'Artemy Petrovich Volynsky' (''Арте́мий Петро́вич Волы́нский'' in
Russian) (
1689 –
1740) was a
Russian
statesman and
diplomat. His career started as a soldier but was rapidly upgraded to minister under
Peter the Great and governor of
Astrakhan. Peter stripped him of nearly all his powers until
Catherine I appointed him governor of
Kazan.
Conspiracy under
Anna of Russia earned him a trial with
Biren's men; he was executed on
June 27,
1740.
Military youth
Artemy Volynsky was a son of Peter Volynsky who came of an ancient
Gediminids family. Artemy's father was one of the dignitaries at the court of
Feodor III, and also a
voivod in Kazan.
[1] He entered a
dragoon regiment in
1704 and rose to the rank of
captain, by
1711; then, exchanging the
military service for
diplomacy, he was attached to the suite of Vice-
Chancellor Peter Shafirov. He was present during the
Pruth Campaign, shared Shafirov's captivity in the
Seven Towers in
Constantinople.
Minister for Peter the Great
In
1715, by orders of
Peter the Great he was sent to
Ispahan,
Persia (which he reached in March 1717) as a Russian minister to explore the area and find a way by sea to India. During his travelling he was supposed to redirect the silk trade route in Persia to Russia with the Armenians' help. During his stay in Ispahan, Volynsky signed a treaty with the
Shah Husayn giving commercial advantages over a country torn by revolts.
[2]
In
1718 Peter made him one of his six
adjutant generals, and
governor of
Astrakhan. In this post Volynsky displayed distinguished administrative and financial talents. In
1722 he married
Alexandra Naryshkina, Peter's cousin.
[Pushkin, Aleksandr Sergeevich. (1999) ''Tales of the Late, Ivan Petrovich Belkin, the Queen of Spades, the Captain's Daughter, Peter the Great'S, Blackamoor'', Oxford University Press. 336 pages. ISBN 0-19-283954-3.] The same year he was accused of
peculation and other offences to the
emperor, who caned him severely and deprived him of his plenipotentiary powers, despite his undeniable services in Persia, but for which Peter could never have emerged so triumphantly from the difficult
Persian war of 1722-1723.
Governor of Kazan
Catherine I made Volynsky governor of
Kazan for a short time, and he held the same post for two years (
1728-
1730) under
Peter II. But his incurable corruption and unbridled temper so discredited the government that he was deprived of the post shortly after the accession of
Anne. From
1730 to
1736 Volynsky served in the army under
Munnich. In
1737 he was appointed the second Russian
plenipotentiary at the abortive congress of
Nemirov held for the conclusion of peace with the
Porte.
Condemned under Anne
In
1738 he was introduced into the Russian cabinet by
Biron as a counterpoise against
Andrei Osterman.
Volynsky, however, now thought himself strong enough to attempt to supersede Biron himself, and openly opposed the favorite in the
State Council in the debates as to the indemnity due to
Poland for the violations of her territory during the
War of the Polish Succession, Biron advising that a liberal indemnity should be given, whereas Volynsky objected to any indemnity at all.
Biron thereupon forced Anne to order an inquiry into Volynsky's past career, with the result that he was tried before a
tribunal of Biron's men. The charges faced were that he, as a minister, and
Andrei Fedorovich Khrushchev (1691—1740), as an assistant minister, tried to dethrone Queen Anna for Peter the Great's daughter, Elizabeth.
[Pushkin, Alexandr Sergeyevitch. (1968) ''The Complete Prose Tales of Pushkin'', W. W. Norton & Company. 504 pages. ISBN 0-393-00465-1.] He was arrested on
June 23,
1740 and thus condemned to be broken on the wheel and then beheaded. On the scaffold, by the clemency of the empress, his punishment was mitigated to the severing of his right hand followed by
decapitation in
June 27,
1740.
The sentence was executed on
Poltava Victory's day and Volynsky had by his side
Pyotr Mikhailovich Eropkin & A. F. Khruschov.
[ Monument to Biron’s Enemies ]
A tombstone in their honour was erected in 1741 by order of
Elizabeth of Russia over their burial place beside St. Sampson Cathedral. That was the only thing that was visible over their grave until 1885 when a monument was placed as they were seen as national heroes because they opposed to German ideas, that of Biron.
Although Britannica stated in 1911 that ''The whole business seems to have been purely a piece of vindictiveness on the part of Biron.'', since the erection of the monument, there was controversy over their plans since Volynsky's work ''General Project of Internal Affairs of the State'' state that they were conspirators in a plan to overturn the Empress.
References
1. Волынский Артемий Петрович
2. Bain, Robert. (2005) ''The First Romanovs'', Kessinger Publishing. 444 pages. ISBN 1-4179-7076-6.
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Image of Volynsky
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