E.V. : For attempted assassination in peacetime should not be executed.. ..
For attempted assassination Alexandra III Alexander Ulyanov and his comrades were hanged in the Shlisselburg fortress
May 20, 1887
Alexander Ulyanov - one of the organizers of the assassination attempt on Alexander III
The “terrorist faction” united mainly university students (P. Andreyushkin, V. Generalov, O. Govorukhin, Yu. Lukashevich, V. Osipanov, N. Rudevich, etc.) and was independent from other Narodnaya Volya groups, maintained connections with circles in Vilnius and Kharkov, with revolutionary-minded students of the capital's military educational institutions, conducted propaganda among the workers.
Members of the faction acted both under the influence of the ideas of K. Marx, F. Engels, G. Plekhanov, and the program documents of Narodnaya Volya. The program of the “Terrorist Faction” recognized the need to organize a socialist party, the core of which should be the working class, the nationalization of land, factories, factories and, as the ultimate goal, the establishment of a socialist system.
Following the Narodnaya Volya tradition, the authors of the program considered the organization’s primary task to be the struggle for political freedoms through the “disorganization” of the government; terror was recognized as a method of struggle. They were preparing an assassination attempt on Emperor Alexander III, scheduling it for March 1, 1887, in honor of the day when Emperor Alexander II was killed 6 years ago, also at the hands of Narodnaya Volya.
But the attempt failed - the police had been watching the terrorists for a long time, they were all arrested. During the search, they found three bombs, a revolver and a program from the executive committee of Narodnaya Volya. The assassination attempt on the Tsar ended in the destruction of the organization. The participants and organizers of the assassination attempt (15 people) were tried on April 15-19 in the Special Presence of the Government Senate.
First the court sentenced death penalty everyone, but Alexander III approved capital punishment only for five. On May 20, 1887, Ulyanov, Andreyushkin, Generalov, Osipanov and Shevyrev were hanged in the Shlisselburg fortress, the rest were sentenced to various terms of hard labor and exile to Siberia.
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revolutionary-People's Volunteer, elder brother of V.I. Lenin
April 12, 1866 - May 20, 1887
Alexander Ilyich Ulyanov, older brother of V.I. Lenin, was born in the family of the famous teacher Ilya Nikolaevich Ulyanov, in Nizhny Novgorod. In 1883 he graduated from the Simbirsk gymnasium with a gold medal and entered the Faculty of Science St. Petersburg University, where he studied brilliantly.
Alexander took part in illegal student meetings and demonstrations, and conducted propaganda in the workers' circle. At the end of 1886 he became a member of the terrorist faction of the People's Will party. He was one of the authors of the party program, where the influence of Marxism was manifested.
Along with the recognition of the working class as the center of the socialist party, the program argued that the revolutionary intelligentsia should take the initiative in the fight against the autocracy, and terror was recognized as the method of struggle.
Ulyanov and his comrades prepared an assassination attempt on Alexander III, but the assassination attempt was prevented, and the organizers were arrested - a total of 15 people. In mid-April, a trial was held at which Ulyanov, Shevyrev, Andreyushkin, Generalov and Osipanov were sentenced to death, and the rest to various terms of hard labor and exile. At the trial, Alexander made a political speech.
It is known that Alexander’s mother, Maria Alexandrovna, wrote a letter to Emperor Alexander III and received permission to visit her son. Alexander Ulyanov had the opportunity to ask the emperor for pardon, but he refused this opportunity.
Execution of Alexander Ulyanov
By 1887 in major cities In Russia there were separate circles, small organizations consisting mainly of students. Their members did not have thorough theoretical training, revolutionary experience and sufficient endurance. Political circles were isolated from each other and acted according to own plan. A noticeable mark on the revolutionary movement of the second half of the 1880s was left by the circle of Ulyanov, Shevyrev, Lukashevich and others. Their program is an attempt to reconcile the theory and practice of Narodnaya Volya with social democracy and give “ scientific explanation"terror. The idea of drawing up a program arose in the circle, according to A. Ulyanov, approximately in the second half of December 1886.
Then, having gathered his friends and sister Anna at the apartment, young Sasha Ulyanov explained to them his thoughts, which boiled down to the fact that: “In the fight against revolutionaries, the government uses extreme measures intimidation, therefore the intelligentsia was forced to resort to the form of struggle indicated by the government, that is, terror. Terror is, therefore, a clash between the government and the intelligentsia, from which the possibility of peaceful cultural influence on social life. Terror must act systematically and, by disorganizing the government, will have a huge impact psychological impact: he will raise the revolutionary spirit of the people... The faction stands for the decentralization of the terrorist struggle, let the wave of red terror spread widely throughout the province, where a system of intimidation is even more needed as a protest against administrative oppression.”
Thus, Sasha Ulyanov’s proposals were more dashing than the attempts of the current Italian “Red Brigades” and the German “Rot Armee Faction”. In fact, it was a call for mass murder of everyone who did not like the Ulyanov brother and sister. The boys enthusiastically accepted the calls of their twenty-year-old leader and began preparing the first terrorist attack. To some extent, one can understand these provincial romantics who lived in an atmosphere of philistinism and despondency. But to go out into the streets and start killing people...
