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Ghosts of the Peter and Paul Fortress. Decembrists. Execution of the pardoned

The Decembrists are representatives of the nobility who demanded reforms. Possessing high status, good level life and European education, they dreamed of changing life in Russia for the better. They proposed reforms that would bring the country closer to the most developed powers at that time.

The code of noble honor determined the behavior of the Decembrists. Many of them were officers - professional soldiers who went through a difficult path of trials and wars. They put the interests of the Fatherland at the forefront, but they wanted to see the structure of Russia in a different way. Not all of them considered the overthrow of the king the right measure.

How many Decembrists were there in Russia? 10, 20, 200?

It's very difficult to calculate. There was no single organization with a fixed membership. There was no reform plan. Even the algorithm of actions has not been developed. It all came down to simple conversations dining table. Many nobles did not participate in the armed uprising for personal reasons. Others "fired up" with the idea, but "cooled off" after the first meetings and discussions.

The most famous Decembrists were P.I. Pestel, S.I. Muraviev-Apostol, K.F. Ryleev, M.P. Bestuzhev-Ryumin, as well as P.G. Kakhovsky.

The Decembrists became the first opposition in the country. Their ideological views were radically different from those existing at that time. They were not revolutionaries! They served the state and were representatives of the upper class. The Decembrists wanted to help Emperor Alexander I.

Societies and unions of the Decembrists

Historians consider secret societies not as paramilitary organizations. It's more of a way of socializing young people. After all, many were tired of the officer service, they didn’t want to exchange cards and “revel”. Discussion of politics made me feel like an important part of society.

Southern Society

The assembly appeared in a small town called Tulchin, where at one time the headquarters of the Second Army was located. Young officers who a good education, decided to get together in a close circle and discuss policy issues. Why not an alternative to cards, women and vodka?

Union of Salvation

It consisted of officers of the Life Guards Semenovsky Regiment. After 1815 they returned from the war and settled in St. Petersburg. Members of the "Union of Salvation" rented housing together. They even wrote down the details of everyday life in the charter: duty, rest, discussions. They were also interested in politics. Participants developed ways further development Russia, proposed reforms.

Welfare Union

After a couple of years, the Salvation Union grew so much that it turned into the Welfare Union. It had much more participants (about 200). They never got together. Some may not even know each other by sight.

Later, the Union had to be dissolved, as there were too many people in it who did not bring any benefit to society.

Goals of the Decembrists. What did they want to achieve?

Many Decembrists took part in the fighting. They participated in foreign campaigns and saw how Europe lives, what orders are in other countries. They understood that serfdom and the existing system do not meet the interests of Russia. These are the "fetters" that do not allow the country to develop.

The Decembrists demanded:

Carrying out drastic reforms.
Introduction to the country's constitution.
The abolition of serfdom.
Creation of a fair judicial system.
Equality of people.

Of course, the details of the plan differed. There was no clear and thoughtful algorithm of actions. For example, it was not entirely clear how the constitution would be introduced. There were also questions about how to hold a general election when the population cannot read or write.

The Decembrists raised questions to which there was no single answer. The political discussion was only in its infancy in Russia. The nobles were afraid of civil strife and bloodshed. Therefore, they chose a military coup as a way to change the government. The Decembrists believed that the soldiers would not let them down, that the military would unquestioningly carry out all orders.

Uprising on the Senate Square in 1825

The Decembrists needed a convenient moment to translate their "reasoning" into reality. It came in 1825, when Alexander I died. The place of emperor was to be taken by Tsarevich Konstantin, but he abdicated. Nicholas became the head of state.

Due to the lack of a clear and thoughtful plan, the Decembrists' idea of an armed uprising was doomed to failure. In December 1825 they brought troops loyal to them to Senate Square. But it was too late, because all the decisions on the transfer of power were made.

There was no one to make demands. The general situation soon came to a standstill. The rebels were quickly surrounded by troops loyal to the government. A firefight broke out, due to which the rioters were divided. They had to flee. Historians have counted approximate figures killed at that time from 2 sides. There were about 80 of them.

Trial of the Decembrists

To investigate the causes and identify persons involved in the armed uprising, a special body. It was called the Secret Committee. A separate court was also established, which dealt with sentencing "rebels".

For Emperor Nicholas I, it was extremely important to condemn the rebels strictly according to the law. The emperor had recently taken office, and a "strong hand" had to be shown.
The difficulty was in the absence of such laws. There was no single code that would contain penalties for committing crimes. Nicholas I instructed Mikhail Speransky, his dignitary, who was distinguished by liberal views, to develop the system.
It was Mikhail Speransky who divided the accusations into 11 categories (depending on the degree of guilt). The punishment was assigned depending on the category in which the accused was included.
5 main Decembrists were immediately sentenced to death penalty. The quartering was changed to hanging.

The Decembrists could not defend themselves and have lawyers. They didn't even attend the meeting. The judges simply considered the documents prepared by the investigators and made the final decision.

Many participants in the uprising were exiled to Siberia. Only Alexander II, 30 years later, will have mercy on the Decembrists. Although many of them never made it to this point

For almost 200 years, the Decembrist uprising has attracted the attention of historians. Written great amount scientific articles and even dissertations on the subject. As a result of the execution of the Decembrists, Russian society lost the very color of enlightened youth, because they came from families of the nobility, glorious participants in the war of 1812 ...

Who were the Decembrists?

A company of young nobles who dreamed of changing the state of affairs in Russia.

On the early stages quite a lot of people participated in the Decembrist secret societies, and later the investigation had to think about who to consider as a conspirator and who not.

This is because the activities of these societies were limited exclusively to conversations. Were the members of the Union of Welfare and the Union of Salvation ready to move on to any action is a moot point.

Decembrists at a mill in Chita. Drawing by Nikolai Repin. 1830s. Decembrist Nikolai Repin was sentenced to hard labor for 8 years, then the term was reduced to 5 years. He served his sentence in the Chita prison and in the Petrovsky Zavod.

The society included people varying degrees nobility, wealth and position, but there are several things that united them.

Poor or wealthy, well-born or not, but they all belonged to the nobility, that is, to the elite, which implies a certain standard of living, education and status.

This, in particular, meant that much of their behavior was determined by the code of noble honor. Subsequently, this put them in a difficult moral dilemma: the code of a nobleman and the code of a conspirator obviously contradict each other.

The nobleman, being caught in an unsuccessful uprising, must come to the sovereign and obey, the conspirator must remain silent and not betray anyone. The nobleman cannot and should not lie, the conspirator does everything that is required to achieve his goals.

