What is a civil penalty. Civil execution of Chernyshevsky and description of the execution as a gift

The most popular types of execution in the Middle Ages were beheading and hanging. Moreover, they were applied to people of different classes. Decapitation was used as a punishment for noble people, and the gallows was the lot of the rootless poor. So why did the aristocracies cut off their heads, and the common people were hanged?

Decapitation is the lot of kings and nobles

This type of death penalty has been used everywhere for many millennia. In medieval Europe, such punishment was considered "noble" or "honorable". They cut off the head mainly of aristocrats. When a representative of a noble family laid his head on the chopping block, he showed humility.

Decapitation with a sword, ax or ax was considered the least painful death. A quick death made it possible to avoid public agony, which was important for representatives of noble families. The crowd, thirsty for spectacles, should not have seen low death manifestations.

It was also believed that the aristocrats, being brave and selfless warriors, were prepared specifically for death from edged weapons.

Much in this matter depended on the skills of the executioner. Therefore, often the convict himself or his relatives paid a lot of money so that he did his job with one blow.

Decapitation leads to instant death, which means it saves from violent torment. The sentence was carried out quickly. The condemned lay his head on a log, which was to be no more than six inches thick. This greatly simplified the execution.

The aristocratic connotation of this type of punishment was also reflected in books devoted to the Middle Ages, thus perpetuating its selectivity. In the book “History of the Master” (author Kirill Sinelnikov) there is a quote: “... a noble execution is cutting off the head. This is not hanging for you, the execution of the mob. Decapitation is the lot of kings and nobles."

Hanging

If noblemen were sentenced to beheading, then commoner criminals fell on the gallows.

Hanging is the most common execution in the world. This type of punishment has been considered shameful since ancient times. And there are several explanations for this. Firstly, it was believed that when hanging, the soul cannot leave the body, as if remaining hostage to it. Such dead people were called "mortgages".

Secondly, dying on the gallows was excruciating and painful. Death does not come instantly, a person experiences physical suffering and remains conscious for several seconds, perfectly aware of the approach of the end. All his torments and manifestations of agony are watched by hundreds of onlookers. In 90% of cases, at the moment of strangulation, all the muscles of the body relax, which leads to complete emptying of the intestines and bladder.

In many nations, hanging was considered an unclean death. No one wanted his body to hang out in front of everyone after the execution. Swearing by exposure is an obligatory part of this type of punishment. Many believed that such a death was the worst thing that could happen, and it was reserved only for traitors. People remembered Judas, who hanged himself on an aspen.

A person sentenced to the gallows had to have three ropes: the first two, the thickness of the little finger (tortuzas), were equipped with a loop and were intended for direct strangulation. The third was called a "token" or "throw" - it served to drop the condemned to the gallows. The execution was completed by the executioner, holding on to the crossbar of the gallows, he beat the sentenced man in the stomach with his knee.

Exceptions to the rules

Despite a clear distinction according to belonging to a particular class, there were exceptions to the established rules. For example, if a nobleman raped a girl who was entrusted to him for guardianship, then he was deprived of his nobility and all the privileges associated with the title. If during the detention he resisted, then the gallows awaited him.

Among the military, deserters and traitors were sentenced to hanging. For the officers, such a death was so humiliating that they often committed suicide without waiting for the execution of the punishment imposed by the court.

The exception was cases of high treason, in which the nobleman was deprived of all privileges and could be executed as a commoner.

Civil penalty in the Russian Empire and other countries - one of the types of shameful punishment in the XVIII-XIX centuries. Her rite consisted in the public humiliation of the punished with the breaking of a sword over his head as a sign of deprivation of all the rights of the state (ranks, estate privileges, property rights, parental rights, etc.).

In the Middle Ages, instead of breaking the sword, under the funeral psalms from the knight standing on the scaffold, they removed the knight's vestments (armor, knight's belt, spurs, etc.) in parts, and at the culmination they broke the shield with the noble coat of arms. After that, they sang the 109th psalm of King David, consisting of a set of curses, under the last words of which the herald (and sometimes the king himself) poured cold water on the former knight, symbolizing purification. Then the former knight was lowered from the scaffold with the help of a gallows, the loop of which was passed under the armpits. The former knight, under the hooting of the crowd, was led to the church, where a real funeral service was performed on him, after which he was handed over to the executioner, unless he was prepared for a different punishment by sentence that did not require the executioner’s services (if the knight was relatively “lucky”, then everything could be limited to the deprivation of knighthood). After the execution of the sentence (for example, execution), the heralds publicly announced the children (or other heirs) “vile (literally villains, French vilain / English villain), deprived of ranks, not having the right to bear arms and appear and participate in games and tournaments , at court and at royal meetings, under fear of being stripped naked and carved with rods, like villans and born from an ignoble father.

