Peter the Great

by Robert K. Massie

  On August 18, the Imperial Council met to consider the dilemma. Alexis could not be summarily dispatched back to Peter; if the Tsar's protestations of mercy later proved false, Austria would then be accused of having played a part in Alexis' death. On the other hand, a large Russian army was stationed in Poland and North Germany. Such was Peter's character, it was believed,

  that if thwarted he might divert his troops from the war against Charles XII to march on Silesia and Bohemia. The solution eventually reached was to reply to Peter's letter that the Emperor had actually been performing a service for the Tsar by attempting to preserve the affection between father and son and by not allowing Alexis to fall into the hands of a hostile nation. The Emperor insisted to Tolstoy that Alexis was not a prisoner in Naples: He was and always had been free.to go where he liked. Meanwhile, the Emperor instructed his viceroy in Naples that the Tsarevich was not to be forced into anything and that precautions were to be taken to make sure the Russian did not assassinate the fugitive.

  On September 26, 1717, Alexis was invited to the Viceroy's palace in Naples. Led into a chamber, he saw, to his horror, Tolstoy and Rumyantsov standing beside the Viceroy. The Tsarevich trembled; the Viceroy, Count Daun, had not told him of their presence, suspecting that if he had known, he would not have come. Alexis, aware that the giant Rumyantsov was an intimate of his father's, expected the sudden flash of a sword blade. Gradually, Tolstoy, speaking in his most reassuring tones, persuaded the young man that they had come only to deliver a letter from Peter, to listen to his thoughts and to wait for his reply. Still trembling, the Tsarevich took the letter and read it.

  My Son:

  Your disobedience and the contempt you have shown for my orders are known to all the world. Neither my words nor my corrections have been able to bring you to follow my instructions, and last of all, having deceived me when I bade you farewell and in defiance of the oaths you made, you have carried your disobedience to the highest pitch by your flight and by putting yourself like a traitor under a foreign protection. This'is a thing hitherto unheard of, not only in our family, but among our subjects of any consideration. What wrong and what grief have you thereby occasioned to your father, and what shame have your drawn upon your country!

  I write to you for the last time to tell you that you are to do what Messrs. Tolstoy and Rumyantsov will tell you and declare to be my will. If you are afraid of me, I assure you and I promise to God and His judgement that I will not punish you. If you submit to my will by obeying me and if you return, I will love you better than ever. But if you refuse, then I as a father, by virtue of the power I have received from God, give you my everlasting curse; and as your sovereign, I declare you traitor and I assure you I will find the means to use you as such, in which I hope God will assist me and take my just cause into His hands.

  As for what remains, remember I forced you to do nothing. What need had I to give you a free choice? If I had wished to force you, was it not in my power to do it? I had but to command and I would have been obeyed.

  Peter

  Finishing the letter, Alexis told the two envoys that he had put himself under the Emperor's protection because his father had decided to deprive him of the crown and put him in a monastery. Now that his father had promised parden, he said, he would reflect and reconsider; he could not answer immediately. Two days later, when Tolstoy and Rumyantsov returned, Alexis told them that he was still afraid to go back to his father and would continue to ask the hospitality of the Emperor. Hearing this, Tolstoy put on a different face. Roaring with anger, storming about the room, he threatened that Peter would make war on the empire, that the Tsar eventually would take his son dead or alive as a traitor, that wherever he might flee, there would be no escape because Tolstoy and Rumyantsov had orders to remain close by until they took him.

  His eyes staring with fright, Alexis grasped the Viceroy by the hand, pulled him into an adjoining room and begged Count Daun to guarantee the Emperor's protection. Daun, whose orders were to facilitate the interviews while at the same time preventing violence, suspected his master's dilemma. Believing that if he could help persuade the Tsarevich to return voluntarily he would be doing a service to all parties, he calmed Alexis. But he began to work with Tolstoy.

  Meanwhile, Tolstoy turned his fertile mind to other intrigues worthy of his years in Constantinople. With 160 ducats, he bribed the Viceroy's secretary to whisper in the Tsarevich's ear that he had heard that the Emperor had decided to return the son to the angry father. Next, speaking again to Alexis himself, Tolstoy lied, saying that he had received a new letter from Peter announcing that he was coming to seize his son by force and that the Russian army soon would be marching toward Silesia. The Tsar himself meant to come to Italy, Tolstoy went on. "And when he is here, who can prevent him from seeing you?" he asked. At the thought, Alexis turned pale.

