Palen, Pyotr Petrovich

The early years

The second son of Baron Pyotr Alekseevich Palen , Peter Palen was born on August 31, 1777 in the south of Courland in the family estate of . About his education, the army certificate says: "He knows how to read and write in Russian, German and French, he knows arithmetic, geometry, trigonometry, history and geography."

At 12 years old, on March 25, 1790, he was enlisted in the Life Guard as a cavalry regiment commander , and on January 1, 1792 he was promoted to army captains with the appointment to the Orenburg Dragoon Regiment. The following year, on August 18, 1893, he was appointed Chief Executive Provider of the Premier Major rank with admission to the Provincial Department.

Over the next four years, Palen changed four regiments. On June 28, 1794, he was transferred to the Moscow Carabinieri , on April 26, 1796, to the Nizhny Novgorod Dragoon , in whose ranks he took part in the siege and capture of Derbent, on November 19, 1797, to His Majesty's Life-Cuirassier , and finally, on September 28, 1798 for a vacancy in the Life Guard Horse Regiment with the production of lieutenant colonels of the guard. Two weeks later, on October 10, he was promoted to colonel . On February 22, 1799, following his father, he was granted the rank of count.

On August 14, 1800, Pyotr Palen was dismissed from service, but a month later, on September 9, he was taken back with the same rank and was appointed adjutant to his father, who was in command of the army at Brest-Litovsk at that time. On September 18, 1800, the 23-year-old colonel was promoted to major general with the appointment of chief of the Kargopol Dragoon Regiment , and six months later, on March 20, 1801, he was appointed chief of the Sumy Hussar Regiment .

On November 2, 1804, he requested leave, and on March 2, 1805, he was dismissed abroad "before the cure of the disease . " He returned to service the same year.

Napoleonic Wars

On November 4, 1805, he set out on a campaign with the regiment, which lasted until March of the following year, but did not take part in hostilities .

He campaigned on October 17 in the 1806 campaign. Being appointed to command the vanguard cavalry of the Russian army, he participated in the battles on December 13 at Lopacin, December 14 at Pultusk , and December 15 at Makuv. He participated in the 1807 campaign on January 13 in the battle of Morungen , on January 26 during the retreat from Landsberg, on January 27 in the battle of Preisisch-Eylau , on February 20–22 at Launau, on May 24–26 at Guttstadt and in pursuit of the enemy to the Passargue River. On May 27, he covered the army’s withdrawal across the Alla River. May 29, participated in the battle of Heilsberg and June 2 at Friedland .

On January 19, 1807 he was awarded the Order of St. George of the 4th class “ in retribution of the excellent courage and courage shown on December 13 at metro Lopachin and 14 at Golomin against the French troops ”, and on April 8 of the same year he was awarded the Order of St. George of the 3rd class " In retaliation for the excellent courage and courage shown in the battle against the French troops on January 26th and 27th at Preisisch Eylau ."

March 20, 1810 received the command of the 3rd Cavalry Division, and in 1812 - the 3rd reserve cavalry corps.

With the beginning of the Patriotic War of 1812, Palen on June 19 participated in the battle at the town of Kozyana. July 15 with the rear guard kept the enemy near Vitebsk, covering the withdrawal of the army of Barclay de Tolly . A. P. Ermolov , referring to this case, recalled ^[3] :

My eyes did not come off the vanguard and the glorious Earl of Palen. The distant army, having entrusted him with its peace of mind, could not shield him with forces proportionate to the enemy, but nothing could shake his courage; I will say with Horace : " If the universe is destroyed, in its ruins it will be buried by the fearless ." Until the fifth hour, the battle continued with equal obstinacy and the rearguard moved to the other side of the city, leaving the enemy surprised by the order.

July 16, participated in the battle near the village of Agaponovshchina, July 23 at Porechye and July 31 at the town of Rudne. On August 10, 1812, for the difference in the case of Vitebsk, he was promoted to lieutenant general ( with seniority from July 15). In August, due to illness, he was forced to leave the army.

On January 1, 1813, Palen took command of a flying corps at the forefront of the main forces of the Russian army, with which he took part in a foreign campaign . On January 19, he occupied Ruzhany, on January 20 - Pultusk, and on January 27 participated in the occupation of Warsaw. In February-March he led the demolition of the fortifications of Prague and in the siege of Modlin , on May 9 in the battle of Bauzen , on May 10 at Reichenbach, on May 11 he covered the army's withdrawal from Goerlitz to Lauban, on May 12 in the battles at Lauban, on May 13 at Leuvenberg, where he was wounded to the head.