Famous personalities subjected to civil execution

November 12, 1708 - a symbolic civil execution of Hetman Mazepa took place in Hlukhiv (in the absence of Mazepa himself, who fled to Turkey)

1768 - struck in all estate and property rights and deprived of the surname Saltychikha (Daria Nikolaevna Saltykova)

On January 10 (21), 1775, on Bolotnaya Square in Moscow, the executioners performed the ritual of the civil execution of Mikhail Shvanvich

on the night of July 12-13, 1826 - Decembrists: 97 people in St. Petersburg and 15 naval officers in Kronstadt

Public trampling of honor was sometimes considered even more severe punishment than the death penalty, since the scolded citizen then had to put up with the dishonor that accompanied him throughout his earthly journey. At all times, both men and women could be humiliated, only depending on the sex, both the methods of dishonor and the causes of shame differed.

Trade execution

Dooming a person to corporal punishment, judges in the person of kings could pursue three goals: kill the criminal, turn him into a cripple, or publicly humiliate him in order to put the offender in his place. Representatives of the upper classes who had lost the trust of the ruler were subjected to the lightest physical flogging, which caused irreparable damage to their personal dignity. Usually, public punishment, regulated by the Sudebnik of 1497, was carried out on trading floors right in front of the common people and therefore was called "commercial execution".

If the executioner used a whip for the death penalty, then the use of a rod or whip was enough to humiliate a person. At the same time, the punished man had to be naked, otherwise these blows did not harm his honor. The last time the "commercial execution" was used in the Russian Empire in 1845, but Catherine II banned it even earlier.

Pillory

Since the 18th century, instead of painful corporal punishment, representatives of the privileged classes began to be subjected to a more humane, but no less humiliating standing at the pillory. Installed in a crowded place on a special platform, the pillory was sometimes equipped with blocks in which the hands and head of the “criminal” were clamped, and sometimes it was equipped only with shackles and a collar hanging on a chain. A nobleman sentenced to public insult was taken to the place of general ridicule on "shameful" black horns, put on his knees and chained to a pillory. Each convict had to stand for the period specified in the verdict, which was counted from the moment when the executioner broke the sword over the head of the punished, symbolizing noble honor.

Defamation

The ritual of breaking the sword, in other words, defamation, was first introduced by Peter I, and initially it was used only in the army, and then moved into general civil practice. This humiliating act was a prelude to the deprivation of their estate rights, military ranks, title, status and sending them into life exile. Defamation, as a way of insulting human dignity, was necessarily accompanied by nailing a tablet with the name of the convict to the gallows. This rite of "civil execution" was used in the period from 1716-1766.

beard duty

Peru of Peter I belongs to another resonant law that changed not only the appearance, but also the consciousness of a Russian person, for whom a broad beard has been a sign of honor and nobility from time immemorial. The length of the beard was a measure of respect and aristocracy, so it was diligently grown and cherished like the apple of an eye. Sometimes it was passed on as an inheritance from one generation to another, and the majesty of the family was judged by the addition of the lengths of all the beards in the pedigree.

A spit in the beard was regarded as a personal insult, and therefore it was immediately followed by a weighty blow, restoring the violated honor of the bearded man. A boyar who did not get involved in a fight was considered to have endured an insult and immediately lost the respect of his fellow citizens. Each prince who ruled in Russia in his judicial code, which was called "Pravda", noted in a separate line the punishment provided for an attempt on a beard.

Yaroslav the Wise introduced a fine of 12 hryvnias for causing damage to honor by damaging a beard, and in the Pskov Judicial Code of the 14th century, a vira of 2 rubles was charged for such an offense, although only 1 ruble had to be paid for killing a person. Tsar Ivan the Terrible humiliated objectionable boyars by pulling his beard, as well as cutting it. Having commanded the boyars to remove facial hair, Emperor Peter I encroached on something sacred, the meaning of which is indicated by the saying: "Cut our heads, do not touch our beards." That is why at the initial stage of the "reform" many boyars agreed to pay a hefty "beard duty" to the treasury, so as not to lose this symbol of dignity and honor of the clan.

Disfiguring executions

Non-elite citizens were subjected to much more painful humiliation procedures, which could not be hidden, since they were subjected to such cruel measures as nostril plucking and branding.

Initially acting as a punishment for smoking, pulling out the nostrils later turned into a popular procedure for marking recidivist convicts, whose biography was eloquently told by their appearance.

A commoner caught stealing was immediately condemned to hard labor, after which the letters “B”, “O” and “P” were burned on his forehead and cheeks, so that everyone who could read knew that he was facing a swindler. Only women, who, according to the law, were not supposed to be branded, could avoid this fate.

Purely female humiliation

It was possible to humiliate a Russian woman by cutting off her hair, which was done by the husband or relatives of the lady in case of convicting her of treason or fornication. However, self-willed landowners often practiced this kind of humiliation for no reason, since they saw in the serfs not people, but an object for entertainment.

To disgrace a married woman, one had simply to rip off her headdress, which after the wedding became an obligatory attribute of her clothes. It is from here that the word “goof off” originates in the meaning of disgrace.