Imagine a Decembrist living in an illegal position on forged documents - that is ordinary life underground worker second half of XIX century is impossible.

The Decembrists are people of the army, professional soldiers with the appropriate education; many went through battles and were heroes of wars, had military awards.

The overthrow of the sovereign was not at all the main idea of the Decembrists, they came to it by looking at the current state of affairs and logically studying the experience of revolutions in Europe (and not all of them liked this idea).

How many Decembrists were there?

In total, after the uprising on December 14, 1825, more than 300 people were arrested, of which 125 were convicted, the rest were acquitted.

It is difficult to establish the exact number of participants in the Decembrist and pre-Decembrist societies, precisely because all their activities were reduced to more or less abstract conversations in a friendly circle of young people who were not bound by a clear plan or strict formal organization.

Nikolai Panov's cell in the Petrovsky Zavod prison. Drawing by Nikolai Bestuzhev. 1830s Nikolai Bestuzhev was sentenced to hard labor forever, kept in Chita and Petrovsky Zavod, then in Selenginsk, Irkutsk province.

It is worth noting that the people who participated in the Decembrist secret societies and directly in the uprising are two not very overlapping sets.

Many of those who participated in the meetings of the early Decembrist societies subsequently completely lost interest in them and became, for example, zealous guardian officials; in nine years (from 1816 to 1825) quite a lot of people passed through the secret societies.

In turn, those who did not belong to secret societies at all or were admitted a couple of days before the rebellion also participated in the uprising.

How did you become a Decembrist?

To be included in the circle of Decembrists, sometimes it was enough to answer the question of a not quite sober friend: “ There is a society of people who want the good, prosperity, happiness and freedom of Russia. Are you with us?"- and both of this conversation could later be forgotten.

It is worth noting that conversations about politics in the noble society of that time were not encouraged at all, so those who were inclined to such conversations, willy-nilly, formed closed interest circles.

IN in a certain sense one can consider the Decembrist secret societies as a way of socializing the then generation of young people; a way to get away from the emptiness and boredom of officer society, to find a more sublime and meaningful way of existence.

They would call these meetings, in the fashion of the time, a secret society, which, in fact, was simply a way of identifying themselves and their interests, characteristic of the era.

This small friendly company will later become a secret society with the loud name “Union of Salvation”, or “Society of True and Faithful Sons of the Fatherland”. In fact, this is a very small - a couple of dozen people - a friendly circle, the participants of which wanted, among other things, to talk about politics and the ways of Russia's development.

"Russian Truth" by Pavel Pestel. 1824 Program document of the Southern Society of Decembrists. The full title is “The Preserved State Charter of the Great Russian People, which serves as a covenant for the improvement of Russia and contains a true mandate both for the people and for the temporary supreme government with dictatorial powers.”

This uncontrolled expansion of the circle prompted the leaders of the movement to announce the dissolution of the Welfare Union: to get rid of extra people, as well as to give those who wanted to seriously continue the work and prepare a real conspiracy to do it without prying eyes and ears.

How did they differ from other revolutionaries?

Soviet historians habitually began with them a chain of revolutionaries, which continued with Herzen, the Petrashevites, the Narodniks, the Narodnaya Volya, and, finally, the Bolsheviks.

However, the Decembrists were distinguished from them primarily by the fact that they were not obsessed with the idea of revolution as such, did not declare that any transformations were meaningless until they were overthrown. old order things and no utopian ideal future is proclaimed.

They did not oppose the state, but served it and, moreover, were an important part of Russian elite. They were not professional revolutionaries living within a very specific and in many ways marginal subculture, like all those who later came to replace them.

They thought of themselves as possible assistants to Alexander I in carrying out reforms, and if the emperor continued the line that he so boldly began before their eyes, granting a constitution to Poland in 1815, they would be happy to help him in this.

What inspired the Decembrists?

Most of all, experience Patriotic War 1812, characterized by a huge patriotic upsurge, and foreign campaign Russian army of 1813-1814, when many young and ardent people for the first time saw another life close by and were completely intoxicated by this experience.

It seemed unfair to them that Russia did not live like Europe, and even more unfair and even savage - that the soldiers with whom they won this war side by side were all serfs and the landowners treated them like a thing.

It was these topics - reforms to achieve greater justice in Russia and the abolition of serfdom - that were the main ones in the conversations of the Decembrists.

The political context of that time was no less important: transformations and revolutions after the Napoleonic Wars took place in many countries, and it seemed that Russia could and should change along with Europe.

The Decembrists owe the very opportunity to seriously discuss the prospects for a change of order and revolution in the country to the political climate.

What did the Decembrists want?

It would be fair to say that the Decembrists did not have any single and clear plan for reforms or revolutionary changes. It is impossible to imagine what would have happened if the Decembrist uprising had been crowned with success, because they themselves did not have time and could not agree on what to do next.

First page of Nikita Muravyov's constitutional draft. 1826 The Constitution of Nikita Mikhailovich Muravyov is a policy document northern society. It was not officially accepted by the society, but it was widely known and reflected the mood of the majority of its members. Compiled in 1822-1825.

How to introduce a constitution and organize general elections in a country with a completely illiterate peasant population? They did not have answers to this and many other questions. The disputes between the Decembrists only marked the birth of a culture of political discussion in the country, and many questions were raised for the first time, and no one had answers to them at all.

Idea popular uprising was absolutely alien to them: they were firmly convinced that it was extremely dangerous to involve people in this story. The rebellious people cannot be controlled, and the troops, as it seemed to them, will remain under their control (after all, most of the participants had command experience). The main thing here is that they were very afraid of bloodshed, civil strife and believed that a military coup made it possible to avoid this.

In particular, this is why the Decembrists, bringing the regiments to the square, did not at all intend to explain their reasons to them, that is, they considered it unnecessary to conduct propaganda among their own soldiers. They counted only on the personal loyalty of the soldiers, whom they tried to be caring commanders, and also on the fact that the soldiers would simply follow orders.

How did the uprising go?

Decembrist revolt. Senate Square December 14, 1825. Painting by Karl Kolman. 1830s.

But when the Decembrists came to the square, it turned out that the meeting had already ended, the dignitaries had dispersed, all decisions had been made, and there was simply no one to make demands.

The situation reached a dead end: the officers did not know what to do next, and continued to keep the troops on the square. The rebels were surrounded by government troops, there was a shootout.

The rebels simply stood on Senatskaya, not even trying to take any action - for example, to storm the palace. Several buckshot shots from government troops dispersed the crowd and put them to flight.

Why did the uprising fail?

