Oldenburg, Peter Georgievich

A few days before the Battle of Borodino, Prince George Petrovich Oldenburgsky and the wife of his Grand Duchess Catherine Pavlovna had a son, named at the baptism of Konstantin-Friedrich-Peter, later known in Russia under the name of Prince Peter Georgievich. Four months from birth, the prince lost his father and was transferred to his grandmother, Empress Maria Feodorovna , wife of Emperor Paul I , and then, when Ekaterina Pavlovna entered into a new marriage with the Crown Prince of Württemberg , he followed his mother to Stuttgart .

In his eighth year, he lost his mother and, at her request, expressed by the princess before his death, was taken to Oldenburg to his grandfather, Duke of Oldenburg, Peter Friedrich-Ludwig, where he was further educated with his older brother, Prince Friedrich-Paul-Alexander . Incidentally, the circle of sciences that the prince was supposed to go through included ancient and new languages, geometry, geography, and also the Russian language. Recently, his stay in Oldenburg, the prince with particular love engaged in legal sciences and logic under the leadership of Christian Runde. In 1829, Greece gained political independence in the Adrianople peace, and some diplomats of that time called Prince of Oldenburg the candidate for the Greek throne. But at the end of 1830, Emperor Nicholas I called the prince (his nephew) to Russian service.

On December 1, 1830, the prince arrived in St. Petersburg , was greeted very cordially by the emperor, enlisted in active service in the Life Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment, and made the owner of the estate in Peterhof . During the five-year service of his regiment, the prince first commanded the 2nd battalion, and then (temporarily) the regiment, and for the difference in service , was promoted to major general on August 6, 1832, and to lieutenant general on December 6, 1834 . On his initiative and under his control, a school was established in the Preobrazhensky regiment; Along with literacy at this school, attention was also paid to the moral side of students.

On March 12, 1835, he was appointed a member of the council of military schools, and in May of the following year he temporarily corrected the duties of the head of military schools. On December 6 of that year, he was appointed chief of the Starodub cuirassier regiment. At the same time, the prince did not stop his education and continued to engage in literature (he translated Pushkin's “ Queen of Spades ” in French in 1834 ), history, the natural sciences, and especially the legal sciences (under the direction of K. I. Arsenyev ).

In 1834 he left military service. The reason for the transition to the civil service was the following incident (known from the words of Polovtsov , whom the prince himself told). During his service in the Preobrazhensky regiment, the prince had, by official duty, to be present at corporal punishment of a woman, and stick strikes were carried out by soldiers on her bare shoulders. Outraged by this picture, the prince from the place of execution went to the then Minister of the Interior Count Bludov and told him that he would never again take part in orders to enforce such a punishment that did not exist with any enlightened people, and therefore asked report to the Emperor his request for resignation. The prince was appointed a member of the consultation with the Minister of Justice, and after that (April 23, 1834) as a senator.

In a new place, the prince quickly became convinced that Russia was sorely lacking officials with a legal education, and that this required a special legal higher educational institution. The prince elaborated in detail the draft of the new “School of Jurisprudence” and presented it to the sovereign at the sole discretion, with a promise to donate the amount needed to purchase a house and initial acquirement of the school. The prince’s letter with the draft, dated October 26, 1834 , the sovereign handed to M. M. Speransky , with the inscription:

On May 29, 1835 , the draft and staff of the school of law were already reviewed and approved by the prince, together with Speransky , and on the third day the highest rescript followed, with which the prince was entrusted with the school. By the end of November of the same 1835, the building bought at the expense of the prince on the corner of Fontanka and Sergievskaya Street (now Tchaikovsky Street ) was redone and adapted to open a school in it (the purchase of the building and its adaptation and acquisition cost the prince more than 1 million rubles ) December 5, 1835 followed by the solemn, in the presence of the emperor, the opening of the school. On the same day, the prince was approved by the highest rescript with the rank of trustee of the school and was granted the knight of the Order of St. Vladimir of the 2nd degree. From the moment the school was founded until his death, for almost half a century, the prince took care of this institution.

December 6, 1836 he was ordered to attend the Council of State in the Department of Civil and Spiritual Affairs with the right to occupy the post of chairman in his absence. February 25, 1842 the highest was ordered to be the chairman of the department, and in this rank the prince took an active part in the reforms of the 1860s, namely in the reform of the peasant and judicial.