The greatest shame could be incurred by a girl who lost her chastity before marriage. In this case, the gates of her house were smeared with tar, her relatives had the right to beat her, and her chances of getting married were sharply reduced.

Notable individuals subjected to civil execution:

November 12, 1708 - Hetman Mazepa was executed in Hlukhiv. In 1708, Mazepa went over to the side of the enemy of the Russian state in the Northern War - the Swedish king Charles XII, almost a year before he was defeated by the Russian army. For betrayal of the oath, he was sentenced to civil execution with the deprivation of titles and awards that he received from the king. The Russian Orthodox Church anathematized Ivan Mazepa. After the defeat of Charles XII near Poltava (1709), he fled to the Ottoman Empire and died in the city of Bendery.

On the night of July 12-13, 1826 - the Decembrists: 97 people in St. Petersburg and 15 naval officers in Kronstadt

December 12, 1861 - Mikhail Mikhailov. In the late 1850s and early 1860s, Mikhailov was one of the prominent figures in the revolutionary underground in Russia. In the spring of 1861 he traveled to London to print the proclamation "To the Younger Generation". In 1861, upon his return from abroad, Mikhailov was arrested in connection with the distribution of revolutionary proclamations in St. Petersburg. Convicted and sentenced to hard labor for 12.5 years. In 1862 he was exiled to hard labor in Siberia.

May 19, 1864 - Nikolai Chernyshevsky. June 12, 1862 Chernyshevsky was arrested and placed in solitary confinement in the Alekseevsky ravelin of the Peter and Paul Fortress on charges of compiling proclamations "Bow to the lord peasants from well-wishers." The reason for the arrest was a letter from Herzen to N.A. Serno-Solovyevich intercepted by the police, in which the name of Chernyshevsky was mentioned in connection with a proposal to publish the banned Sovremennik in London. The investigation went on for about a year and a half. Chernyshevsky waged a stubborn struggle with the commission of inquiry, refuting false documents and false testimonies, which were fabricated on the instructions of the commission (source?) and attached to the case. In protest against the illegal actions of the commission of inquiry, Chernyshevsky went on a hunger strike, which lasted nine days. On February 7, 1864, the Senate announced a verdict in the case of Chernyshevsky: a link to hard labor for a period of fourteen years, and then a settlement in Siberia for life. Alexander II reduced the term of hard labor to seven years, in general, Chernyshevsky spent more than twenty years in prison and hard labor. On May 19, 1864, a civil execution of a revolutionary took place in St. Petersburg on Horse Square. He was sent to Nerchinsk penal servitude; in 1866 he was transferred to the Alexander Plant of the Nerchinsk District, in 1871 to Vilyuisk.

May 15, 1868 - Grigory Potanin. In the summer of 1865, Potanin was arrested in the case of the Society for the Independence of Siberia and brought to trial on charges of seeking to separate Siberia from Russia. On May 15, 1868, after a three-year stay in the Omsk jail, Potanin was subjected to a civil execution, then he was sent to hard labor in Sveaborg, where he remained until November 1871. After serving his sentence, he was exiled to the city of Nikolsk, Vologda province.

December 21, 1871 - Ivan Pryzhov. November 1, 1869 Pryzhov takes part in the murder of student Ivanov. Arrested December 3, 1869; On March 5, 1870, he was transferred to the Peter and Paul Fortress. At the trial on July 1-5, 1871, he was sentenced to the deprivation of all rights of fortune, twelve years of hard labor and eternal settlement in Siberia. On September 15, 1871, he was transferred to the St. Petersburg prison castle. The civil execution took place on December 21, 1871 at Horse Square. On January 14, 1872, Pryzhov was sent to the Vilna hard labor prison, then to a prison in Irkutsk, and on a stage to the Petrovsky ironworks in the Trans-Baikal region.

mock execution- a type of torture or psychological pressure, which consists in simulating preparations for the death penalty of a person who is subjected to pressure. In a number of cases, a staging is arranged in order to achieve some kind of confession: a person is blindfolded, forced to dig his own grave, put a gun barrel to his head, expecting that the fear of death will make him agree to certain demands of the torturers. Sometimes a mock execution is performed on an already pardoned convict who does not know this and is preparing for death; such psychological trauma acts as an additional punishment.

One of the most famous cases of staged execution (of the second type) was staged on the Petrashevites in 1849; the most famous of them, F. M. Dostoevsky, repeatedly returned to this scene in his works.

Performances for the purpose of intimidation were also used under the Soviet regime. When K.K. Rokossovsky, who was arrested in 1937 on false charges, refused to confess even under torture, he was twice taken out to be shot, but they shot not at him, but at other convicts who were next to him.

In the United States, mock execution by drowning - water torture - until January 2009, when the administration of Barack Obama canceled interrogations at the CIA, was legally used by CIA officers against terrorist suspects, which caused numerous protests from the public and Congress, which, however, were not supported by the administration G. Bush. Cases of mock executions were noted among the torture carried out by American soldiers on captured Iraqis in the Abu Ghraib prison in 2003-2004.