The first step was to kill the king (it was he who was the tasty morsel in the eyes of the young people). The original plan to shoot the Tsar was rejected and they decided to throw bombs. Their preparation required a special room, dynamite, mercury and Nitric acid, which at first were prepared in a “homemade” way. Gerasimov and Andreyushkin expressed a desire to throw bombs. However, from the day of the first terrorist attacks by the Ishutinites, the authorities began to pay close attention to “pale young men with burning eyes,” especially those who distinguished themselves at demonstrations. And, in particular, they did not hesitate to illustrate their letters. So, one day, having opened a letter addressed to a certain Nikitin, a Kharkov police officer almost fell out of his chair after reading the following passage: “The most merciless terror is possible in our country, and I firmly believe that it will happen, and even in a short time.”
The name of the correspondent, a St. Petersburg friend of Andreyushkin, an active member of the faction, was shaken out of Nikitin. The police launched a meticulous operation to identify all characters impending terrorist attack. They established round-the-clock surveillance of the apartment of the bloodthirsty Andreyushkin and all its visitors. Meanwhile, the gendarmes received alarming information about the impending assassination attempt only on February 28, if you trust the most reliable report of their chief. On March 1, the Minister of Internal Affairs, Count D. Tolstoy, informed the Tsar: “Yesterday, the head of the St. Petersburg secret department received intelligence information that a circle of criminals intends to carry out a terrorist act in the near future and that for this purpose these persons have at their disposal projectiles brought to St. Petersburg ready to “come” from Kharkov." Meanwhile, the terrorists decided to go hunting for the Tsar on March 1, and if the assassination attempt on that day fails, and the Tsar goes south, then follow him and kill him along the way. However, the police also they remembered this date - March 1, - too memorable for both the government and the revolutionaries, so the head of the secret department, without waiting for the tsar’s resolution, ordered the immediate arrest of the persons tracked down by the agents, hardly assuming that these were the terrorists about whom he had already been warned .
On March 1, 1887, three students, Osipanov, Andreyushkin and Generalov, were captured with explosive shells on Nevsky Prospekt. The “frank testimony” of signalmen (Kancher and Gorkun) who were arrested at the same time allowed the gendarmes to quickly identify the participants in the terrorist organization and the leading role in it of students Alexander Ulyanov and Shevyrev. In total, 25 people were arrested in the first days of March, and later another 49 people. Fifteen people were put on trial, and the remaining cases were resolved administratively. The police department immediately drew up a report on the arrest of the terrorists and sent it to the Tsar, signed by Tolstoy, with a brief notice of the conspiracy and small biographical information about those arrested. “This time God saved us,” the king wrote in the report, “but for how long? “Thank you to all the police officers who do not sleep and act successfully - send everything you learn more.” At first, the king did not attach much importance to the students’ prank. When, “in order to avoid exaggerated rumors,” Count Tolstoy on March 1 asked the sovereign for permission to print a special notice, the tsar wrote a resolution on the report:
“I completely approve and in general it is advisable not to attach too much of great importance these arrests. In my opinion, it would be better, having learned everything possible from them, not to bring them to trial, but simply send them to the Shlisselburg fortress without any fuss - this is the most severe and unpleasant punishment. Alexander". However, having become more familiar with the activities of the faction, the king changed his mind. Thus, he was presented with the “Program of the Terrorist Faction of the Narodnaya Volya Party,” personally written by Alexander Ulyanov. And the first resolution that the tsar put on it was: “This is a note not even from a madman, but from a pure idiot.”
“Final demands” necessary “to ensure the political and economic independence of the people and their free development”, were reduced by Ulyanov to 8 points.
1. A permanent government of the people, freely elected by direct and universal suffrage.
2. Broad local self-government.
3. Independence of the community as an economic and administrative unit.
4. Complete freedom of conscience, speech, press, gatherings and movements.
5. Nationalization of land.
6. Nationalization of factories, factories and instruments of production.
7. Replacement of the standing army with the zemstvo militia.
8. Free initial training.
The main task of the faction was the elimination of Alexander III. (“The purest commune,” added Alexander III. He, apparently, still could not understand why, for the sake of all this nonsense, it was necessary to kill him.) The next day, the chief of gendarmes presented a “draft government message.” “On March 1, on Nevsky Prospekt at about 11 o’clock in the morning, three students of St. Petersburg University were detained, and explosive shells were found during a search. The detainees stated that they belonged to a secret criminal community, and the selected shells, upon examination by their expert, turned out to be loaded with dynamite and lead bullets filled with strychnine.” Alexander III recognized this message as “completely sufficient.” When collecting materials, the gendarmes did not stop at any difficulties and did not hesitate to use any means.
As a result of this they received detailed readings signalmen Kancher and Gorkun. This service was appreciated by the court and the tsar himself, who wrote an inscription on the death sentence presented to him for 15 people with a petition to commute the punishment for some of the convicts. “Quite rightly, I believe that Kancher and Gorkun could have had their sentences reduced further for their frank testimony and repentance.”