In April 1837, he married the daughter of Duke Wilhelm of Nassau - Princess Theresa-Wilhelmina-Charlotte .

In 1838 , in view of numerous personal and official occupations, he asked for his dismissal from his presence in the Senate, and this request was respected on February 17 of that year. September 30, 1839 he was highly appointed honorary guardian at the St. Petersburg Board of Trustees and a member of the Councils of the Educational Society of Noble Maidens and the School of the Order of St. Catherine. On October 14 of that year, he was entrusted with the management of the St. Petersburg Mariinsky Hospital for the Poor.

The activities of the prince took on a broader dimension since 1844 , when he was entrusted with the presidency of the St. Petersburg Board of Trustees. The gradual increase in the number of women's educational institutions required new forms of government; their very charters needed to be reviewed. To this end, in 1844, a committee was formed under the chairmanship of the Prince of Oldenburg, which developed ranks, staff and programs. Then ( December 30, 1844) at IV Sep. The Educational Committee was established as its own EIV Chancellery as the central department for education in women's educational institutions; and from January 1, 1845 - a special Main Council chaired by the Prince of Oldenburg and for a long time playing the role of a special ministry of female education in Russia.

In 1851 he was appointed chairman of the Study Committee, and thus became the head of women's upbringing and education. In his activity, the prince took care of the further and wider development of the educational business and always went to meet the needs of the educational institutions subordinate to him. From the works and notes of the prince, mention should be made of a note compiled by him in 1851 and soon implemented on the teaching of gymnastics; then "Manual for the education of pupils of women's educational institutions" ( 1852 ). In 1855, the Main Council, under the chairmanship of the prince, worked out a charter for women's educational institutions, which was highly approved on August 30, 1855 . On April 19, 1858, according to the thoughts and instructions of Empress Maria Alexandrovna and with his active assistance, the first seven-year female school for incoming girls was opened in Russia, named Mariinsky, whose prince was appointed guardian.

In the same year, several more public schools opened in St. Petersburg. On February 26, 1859, the prince approved the internal rules of the Mariinsky Women's School, which fully reflected those humane ideas that the prince was carrying. On the model of the Mariinsky School, public educational institutions were soon opened in the provinces; by 1883, there were already up to thirty of them. On August 12, 1860, the draft Regulation on the General Directorate of the Institutions of Empress Maria was highly approved; according to the Regulation, the main management of these institutions was concentrated in the IV branch of His Majesty's own Chancellery; the head of the department was ex officio the chairman of the Main Council of Women's Educational Institutions and the St. Petersburg Board of Trustees.

The sovereign appointed Prince P. G. Oldenburgsky as the chief manager and approved the draft so that the position and decree would display: " Tver , August 14 , that is, the birthday of Prince Oldenburg." On May 5, 1864 , on the occasion of the centenary of the educational society of noble maidens, the highest rescript said in his name: “The title of general manager was only a fair recognition of your twenty years of merit to the good of institutions under your direct protection.”

In 1844, under his chairmanship, rules and regulations were developed for two-year pedagogical courses at the Alexander Women's Schools in St. Petersburg and Moscow; in addition, the theoretical and practical courses of candidates at both orphanages in the capital city were transformed. Finally, in view of the rapid spread of female gymnasiums and the lack of well-trained teachers , pedagogical courses were founded in 1863 , and in 1871, in order to train French teachers, according to the prince and his initiative, a French class was established at the Nikolaev Orphanage Institute with a two-year course for graduates of the institute who completed the course with first awards. In 1864, a teaching seminary was established at the St. Petersburg Educational House and 20 elementary schools were opened in its districts; the number of schools, as well as the number of shelters, gradually increased.

On March 10, 1867, with the highest permission, he opened in St. Petersburg, at his own expense, a children's shelter for 100 children under the name "Shelter in memory of Catherine and Mary", which since 1871 was renamed the "Children's Shelter of Catherine, Mary and George." In addition, many improvements and transformations were also due to him at the vocational school at the Moscow Educational House, whose charter and staff were again developed in 1868 and the school itself was renamed the Imperial Moscow Technical School . The results of the reforms were not soon slowed down: the school exhibits attracted general attention at Russian and foreign exhibitions.

