The award of the highest military award continued during the reign of Nicholas I. During this period, two commanders, I. F. Paskevich and I. I. Dibich, were awarded the Order of St. George, 1st class.

Ivan Fyodorovich Paskevich was born on May 19, 1782, at the age of 12 he was assigned to the Page Corps, and in October 1800, among the first graduates, he was sent as a lieutenant to the Preobrazhensky Regiment of the Life Guards.

He made his first campaign in 1805, but received real combat training during the Russo-Turkish war of 1806-1812 under the leadership of General I. I. Mikhelson. Staff Captain Paskevich participated in the occupation of Iasi, the capture of Bucharest and in the battle of Izmail, and in 1810, at the walls of the Varna Fortress, he earned his first St. George's Cross. This happened during the battles at Cape Galotoburg during the capture of a Turkish battery.

18 days later, in the same place, the Vitebsk regiment, commanded by Colonel Paskevich, repelled the attacks of the Turks throughout the day. The fierce battle ended in a complete victory for the Russians, who not only fought in defense against a numerically superior enemy, but also counterattacked themselves. This feat became widely known in the active army, and the young commander of the Vitebsk regiment put the cross of the Order of St. George of the 3rd degree on his neck.

During the Patriotic War of 1812, Paskevich commanded a division and participated in the battles of Saltanovka, Smolensk, Borodino and Maloyaroslavets. No less bravely he fought during the foreign campaigns of the Russian army in 1813-1814. Commanding the corps at Donau, he defeated the troops of Marshal L. Saint-Cyr, and during the battle of Dresden was at the head of the column and, breaking into the city suburb, captured about 4 thousand people and repulsed 30 guns. Then, already with the rank of Lieutenant General, he led the troops during the siege of the fortresses of Magdeburg and Hamburg. In 1814, Paskevich, commanding the 2nd Grenadier Division, participated in the battles of Belleville and pursued the French all the way to Paris. The award for this was the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky.

The Russo-Persian War of 1826-1828. Paskevich met in the Caucasus, where he succeeded General Yermolov as commander of a Separate corps. In the war with the Persians, he acted decisively. Already in the first battle with the troops of Abbas Mirza in September 1826, a 7-thousandth detachment under his command completely defeated the 35-thousandth Persian army. During the campaign of 1827, Paskevich occupied Nakhichevan, the strategic fortress of Abbas-Abad, and in October - Erivan. The rescript of Nicholas I read: "For the excellent courage, firmness and skill shown by Adjutant General Paskevich during the conquest of Sardar Abbad and the important conquest of the famous Erivan fortress in Asia, I received the Order of St. John the Baptist. St. George the Victorious, 2nd class Grand Cross". With the capture of Erivan, the Russo-Persian war actually ended. In 1828, a peace treaty was signed in Turkmanchay. On March 27, 1828, I. F. Paskevich was granted the hereditary title of Count of the Russian Empire with the honorary name of Erivan. In turn, the Persian Shah awarded the commander-in-chief of the Russian troops with the Order of the Lion and the Sun.

In the last days of March 1828, Paskevich received a notification about " the complete break between Russia and Porto." In June of the following year, in a field battle, he completely defeated the Turkish army under the command of Gakki Pasha. During the two-day battles near the village of Kainli, the Sultan's army virtually ceased to exist. For this success, Paskevich was awarded diamond badges of the Order of St. Andrew the First-Called. But the war continued, and after marching more than 100 km in three days, on July 5 the Russian corps occupied the fortress of Hassan-Kale, and four days later the Russian soldiers entered the rich and crowded Erzurum-the control center of Asian Turkey. For Erzerum, General of Infantry Ivan F. Paskevich was awarded the Order of St. George, 1st class, thus becoming a full cavalier of the highest military award of the empire. The following year, he was awarded the Field Marshal's baton.

Ivan Ivanovich (Johann Karl Friedrich Anton) Dibitsch, the fourth and last full knight of the Order, was born on May 2, 1785 in the Grosleine estate in the family of a colonel in the Prussian army. In 1798, his father was invited to the Russian service. Together with him, Johann moved to the new Fatherland, who on August 23 became an ensign in the Life Guards of the Semenovsky Regiment. The young officer received his baptism of fire in the war with the French in 1805, and the first award - a golden sword with the inscription "For Bravery" - for the Battle of Austerlitz. In 1807, Dibitsch participated in the battles of Gaustat, Geislsberg and Friedland. For his "personal courage and efficiency" in the last battle, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 4th class.