Since August 1813, he commanded the vanguard of the column of Count Wittgenstein as part of the Silesian Army. He participated in the battles of August 6 at Hirschberg, August 13 at Leibniz, August 27 at Don, September 2 at Nollendorf, September 3 at Glendorf, September 27 at the village of Gösnitz and the capture of Altenburg , September 28 at the battles at Born. On October 2, he took part in the battle with the enemy cavalry near Leipzig, and on October 4-7 in the Battle of the Peoples , where he received a concussion in the head and shoulder. On October 11, he participated in the battle of Buttelstedt, and after that - in the pursuit of the enemy to the Rhine, through which he crossed on December 22. Saverne occupied December 26, and blocked the fortress of Falsbourg on December 28.

On January 6, 1814, Palen joined forces with the main forces of the Silesian Army. January 17 participated in the battle of Brienne, January 18, covered the retreat of the army to the village of Tran. On January 26, he participated in the capture of Mary, on January 28–29 in the pursuit of the enemy to Nozhan and on January 30 in his capture, on February 4 in the battle near the village of Morman, on February 5–6 he covered the retreat of the army to Nozhan. On February 8 he participated in the battle at Mary, on February 9 at the village of Romilli, on February 15 at Bar-sur-Oba , on February 17 at Villeneuve-Meghrigny, on February 19 at La Brussels, on February 20, when Troyes was captured.

March 2 crossed the Seine at Pont-sur-Seine, March 4-6, participated in the battles of Saint-Martin and the village of Leshel, March 8-9, at the battle of Arcy-sur-Ob , March 13 at Fer-Champenoise , where he defeated parts of Marshal Mortier . March 18, the first of all allied forces entered Paris , for which the next day he was awarded the Order of St. George 2nd class. After the end of the campaign he returned to Russia.

On March 20, 1815 he was appointed commander of the 3rd reserve cavalry corps, with whom he was on a campaign to France from June 28 to September 18. September 3 appointed commander of the 4th reserve cavalry corps. March 1, 1816 was fired on vacation "until the cure of the disease . " On March 12, 1823 he was dismissed from service upon request.

Service under Nicholas I

In 1827, Pyotr Petrovich Palen returned to service and was appointed commander of the 1st Infantry Corps on November 11. On December 6 of the same year, he was promoted to general from the cavalry and granted as adjutant general of His Majesty. On January 19, 1829 he was appointed commander of the 2nd Infantry Corps located at the theater of operations against the Turks , to which he arrived in Bucharest on February 27. After crossing the Danube near Kalarash, he approached Silistra, where on May 11, 16 and 23 he participated in repelling the attacks of the Turkish garrison of the fortress. On May 29 he advanced to Shumla, on May 30 he took part in the battle of Kulevcha, on May 31 he pursued the enemy to the fortress of Pravody, and then he settled down at Shumla. July 5, spoke to the river. Kamchik, after crossing the Balkans, participated in the attack on Karabunar, Slivno, Yambol, and in the capture of Adrianople. On August 8 he advanced to the Visa, which he occupied on August 25, after which he returned to Adrianople.

September 22, 1829 again appointed commander of the 1st Infantry Corps. On October 25, 1829, for the distinction in the last campaign, he was granted the chief of the Sumy hussar regiment.

With the start of the campaign against the Polish rebels, on January 25, 1831, he arrived with a corps at Tykocin. On February 6, he participated in the battle between Kalushin and Minsk, on February 7 at the Waver farm, on February 13 at Grokhuv, on April 14 at Minsk on April 22 in an intensified reconnaissance to the Zimnovodov, on May 1 in the battle between Kalushin and Enjeyuv, on May 13 near the village of Yakats-Stara , May 14 at Ostroleka . On August 25-26 he participated in the assault on Warsaw, after which he advanced to Modlin. In September, he pursued the rebels through Sochachev, Gombin and Koval to Wroclawek, through Lipno and Rypin to the Prussian border, forcing the enemy out of the borders of the Russian Empire. After the campaign, he moved with the building to winter apartments in Plock.

From November 8, 1831 to September 28, 1832, General Palen was on vacation abroad. On January 26, 1834, he was dismissed from the post of corps commander and on January 31 he was appointed a member of the State Council, and on February 21 he was also a member of the Military Council. During the marriage of Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna and the Duke of Leuchtenberg on July 2, 1839, Count Palen was honored to hold a crown over his bridegroom ^[4] .

