In recalling to memory all that the Russian nation passed
through during the reign of the emperor Alexander II, and
comparing the position and condition of Russia at the end
of the reign with what they were in the beginning, it is
impossible not to marvel at the beneficent change which took
place throughout all the branches of national life during
that short space of time. The liberation of the peasants from
the dependence of serfdom, which had weighed on them for
some centuries, and the organisation of their existence, the
abolition of shameful and cruel corporal punishments, the
introduction of provincial and territorial institutions, of
the self-government of towns, the new tribunals and general
military service, without mentioning other less important
reforms, innovations and improvements accomplished by the
will of the Czar Liberator, had an immeasurable influence
upon the intellectual and moral regeneration of the people,
and, it may be said, gave to Russia a complete inward
revival.--SCHUMACHER.[d]
[Sidenote: [1855-1881 A.D.]]
Born in 1818, Alexander came to power at the age of thirty-seven under
circumstances of the greatest difficulty both at home and abroad. “Your
burden will be a heavy one,” his father had said to him when dying.
Alexander’s first care was to terminate under honourable conditions the
war that was exhausting Russia. At the news of the death of Nicholas
the value of stocks and bonds rose in every exchange in Europe; and the
general peaceful mood was not disturbed by the new emperor’s proclamation
that he would “endeavour to carry out the views of his illustrious
predecessors, Peter, Catherine, the beloved Alexander, and our father of
imperishable memory.” A new conference took place at Vienna between the
representatives of Austria, Russia, and the two western powers. France
demanded the neutralisation of the Black Sea, or the limitation of
the naval powers that the czar might place there. “Before limiting our
forces,” replied Gortchakov and Titov, the representatives of Russia,
“take from us Sebastopol!”
[Sidenote: [1855 A.D.]]
The siege continued. Sardinia in its turn sent 20,000 men to the East.
Austria agreed to defend the principalities against Russia, and Prussia
agreed to support Austria. On the 16th of May Pélissier succeeded
Canrobert as general-in-chief of the French forces. During the night
of the 22nd of May the Russians made two sorties, which were repulsed;
all the allied forces occupied the left bank of the Tchernaia, and an
expedition was sent out which destroyed the military posts of Kertch and
Jenikale, occupied the Sea of Azov, and bombarded Taganrog, leaving the
Russians no route by which to receive supplies save that of Perekop. The
Turks occupied Anapa and incited the Circassians to revolt.
Pélissier had announced that he would gain possession of Sebastopol, and
on the 7th of June he took by storm the Mamelon Vert (Green Hillock) and
the Ouvrages Blancs (White Works), on the 18th he sent the French to
attack Malakov and the English to lay siege to the great Redan, but both
expeditions were repulsed with a loss of 3,000 men. On the 16th of August
the Italian contingent distinguished itself in the battle of Traktir on
the Tchernaia. The last day of Sebastopol had arrived. Eight hundred
and seventy-four cannon directed their thunder against the bastions and
the city; and the Russians, who displayed a stoical intrepidity that
nothing could shake, lost 18,000 men from the effects of the bombardment
alone. A million and a half of projectiles were thrown upon the city. The
French had dug 80 kilometres of trenches and sunk 1,251 metres of mines
before the Mast bastion alone, and their parallels had been extended to
within thirty metres of Malakov. Under a terrible fire, the noise of
which could be heard at a distance of a hundred kilometres, the Russian
bastions crumbled away, and their artillerists and reserve soldiers fell
by thousands. Korinlov, Istomin, and Nakhimov succumbed. The besieged had
not even time to substitute good cannon for those that had been damaged,
and could scarcely accomplish the burial of their dead. The very eve of
the crisis that was to end all had arrived.[b]
During the protracted siege of Sebastopol death had claimed Marshal
Saint-Arnaud; the French commander general Canrobert succeeded him and he
was now superseded by General Pélissier. Lord Raglan had fallen a victim
to cholera, and General Simpson was now in command of the English army.
In these weary months of waiting there had been many sanguinary
encounters both by day and by night, and repeated bombardments. But it
was not until September the 8th, 1855, that the grand assault was made.[a]
THE FALL OF SEBASTOPOL
At half-past eleven in the morning (September 8) all the trenches before
the Karabel faubourg were occupied by the attacking force. Pélissier,
surrounded by his staff, was installed on the Green Mamelon. In the sixth
parallel was Bosquet, attentive to everything and influencing everyone
around him by his calm energy. The troops, excited, eager, with their
clothes loosened so as to fight the better, filled beforehand with the
rage of battle (for the long siege had tried their patience), impatiently
awaited the signal. From time to time bayonets showed above the parapets.
“Down with the bayonets,” shouted Bosquet, who feared to reveal to the
enemy the position of the French: then he added more gently: “Have
patience! the time will come.” It had as a fact almost come, being now
on the stroke of noon. “Forward!” cried Bosquet, and immediately his
colours as commandant were planted on the parallel. The order flew from
mouth to mouth; drums beat, trumpets sounded; the officers with naked
swords led their troops out of the trenches.
The Malakov garrison at that time was composed of 500 artillery, certain
militiamen or workmen, and 1400 infantry belonging to the Modlin, Praga
and Zamosc regiments. After being prepared for an attack at daybreak the
garrison was no longer upon the alert. Only the gunners remained by their
guns, with a few riflemen along the ramparts. All the rest were hidden
in their bomb-proof shelters and were about finishing their dinner.
Having become accustomed to alarms, they were resting at comparative
ease, and, yielding to that lassitude which often overtakes the mind
and will after a night of anxious watching. They did not move except to
salute the commandant of the fort, General Bessau, who was making an
examination of the casemates and bestowing the cross of St. George on
the most deserving. Suddenly, on the stroke of noon, the sharp crack of
the French rifles rent the air, and the zouaves in their brilliantly
coloured uniforms were seen bounding up the Malakov slopes. “The French
are upon us! We are attacked!” cried the guard. Before the defenders
of the bastion had even had time to pick up their arms, the zouaves
had thrown themselves on the work. They cleared the fosse, and without
waiting for ladders scaled the escarp and precipitated themselves through
the embrasures. The Russian gunners stood to their guns, defending
themselves with stones, pickaxes, and sponges. Meantime the men of the
Modlin regiment rushed from their shelters and massed themselves towards
the front of the fort. There took place one of those hand-to-hand fights,
so rare in the history of battles, a desperate, merciless fight, full of
terrible episodes. But the Russians were hampered by their long cloaks;
the assailants, more active than they, dodged the blows of their enemies,
surrounded them, closed with them, and little by little gained ground.
The number of assailants momentarily increased. Immediately following the
zouaves, almost side by side with them, appeared a battalion of the 7th
line regiment, supporting the African troops with energy and bravery.
General Bessau fell, mortally wounded, nearly all the other Russian
leading officers were killed. Pressed and outflanked on every side the
besieged fell back, surrendering the terre-plein, and retiring beyond the
first traverses, and the colours of the 1st zouaves were hoisted on the
captured redoubt. The battle had lasted only half an hour.
During this same space of time Dulac’s division had invaded the Little
Redan and driven back the riflemen as far as the second enceinte;
whilst La Motterouge’s division took possession of the curtain between
the Malakov and the Little Redan. From this post of observation the
commander-in-chief had seen the French eagle planted on the Malakov; he
had also witnessed the triumphant passage of Dulac’s and La Motterouge’s
divisions. Immediately he hoisted the queen’s colours on the Green
Mamelon. This was the signal for which the English were waiting.
At the sight of it they poured out of their trenches; with the intrepid
coolness characteristic of their temperament and their country. First
came their rifles, next the men with scaling ladders, then the attacking
columns composed of the light division and the 2nd division. In making
their attack our allies were at a double disadvantage; in the first place
the Russians were on the alert throughout the length of their line of
defence, and, secondly, a distance of 200 yards lay between them and the
Great Redan. A murderous fire greeted them, and before they could reach
the work the ground was strewn with their red coats. They continued to
advance notwithstanding, doubled to the fosse, scaled it, drew up their
ladders, reached the now almost demolished salient-angle and routed the
battalions of the Vladimir regiment. Before them stretched a great space,
open and exposed; beyond it were the bomb-proof shelters from which
the Russians kept up their hottest and best directed fire. Vainly the
attacking party strove to push their undertaking further: vainly even did
they strain every nerve to maintain the ground they had gained. After an
hour and a half of futile attempts they fell back on their trenches.
Whilst the English were being foiled at the Great Redan, Levaillant’s
division approached the central bastion at about two o’clock and met
with no better fate. At first Couston’s brigade succeeded in getting
possession of the Schwartz redoubt, to the left of the bastion; it even
fought a battle in the gully known as the Town Gully. But the commanding
officer was wounded, reinforcements arrived for the enemy, and it was
brought back to the foremost parallels. To the right of the bastion
Trocher’s brigade had invaded the Bielkine lunette and gained the bastion
itself, but could no longer maintain its advantage. Like General Couston,
General Trocher was wounded, and the Russian reprisals shattered his
unhappy regiments. A second attempt was not more happy, and orders came
from the commander-in-chief forbidding a continuance of such bloody
efforts.
[Illustration: ALEXANDER II
(1818-1881)]
And indeed where was the use of persisting against the town when the
principal engagement had been fought in the Karabel faubourg, an
engagement which, according to whether it succeeded or failed, would save
or compromise everything else?
At the Little Redan fortune had made the French columns pay dearly for
their early success. Barely mistress of the bastion, Dulac’s division had
been assailed by a heavy fire from the batteries of the _Maison-en-Croix_
and of the three vessels moored in the roads. Moreover the Russians had
brought up a large number of field-pieces to all the more favourable
points, whilst a considerable number of reserve troops debouched from the
Uchakov gully. Outnumbered; crushed by showers of missiles, and finally
compelled to evacuate a redoubt filled with their dead, our troops had
retired to their place-of-arms. At the curtain La Motterouge’s division
had itself given way before the attacks of the enemy. New columns were
formed from the débris of Saint-Pol’s brigade, which had already lost its
general, de Marolles’ brigade, and the guards division. A little later
arrived at full gallop two batteries of the Lancaster artillery which, by
the hotness of their fire, strove to work havoc in the enemy’s columns,
and, above all, to disperse the fog. The Little Redan was taken, lost,
retaken, abandoned. The bloodshed was terrific. General de Marolles was
killed, Generals Bourbaki, Bisson, Mellinet and de Pontevès wounded,
the latter mortally; the trenches were so heaped with dead that it was
almost impossible to move in them. Atop of all this General Bosquet was
wounded in the right side by the bursting of a shell. He was obliged to
relinquish his command, and a rumour even got about that he was dying.
Shortly after a loud report was heard from the direction of the curtain.
A powder-magazine had exploded, claiming fresh victims; General de la
Motterouge was among the wounded. So many casualties, the loss of so many
officers, the difficulty of fighting in a narrow space choked up with
dead and dying, even extreme exhaustion, all combined to dissuade from
a renewed attack on the Little Redan. Only a portion of La Motterouge’s
division partially held its own on the ramparts.
