Russia’s tsar is brutally beaten to death
A plot to force the unpopular Paul I to abdicate results in his murder
Catherine the Great was a hard act to follow. Even so, her son and heir Paul, who became tsar of Russia in 1796, made a pretty wretched fist of it. Having been separated from his mother as a boy, he had become obsessed with military minutiae and kicked off his regime by introducing Prussian-style uniforms, which proved deeply unpopular with his soldiers. His plans to force the nobility to subscribe to a new code of chivalry produced an angry reaction, while the total failure of his anti-French foreign policy made for a stark contrast with Catherine’s canny diplomacy.
On the night of 23 March, matters came to a head. After a frosty dinner party, Paul had retired to bed in St Petersburg’s Mikhaylovsky Palace. Meanwhile, a group of aristocratic officers, including the city’s military governor Count Pahlen, were fortifying themselves with champagne before the action to come. At last, they burst into the emperor’s chambers, forcing their way past his valet and literally dragging Paul out in his nightcap.
Many accounts agree that the plotters initially planned to force Paul to abdicate, but alcohol soon took over. In the confusion, one officer hit the struggling Paul in the face with a golden snuffbox. The emperor went down, and a group of the plotters piled on top of him, kicking and choking him. One of them wrapped a sash around his neck and began to tighten. Then, when he had stopped twitching, they kicked and stamped on his body, until they were pulled away.
The next morning, when Paul’s son Alexander, now emperor, reviewed the guards, they were wearing their old uniforms.