Excommunication)- a measure of punishment practiced in some religions for actions incompatible with the way of life approved by the church, for violation of church rules, for apostasy (apostasy) or for heresy. It consists in breaking off all relations between the church and the excommunicated. The religious meaning of excommunication is the refusal of the church to be in any way responsible for the thoughts, words and actions of the excommunicated.

Excommunication is practiced in many religions, in particular, in Christianity and Judaism. In practice, excommunication usually consists in the fact that the excommunicated person is forbidden to participate in the commission of public religious activities. One of the first known examples of this practice is the excommunication from sacrificial offerings adopted by the Celtic Druids, described by Julius Caesar in his Notes on the Gallic War.

The Christian Church practices the following types of excommunication:

Anathema (or great excommunication, Greek ἀνάθεμα) - imposed by the highest church authority, applied to apostates and heretics. The anathema has an indefinite duration and provides for a ban on any connection between the church and the excommunicated.

Prohibition (or small excommunication, Greek ἀφορισμός) - imposed by the church authorities of the regional or local level (in Orthodoxy - by the bishop), mainly for violation of church rules and for deviation from the commandments, consists in a temporary ban on participation in religious ceremonies, on communion and blessing.

Interdict - used mainly in Western Christian churches. It represents excommunication from the church not of an individual parishioner, but immediately of a large group: a village, city, region, or even a state. On the territory under the interdict, churches did not work, religious holidays were not held, ceremonies were not performed (baptism, wedding, funeral, etc.).

Shameful Punishments

Criminalist D. M. Kahan argued in his early writings that “society reinforces its fundamental values ​​by punishing criminals, it does so publicly when it uses shameful punishments: one who is humiliated in public “cannot hide, and his offense is brought to justice others." Moreover, ignominious punishments have a strong deterrent effect and are better suited to the crime.” In his later writings, D. M. Kahan “revises his position on shaming punishments as a substitute for imprisonment, arguing, ‘what is really wrong with shaming punishments, I think, is that they are deeply biased: when society elects them, it chooses the side of those who obey the norms, which ensures the stability of the community and social differentiation rather than individuality and equality.

Liberals, according to Martha Nussbaum, "contend that Western legal systems cannot support the idea of ​​infamous punishments because they have already 'articulated the difference between shame and guilt. A shame<…>refers to the traits of human character, while guilt characterizes action. Accordingly, they raise five objections to shameful punishments as sanctions:

The purpose of shaming punishments is to offend human dignity: "they do not punish a criminal act as such, rather, they "mark a deviant identity for others, they humiliate a person by characterizing him as bad and creating a 'corrupted identity'." Shameful punishments deprive the individual of a basic virtue , turning him into a kind of sub-individual and depriving him of the possibility of redemption and return to society.

Shameful punishments are a type of "mob justice because they push the public to punish the criminal and thus cannot be considered a credible punishment" (James Whitman).

In history, according to lawyer and legal philosopher Eric Posner, ignominious punishments fell short of their intended purpose: “instead of punishing the crime committed, there was the punishment of individuals who were nonconformists or outcasts, from whom society tried to fence off and defend itself.”

According to psychologist James Gilligan (as well as J. Braithwat, who argues that it is stigmatization that contributes to recidivism), one cannot say that “shameful punishments have a serious deterrent power; people who have been publicly humiliated face great difficulty in trying to reintegrate into society, become excluded from it, and are more likely to commit a crime again. They also solidarize within their environment. Thus, the use of ignominious punishments increases the number of crimes rather than reduces them.”

According to criminologist Steven Schulhofer, one may question “that ignominious punishments could be used instead of imprisonment for petty crimes, for juvenile offenders or first time offenders. In fact”, “shameful punishments will be used against people who are exempted from punishment altogether or sentenced to a fine or a suspended sentence. Thus, shameful punishments are more likely to contribute to the tightening of social control.

Collected works. Volume 5

Literary-critical articles and memoirs.

Library "Spark". Publishing house "Pravda", Moscow, 1953.

In Nizhny Novgorod, at the end of the last century, the doctor A. V. Vensky, "a man of the sixties", a school friend of P. D. Boborykin and even the hero of one of the writer's novels, died. It was known that he was present as an eyewitness at the "civil execution" of Chernyshevsky. On the first anniversary of Chernyshevsky's death, a circle of the Nizhny Novgorod intelligentsia decided to arrange a memorial service and a number of messages to restore this bright, significant and suffering image in the memory of the younger generation. The well-known zemstvo figure A. A. Savelyev suggested that Vensky also make a report on the event, of which he was an eyewitness. At that time, a meeting in memory of the persecuted writer could not, of course, take place quite "legally", and Vensky refused to participate in it. But he agreed to give written answers to precisely posed questions, which were read at our meeting. This leaflet remained with me, and I restored Vensky's answers in the first edition of my book ("The Departed").