A huge amount of “work” was going on in the police department itself in St. Petersburg. The detectives needed to reveal the surname of a member of a terrorist organization, who was known to have the patronymic “Sergeevich.” To facilitate such a search, the police department wrote down from its records the names and surnames of all persons who had this patronymic. The result was a huge list of 16 pages, indicating for what case each person on the list was involved. Another list, shorter, contained information about the “Sergeevichs” who were brought to justice in various political cases. The trial on March 1, 1887 took place behind closed doors. Only ministers, their comrades, members of the State Council, senators and specially listed persons from the highest bureaucracy were allowed to enter the courtroom. In this regard trial in the case of March 1, 1887, left far behind him the trial in the case of March 1, 1881, in which during judicial trial Representatives of the press were present and stenographic notes were taken.
The closest relatives of the defendants were not allowed not only to enter the courtroom, but also to visit them. So, for example, the following resolution was imposed on Ulyanov’s mother’s request to allow her to visit her son: “If Mrs. Ulyanov complies, declare that visits are not allowed.”
It is characteristic that instead of responding to Ulyanova’s petition, the director of the police department ordered to respond only in the event of a new appeal. It should also be noted the fate of Ulyanova’s petition to mitigate the fate of her son Alexander Ilyich Ulyanov and daughter Anna Ilyinichna Ulyanova. The mother asked the Comrade Minister of the Interior to forward her request to the Tsar. However, Orzhevsky forwarded this request instead of the tsar to the special presence of the Senate, where the matter was received. The Minister of Internal Affairs received a report from the police department about each court hearing. The Minister of Justice submitted written reports to the Tsar about each meeting. Police Department reports confirm that Senator Dreyer lived up to his expectations. For example, he did not give Ulyanov the opportunity to talk about his attitude to terrorism. The report noted Ulyanov's attempts to defend the defendant Novorussky. He tried to prove that Novorussky could not have guessed about the production in his apartment explosive. With visible pleasure, the Minister of the Interior was informed that “the speeches of the defenders were brief and very decent.” This gendarmerie praise does not honor the defenders, but at the same time characterizes the conditions in which the defense was placed.
Of the several dozen brought to justice in the case on March 1, 1887, 15 people were put on trial: Ulyanov Alexander, Osipanov, Andreyushkin, Generalov, Shevyrev, Lukashevich, Novorussky, Ananyina, Pilsudsky Bronislav, Pashkovsky, Shmidova, Kancher, Gorkun, Volokhov and Serdyukova. Of these accused, 12 were students. All defendants were sentenced to death, but the special presence of the Senate petitioned for eight defendants to commute the death penalty to other punishments. Alexander III approved the death sentence for five convicts, namely Ulyanov, Shevyrev, Generalov, Osipanov and Andreyushkin. Lukashevich and Novorussky were imprisoned for life in the Shlisselburg fortress and stayed there for 18 years each, until the 1905 revolution freed them. Ananyina was exiled to the Kara for 20 years, Pilsudski, upon confirmation, was sent to Sakhalin for 15 years. The four convicts were sentenced to 10 years of hard labor instead of the death penalty. Shmidova was exiled to Siberia for a settlement, and Serdyukova, found guilty of non-reporting, was imprisoned for 2 years.
An interesting detail: due to the absence of an executioner in St. Petersburg, an encrypted telegram was sent to the Warsaw Chief of Police with a request to send an executioner upon request, and on April 30 the demand followed. “Send out the executioner immediately.” Four days later, five sentenced to execution and two to life imprisonment were taken from the Trubetskoy bastion to Shlisselburg. The execution took place on May 8.
On the same day, Count Tolstoy reported to the emperor in writing: “Today in the Shlisselburg prison, according to the verdict of the special presence of the Governing Senate, which took place on April 15-19, state criminals were subjected to the death penalty: Shevyrev, Ulyanov, Osipanov, Andreyushkin and Generalov.
According to information provided by the prosecutor of the St. Petersburg district court, Shcheglovitov, who carried out the Senate sentence, the convicts, due to their transfer to the Shlisselburg prison, assumed that they had been granted pardon. Nevertheless, when it was announced to them half an hour before the execution, namely at 3? o'clock in the morning, about the upcoming execution of the sentence, they all remained completely calm and refused to confess and receive the holy mysteries. Due to the fact that the location of the Shlisselburg prison did not provide the opportunity to execute all five at the same time, the scaffold was built for three people. The first to be taken out for execution were Generalov, Andreyushkin and Osipanov. After hearing the verdict, they said goodbye to each other, venerated the cross and cheerfully entered the scaffold, after which Generalov and Andreyushkin said in a loud voice: “Long live the People's Will!” Osipanov intended to do the same, but did not have time, because he a bag was thrown in. After removing the corpses of the executed criminals, Shevyrev and Ulyanov were brought out, who also cheerfully and calmly entered the scaffold, with Ulyanov kissing the cross, and Shevyrev pushing away the priest’s hand." On the report, except for the usual sign that the Tsar had read it, there was no other there is no mark.
The execution of the death sentence and the imprisonment of the convicts in hard labor prisons was not the end of the extensive paperwork in the trial on March 1, 1887; the administrative reprisal against many of those arrested continued, and it began even before the judicial reprisal. Already on April 8, the “highest” order was issued to exile Eastern Siberia for 5 years to Anna Ulyanov.