Dibich met the Patriotic War of 1812 with the rank of colonel as Chief quartermaster of the corps of Count P. H. Wittgenstein. For the qualities shown in the battles of Klyastitsy, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 3rd class.

During the foreign campaign of the Russian army, Dibich established himself as a competent and brave commander. So, for his skillful actions in the battles of Kulm, he was awarded the Order of St. John the Baptist. Vladimir of the 2nd degree, and at Leipzig, with his bravery and advice, he greatly contributed to the overall victory. The commander - in-chief of the Allied army, the Austrian Prince Schwarzenberg, took off the Order of Maria Theresa after the battle and put it on Dibich.

During the Russo-Turkish War of 1828-1829. Dibich

page 65

In fact, he led the Russian troops in the Balkans under the elderly commander-in-chief P. H. Wittgenstein. For organizing the siege and capture of Varna, he was awarded the Order of St. John the Baptist. St. Andrew the First-Called. For the battle of Kulevcha on May 30, where Dibich defeated the 40-thousandth army of Reshid Pasha, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 2nd degree. At the end of the war, for the victory in which Dibich did a lot, he was showered with awards: an honorary addition to the surname was granted - Zabalkansky, field Marshal's baton and the Order of St. George, 1st degree.

The last recipients of the highest degree of the Order of St. George were two representatives of the imperial family - Grand Dukes Nikolai Nikolaevich the Elder and Mikhail Nikolaevich, who commanded Russian troops in the European and Caucasian theaters of military operations during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878.

Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, the third son of Emperor Nicholas I, was born on July 27, 1831. His military service began in the Life Guards Mounted Regiment in 1851. The following year, he was promoted to Major General and appointed Inspector General of Engineering. He received his baptism of fire during the Crimean War, and for his courage in the Battle of Inkerman, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 4th degree.

In August 1864, Nikolai Nikolaevich was appointed commander of the Guard and the St. Petersburg Military District. In these posts, he did much to improve the combat training of the troops entrusted to him. In 1876, on the eve of the Russo-Turkish war, the Grand Duke was appointed commander-in-chief of the Danube Army. On June 15, 1877, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 2nd class, for his successful leadership of the Russian troops crossing the Danube near Sistov, and for the capture of Plevna and the capture of the 40-thousandth Turkish corps, Nikolai Nikolaevich was awarded the Order of St. George, 1st class. In 1878, due to a breakdown in his health and at his request, the Grand Duke was dismissed with the rank of Field Marshal General.

Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich, the fourth son of Nicholas I, was born on October 13, 1832. He received his first officer rank in 1846, and in 1852 was promoted to Major General. His baptism of fire took place during the Crimean War. To raise the spirits of the defenders of Sevastopol, Emperor Nicholas sent two of his sons to the front lines. During the battle of Inkermain, the Grand Duke showed courage and bravery, which was duly awarded the 4th degree of the Order of St. George.

In January 1856, Mikhail Nikolaevich took up the post of General-Feldseichmeister of the Russian army. In this post, he held a number of events that really contributed to the reform of the Russian artillery. Thus, officer schools were established under all artillery divisions, the number of artillery ranges was significantly increased, and the artillery committee was created, which became the brain of artillery reform. In 1860, the Grand Duke was promoted to the rank of General of Artillery.

In 1862, Mikhail Nikolaevich was appointed Governor of the Caucasus and commander of the Caucasian Army. It was under his leadership that the Caucasus Region was finally conquered by the annexation of the Western Caucasus.

With the declaration of war on Turkey, he was appointed commander-in-Chief of the active army in the Asian theater. For storming and capturing the large Turkish fortress of Kare, the Grand Duke was awarded the Order of St. George, 1st class.

It should be noted that up to 1869 all awards of the highest degree of the order were carried out only for military exploits, with the exception of Catherine II, who assumed the insignia of the order as its founder. But for the centenary of the order, which was solemnly celebrated in November 1869, the 1st degree signs were placed on themselves by Emperor Alexander II and even sent them to the Prussian King Wilhelm I.

