Nikolai Petrovich Resanov

Nikolai Resanov

Nikolai Petrovich Resanov ( Russian: Николай Петрович Резанов , scientific transliteration Nikolaj Petrovič Rezanov ; * March 28th ^July / April 8th 1764 ^greg. , Saint Petersburg ; † March 1st ^July / March 13th 1807 ^greg. , Krasnoyarsk ) was a Russian statesman and one of the founding initiators of the Russian-American Company (RAK).

Life

Resanov came from a respected family of the lower nobility, but who had ties to the Russian nobility. His father, Peter Gavrilowitsch Resanow, was exiled to Irkutsk as a judge for at least a few years on suspicion of embezzlement , where he lived separately from his family during this time. After his school education, which he enjoyed at home, Resanov first joined the artillery in 1778 and later, by favoring the famous Izmailov guards regiment. After two years it turned out that he appeared unsuitable for military service, so he left it and took a post as an assessor at a civil court in Pskow (Pleskau). Five years later he came to the Treasury in Saint Petersburg. After two years at this post, Resanov was appointed office manager at the Vice-President of the Admiralskolleg, Count Ivan Chernyshov . In 1791 he moved to the same position in the office of the newly appointed Senate Secretary Gawriil Derschawin (1743-1816), a well-known poet and courtier and at the same time a long-time friend of the family. Resanov was slowly gaining access to the Tsar's court. For a while he even served Catherine II's favorite , Prince Platon Zubov . The Tsarina herself entrusted him with special missions. In gratitude for his services, Resanov received the Order of St. Anna 2nd Class and an annual pension of 2,000 rubles.

In 1794 he was sent again on a mission to Irkutsk, where his father still acted as a judge. Here he met Grigori Schelichow (or deepened his friendship from previous visits) and on January 25, 1795 married his 14-year-old daughter Anna. Resanov was extremely useful to the Shelichows through his connections to Subov and thus to the Tsarina. With Grigori Schelichow's sudden death on July 20, 1795, the widow Natalja Alexejewna Schelichowa took over the management of Schelichow and the representation of family interests with Resanov's support. After Katharina's death on November 6, 1796, Resanov's influence under the successor Tsar Paul I even grew . In 1797 he became Senate Secretary and a month later Chief Secretary of the Senate.

On August 11, 1799, he brought the Tsar to the 1797 initiated interest group of the last remaining and mutually warring fur trading companies in Russian America and the Kuril Islands in a decree by the name of a monopoly company, the Russian-American Company (RAK) , new to constitute. On October 18, 1800, the Tsar also agreed to move the RAK headquarters from Irkutsk to St. Petersburg. The board of directors of the RAK, to which a member of the Shelikhov family had to belong, had thus moved very close to the actual decision-makers. When Alexander I ascended the throne on March 12, 1801, he made Resanov a member of the Finland Commission and participated with other members of his family in the capital of the RAK. At the end of 1802 the number of RAK shareholders had risen from 17 to 400.

On July 18, 1801, his wife Anna gave birth to a boy, Peter. Daughter Olga was born on October 6, 1802, but Anna died just 12 days later. The grieving Resanov sought diversion and in the following year took part in the first Russian circumnavigation under Krusenstern as a special ambassador for Japan. When they arrived there in 1804, however, he and the ship's crew had to spend half a year, as it were, in captivity (October 1804 to April 1805) before they traveled on without result. Resanov separated from the Krusenstern expedition in 1805 and went with a few followers to Novo-Archangelsk (today Sitka ), the capital of Russian America, to inspect the colony. In 1806 he traveled to California , where he was able to acquire urgently needed food for the RAK and to make first friendly contacts with the Spaniards. The 42-year-old u. a. by the fact that he “turned the head” of the just 15-year-old (born February 19, 1791) daughter of the commandant of the Spanish Presidium of San Francisco, Maria de la Concepcion Marcela Argüello (Conchita). On the way back to St. Petersburg, the total disaster of the Japan mission led Resanov to issue orders to naval officers Davydov and Chwostov to carry out retaliatory strikes against Japan. This measure, which amounted to a handwritten declaration of war, weighed on the Japanese-Russian relationship for decades. Resanov died of a fever in the city of Krasnoyarsk in Siberia on March 1, 1807 while he was returning overland to Saint Petersburg . On March 13, he was buried near the entrance to the old Voskressensky Cathedral (Resurrection Cathedral).