Booker Igor 05/21/2012 at 17:00
125 years and one day ago, on the crown of the Shlisselburg fortress, by verdict of the Special Presence, Lenin’s elder brother, Alexander Ulyanov, was executed by hanging. A talented 20-year-old zoologist (in his third year the young man received a gold medal) for some reason got involved in politics. Having died without really starting to live, he brought great grief to his family.
And if he were successful in killing Tsar Alexander III, he would bring grief to the family of his royal namesake. Co-organizer of the “Terrorist Faction” of the “People’s Will” party, the half-educated terrorist Ulyanov still understood too little about life to dispose of other people’s lives. The motives of the Pole Bronislaw Pilsudski, who prepared explosives to kill the sovereign, can still be understood. In his opinion, his homeland Poland suffered from the Russians and their Tsar. But what was missing from the boy who graduated from the Simbirsk gymnasium with a gold medal?
Arrested on March 1, 1887, on the sixth anniversary of the assassination of Tsar Alexander II, Alexander Ulyanov appeared in court. Eyewitnesses noted that at the trial and during the execution he behaved with exceptional dignity and saved the lives of his comrades with his testimony. Historians have no reason to doubt the personal integrity of Alexander Ulyanov. Decency played a cruel joke on the beautiful young man! However, it cannot be said that in terms of his human qualities Sasha Ulyanov was in some way superior to Sasha Romanov.
Because " good intentions“The terrorist Ulyanov was led to hell in full accordance with the proverb. The famous words allegedly said by Lenin when he learned of his brother’s death: “No, we will not go that way. This is not the way to go," - belong rather to the genre of apocryphal literature. In the year of the tragedy, Maria Ulyanova was only nine years old, and Lenin still had no idea about politics. Years later, fellow university students recruited Vladimir Ulyanov to participate in an illegal group "People's Will" as the brother of a famous terrorist.
Lawyers then justified their charges by saying that the state itself was pushing young people onto the path of terror. In this context, I remember how the first Russian revolutionary Alexander Radishchev accused not even the government, but Empress Catherine II herself of giving Russian students abroad such a large allowance that the students had enough not only to buy books, but also to visit whores! As a result, Radishchev’s friend from studying in Leipzig rotted before our eyes from syphilis, which he picked up while wandering around brothels. Radishchev himself later infected bad illness his wife, of which he repented on the pages of his main literary work.
Unlike modern society, which generally condemns terrorism, the danger of the then state of affairs lay in a positive attitude towards bombers. Nowadays, terror concerns primarily ordinary citizens, but then the hunt was for high-ranking officials or the autocrat himself. And if strangers accidentally died during a bomb explosion, well, they said, the forest is being cut down, the wood chips are flying! It turns out that the whole world sympathized with the terrorists?
The famous writer and publicist Konstantin Leontiev, in his essay “How and in what way is our liberalism harmful?”, cites as an example the persecution by society of the abbess (and also the baroness) Mitrofania, who committed money forgery, and the rejoicing over the release of the midwife Vera Zasulich, who almost shot the general Trepov. Was everything normal in such a society?
“Mitrofania is to blame, but Vera Zasulich is right. No one pities the elderly, distinguished woman, carried away by her active character and the desire to enrich her beloved religious institution; Vera Zasulich, who decides to commit political murder because of communist sympathies, is pitied by everyone and gives her a mad ovation!” - wrote K. Leontyev.
Further, Leontyev adds: “Why did she shoot the mayor? Was she in love, perhaps, with that political prisoner whom General Trepov flogged for insolence in prison? Wasn’t she in a love affair with him? Not at all! Then he would have come to her , probably would have been stricter. But she did not have any personal relations with this prisoner and wanted to kill the mayor in the name of “equality and freedom”. She was acquitted, she was given a brilliant ovation. The St. Petersburg newspapers wrote that her shot from a revolver would make a difference as a turning point, after which there will either be no political prisoners at all, or they will have the right to be rude to their superiors with impunity.”
The St. Petersburg newspapermen were right about only one thing - this really turned out to be a turning point. That's just with negative sign. Having come to power thanks to the liberals, the “demons” no longer stood on ceremony with those who attempted murder and the murderers themselves. On the contrary, in response to terrorist attacks against their leaders, they declared their “red terror”.
Apparently, this is the evolution of terrorism. They start by selectively eliminating “bad” bosses or the Chief himself, and then move on to “mow down” everyone indiscriminately. Remember how one papal legate advised in battle to distinguish between worthy Christians and heretics? "Kill everyone! The Lord will distinguish his own."
Ulyanov Alexander Ilyich (1866-1887) - the elder brother of Ulyanov Vladimir Ilyich (Lenin), one of the leaders of the terrorist faction Narodnaya Volya. He was hanged on May 8 (all dates are given according to the old style) 1887 in the Shlisselburg fortress along with 4 other terrorist revolutionaries. The reason for the execution was an assassination attempt on Emperor Alexander III. Law enforcement agencies detained the Narodnaya Volya members, arrested them and brought them to trial. A total of 15 people were tried, 5 of them were sentenced to death by hanging.