For any uprising to succeed, there must be an undeniable willingness to shed blood at some point. The Decembrists did not have this readiness, they did not want bloodshed. And it is difficult for a historian to imagine a successful rebellion, the leaders of which are making every effort not to kill anyone.

Modern estimates of historians show that about 80 people died on both sides during the events on Senatskaya Street. The rumors that there were up to 1,500 victims, and about a bunch of corpses that the police threw into the Neva at night, are not confirmed by anything.

Who judged the Decembrists and how?

A special body was created to investigate the case - " the highest established Secret Committee to find accomplices of a malicious society, which opened on December 14, 1825”, where Nicholas I appointed mainly generals.

To pass the verdict, the Supreme Criminal Court was specially established, to which senators, members of the State Council, and the Synod were appointed.

Interrogation of the Decembrist Investigative Committee in 1826. Drawing by Vladimir Adlerberg

That is, it was possible to use, say, the Code of Law of Ivan the Terrible - no one canceled it - and, for example, boil everyone in boiling tar or wheel them. But there was an understanding that this no longer corresponds to the enlightened XIX century. In addition, there are many defendants - and their guilt obviously differs.

And then the accused were assigned to these categories, and for each judge, after listening to a note on the strength of his guilt (that is, the result of the investigation, something like an indictment), they voted whether he corresponded to this category and what punishment to assign to each category.

Outside the ranks were five sentenced to death. However, the sentences were made “with a margin”, so that the sovereign could show mercy and mitigate the punishment.

Trial of the Decembrists.

The procedure was such that the Decembrists themselves were not present at the trial and could not justify themselves, the judges considered only the papers prepared by the Investigative Committee.

Decembrists only announced the finished verdict. For this, they later reproached the authorities: in a more civilized country, they would have had lawyers and the opportunity to defend themselves.

execution

Appealing to the court possible way execution of the Decembrists, Nikolai notes that blood should not be shed. Thus, they, the heroes of the Patriotic War, are sentenced to the shameful gallows ...

Who were the executed Decembrists? Their surnames are as follows: Pavel Pestel, Pyotr Kakhovsky, Kondraty Ryleev, Sergei Muravyov-Apostol, Mikhail Bestuzhev-Ryumin. The verdict was read out on July 12, and they were hanged on July 25, 1826.

Execution of the Decembrists. Pushkin's drawing in the manuscript "Poltava", 1828

The place of execution of the Decembrists was equipped for a long time: a gallows with a special mechanism was built. However, it was not without overlays: three convicts fell off their hinges, they had to be hung again.

In that place in Peter and Paul Fortress, where the Decembrists were executed, there is now a monument, which is an obelisk and a granite composition. It symbolizes the courage with which the executed Decembrists fought for their ideals.

Those who received a sentence of hard labor were sent to Siberia. According to the verdict, they were also deprived of ranks, noble dignity and even military awards.

More lenient sentences for the last ranks of convicts are exile to a settlement or to remote garrisons where they continued to serve; not everyone lost their ranks and nobility.

Those sentenced to hard labor began to be sent to Siberia gradually, in small batches - they were transported on horseback, with courier.

The first batch, of eight people (the most famous included Volkonsky, Trubetskoy, Obolensky), were especially unlucky: they were sent to real mines, to mining plants, and there they spent their first, really hard winter.

But then, fortunately for the Decembrists, they realized in St. Petersburg: after all, if you distribute state criminals with dangerous ideas among the Siberian mines, this also means with my own hands scatter rebellious ideas throughout the penal servitude!

Nicholas I decided, in order to avoid the spread of ideas, to gather all the Decembrists in one place. There was no prison of this size anywhere in Siberia. They adapted a prison in Chita, transported those eight who had already suffered at the Blagodatsky mine, and the rest were taken there right away.

It was crowded there, all the prisoners were kept in two large rooms. And it just so happened that there was absolutely no object of hard labor, no mine. The latter, however, did not worry the St. Petersburg authorities very much. Instead of hard labor, the Decembrists were taken to fill up a ravine on the road or grind grain in a mill.

By the summer of 1830, for the Decembrists built new prison in the Petrovsky Zavod, more spacious and with separate personal cells. There was no mine there either.

From Chita they were led on foot, and they remembered this transition as a kind of journey through unfamiliar and interesting Siberia: some of them sketched out drawings of the area along the way, collected herbariums. The Decembrists were also lucky in that Nikolai appointed General Stanislav Leparsky, an honest and good-natured man, as commandant.

Decembrist cell in the Chita jail.

If it were not for the arrival of their wives, the Decembrists, as the tsar wanted, would have been completely cut off from their past life: correspondence was strictly forbidden to them. But it would be scandalous and indecent for wives to forbid correspondence, so it didn’t work out very well with isolation.

There was also that important point that many had influential relatives, including those in St. Petersburg. Nicholas did not want to irritate this layer of the nobility, so they managed to achieve various small and not very small indulgences.

A curious social collision has developed in Siberia: although deprived of the nobility, called state criminals, for local residents the Decembrists were still aristocrats - in manners, upbringing, education.

True aristocrats were rarely brought to Siberia, the Decembrists became a kind of local curiosity, they were called “our princes”, and the Decembrists were treated with great respect. Thus, that cruel, terrible contact with the criminal world of hard labor, which happened to the exiled intellectuals later, did not happen in the case of the Decembrists either.

At modern man who knows about the horrors of the Gulag and concentration camps, there is a temptation to treat the exile of the Decembrists as a frivolous punishment. But everything is important in its historical context. For them, the exile was associated with great hardships, especially in comparison with the former way of life.

And, whatever one may say, it was a conclusion, a prison: for the first years they were all constantly, day and night, shackled in hand and foot shackles. And to a large extent, the fact that now, from a distance, their imprisonment does not look so terrible is their own merit: they managed not to stoop, not to quarrel, retain their own dignity and inspire real respect in others.

In the early morning of July 13, 1826, on the rampart of the Kronverk bastion of the Peter and Paul Fortress, the leaders of the armed uprising on Senate Square. Five out of more than a hundred and fifty arrested in the case of "December 14th": Pavel Pestel, Kondraty Ryleev, Sergei Muravyov-Apostol, Vladimir Bestuzhev-Ryumin and Pyotr Kakhovsky were hanged. The bodies of the executed Decembrists were not given to families for burial. The burial place of the leaders of the uprising is still a mystery.

Such was the highest will of the emperor. And they performed it so carefully that after forty years the new governor-general of the capital, acting at least with the knowledge of the son of Nicholas, Emperor Alexander II, could not even find traces of the mysterious burial.

