Terrible Tsarinas: Five Russian Women in Power (19 page)

All the information she was able to obtain concurred: according to the few people who had met the girl, she was gracious, cultivated and reasonable, spoke French as well as German, and, despite her tender years, conducted herself well under any circumstance. Too good to be true? Seeing Figchen’s portrait, sent by Frederick II, Elizabeth was even more convinced. The little princess was truly delicious, with a sweet face and an innocent look.

Fearing any last-minute disappointment, the tsarina kept secret from her entourage the imminence of the great event that she was preparing for the happiness of Russia. But, while Alexis Bestuzhev may have been in the dark, diplomats close to Prussia were well aware of what was going on, and they found it hard to keep the news to themselves. Mardefeld kept La Chétardie and Lestocq informed as the talks progressed day by day. Here and there, rumors began to circulate. The Francophile clan was guardedly optimistic to hear that this princess, educated by a French teacher, was coming to join the court. She might be Prussian by blood, but she could not help but serve the cause of France if she had been well-instructed by her governess - even if the marriage plans fell through.

Elizabeth received news of Sophia’s progress en route to the capital, with her mother. They presented themselves in Berlin, where they received Frederick II’s blessing and bankrupted themselves buying a suitable trousseau. Sophia’s father stayed behind in Zerbst. Was it to save money or to save face that he refused to accompany his daughter on this quest for a prestigious fiancé?

Elizabeth didn’t care: the fewer Prussian relations surrounding the girl, the better it would be. She sent the ladies an allowance to help defray their travel expenses, and suggested that they remain
incognito
at least until they arrived in Russia. When they crossed the border, they were to say that they were on their way to St. Petersburg to pay Her Majesty a courtesy call. The tsarina had a comfortable carriage, drawn by six horses, waiting for them when they got to Riga. They gratefully wrapped themselves in the sable shawls that Elizabeth had thoughtfully provided against the chill, and continued their journey north.

However, upon their arrival in St. Petersburg,, they were disconcerted to learn that the Empress and all the court had removed to Moscow in order to celebrate Grand Duke Peter’s 17th birthday on February 10, 1744. In Elizabeth’s absence, La Chétardie and the Prussian ambassador, Mardefeld, had been left to welcome the ladies and introduce them to the capital city.

Sophia was enchanted by the beauty of this enormous city built at the water’s edge, admired the regiments’ changing of the guard and clapped her hands with pleasure at the sight of fourteen elephants, a gift to Peter the Great from the shah of Persia. Her shrewd mother, however, was miffed that they had not yet been presented to the Empress. She was also worried by Chancellor Alexis Bestuzhev’s frosty attitude toward the intended match. She knew he was “more Russian than Russia itself,” and violently opposed to any concession to the interests of Prussia. Furthermore, she had heard rumors that he intended to induce the Holy Synod to oppose the marriage on the basis that the two fiancés were too closely related. Elizabeth was unfazed by Johanna’s worries: she knew that at the first hint from her, Bestuzhev would drop his objections and fall into line, for fear of setting off another wave of punishment against his clan, and she knew that the high prelates, mumbling in their beards, would bite their tongues and go ahead to give the couple their blessing.

Johanna cut short her daughter’s fun and entertainment and, on Mardefeld’s advice, set off at the end of January to meet the court in Moscow. La Chétardie escorted them. Elizabeth had set a date to receive them at the Annenhof Palace, in the eastern sector of the second capital, on February 9 at 8:00pm. After keeping them waiting, she gave orders to open the doors to the audience hall and appeared at the threshold, while the two visitors sank into their deepest curtseys. She took in the future fiancée in a glance - a slender, pale young girl, in a pink and silver gown with a plain skirt - no pannier. The toilette was inadequate but the girl herself was darling. Standing next to this scrumptious young lady, Peter - who had come to take delivery of this princess that had been shipped to him - looked even uglier and more disagreeable than usual.

His provocations recently had reached a new height, as he had taken up with Brummer, the minister from Holstein, and a clique of schemers all of German extraction. Furthermore, instead of being pleased that Her Majesty had named him a colonel in the Preobrazhensky Regiment, he now had the gall to invite a regiment from Holstein to come and demonstrate what was meant by discipline and efficiency - two qualities that were, in his view, sorely lacking in the Russian military.