The information is not very pleasant, but how did a young 20-year-old man get into such trouble and be sentenced to the most severe punishment? Alexander Ulyanov was born into a quite decent and respected family. His father Ilya Nikolaevich (1831-1886) had the civil rank of full state councilor. He matched military rank major general and gave the right to hereditary nobility. A person with such a rank was addressed as “Your Excellency.”
Since 1869, Ilya Nikolaevich held the position of inspector of public schools in the Simbirsk province. In 1874 he became the director of public schools in the Simbirsk province. This man was highly educated and advocated equal education for everyone, regardless of class and nationality. He was born into a family of bourgeois (city dwellers), but, thanks to work and diligence, he achieved a lot in life.
At the age of 32, he married 28-year-old Maria Alexandrovna Blank (1835-1916). She was born into the family of a physiotherapist and received an excellent education at home. She confirmed it by passing exams for the right to teach as a home teacher. In her marriage, Maria Alexandrovna gave birth to 8 children - 4 sons and 4 daughters. One boy and one girl died in childhood.
Alexander was the second child. He was born after his older sister Olga (1864-1935). In 1883 he graduated from the Simbirsk classical gymnasium. At that time, its director was Fyodor Mikhailovich Kerensky, the father of the future chairman of the Provisional Government, Alexander Kerensky. He was described as smart person and an extremely capable teacher.
While studying at the gymnasium, Alexander became interested in chemistry. He even made a small home laboratory where he performed chemical experiments. He graduated from the educational institution with a gold medal and in the same 1883 he entered St. Petersburg University at the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics.
In higher educational institution He studied extremely well. In 1886 he did scientific work in invertebrate zoology. I collected all the material myself and received a gold medal for this work. I studied in a biology club, which was created by the students themselves. He became a member of the economic circle and took an active part in the scientific and literary society, which was led by the nationally known professor of the history of Russian literature, Orest Fedorovich Miller.
That is, we see a very smart and inquisitive young man, drawn to fundamental knowledge. A bright future awaited him with interesting work and bright prospects, but, as they say, the devil got me wrong.
The end of the 19th century was a time of fermentation of minds. During this period in Russian Empire The revolutionary movement had already fully formed, taking into account the works of Marx, Engels, and Plekhanov. In 1879, the revolutionary populist organization Narodnaya Volya arose. She considered terror one of the main methods of combating the existing regime. Members of the organization believed that if the king were killed, it would stir up society and lead to fundamental political changes.
In 1884, after a series of terrorist attacks and the assassination of Emperor Alexander II, the party was completely weakened, as it lost most of its members as a result of arrests. And in December 1886, a new Narodnaya Volya group arose from the ruins of the terrorist organization. It was created by Alexander Ulyanov and Pyotr Shevyrev. Her main goal was the assassination of Emperor Alexander III.
Emperor Alexander III meets with the people. It was him who was preparing the assassination attempt by Alexander Ulyanov and his associates
The members of the terrorist group were mainly university students. But there were not a single old member of Narodnaya Volya. That is, the faction arose on the initiative of Ulyanov and Shevyrev without any outside interference. Ulyanov wrote the program, members of the organization accepted it and began preparing for the assassination attempt on the emperor.
To fill bombs with explosives, money was needed. Alexander Ulyanov sold his gold medal, and the terrorists purchased explosives with the proceeds. Having made the bombs, they scheduled the assassination attempt for the end of February. But the members of the terrorist faction did not have any clear plan. In addition, they behaved extremely carelessly and even told their friends who were not members of the faction about the impending assassination attempt.
A few days before the action, Pyotr Shevyrev got scared. He told his comrades that his tuberculosis had worsened, and hastily left for Crimea. After this, Ulyanov took over all leadership. He planned to carry out the assassination attempt right on Nevsky Prospekt, along which the emperor regularly traveled.
And so on February 26, 1887, a group of young people hung with bombs appeared near the Admiralty. They began to walk back and forth, waiting for the emperor to appear. But he never showed up on that ill-fated day. He did not appear on February 27 and 28. However, all these misunderstood festivities aroused the keen interest of the police. Here it must be said that some members of the faction were registered as unreliable. The authorities knew them well by sight, and their regular appearance near the Admiralty led to certain conclusions.
And when on March 1 the same young people again appeared on Nevsky Prospekt, they were immediately detained. They brought me to the police station, searched me and found bombs. After this, the entire group of 15 people was arrested. Alexander Ulyanov and other members of the faction were imprisoned Peter and Paul Fortress and an endless series of interrogations began. One of those arrested named Shevyrev, and he was arrested in Yalta on March 7.
The trial went quickly. It began on April 15, and on April 19 the verdict was read out. According to it, 5 conspirators were sentenced to death by hanging. Another 8 people were sentenced to hard labor. Among the suicide bombers were Alexander Ulyanov (21 years old), Pyotr Shevyrev (23 years old), Pakhomiy Andreyushkin (21 years old), Vasily Generalov (20 years old) and Vasily Osipanov (26 years old).
After the verdict was pronounced, the death row prisoners were placed in the Shlisselburg fortress, where the execution was to take place. Alexander's mother came to see him. She was allowed to meet her son after she wrote a petition addressed to the emperor. And the father did not live to see the shame that fell on his family. He died on January 12, 1886 from a cerebral hemorrhage.