  Finally, Tolstoy's relentless mind located the key to Alexis' decision: It was Afrosina. Observing the Tsarevich's almost desperate need for the serf, he told the Viceroy that she was a major cause of the rift between father and son. Further, he suggested, Afrosina was still encouraging Alexis not to return home because there her own status would be questionable. At Tolstoy's urging, Count Daun issued orders to remove the girl from Castle St. Elmo. When Alexis heard this, his defenses crumbled. He wrote to Tolstoy, begging him to come alone to the castle so that they might work out an agreement. His battle almost won, Tolstoy then persuaded Afrosina, with promises and gifts, to urge her lover to return home. She did as she was asked, begging her lover in tears to give up his last desperate idea: a flight to the Papal States to put himself under the protection of the Pope.

  Alexis was now emotionally and psychologically battered to the point of submission. His choice lay between returning to Russia in the company of his mistress to receive his father's pardon, or the removal of Afrosina and of the Emperor's protection, leaving him at the mercy of Tolstoy and Rumyantsov or, worse, Peter himself. The choice was obvious, and when Tolstoy arrived, the Tsarevich quickly capitulated. Although hesitant and filled with fear and misgiving, he told the Ambassador: "I will go to my father on two conditions: that I may be allowed to live quietly in a country house and that Afrosina will not be taken away from me." Tolstoy, mindful of Peter's command to get the Tsarevich back to Russia by any means, instantly agreed; indeed, he promised Alexis that he would write personally to the Tsar asking permission for the Tsarevich to marry Afrosina immediately. Cynically, Tolstoy explained in his letter to Peter that this marriage would demonstrate that Alexis had fled not for serious political reasons but simply for frivolous love of a peasant girl. This in turn, Tolstoy added, would strip away any last sympathy the Emperor might have for his erstwhile brother-in-law.

  Alexis wrote begging the Tsar's forgiveness and entreating that the two conditions to which Tolstoy had agreed might be carried out. On November 17, Peter replied: "You ask for pardon. It has already been promised to you orally and in writing by Messrs. Tolstoy and Rumyantsov, and I now confirm it, of which you can be fully assured. As regards certain other wishes expressed by you [marriage to Afrosina], they will be allowed to you here." To Tolstoy, Peter explained that he would permit the marriage if Alexis still wished it on his return, but that it must take place either on Russian soil or in one of the newly conquered Baltic territories. Peter also promised to grant Alexis' wish to live in peace in a country house. "Perhaps he may doubt whether he will be allowed to do this," the Tsar wrote to Tolstoy, "but let him reason thus: when I have pardoned such a great crime, why should I not allow this little matter?"

  Once Alexis had agreed to return and had written this to the Emperor in Vienna, there could be no question of detention by the imperial authorities. The Tsarevich left Castle St. Elmo with Tolstoy and Rumyantsov, and, traveling slowly and feeling more relaxed, he made a pilgrimage to Bari to visit the shrine of St. Nicholas, the miracle worker. From there, he went to Rome, where he visited the holy shrines in a Vatican carriage and was received b
y the Pope. In a cheerful mood, he reached Venice, where he was persuaded to leave Afrosina behind so that she would not have to cross the Alps in winter in her delicate state.

  For the Tsarevich's wary escorts, Tolstoy and Rumyantsov, and for Veselovsky, who was waiting for them near Vienna, the passage through the Imperial capital posed something of a gauntlet to be run. Alexis was asking that the party halt in Vienna so that he could call on the Emperor and thank him for his hospitality. Tolstoy, however, was afraid that one or both of the brothers-in-law might have a change of mind which would upset the success of his mission. Accordingly, he arranged for Veselovsky to spirit the little party through Vienna in a single night. By the time the Emperor heard about it, the Tsarevich and his escorts were already north of the city in the town of Brunn in the imperial province of Moravia.

