Terrible tsarinas

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Terrible Tsarinas doubt. Alexis Dolgoruky and his son, the ravishing and underhanded Ivan, must have masterminded it all. How could Menshikov save whatever might still be salvageable? Should he beg for leniency from those who had cut him down, or turn to Peter and try to plead his cause directly? Even as he pondered these unpalatable options, he heard that the tsar, having joined his aunt Elizabeth at the Summer Palace, had convened the members of the Supreme Privy Council and that he was discussing with them what additional sanctions should be taken. The verdict came down before the defendant could even prepare his defense. Most probably egged on by Elizabeth, Natalya and the Dolgoruky clan, Peter ordered the Serene One arrested. When Major General Simon Saltykov came to inform him of his condemnation, Menshikov could only write a letter of protest and justification, which he doubted would ever be transmitted to the intended recipient.

The next day the charges began to mount, increasingly iniquitous, increasingly defamatory. Stripped of his titles and privileges, Menshikov was exiled to his own estate, for life - in other words, he was permanently grounded. With whatever possessions he could throw together on the spot, the condemned left St.

Petersburg by slow caravan - and no one came out to see him off.

He who had been everything, yesterday, was a nonentity today.

His most enthusiastically obliged friends became his worst enemies. And the tsar’s hatred continued unabated. At every stage along the road, a missive from the palace announced a new disgrace for him. At Vyshny-Volochok came an order to disarm the deposed favorite’s servants; at Tver, it was announced that he had taken too many servants, horses and carriages - those in excess were to be returned to St. Petersburg; at Klin came the order to confiscate from Miss Maria Menshikov, ex-fiancee of the tsar, the ring by which he had pledged his troth; and finally, at the approaches to Moscow, came an order to by-pass the old city of