In 1840 he was appointed Chief Executive Officer of the St. Petersburg Commercial School, which he underwent fundamental reforms. On June 28, 1841, the new charter of the school was highly approved, and since then the prince was already the trustee of the latter. In the same year, the prince assumed the title of President of the Imperial Free Economic Society, and since 1860 he was an honorary member; during the presidency of the prince, a new charter of society was developed.

On November 6, 1843, he was entrusted with the main command over the Alexander Lyceum, which that year was included in the department of institutions of the Empress Maria. In 1880 he created the Russian Society of International Law , the opening of which under his chairmanship followed on May 31 of that year.

Engaged in charity; his resources and care were due to their emergence and development: the Women's Institute of Princess Theresa of Oldenburg; Shelter of His Highness Prince P.G. of Oldenburg . Children's Hospital of Prince Peter of Oldenburg; the aforementioned shelter in memory of Catherine, Mary, and George; Holy Trinity Community of Sisters of Mercy; hospitals Obukhovskaya, Mariinskaya, Peter and Paul, etc. An educational house, etc., on November 28, 1880, by decree of Emperor Alexander II in honor of the 50th anniversary of his stay in the court and public service of P. G. Oldenburg, under the authority of the Council of the St. Petersburg Women's Patriotic Society of the Office of the Empress Maria, a two-year school for women was named "School of Peter Georgievich of Oldenburg . "

On June 6, 1880, the rector of Moscow University, N. S. Tikhonravov, at the solemn meeting on the occasion of the unveiling of the monument to A. Pushkin, announced the election of Prince P. G. Oldenburgsky, chairman of the monument construction commission, as an honorary doctor of the university ^[1] .

Already an old man who had celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of his public service, dejected by illnesses and unable to climb stairs without outside help, the prince continued to visit the institutions entrusted to him, to engage in current affairs and to be vividly interested in everything that was subject to him.

He died of transient pneumonia on May 2, 1881 , at 7 hours 45 minutes in the afternoon ^[2] . His death was accelerated by the news of the murder by terrorists of Emperor Alexander II , with whom he was on friendly terms ^[3] .

On May 8, 1881, his solemn burial took place in the cemetery of the Sergius desert , on which at that time there were graves of many prominent citizens of St. Petersburg and the Russian state.

Under the Bolsheviks, the cemetery was ruined, the graves of representatives of the nobility were desecrated, and the ruin itself continued after the war ended, during which the cemetery was in the combat zone. (See Strelninsky landing ) The massive destruction of the cemetery began in the 1930s, the cemetery was razed to the ground, but the outbreak of war was finally prevented from destroying it. The greatest destruction occurred in the 1960s.

Many years later, a memorial plate was erected on the territory of the reviving monastery (1998) with the names of eight members of the family of the Princes of Oldenburg buried there. To the 200th anniversary of Prince P.G. Oldenburgsky, a bust of the sculptor S.V. Ivanov was installed next to the stove (2012)

• Colonel (08.14.1812)
• Major General (08/06/1832)
• Lieutenant General (12/06/1834)
• General from Infantry (04.16.1841)
• General, consisting of the Person of His Majesty (04/08/1851) ^[4] .

• Order of St. Andrew the First-Called (10/22/1812)
• Order of St. Anne 1st Art. (10.22.1812)
• Order of St. Alexander Nevsky (10.22.1812)
• Order of St. Vladimir , 2nd art. (12/06/1835)
• Order of St. Vladimir 1st Art. (04/14/1840)
• Insignia for the XV years of immaculate service (08/22/1850)
• Insignia for XX years of immaculate service (08/22/1854)
• Gold medal "For the work to free the peasants" (12/05/1861)
• Order of the White Eagle (1865)
• Order of St. Stanislav 1st Art. (06/11/1865)
• Medal "In memory of the war of 1853-1856"
• Badge of the Russian Red Cross Society
• Insignia for XL years of immaculate service (12/23/1870)

Foreign:

• Saxe-Weimar Order of the White Falcon , Grand Cross (1826);
• Wurtenberg Order of the Crown 1st Art. (1826);
• Order of the Netherlands Lion (1852);
• Oldenburg Order of Merit of the Duke Peter-Friedrich-Ludwig 1st Art. (1852);
• Austrian Order of St. Stephen , the Great Cross (1874);
• Hesse-Darmstadt Order of Ludwig (1860);
• The Netherlands Order of the Golden Lion of Nassau (1860);
• Greek Order of the Savior (1862).

