Rostopchin, Feodor Vasilyevich, Count
Rostopchin, Feodor Vasilyevich, Count
(fyô`dər vəsē`lyəvĭch, rəstəpchēn`), 1763–1826, Russian general and statesman. He rose rapidly under Czar Paul IPaul I,1754–1801, czar of Russia (1796–1801), son and successor of Catherine II. His mother disliked him intensely and sought on several occasions to change the succession to his disadvantage.
..... Click the link for more information. , serving as foreign minister from 1798–1800. He was made a count in 1799. In 1812, Czar Alexander IAlexander I,
1777–1825, czar of Russia (1801–25), son of Paul I (in whose murder he may have taken an indirect part). In the first years of his reign the liberalism of his Swiss tutor, Frédéric César de La Harpe, seemed to influence Alexander.
..... Click the link for more information. appointed him governor-general of Moscow. He was later held responsible for the burning of Moscow, which occurred when NapoleonNapoleon I
, 1769–1821, emperor of the French, b. Ajaccio, Corsica, known as "the Little Corporal." Early Life
The son of Carlo and Letizia Bonaparte (or Buonaparte; see under Bonaparte, family), young Napoleon was sent (1779) to French military schools at
..... Click the link for more information. 's forces entered the city in Sept., 1812. He was dismissed from office in 1814 and went into exile. Rostopchin denied the accusation in his pamphlet The Truth concerning the Fire of Moscow (in French, 1823); the cause of the conflagration is still in doubt.