It was now three o’clock. Judging only by the results as a whole the
allies had to count more disappointments than successes. The English
had been beaten back at the Great Redan. The central bastion withstood
all attacks. And finally, in the Karabel faubourg the Little Redan,
already carried, had just slipped from our grasp. But, notwithstanding,
there was more joy than depression amongst those surrounding the
commander-in-chief. All eyes were turned obstinately towards the Malakov.
Were the Malakov safely held, not only would the other checks be made
good but the advantage of the day would rest with the allied army;
for the occupation of this dominant position would render all further
resistance impossible. Now, according to all accounts MacMahon was
keeping safe hold of his prize and strengthening himself there.
He had maintained his position, God only knows at what cost of valour. We
have related how the terre-plein fell into the hands of the allies, and
how this brilliant success had determined the great attack. But inside
the work, fortified and improved with so much care during the long days
of siege, the Russians had thrown up a multitude of traverses beneath
which were their bomb-proof shelters, which formed all over the fort
so many trenches easy of defence. The salient-angle once occupied, it
would be necessary to carry one by one these traverses behind which were
drawn up what remained of the Modlin regiment and the Praga and Zamosc
battalions. Happily General MacMahon had recalled the 2nd, Vinoy’s,
division. Thanks to these reinforcements he had been enabled to force
back the enemy, dislodge them from their positions and drive them towards
the gorge of the redoubt.
There an engagement had taken place more terrible than any throughout the
day. Driven to bay at the extremity of the work, the Russians had, by
a series of heroic rushes, attempted to retake the fort, the veritable
palladium of their city. Whilst MacMahon hastily ordered up Wimpfen’s
brigade, and the zouaves of the guard, in short all the reserves, the
Muscovite officers sacrificed themselves one after the other in their
efforts to avert a total defeat. First it was General Lisenko with a few
remnants of the Warsaw, Briansk and Ieletz regiments; then General Krulov
with four battalions of the Ladoga regiment, lastly General Iuverov
with the same men newly led on to battle. Lisenko was mortally wounded,
Krulov dangerously so, Iuverov killed. In the end the Malakov gorge was
ours. The engineers began at once to put it in a state of defence: the
capitulation of the little garrison of the tower, isolated in the midst
of the fort, completed the victory. A supreme effort made a little later
by General de Martinau with the Azov and Odessa regiments only served to
demonstrate the powerlessness of our enemies to wrest the magnificent
prize from us.
And magnificent it certainly was. The corpses heaped around the fortress
showed plainly enough the Russians’ obstinate intention to defend or
recapture it. Notwithstanding the fact that our triumph was complete the
fusilade had not ceased. There were still certain volunteers risking
their lives around the Mamelon, meditating some desperate stroke. “Give
us cartridges,” they cried: “Let someone lead us again to battle.” But
nearly all their officers were either dead or in the ambulances, and
the remainder scarcely troubled to answer them. Not that they were
indifferent to so crushing a defeat, but after such desperate fighting an
immense weariness had overtaken them, and, having done all they could to
avert their fate they now submitted to it impassively.
Towards four o’clock Prince Gortchakov arrived on these scenes of
confusion and woe. On receiving the first intelligence of the assault
he had crossed the roads and had been able to follow all the varying
chances of the fight. For a long time he surveyed the Karabelnaia, as if
to gauge the defensive strength of the faubourg; for a yet longer time
he contemplated the Malakov, so lately the pride of the Russians and
now lost to them. Neither the still hot firing which killed one of his
officers at his side, nor the time which pressed availed to cut short
this searching examination.
At last, judging that the town was no longer tenable he decided on
consummating the sacrifice. The moment seemed to him a favourable one,
for two reasons: the success gained at the Great and Little Redans
and at the safeguarded central bastion, had established the honour
of the Muscovite arms; whereas the extreme weariness of the allies
guaranteed that the remainder of the day and the ensuing night would be
allowed by them to pass without further offensive action. The Russian
commander-in-chief therefore resolved to evacuate Sebastopol and to make
all his troops cross over to the northern bank. The idea once conceived
he hurried to the Nicholas battery to secure the immediate execution of
his orders.
At his post of observation on the Green Mamelon, Pélissier had learnt
of MacMahon’s signal success, and this great advantage, somewhat
counterbalanced it is true by the checks received in other engagements,
filled all hearts with hope. Nevertheless, by reason of this multitude of
engagements, victory appeared to be, though probable, still uncertain.
Would MacMahon be able to maintain his position at the Malakov? Might not
some exploding mine change the triumph into a catastrophe? Would not the
defeated Russians defend themselves from behind their second enceinte,
in their streets, in their houses even? And would not the battle of
September 8 have a yet more bloody morrow? No answer was forthcoming to
these questions, and faces that had begun to brighten grew troubled.
Things were at this stage when, towards the end of the day, General
Martimprey turning his glasses towards the town thought he detected an
unaccustomed movement on the great bridge spanning the roads. Glasses
were passed from hand to hand and, despite the first shades of evening,
long processions of soldiers, waggons, carriages, guns, could be
distinctly seen wending their way towards the northern bank. The bridge
gave under the weight, and shaken by a high wind swayed beneath the swell
which from time to time submerged and almost swamped it. In spite of this
hindrance the march continued, whilst ferry-boats filled with people
crossed to the northern bank, and then returned empty to fetch other
passengers. The rapidly falling darkness prevented further observation,
but the spectators felt no doubt that they were watching the retreat of
the Russians.
[Illustration: PRINCE A. M. GORTCHAKOV
(1798-1883)]
They had not all retreated, however. At this supreme moment Gortchakov
bethought himself of Moscow. Several volunteer corps and several
detachments of sappers and marines were left behind, not to give battle
to an already victorious enemy, but to level to the dust the city it
was no longer possible to defend. As night fell the work of devastation
was begun. Powder-magazines were blown up. The cannon and siege trains
that could not be removed were sunk in the bay. All that remained of the
North Sea squadron was sunk; even the _Empress Marie_ was not spared,
that splendid vessel which was commanded by the glorious Nahkimov at
the battle of Sinope. Only the war steamers were saved and taken across
to the northern bank. The blowing up of the Paul battery completed the
work of destruction. When all was finished the great bridge was broken
up. Then the executors of those savage orders departed in boats for the
further shore. With them went the generals who up to that moment had
remained at Sebastopol to guard the retreat. Of this number was Count
Osten-Sacken, governor of the town, who was one of the last to leave, as
a captain abandons his burning ship only when all the hands have left.
The explosions of that terrible night had kept the allies on the alert
in their camp, and had triumphed over their immense fatigue. At daybreak
on the 9th of September, Sebastopol, already nearly deserted, appeared
to them as an immense heap of ruins from which shot up tongues of
flame kindled by the incendiaries. For a long time French and English
contemplated with a mixture of joy and horror those ruins which attested
the greatness of their triumph and also the tenacity of their enemies.
Beyond the roadstead, on the northern heights, appeared the Russians,
vanquished but still menacing.
On the morrow, September 10th, 1855--after 332 days of siege, three set
battles, and three assaults more bloody even than the battles--Pélissier,
as marshal of France, in the name of the emperor, planted his country’s
flag among the smoking ruins.[e]
With the fall of Sebastopol the war was practically at an end.
Hostilities continued for some time longer, but neither side won any
material advantage. The allies were not in complete accord on the
question of the continuance of the war, England being inclined to push
matters to a complete overthrow of Russia, while France was ready to talk
about terms of peace. Lord Palmerston himself was a strenuous opponent
of peace, and declared that Russia had not been sufficiently humbled. At
this juncture Prince A. M. Gortchakov, the Russian ambassador at Vienna,
taking advantage of the divided councils of the allies, urged Austria to
act as peacemaker. The emperor Francis Joseph thereupon took the occasion
to press upon Russia an acceptance of the four conditions on which Turkey
was prepared to make peace, backing the communication with an implied
threat of war in case of denial. On January 16th, 1856, the czar, much
against his will, signified his acceptance of Austrian intervention. The
preliminaries of peace were signed on February 1st and on the 25th of
the same month representatives of the great powers assembled at Paris
to settle the details of the peace. Negotiations proceeded for over a
month, France and Russia drawing together and Austria insisting upon the
maximum of Russian cessions.[a]
[Sidenote: [1856 A.D.]]
Under the Treaty of Paris, March 30th, 1856, the powers bound themselves
not to intervene singly in the administration of Turkey, to respect her
independence and territorial status, and to treat disputes between any
of them and the Porte as matters of general interest. A Hatti-sherif,
or ordinance, had been obtained by England from the sultan before the
congress opened, which guaranteed equal religious privileges to all
his subjects. This was set forth as an article in the treaty. Russia
renounced her claims to a protectorate over Turkish Christians. She
abandoned similar pretensions with regard to the Danubian principalities,
which were in future to be governed by hospodars elected under European
control. She surrendered to Moldavia the southern portion of Bessarabia,
which had been ceded under the Treaty of Bucharest, retaining however
the principal trade-routes southwards and the fortress of Khotin. The
navigation of the Danube was declared free to all nations, and placed
under an European commission.
A clause, through which Russia drew her pen as soon as an opportunity
presented itself, declared the Black Sea neutral and closed it to
men-of-war of all nations. Russia surrendered Kars to Turkey, but
regained the portion of the Crimea in the allies’ occupation. By a
separate act she undertook not to fortify the Åland Isles or to make them
a naval station. Thanks to the astuteness of her diplomacy, she scored
a decided success against England in securing the insertion of articles
which limited the scope of naval warfare. The Treaty of Paris abolished
privateering, and provided that a neutral flag should protect the enemy’s
goods, while neutral property, even under a hostile flag, was exempted
from capture. “Contraband of war” was indeed excepted, but no attempt was
made to define the meaning of this ambiguous phrase. The recognition of a
blockade by neutrals was to be conditional on its effectiveness.[g]
AMELIORATION IN THE CONDITION OF THE SOLDIER
On the 26th of August, 1856, the emperor Alexander Nikolaivitch placed
on his head, in the cathedral of the Assumption at Moscow, the imperial
crown and received the sacrament of anointing with the Holy Chrism.
The sacred day of the coronation was one of rejoicing and hitherto
unprecedented favours and therefore left the most joyful remembrance in
the hearts of the people.
When he had taken upon himself the imperial crown, the emperor Alexander
II immediately set about the preparation of those great administrative
reforms, which were so full of humanity and justice, which made his reign
illustrious and which immortalised his name.
Solicitous for the welfare of his people, the emperor first of all
directed his attention to the improvement of the condition of the
soldier and entered upon a series of reforms in the organisation and
administration of that army, which was so dear to his heart, with the
object of raising the moral spirit of the troops, of arousing the lower
ranks to the consciousness of their dignity and in general of placing the
military profession upon its proper elevated footing.
As the preserver of order in the state during times of peace and the
defender of the country in time of war, the soldier is justly proud of
his profession; he should not be given cause for mortification by finding
beside him in the service men condemned to the ranks as punishment for
vicious behaviour. Yet in previous times men were frequently made
soldiers by way of punishment for some crime instead of being banished
to the settlements: fugitives, vagabonds, horse stealers, thieves,
swindlers, and such vicious persons found a place in the ranks of the
army.