  Charles was alarmed and indignant. He had suffered needles of conscience over what he had permitted to take place in Naples. To reassure himself, he had resolved to interview his brother-in-law in Vienna to make sure that the Tsarevich truly was returning to Russia voluntarily. The Emperor hoped, of course, that this was so; repatriation of the embarrassing guest would remove a large thorn from his own foot. But honor required that Alexis consent; the imperial dignity could not permit the Tsarevich to be dragged away by force. Thus, a meeting of the Council was hastily convened and a messenger dispatched to Count Colloredo, Governor of Moravia, commanding him to detain the Russian party until Alexis had personally assured the Governor that he was traveling freely at his own wish.

  Tolstoy, finding his inn surrounded by soldiers, denied that the Tsarevich was in the party. He threatened to use his sword to prevent anyone from entering Alexis' room, and promised that the episode would summon the vengeance of Tsar Peter. The Governor, taken aback, sent to Vienna for new instructions, and again he was ordered not to permit Tolstoy's party to leave Briinn until he had seen and talked with the Tsarevich; if necessary, he was to use force to achieve this. This time, Tolstoy backed down. The interview was permitted, although the Govern's request to speak to Alexis alone was ignored; Tolstoy and Rumyantsov remained in the room. Under the circumstances, Alexis spoke only in monosyllables, saying that he was anxious to return to his father and that he had not stopped to call on the Emperor because he lacked court clothes and a suitable carriage. The game was over. The forms of propriety and diplomatic etiquette had been observed. The Governor and, through him, the Emperor had discharged their obligations; permission to depart was granted. Within a few hours, Tolstoy had secured new horses and the Russian party was gone. It reached Riga in Russian-occupied territory on January 21, 1718. From there, Alexis was taken to Tver near Moscow, to await his father's summons.

  Afrosina remained in Venice, intending to travel in better weather and at a more leisurely pace. As he journeyed farther from her, Alexis wrote to her constantly, expressing his love and concern: "Do not trouble yourself. Take care of yourself on the road. Go slowly because the road in the Tyrol is stony, as you know. Stop where you want as many days as you like. Do not consider the money expense. Even if you spend much, your health is dearer to me than anything." He counseled her on places to buy medicines in Venice and Bologna. From Innsbruck, he wrote, "Buy either here or somewhere else a comfortable carriage." To one of her servants, he pleaded, "Do all you can to amuse Afrosina so that she will not be unhappy." Arriving in Russia, his first concern was to send her some women servants and an Orthodox priest. His last letter, written from Tver, where he was waiting his father's summons, was optimistic: "Thank God, all is well. I expect to be rid of everything so as to live with you, if God allow, in the country, where we will not have trouble about anything."

  While Alexis was pouring his heart out to her, his beloved Afrosina was enjoying her new status as the favorite of both the son and—through her aid to Tolstoy—the father. She amused herself in Venice, riding in a gondola and buying cloth of gold for 167 ducats, a cross, earrings and a ruby ring. Most of her letters lack the urgency and passion displayed by her lover; indeed, they were written by a secretary, with the uneducated mistress usually adding a few lines in her large, ill-formed scrawl, begging Alexis to send her some cavier, smoked fish or kasha by the next courier.

  In Russia, news of the Tsarevich's return stirred mixed feelings. No one knew quite how to receive him: Was it the heir to the throne or a traitor to Russia who now waited outside Moscow to see his father? De la Vie, the French commercial agent, expressed this strange, uneasy mood: "The arrival of the Tsarevich caused as much joy to some as grief to others. Those who took his part were glad before his return in hope that some revolution would take place. Now all is changed. Policy takes the place of discontent and everything is quiet while waiting for the result of the affair. His return is generally disapproved, for it is believed that he will have the same fate as his mother." Some observers, especially those who had hoped that the heir would oudast and succeed his father, were angry and disgusted. Said Ivan Naryshkin: "That Judas of a Peter, Tolstoy, has delivered the Tsarevich." Said Prince Vasily Dolgoruky to Prince Gagarin: "Have you heard that that fool of a Tsarevich is coming here because his father has allowed him to marry Afrosina? He will have a coffin instead of a wedding!"

