The Measures adopted in the Russian Empire towards the French suspected of having revolutionary sympathies

Abstract

From the beginning of the French Revolution, Catherine II supported the cause of émigré princes, but it was only in the summer of 1792 that she decided to sever all relations with the Revolutionary government. The French community living in Russia composed of nearly 2500 persons found itself under surveillance and held suspect by the Russian power. Some Frenchmen were arrested for having expressed their revolutionary opinions too openly. On 8 Februrary 1793, an oukasse compelled all the French to take an oath of loyalty to the Monarchy and to religion. But the persecutions did not cease, and numerous persons in the years that followed were expelled from the Empire or deported to Siberia for different crimes. Whether they voiced opinions considered too audacious in favor the Revolution or against Russia, or they violated prohibitions to go to France or communicate with their relatives who remained in the country, or they tried to conceal their identity with false papers, they did not escape Russian justice. Above all, three cases of espionage, only one of them well-founded, showed the severity of the Tsarina. After her death in 1796, this repression continued under her son Paul 1, whose police was exceptionally efficient. While he offered an asylum to Louis XVIII in Mitau, or claimed to serve the Army of Condé, and threw his Empire into a war against France during the Second Coalition, the situation of French residents in Russia remained exceedingly difficult, and every slip up could have grave consequences. It was only at the dawn of a new century, when Paul 1 grew closer to Bonaparte that suspicion about the French declined. But from 1792 to 1799, there were many victims of these measures, whether or not they were true sympathizers with the Revolution.