[Sidenote: [1860 A.D.]]
The emperor Alexander II put an end to this shameful state of things: by
the imperial manifesto of 1860 the enrolment of soldiers as a punishment
for crimes and offences, an abuse which had attained vast dimensions,
was abolished and replaced by other forms of punishment. But the czar’s
chief care was to bring to fulfilment his most sacred idea, one which
he cherished day and night: to give liberty to the peasants who were
dependent as serfs upon the landowners; to abolish the law of serfdom.
Amongst the great administrative reforms accomplished during the reign
of the emperor Alexander II, the liberation of the peasants occupies
incontestably the first place and served as the chief foundation for
all the reforms that followed. All further changes were directly or
indirectly called forth by the abolition of the law of serfdom. This
glorious accomplishment which gave new life to Russia, which breathed a
new soul into the millions of Russian peasantry, was the most important
of all the great deeds of the emperor Alexander II, and the brightest
jewel in the crown of his glory.
THE EMANCIPATION OF THE SERFS (1861 A.D.)
[Sidenote: [1861 A.D.]]
[Illustration: A PEASANT COSTUME]
The predecessors of Alexander II had already felt all the evils of
the law of serfdom and had not unfrequently aimed, if not directly at
its abolition, at least at the amelioration of the position of the
peasant serfs and their gradual preservation against the arbitrariness
of the landowners’ authority. But all these beneficent measures were
insufficient for the abolition of the firmly established order; they
only limited the rights of serfdom, put a certain restraint upon it, but
did not abolish the right of the possession of serfs. The glory of the
complete emancipation of the peasants from the dependency of serfdom,
the great and difficult initiative of the entire abolition of the law of
serfdom in Russia belongs wholly to the emperor Alexander II.
The question of the abolition of the law of serfdom constituted the chief
care of the emperor Alexander II during the first years of his reign;
all the course of the work in connection with the matter of the peasants
testified to what firmness of will, immovable convictions and persistency
were brought by the emperor himself into this matter which he regarded
as “sacred and most vital” for Russia.
The emperor spoke many times in public on the peasant question during
the time when the measure was under discussion. The sovereign’s speeches
all displayed his firm, inflexible intention of bringing the work he had
conceived to a successful termination; they had kept up the courage of
those labouring for the peasantry reforms, attracted the wavering, kept
opponents in check, and thus had an enormous influence both on public
opinion and on the course of local and general work in the matter of
peasant reforms.
The solution of the peasant question, which was of such vital importance
to Russia, presented many difficulties. Of course it would have been far
easier to master the problem if the emperor had desired to solve it as
it had already been solved in some kingdoms of western Europe, where the
peasants had been at one time in the same position as the Russian serfs;
there the peasants had only been declared individually free, the land
remained the property of the landowner. But such was not the will of the
emperor Alexander II. He desired that the interests of the landlords
should be as far as possible guarded, and also that the emancipated
peasants should be endowed with a fixed quantity of land; not converted
into homeless, landless labourers.
Much labour had to be expended over this great problem before an issue
was found for its successful solution. The chief executor of the
emperor’s preconceived plans in the matter of the peasant question was
Adjutant-General J. T. Rostovtsev, in whom Alexander found an enlightened
and boundlessly devoted assistant. In his turn Rostovtsev found a most
zealous and talented collaborator in the person of N. A. Milutin, who
warmly took up the cause of the emancipation of the peasants and who,
after the death of Rostovtsev in 1860, became the chief director of all
the work upon this question. The emperor attentively followed the course
of the preparatory labours on the peasant reforms and without giving any
serious heed to the wiles and opposition of the obstinate partisans of
the law of serfdom, he firmly and unwaveringly directed these labours to
the object marked out.
But of course it was impossible to accomplish so vast a work at once.
Four years passed in the indispensable preparatory work. The thoughts of
the sovereign were full of this administrative measure; his heart must
have been frequently overwhelmed with anxieties and fears in regard to
the successful solution of the peasant question. But the czar’s will
never weakened, his love for his people was never exhausted, and the
great, holy work of the emancipation of the rural population of Russia
from the bondage of serfdom, and the organisation of this population into
a new form of existence was at last brought to a successful conclusion.
On the 19th of February, 1861, in the sixth year of the reign of the
emperor Alexander II, all doubts were resolved. On that memorable day,
which can never be forgotten in Russia, was accomplished the greatest
event in the destinies of the Russian people: the emperor Alexander II,
after having fervently prayed in solitude, signed the imperial manifesto
for the abolition of the right of serfdom over the peasants living on
the landlords’ estates and for granting to these peasants the rights
of a free agricultural status. Through the initiative and persistent
efforts of their czar more than twenty-two million Russian peasants were
liberated from the burden of serfdom, which had weighed on them and their
forebears for nearly three centuries. They obtained their freedom and
together with it the possibility of enjoying the fruits of their free
labour, that is, of working for themselves, for their own profit and
advantage and of governing themselves and their actions according to
their own will and discernment. Freedom was given to the Russian peasant
by the emperor Alexander II himself; it was not given under him, but
by him; he personally maintained the right of his people to freedom,
personally broke the chains of serfdom; the initiative of this great
work, its direction and its execution belong wholly to the emperor.
We repeat, the laws of serfdom crumbled away at his royal word alone.
Together with the imperial manifesto of the 19th of February, 1861, were
promulgated in both capitals and afterwards throughout all Russia, laws
for the organization of the liberated peasants into the social order,
entitled “General regulations concerning the peasants issuing from the
dependence of serfdom.” Upon the basis of these laws and in particular
by virtue of the reforms that followed, the liberated peasants were thus
granted personal, social, and individual rights which placed them almost
on a footing of equality with the other classes of the state.
_Laws and Social Rights Granted to the Peasants_
In conferring upon the liberated peasants the individual rights,
common to all citizens of the empire, the czar was solicitous for the
establishment of laws actually conducive to the security and amelioration
of their condition, indissolubly bound up as it had been with the use and
enjoyment of the land. With this object in view it was established that
the peasant should have a share in the perpetual enjoyment of the farm
settlements and arable land, in accordance with the qualities of the land
of each locality and with local requirements. But as the peasants had not
means to give the landowner at once all the value due for their share
of the land, and on the other hand as the prospect of receiving the sum
allotted, in small proportions during a period of thirty to forty years,
was not an alluring one for the landowner, the state took upon itself the
office of intermediary between the landowners and the liberated peasants
and paid the landowner in redeemable paper all the sums due to him and
inscribed them as long term debts against the peasants, who were under
the obligation of paying them off by yearly instalments.
Together with the reservation of individual and property rights to the
emancipated peasants, a special peasant government was established
for them. The peasants received the right of disposing independently
of their agricultural and public work, and of choosing from amongst
themselves the wisest and most reliable persons for conducting their
affairs under the direction of peasant assemblies. And as in the life of
the Russian peasants many ancient customs and rules are preserved which
are esteemed and observed as sacred, being the product of the experience
of their forefathers, the emperor granted them also their own district
peasant tribunals which decide upon purely local questions and arbitrate
according to the conscience and traditions of these communities.
The imperial manifesto was, as has already been said, signed on the
19th of February, 1861, but it was universally proclaimed only on the
5th of March of the same year; the news of the emancipation evoked an
indescribable enthusiasm, a touching gratitude in the people towards
their liberator throughout the whole length of the Russian land,
beginning with the capital and finishing with the last poor little
hamlet.[d]
Having thus summarised the results achieved by this remarkable manifesto,
we give below a literal translation of the full text of the document
itself.[a]
_Text of the Imperial Proclamation_
Manifesto of the Emancipation of the Serfs:
By the Grace of God
We, Alexander the Second,
Emperor and Autocrat
Of All the Russias,
King of Poland, Grand Duke of Finland,
et cætera, et cætera, et cætera,
Make known to all Our faithful subjects.
Having been called by God’s Providence and the sacred law of succession
to the throne of our forefathers and All the Russias, We have in
accordance with this calling vowed to comprehend in Our royal love and
care all Our faithful subjects of every calling and condition, from him
who nobly wields the sword in the defence of the fatherland to the modest
worker with the tools of the artisan, from him who serves in the highest
service of the state to him who draws the furrow over the field with the
plough.
[Illustration: A STREET VENDER]
Upon examining into the position of the various callings and conditions
of the state structure, We have observed that the legislation of the
state, while organising actively and well the higher and middle classes
by determining their duties, rights and privileges, has not attained to
an equal activity in regard to the people bound to the soil and called
serfs because they, partly through ancient laws, partly from custom, are
hereditarily settled under the authority of the landowners, upon whom
at the same time the obligation lies to provide for their welfare. The
rights of the landowners have been until now extensive and not defined
with any exactitude by the law, the place of which has been taken instead
by tradition, custom and the good will of the landowner. In the most
favourable cases there have proceeded from this state of things kind,
patriarchal relations of sincere and true guardianship and beneficence
on the part of the landlord, and good tempered obedience on the part of
the peasant. But with the increasing complexity of manners and customs,
with the increasing diversity of relations, the lessening of direct
intercourse between the landowners and peasants, the occasional falling
of the landowner’s rights into the hands of persons who only seek their
own profit, these good relations have weakened, and a path has been
opened for an arbitrariness which is burdensome to the peasants and
unfavourable to their welfare, and to which the peasants have responded
by insensibility to improvement in their own existence.
These matters were observed also by Our ever to be remembered
predecessors and they took measures to effect a change for the better in
the position of the peasants; but these measures were indecisive. In many
cases they depended on the co-operation of the landowners; in others they
concerned only particular localities and were instituted to meet special
requirements or else as experiments. Thus the emperor Alexander I issued
a regulation concerning the freedom of agriculturists, and Our deceased
parent Nicholas I, who rests in God, a regulation as to the obligations
of peasants. In the western governments inventory rules have defined the
distribution of the peasants by the land and their obligations. But the
regulations concerning the freedom of agriculturists and the obligations
of peasants have been carried out only to a very limited extent.
Thus, We have become convinced that the amelioration of the condition
of the serfs or people bound to the soil, is for us a testament of
Our predecessors and a lot appointed to Us, through the course of
circumstances, by the hand of Providence.
We have entered upon this work by an act showing Our confidence in the
Russian nobility, Our confidence in their devotion to the throne, which
has been proved by great trials, and in their readiness to make large
sacrifices for the good of the country. We left the nobility, at its own
request, responsible for the new legislation in behalf of the peasantry.
It thus became the duty of the nobles to limit their rights over the
peasants and to take up the difficulties of the reformation; and this
involved a sacrifice of their own interests. But Our confidence has been
justified. In the government committees, invested with the confidence of
the nobility of each government, the nobility has voluntarily renounced
its rights over the persons of the serfs. In these committees when the
necessary information had been collected, propositions were drawn up for
the new code regulating the conditions of persons bound to the soil, and
their relations to the landowners.
These propositions, which, as might have been expected from the nature
of the matter, were very various, have been compared, brought into
harmony, arranged in a regular form, amended and completed in the higher
commission appointed for this matter; and the new propositions thus
constituted in the interests of landowners, peasants, and menials have
been examined in the council of state.