Then, in the December book of "Russian wealth" (1909), MP Sazhin's note about the same event was printed. Using this last note as a basis, and supplementing it with some features from the answers of A. V. Vensky, we can now restore with considerable completeness this truly symbolic episode from the history of Russian oppositional thought and the Russian intelligentsia.

The time of the execution, - says M. P. Sazhin, - "was announced in the newspapers a few days in advance. On the appointed day, I went to Horse Square early in the morning with my two fellow students-technologists. Here, in the middle of the square, stood the scaffold - a quadrangular platform, a yard and a half to two arshins high from the ground, painted with black paint. On the platform rose a black pillar, and on it, at a height of about one sazhen, hung an iron chain. At each end of the chain there was a ring so large that through it the hand of a man dressed in a coat could pass freely.The middle of this chain was put on a hook driven into a post.Two or three fathoms back from the platform, soldiers with rifles stood in two or three lines, forming a solid carre with a wide exit against the front side of the scaffold Then, retreating another fifteen to twenty sazhens from the soldiers, mounted gendarmes stood, quite rarely, and in the interval between them and a little back, policemen. e-five, mostly intelligent. My comrades and I stood on the right side of the square, if you stand facing the steps of the scaffold. Writers stood next to us: S. Maksimov, author of the famous book "A Year in the North", Pavel Ivanovich Yakushkin, a populist ethnographer, and A. N. Morigerovsky, an employee of "Russian Word" and "Delo". I knew all three personally.

The morning was gloomy, overcast (it was raining lightly). After a rather long wait, a carriage appeared, driving inside the carré to the scaffold. There was a slight movement in the public: they thought it was N. G, Chernyshevsky, but two executioners got out of the carriage and climbed onto the scaffold. A few more minutes passed. Another carriage appeared, surrounded by mounted gendarmes with an officer in front. This carriage also drove into the carriage, and soon we saw how N. G. Chernyshevsky climbed the scaffold in a coat with a fur collar and a round hat. He was followed by an official in a cocked hat and uniform, accompanied, as far as I remember, by two persons in civilian clothes. The official stood facing us, and Chernyshevsky turned his back. The reading of the verdict was heard over the hushed square. However, only a few words have reached us. When the reading was over, the executioner took N. G. Chernyshevsky by the shoulder, led him to the post and thrust his hands into the ring of the chain. Thus, with his arms folded across his chest, Chernyshevsky stood by the post for about a quarter of an hour.

During this interval of time, the following episode played out around us: Pavel Ivanovich Yakushkin (dressed as usual in a red calico shirt, in plush trousers tucked into simple oiled boots, in a peasant coat made of coarse brown cloth with a plush trim and in gold glasses) suddenly quickly slipped past policemen and gendarmes and headed for the scaffold. The policemen and the mounted gendarme rushed after him and stopped him. He began to warmly explain to them that Chernyshevsky was a close person to him and that he wanted to say goodbye to him. The gendarme, leaving Yakushkin with the policemen, galloped to the police authorities, who were standing at the scaffold. A gendarmerie officer was already walking towards him, who, having reached Yakushkin, began to convince him: "Pavel Ivanovich, Pavel Ivanovich, this is impossible." He promised to give him a meeting with Nikolai Gavrilovich later.

At that time, on the scaffold, the executioner pulled Chernyshevsky's hands out of the rings of the chain, placed him in the middle of the platform, quickly and roughly tore off his hat, threw it on the floor, and forced Chernyshevsky to kneel; then he took a sword, broke it over N. G.'s head and threw the fragments in different directions. After that Chernyshevsky got to his feet, raised his hat and put it on his head. The executioners grabbed him by the arms and led him off the scaffold.

A few moments later the carriage, surrounded by gendarmes, drove out of the carré. The audience rushed after her, but the carriage sped away. For a moment she stopped already in the street and then quickly drove on.

As the carriage pulled away from the scaffold, several young girls drove forward in cabs. At that moment, when the carriage caught up with one of these cab drivers, a bouquet of flowers flew to N. G. Chernyshevsky. The driver was immediately stopped by police agents, four young ladies were arrested and sent to the office of the Governor-General Prince Suvorov. The one who threw the bouquet, as it was said then, was Michaelis, a relative of N. V. Shelgunov's wife. I heard a story about flowers from one of the four young ladies, who was also arrested and escorted to Suvorov.

The latter, however, limited himself to a reprimand. The story seems to have had no further consequences."

To this description, "Vensky's answers" add a characteristic feature that depicts Chernyshevsky's behavior on the scaffold and the attitude of different categories of spectators towards him.

“Around the scaffold, mounted gendarmes were stationed in a ring, behind them the public, decently dressed (there were many literary brethren and women, in general, no less than four hundred people) (Vensky gives the following approximate diagram: the distance of the public from the scaffold was eight or nine sazhens, and " the thickness of the ring is at least one sazhen.") Behind this audience are ordinary people, factory workers and workers in general. poked out from behind the fence. During the reading by the official of a long act, ten pages long, the audience behind the fence expressed disapproval of the culprit and his wicked intentions. Disapproval also concerned his accomplices and was expressed loudly. The audience, standing closer to the scaffold, behind the gendarmes, only turned around at the murmurers.