Elizabeth had long mourned her inability to produce an heir for Russia herself, but given all these annoyances from her Germanophile nephew she must have been glad, in the end, that he was in fact not her own son. This disastrous successor resembled her neither in mind nor spirit. She began to pity the poor girl she was about to throw at the feet of such an unworthy man. She would have to do whatever she could to help the new bride win over, and control, the stupid and fanatical young fellow who was destined to become emperor one day. If only Sophia could still rely on her mother to guide her and comfort her in her disappointment; but with all her airs, Johanna appeared to be as irksome as Sophia was pleasing, with her aura of sincerity, health and good cheer.

Some relationships can be sized up in a flash. Elizabeth sensed that the bond between Johanna and Sophia was more form than feeling, based on circumstance and need rather than on affection and sympathy. Maybe Elizabeth could take the girl in hand; maybe it would be a pleasure to do so. While she had not been able to do much to mold the Grand Duke, perhaps she could help Sophia to develop into a happy, clear-headed and independent woman - without impinging on the husband’s traditional authority.

As a start, she had Razumovsky bring her the insignia of the Order of St. Catherine, and had two ladies-in-waiting pin them to the bodice of Sophia’s dress. Razumovsky was aware of her feelings in regard to this unequal but so necessary match, which had no hope of providing its protagonists with the satisfaction Elizabeth had found in her
de facto
marriage.

In the days that followed, Elizabeth watched closely and had her ladies-in-waiting report as well on the conduct of the young couple. While Sophia seemed to be waiting for her suitor to undertake some sort of gallant initiative, the foolish grand duke talked about nothing but the fine qualities of the Prussian Army, on parade as well as in combat, while systematically denigrating everything about Russia, from its customs to its history to its religion. Was he simply trying to assert his independence? As though in compensation, Sophia began to display the contrary view on every point, and seemed to find the history and the traditions of her new homeland more and more appealing.

Both Vasily Adadurov and Simon Todorsky, the tutors appointed by Her Majesty to instruct Sophia in the Russian language and religion, praised her diligence. Enjoying the intellectual effort, she would study the most difficult problems of vocabulary, grammar and theology until late at night. Then she caught cold, and took to bed with a fever. Terrified that they might fail in their objective, after coming so close, Johanna accused her of shirking her duties as a princess preparing herself for marriage; she told her to get up and get back to work.

The Francophile clique took this development as a positive sign. If the perspiring, shivering Sophia should fail to recover, a replacement bride would have to be found - and another candidate might be more inclined to favor an Anglo-Austrian alliance. Elizabeth hotly declared that she would refuse any Saxon candidate, come what may.

The men of medicine recommended bleeding the patient; Johanna was against it. Elizabeth, under pressure from her personal physician, Lestocq, cast the deciding vote and Sophia was bled 17 times in seven weeks. That was how they saved horses, and that is how they saved her. Back on her feet but still very weak, she went straight back into the fray.

She was to celebrate her 15th birthday on April 21, 1744, but she was so pale and thin that she was afraid she would make a poor impression on the public, and maybe even on her fiancé. Moved by an uncharacteristic solicitude, Elizabeth sent her some rouge and suggested she touch up her face in order to appear to better advantage. Impressed by Figchen’s courage, she found the charming girl (who was unrelated to her, but was so eager to become Russian) far more worthy than her pitiful nephew and adoptive son (who was adamant in remaining German).

Meanwhile, Johanna was busily engaging in high politics and covert diplomacy. She received visits from all the traditional enemies of Chancellor Alexis Bestuzhev, the inveterate Russophile. La Chétardie, Lestocq and Brummer held clandestine meetings in her apartments. Perhaps Sophia, under her mother’s direction, could influence Peter and maybe even the tsarina, who was visibly impressed with her, to get rid of Bestuzhev.

But Russia’s top diplomat was hardly sitting idly by while these conspiracies were being spun. His personal spies had succeeded in intercepting and deciphering encrypted correspondence from La Chétardie to various foreign ministries all over Europe. With these incriminating documents in hand, he presented himself to Elizabeth to prove his case. He had a portfolio full of damning letters, which Elizabeth read with horror: “Recognition and attention from such a dissipated princess [the tsarina] mean nothing.” “Her vanity, lack of seriousness, bad conduct, weakness and obstinacy make any serious negotiation an impossibility.” Elsewhere, La Chétardie criticized her excessive interest in clothing and frivolous pursuits, and stated that she was totally ignorant of the major issues of the day, which she found “annoying rather than interesting.” In support of these calumnies, La Chétardie cited the opinion of Johanna, whom he portrayed, furthermore, as a spy in league with Frederick II.

