russia1801 1825 Succeeded byNicholas IPreceded byGustav IV Adolf Grand Duke of Finland1809 1825Preceded byStanislaw August King of PolandGrand Duke of Lithuania1815 1825 Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Alexander I of Russia amp oldid 1207572346, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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