  54

  THE FUTURE ON TRIAL

  On winter mornings in Moscow, a pale sun emerges to cast a hazy light on the snow-covered rooftops of the ancient city. At nine o'clock on such a morning, February 3, 1718, the great men of Russia were assembled in solemn conclave in the Great Audience Hall of the Kremlin. Ministers and other officials of the government, the highest dignitaries of the clergy and the leading members of the nobility had gathered to witness a historic act: the disinheritance of a Tsarevich and the proclamation of a new heir to the throne of Russia. To underscore the drama and its potential dangers, three battalions of the Preobrazhensky Regiment had been brought into the Kremlin and stationed around the palace with muskets loaded.

  Peter arrived first and took his place upon the throne. Then Alexis was escorted in by Tolstoy. The status of the Tsarevich was clear to everyone: He lacked his sword and therefore came as a prisoner. Alexis confirmed this instantly by going straight to his father, falling on his knees, acknowledging his guilt and begging pardon for his crimes. Peter ordered his son to rise while a written confession was read aloud:

  Most Clement Lord and Father. I confess once more at present that I have swerved from the duties of a child and of a subject in evading and putting myself under the Emperor's protection and by applying to him for support. I implore your gracious pardon and your clemency. The most humble and incapable servant, unworthy to call himself son, Alexis.

  The Tsar then denounced his son formally, condemning him for repeatedly ignoring his father's commands, for his neglect of his wife, for his relations with Afrosina, for his desertion from the army and, finally, for his dishonorable flight to a foreign country. Speaking loudly, Peter announced that the Tsarevich begged only for his life and was ready to renounce the inheritance. Out of mercy, Peter continued, he had assured Alexis of his pardon, but only on condition that the whole truth of his past conduct and the names of all who had been his accomplices be revealed. Alexis agreed and followed Peter into a small nearby chamber, where he swore that only Alexander Kikin and Ivan Afanasiev, the Tsarevich's valet, had known that he planned to flee. Father and son then returned to the Audience Hall, where Vice Chancellor ShafirOv read a printed manifesto listing the offenses of the Tsarevich, declaring that he had been both pardoned and disinherited, and proclaiming that Catherine's son, the two-year-old Tsarevich Peter Petrovich, was now the heir to the throne. From the palace, the entire assembly walked across the Kremlin courtyard to the Assumption Cathedral, where Alexis, kissing the Gospel and a cross, swore before the holy relics that when his father died, he would bear faithful allegiance to his little half-brother and never attempt to regain the succession for himself. Everyone present took the same oath. That night, the manifesto was published, and over the next three da
ys all citizens of Moscow were invited to visit the cathedral and swear the new oath of allegiance to Peter Petrovich as heir to the throne to the whole of the garrison, the nobility, the townspeople and the peasants.

  The two public ceremonies in Moscow and St. Petersburg seemed to bring the affair to an end. Alexis had resigned his claim to the throne; a new heir had been proclaimed. What more was necessary? A great deal more, as it turned out. For the terrible drama was only beginning.

  Peter's decree in the Kremlin ceremony, making his pardon conditional on Alexis' revealing the names of all his advisors and confidants, introduced a new element into the affair between father and son. This was, in fact, a betrayal by the Tsar of the promise given the Tsarevich by Tolstoy at Castle St. Elmo. There, Alexis had been promised an unconditional pardon if he would return to Russia. Now, it was demanded that he name all his "accomplices" and not conceal even the slightest of the "conspiracy."

  The reason, of course, was Peter's gnawing curiosity to know how far the threat to the throne and perhaps his life had gone, and his growing determination to know who among his subjects—and perhaps even among his advisors and intimates—had secretly sided with his son. He could not believe that Alexis would have fled without assistance and without some conspiratorial purpose.

  Thus, as Peter saw it, this was no longer merely a family drama, but a political confrontation involving the permanence of the achievements of his reign. He had settled the succession on another son, but Alexis remained alive and free. How could Peter be sure that, after his own death, the same nobles who had so speedily signed the oath to two-year-old Peter Petrovich would not equally hastily overturn their vows and rush to support Alexis? Above all, how could he continue to surround himself with familiar faces, now knowing which among them had been false?