310 The Military Settlements
done so for more than^20 years.^67 The proportion will probably have been even
higher among rural police chiefs.are more plentiful, 110 that one can put some flesh on the bare statistical bones.
Nearly all the 77 governors appointed after^1775 were military men. The Rus-
sian countryside experienced what J. P. Le Donne has called 'an invasion of
the major-generals'.^68 This may seem paradoxical since, as we have suggested,
Catherine's intention was to reduce the military's role rather than to expand it.
One has to take into account the improved quality of the individuals selected
<:nd the greater control that was henceforth exercised over them-especially by
the namestniki as direct agents of the Crown and close confidants of the ruler.
These dignitaries were appointed principally for their all-round savoir-faire-
and not simply for their expertise in the arts of coercion or just to keep them
occupied, as was so often the case lower down the hierarchy. Of^30 governors-
general who came fresh to the field of provincial administration, exactly half
(15) were generals who had proved themselves on the battlefield. Of the others
nine bore military rank but 'were truly civilians' (their experience had been in
police work), and the remainder 'belonged to the higher ranks of the civil
bureaucracy'. Most of the military men had had some exposure to civil admin-
istration prior to their appointment to this prestigious position.^69
Closer examination shows that these governors-general were stationed either
in the two capitals or in those borderland areas where they might need to use
their military skills.^70 The cities of St. Petersburg and Moscow (along with
Kiev) had been ruled by governors-general from time to time earlier in the cen-
tury; 71 now the office became permanent. St. Petersburg was placed under
a field-marshal, A. M. Golitsyn ( 1783), and then one of his close associates,
General Ya. A. Brius (Bruce), until 1791, whereupon it passed into the hands
of an individual with mainly police background (N. P. Arkharov). Moscow
was run in turn by 'one of those political generals who abound in the Russian
army' (V. M. Dolgorukov), by a senior commander whose reputation dated
back to the Seven Years War (Z. G. Chernyshev), and by Brius. At the time of
the French Revolution the man currently in this office was another elderly
general, P. D. Yeropkin, who was thought too lax and replaced by 'a known
hard-liner', A. A. Prozorovsky. The latter, who had served with Dolgorukov,
doubled as commander-in-chief of the troops in the region. His predecessors
seem to have done so as well.^72
67 Ibid., p. 124; cf. Wortman, l.l.'gal Consciousness, p. 77, for the biography of one such
official, P. I. Prilyupov.
6~ LeDonne, Ruling Russia, MS.
69 LeDonnc, 'Calherine's Governors', pp. 21. 2-1, 25.
10 De Madariaga, Catherine, p.^358 (Rumyantsev, Chcrnyshcv, Repnin).
11 Amburger, Geschichte, pp. 369-70, 382, 31!4; the holder >Omclimes bore the title of
'commander-in-.:hief'.
n LeDonne, 'Catherine's Governors', pp. 22-3; Amburgcr, Geschichte, pp. 382, 385; RBS xv.- PSZ xx. t4392 (7 Nov. t775), IV,§§ 89-90 pres..:rihed (rather vaguely) lhe proper relationship
between governors-general and mili1ary ..:ommander'>.