During the First World War, the highest degree of the order was not awarded to any military commander, although there were undoubtedly worthy ones.

In addition to Russian commanders, several foreign military leaders were awarded the highest degree of the Russian military Order. Some of them earned this award on the battlefields with the enemy, others-speaking out against unarmed people, and the Prussian King Wilhelm I in 1869 received it as a memorial sign for the centenary of the order.

The greatest number of awards was awarded by Alexander I during the confrontation with Napoleon. In 1813, Allied commanders Jean Baptiste Bernadotte, Gebhard Leberecht Blucher and Karl Philipp Schwarzenberg were awarded the Grand Cross of the 1st class for the Battle of Leipzig, which was called the "Battle of the peoples".

Jean Baptiste Jules Bernadotte, who by a whim of history became the founder of the now reigning Swedish royal dynasty, belonged to the brilliant galaxy of Napoleon's marshals, who rose from the very bottom thanks to the Great French Revolution and personal talents.

He was born on January 26, 1763 in the family of a minor official. The difficult financial situation of the family forced Bernadotte to enlist as a soldier. In 1792, he received the rank of lieutenant, and after the victory at Fleurus in June 1794, he was promoted to brigadier general. Bernadotte's name became famous during the campaigns in Belgium (1794) and Germany (1795-1796). What especially distinguished the general from many other military leaders during this bloody period of guillotines and executions was that he strictly exacted from his subordinates for any violence against the civilian population.

In 1797, the general was sent to the Italian Army, where he met Napoleon for the first time. In July 1799, Bernadotte was appointed Minister of War of the Republic. However, in this post Bernadotte did not come to the court of the Directory, and in September of the same year he was dismissed.

After the coup of 18 Brumaire, Bernadotte led the Western Army, and on May 19, 1804, he became one of the first marshals of the Empire. In the campaign of 1805, he commanded the 1st Army Corps of the "Grand Army" and fought with Russian troops at Austerlitz. The following year, he defeated the Prussians at Schleitz, and on November 7, in Lubeck, forced the surrender of General Blucher's 15,000-strong army. Then there were two wounds in 1807, the Battle of Morungen and the defeat at Wagram during the 1809 campaign. In July, Napoleon removed the marshal from command.

Then the incredible happened. The Swedish officer K. O. Merner, who arrived to Napoleon with a letter from the Swedish King Charles XIII, in which he asked for advice on a possible candidate for the Swedish throne, turned to the disgraced marshal with a proposal.

The idea of putting one of the following at the head of the kingdom:

page 66

people close to Napoleon appeared in Sweden in 1809. The most famous name here was Bernadotte, who in 1806 was especially good with the captured Swedish officers. Napoleon was surprised to learn about the choice of the Swedes and thought for a long time, but in the end did not interfere with the marshal. And Bernadotte, having received such a flattering offer, secretly went to Colonel V. Chernyshev, a former Russian military agent in Paris, and asked him to inform Alexander I that he would be a useful neighbor for Russia. Indeed, having arrived in Sweden and become crown prince under the name of Karl Johan, Bernadotte already signed a treaty of alliance with Russia on April 5, 1812, and in 1813 joined the 6th anti-Napoleonic coalition. In the spring of 1813, Karl Johan led the Swedish army into Germany and defeated the French forces of Marshal Oudinot at Gross - Beeren, and Marshal Ney at Dennewitz. He also participated in the victorious "battle of the nations" for the Allies near Leipzig (October 16-19). Jean Bernadotte was crowned King of Sweden as Charles XIV, giving rise to a new Swedish dynasty.

Prussian Field Marshal Gebhart Leberecht von Blucher, who turned gray in the wars with the French, was born on December 16, 1742 and entered the Swedish service as a junker at the age of sixteen. In 1760, captured by the Prussians, he entered the Prussian service. He participated in the Seven Years ' War and received cavalry training in the cavalry of the "iron Seidlitz", one of the best Prussian generals of the era of Frederick II. As a military commander, he was formed in the wars with Napoleonic France. He participated in the battles of Jena and Auerstedt, where Prussian troops were defeated. In 1813, he was appointed commander of the Allied Silesian Army. He participated in the battles of Bautzen and Lutzen, and during the autumn campaign vigorously acted against the French corps of Marshal Ney, but avoided a general battle with Napoleon himself. Blucher defeated MacDonald at Katzbach in August, and Marshal Marmont at Meckern in October. For his participation in the "battle of the nations" near Leipzig, where he skillfully organized the pursuit of the retreating French, he was awarded the Order of St. George 1st class by Emperor Alexander I.