Chernyshevsky, blond, not tall, thin, pale (by nature), with a small wedge-shaped beard, stood on the scaffold without a cap, in glasses, in an autumn coat with a beaver collar. During the reading of the act, he remained completely calm; he probably did not hear the disapproval of the public behind the fence, just as, in turn, the public closest to the scaffold did not hear the loud reading of the official. At the pillory, Chernyshevsky looked all the time at the audience, two or three times taking off and rubbing his glasses moistened with rain with his fingers.

The episode with the Viennese flowers is told as follows:

“When Chernyshevsky was brought down from the scaffold and put into the carriage, bouquets of flowers flew from among the intelligent public; some of them hit the carriage, and most of them missed. There was a slight movement of the public forward. The horses started off. No further comment from the crowd was heard. .. The rain started getting stronger"...

Finally, Mr. Zakharyin-Yakunin in "Rus" speaks of a wreath that was thrown onto the scaffold at the time when the executioner was breaking his sword over Chernyshevsky's head. This bouquet was thrown by a girl who was immediately arrested. It may very well be that there is no contradiction here, and each of the three narrators conveys only different moments they noticed.

That was forty years ago (Written in 1904). The people, just liberated from serfdom, probably considered Chernyshevsky the representative of the "gentlemen" who were dissatisfied with the liberation. Be that as it may, the story of the old woman who, in holy simplicity, brought a bundle of brushwood to the fire of Hus, was repeated, and the picture drawn by the ingenuous stories of "eyewitnesses" will probably catch the attention of the artist and historian more than once ... This cloudy morning with a fine Petersburg rain ... a black platform with chains on a pillory ... a figure of a pale man wiping his glasses in order to look through the eyes of a philosopher at the world as it appears from the scaffold ... Then a narrow ring of intelligent like-minded people, squeezed between a chain of gendarmes and the police, on the one hand, and the hostile people, on the other, and ... bouquets, innocent symbols of sympathetic confession. Yes, this is a real symbol of the fate and role of the Russian intelligentsia in that period of our society ...

There can hardly be any doubt that now the attitude of even the common public towards the civil execution of the author of "Letters Without an Address" would be much more complicated...

Civil execution in the Russian Empire and other countries is one of the types of shameful punishment used in the 18th-19th centuries. ekov. The convict was tied to a pillory and publicly broke his sword over his head as a sign of deprivation of all the rights of the state ( ranks, class privileges, property rights, parental rights, etc.). For example, on May 31, 1864, the “civil execution” of the revolutionary Nikolai Chernyshevsky took place in St. Petersburg on Horse Square, after which he was sent to Nerchinsk penal servitude in the Kadai prison.

Today our material is about which other famous personalities in the history of our country were subjected to such a shameful form of punishment.

Nikolay Chernyshevsky

Since we started with Nikolai Gavrilovich, let's deal with him to the end and figure it out. As we have already noted, the civil execution of the Russian materialist philosopher and democratic revolutionary took place on May 31, 1864 in St. Petersburg on Konnaya Square, then he was sent to Nerchinsk penal servitude in the Kadai prison, then transferred to the Alexander Plant of the Nerchinsk district, and in 1867 to Akatui prison. At the end of the seven-year penal servitude, he was transferred in 1871 to Vilyuysk. Three years later, in 1874, he was officially offered release, but he refuses to petition for clemency. In 1875, Ippolit Nikitich tried to release him, but to no avail. Only in 1883 Chernyshevsky was allowed to return to the European part of Russia, to Astrakhan.

Mazepa

On November 12, 1708, a symbolic execution of the former hetman was carried out in Hlukhiv, which is described as follows: “ they brought a stuffed effigy of Mazepa to the square. The verdict on the crime was read and his execution; torn by Prince Menshikov and Count Golovkin letters granted to him for the hetman's order, the rank of real privy councilor and the order of the holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called, and the ribbon was removed from the effigy. Then they threw this image of a traitor to the executioner; everyone trampled on it with their feet, and the executioner dragged the effigy on a rope along the streets and city squares to the place of execution, where he hung».

Decembrists

According to the verdict of the Supreme Criminal Court, the defendants were divided into 11 categories according to the degree of their guilt and sentenced to death by “beheading” (1st category), various terms of hard labor (2-7 categories), exile to Siberia (8th category). and 9th ranks), demoted to soldiers (10th and 11th ranks). Convicts from 1-10 categories were also sentenced to civil execution, which took place on the night of July 12-13, 1826: 97 people were executed in St. Petersburg and 15 naval officers in Kronstadt. In addition, among the defendants, a special group “out of ranks” was singled out, which included P. I. Pestel, K. F. Ryleev, S. I. Muravyov-Apostol, M. P. Bestuzhev-Ryumin and P. G. Kakhovsky sentenced to death by quartering.

Mikhail Illarionovich Mikhailov

The civil execution of the writer Mikhail Larionovich Mikhailov took place on December 12, 1861. He was convicted of "maliciously distributing an essay in which he took part and which was aimed at inciting a revolt against the Supreme Power to shock the main institutions of the State, but remained without harmful consequences for reasons beyond Mikhailov's control." Mikhailov was then sentenced to the deprivation of all rights of the state and six years of hard labor.

On that day, everything was as it usually happened during such executions: Mikhailov, dressed in gray prison clothes, was taken in a shameful chariot from the Peter and Paul Fortress to Sytny Market, raised to the scaffold, put on his knees, read the sentence, to the beat of a drum they broke over sword head. Since the authorities, fearing demonstrations, did everything to ensure that the number of spectators was as modest as possible, even the announcement of the upcoming execution appeared in Vedomosti S. - Petersburg City Police on the same day, and the execution itself was scheduled for 8 o'clock in the morning - public in In the full sense of the word, this execution was not.

Grigory Potanin

In the summer of 1865, the Russian geographer Potanin was arrested in the case of the Society for the Independence of Siberia and brought to trial on charges of seeking to separate Siberia from Russia. On May 15, 1868, after a three-year stay in the Omsk prison, Potanin was subjected to civil execution, and then sent to hard labor in Sveaborg, where he stayed until November 1871, after which he was sent to Totma.

Ivan Pryzhov

On November 1, 1869, Prizhov takes part in the murder of student Ivanov, after which he was arrested on December 3, 1869. At the trial on July 1-5, 1871, he was sentenced to the deprivation of all rights of fortune, twelve years of hard labor and eternal settlement in Siberia. On September 15, 1871, he was transferred to the St. Petersburg prison castle.

The civil execution of him took place on December 21, 1871 at Horse Square. On January 14, 1872, Pryzhov was sent to the Vilna hard labor prison, then to a prison in Irkutsk, and on a stage to the Petrovsky ironworks in the Trans-Baikal region. Since 1881 in a settlement in Siberia. According to the Russian writer Rachel Khin, " While his wife was alive, one of those unknown Russian heroines whose life is one of sheer selflessness, Pryzhov, despite extreme need, still somehow held on. After her death, he finally lost heart, took to drink and died at the Petrovsky plant in the Trans-Baikal region on July 27, 1885, alone, sick, embittered not only against enemies, but also against friends. The manager of the Petrovsky plant, mining engineer Anikin, informed N.I. Storozhenko about his death.».

Revolutionaries and members of the opposition movement in the Russian Empire were often referred to hard labor in Siberia. Hard labor was usually preceded by a civil execution, that is, the deprivation of class, political and civil rights. Of the well-known personalities who were subjected to such punishment, only the Decembrists and Nikolai Gavrilovich Chernyshevsky are usually remembered. Civil execution (a brief description of the ceremony and reasons) of the latter are discussed in this article.

Activities N.G. Chernyshevsky

Already in his student years, Chernyshevsky was ready to devote himself entirely to revolutionary activity. His first literary works date back to this time. He wrote political-economic, literary-critical and historical-literary works, articles covering economic and political issues. Nikolai Gavrilovich was the ideological inspirer of the organization "Land and Freedom".

Political ideology: the peasant question

In several of his publications, Chernyshevsky touched on the idea of ​​freeing peasants with land without a ransom. In this case, communal ownership should have been preserved, which would later lead to socialist land tenure. But according to Lenin, this could lead to the most rapid and progressive spread of capitalism. When the press printed the "Manifesto" of Tsar Alexander II, only excerpts were placed on the first page of the Sovremennik. In the same issue, the words "Songs of the Negroes" and an article on slavery in the United States were printed. Readers understood exactly what the editors wanted to say.

Reasons for the arrest of the theorist of critical socialism

Chernyshevsky was arrested in 1862 on charges of drawing up a proclamation "To the fraternal peasants ...". The appeal was passed on to Vsevolod Kostomarov, who (as it turned out later) turned out to be a provocateur. Nikolai Gavrilovich was already then in documents and correspondence between the gendarmerie and the police called "enemy number one of the Empire." The immediate reason for the arrest was an intercepted letter from Herzen, in which Chernyshevsky was mentioned in connection with the idea of ​​publishing the banned Sovremennik in London.

The investigation went on for a year and a half. In protest, Nikolai Gavrilovich went on a hunger strike, which lasted 9 days. In prison, he continued to work. For 678 days of imprisonment, Chernyshevsky wrote at least 200 sheets of text materials. The most ambitious work of this period is the novel What Is To Be Done? (1863), published in issues 3-5 of Sovremennik.

In February 1864, the senator announced the verdict in the case: exile to hard labor for fourteen years, and then life-long settlement in Siberia. Alexander II reduced the term of hard labor to seven years, but in general, Nikolai Gavrilovich spent more than twenty years in prison, hard labor and exile. In May, the civil execution of Chernyshevsky took place. Civil execution in the Russian Empire and other countries was a type of punishment consisting in depriving a prisoner of all ranks, privileges by estate, property, and so on.

Ceremony of civil execution of N. G. Chernyshevsky

The morning of May 19, 1864, was foggy and rainy. About 200 people gathered on Mytninskaya Square - at the site of the civil execution of Chernyshevsky - writers, publishing house employees, students, and detectives in disguise. By the time the verdict was announced, about two and a half thousand people had already gathered. Along the perimeter, the square was cordoned off by policemen and gendarmes.

A prison carriage drove up, from which three people got out. It was Nikolai Chernyshevsky himself and two executioners. In the middle of the square stood a high pillar with chains, to which the new arrivals headed. Everything froze when Chernyshevsky went up to the dais. The soldiers were commanded: "On guard!", And one of the executioners took off the convict's cap. The reading of the verdict began.

The illiterate executioner read loudly, but with stutters. In one place he almost uttered: "Satsal ideas." A smile flickered across Nikolai Gavrilovich's face. The verdict declared that Chernyshevsky had a great influence on the youth through his literary activity and that for malicious intent to overthrow the existing order, he was deprived of his rights and referred to hard labor for 14 years, and then settled permanently in Siberia.

During the civil execution, Chernyshevsky was calm, all the time looking for someone in the crowd. When the verdict was read, the great son of the Russian people was lowered to his knees, his sword was broken over his head, and then he was chained to a pillory. For a quarter of an hour Nikolai Gavrilovich stood in the middle of the square. The crowd calmed down and at the place of civil execution N.G. Chernyshevsky, deathly silence reigned.

Some girl threw a bouquet of flowers to the post. She was immediately arrested, but this act inspired others. And other bouquets fell at Chernyshevsky's feet. He was hastily released from the chains and put into the same prison carriage. The youth who were present at the civil execution of Chernyshevsky saw off their friend and teacher with shouts of "Goodbye!" The next day, Nikolai Gavrilovich was sent to Siberia.

The reaction of the Russian press to the execution of Chernyshevsky

The Russian press was forced to remain silent and did not say a word about the further fate of Nikolai Gavrilovich.

In the year of the civil execution of Chernyshevsky, the poet Alexei Tolstoy was on a winter court hunt. Alexander II wanted to find out from him about the news in the literary world. Then Tolstoy replied that "literature has put on mourning over the unjust condemnation of Nikolai Gavrilovich." The emperor abruptly interrupted the poet, asking him never to remind him of Chernyshevsky.

The further fate of the writer and revolutionary

Chernyshevsky spent the first three years of hard labor on the Mongolian border, and then was transferred to the Alexander Plant. He was allowed to visit his wife and young sons. Nikolai Gavrilovich's life was not too hard, since political prisoners at that time did not carry real hard labor. He could communicate with other prisoners, walk, for some time Chernyshevsky even lived in a separate house. At one time, performances were staged in hard labor, for which the revolutionary wrote short plays.

When the term of hard labor ended, Nikolai Gavrilovich could himself choose a place of residence in Siberia. He moved to Vilyuisk. In his letters, Chernyshevsky did not upset anyone with complaints, he was calm and cheerful. Nikolai Gavrilovich admired the character of his wife, was interested in her health. He gave advice to his sons, shared his knowledge and experience. During this time, he continued to engage in literary activities and translations. In hard labor, Nikolai Gavrilovich immediately destroyed everything written, in the settlement he created a cycle of works about Russian life, the most significant of which is the novel Prologue.

Russian revolutionaries tried several times to release Nikolai Gavrilovich, but the authorities did not allow it. Only by 1873, ill with rheumatism and scurvy, was he allowed to move to Astrakhan. In 1874, Chernyshevsky was officially offered release, but he did not apply. Thanks to the cares of Mikhail (son of Chernyshevsky), in 1889 Nikolai Gavrilovich moved to Saratov.

Four months after the move, and twenty-five years after the civil execution, Chernyshevsky died of a cerebral hemorrhage. Until 1905, the work of Nikolai Gavrilovich was banned in Russia.

Other Notable Persons Subjected to Civil Execution

Hetman Mazepa was the first in Russian history to be subjected to civil execution. The ceremony took place in the absence of the convict, who was hiding in Turkey.

In 1768, Saltychikha was deprived of all property and estate rights - Daria Nikolaevna Saltykova, a sophisticated sadist and murderer of several dozen serfs.

In 1775, the executioners performed the ritual execution of M. Shvanvich, and in 1826 the Decembrists were deprived of their rights: 97 people in St. Petersburg and 15 naval officers in Kronstadt.

Mikhail Mikhailov was executed in 1861, Grigory Potanin in 1868, and Ivan Pryzhkov in 1871.