Birth of Tsar Peter III

Birth of Tsar Peter III

Born Karl Peter Ulrich on 21st February 1728, Peter III was the grandson of two emperors ~ Peter the Great of Russia and Charles XII of Sweden.

After the death of his parents, Peter was raised and educated in the Swedish court, where during his grooming for the Swedish throne, he proved an abjectly miserable student.

However, Peter loved military parades and dreamed of becoming a world-famous military leader.

At age fourteen, Peter was summoned to Russia by his aunt Elizabeth, who became empress and proclaimed him heir to the Russian throne.

Peter resented Russia and hated Russian Orthodoxy.
He often complained bitterly that the Russian people would never accept him as their ruler.

Empress Elizabeth shielded Peter from government affairs, because she believed he was intellectually incapable of participating.

At age 17, Peter married Princess Sophie Frederica Auguste, a 16-year-old Prussian princess.
When Princess Sophie converted to Russian Orthodoxy, she took the name Yekaterina, anglicized as Catherine.

Catherine and Peter were a poor match in every way.
Catherine was a cultured woman with a prodigious intellect. meanwhile, Peter was a drunkard and a simpleton.

Catherine took numerous lovers during the unhappy marriage, and when she wrote her memoirs later in life, she alleged that her son Paul, the future emperor of Russia, could not have been Peter’s child ~ as by her account, they never even consummated the marriage!

When Peter inherited the throne in 1762, Catherine became empress consort.
Peter only reigned for six months, as he was hugely unpopular with the Russian aristocracy.

Once on the throne, Peter allied Russia with Prussia, its longtime enemy, and waged war against Denmark to regain his native land of Holstein.

Among military officers and members of the court, such foreign policy was viewed as treasonous.

Groups alienated by Peter came to Catherine, arguing that the tsar must be overthrown to protect the Russian way of life.

When Peter left the capital on vacation, Catherine met with members of the military.
She implored them to protect her from her husband, whom many viewed as erratic and dangerous.
When Peter returned, Catherine had him arrested and forced to sign a document of abdication.

Some historians increasingly believe that it was Catherine who masterminded the coup, as she feared that Peter planned to divorce her.

Whatever the case, Catherine was declared the sole ruler of Russia, while Peter was exiled to Ropsha, a settlement outside of Saint Petersburg.

Eight days after his abdication, on 17th July 1762, Peter died.
Its generally thought he was assassinated by Alexei Orlov, younger brother to Catherine’s then-lover, Grigory Orlov.

The cause of death is unclear, though the official autopsy report indicates that he died of hemorrhoids and an apoplectic stroke.

Another theory argues that he died through injuries sustained from a drunken brawl with a bodyguard, where he was held captive at Ropsha.
Others argue that he may have committed suicide.

Did Catherine order Peter’s assassination?
Many historians believe that Catherine intended only to exile Peter, not to have him assassinated.

No evidence exists to support Catherine’s complicity in the assassination, though the Russian public by and large held her accountable, casting a pall over her reign.

Catherine proved to be much savvier about coups and uprisings than her late husband, squashing dozens of them, to reign for over three decades until her death.

? Coronation portrait of Peter III of Russia -1761