Mikhail Andreyevich Miloradovich was a Russian general and statesman who served in the wars against Sweden, the Ottoman Empire, and Napoleonic France. He commanded Russian forces during the campaigns of 1812–1814, became military governor-general of Saint Petersburg in 1818, and was mortally wounded while confronting the Decembrist uprising in December 1825.
Background
Ethnicity:
He descended from a Serbian noble family whose members entered Russian service under Peter the Great and settled in the Russian Empire.
Miloradovich was born on October 12, 1771, in Saint Petersburg, the capital of the Russian Empire. He belonged to a Serbian noble family established in Russian service during the reign of Peter the Great and was the son of Lieutenant General Andrei Stepanovich Miloradovich.
He entered the army in 1780 while still a child, following the eighteenth-century practice by which noble families registered sons in military regiments early in life. From 1780 to 1787 he studied abroad, attending the universities of Göttingen and Königsberg and receiving additional instruction in artillery and fortification at Strasbourg and Metz. This education combined the classical and political studies of German universities with practical preparation for an officer career.
Education
Miloradovich received part of his education at the University of Göttingen and the University of Königsberg. Göttingen was one of the leading research-oriented universities of the German Enlightenment, while Königsberg was associated with the intellectual environment of Immanuel Kant and provided instruction in the humanities and sciences.
He also studied military subjects in Strasbourg and Metz, particularly artillery and fortification. These institutions and military centers formed part of the European educational network available to Russian noble officers before the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. He returned to Russian service in the late 1780s and continued his professional development through active command.
Career
Miloradovich entered the Imperial Russian Army in 1780 and served in the Life Guards Izmailovsky Regiment from 1787. He participated in the Russo-Swedish War of 1788–1790 and advanced through the officer ranks, becoming a colonel in 1797 and a major general in 1798. He was then appointed chief of the Apsheron Musketeer Regiment and served under Alexander Suvorov during the Italian and Swiss campaigns of 1799.
During the 1805 campaign against Napoleonic France, Miloradovich commanded a brigade and distinguished himself at Amstetten and Krems during the Russian retreat toward Moravia. In the Russo-Turkish War of 1806–1812, he commanded a corps, captured Bucharest on December 13, 1806, and defeated Ottoman forces at Turbat and Obilesti in 1807. He became a general of the infantry in 1809 and served as military governor of Kyiv from 1810 to 1812.
At the beginning of the Patriotic War of 1812, Miloradovich organized reserve forces and then joined the field army. At the Battle of Borodino he commanded formations on the Russian right wing and in the center; afterward he directed the rearguard that covered the Tarutino maneuver and the withdrawal from Moscow. During the pursuit of Napoleon's army he commanded advance forces and later took part in the foreign campaigns of 1813–1814, including the battles of Leipzig and the Allied advance into France.
In 1814 he became commander of the Russian Guards Corps. From 1818 until his death he served as military governor-general of Saint Petersburg and as a member of the State Council and other imperial committees. The governor-generalship combined military authority with responsibility for the administration and security of the imperial capital. On December 14, 1825, during the Decembrist uprising on Senate Square, Miloradovich attempted to persuade rebel troops to return to their barracks; he was shot by Pyotr Kakhovsky and died from his wounds.
Connections
Miloradovich never married and had no children. His family background connected him to the Miloradovich noble house, a Serbian-origin lineage that had served the Russian state since the early eighteenth century.
