Catherine the Great & Potemkin: The Imperial Love Affair

1 AKV 16: 202–4, S. R. Vorontsov 11/22 August 1786, London. AKV 11: 177–9, S. R. Vorontsov to Count N. P. Panin 6/18 May 1801, Southampton. AKV 13: 101–2, A. A. Bezborodko to S. R. Vorontsov 28 October 1785, St Petersburg.

2 BM 33540 ff 64–5, SB to JB 1784, Kremenchuk.

3 Bartlett pp 127–8, D. Gray to Sir Robert Ainslie 24 June 1784.

4 ZOOID 12: 324, GAP to V. V. Kahovsky.

5 M. S. Vorontsov’s Family Archive, Orders of H. E. Prince GAPT regarding Tauris Region ud, July? 1785: pp 324–5 no 194, GAP to Kahovsky.

6 ZOOID 15 (1889): 607–8, GAP to Sinelnikov 1 July 1784.

7 ITUAK 8 (1889) p 10, GAP to Kahovsky 16 August 1787.

8 RGVIA 52.1.2.461.40, GAP to Kahovsky 25 May 1787.

9 ZOOID 11: part 2 pp 673–4, GAP to M. L. Faleev.

10 RGADA 16.788.1.149, GAP’s printed address to nobility and inhabitants of Tavrichesky Region, containing appeal to cultivate agriculture and description of benefits from this.

11 RGVIA 52.1.2.496.44–5, GAP to Kahovsky 20 January 1787. M. S. Vorontsov’s Family Archive, p 220 no 180, Orders of H. E. Prince GAPT regarding Foundation of Tavrichesky Region 1781–6, GAP to Kahovsky.

12 RGVIA 52.1.461.1.13, GAP to Professors V. Livanov and M. Prokopovich 5 January 1787. RGVIA 52.1.461.1.14 GAP to K. Hablitz same date. SIRIO 27 (1880): 357, CII to GAP on Professors Livanov and Prokopovich recently back from England 1 September 1785.

13 PRO FO Secretary of State: State Papers, Foreign, cyphers SP106/67, William Fawkener to Lord Grenville 18 June 1791, unpublished.

14 AKV 13: 59–60, Bezborodko to S. R. Vorontsov 20 August 1784. Sirin Bey, one of the local Crimean officials, got 27,000 desyatins, more than Bezborodko’s 18,000. Popov received 57,876 desyatins (28,000 on the peninsula itself), while Bezborodko was so thrilled with his ‘very nice country estate near Karasubazaar’ that he boasted, in Petersburg, it would be royal in scale. (Potemkin set up ‘an English farm’ on it.) Druzhinina pp 119–20.

15 RGVIA 52.1.2.461.1.64.

16 Venetia Murray, High Society in the Regency Period pp 145–7.

17 RGADA 11.939.2, Lady Craven to GAP 5 April 1786, Sebastopol, unpublished. Cross, By the Banks of the Neva p 358.

18 Filosofskaya i politicheskaya perepiska Imperatritsky Ekateriny II s Doctorom Zimmermanom p 47, CII to Dr Zimmerman 10/21 January 1786. GAP’s request for silk experts in Crimea. AAE 10: 206, Observations sur l’état actuel de la Crimée, Comte de Ségur to Comte de Vergennes, unpublished.

19 M. S. Vorontsov’s Family Archive, Orders of H. E. Prince GAPT regarding Foundation of Tavrichesky Region p 313 no 159, 3 December 1784.

20 ZOOID 15 (1889): 678–80. E. A. Zagorovsky, Potemkin’s Economic Policy in New Russia (reprinted in KNDKO vol 2, 1926) p 6. Shterich and mining engineer Gayskop were ordered to seek bituminous cola in 1790 around Lugansk and North Donetz. A nobleman named Falkenberger was employed by Tauris Region for his specialist knowledge on mining. RGADA 16.689.1.50. See also RGADA 11.869.134, A. A. Viazemsky to GAP on mining prospects in Crimea and Caucasus 12 September 1783.

21 RGADA 16.799.1.35, GAP to CII.

22 AAE 10: 206, Observations sur l’état actuel de la Crimée, Ségur to Vergennes, unpublished.

23 Guthrie letter LXI p 195. In another example of his sponsoring new industries, GAP aided and established a Greek artisan named Pavel Aslan in Taganrog in 1780 because he knew the secret of making a special form of brocade. SIRIO 27: 257–8. Druzhinina, Severnoye prichernomorye p 84. Bruess, pp 130–1.

24 RGADA 16.799.1.35, L 210, GAP to CII. RGADA 5.85.1.498, L 203, GAP to CII ud.

25 RGADA 11.946.201, Joseph Banq to GAP 14 October 1781, Astrakhan. RGADA 11.946.207, Banq to GAP 16 April 1782, Astrakhan. RGADA 11.946.208, Banq to GAP 10 May 1783, Kherson. RGADA 11.946.203, Banq to GAP 31 October 1783, Soudak. RGADA 11.946.204, Banq to GAP 14 January 1784. RGADA 11.946.220, Banq to GAP, Karasubazaar 26 April 1785. RGADA 11.946.226, Banq to GAP 15 January 1787, Soudak. All unpublished.

26 ZOOID 9 (1875): p 254.

27 RGVIA 271.1.33.1, Banq to GAP 25 September 1783, Soudak, unpublished.

28 Tavricheskiy Gubernskiye Vedomosti 5. GAOO 150.1.23.10, GAP to Kahovsky re Banq. RGADA 11.946.226, Banq to GAP 15 January 1787, Soudak. Banq’s replacement was the Frenchman Jacob Fabre. unpublished.

29 AAE 10: 206, Observations sur l’état actuel de la Crimée, Ségur to Vergennes. Guthrie letter XL p 130.

30 ZOOID 4: 369, GAP to Faleev 13 October 1789, Akkerman (Belgrade-on-Dniester).

31 PSZ 20: 520–1, 24 April 1777.

32 PSZ 21: 784, 22 December 1782.

33 Bartlett p 120. RGADA 11.869.73, 5 August 1786 Viazemsky offers GAP 30,307 settlers (male and female) for Caucasus (or possibly Ekaterinoslav). P. S. Potemkin governed the region from 1 July 1783. Russkiy Biographicheskiy Slovar vol 14 (1904).