Calling upon God to assist us, We have decided to bring this work to its
accomplishment.
In virtue of the new regulations, the serfs will receive at the proper
time the full rights of free villagers.
The landowners while preserving the rights of property over all the
land belonging to them, will leave the peasants, in return for the dues
established, in perpetual enjoyment of their farm settlements; Moreover,
in order to ensure the security of their existence and the fulfilment of
their obligations before the Government, the quantity of arable land and
other necessaries allotted will be determined by regulation.
Thus profiting by a share of the land, the peasants are in return obliged
to pay in to the landowner certain dues determined by the regulations.
In this condition which is transitory the peasants are denominated as
temporarily bound to work for the landlords.
Together with this they are given the right to buy their farm
settlements, and with the consent of the landlords they can acquire
as property the arable land and other appendages, allotted for their
perpetual enjoyment. By such acquisitions of certain determined
quantities of land, the peasants are freed from any obligations to the
landowners on the land purchased and enter into the position of free
peasant-proprietors.
By special regulation in regard to menials or domestic servants, a
transitory position is determined for them adapted to their occupations
and requirements; after the expiration of a space of two years from the
day of the issue of this regulation, they will receive full emancipation
and exemption from taxes.
These are the chief principles by which are determined the future
organisation of the peasants and the menials. They indicate in detail the
rights granted to the peasants and menials and the duties laid upon them
in respect to the government and the landlords.
Although these regulations, general, local and special as well as
supplementary rules for certain particular localities, for the estates
of small landed proprietors, and for peasants working in their
landlords’ manufactories are as far as possible adapted to the economic
requirements, yet in order to preserve the usual order, We leave to the
landlords the option of making a voluntary agreement with the peasants
regarding land and dues.
As the new system, on account of the inevitable multitude of changes it
involves, cannot be at once introduced, but requires time for adjustment,
therefore in order to avoid disturbance in public and private affairs,
the order existing until now shall be preserved for two years, when,
after the completion of the necessary preparations, the new laws shall go
into force.
[Illustration: A WOMAN OF KAMCHATKA]
For the lawful attainment of this, We have considered it well to command
that:
1. In every government a government council on peasant affairs shall
be opened, having the supreme direction of the affairs of the peasant
societies installed on the landowners’ territories.
2. Arbiters of peace are to be nominated in the districts, and district
assemblies formed from them in order to investigate on the spot into any
misunderstandings and disputes which may arise in the fulfilment of the
regulations.
3. Besides this, communal councils are to be established on the
landowners’ estates, in order that, while leaving the village communities
in their present formation, _Volost_[69] councils should be opened in the
principal villages, uniting the smaller village communities under one
_Volost_ administration.
4. A charter shall be drawn up in each village specifying, on the
basis of the local regulations, the quantity of land appointed for
the perpetual enjoyment of the peasants, and the dues to be paid the
landowner.
5. These charters shall be executive, and brought into operation within a
space of two years from the day of the issue of this manifesto.
6. Until the expiration of this term, the peasants and menials are to
remain in their previous condition of subjection to the landlords and
indisputably to fulfil their former obligations.
7. The landowners are to see that order is maintained on their estates,
and preserve the right of the dispensation of justice until the formation
and opening of the _Volost_ tribunals.
In contemplating the inevitable difficulties of the reform, We first
of all lay Our trust in God’s most gracious Providence, which protects
Russia.
After this We rely on the valiant zeal of the Honourable body of the
Nobility, to whom We cannot but testify the gratitude it has earned
from Us and from the whole country for its disinterested action in the
realisation of Our preconceived plans. Russia will not forget that it has
voluntarily, incited only by respect for the dignity of man and Christian
love for its neighbour, renounced serfdom and laid the foundation of the
new agricultural future of the peasant. We believe unquestioningly that
it will continue its good work by ensuring the orderly accomplishment
of the new regulations, in the spirit of peace and benevolence; and
that each landowner will complete within, the limits of his own
estate, the great civic movement of the whole body, by organising the
existence of the peasants settled on his lands, and that of his domestic
servants, upon conditions advantageous to both sides, thus setting the
rural population a good example, and encouraging it in the exact and
conscientious fulfilment of the state regulations.
The examples that We have in view of the generous solicitude of the
landlords for the welfare of the peasants, and the gratitude of the
peasants for the beneficent solicitude of the landlords, confirm in Us
the hope that mutual, spontaneous agreement will solve the greater number
of difficulties; difficulties which are inevitable in the adaptation
of general rules to the diversity of conditions existent in separate
estates; and that by this means the transition from the old order to the
new will be facilitated, and that for the future, mutual confidence,
good understanding and unanimous striving for the common welfare will be
consolidated.
For the more convenient accomplishment of those agreements between the
landlords and peasants, by which the latter will acquire property,
together with the farms and agricultural appendages, assistance will also
be afforded by the government, on the basis of special rules, by the
payment of loans, and the transfer of debts lying on the estates.
We rely upon the good sense of Our people. When the government’s idea
of the abolition of serfdom became spread amongst the peasants who were
unprepared for it, it aroused partial misunderstandings. Some thought of
liberty and forgot all about obligations. But the mass of the people did
not waver in the conviction, that by natural reasoning, a society that
freely enjoyed benefits must mutually minister to the welfare of society
by the fulfilment of certain obligations, and that in accordance with
the Christian law, _every soul_ must be _subject unto the higher powers_
(Rom. xiii, 1), must _render therefore to all their dues_, and especially
to whom are due _tribute_, _custom_, _fear_, _honour_ (v. 7); that the
lawfully acquired rights of the landowners cannot be taken from them
without fitting recompense for their voluntary concession; and that it
would be opposed to all justice to avail oneself of the land belonging to
the landlord without rendering certain obligations in return for it.
And now we hopefully expect that the serfs, in view of the new future
opening for them, will understand and gratefully receive the great
sacrifice made by the honourable nobility for the improvement of their
condition.
They will understand, that having received a firmer foundation of
property and greater freedom in the disposition of their agricultural
labours, they have become bound, before society and themselves to
complete the beneficence of the new law by a faithful, well-intentioned
and diligent use of the rights conferred by it upon them. The most
beneficent law cannot make people happy and prosperous, if they do not
themselves labour to establish their felicity under the protection of the
law. Competence and ease are not acquired and increased otherwise than by
unremitting labour, a wise use of powers and means, strict thrift and an
honest, God-fearing life.
The executors of this new system will see that it is accomplished in an
orderly and tranquil manner, so that the attention of the agriculturists
may not be drawn off from their necessary agricultural occupations. May
they carefully cultivate the earth, and gather its fruits in order that
afterwards from well-filled granaries the seed may be taken for sowing
the land that is for their perpetual enjoyment, or that will be acquired
by them as their own property.
Sign yourselves with the sign of the cross, orthodox people, and call
upon God with Us for His blessing on your free labour, on your homes and
on the public welfare.
Given in St. Petersburg, on the nineteenth day of February in the year
one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one from the birth of Christ, and
the seventh of Our reign.
ALEXANDER.[f]
EFFECTS OF THE NEW CONDITIONS
Let us now turn our attention to the epoch in which this law was
published. As regards the effect of the new law on the mind of the
population, it was soon evidenced, that the cultivated classes, burdened
as they were with sacrifices for the work of reform, expressed their joy
and satisfaction at this great acquisition, far more readily than the
peasants, whom it immediately concerned. The disaffected portion of the
Russian nobility was and remained decidedly in the minority, especially
under the first impression of the great and decided step that had been
taken, and no one ventured to manifest disapproval. Public opinion had
declared itself too decidedly in favour of the government for any one
to venture on opposition. On the contrary, the number was by no means
unimportant, of those among the nobles and officials, who exceeded even
the demands of the government, and who could not suppress their vexation,
that their desire that the lands possessed by the community should be
gratuitously transferred into their property, had been disregarded.
Although these voices were not distinctly audible until a later period,
still from the first they had influence, because they could reckon on
the sympathies of the freed portion of the population. Moreover a great
part of the nobles, at that time, looked for a rich compensation for the
sacrifice they had made; they hoped to be able to excite public opinion
in favour of the embryo demand for the restoration of a constitution,
and by its assistance to reach the desired goal. Thus the disaffected
feelings of the hitherto ruling classes were veiled, and maintained in
one balance, by hopes of the future; at the most a small band of stubborn
adherents to the system of Nicholas grumbled at the liberalism come into
fashion, could not conceal their vexation at the loss of their revenues,
and used every effort to recover their lost influence in the court
circles.
The Russian peasant received the important tidings of the breaking of
his fetters with profound silence; and some time elapsed before he had
made up his mind what position to assume with regard to it. Partly, the
habitual want of freedom had become too inveterate, and was too deeply
rooted, to be at once cast aside; and partly, the attention of the people
was too eagerly directed to the still pending agricultural arrangements
with the proprietors, for the publication of the emancipation edict to
make at once any evident impression. The effect of the emancipation act
was felt most strongly and evidently in the two capitals of the empire;
here there were thousands of serfs living (as merchants, second-hand
dealers, artisans, drivers, servants, etc.) who had been obliged to
purchase with high obroc-payments the right of seeking their gain, and
were always in danger of being recalled by the will of their masters
and constrained to return to the old position of dependence. To these,
the advantages of the newly established arrangement of things were
manifest, and the fruits of it could at once be enjoyed; the emancipation
law limited the duration of their dependence to merely two years, and
fixed an unimportant obroc-sum for this transition period. From these
town-serfs, therefore, proceeded the first exhibitions of thankfulness
and joy, the first ovations to the “liberating czar.” But here also the
weak, womanish character of the Slavonic race did not belie itself; there
was no idea of passionate outbursts. The St. Petersburg descriptions
of those momentous February days tell most characteristically of
intoxicated bands of bearded cab-drivers and artisans, who reeled through
the streets, humming as they went “Volyushka, Volyushka,” (literally,
“beloved freedom”). Truly effective, however, was the shout of rejoicing,
with which the masses of the people received the emperor when he quitted
the winter-palace, on the 19th of February, in order to be present at the
reading of the emancipation-ukase in the Kazan church; and subsequently,
the addresses sent to the emperor by the drivers and lower class of
citizens in the two capitals, who had been freed from serfdom.
Although this law had been published throughout the whole empire on the
same day in all churches, and the peace-mediators (_mirovuye-Posredniki_)
had at once proceeded to regulate the agricultural questions, the first
more important manifestations in the country did not occur until two
months later, in the end of April, 1861. These were manifestations of
dissatisfaction and disappointment, which appeared east of the Volga, and
had the districts of Kazan and Nijni-Novgorod for their principal centre.