However, based on the principle: “Everything in Russia is a secret, but nothing is a secret” a large number of contemporaries of the execution left written evidence of the place of burial of the Decembrists. Here are some of them:

“They were buried in the ditch of the fortress with quicklime, near the gallows itself ";

“The bodies were taken to the seaside and there they were thrown with stones tied to them into the depths of the waters”;

“The box with the naked bodies of five was taken to some island in the Gulf of Finland and buried in a pit along with lime”;

“At night, the bodies in matting were transported in a boat and buried on the shore of Golodai Island.”

The last statement is believed to be closer to the truth. By at least, on this island, which is currently part of St. Petersburg, there are two monuments in honor of the Decembrists. Each of them says that it is here that the remains of the leaders of the December uprising are buried. The distance in a straight line between the monuments is one kilometer. The island itself Soviet times was renamed the island of the Decembrists.

Let's try to trace the path of the bodies of the executed Decembrists to the moment of their burial. After the doctors confirmed the death of all five hanged men, the bodies were placed in an empty barn, located next to the merchant seafaring school. Officially, it is believed that because of the authorities' fear of transporting bodies during daylight hours. However, already in the morning a rumor was spread among the people that the bodies had been thrown into the water of the fortress canal.

“People came and went all day, looked, saw nothing and nodded their heads,” one of the eyewitnesses of the execution recorded. All this time, the bodies continued to lie in the barn. The authorities waited for the onset of darkness. By the next morning, the barn was already empty. Only shrouds taken from the dead remained in it, and boards with the inscription "regicide".

In the report of the head of the Kronverk bastion, Colonel Berkopf, it is written: “In next night a driver from the butchers came with a horse to the fortress, and from there drove the corpses in the direction of Vasilyevsky Island. But when he drove them to the Tuchkov Bridge, armed soldiers came out of the booth and, having mastered the reins, put the cabman into the booth. A few hours later the empty cart returned to the same place. The driver was paid, and he went home. According to chief police chief Tuchkov, the bodies of the executed were buried in a common grave in the bushes on the shore of the Gulf of Finland so that no signs of burial were left.

Nevertheless, there were rumors in St. Petersburg that the burial place was known to Ryleev's widow. But, as it turned out, not only to her. About a certain secret grave on a secluded island, at least four months before the moment when the first snow fell, it was known to every Petersburger. A relative of Bestuzhev later wrote: “They were buried on Goloday behind the Smolensk cemetery, and probably not far from the Galernaya harbor, where there was a guardhouse. Because sentries dressed up from this guardhouse in order to prevent people from visiting the hanged man's grave. This circumstance was the reason for the people to pour there in droves.

The sentries stood at the "grave" for only four months. After that, interest in her fades, moreover, she soon becomes completely forgotten. Soon a rumor spread around Petersburg that the bodies of the executed had been stolen. In the late autumn of 1826, in the third branch of the Office of His Imperial Majesty a denunciation was received from the famous scammer Sherwood, who was awarded by Nicholas the First for revealing plans for an uprising by the second name of Verny. The denunciation reported that someone had dug up the bodies of the executed Decembrists and secretly reburied them elsewhere.

Who this person was remains unknown. But it is known that Benckendorff's department did not even open a case on this denunciation. There can be only one reason - he did not find anything, and could not find anything. The falsified grave diverted the attention of potential grave-diggers until the snow fell, which hid all traces of the real grave.

After 1917, the search for the grave of the Decembrists is more like a joke.

In early June 1917, the Petrograd newspapers exploded with sensational headlines: "The grave of the executed Decembrists has been found!" Since the February Revolution that recently took place in Russia seemed to be a continuation of the work of the Decembrists, the message about this find aroused unprecedented interest in the widest circles of the public.

Here is how it was. In 1906, the city authorities decided to build up Goloday Island with a complex of buildings called "New Petersburg". Owner construction company, Italian Richard Gualino heard that the Decembrists were buried somewhere on the site of the current construction site, and tried to find the grave. However, in 1911, the police found out about the activities of the Italian and forbade him to excavate.

After February Revolution In 1917, he left for Turin, leaving in his place the managing engineer Gurevich, whom he asked to continue the search. With a similar request, the newly created Society for the Memory of the Decembrists in Petrograd turned to him.

On June 1, 1917, Gurevich informed the secretary of the society, Professor Svyatlovsky, that while digging a trench for water supply behind the garrison wing in the area formerly called the "dog cemetery", where animals were once buried, someone's coffin was found. The next day, at the request of the professor, General Schwartz assigned soldiers from the 1st Automobile Company for further excavations.

As a result of the measures taken, 4 more coffins were dug out of the ground, which lay in a common grave along with the first one. Thus, a total of 5 human skeletons were found, which corresponded to the number of executed Decembrists. In the first, best-preserved coffin, a skeleton was found, dressed in an officer's uniform from the time of Alexander I. The coffin was rich, once upholstered in brocade, had wooden legs in the form of lion's paws.

The rest of the dominoes were much more modest in production and worse preserved. Therefore, the bones in them were only fragments of human skeletons. Judging by the surviving remains of clothing, three of the people buried here were military, and two were civilians. This is fully consistent with the truth - Pestel, Muraviev-Apostol and Bestuzhev-Ryumin were military men, and Ryleev and Kakhovsky were civilians.

Another surge of interest in the grave of the Decembrists arose in 1925 in connection with the upcoming 100th anniversary of their execution. Then an organization engaged in the study of the history of the party and the revolutionary movement in Russia began to clarify the circumstances of the 1917 finds. Previously found skeletons were found in the basements Winter Palace. As it turned out, in 1918 they were placed in a box, sealed and sent to the Museum of the Revolution, which was then located in the palace.

At the site of the discovery of the skeletons in 1917, it was decided to conduct new excavations, and medical experts from Military Medical Academy, Vikhrov and Speransky, were instructed to give an opinion on the bones stored in the cellars of the palace. As a specialist in military uniforms, an expert from Glavnauka Gabaev was invited.

Before carrying out new excavations on Goloday, it was found out that in reality in 1917 not 5, but 6 coffins were dug (nothing was reported about the latter, and it disappeared somewhere). medical expertise remains, found in 1917, gave sensational results. It turned out that they belonged not to five, but only to four people: three adults and one teenager aged 12-15!

A historical examination of the uniform found in one of the coffins showed that it belonged to an officer of the Life Guards of the Finnish Regiment of the 1829-1855 model. Thus, the Eastpart Commission concluded that the remains found in 1917 on Goloday "cannot belong to the executed Decembrists." The fact that the executed Decembrists were supposed to be naked - remember the shrouds in the barn of the school of merchant shipping, then they didn’t even remember.

