Catherine the Great

Similarly, in the early months of Catherine’s marriage, the people leaving the young court were not always forced to do so by Elizabeth. Catherine’s chamberlain, Count Zakhar Chernyshev, suddenly disappeared. He had been one of the young courtiers invited by Catherine and Peter to join them in the large, pillowed cart in which they traveled to Kiev before their marriage. But Count Zakhar’s departure in the form of a diplomatic assignment had nothing to do with the empress. Instead, the initiative came from the young man’s mother, who had begged Elizabeth to send her son away. “I fear he may fall in love with the grand duchess,” the mother had said. “He never takes his eyes off her and when I see that, I tremble for fear that he might do something rash.” In fact, her intuitions were sound: Zakhar Chernyshev was indeed attracted to Catherine, as he would make clear a few years later.

The next to go, lamented by no one, was Peter’s longtime tormentor, Otto Brümmer. In the spring before his marriage, seventeen-year-old Peter had been formally declared to be of age and had become, in title at least, the reigning Duke of Holstein. In matters concerning his duchy, he now was entitled to make certain decisions. The decision he most wanted to make was to get rid of Brümmer. After reading the document confirming his title, Peter turned to his nemesis and said, “At last my wish is fulfilled. You have dominated me long enough. I shall take steps to have you sent back to Holstein as soon as possible.” Brümmer struggled to save himself. To Catherine’s surprise, he turned to her, asking her to make more frequent visits to Elizabeth’s dressing room and speak to the empress. “I told Brümmer that his suggestion could not help him as the empress almost never appeared when I was there. He begged that I should persevere.” Catherine, understanding that “this might serve his purposes but could do me no good,” told Count Brümmer that she was reluctant. Desperate, he continued to try to persuade her—“without success.” In the spring of 1746, the empress sent Brümmer back to Germany with an annual pension of three thousand rubles.

Living under the eye of Empress Elizabeth was difficult for Catherine, but with the early exception of her vigorous, and ultimately failed, attempt to help Maria Zhukova, the young grand duchess tried to accept her situation. Peter was less pliable. He had little desire to please his aunt; Instead, a belligerent rebelliousness often led him to do foolish things.

The episode of the peepholes was an example: Around Easter in 1746, Peter created a puppet theater in his apartment and insisted that everyone in the young court attend performances. On one side of the room in which he had erected his theater, a door had been walled up because it led into the dining room of the empress’s private apartment. One day while working with his puppets, Peter heard voices through the blocked door. Curious to see what was happening in the next room, he took a carpenter’s bore and drilled peepholes through the door. To his delight, he found himself witnessing a private, mid-day dinner party with the empress surrounded by a dozen of her friends. Next to his aunt sat Count Razumovsky, who, recovering from an illness, was dressed informally in a brocaded dressing gown.

Then, having already trespassed beyond the limits of discretion, Peter went further. Excited by his discovery, he summoned everyone to come and peek through the holes. Servants placed chairs, footstools, and benches before the perforated door to form an impromptu amphitheater so all could enjoy the spectacle. When Peter and his entourage had finished staring, he invited Catherine and her ladies-in-waiting to come and see this remarkable sight.

He did not tell us what it was, apparently to give us a pleasant surprise. I did not hurry quickly enough, so he carried off Madame Krause and my women. I arrived last and found them all sitting in front of the door. I asked what was going on. When he told me, I was horrified and frightened by his rashness and said that I wished neither to look nor to take part in this scandalous behavior which would surely upset his aunt if she learned about it. Which she could scarcely fail to do since he had shared his secret with at least twenty people.

When the group that had been peeking through the door saw that Catherine refused to do so, they all began, one by one, to walk away. Peter himself became apprehensive and went back to arranging his puppets.