In all probability they were revolutionary agitators from the higher and
more cultivated classes who first scattered the seeds of discontent. The
people were persuaded that the true emancipation-ukase of the czar had
been craftily intercepted by the nobles and officials; that the will
of the czar was to consign to the peasants, without compensation or
hindrance, the land they had hitherto cultivated. These doctrines fell
on a soil all the more ready, as the services yielded to the masters
were in the eyes of the people of a purely personal nature, and were
no equivalents for the lands conceded to the communities. “We belong
to the proprietors, but the common land belongs to us,” was the creed
of the peasant; hence the feeling was, that the abolition of personal
servitude was synonymous with the establishment of free property. In
the Kazan district, matters soon reached a pitch of open refusal to
obedience; and when the magistrates interfered, they amounted to attempts
at resistance. Popular discontent assumed at once a genuinely national
stamp; it found a leader in a new Pugatchev, the peasant Anton Petrov,
who personated the czar (who had fled from St. Petersburg, pursued by the
boyars); and within a short time he had gathered round him 10,000 men.
After vain attempts to bring back the infatuated men by gentle means to
obedience, military power was obliged to be employed. Some battalions,
led by Count Apraxin, marched through the insurgent country, and took
the ringleader prisoner; and after Petrov had fallen into their hands,
and had been immediately shot, order was again so completely established,
that in May nothing further was thought of this episode. The peasants
returned to their obedience, and everywhere the arrangements of the
peace-arbitrator were complied with. Yet the idea of the perfect freedom
hoped for, was not yet wholly forgotten; the Volga districts remained for
some time longer the scene of revolutionary experiments, which excited
the people with the hope of a “new freedom” still to be expected and
held fast to the old idea of a gratuitous division of the soil. Under
the title _Zemliyä i Volyä_ (Land and Freedom), there appeared from time
to time secretly published pamphlets, which endeavoured to give the
agrarian question a revolutionary colouring, and which were numerously
circulated, in the eastern districts especially. These manifestations
of a propaganda, secretly inflaming the public mind, we shall meet with
again in other places, and under other forms.
In general, the completion of the arrangement between peasant and lord
was unexpectedly quick, and favourable in its course. Little as it can be
asserted, that the Russian peasant subsequently made a just use of his
newborn liberty, or that agricultural progress exhibited any favourable
influence from it; still it is evident, that the peasant population
manifested in the arrangement good-will, a just insight into the state
of affairs, and great tractableness; and that this matter was justly
conceived and handled by those entrusted with it. The execution of
the law of the 19th of February, 1861, was not placed in the hands of
ordinary magistrates, but was consigned to officials, who were selected
_ad hoc_ from the number of landed proprietors, and were furnished
with extensive authority. It was a happy idea, and one of decided and
lasting importance, that these peace mediators, or arbitrators, as they
were called, were not reckoned in the service of the state, and were
not fettered to the orders of the bureaucratic hierarchy. For the first
time in Russia, men of the most different calling, and social position,
stood side by side with equal right to join hands for the execution of
a patriotic work, which promised neither title, rank, nor advancement.
Generals in command, and mere lieutenants, councillors of the state, and
simple titular councillors, once the choice of their fellow-citizens and
class-equals fell on them, demanded leave of absence from service, in
order to undertake, according to the law, the demarcation between the
estates of the nobles and the lands of the community within definite
districts, and to induce both parties to agree; it was only where this
result could not be attained, that the strict orders of the regulations
were enforced, and the co-operation of higher authority was appealed
to.[h]
ABOLITION OF CORPORAL PUNISHMENT (1863 A.D.)
[Sidenote: [1863 A.D.]]
The first reform that followed on the abolition of the law of serfdom,
which had been an unsurmountable obstacle to any improvement and reform
in the political organisation of the state, was the abolition of the
cruel and shameful corporal punishments which were formerly allotted for
crimes.
In the beginning of the reign of Alexander II attention had been
directed to the fact that corporal punishment as a punitive measure
did not accomplish the reformation amendment of the criminal, but only
dishonoured the personality of the man, lowered his feeling of honour and
destroyed in him the sense of his manhood.
The emperor began by diminishing the number of offences amenable to
corporal punishment; the new position which had been given to the
peasants by the abolition of serfdom, soon led to the almost total
suppression of corporal punishment for them.
On the 29th of April, 1863, an imperial ukase followed, by which corporal
punishment was entirely abolished as a punitive measure, determined by
the sentence of the public tribunals. By this memorable ukase, which
will ever remain a glorious monument in the legislation of Russia, were
abolished by the will of the czar-liberator, the last traces of slavery
in Russia, the running of the gauntlet, the spur, the lash, the cat, the
branding of the human body, all passed away into eternal oblivion; the
punishment of the rod to which persons belonging to the class not exempt
from corporal punishment had hitherto been subjected was replaced for
them by arrest or confinement in prison, and was preserved only in two or
three cases and then in the most moderate measure.
REFORMS IN THE COURTS OF JUSTICE
Almost simultaneously with the establishment of the provincial and
territorial institutions, the emperor Alexander II recognised it as
indispensable for the welfare of his people, to reform the existing
judiciary system and law proceedings, to render all his subjects equal
before the legal authorities, and to afford them all the same protection
of the tribunals and the law.
Ancient Russian tribunals, as is well known, were far from being
distinguished either by their uprightness or the rapidity of their
procedure. It is hardly necessary to remind readers that justice was
administered in secret, behind closed doors, besides which not merely
outsiders were refused admittance to the courts, but even the persons
implicated and interested in the affair. Such chancery secrecy resulted
in great lack of truth and justice in the tribunals. Taking advantage
of the secrecy of the proceedings, the judges allowed themselves to
commit every possible abuse: they extorted money from the suitors,
behaved unfairly and against their own consciences, distorted facts and
afterwards decided the affair in accordance with their own views and
pleasure, that is, as was most advantageous and convenient to them.
Another great defect in the ancient Russian tribunals was due to the
fact that the entire procedure was carried on in them exclusively on
paper, upon the foundation of notes alone; verbal explanations were not
permitted in the tribunals. This complicated form of written procedure
led to litigations of incredible length; the most trivial lawsuit
sometimes dragged on for years, requiring enormous expenditure and
often in the end ruining the litigants. In a like manner, the accused,
not infrequently innocent people, and only suspected of some crime or
offence, had to languish for years in prison, awaiting the termination of
their affairs before the courts.
The emperor Alexander II was well aware of all these defects and
imperfections in the ancient courts of justice, and as a true friend of
humanity, could not remain indifferent to such an order of things. He
therefore desired that there should be established in Russia a system
of justice that would be “speedy, righteous, merciful, and equitable.”
The reign of truth and mercy in the tribunals could be attained only by
a complete reorganisation of the ancient tribunals, in consequence of
which, by command of the czar, new legal statutes were composed, and
received the imperial confirmation towards the end of November, 1864.
The enormous superiority of the new tribunals over the old ones was at
once evident. The new courts, carrying on their business in public,
punished crimes without respect of persons; all Russian subjects were
recognised as equal before the law and the courts. The appearance of
justices of the peace had a particular importance for the people newly
liberated from the dependence of serfdom; they afforded the hitherto
poor and almost defenceless lower classes a possibility of protecting
themselves against every kind of offence, violence and oppression, and of
claiming their legal rights almost without trouble or expense.
THE POLISH INSURRECTION OF 1863
In spite of his ardent reformatory activity in the interior of the
empire, the emperor Alexander II did not neglect foreign policy.
Although, at the conclusion of the Crimean war, the emperor had
recognised the necessity of a prolonged peace for Russia, and therefore
continually endeavoured to avoid becoming entangled in the affairs of
nations, nevertheless in all cases where the interests of Russia were
affected, he firmly and calmly declared his requirements, and by means of
peaceful persuasions maintained the honour and interests of his country.
The suppression of the Polish rebellion of 1863 is particularly
remarkable in this respect: The amelioration of conditions in Poland had
occupied Alexander II immediately after his accession to the throne, and
he had at once eliminated inequalities of legislation between his Russian
and Polish subjects: all that was granted to Russia was granted also to
the kingdom of Poland.
[Illustration: A MESTCHER COSTUME]
All these favours aroused a feeling of gratitude in the more moderate and
wiser portion of the population. But they were not received in the same
spirit by those Poles who dreamed of the re-establishment of the ancient
Poland with its former frontiers, and of giving entire self-government
to the kingdom by means of its separation from Russia, and the formation
of a separate state. These persons looked with hostility upon all the
actions of the Russian government and, with the design of entering into
an open conflict with Russia, secretly began to incite the people of
Poland to revolt.
In January, 1863, a fresh insurrection burst forth in Poland. But the
revolutionaries were unsuccessful, and the Russian troops defeated them
at every point, taking 300 prisoners and a considerable number of guns.
Being desirous of again trying mild measures, and in the hope of at last
bringing the Poles to reason, the emperor declared that pardon would
be granted to all who laid down their arms by the 13th of May. But the
term allotted expired without good sense having triumphed. Then Count
Birg was appointed viceroy in Warsaw, and Adjutant-General Muraviev,
governor-general of the northwest border. Under the direction of these
two men, the conflict took a more decided character and the suppression
of the rebellion was made effective.
Meanwhile, when the insurrection was already almost put down by the
Russian troops, three great western European powers--England, France and
Austria--expressed their sympathy with the Polish movement and at the
same time gave the Poles hopes of assistance. Having concerted together,
and being besides supported by Turkey, these powers simultaneously sent
the Russian government threatening exactions for concessions to Poland.
Naturally, these pretensions on the part of the powers were offensive
to Russian national honour. A feeling of profound indignation and
wounded dignity took possession of the Russian nation, and readiness
was expressed to sacrifice everything to the defence of the fatherland.
Prince A. M. Gortchakov showed himself a worthy champion of Alexander II
in the resistance shown to the European powers.
[Sidenote: [1864 A.D.]]
Meeting with such decided opposition to their interference, the powers
became convinced that the entire Russian nation stood behind the czar,
and they were obliged to withdraw their exactions. The final suppression
of the Polish insurrection became thenceforth a matter of internal
policy. Complete tranquillity was restored in Poland in the year 1864.
Following on these events a series of measures was undertaken tending to
the gradual union of the kingdom of Poland with the Russian empire. The
most beneficial of all these measures was the ukase of the 2nd of March,
1864, for the reorganisation of the peasantry in the kingdom of Poland.
Strictly speaking, the law of serfdom had been abolished in Poland as
early as the beginning of the nineteenth century, but the freedom the
peasants had then received was no better than servitude; they were
individually free, but had no share in the possession of land. By virtue
of the ukase of the 2nd of March, 1864, the land of which the peasants
had the use became their property, and the compensation to the landowners
was defrayed by the state.
Upon this important measure followed a series of other measures,
contributing to the development of the general welfare of Poland; and
finally in 1869, it was declared by the imperial will that measures
should be taken for the complete union of the kingdom of Poland with the
other parts of the empire, by which the definitive pacification of Poland
was completed.
THE SUBJECTION OF THE CAUCASUS (1864 A.D.)
The subjection of the Caucasus took place in the year after the
suppression of the Polish insurrection.
Of all the nations that populated the Caucasus, only the Georgians and
Armenians had succeeded, some centuries before the birth of Christ, in
establishing independent kingdoms. But being surrounded by powerful and
warlike mountaineers and bounded on the south by the dominions of Persia
and Turkey, the kingdoms of Georgia and Armenia had gradually fallen into
decay, and therefore Georgia itself turned to Russia, as professing the
same religion, with the request to be received into the empire. Yielding
to the urgent request of the unfortunate country, the emperor Paul I, who
was then reigning in Russia, annexed Georgia in 1800 A.D.