All this did not prevent the installation of a monument on Golodai in 1939, and the island itself was renamed the island of the Decembrists.

At present, the island of the Decembrists is densely built up. And, if the Decembrists are really buried there, and not drowned in the waters of the Gulf of Finland, the real grave, apparently, will never be found.

A company of young nobles who dreamed of changing the state of affairs in Russia. In the early stages, quite a lot of people participated in the Decembrist secret societies, and later the investigation had to think about who to consider as a conspirator and who not. This is because the activities of these societies were limited exclusively to conversations. Whether the members of the Union of Welfare and the Union of Salvation were ready to take any active action is a moot point.

The societies included people of varying degrees of nobility, wealth and status, but there are several things that united them.

Decembrists at a mill in Chita. Drawing by Nikolai Repin. 1830s Decembrist Nikolai Repin was sentenced to hard labor for 8 years, then the term was reduced to 5 years. He served his sentence in the Chita prison and in the Petrovsky Zavod. Wikimedia Commons

They were all nobles

Poor or wealthy, well-born or not, but they all belonged to the nobility, that is, to the elite, which implies a certain standard of living, education and status. This, in particular, meant that much of their behavior was determined by the code of noble honor. Subsequently, this put them in a difficult moral dilemma: the code of a nobleman and the code of a conspirator obviously contradict each other. The nobleman, being caught in an unsuccessful uprising, must come to the sovereign and obey, the conspirator must remain silent and not betray anyone. The nobleman cannot and should not lie, the conspirator does everything that is required to achieve his goals. It is impossible to imagine a Decembrist living in an illegal position on false documents - that is, the ordinary life of an underground worker in the second half of the 19th century.

The vast majority were officers

The Decembrists are people of the army, professional soldiers with the appropriate education; many went through battles and were heroes of wars, had military awards.

They were not revolutionaries in the classical sense

All of them sincerely believed that their main goal was to serve for the good of the fatherland and, if circumstances were different, they would consider it an honor to serve the sovereign as state dignitaries. The overthrow of the sovereign was not at all the main idea of the Decembrists, they came to it by looking at the current state of affairs and logically studying the experience of revolutions in Europe (and not all of them liked this idea).

How many Decembrists were there?

Nikolai Panov's cell in the Petrovsky Zavod prison. Drawing by Nikolai Bestuzhev. 1830s Nikolai Bestuzhev was sentenced to hard labor forever, was kept in Chita and in the Petrovsky Zavod, then in Selenginsk, Irkutsk province.

In total, after the uprising on December 14, 1825, more than 300 people were arrested, of which 125 were convicted, the rest were acquitted. It is difficult to establish the exact number of participants in the Decembrist and pre-Decembrist societies, precisely because all their activities were reduced to more or less abstract conversations in a friendly circle of young people who were not bound by a clear plan or strict formal organization.

It is worth noting that the people who participated in the Decembrist secret societies and directly in the uprising are two not very overlapping sets. Many of those who participated in the meetings of the early Decembrist societies subsequently completely lost interest in them and became, for example, zealous guardian officials; in nine years (from 1816 to 1825) quite a lot of people passed through the secret societies. In turn, those who did not belong to secret societies at all or were admitted a couple of days before the rebellion also participated in the uprising.

How did you become a Decembrist?

"Russian Truth" by Pavel Pestel. 1824 Program document of the Southern Society of Decembrists. The full name is the Reserved State Charter of the great Russian people, which serves as a testament to the improvement of Russia and contains the right order both for the people and for the temporary supreme government, which has dictatorial powers.

To be included in the circle of the Decembrists, sometimes it was enough to answer the question of a not quite sober friend: “There is a society of people who want the good, prosperity, happiness and freedom of Russia. Are you with us?" - and both of this conversation could later be forgotten. It is worth noting that conversations about politics in the noble society of that time were not encouraged at all, so those who were inclined to such conversations, willy-nilly, formed closed interest circles. In a certain sense, the Decembrist secret societies can be considered a way of socializing the then generation of young people; a way to get away from the emptiness and boredom of officer society, to find a more sublime and meaningful way of existence.

So, the Southern Society arose in the tiny Ukrainian town of Tulchin, where the headquarters of the Second Army was quartered. Educated young officers, whose interests are not limited to cards and vodka, gather in their circle to talk about politics - and this is their only entertainment; these gatherings they would call, in the fashion of the time, a secret society, which, in fact, was simply a way of identifying themselves and their interests, characteristic of the era.

Similarly, the Union of Salvation was simply a company of comrades-in-arms of the Semyonovsky Life Guards; many were relatives. Returning from the war in 1816, they organize their life in St. Petersburg, where life was quite expensive, according to the artel principle familiar to the soldiers: they rent an apartment together, chip in for food and prescribe the details of common life in the charter. This small friendly company will later become a secret society with the loud name of the Union of Salvation, or the Society of True and Faithful Sons of the Fatherland. In fact, this is a very small - a couple of dozen people - a friendly circle, the participants of which wanted, among other things, to talk about politics and the ways of Russia's development.

By 1818, the circle of participants would expand, and the Union of Salvation would be reformed into the Union of Welfare, in which there were already about 200 people from Moscow and St. Petersburg, and all of them never met together, and two members of the union might no longer know each other personally. This uncontrolled expansion of the circle prompted the leaders of the movement to announce the dissolution of the Welfare Union: to get rid of unnecessary people, and also to give those who wanted to seriously continue the work and prepare a real conspiracy to do it without prying eyes and ears.

How did they differ from other revolutionaries?

First page of Nikita Muravyov's constitutional draft. 1826 The Constitution of Nikita Mikhailovich Muravyov is the program document of the Northern Society. It was not officially accepted by the society, but it was widely known and reflected the mood of the majority of its members. Compiled in 1822-1825. Project "100 main documents of Russian history"

In fact, the Decembrists were the first political opposition in the history of Russia, created on ideological grounds (and not, for example, in the course of the struggle of court groups for access to power). Soviet historians habitually began with them a chain of revolutionaries, which continued with Herzen, the Petrashevites, the Narodniks, the Narodnaya Volya, and, finally, the Bolsheviks. However, the Decembrists differed from them primarily in that they were not obsessed with the idea of revolution as such, did not declare that any transformations were meaningless until the old order of things was overthrown and some kind of utopian ideal future was proclaimed. They did not oppose the state, but served it and, moreover, were an important part of the Russian elite. They were not professional revolutionaries living within a very specific and in many ways marginal subculture, like all those who later came to replace them. They thought of themselves as possible assistants to Alexander I in carrying out reforms, and if the emperor continued the line that he so boldly began before their eyes, granting a constitution to Poland in 1815, they would be happy to help him in this.