At meetings with her son, Maria Alexandrovna begged him to submit a petition for clemency. However, the young man initially categorically refused to do this. Then, however, he succumbed to his mother’s persuasion, agreed and asked the emperor to replace the death penalty with another punishment. But the request was rejected.
Terrorists were executed on May 8, 1887 on the territory of the Shlisselburg fortress. There were only 3 gallows, so first Andreyushkin, Generalov and Osipanov were hanged, and after them it was the turn of Ulyanov and Shevyrev. The conspirators were buried in one grave near the fortress wall. This is how I finished my life path Alexander Ulyanov. He died stupidly, having exchanged his talent and interesting life to some mythical and absolutely unviable idea. But for the sake of objectivity, it must be said that at that time there were many like him.
Alexander Ulyanov. Was the terrorist the son of the emperor? A surprise in Lenin's pedigree: why did this come as a surprise even to researchers of his biography? Why did rumors discrediting the honor of the main revolutionary so quickly take hold after the collapse of the USSR? What would have happened if Alexander Ulyanov had not been executed? Read about this in the documentary investigation “Moscow Trust”.
Student, excellent student, terrorist
Family portrait of the Ulyanovs, one of the few that have ever existed. On the right sits the future leader of the proletarian revolution, Vladimir Lenin. In the very center stands his older brother Alexander. He will be hanged in the Shlisselburg fortress for the attempt on the life of the Tsar, whom popular rumor will later write down as his father.
The beginning of the 90s of the twentieth century. Facilities mass media almost every day they unleash a stream of sensations on the citizens of the former Soviet republics. The biographies of communist leaders, polished to a shine, suddenly seem not so smooth at all.
"These are precisely attempts to delegitimize everything as much as possible. soviet myths. There is a cliché: Lenin loved children. Everyone has read Bonch-Bruevich’s book since childhood. Therefore, Volkogonov wrote an article about how Lenin hated children. There was a thing about them being smart people, we prove that Lenin did not receive any education. If there was a book that Lenin was a good lawyer, we are trying to prove that he was a bad lawyer. It was just a reverse system,” says historian Yaroslav Listov.
Lenin gets the most. On October 27, 1995, an interview with journalist Alexander Kutenev appeared in the New Petersburg newspaper. We are talking about the illegitimate children of Emperor Alexander III. And the journalist calls Ilyich’s older brother Sasha one of them. They say his mother gave birth to him when she served as a maid of honor at court.
Moscow. The State Archive of Social and Political History was created on the basis of the Central Party Archive of the Institute of Marxism and Leninism. Hundreds of documents from the Ulyanov family are kept here. These are the texts of petitions for pardon. Maria Ulyanova wrote them to Emperor Alexander III in 1887. She asks for mercy from the one whom her eldest son Sasha had recently planned to kill. With the highest permission, Ulyanova could do a lot, even meet with a potential regicide.
“The terrorist faction “People's Will” - under this loud name hid a student circle, ten-odd people, young students, Alexander Ilyich himself was only 21 years old. And they decided to start the terrorist struggle right away with the murder of the Tsar. Three bombs were prepared , two of them were made by Alexander Ilyich. He was well versed in chemistry, developed the design, made two of the three bombs himself, and there were bullets around the dynamite, which he also made himself. Alexander Ilyich made the bullets himself, and the bullets were poisoned with strychnine, "This is one of the most terrible poisons. In addition, they had two pistols," says historian Vladimir Lavrov.
Exactly six years have passed since the murder of the previous Russian Emperor Alexandra II. Almost all the Narodnaya Volya members who organized that terrible terrorist attack against the Tsar were arrested. Excellent student Sasha Ulyanov studies in the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of the University in St. Petersburg, and then suddenly becomes one of the founders of the new radical wing of the Narodnaya Volya party.
“He was a very capable, talented child, but in his own way an unhappy person, because in childhood he received very serious injury spine. Alexander Ulyanov was short, and it always seemed to him that his family did not like him. He graduated from school with a gold medal and came to study in St. Petersburg. Already in my third year, before graduating from university, I received a gold medal for research in the field of biology,” says journalist Andrei Binev.
The Lenin Museum is a forge of Soviet legends about the heroic life of Ilyich. Behind these walls, the biography of the leader of the proletariat was embellished in every possible way. The politically correct remained, the dubious was hushed up. Galina Borodulina has been working at the Lenin Museum for many years, studying the genealogy of the Ulyanov family.
“There was a special approach to the study of Lenin’s life and work and to the creation of his biography. Actually, this approach was defined. Back in the late 20s, party historians were interested not so much in Lenin’s personality, not so much in his personal life How long is Lenin's life in the party? Moreover, they generally did not see any contradictions between the fact that Lenin was the leader of the proletarian revolution and his noble origin, because among the leaders Communist Party there were quite a lot of people noble origin", says historian Galina Borodulina.
Skeleton in the closet of the Ulyanov family
Journalist and writer Andrei Binev investigated the story of the illegitimate origin of Alexander Ulyanov. In the late 90s he worked on his own documentary.
