Chapter VII: Catherine I to Peter III (4)

On the seventh day after our acceptation of the throne of all
the Russias, we received the news that the former emperor
Peter III, by an attack of hemorrhage which was common and
previously frequent to him, had fallen into a most dangerous
condition. In order therefore not to neglect our Christian duty
and the sacred command, by which we are obliged to preserve the
life of our neighbour, we immediately ordered that everything
necessary should be sent to him in order to avert consequences
that might be dangerous to his health through this mischance,
and tend to assist to his speedy recovery. But to our extreme
grief and trouble of heart, we yesterday evening received news
that, by the will of God, he had departed this life. We have
therefore commanded that his body should be taken to the Nevski
monastery to be there interred; meanwhile we incite and exhort
all our true and faithful subjects by our imperial and maternal
word that, without evil remembrance of all that is past, they
should raise to God their heartfelt prayers that forgiveness
and salvation of his soul may be granted to the deceased;
this unexpected decree by God of his death we accept as a
manifestation of the divine providence through which God in
his inscrutable judgment lays the path, known to his holy will
alone, to our throne and to the entire fatherland. Given at St.
Petersburg on the 7th day of July, 1762.

CATHERINE.

The Russian made the sign of the cross as he read this manifesto. Yes, the judgments of God are indeed inscrutable! The former emperor had experienced in his last days so many sorrows, so many reverses--no wonder his feeble, sickly nature, which had already suffered from attacks of hemorrhage, would not withstand these shocks; in the matter of death nobody is free: he had fallen ill and died. To the common people his death appeared natural; even the upper classes, although they might hear even if they did not know something, did not admit any thoughts of Catherine’s having had any share in his death. The empress “must not be suspected” and she remained unsuspected. On the night between Sunday, the 7th of July, and Monday, the 8th, the body was brought straight to St. Petersburg, directly to the present monastery of St. Alexander Nevski to the same place where the body of the princess Anna of Brunswick was exposed for reverence, and later on the body of the princess Anna Petrovna, Catherine’s daughter.[e]

FOOTNOTES

[49] It is said that when the infant Ivan heard the shouts of the soldiers in front of the palace, he endeavoured to imitate their vociferations, when Elizabeth exclaimed, “Poor babe! thou knowest not that thou art joining in the noise that is raised at thy undoing.”

[50] The mother died in childbed, 1746; the father survived until 1780.

[51] She is said to have been privately married to a singer; but this is doubtful. What is certain is that her lovers were as numerous after as before the alleged union.

[52] The exact expression in Russian is _Matushka_ (little mother), a title of endearment given by the people to the sovereign.

[53] Prince Theodore Sergeivitch Bariatinski.