What inspired the Decembrists?

Battle for Moscow at Borodino on September 7, 1812. Painting by Albrecht Adam. 1815 Wikimedia Commons

Most of all - the experience of the Patriotic War of 1812, which was characterized by a huge patriotic upsurge, and the Foreign Campaign of the Russian Army of 1813-1814, when many young and ardent people for the first time saw another life close by and were completely intoxicated by this experience. It seemed unfair to them that Russia did not live like Europe, and even more unfair and even savage - that the soldiers with whom they won this war side by side were all serfs and the landowners treated them like a thing. It was these topics - reforms to achieve greater justice in Russia and the abolition of serfdom - that were the main ones in the conversations of the Decembrists. The political context of that time was no less important: transformations and revolutions after the Napoleonic Wars took place in many countries, and it seemed that Russia could and should change along with Europe. The Decembrists owe the very opportunity to seriously discuss the prospects for a change of order and revolution in the country to the political climate.

What did the Decembrists want?

In general - reforms, changes in Russia for the better, the introduction of a constitution and the abolition of serfdom, fair trials, equality of people of all classes before the law. In the details, they differed, often dramatically. It would be fair to say that the Decembrists did not have any single and clear plan for reforms or revolutionary changes. It is impossible to imagine what would have happened if the Decembrist uprising had been crowned with success, because they themselves did not have time and could not agree on what to do next. How to introduce a constitution and organize general elections in a country with a completely illiterate peasant population? They did not have answers to this and many other questions. The disputes between the Decembrists only marked the birth of a culture of political discussion in the country, and many questions were raised for the first time, and no one had answers to them at all.

However, if they did not have unity about the goals, then they were unanimous about the means: the Decembrists wanted to achieve their goal through a military coup; what we would now call a putsch (with the amendment that if the reforms had come from the throne, the Decembrists would have welcomed them). The idea of a popular uprising was absolutely alien to them: they were firmly convinced that it was extremely dangerous to involve the people in this story. The rebellious people cannot be controlled, and the troops, as it seemed to them, will remain under their control (after all, most of the participants had command experience). The main thing here is that they were very afraid of bloodshed, civil strife and believed that a military coup made it possible to avoid this.

How did the uprising go?

Senate Square December 14, 1825. Painting by Karl Kolman. 1830s Bridgeman Images/Fotodom

Unsuccessfully. It cannot be said that the conspirators did not have a plan, but it was not possible to carry it out from the very beginning. They managed to withdraw troops to the Senate Square, but it was planned that they would come to the Senate Square for a meeting of the State Council and the Senate, which were supposed to swear allegiance to the new sovereign, and demand the introduction of a constitution. But when the Decembrists came to the square, it turned out that the meeting had already ended, the dignitaries had dispersed, all decisions had been made, and there was simply no one to make demands.

The situation reached a dead end: the officers did not know what to do next, and continued to keep the troops on the square. The rebels were surrounded by government troops, there was a shootout. The rebels simply stood on Senatskaya, not even trying to take any action - for example, to storm the palace. Several buckshot shots from government troops dispersed the crowd and put them to flight.

Why did the uprising fail?

Blood spilled anyway, but there were relatively few casualties: both sides fired with noticeable reluctance, if possible over their heads. Government troops set the task simply to disperse the rebels, and they fired back. Modern estimates of historians show that about 80 people died on both sides during the events on Senatskaya Street. The rumors that there were up to 1,500 victims, and about a bunch of corpses that the police threw into the Neva at night, are not confirmed by anything.

Who judged the Decembrists and how?

Interrogation of a Decembrist by the Investigative Committee in 1826. Drawing by Vladimir Adlerberg Wikimedia Commons

To investigate the case, a special body was created - "the highest established Secret Committee to find accomplices of the malicious society that opened on December 14, 1825", where Nicholas I appointed mainly generals. To pass the verdict, the Supreme Criminal Court was specially established, to which senators, members of the State Council, and the Synod were appointed.

The problem was that the emperor really wanted to condemn the rebels fairly and according to the law. But, as it turned out, there were no suitable laws. There was no complete code indicating the relative severity of various crimes and penalties for them (like the modern Criminal Code). That is, it was possible to use, say, the Code of Law of Ivan the Terrible - no one canceled it - and, for example, boil everyone in boiling tar or wheel them. But there was an understanding that this no longer corresponds to the enlightened 19th century. In addition, there are many defendants - and their guilt obviously differs.

Therefore, Nicholas I instructed Mikhail Speransky, a dignitary then known for his liberalism, to develop some kind of system. Speransky divided the accusation into 11 categories according to the degree of guilt, for each category he prescribed what corpus delicti corresponds to it. And then the accused were assigned to these categories, and for each judge, after listening to a note on the strength of his guilt (that is, the result of the investigation, something like an indictment), they voted whether he corresponded to this category and what punishment to assign to each category. Outside the ranks were five sentenced to death. However, the sentences were made “with a margin”, so that the sovereign could show mercy and mitigate the punishment.

The procedure was such that the Decembrists themselves were not present at the trial and could not justify themselves, the judges considered only the papers prepared by the Investigative Committee. Decembrists only announced the finished verdict. For this, they later reproached the authorities: in a more civilized country, they would have had lawyers and the opportunity to defend themselves.

How did the Decembrists live in exile?

Street in Chita. Watercolor by Nikolai Bestuzhev. 1829-1830 years Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images

Those who received a sentence of hard labor were sent to Siberia. According to the verdict, they were also deprived of ranks, noble dignity and even military awards. More lenient sentences for the last ranks of convicts are exile to a settlement or to remote garrisons where they continued to serve; not everyone lost their ranks and nobility.

Those sentenced to hard labor began to be sent to Siberia gradually, in small batches - they were transported on horseback, with courier. The first batch, of eight people (the most famous included Volkonsky, Trubetskoy, Obolensky), were especially unlucky: they were sent to real mines, to mining plants, and there they spent their first, really hard winter. But here, fortunately for the Decembrists, they realized in St. Petersburg: after all, if you distribute state criminals with dangerous ideas among the Siberian mines, this also means dispersing rebellious ideas throughout the penal servitude with your own hands! Nicholas I decided, in order to avoid the spread of ideas, to gather all the Decembrists in one place. There was no prison of this size anywhere in Siberia. They adapted a prison in Chita, transported those eight who had already suffered at the Blagodatsky mine, and the rest were taken there right away. It was crowded there, all the prisoners were kept in two large rooms. And it just so happened that there was absolutely no object of hard labor, no mine. The latter, however, did not worry the St. Petersburg authorities very much. Instead of hard labor, the Decembrists were taken to fill up a ravine on the road or grind grain in a mill.

