The collection the Presidential Library focuses its part on the Peacemaker Emperor Alexander III

9 March 2017

March 10 (February 26 old style), 2017, marks the 172nd anniversary of birth of the Russian Emperor Alexander III. A separate chapter of an extensive electronic collection of the Presidential Library entitled The House of Romanov. The Zemsky Sobor of 1613, which includes the official papers, memoirs, diaries, business and personal correspondence, newsreel snippets, photographs and paintings, radio recordings, popular science, historical research works, and much more, is focused on Tsar-peacemaker.

“The second son of the then heir to the throne, the crown prince of Russian Empire Alexander Nikolayevich and his wife Maria Alexandrovna was born on February 26, 1845 (on Monday), in the Anichkov Palace. At 3 pm, this joyful news was proclaimed to the capital city residents with 301 cannon shots from the bastions of the Peter and Paul Fortress, and in the same evening the city was magnificently illuminated. A newborn in his Father's honor and in a memory of the famous Grandfather was christened Alexander,” – as K. N. Korolkov describes this momentous for Empire event in his Life and reign of Emperor Alexander III, published in 1901.

Alexander was not getting ready for succession to the throne, because his older brother was going to be the emperor, though the boy has received proper education. In the aforementioned book, we read: “God, who foresaw the impending fate of the Child, has been pleased to suit His development from the earliest years to the best advantage. Overviewing the entire period of life of the Grand Duke Alexander Alexandrovich up to the accession to the throne, with no exaggeration to say that the rare monarch was given such comprehensive training to the autocratic sovereignty, and a rare one has taken it with such integrity as the deceased Emperor.” Among the boy’s teachers are such outstanding representatives of the epoch as A. I. Chivilev, staff professor of Moscow University and economist, Y. K. Groth, philology professor and a vocational school student, and K. P. Pobedonostsev, Ober-Procurator of the Most Holy Synod. “A proper study of Russian history and a clear understanding of the fate of his country is paramount for the heir to the throne of the vast Russian state. This high task Emperor Alexander Nikolayevich entrusted Sergey Mikhaylovich Solovyov, staff professor of Russian history at Moscow University,” - writes K. N. Korolkov.

Alexander III was a diligent student. “His sincere love for all things Russian has to be heartily pointed,” – as we can read in the electronic copy of the collected works of 1894 The Emperor memory of Alexander III, which included related to Tsar publications in the Russian and foreign newspapers, articles focused on his activities, memories and characteristics. “Moskovskiye Vedomosty” (Moscow News) recreates the image of the Russian autocrat: “These kind blue eyes with a clear, frank look in it, this pretty face, framed with a thick, light blond colored beard, this epic-mighty giant height, and finally - this introduced by Him for servicemen Russian styled outfit consisting of Russian kazakin (knee-length coat), Russian sash, round hat and high boots - all this was wonderfully consistent with the nation’s notion of the great Emperor of all Russia.” The publication notes: “His ease daily life was deeply tied with this love to dear native. Disliking the external splendor, an unnecessary luxury and dazzling splendor, deceased Emperor did not reside in the Great Winter Palace. He liked the small Anichkov Palace more. <…> There in the lowlier ambiance, the days were going “among the sovereign thoughts.”

Alexander III ascended to the throne by the will of fate: he was declared the heir to the throne in 1865 after the death of his elder brother Nicholas. On the 1st (13th) of March 1881 Alexander II died as a result of his mortal wound in an attack, and the very next day the heir’s coronation has taken place. A separate chapter in the electronic collection, describing in detail how the ceremony itself and the momentous for the entire country day, is dedicated to that event.

“An arrangement of happiness of the loyalists,” – that is a program of the beginning reign, proclaimed in its first minute from the new monarch’s own lips,” – was in its time’s papers. Dedicated to the coronation and the first decrees of the new autocrat articles were released as a separate brochure entitled The accession to the Russian throne, on March 1, 1881, His Imperial Majesty the Emperor Alexander III Alexandrovich, a digital copy of which is also in open access on the Presidential Library website.

Included in the electronic collection sources provide the widest possible view of the state of activity of the emperor. So, for example, a digital copy of a book by F. V. Schepansky entitled A reign of Emperor Alexander III, Tsar-peacemaker we learn that Tsar has taken a number of measures to improve the economic situation of the peasantry: lowered payments for peasant land; founded the Peasant Bank, which offered the farmers help with buying a new land; reduced the taxes imposed on the peasants.

“By 1887 the state power of Russia reached a high level, and since that time Emperor Alexander III is the Peacemaker of the peoples of Europe. Tsar applied his sovereign power to ensure peace, besides Russia, to the entire Europe. The anxious for Europe days were coming repeatedly, when everyone was expecting all-European war, when some States were frightening to resolve their mutual disputes with the blood flows, but the strong will of the Emperor Alexander III eliminated the terrible shadow of European war and provided a peaceful prosperity of the peoples,” - describes the foreign policy of the Emperor I. Petrov in his work Tsar- peacemaker Alexander III, published in 1897.

Emperor Alexander III died from the disease in 1894. The famous historian Klyuchevsky in his In a memory of fallen asleep in the Lord Emperor Alexander III speech commented on the autocrat’s reign as follows: “Science will allot to the Emperor Alexander III rightful place in the history of Russia and the entire Europe, but also in Russian historiography, which will say that he has won in the field, where to get a victory is the most difficult, has won the prejudice of the peoples, and that helped to bring them closer, has conquered the public conscience for the sake of peace and truth, has increased the number of good in an ethical changeover of a mankind, has encouraged and elevated the Russian historical thought, the Russian national consciousness, and has done all that so quietly and silently, that only now when he is not with us any more, Europe has understood, what he was for it.”