Resanov grave monument in Krasnoyarsk (originally 1831, rebuilt 2007)

On November 28 of the same year, the German scientist von Langsdorff , who was in California with Resanow, visited his grave. There was only an altar-like stone without inscriptions on the grave. In 1831 the RAK erected a monument that was damaged in 1936. A short time later, due to considerable renovations, it became necessary to relocate Resanow's zinc coffin. Since then, his final resting place has been considered unknown. The Krasnoyarsk Troitsky Cemetery (Trinity Cemetery), where a grave site was prepared again in 2000, is accepted, as is the grave monument erected by the RAK in 2007.

reception

The figure of Resanov has not yet been adequately recorded historically. There is still no basic biography. Especially because of the "Conchita love affair", his person is unrealistically glorified, as is this affair. His preference for young girls, the Japan Mission and the reprisals allow a different assessment of this man. The publication of the diary of the member of the Krusenstern circumnavigation, Hermann Ludwig von Löwenstern (1777–1836), threw another negative image on Resanow in 2003. This diary was not intended for the public and this may give it particular credibility.

Resanov left no lasting impressions in Russian America and California. However, his services in connection with the establishment of the RAK, his forward-looking thoughts about the future of Russian America and the fight against the onset of famine in Novo-Arkhangelsk were recognized by his trip to California in 1806.

The appreciation during Resanov's lifetime was shown, among other things, in the fact that in 1800 he was allowed to found his own village not far from Saint Petersburg. He named it in honor of his wife Annensky (according to other sources Resanovskoye-Annenskoye ). The village was on the right bank of the Neva , 43 km east of Saint Petersburg and 17 km from Shlisselburg . In 1884 it still belonged to his grandson, the landowner Kokoschkin (son of his daughter Olga). Resanow's mother, Alexandra Gawrilovna, b. Okunewa (* 1741), who died shortly after the village was founded, was buried there.

Nikolai Resanov's life was thematized in the 1980 rock opera Juno and Avos (Russian Junona i Awos ) by composer Alexei Rybnikow based on a libretto by the poet Andrei Vosnesensky . The play, which also referred to the “Conchita love affair”, but also addressed the longing of Russian society for an opening to the West, was already a great success in the first production of the Lenin Komsomol Theater in Moscow under director Mark Sakharov . It was filmed twice and is still on the program today.