By the summer of 1830, a new prison was built for the Decembrists in Petrovsky Zavod, more spacious and with separate personal cells. There was no mine there either. From Chita they were led on foot, and they remembered this transition as a kind of journey through unfamiliar and interesting Siberia: some of them sketched out drawings of the area along the way, collected herbariums. The Decembrists were also lucky in that Nikolai appointed General Stanislav Leparsky, an honest and good-natured man, as commandant.

Leparsky did his duty, but did not oppress the prisoners and, in what he could, alleviated their situation. In general, little by little the idea of hard labor evaporated, leaving imprisonment in remote regions of Siberia. If it were not for the arrival of their wives, the Decembrists, as the tsar wanted, would have been completely cut off from their past life: correspondence was strictly forbidden to them. But it would be scandalous and indecent for wives to forbid correspondence, so it didn’t work out very well with isolation. There was also that important point that many had influential relatives, including those in St. Petersburg. Nicholas did not want to irritate this layer of the nobility, so they managed to achieve various small and not very small indulgences.

Interior view one of the courtyards of the casemate of the Petrovsky Plant. Watercolor by Nikolai Bestuzhev. 1830 Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images

In Siberia, a curious social conflict has developed: although deprived of the nobility, called state criminals, for local residents, the Decembrists were still aristocrats - in manners, upbringing, education. True aristocrats were rarely brought to Siberia, the Decembrists became a kind of local curiosity, they were called “our princes”, and the Decembrists were treated with great respect. Thus, that cruel, terrible contact with the criminal world of hard labor, which happened to the exiled intellectuals later, did not happen in the case of the Decembrists either.

Modern man, who already knows about the horrors of the Gulag and concentration camps, is tempted to regard the exile of the Decembrists as a frivolous punishment. But everything is important in its historical context. For them, the exile was associated with great hardships, especially in comparison with the former way of life. And, whatever one may say, it was a conclusion, a prison: for the first years they were all constantly, day and night, shackled in hand and foot shackles. And to a large extent, the fact that now, from a distance, their imprisonment does not look so terrible is their own merit: they managed not to stoop, not to quarrel, retain their own dignity and inspire real respect in others.

190 years ago, Russia experienced events that, with a certain convention, can be considered an attempt to make the first Russian revolution. In December 1825 and January 1826, there were two armed uprisings organized by the Northern and Southern secret societies Decembrists.

The organizers of the uprising set themselves very ambitious tasks - changing political system(replacement of autocracy by constitutional monarchy or republic), the creation of a constitution and parliament, the abolition of serfdom.

Until that moment, armed uprisings were either large-scale riots (in the terminology of the Soviet period - peasant wars), or palace coups.

Against this background, the Decembrist uprising was political event completely different character, hitherto unseen in Russia.

The large-scale plans of the Decembrists crashed into reality, in which the new emperor Nicholas I managed to firmly and decisively put an end to the performance of the fighters against the autocracy.

As you know, a failed revolution is called a rebellion, and its organizers will face a very unenviable fate.

A new court was established to consider the "case of the Decembrists"

Nicholas I approached the matter carefully. By decree of December 29, 1825, a Commission was established for research on malicious societies, chaired by the Minister of War Alexandra Tatishcheva. The Manifesto of June 13, 1826 established the Supreme Criminal Court, which was supposed to consider the “case of the Decembrists”.

About 600 people were involved in the investigation into the case. The Supreme Criminal Court sentenced 120 defendants in 11 different categories, ranging from the death penalty to deprivation of rank and demotion to the soldiers.

Here it must be borne in mind that we are talking about the nobles who participated in the uprising. The cases of soldiers were considered separately by the so-called Special Commissions. According to their decision, more than 200 people were subjected to "wire through the ranks" and other corporal punishment, and more than 4 thousand were sent to fight in the Caucasus.

"Wire through the ranks" was a punishment in which the condemned passed through the ranks of soldiers, each of whom stabbed him with a gauntlet (a long, flexible and thick rod of willow). When the number of such blows reached several thousand, such punishment turned into a sophisticated form of the death penalty.

As for the Decembrist nobles, the Supreme Criminal Court, based on the laws Russian Empire, handed down 36 death sentences, of which five involved quartering, and another 31 - beheading.

“An exemplary execution will be their just retribution”

The emperor had to approve the sentences of the Supreme Criminal Court. Nicholas I commuted the punishment for convicts in all categories, including those sentenced to death. Everyone who was to be beheaded, the monarch saved his life.

It would be a strong exaggeration to say that the fate of the Decembrists was decided by the Supreme Criminal Court on its own. historical documents, published after February 1917, show that the emperor not only followed the process, but also clearly imagined its outcome.

“Regarding the main instigators and conspirators, an exemplary execution will be their just retribution for violating public peace,” Nikolai wrote to the members of the court.

The monarch also instructed the judges as to exactly how the criminals should be executed. The quartering, provided for by law, was rejected by Nicholas I as a barbaric method, inappropriate European country. Execution was also not suitable, since the emperor considered the convicts unworthy of execution, which allowed the officers not to lose dignity.

All that remained was hanging, to which the court ultimately sentenced five Decembrists. On July 22, 1825, the death sentence was finally approved by Nicholas I.

The leaders of the Northern and Southern societies were subject to the death penalty Kondraty Ryleev And Pavel Pestel, as well as Sergey Muravyov-Apostol And Mikhail Bestuzhev-Ryumin, who directly led the uprising of the Chernigov regiment. The fifth person sentenced to death was Pyotr Kakhovsky, who mortally wounded the governor-general of St. Petersburg on Senate Square Mikhail Miloradovich.

The infliction of a mortal wound on Miloradovich on December 14, 1825. Engraving from a drawing by G. A. Miloradovich. Source: Public Domain

The execution was practiced on sandbags

The news that the Decembrists will ascend the scaffold, for Russian society became a shock. From the time of the empress Elizabeth Petrovna death sentences in Russia were not carried out. Emeliana Pugacheva and his comrades were not taken into account, since they were talking about commoner rebels. The execution of the nobles, even if they encroached on political system, was an out of the ordinary event.