“Maria Alexandrovna was born and raised in Kazan, was a very educated and free woman, with a view of free love, free relationships. Therefore, many who examine her biography and family life suggest that she gave birth to children from different husbands, because she followed like this. And it turned out that Maria Alexandrovna and Ilya Nikolaevich were sleeping in different rooms. Between them there was a corridor. And the bedroom of the other children opened into this corridor. They could not, without being noticed, meet, say, in the same bedroom, it was difficult This, by the way, was one of the reasons why such legends were born,” says Binyev.
Writer Larisa Vasilyeva, author of the book “Kremlin Wives,” is also involved in reproducing the story about the too free behavior of Maria Ulyanova, nee Maria Blank. What was told in the kitchens as a piquant anecdote, Vasilyeva captured on paper. It was she who reported in 1993 that Alexander Ulyanov was the illegitimate son, although not of the tsar, but of the terrorist Dmitry Karakozov.
“And it is quite possible that Maria Alexandrovna and Dmitry Karakozov did not just meet on the stairs, and her son Alexander Ilyich Ulyanov was born from Karakozov. And since Karakozov attempted to assassinate the emperor, somewhere before this attempt he disappeared from home somewhere, it is quite perhaps he was where she gave birth, nearby, and it is quite possible that he saw this child. But he disappeared, and then suddenly, like a bolt from the blue - Dmitry Karakozov makes an attempt on the life of the emperor. And the persecution of everyone began democratically thinking people, and I think that Maria Alexandrovna lived in fear. I would not have said all this now if I had not once written in “The Kremlin Wives” that Inessa Armand told Ivan Fedorovich Popov: “Lenin’s family had its own secret,” Vasilyeva believes.
And that is why, according to Vasilyeva, Sasha Ulyanov suddenly became a terrorist. He learned the truth and wanted to avenge his father, who was executed for an unsuccessful attempt on the life of Alexander II. Dmitry Karakozov was executed by hanging in St. Petersburg in 1866.
Although professional researchers are sure: the paternity of terrorist Karakozov is simply a writer’s invention. Galina Borodulina's work in the archives showed that Maria Blank and Dmitry Karakozov were unlikely to know each other at all.
“Karakozov was familiar with Ilya Nikolaevich Ulyanov, but he left Penza even before Maria Alexandrovna appeared there. He went to study in another city, so they simply could not cross paths with Maria Alexandrovna anywhere. In 1863, Maria Alexandrovna had already left married Ilya Nikolaevich, the eldest daughter Anna was born in 1964, Alexander was born in 1966. By the way, those who write about the illegitimate origin of the Ulyanov children very often confuse, claiming that Alexander was the eldest, Anna was the youngest, this is already an indicator of how knowledgeable the people who compose this kind of version are,” says Borodulina.
Illegitimate son of the emperor
However, whether Blank and the emperor had a relationship is the main mystery. Petersburg, 1887. After Sasha's arrest, Maria urgently travels to the capital from Simbirsk and easily gets an appointment with Alexander III. She is allowed to meet with the terrorist without delay. Perhaps it’s true that she and the tsar are connected not only by formalities?
“Allegedly, Maria Blank, the mother of Vladimir Ilyich, was a maid of honor at the imperial court. I think one example, one fact, and, in general, there are many of them, will be enough to prove that there was no trace of such a thing. that the imperial court was a kind of institution, and being a maid of honor at the imperial court meant performing certain job responsibilities. Therefore, documents have been preserved that confirm that there was never a maid of honor, Maria Blank, at the imperial court. And documents on the composition of the ladies-in-waiting have been preserved since 1712. Another fact. Alexander III was ten years younger than Maria Alexandrovna, Lenin's mother. She was born in 1935, he in 1945, Maria Alexandrovna lived with her family in St. Petersburg until 1841. Then the family left St. Petersburg, and Maria Alexandrovna did not return there until the arrest of her eldest son Alexander,” says Galina Borodulina.
And here are the archival documents. An entry from a church book about the marriage between Ilya Ulyanov and Maria Blank - 1863. This is data on the birth of children, first Anna, then Alexander. The version of journalist Kutenev, published in the newspaper “New Petersburg” in 1995, about the illegitimate son of the emperor is nothing more than fiction.
Historian Vladimir Lavrov provides further evidence of the implausibility of journalist Kutenev’s version. Maria Blanc's origins would never have allowed her to become a maid of honor at the imperial court. These were the realities of Tsarist Russia.
“As for Maria Alexandrovna, the mother of Alexander Ilyich and Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. Her father was a doctor, quite wealthy, absolutely unknown, and only a noble noblewoman could become a maid of honor. I can say that the hereditary nobility was formalized by Maria Alexandrovna only after the death of her husband, so that "Receive a good pension. She received it from the tsarist government. During the time of Peter I, there were isolated cases when humble people rose to the top, but in the second half of the 19th century, this was already a different era, this did not happen," Lavrov argues.
Victim of freethinking
After the death of Alexander II, Alexander III ascends the throne. Historians call the 13 years of his reign controversial. As they will later write in textbooks, the country’s economic well-being is growing at a high rate. But corruption and humiliation of the working class are rampant. The situation in society also affected the Ulyanovs. All over Russia, schools for the unprivileged classes, which were once opened by the father of the family Ilya Nikolaevich, began to close.