Remarks

↑ There was at least one uncle, Ivan Gavrilowitsch Resanow (January 21, 1726 - December 23, 1787). He was Lieutenant General, President of the Mining College and Chief Procuror of the 1st Department of the Senate.
↑ Resanov had a sister, Yekaterina, who was eight years younger than him, and two brothers, Dmitri three years younger and Alexander seven years younger, who died on February 18, 1853. Ekaterina married the landowner Alexander Stepanovich Korsakov. The marriage resulted in six children, of which Nikolai Korsakow (1800-1820) is particularly well-known, who was a classmate of Pushkin at the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum , and Pyotr Korsakow (1790-1844), who made a name for himself as a writer and editor of the made his first poems by Pushkin.
↑ There were family ties to Pskov through his mother. In 1796 his mother-in-law, Natalia Schelichowa, bought an estate in Demjanizki Gottesacker of the Pskov district with 245 souls from the second major Pyotr Gavrilowitsch Okunew (a relative of his mother's family) and bequeathed it to the children a year later. Resanov, his mother, his sister and both brothers lived together in this city during this period. For the entire fifth year, however, Resanov is noted as "on vacation", most of which he spent most of his usual annual vacation in Saint Petersburg, where he was preparing for his further career.
↑ Born on February 15, 1780. This was legally possible because at that time the official minimum age for girls willing to marry in Russia was 13 years.
↑ Resanov also benefited from relations with the Governor General of Irkutsk, Ivan Aliferowitsch Pil, who previously held this post in the Pskov governorate and had once served under the Resanov.
↑ Here his friendship with Pyotr Chrisanfowitsch Oboljaninow (1752–1841), a former colleague from his time in Pskov, who made a quick career and was prosecutor general under Tsar Paul I.
↑ The tsar had even decided to appoint Resanov as prosecutor general instead of the disgraced Obolyaninov. Court intrigues during the troubled phase after the murder of Paul I had prevented this.
↑ the date of his death is not known. He was listed at the Petersburg grammar school in 1813.
↑ Olga married Colonel Sergei Alexandrowitsch Kokoschkin and died on June 20, 1828. Kokoschkin married again, became Major General and later Chief Police Officer of St. Petersburg. He died in 1861.
^ Krusenstern, Adam J. von, Voyage round the World in the Years 1803, 1804, 1805, and 1806 , Ridgewood, NJ: The Gregg Press, Inc., 1968, Vol. I, pp. 251-313. [Reprint of the original English-language edition from 1813]
↑ There are indications that Resanov was very worried about his reception in Sankt Peterburg. In a letter (interpreted as “last will”) to his brother-in-law Buldakov (who was also the chairman of the RAK) shortly before his death, he remarked, “I was deeply saddened ...”. He also seemed to have premonitions regarding his serious illness: "... but they do not know [in relation to his mother-in-law, Natalija Schelichowa, and his children] that I may not see them again during my lifetime." See letter from NP Resanov to MM Buldakow from Irkutsk v. January 24, 1807, published in excerpts (in English) by: Black, Dawn Lea and Petrov, Alexander Yu. (Ed. And translator), Natalia Shelikhova: Russian Oligarch of Alaska Commerce , Fairbanks, AK: University of Alaska Press, 2010, p. 156. In the introduction, the editors specify this view. In another letter from Yakutsk, Resanov previously described how he rode day and night across the Okhotsk mountain range, caught a cold while crossing the Aldan and finally fell off his horse after spending the nights camping in the snow. He lay unconscious in a yurt for 24 hours and eventually dragged himself to Irkutsk and beyond, knowing that he would die. S. xlviii. On the other hand, his bad condition at this point in time is questioned, as he is said to have led a dissolute life with nightly drinking during his three-month stay in Irkutsk (November 1806 - February 1807), see. Lydia T. Black: Russians in Alaska, 1732-1867. Fairbanks, 2004. p. 177.

^ Langsdorff, Georg Heinrich von, remarks on a trip around the world in the years 1803 to 1807, 2 vol., Frankfurt am Mayn: Friedrich Wilmans, 1812, p. 334.

↑ Concepcion faced an uncertain future and only found out about two years later of the death of the man she had fallen in love with. Although she had several interested parties, also because of her extraordinary beauty, she rejected them all and remained unmarried for the rest of her life. She worked for the common good in Upper California, later even seven years in Loreto, Baja California, before she joined the newly founded convent of Dominican Sisters in Monterey in 1851 . After the sorority moved to Benicia , California in 1854 , she died there on December 20, 1857 at the age of 66. She was first buried in the Saint Catherine Convent Cemetery; since 1894 her grave has been in the Saint Dominics Catholic Cemetery in Benicia. Resanow himself stated in a letter to his brother-in-law, MM Buldakow, shortly before his death: “Conception is sweet as an angel, beautiful, kind-hearted and loves me. I love her and I cry at the fact that there is no room for her in my heart. ”See Dawn Lea Black, and Alexander Yu. Petrov (ed. And translator); Natalia Shelikhova: Russian Oligarch of Alaska Commerce. Fairbanks, AK: University of Alaska Press, 2010. Introduction pp. Xlviii.

↑ During his stay in Novo-Arkhangelsk, he “kept” a minor Tlingit girl as a “lover”, s. Black: Russians… . P. 176.