In 1815, he led the Prussian-Saxon army, concentrated in the Netherlands, and in the battle of Ligny was defeated by Napoleon, who returned from the island of Elbe. But with his usual energy, Blucher was able to quickly recover from the setbacks and in time came to the aid of Wellington attacked by the French at Waterloo. It was Blucher's timely arrival at the battle site that decided the outcome in favor of the Allied army.

The Austrian Field Marshal Karl Philipp Schwarzenberg, born in 1771, came from an ancient princely family whose roots are lost in the depths of centuries. His entire military career was shaped by the wars with France. In 1800, the prince commanded the Austrian troops at Hohenlinden and covered the retreat to the Ems. In the campaign of 1805, he was appointed vice-president of the Military Council, and he was under the commander - in-chief of the Austrian troops, Field Marshal Mack. During the Ulm disaster, in which the Austrian army was completely defeated and Austria was forced to sign the terms of a hard peace with Bonaparte, Schwarzenberg managed to fight his way with some cavalry from the encirclement to Eger. In 1808, the prince entered the diplomatic field and was sent as ambassador to St. Petersburg, and then negotiated the marriage of Napoleon with Archduchess Marie-Louise. During the campaign of the" Grand Army " in Russia, at the head of the auxiliary corps, Schwarzenberg crossed the Bug and took up positions near Pinsk. But his corps did not participate in the fighting and was soon forced to retreat to Warsaw. In 1813, when Austria declared war on France, Schwarzenberg was appointed commander-in-chief of all Allied forces. For the battle of Leipzig, he was awarded the Order of St. George, 1st class.

The last person to be awarded the Order of St. George, 1st class, during the Napoleonic Wars was the English commander Duke Wellington, winner of the French Emperor's Battle of Waterloo.

Arthur-Collie Wellington, British general and statesman, was born on May 1, 1769. He received his baptism of fire in 1794 during a campaign in Holland against French troops. In 1797, he was in India, where he participated in military operations against local tribes. The star of general Wellington rose in 1808, when he was placed at the head of the British troops operating against the French in Portugal. On August 21, he defeated Marshal Junot's corps at Vimeyra, and on May 16 of the following year forced Marshal Soult to retreat and invaded Spain. On July 27-28, at the head of a combined Anglo - Spanish army, Wellington defeated the French forces at Talavera. In the autumn of the same year, the successful actions of Marshal Massena's French corps forced Wellington to abandon the captured territory and retreat to Lisbon. It was only in 1811, when the best-trained French troops were withdrawn by Napoleon from Spain to prepare for the campaign to Russia, that Wellington again went on the offensive. On July 22, 1812, he defeated Marshal Marmont and entered Madrid in August. In June 1813, Wellington defeated the French at Vittoria, for which he was awarded the Field Marshal's baton. During Napoleon's Hundred Days, Wellington was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Allied forces. On June 18, 1815, at Waterloo, he repelled all the attacks of French troops, and with the arrival of Blucher, he was able to defeat Napoleon. For the victory at Waterloo, among other awards showered on the Field Marshal was the Order of St. George, 1st class.

Three other people were awarded the highest degree of the Order at different times. Louis-Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Angouleme, received it from Emperor Alexander I in 1823 for suppressing the revolution in Spain in 1820-1823. For similar "exploits", but already in Italy, in 1849, the Austrian Field Marshal Joseph Radetzky von Radetz received the Order from Nicholas I.

The last foreign military leader, Archduke Albrecht Friedrich of Austria, earned the 1st Class Cross on the battlefields. He was awarded by Emperor Alexander II in 1870 for his victories in the Austro-Italian War and for his activities aimed at improving the organization of the Austrian army.

So, for less than 150 years of its existence, only twenty-five times the grand cross of the highest military order of the Russian Empire was worn on a ribbon over the left shoulder of the recipient of this award. In the overwhelming majority, the knights of the order earned it by their military exploits, but sometimes, due to political conjuncture, it was awarded not according to the statute - for a high family or for other reasons.

page 67

Permanent link to this publication: