The Library › Reel IV · All the Empress’s Men
Did Catherine the Great seize the throne in a borrowed military uniform?
VERDICTTRUE
Yes. On 28 June 1762 (Old Style) she wrote that at about ten at night she “dressed in the uniform of the guards,” was proclaimed colonel, “mounted on horseback,” and rode at the head of the troops toward Peterhof. A portrait of that day by Vigilius Eriksen shows her astride her horse Brilliant in a Semyonovsky Guards coat that belonged to Lieutenant A. F. Talyzin.
The receipts
- Memoirs of the Empress Catherine II (incl. her letter to Poniatowski), ed. Alexander Herzen, Project Gutenberg
- Vigilius Eriksen, Portrait of Catherine II on Her Horse Brilliant, DailyArt
The comedy version
The untold story of Catherine the Great, inventor of the job interview.
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