↑ For a more critical consideration of Resanov's merits, see Black: Russians… . P. 168

↑ Towards the end of the 19th century, the village experienced its decline under the subsequent owners of the estate. Various buildings, including the church, survived into the 1940s when they were completely destroyed during World War II.

literature

Richard A. Pierce (Ed.), Russian America: A Biographical Dictionary , Kingston, Ontario, 1990, pp. 418-421.
Victoria Joan Moessner, An annotated transcription of the diaries of Hermann Ludwig von Löwenstern (1777–1836): 1803–1806: Die Erste Russische Weltumegelung, Part 1 (Studies in German Language and Literature) , Edwin Mellen Press, 2005.
Hubert Howe Bancroft, History of California , 7 Vols., San Francisco, 1885. [basic work still valid]
Georg Heinrich von Langsdorff, Remarks and Observations on a Voyage around the World from 1803 to 1807 , translated by Victoria Joan Moessner, 2 vols., Kingston, Ontario, 1993.
Eve Iversen and Father Maurice M. O'Moore, The Romance of Nikolai Rezanov and Concepcion Argüello and The Concha Argüello Story , edited by Richard A. Pierce, Kingston, Ontario, 1998. [gives a pleasantly sober overview of the affair]
Lydia T. Black, Russians in Alaska, 1732-1867 , Fairbanks, 2004, pp. 169-177. [more recent summary of the Resanow tour]
Peter Littke, From the Tsar's Eagle to the Stars and Stripes. The History of Russian Alaska , Essen, 2003, pp. 137–146. [Krusenstern's circumnavigation and Resanow tour in German]
Iu. P. Avdiukow, Komandor , Kranoiarsk: Izdatel'skii otdel PIK Ofset,, 1995. [contains a lot of material about Resanow]
Hector Chevigny, Russian America: The Great Alaskan Venture, 1741–1867 , Portland, 1965. [closes the knowledge gaps of the 1960s through sometimes astonishing combinatorics, therefore the complete work can only be described as fictional. Obsolete today through research, but still very readable for those who know English as an introduction to the subject thanks to the wonderful narrative style of this blind and long deceased writer]

Web links

Website on Resanov (Engl.)

Resanov's mission in Japan (English, insufficiently translated from Russian )

Ermolaev IN, "Pskov, Nikolay Rezanov (1764–1807)" (Russian, with the option of online translation into other languages)

Bret Hartes poem "Concepcion De Arguello" (engl.)

personal data
SURNAME	Resanov, Nikolai Petrovich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Резанов, Николай Петрович (Russian)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Russian statesman
DATE OF BIRTH	April 8, 1764
PLACE OF BIRTH	St. Petersburg
DATE OF DEATH	March 13, 1807
Place of death	Krasnoyarsk

[1] There was at least one uncle, Ivan Gavrilowitsch Resanow (January 21, 1726 - December 23, 1787). He was Lieutenant General, President of the Mining College and Chief Procuror of the 1st Department of the Senate.

[2] Resanov had a sister, Yekaterina, who was eight years younger than him, and two brothers, Dmitri three years younger and Alexander seven years younger, who died on February 18, 1853. Ekaterina married the landowner Alexander Stepanovich Korsakov. The marriage resulted in six children, of which Nikolai Korsakow (1800-1820) is particularly well-known, who was a classmate of Pushkin at the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum , and Pyotr Korsakow (1790-1844), who made a name for himself as a writer and editor of the made his first poems by Pushkin.

[3] There were family ties to Pskov through his mother. In 1796 his mother-in-law, Natalia Schelichowa, bought an estate in Demjanizki Gottesacker of the Pskov district with 245 souls from the second major Pyotr Gavrilowitsch Okunew (a relative of his mother's family) and bequeathed it to the children a year later. Resanov, his mother, his sister and both brothers lived together in this city during this period. For the entire fifth year, however, Resanov is noted as "on vacation", most of which he spent most of his usual annual vacation in Saint Petersburg, where he was preparing for his further career.

[4] Born on February 15, 1780. This was legally possible because at that time the official minimum age for girls willing to marry in Russia was 13 years.

[5] Resanov also benefited from relations with the Governor General of Irkutsk, Ivan Aliferowitsch Pil, who previously held this post in the Pskov governorate and had once served under the Resanov.