After the annexation of Georgia to Russia, the mountain people made
their appearance from the north and south amongst Russian possessions,
but by continuing their previous plundering and incursions into Russian
territory, they hindered relations between the Caucasus and the empire.
Thus, in order to secure the tranquil possession of Georgia nothing
remained but to subject to Russian domination those wild tribes of the
Mohammedan faith which lived in the mountains separating Russia from the
Caucasus. Therefore during the first years of the nineteenth century
there commenced an almost continuously persistent and truly heroic
struggle of the Russian army against the Caucasian tribes, which was
prolonged for more than sixty years until that definitive subjection of
the Caucasus which took place during the reign of Alexander II.
_The Taking of Schamyl_
The struggle against the Caucasian mountaineers was rendered peculiarly
difficult at that time by the appearance of Schamyl as their leader,
uniting as he did all the qualities of a brave and experienced soldier to
his spiritual calling. The possessor of an iron will and an astonishing
skill in ruling over the wild mountain tribes, Schamyl converted them
into an organ of war which he directed against the Russians. Added
to this he fortified the almost impregnable mountains, constructed
excellent fortresses and established powder-works, foundries, etc.
Seeing all this the Russians began to carry on a regular warfare against
the mountaineers. The commander-in-chief in the Caucasus, who also
exercised the functions of Caucasian viceroy, was Adjutant-general Prince
Bariatinski, with whose nomination the war took a decisive turn.
Prince Bariatinski directed his efforts first of all against the eastern
group of the Caucasian mountains. The general aggressive movement of the
Russian army, which was accomplished after mature reflection, soon placed
Schamyl in an embarrassing position which put an end to the fascination
he had exercised over the mountaineers, who had hitherto been blindly
devoted to him. One tribe after another fell away from Schamyl and
declared its submission to Russia. Defeated and pressed on every side,
Schamyl fled to Daghestan, the extreme eastern province of the Caucasus,
on the shores of the Caspian Sea and took refuge with his family and
a little band of adherents in the village of Gunib situated on the
heights of an inaccessible mountain, where he decided to defend himself
to the last. Meanwhile, the Russian troops, which had indefatigably
pursued Schamyl, finally besieged him at Gunib and surrounded the
village itself with a thick chain of soldiers. Upon the proposal of the
commander-in-chief to put an end to the useless defence, and to spare the
village the horrors of an assault, Schamyl, hitherto deemed invincible,
saw his hopeless position, left his refuge, and surrendered himself as
prisoner on the 6th of September, 1859, throwing himself upon the mercy
of the czar. The taking of Schamyl produced an impression of astonishment
on all the mountain tribes: the whole Caucasus trembled with desire for
peace. After the taking of Gunib, and the captivity of Schamyl the whole
eastern portion of the Caucasus submitted to the Russian domination.
After this all the efforts of the Russian troops were immediately
directed towards the western Caucasus, adjoining the eastern shore of the
Black Sea; but the definitive subjection of this part of the Caucasus
required yet four years of uninterrupted and unrelaxed conflicts.
Meanwhile, at the beginning of the year 1863, Field-marshal Prince
Bariatinski was on account of impaired health replaced by a new Caucasian
viceroy in the person of the emperor’s youngest brother, the grand duke
Michael Nikolaivitch, after which the aggressive movements of the Russian
troops proceeded with such rapidity, that the entire conquest of the
western portion of the Caucasus was accomplished in the spring of the
year 1864. Thus ended the costly and bloody Caucasian war, and since then
all the Caucasus has belonged to Russia.
WARS WITH KHOKAND AND BOKHARA
[Sidenote: [1864-1867 A.D.]]
Following on the subjection of the Caucasus, Russia began to settle
accounts with three small neighbouring Mohammedan khanates, those of
Khokand, Bokhara, and Khiva. These khanates were situated amidst the
arid, sandy steppes of central Asia and were populated by half savage
robber tribes who continually made audacious incursions upon Russian
central Asian frontier possessions, attacking Russian mercantile
caravans, and plundering the merchants, either killing or carrying
them into captivity and selling them as slaves. All this greatly
hindered Russian trade with Asia, it destroyed the tranquillity of
Russian frontier possessions and therefore had long been a source of
preoccupation and disquietude on the part of the Russian government.
Therefore, in 1864, two small detachments of Russian troops under the
command of Colonel Tchernaiev and General Verevkine, were despatched from
two sides for the punishment of the hostile tribes and the preservation
of the Russian eastern frontier from their plundering incursions. Colonel
Tchernaiev, by storm, took the Khokand fortress of Auliet, while General
Verevkine seized the Khokand town of Turkestan. In the following year,
1865, General Tchernaiev took by assault one of the most important towns
of the Khokand khanate--Tashkend--after which the khan of Khokand ceased
hostilities and declared his submission to the Russian czar.
Then, however, one of the khanates neighbouring upon that of
Khokand--Bokhara--began to disturb peace on the Russian frontiers and it
became necessary to quiet it. A detachment of Russian troops under the
command of General Romanovski was sent against Bokhara.
The war with Bokhara was as successful as that with Khokand. In the
year 1866 the chief forces of the emir of Bokhara were utterly defeated
and the Russians took some towns and fortresses. But it was only after
the Russian troops had taken the ancient, famous, and wealthy town of
Samarkand, that the emir finally submitted, being bound by a special
treaty to allow the Russian merchants entire liberty to trade in the
Bokharan possessions, and to abolish slavery throughout his dominions.
This greatly raised the prestige of the czar in Asia.
The newly conquered territories in central Asia (in Khokand and Bokhara)
were joined to the Russian possessions, and from them was formed (in
1867) the special government general of Turkestan, with Tashkend for its
chief town.[d]
A GLANCE AT THE PAST HISTORY OF BOKHARA
It may be of interest to recall in a few words the past history of the
somewhat important territory thus acquired by Russia. We have already
become acquainted with Bokhara in ancient history under the name of
Sogdiana; afterwards in Persian history it appears as T̈ransoxania, or
by the Arabic name of Mawarra an-nahr. The country was conquered by the
Arabs in the early part of the eighth century, and towards the end of the
ninth it was conquered by Ismail, the founder of the Samanids dynasty,
who became emir of Bokhara and Kharezm (Khiva) in 893. Towards the end of
the eleventh century the celebrated Seljuk sultan Malik Shah conquered
the country beyond the Oxus, and in 1216 it came for a short time under
the power of the Kharezmian prince, Muhammed Kutbuddin. In about 1220 the
land was subdued by Jenghiz Khan and incorporated into the khanate of
Jagatai. Bokhara remained under the successors of Jenghiz until the whole
country was overrun and conquered by Timur (Tamerlane), who selected
Samarkand as his capital and raised it to a high stage of prosperity.
The descendants of Timur ruled in the country until about the year 1500,
when they were overthrown by the Usbeg Tatars under Muhammed Shaibani,
a descendant of Shaiban, the fifth son of Juji. Muhammed ruled over
T̈ransoxania, Ferghana, Khwarizm and Hissar, but in 1510 he was defeated
and killed by Shah Ismail, the founder of the Persian dynasty of Sufi.
The Shaibani dynasty ruled for nearly a century when it was replaced
by the dynasty of Astrakhan, a house related to the Shaibanis by
marriage. Under two rulers of this family--Iman Kuli Khan and Subhankuli
Khan--Bokhara recovered somewhat of its former glory, and Subhankuli
ruled over Khiva also for a time. In 1740 Bokhara had been so reduced
under weak rulers that it offered its submission to Nadir Shah of Persia,
and after his death the Astrakhan dynasty was overthrown by the house of
Mangit (1784), which is the dynasty at present ruling in the country.
Under the first sovereign of this family, Mir Maasum, Bokhara enjoyed a
certain degree of prosperity, although the ruler was a cruel tyrant and
a bigoted ascetic. He led a curious life of pretended piety, living in
filth and misery although surrounded by wealth. He conquered and almost
exterminated the city of Merv and invaded and devastated Khorassan. At
his death in 1802 he was succeeded by his son Saïd, a weak ruler who
lived until 1826. He was succeeded by one of the worst tyrants who ever
occupied a throne--the emir Nasrullah Bahuder; he was cruel, lustful,
treacherous, hypocritical, ungrateful to friends, whom he rewarded for
service by putting them to death--in short, he appears to have had all
the vices it is possible for a human being to have. It was during his
reign that England and Russia tried to acquire influence in Bokhara.
Two English envoys, Colonel Stoddart and Captain Conolly, were executed
in 1842 after several years’ imprisonment in a loathsome dungeon. The
Russian envoy did indeed come away alive from the court of the tyrant but
he succeeded in gaining no concessions for his country. Nasrullah died
in 1860, his last act being to have his wife killed and her head brought
to his bedside. He was succeeded by his son Mozaffer-eddin, during whose
reign the Russian conquest took place.[a]
THE CONQUEST OF KHIVA (1873 A.D.)
[Sidenote: [1873 A.D.]]
After Khokand and Bokhara came the turn of Khiva. In the early spring
of 1873 three detachments of Russian troops marched on Khiva from
different sides under the command of the governor-general of Turkestan,
Adjutant-general V. P. von Kaufmann. Incredible privations and
difficulties had to be borne and overcome by the Russian troops during
this march across the steppes. First they endured frosts and snowstorms,
and then under the sun’s burning rays they courageously accomplished
in the space of one month a thousand versts march across a desert, and
finally reached the borders of the khanate of Khiva in the beginning of
May. In three weeks’ time the entire khanate was subjugated; some of the
towns were taken after a combat, others surrendered without resistance,
and on the 10th of June the capital of the khanate--Khiva--fell. The
Russian troops entered the town in triumph, covered with fresh glory.
After the taking of Khiva by the Russians, the khan of Khiva fled to
the steppes, but he afterwards returned and declared his submission, in
consequence of which he was reinstated on his throne. But in spite of
this a portion of the Khivan possessions fell to Russia. Besides this,
the khan had to acknowledge a partial dependence upon Russia, he was
obliged to reimburse her by a considerable sum of money for the expenses
incurred in the campaign, and to allow the Russian merchants to trade
freely in his dominions; he was pledged to discountenance plundering,
to set at liberty all prisoners and slaves, and to abolish throughout
his possessions forever all traffic in slaves. Thus, through the medium
of the Czar Liberator, freedom was brought into central Asia--the land
of slavery and of arbitrary rule. The complete pacification of a great
country was accomplished.
THE RUSSO-TURKISH WAR (1877-1878 A.D.)
[Sidenote: [1875-1877 A.D.]]
Besides the wars already enumerated, Russia had, under the reign of the
Czar Liberator, to carry on another war, which entailed innumerable
sacrifices.
In the summer of 1875, the Slavonians of the two Turkish dependencies
of Bosnia and Herzegovina, inhabited by Servian races, rose against
their oppressors, the Turks, and decided to take up arms in defence of
their faith, freedom, and property, and the honour of their wives and
daughters, and to endeavour to obtain equal rights with the Mussulman
subjects of Turkey.