On April 23, 1837, he married Princess Teresa-Wilhelmina of Nassau (1815–1871), daughter of the Duke Wilhelm of Nassau (1792–1839) and Princess Louise of Saxe-Gildburghausen (1794–1825), sister of Adolf Wilhelm of Nassau . 8 children were born in the marriage:

1. Alexandra (1838-1900) - wife of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich ;
2. Nicholas (1840-1886);
3. Cecilia (1842-1843);
4. Alexander (1844-1932);
5. Catherine (1846-1866);
6. George (1848-1871);
7. Constantine (1850-1906);
8. Teresa (1852-1883) - wife of George Maximilianovich, 6th Duke of Leuchtenberg

•  

  Alexandra

•  

  Nikolay

•  

  Alexander

•  

  Catherine

•  

  Konstantin

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  Theresa

On the day of the 125th anniversary of the Educational Society of Noble Maidens and the 25th anniversary of the accession of Prince Oldenburg to the Office of Empress Maria on May 5, 1889, at 56 Liteiny Prospekt , in front of the building of the Mariinsky Hospital , a monument was erected in honor of the Prince I. Schroeder with the inscription: “To the enlightened benefactor Prince Peter Georgievich of Oldenburg. 1812-1881. "

The monument represents the prince of Oldenburg in height, in a military uniform with epaulettes. The prince's left hand rests on books laid on a half-column with a cannulated top. The statue is on a granite tetrahedral pedestal, on the side faces of which there are bronze bas-reliefs for the following subjects: the prince takes an exam at the Catherine Institute; exam at the School of Law; scene in a children's hospital with a prince at the bed of a sick child. In 1930, the monument was destroyed, in its place the symbol of medicine was put - a bowl with a snake ^[5] . More than 10 years ago, the reconstruction of the monument was being prepared ^[6]

There are references to the bust of the prince of Oldenburg, located “at the Warsaw station ”. The bust was probably installed not at the station, but at the building of the Free Economic Society (4th Krasnoarmeyskaya, 1/33), whose president was Pyotr Georgievich.

On November 28, 1880, a decree of Emperor Alexander II was issued in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of P.G. Oldenburgsky’s service on the device under the authority of the Council of the St. Petersburg Women's Patriotic Society of the Office of Empress Maria of the two-year school at the Alexander Mechanical Plant, with the school naming: “School Prince of Oldenburg ”(now Lyceum No. 344 , city of St. Petersburg).

• Oldenburg Dynasty
• Oldenburg
• Oldenburg Park
• Shelter of Prince Peter G. Oldenburgsky
• Office of the Empress Maria

• His Imp. High Prince of Oldenburg. Petr Georgievich. // List to generals by seniority . Fixed on November 1st. - SPb. : Military Printing House, 1880. - S. 11-12.
• V. Glasko. Oldenburg, Peter Georgievich // Russian Biographical Dictionary : in 25 volumes. - SPb. - M. , 1896-1918.
• Willow The bourgeoisie. In memory of Prince Peter Georgievich of Oldenburg. // " Historical Bulletin ", 1912, August, pp. 548-568.
• Ageeva Larisa. Peter Georgievich Prince of Oldenburg. St. Petersburg: North Star, 2012 .-- 280 p., 500 copies, ISBN 978-5-905042-26-3
• Annenkova E.A., Smagina G.I. Enlightened philanthropist Prince P.G. Oldenburg. St. Petersburg: Faces of Russia, 2012 .-- 184 p., 500 copies, ISBN 978-5-87417-399-9
• Annenkova E. A., Golikov Yu. P. Russian Oldenburg and their palaces
• Memoirs of Count S. D. Sheremetev
• Oldenburgsky P.G. In tireless cares about the enlightenment and greatness of Russia. M .: Publishing House "Economic Newspaper", 2013. ISBN 978-5-900792-89-7

• Biography on the site "Russian Imperial Army"
• Monument to Oldenburg, Prince Peter Georgievich
• The prince returns to the Mariinsky hospital , Metro-Russia (02.28.2007).