[6] Here his friendship with Pyotr Chrisanfowitsch Oboljaninow (1752–1841), a former colleague from his time in Pskov, who made a quick career and was prosecutor general under Tsar Paul I.

[7] The tsar had even decided to appoint Resanov as prosecutor general instead of the disgraced Obolyaninov. Court intrigues during the troubled phase after the murder of Paul I had prevented this.

[8] the date of his death is not known. He was listed at the Petersburg grammar school in 1813.

[9] Olga married Colonel Sergei Alexandrowitsch Kokoschkin and died on June 20, 1828. Kokoschkin married again, became Major General and later Chief Police Officer of St. Petersburg. He died in 1861.

[10] Krusenstern, Adam J. von, Voyage round the World in the Years 1803, 1804, 1805, and 1806 , Ridgewood, NJ: The Gregg Press, Inc., 1968, Vol. I, pp. 251-313. [Reprint of the original English-language edition from 1813]

[11] There are indications that Resanov was very worried about his reception in Sankt Peterburg. In a letter (interpreted as “last will”) to his brother-in-law Buldakov (who was also the chairman of the RAK) shortly before his death, he remarked, “I was deeply saddened ...”. He also seemed to have premonitions regarding his serious illness: "... but they do not know [in relation to his mother-in-law, Natalija Schelichowa, and his children] that I may not see them again during my lifetime." See letter from NP Resanov to MM Buldakow from Irkutsk v. January 24, 1807, published in excerpts (in English) by: Black, Dawn Lea and Petrov, Alexander Yu. (Ed. And translator), Natalia Shelikhova: Russian Oligarch of Alaska Commerce , Fairbanks, AK: University of Alaska Press, 2010, p. 156. In the introduction, the editors specify this view. In another letter from Yakutsk, Resanov previously described how he rode day and night across the Okhotsk mountain range, caught a cold while crossing the Aldan and finally fell off his horse after spending the nights camping in the snow. He lay unconscious in a yurt for 24 hours and eventually dragged himself to Irkutsk and beyond, knowing that he would die. S. xlviii. On the other hand, his bad condition at this point in time is questioned, as he is said to have led a dissolute life with nightly drinking during his three-month stay in Irkutsk (November 1806 - February 1807), see. Lydia T. Black: Russians in Alaska, 1732-1867. Fairbanks, 2004. p. 177.

[12] Langsdorff, Georg Heinrich von, remarks on a trip around the world in the years 1803 to 1807, 2 vol., Frankfurt am Mayn: Friedrich Wilmans, 1812, p. 334.

[13] Concepcion faced an uncertain future and only found out about two years later of the death of the man she had fallen in love with. Although she had several interested parties, also because of her extraordinary beauty, she rejected them all and remained unmarried for the rest of her life. She worked for the common good in Upper California, later even seven years in Loreto, Baja California, before she joined the newly founded convent of Dominican Sisters in Monterey in 1851 . After the sorority moved to Benicia , California in 1854 , she died there on December 20, 1857 at the age of 66. She was first buried in the Saint Catherine Convent Cemetery; since 1894 her grave has been in the Saint Dominics Catholic Cemetery in Benicia. Resanow himself stated in a letter to his brother-in-law, MM Buldakow, shortly before his death: “Conception is sweet as an angel, beautiful, kind-hearted and loves me. I love her and I cry at the fact that there is no room for her in my heart. ”See Dawn Lea Black, and Alexander Yu. Petrov (ed. And translator); Natalia Shelikhova: Russian Oligarch of Alaska Commerce. Fairbanks, AK: University of Alaska Press, 2010. Introduction pp. Xlviii.

[14] During his stay in Novo-Arkhangelsk, he “kept” a minor Tlingit girl as a “lover”, s. Black: Russians… . P. 176.

[15] For a more critical consideration of Resanov's merits, see Black: Russians… . P. 168

[16] Towards the end of the 19th century, the village experienced its decline under the subsequent owners of the estate. Various buildings, including the church, survived into the 1940s when they were completely destroyed during World War II.