“The fate of my father, Ilya Nikolaevich, who dedicated his entire life to the cause, is very indicative public education. He was an inspector of public schools in the Simbirsk province, thanks to him new schools were opened and teaching in them was brought to the proper level. And the example of his father, the facts that spoke of the onset of a new period in the history of Russia (at least the brutal dispersal of the student demonstration in 1886), I think, led Sasha to think. We know that Sasha was familiar with the works of Marx. I think ultimately that was the reason why he took an active part in revolutionary activities", says Galina Borodulina.
It is these facts, and not at all the desire to take revenge on the tsar for his allegedly illegitimate origin, that historians call decisive in the fate of Alexander Ulyanov. It took him only a few months to create a circle and begin organizing the assassination attempt.
“Basically, a provincial guy from the city of Simbirsk, from an educated family, who lived, I would not say completely in hothouse conditions, but a little distanced from the reality of what is happening, suddenly finds himself in the capital. In the capital, this provincial information vacuum disappears, he is bombarded with global information from all over the country, newspaper correspondence, discussions, conversations flock here. The institute where he studies is one of the most popular, people from all over the country come to it. All this fell on young Alexander, he was a rather impressionable person ". And like any young man, he wanted to solve all the problems at once. And with this one and only way that could be solved, it seemed to kill the figure who stood at the head and personified the entire system of the regime. This is how this terrorist attack against Alexander III matured ", says historian Yaroslav Listov.
Another way of Vladimir Ulyanov
There is another secret that was hidden by Soviet propaganda. Before the opening of the archives, it was believed that Alexander Ulyanov did not ask for himself, but it turned out that a document exists. Here is his copy: “I ask Your Majesty to replace my death penalty with some other punishment.” There is not a drop of remorse in the text, he simply asks not to hurt his mother.
"There are several memories. There is a memory of lawyer Knyazev, who was present. There is a memory of Anna Ilyinichna, sister. Naturally, she was aware. Alexander Ilyich asked his mother for forgiveness for the grief caused to her and the family. She asked her son to write a petition addressed to sovereign with a request for pardon. He refused, according to Knyazev’s memoirs, citing the fact that he told his mother: “Imagine a duel: I shot, my opponent has not shot yet, and I tell him: ‘Don’t shoot, please.’ That’s not possible.” ". However, there was still a petition, but there was no repentance in this petition. He did not repent. The meaning of the petition was this: I think that I did the right thing, that I wanted to kill you, sir, but I ask you to leave me life for the sake of my mother, my family," says historian Lavrov.
Researchers of the biography of Vladimir Lenin often write that the relationship between the brothers was complex. But the execution of Alexander decided the fate of Ilyich and the Ulyanov family as a whole: they simply became outcasts in provincial Simbirsk, they were afraid to communicate with them.
“This made, let’s say, a decisive impression on my brother. The fact is that he was only 17 years old, a person is just entering life, and an example is when this tragedy occurs in one’s own family, because it is a tragedy twice. The first tragedy is this is that your family member has committed or attempted to commit some kind of atrocity, which attracts the attention of the entire society, and, in fact, all family members become unshakable. On the other hand, this is a personal tragedy - the loss of a person with whom he lived, with whom he communicated Lenin drew a conclusion from this, and then he said his famous phrase: “We will go a different way,” about creating a revolutionary party and overthrowing the system. Not individuals, but a change in the system. That is, Lenin came to the conclusion that individual terror is useless and meaningless. And we see that, indeed, it was precisely from this historical period that all individual terror of the Russian Empire came to naught. That is, the period when it seemed that let’s kill the emperor and everything will be fine is disappearing,” says Yaroslav Listov.
However, the historian Listov believes that the myth of kinship with the imperial crown did not arise in the mass popular consciousness just like that. The reason for the popularity of essentially gossip about an illegitimate son is simple. This is an attempt to bring Lenin’s person closer to God’s anointed ones themselves.
“There is a certain family that was given by God to be the ruling one. And this was especially important for society during the transition from the Russian Empire to Soviet Union. After all, many myths about ruling dynasties were born there. Imagine, for almost 500 years people were told: ruling dynasties- these are God's anointed ones. These are people who did not just ascend to the throne because it happened that way. political situation, and because God brought them here, they are like conductors of the divine will. And then suddenly - once - one emperor was killed, the second emperor was killed, then all the emperors were overthrown. And it’s somehow unclear to them, where have God’s anointed gone? And therefore we will show: God has turned away from these, but here we see that Alexander Ulyanov is the emperor’s family,” says Listov.
The execution by hanging of the terrorists of the “People's Will” faction took place on May 20, 1887 in the Shlisselburg fortress. In the verdict, the word “hang” is handwritten next to five names, among them Alexander Ilyich Ulyanov. His mother, nee Maria Blanc, became completely gray after these events.
30 years after this execution, the Romanovs ceased to rule Russia. On the night of July 16-17, 1918, Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra Fedorovna, their children, a doctor and a servant were killed in Ipatiev’s house in Yekaterinburg. On whether Vladimir Lenin personally made the decision to execute royal family, is still unknown for certain.
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