In the summer of 1876 the neighbouring Slavonian principalities of
Montenegro and Servia came to the aid of the Bosnians and Herzegovinians,
and declared war against Turkey. The Montenegrins were under the
leadership of their Prince Nicholas, and the Servian troops under the
command of the Russian General Tchernaiev, the hero of Tashkend, who
volunteered his services to the Slavonians.
Although Montenegro, which was small in the number of its sons, but
mighty by their bravery and their love of freedom, had more than once
defeated the Turkish army, Servia with her few troops could not stand
against the Turkish troops, which definitively overcame the Servian
forces and were about to invade the frontiers of Servia. Russia, however,
did not allow this invasion to take place, and in October, 1876, the
emperor Alexander II required from the Turkish sultan the immediate
cessation of further hostilities against the Servians, and in order to
support these demands he ordered that a portion of the Russian army
should be placed on a war footing. The decisive action of the czar
towards the Turkish government at once stopped the invasion of the
Turkish hordes into Servia, and a two months’ armistice was concluded
between Servia and Turkey.
But in spite of this, the Turks continued their cruelties amongst the
Christians of the Balkans; defenceless Bulgaria in particular suffered
from the fury of the Turks. They traversed the country with fire and
sword, striving to stifle the movement taking place there by the savage
slaughter of thousands of the inhabitants, without distinction of sex or
age.
For a long while Russia endeavoured to avert the situation, without
having recourse to arms, in order--as Alexander II expressed it--“to
avoid shedding the precious blood of the sons of Russia.” But all his
efforts were unsuccessful, all means of arbitration were exhausted and
also the patience of that most peace-loving of monarchs, the emperor
Alexander II. He found himself obliged to declare war against Turkey
and to advance his troops towards the Turkish frontier. On the 19th of
April, 1877, the emperor joined his army at Kishinev, where it had been
commanded to assemble, and on the 24th of the same month, after public
prayers, he informed the troops of their approaching entry upon the
frontiers of Turkey. Thus commenced the Russo-Turkish war, which was
carried on simultaneously in two parts of the world--in Europe and in
Asia.
The commander-in-chief of the Russian troops upon the Asiatic theatre
of the war was the grand-duke Michael Nikolaivitch, governor of the
Caucasus. A few days after the issue of the manifesto declaring war,
the Russian troops had occupied the Turkish fortress of Bajazet without
a struggle (April 30th), and had proceeded to besiege the first class
fortress of Kars, justly regarded as one of the chief points of support
of the Turkish army in Asia Minor, after which at the beginning of
May they took by assault another sufficiently important Turkish
fortress--that of Ardahan.
As to the Danubian army, of which the grand-duke Nicholas Nikolaivitch
was appointed commander-in-chief, on the very day of the declaration
of war it entered into the principality of Roumania, which was subject
to Turkey, and directed its march towards the Danube. At the passage
of the Danube, the problem consisted in diverting the attention of the
Turks from the spot where the chief forces of the Russian army were to
cross. This was accomplished with entire success; complete secrecy was
maintained, and during the night between the 26th and 27th of June the
Russian troops crossed the Danube with the assistance of pontoons and
rafts, at a point where the Turks least expected it, namely from Zimnitzi
(between the fortresses of Rustchuk and Nikopol) to Sistova; the Russian
losses in this great undertaking did not exceed 1,000 men fallen from
the ranks. Having thus crossed the Danube and disembarked on the enemy’s
shores, the Russian troops, without giving their adversaries time to
recover, began to move into the heart of Bulgaria, and took town after
town and fortress after fortress from the Turks.
But in Asia as well as in Europe the first brilliant successes of the
Russians were followed by some serious reverses, which like the victories
were first manifested upon the Asiatic seat of the war. The most serious
reverse of the Russians in Asia was the unsuccessful attack (June 25th)
upon the Turkish stronghold near Zeven, after which the Russian troops
were obliged to raise for a time even the siege of Kars, and to retire
within their own frontiers. But the temporary reverses of the Russian
troops on the European theatre of the war were far more important. The
most serious reverse during the entire period of the Eastern war was the
attack of the Russian troops upon Plevna. Plevna was an insignificant
Bulgarian town. The Russian troops hoped easily to overcome it, and on
the 20th of July a small detachment of them attacked Plevna. But it
turned out that the Turks had already managed to concentrate considerable
forces within the little town, under the command of the best of their
leaders, the gifted and resolute Osman-Pasha, added to which the most
talented European engineers had constructed round Plevna, in the space of
a few days a network of fortifications, rendering Plevna an impregnable
position. In consequence of this the first attack of the Russian troops
on Plevna was repulsed by the Turks; the losses of the Russians amounted
to three thousand killed.
Ten days later (on the 30th of July) the Russian troops made a second
attack against Plevna. But this time again the attack resulted in a like
defeat; the enemy’s forces, which far exceeded those of the Russians,
repelled all the assaults of the Russian troops, added to which this
second attack on Plevna cost the Russians 7,500 men. Following upon this,
with the arrival of fresh reinforcements for the army encamped before
Plevna, a third and final heroic effort was made to take this fortified
position by storm. The chief part in the attack was taken by the brave
young general Skobelev and his detachment. But in spite of his brilliant
action, in spite of the heroism and self-sacrifice displayed by his
soldiers, this assault also was unsuccessful. On the 12th of September,
Skobelev repulsed five furious attacks by the whole mass of Turks, but
not receiving assistance, he was obliged to retreat. This last reverse
cost the Russians as many as 3,000 killed and nearly 10,000 wounded. But
following on these reverses came a rapidly successive series of victories
of the Russian troops over the Turkish, both in Asia and in Europe.
The crowning success of the Russian troops in Asia was the fall on the
18th of November of the terrible stronghold of Kars, which was taken
by General Loris-Melikov, after a heroic assault by night. All Europe
recognised the taking of Kars as one of the greatest and most difficult
of military exploits ever achieved. At the same time, on the European
theatre of the war, on the southern slope of the Balkans a great Turkish
body of troops was concentrated under the command of the talented leader
Suleiman Pasha, with the object of retaking at any cost the Shipka pass,
which was occupied by a small Russian detachment. During the space of
seven days (from the 21st to the 28th of August) the Turks endeavoured to
wrest from the Russians the Shipka pass, and a series of furious attacks
was made with this object. On the first two days a handful of heroes,
who defended the heights of Shipka, repulsed all the desperate efforts
of Suleiman Pasha’s entire army! The echo of the incessant artillery
fire became one endless roll of thunder. The Russian ranks dwindled and
were exhausted from wounds and fatigue. It was at that time that the
Russian gunners, under the command of General Radetzki came to their
assistance, and by the 24th of August fresh reinforcements arrived. The
Turks’ insane attacks still continued during the 25th, 26th and 27th, but
on the evening of the 27th of August all was suddenly quiet; the Turks
had become convinced that they could not overcome the steadfastness and
bravery of the Russian troops defending the Shipka pass, and had retired.
Meanwhile, after the third attempt on Plevna, it was decided not to
renew any more such dearly bought attacks, but to limit operations to
encircling the Turkish positions in order to cut off communication
between Plevna and the surrounding places, and thus to starve the Turks
into surrender.
At the end of October General Gurko’s division, amongst which were
the guards, took Gorni Dubinak, Telisch and a series of other Turkish
strongholds, situated to the southwest of Plevna and protecting the
Sophia road, along which reinforcements and stores had hitherto been
brought into Plevna, and thus to cut off entirely all communications
between that town and the outside. After less than a month’s time all
the provisions that the Turks had in Plevna were definitively exhausted.
On the morning of the 10th of December, Osman Pasha, being desirous of
penetrating through the Russian lines to the Danube, made a violent
attempt to get out of Plevna. He cut his way through, but after some
hours of desperate fighting--during which he was wounded in the leg--he
was thrown back and compelled to surrender, with all his army to the
number of more than 40,000 men. This heated action cost the Russians 600
men killed, and double that amount wounded.
Taking deeply to heart the successes of his valiant army and the holy
work for which it was fighting, the emperor Alexander II had at the end
of May, 1877, at the very commencement, that is, of the war, arrived in
Bulgaria, and in spite of the weak state of his health had remained all
the while amongst the acting army of the Danube, sharing all reverses and
privations of military life on the march.
“I go as a brother of mercy,” said the czar when he set off for the
active army. And actually, leaving to others all the martial glory of
victory over the enemy, the emperor concentrated his attention upon the
sick and wounded soldiers to whom he showed himself not a brother, but a
very father of mercy. Zealously visiting the sick and wounded soldiers in
the hospitals and ambulances, the emperor showed them heartfelt sympathy,
comforted, encouraged, and sustained the sufferers, listened to their
tales with fatherly love, and with his own hand rewarded those who had
distinguished themselves by their services in battle.
[Sidenote: [1877-1878 A.D.]]
The wounded and their families were the object of the emperor Alexander’s
unwearied care. He was rejoiced when the provisions sent out for the
use of the wounded by the empress Marie Alexandrovna arrived from St.
Petersburg. Alexander unfailingly distributed them himself, carefully
inquiring of each soldier what he wanted, what he liked, and strove
to satisfy each sufferer: to the musicians he gave accordions, to the
readers books, to the smokers tobacco pouches, to the non-smokers tea,
dainties, etc. Both soldiers and officers were as pleased as children at
receiving presents from the hand of the royal “brother of mercy,” and
listening to his cordial, gracious words. The soldiers’ love for the
emperor, their joy and rapture at seeing him acted like living water on
the wounded; everyone that could move strove to rise, to stand up, to
take courage; they stretched out their hands to the czar, kissed his
raiment and blessed his name. It was only after the fall of Plevna when
the war clearly inclined to the advantage of the Russians, and further
success was entirely secured that the emperor, bidding farewell to his
troops, left the active army and in the beginning of December, 1877,
returned to Russia.
Immediately after the taking of Plevna it was decided that, without
losing time, the Balkans should be crossed. Meanwhile a severe winter had
already set in and the Turks did not even admit the possibility of the
Russian troops crossing the Balkans at such a time. But here again all
the valour of the Russian army was displayed. To take a whole army across
the Balkans in winter was a work of the very greatest difficulty and
danger; but to cross the Trievna pass had never yet been attempted by any
army in the world. Strictly speaking, the chief part of the Russian army
crossed the Balkans at two other points, but it was part of the Russian
strategy to carry an insignificant portion of the troops across by the
Trievna pass in order that the attention of the Turks should be diverted
from the chief army, and the passage of the latter thus be facilitated.
The accomplishment of this terribly difficult and almost impossible feat
was entrusted to General Kartzov’s division. On the night between the 3rd
and 4th of January the division moved on its road. After having reached
by incredible efforts the very summit of the pass, where a short time
was spent, on the 7th of January General Kartzov’s division stormed the
Turkish redoubt, forced their way into it and drove out the Turks. After
this the Russians had to descend to the so-called Valley of Roses on
the southern slope of the Balkans, which was even much steeper than the
northern. As soon as the Russians had come down from Trievna, the Turks
abandoned their positions at the feet of the Great Balkans, and General
Kartzov’s division entered into communication on one side with General
Gurko’s division, and on the other with the Shipka division of General
Radetzki.