On March 12, 1835, Count Palen was appointed ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary to France (leaving him a member of the State and Military Councils), and took office on October 7. Emperor Nicholas I wrote about this appointment ^[5] :

This is a man whom I myself have chosen; he will conduct diplomacy, as I think, in the spirit of a loyal military policy; I am grateful to him for giving in to my insistence and accepting this post.

This was a period of cooling Russian-French relations, and Count Palen had to defend the honor of Russia, as in the case of a play that was insulting in content to the Russian government, which the ambassador had to seek a ban on. On October 30, 1841, Count Palen was recalled to Russia, after which he did not return to Paris. The post was corrected by the embassy adviser N. D. Kiselev , and Palen himself spent the summer in Carlsbad and in his Courland estates, and spent the winter in St. Petersburg as an ordinary member of the State Council, in which he “was completely silent, knowing poorly the Russian language and worse " ^[6] . Dismissed from the post of ambassador on April 8, 1851.

February 26, 1847 was appointed inspector general of the cavalry and chief of the cuirassier military order of the regiment . March 30, 1849 enrolled in the lists of the Life Guards Horse Regiment. On February 6, 1853, he was appointed chairman of the Committee, the Highest established on the 18th day of August 1814 (Committee on the Wounded), held this post until January 22, 1862. March 25, 1863 granted the chief of the 5th reserve squadron of the Life Guards Horse Regiment.

Count Palen died on April 19, 1864 in St. Petersburg, and was buried in his estate Gross Ekau ( Bau County of Courland Province). P. A. Valuev wrote in his diary ^[7] :

Today Count Pyotr Palen, a veteran of our generals, died for half a century with unimpeded honor, bearing the glory of the glories of 1812, 1813 and 1814. He died for a long time and suffered a lot before death.

Russian Empire:

• Order of St. Anne 4th (3rd) degree (August 6, 1798)
• Order of St. John of Jerusalem (1800)
• Order of St. George 4th degree (January 29, 1807)
• Order of St. George 3rd degree (April 8, 1807)
• Order of St. Anne 1st Class (December 1, 1807)
• golden sword decorated with diamonds (May 20, 1808)
• diamond signs to the order of St. Anne 1st degree (September 27, 1813)
• Order of St. Alexander Nevsky (October 8, 1813)
• Order of St. George, 2nd Degree (March 19, 1814)
• diamond signs to the order of St. Alexander Nevsky (May 26, 1814)
• medal "In memory of the Patriotic War of 1812" (1814)
• Order of St. Vladimir 2nd degree (September 29, 1814)
• Medal "For the Capture of Paris" (March 19, 1826)
• Order of St. Vladimir 1st degree (June 9, 1829)
• medal "For the Turkish War" (October 1, 1829)
• Order of the White Eagle (March 3, 1831)
• Order of the Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called (September 21, 1831)
• medal "For the capture of the attack of Warsaw" (1832)
• insignia for military dignity of the 1st degree (1832)
• badge of immaculate service for XXXV years (August 22, 1837)
• badge of honor of the immaculate service for XL years (August 22, 1842)
• badge of immaculate service for XLV years (August 22, 1844)
• diamond signs to the order of St. Apostle Andrew the First-Called (April 20, 1845)
• insignia of the immaculate service for L years (August 22, 1850)
• swords for the order of St. Apostle Andrew the First-Called "by right of accession" (August 5, 1855) ^[8]
• portrait of the emperor, adorned with diamonds, to be worn in a buttonhole (May 17, 1855)
• insignia of the immaculate service for LV years (August 22, 1856)

Foreign countries:

• Order of the Red Eagle of the 1st degree (Prussia, 1807)
• Order of Maria Theresa of the 3rd degree (Austria, 1813)
• Order of the Black Eagle (Prussia, June 20, 1840)

• A.N. Petrov. Palen, von der, Petr Petrovich // Russian Biographical Dictionary : in 25 volumes. - SPb. - M. , 1896-1918.
• M.I. Bogdanovich . "Count von der Palen and his time." // Military Library, 1864, No. 94.
• Dictionary of Russian generals, participants in the hostilities against the army of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1812-1815. // Russian archive. The history of the Fatherland in the evidence and documents of the XVIII — XX centuries. : Collection. - M .: TRITE studio N. Mikhalkova , 1996. - T. VII . - S. 506 . - ISSN 0869-20011 . (Comm. A. A. Podmazo )
• List of generals by seniority, corrected March 1, 1864. St. Petersburg, Military Printing House, 1864.
• Shilov D.N. Members of the State Council of the Russian Empire 1801-1906. - SPb., 2007 .-- S. 607-609.