The defendants themselves, both those who were sentenced to death and those who were sentenced to other types of punishment, learned about their fate on July 24, 1826. In the house of the commandant of the Peter and Paul Fortress, the judges announced the sentences to the Decembrists, who were brought from the casemates. After the verdict was announced, they were returned to their cells.

Meanwhile, the authorities were preoccupied with another problem. The absence of the practice of executions for a long time led to the fact that in St. Petersburg there were neither those who knew how to build a scaffold, nor those who knew how to carry out sentences.

On the eve of the execution, an experiment was conducted in the city prison, in which a hastily made scaffold was tested using eight-pound sandbags. The experiments were personally led by the new governor-general of St. Petersburg Pavel Vasilyevich Golenishchev-Kutuzov.

Considering the results satisfactory, the governor-general ordered the scaffold to be dismantled and taken to the Peter and Paul Fortress.

Part of the scaffold got lost along the way

The execution was scheduled in the crown work of the Peter and Paul Fortress at dawn on July 25, 1826. This dramatic act, which was supposed to put an end to the history of the Decembrist movement, turned out to be tragicomic.

As the head of the crown work of the Peter and Paul Fortress recalled Vasily Berkopf, one of the cabbies carrying parts of the gallows, managed to get lost in the dark and appeared on the spot with a significant delay.

From midnight in the Peter and Paul Fortress there was an execution over those of the convicts who escaped execution. They were taken out of the casemates, their uniforms were torn off and swords were broken over their heads as a sign of the so-called "civil execution", then they were dressed in prisoners' robes and sent back to the cells.

Meanwhile the chief of police Chikhachev with an escort of Pavlovsky's soldiers guards regiment took from the cells of five sentenced to death, after which he escorted them to the kronverk.

When they were brought to the place of execution, the suicide bombers saw how the carpenters, under the guidance of an engineer Matushkina in a hurry trying to collect the scaffold. The organizers of the execution were almost more nervous than the convicts - it seemed to them that the cart with part of the gallows had disappeared not just like that, but as a result of sabotage.

The five Decembrists were put on the grass, and for some time they discussed their fate with each other, noting that they were worthy of a "better death."

"We must pay the last debt"

Finally, they took off their uniforms, which they immediately burned. Instead, the condemned were put on long white shirts with bibs, on which the word “criminal” and the name of the convict were written.

After that, they were taken to one of the nearby buildings, where they had to wait for the completion of the scaffold. In the house of suicide bombers communed: four Orthodox - the priest Myslovsky, Lutheran Pestel - pastor rainboat.

Finally, the scaffold was completed. Those sentenced to death were again brought to the place of execution. The governor-general was present at the execution of the sentence. Golenishchev-Kutuzov, generals Chernyshev, Benkendorf, Dibich, Levashov, Durnovo, police chief Knyazhnin, police chiefs Posnikov, Chikhachev, Derschau, head of the kronverka Berkopf, archpriest Myslovsky, paramedic and doctor, architect Gurney, five assistant quarter overseers, two executioners and 12 Pavlovian soldiers under the command of a captain Polman.

Chief of Police Chikhachev read the verdict Supreme Court with the final words: "Hang for such atrocities!".

“Gentlemen! We must pay the last debt, ”Ryleev remarked, turning to his comrades. Archpriest Pyotr Myslovsky read short prayer. White caps were thrown over the heads of the convicts, which caused them dissatisfaction: “What is this for?”

The execution turned into a sophisticated torture

Everything continued to go according to plan. One of the executioners suddenly collapsed into a swoon, and he had to be urgently carried away. Finally, a drum roll sounded, nooses were thrown around the necks of the executed, a bench was pulled out from under their feet, and after a few moments, three of the five hanged fell down.

According to Vasily Berkopf, the head of the crown work of the Peter and Paul Fortress, a hole was dug under the gallows, on which boards were laid. It was assumed that at the time of execution, the boards would be pulled out from under their feet. However, the gallows was built in a hurry, and it turned out that the suicide bombers standing on the boards did not reach the hinges with their necks.

They began to improvise again - in the destroyed building of the School of Merchant Navigation, they found benches for students, who were put on the scaffold.

But at the moment of execution, three ropes broke. Either the executioners did not take into account that they were hanging the sentenced with shackles, or the ropes were initially of poor quality, but three Decembrists - Ryleev, Kakhovsky and Muravyov-Apostol - fell into the pit, breaking through the boards with the weight of their own bodies.

Moreover, it turned out that the hanged Pestel reached the boards with his toes, as a result of which his agony stretched out for almost half an hour.

Some of the witnesses of what was happening became ill.

Muravyov-Apostol is credited with the words: “Poor Russia! And we don’t know how to hang decently!”

Perhaps this is just a legend, but we must admit that the words were very suitable at that moment.

Law versus tradition

The leaders of the execution sent messengers for new boards and ropes. The procedure was delayed - finding these things in St. Petersburg early in the morning was not such an easy task.

There was another nuance - the military article of that time prescribed execution before death, but there was also an unspoken tradition according to which it was not supposed to repeat the execution, because it meant that "The Lord does not want the death of the condemned." This tradition, by the way, took place not only in Russia, but also in other European countries.

Make a decision to stop the execution in this case could Nicholas I, who was in Tsarskoye Selo. From midnight, messengers were sent to him every half an hour to report on what was happening. Theoretically, the emperor could intervene in what was happening, but this did not happen.

As for the dignitaries who were present at the execution, it was necessary for them to bring the matter to the end, so as not to pay with their own careers. Nicholas I banned quartering as a barbaric procedure, but what happened in the end was no less barbaric.

Finally, new ropes and boards were brought in, the three who had fallen off, who were injured in the fall, were again dragged onto the scaffold and hung a second time, this time achieving their death.

Engineer Matushkin answered for everything

Engineer Matushkin was made the last for all the omissions, who was demoted to the soldiers for poor-quality construction of the scaffold.

When the doctors declared the death of the hanged, their bodies were removed from the gallows and placed in the destroyed building of the School of Merchant Navigation. By this time it was dawn in St. Petersburg, and it was impossible to take out the corpses for burial unnoticed.

According to Chief Police Officer Knyazhnin, next night the bodies of the Decembrists were taken out of the Peter and Paul Fortress and buried in a mass grave, on which no sign was left.

There is no exact information about where exactly the executed were buried. The most likely place is Golodai Island, where state criminals have been buried since the time of Peter I. In 1926, on the 100th anniversary of the execution, Golodai Island was renamed the Decembrist Island, with a granite obelisk installed there.