After descending the Balkans to the Valley of Roses, General Radetzki,
together with General Skobelev, who had come to his assistance after the
fall of Plevna, attacked on the 9th of January an army of 40,000 Turks
at Kezanlik, who after a stubborn resistance were defeated and taken
prisoners. After having devastated and scattered the Turkish army of
Shipka and accomplished the feat unexampled in history of the passage
of the Balkans, the Russian army continued its victorious advance;
Adrianople, the second capital of the Turkish empire, was taken without a
struggle and the troops drew near to Constantinople itself. Then, on the
3rd of March, 1878, at a little place called San Stefano, at ten versts
from Constantinople, Turkey signed the conditions of peace offered her by
Russia.
Meanwhile the great European powers required that three conditions of
peace should be submitted to their consideration, and thus the treaty
of San Stefano showed itself to be only a preliminary one; the great
European powers ratified it only after considerable changes. These
altered conditions of peace were signed in 1878 by the plenipotentiaries
of all the great powers at the Congress of Berlin; after which on the
8th of February, 1879, a final treaty of peace, based on these same
conditions, was signed at Constantinople between Russia and Turkey.
The emperor Alexander might certainly with full right have insisted
on the ratification of the treaty of peace of San Stefano without any
alterations; but then Russia would have incurred a fresh war with Europe,
while the emperor deeply felt the necessity of peace. It was time to
give the Russian people rest after they had made such sacrifices in the
struggle for their Slavonian brethren! Pitying his people, the emperor
decided--however painful it might be to him--not to insist on all that
had been gained at the price of Russian blood and confirmed by the treaty
of San Stefano with Turkey, but consented in Berlin to great concessions
which did not, however, in any way interfere with the liberation of the
Christian population of Turkey.
By the treaties of San Stefano and Berlin, that part of Bessarabia was
returned to Russia which, by the Peace of Paris in 1856, had been ceded
to her by Turkey after the Crimean campaign. Thanks to this, Russia again
reached the mouths of the river Danube; in Asia she acquired a portion
of the Turkish possessions, with the port of Batum and the fortress of
Kars, which guaranteed her security and future development. Finally, in
compensating for the military expenditure incurred by Russia, Turkey was
bound to pay her an indemnity of 300 million rubles.
Thus terminated the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878--that decisive
struggle for the liberation of the Slavonians of the Balkan peninsula,
and although in consequence of the interference of Europe Russia was
far from attaining what she had a right to expect after the enormous
sacrifices she had made, and the glorious victories she had gained,
nevertheless the great and sacred object of the war was attained; on the
memorable day of the emancipation of the peasants in Russia, also the
Slavonian nations of the Balkan peninsula were liberated, by the help of
Russia and her great monarch, from the Turkish yoke which had oppressed
them for ages. To the emperor Alexander II, who gave freedom to many
millions of his own subjects, was allotted also the glorious rôle of
liberator of the Balkan Christians, by whom he was a second time named
the Czar Liberator!
SPREAD OF EDUCATION AND CIVILISATION
The new order of things established in Russia, thanks to the great
reforms of Emperor Alexander II, called forth a particular want of
educated, enlightened men. They were necessary to the wise interpretation
and execution of the luminous ideas of the czar-liberator.
Recognising that the spread of education amongst the people is an
indispensable condition of its prosperity, the emperor Alexander II,
who had become convinced by a personal survey of Russia, that one of
the chief obstacles to her progress lay in the ignorance of the people,
wished to give to his subjects the means for the highest degree of
enlightenment. This solicitude was expressed in a radical reform of
all the educational establishments of the empire, beginning with the
university and finishing with the national schools. Properly speaking,
it may be asserted that the primary national schools and village schools
were created during the reign of Alexander II, for until his reign the
primary education of the people was in a sad condition, and amongst them
an almost total ignorance prevailed.
His legislation for the education of the masses should justly be
numbered amongst the most important works of the Czar Liberator. But
many were the other reforms accomplished by him that also had a great
and beneficent signification for the Russian people. During the reign
of the emperor Alexander II the country which had until then but few
means of intercommunication, became covered with a network of railways.
In conjunction with the extraordinarily rapid development of railway
communication, the postal service was perfected, the telegraph made its
appearance, while commerce and trade acquired wide development. Finally,
essential changes and improvements were introduced into the financial
administration of the empire; the police was reorganised and certain
modifications were granted to the press, in consequence of which there
was a powerful awakening in the intellectual life of the people.
THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER II
In studying the wars which took place during the reign of Alexander
II, it is impossible not to remark that they were all entered upon and
carried on, not under the influence of ambition, not with the thirst
for conquest, but exclusively out of a feeling of humanity, in order to
preserve those living on the frontiers of the Russian empire from the
plundering incursions of half savage Asiatic tribes (as was the case
in the subjection of the Caucasus, of Khokand, Bokhara, and Khiva), or
for the deliverance of the oppressed co-religionists of Russia (as, for
example, the deliverance of the Slavonians of the Balkans).
[Illustration: A WINTER COSTUME]
The emperor Alexander II was actively solicitous for the welfare of
his subjects during the twenty-six years of his glorious reign, never
losing sight of the exaltation of the country and the consolidation of
the prosperity of the nation. But in spite of the indefatigable labours
and fatherly care of the emperor Alexander II, in spite of the enormous
services he rendered to the country, of his boundless goodness of heart,
his great clemency and unusual humanity--amongst the Russian people were
to be found those who had more than once tried by violence to shake the
existing state and social organisation of Russia and who did not stop
at any crime for the attainment of their ends. Their boundless audacity
finally reached the last limits, and they dared more than once to make
attempts on the life of the Czar-Liberator.
On the 2nd of March, 1880, the 25th year of the reign of the emperor
Alexander II was accomplished, and this memorable day was celebrated with
heartfelt enthusiasm in both capitals and throughout the whole Russian
Empire. But amongst the millions of joyous Russian hearts, for one man
alone in Russia the festivity was not a festivity. That man was the
czar himself, the creator of the happiness of many millions of Russians
and the cause of the rejoicings. The emperor did not doubt the sincere
affection of the people towards him; he knew and felt that Russia loved
her czar with all her soul; but at the same time he knew and felt, that
in spite of all the glory of his reign, in spite of the great measures he
had accomplished, the Russian land bore a handful of malcontents, whose
designs it was beyond the power of anyone to arrest.
[Sidenote: [1881 A.D.]]
The fatal 13th of March, 1881, came. About one o’clock in the afternoon
the emperor drove in a carriage from the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg,
accompanied by his usual escort, to the Michael riding school to assist
at a grand military parade, appointed to take place that day. Coming
out of the riding school at the end of the parade, at about a quarter
to three, and learning that the grand duke Michael Nikolaivitch, who
was present at the parade intended to visit the grand duchess Catherine
Mikhailovna at the Mikhailovski palace, the emperor proposed to his
brother that they should go together. After spending about half an hour
at the Mikhailovski palace the emperor came out alone, without the grand
duke and told the coachman to “drive home by the same way.” The carriage
set off along the Catherine canal, in the direction of the Theatre bridge.
At three o’clock in the afternoon, at a distance of about 50 sajens from
the corner of the Engineer street, the emperor’s carriage as it drove
along the side of the canal, past the garden of the Mikhailovski palace
came alongside a young man at the footpath of the canal; he afterwards
turned out to be the citizen Nicholas Ivanovitch Rissakov. When he came
on a line with the imperial carriage, Rissakov turned his face towards
it, and before the escort could notice anything, quickly threw beneath
the feet of the horses harnessed to the carriage, something white like
snow, which afterwards turned out to be an explosive instrument wrapped
up in a handkerchief. At the same instant a deafening crash, like a salvo
of artillery, resounded; two Cossacks riding behind the czar’s equipage
fell from their horses wounded, and a fourteen year old peasant boy,
mortally wounded, lay groaning on the pavement; a thick cloud of snow and
splinters filled the air. The emperor’s carriage appeared much damaged
by the explosion, all the four windows and the little glass behind were
broken, the frame of the door was splintered at the side and back, the
side of the carriage was broken and the bottom seriously injured. When he
had thrown the explosive instrument under the carriage, Rissakov began
to run off in the direction of the Nevski Prospect, but at a few sajens
from the spot where the explosion had taken place, he slipped, fell, and
was seized by some soldiers who came up. The emperor himself was entirely
uninjured. He ordered the coachman to stop the horses, opened the left
door, got out of the carriage, and went to the spot where Rissakov was
already surrounded by a crowd of people.
Then, when the emperor, desiring to examine the spot where the explosion
had taken place, had left Rissakov, and had made a few steps along the
pathway of the canal, another man--who turned out to be a Pole named
Grinevetzki--waiting till the emperor was at a distance of two arskins
from him, raised his arms and threw something on the footpath at the
very feet of the emperor. At the same moment, not more than four or
five minutes after the first explosion, another deafening explosion was
heard, after which a mass of smoke, snow and scraps of clothing enveloped
everything for some moments. When the column of smoke dispersed, to the
stricken gaze of the spectators a truly awful sight was presented: about
twenty men more or less severely wounded by the two explosions lay on the
pavement, and amongst them was the emperor. Leaning his back against the
railing of the canal, without his cap or riding cloak, half sitting on
the footpath, was the monarch; he was covered with blood and breathing
with difficulty; the bare legs of the august martyr were both broken, the
blood flowed copiously from them, and his face was covered with blood.
The cap and cloak that had fallen from the emperor’s head and shoulders,
and of which there remained but blood-stained and burnt fragments, lay
beside him.
At the sight of such an unexpected, such an incredible disaster, not
only the uninjured, but also the sufferers from the explosion rushed
to the emperor’s help. Raising the wounded emperor, who was already
losing consciousness, the persons who surrounded him, with the grand
duke Michael, who had arrived on the spot, carried him to the sledge
of Colonel Dvorginski, who had been following the emperor’s equipage.
Leaning over the emperor’s shoulder, the grand duke inquired if he
heard, to which the emperor replied, “I hear,” and then in answer to the
question of how he felt the emperor said: “Quicker ... to the palace,”
and then as if answering the proposal to take him to the nearest house
to get help, the emperor said, “Take me to the palace to die ... there.”
These were the last words of the dying monarch, heard by an eye-witness
of the awful crime of the 13th of March. After this the emperor was
placed in Colonel Dvorginzki’s sledge and transported to the Winter
Palace. When the palace was reached the emperor was already unconscious,
and at 25 minutes of 4 o’clock Alexander II was no more.
The emperor Alexander II was great not only as the czar of a nation of
many millions, but by a life devoted to the welfare of his subjects;
he was great as the incarnation of goodness, love and clemency. The
autocratic monarch of one of the vastest empires of the world, this czar
was governed in all his actions by the dictates of his loving heart.
Showing himself a great example of self-sacrificing human love, he lived
only in order to exalt the land of Russia, to alleviate the necessities
and consolidate the welfare of his people.[d]
FOOTNOTES
[69] [A district containing several villages.]
[Illustration]