Raevskaya, Ekaterina Nikolaevna

The eldest daughter of General Nikolai Raevsky from marriage with Sofia Alekseevna Konstantinova , granddaughter of Lomonosov . She was born " under the walls of Derbent, " as the tombstone says. Received a wonderful home education. She knew how to conquer people with the firmness and directness of her character, for which friends jokingly called her "Martha the Posadnitsa."

In May 1821, she married the commander of the 16th Infantry Division, Major General Mikhail Fedorovich Orlov, who had previously been the chief of staff of Nikolai Raevsky, who commanded the corps. But the Decembrist uprising put an end to Orlov’s successful career: he was arrested, spent six months in the Peter and Paul Fortress , after which he was sent to his estate with a ban on appearing in the capitals. Ekaterina Nikolaevna shared her link with her husband. At the end of 1826, she came to Moscow to say goodbye to her sister , who was leaving for Siberia to her husband, Decembrist S. G. Volkonsky .

In her Notes, Volkonskaya recalled this:

“Orlova’s sister came to Moscow to say goodbye to me ... seeing me leaving without a fur coat, she was frightened for me and, taking off her salop from her shoulders, put it on me. In addition, she provided me with books, needlework wool and drawings. ”

Nikolai Raevsky , who visited the Orlovs on their estate, wrote to his son :

“Katya is happy in her family, her husband is a man without value, a true native to us, the children are nice, but his business is not in a flourishing position, a village in which he, as a prisoner, is a boring, sad desert. But they are healthy and Orlova’s character doesn’t change in fun ”.

After permission in 1831 to move to Moscow, the Orlovs settled on Malaya Dmitrovka , and then lived on Prechistenka . At that time A.I. Herzen , I.S. Turgenev , and J.P. Polonsky visited their house. The contemporaries' letters preserved regrets about the death of Mikhail Orlov in 1842 and the courage of his wife:

On Thursday, the 19th, Orlov passed away. It is impossible to retell how his wife assorted the soul. She did not leave him, day or night, did not cry, and even talked to everyone, but it was simply visible to everyone that she was not on earth.

- A letter to her husband from Moscow on March 23, 1842 Avdotya Petrovna Elagina

After the death of her husband, Ekaterina Nikolaevna traveled a lot, then leaving abroad, then returning, she lived in Moscow, then in St. Petersburg, then in Tsarskoye Selo . She devoted a lot of time to organizing papers and describing the archives of her great-grandfather, Mikhail Vasilievich Lomonosov. Until a very old age she kept a sharp mind, clarity of soul and friendliness of morals. She continued to be interested in literature, carefully following what was written about Pushkin. She died in 1885 in Tsarskoye Selo, was buried in the Novodevichy Convent , next to her husband.

Ekaterina Nikolaevna met Alexander Pushkin in St. Petersburg in 1817. But they got to know each other better during the joint journey of the Raevskys and the poet through the Caucasus in 1820.

They often talked and argued about literature. In letters, Pushkin spoke of Ekaterina Nikolaevna with great respect. On September 24, 1820, he wrote to his brother :

“My friend, the happiest moments of my life I spent in the middle of the family of the venerable Raevsky, I did not see a hero in him, the glory of the Russian army, I loved a man with a clear mind, with a simple, beautiful soul, a condescending, guardian friend, always a sweet, affectionate the owner ... All of his daughters - the eldest charm - is an extraordinary woman. ”

He also wrote: "I admit, I cherish the thought of this woman more than the opinions of all magazines in the world, and of our entire public."

Usually they mention the relationship of Pushkin and the youngest of the Raevsky sisters, Maria Nikolaevna , to whom the dedication of the poem " Poltava " is attributed. Later, in her “Notes”, Maria Volkonskaya wrote of Pushkin like this:

“As a poet, he considered it a duty to be in love with all the pretty women and young girls he met ... In essence, he only loved his muse and put on poetry everything he saw.”

Some Pushkin scholars suggest that Catherine inspired Pushkin to write a number of poems ^[1] . Most often, the passage "Beauty in front of the Mirror", written on February 9, 1821 in Kiev, during his stay in the Raevskys' house, is associated with her name:

A. I. Turgenev wrote to Vyazemsky in February 1821: “Mikhail Orlov marries the daughter of General Raevsky, according to whom the poet Pushkin sighs.”

The letters between the sisters Raevsky and Pushkin are unknown, but in their family correspondence his name is often found. One of the poet’s biographers P.K. Huber believed that the letters of Ekaterina Raevskaya-Orlova testify to some disregard for Pushkin, while other researchers see them as attention to Pushkin, covered by an external chill and stiffness. In her letters to brother Alexander, there are such lines:

“Pushkin no longer pretends to be cruel, he very often comes to us to smoke his pipe and talks or talks very nicely. He has just finished an ode to Napoleon, which, in my humble opinion, is good, as far as I can judge, having heard it partly once. ”

- November 12, 1821

"We very often see Pushkin, who comes to argue with her husband about all kinds of subjects."

- November 23, 1821

“... Pushkin sent Nikolai (brother Orlova - N. Raevsky) an excerpt from a poem that he does not think to print or finish. This is a strange idea, responding, it seems to me, to Byron. ”

- December 8, 1822

In turn, Pushkin also spoke about Orlova in correspondence. In a letter from Mikhailovsky to P. A. Vyazemsky about the Boris Godunov tragedy, he wrote:

“Today I finished the second part of my tragedy ... my Marina is a glorious woman: the real Katerina Orlova! Know her? But do not say this to anyone. ”

Some researchers believe that the poet was in love with Ekaterina Nikolaevna, assigning her either the role of NN - hidden love , then “Katerina III” in his Don Juan list .

Since 1821, married to Mikhail Orlov . In the marriage, the couple had two children:

• Nikolai (1822-1886) - married since 1857 to Olga Pavlovna Krivtsova (1838-1926), the granddaughter of N. G. Repnin-Volkonsky . His daughter, his mother’s complete namesake, Ekaterina Nikolaevna Orlova (the youngest) is the wife of S. A. Kotlyarevsky .
• Anna (1826–1887) - married to Major General Prince Vladimir Vladimirovich Yashville (1813 / 1815–1864), son of Prince V. M. Yashville

• Russian portraits of the XVIII — XIX centuries . Ed. Led. Prince Nikolai Mikhailovich. SPb. 1906. T. II vol. IV. Number 156.
• N.Rabkina. Orlova Ekaterina Nikolaevna // Worker: journal. - 1980s.

• Nina Zababurova. All his daughters are cute // relga: electronic magazine. - 2000-02-09. - No. 3 (33) .