Elizabeth was shocked by these revelations; she no longer knew who were her friends - if, indeed, she had any. She had turned her back on Maria Theresa because of Ambassador Botta, who had called her a diplomatic crook; would she now have to part with Louis XV because of that scoundrel, La Chétardie? She ought to throw him out of the country forthwith. But wouldn’t that offend France, which had to be dealt with as a man more than as a nation?

Before making such an unequivocal gesture, Elizabeth had Johanna called in and, screaming with rage and indignation, showed her the letters. Sophia’s mother was directly incriminated. The young princess from Anhalt-Zerbst, stunned to see her dreams of grandeur flushed away so suddenly, expected to be chased out of Russia forthwith. However, she was granted an unexpected reprieve. Out of respect for her nephew’s innocent fiancée, Elizabeth consented to allow Johanna to stay on, at least until the wedding. This charity did not cost the tsarina anything, and she felt that it would turn to her own benefit in due course. She was sorry for the young lady, who seemed to have a most unnatural mother; and she hoped, by this demonstration of generosity of soul, to earn the girl’s gratitude and, perhaps, even her affection.

The deleterious climate of St. Petersburg suddenly felt intolerable to Her Majesty and, yielding to one of the mystical whims that would strike her from time to time, she decided to make another pilgrimage to the Troitsky-St. Sergievsky Monastery. She would take her nephew, Sophia, Johanna and Lestocq. Before leaving town, she instructed Alexis Bestuzhev to deal with the ignoble La Chétardie however he saw fit, saying that she approved, in advance, of whatever action he chose to take. Having thus washed her hands of the entire sordid affair, she departed on the road to God with an unburdened heart. As the pilgrimage got under way, Elizabeth noted that, while Johanna, Sophia and Lestocq were quite upset over the awkward business of La Chétardie’s letters, Peter was completely unfazed. He seemed to be quite oblivious to the fact that this scandal involved his fiancée, soon to be his wife, and that everything that involved her must affect him as well.

At the monastery, the traveling party discussed the young couple’s future, in religious and not very religious terms; meanwhile, in St. Petersburg, a party of officers and armed guards presented themselves at La Chétardie’s residence and informed him that, in view of his defamations against Her Majesty, he had 24 hours in which to take his leave. Kicked out like a dishonest servant, the Marquis protested, argued, raged, and claimed that he would lodge a complaint with his government; finally, he accepted his fate and quickly packed up.

When he reached the first coach house along the way, an emissary from the Empress caught up with him and demanded that he give back the Order of St. Andrew, and the snuffbox with her portrait enameled in miniature on the lid which he had received some years before - while he was in good standing with the court. He refused to part with these relics. At the next stage, Bestuzhev conveyed to him, by another courier, a comminatory sentence from Elizabeth: “The Marquis de La Chétardie is not worthy of receiving personal commissions from Her Majesty.” At this sudden fall from grace, La Chétardie thought he was losing his mind. He asked Versailles to intervene in a matter that, in his view, insulted France as much as it insulted him. This time, it was Louis XV who set him in his place. As punishment for his maladroit initiatives, he should withdraw to his estate in Limousin, and stay there until further notice.

As for Elizabeth and her fellow pilgrims, after paying a pious visit to the monastery, they made their way back to Moscow where the ladies from Anhalt-Zerbst strove to appear natural in spite of their shame and dis appointment. Johanna was in a rage, knowing that she was now quite unwelcome in Russia and guessing that she would be invited to take her ship out as soon as her daughter was wed. Sophia, for her part, tried to get over this series of setbacks by preparing for her conversion to orthodoxy with all the zeal of a neophyte. While she was scrupulously attending to everything said by the priest charged with initiating her into the faith of her new compatriots, Peter was off on a hunting excursion, merrily scouring the surrounding forests and plains, with his usual comrades. They were all from Holstein, they spoke only German among themselves, and they encouraged the Grand Duke to resist Russian traditions and stand fast to his Germanic origins.