An Age of Reform 365
trying to bring about. Before the new military statute (which replaced that of
1R~9) an(i pe-naJ t:ode received Imperial assent in June !867 they '.vere
thoroughly vetted by several expert commissions and state agencies, and senior
commanders were also invited to express their views. Unfortunately it is not
yet possible to distinguish the contribution of the various elements of the
military public from that made by Milyutin and his close associates.
Bogdanovich's semi-official account extols the War Minister's role and is less
than just to his forerunner, Sukhozanet, or to Senator I. Kh. Kapger, whose
drafts of a penal code (1860) and other legislative acts foreshadowed much
that was to come. Nevertheless it is probably true that without Milyutin's drive
the reform would not have gone as far as it did.
Perhaps the most important change for the soldiers was the legal definition
of offences for which disciplinary penalties could be imposed. Although
Nicholas I had taken a step in this direction in 1839, when military laws were
codified, in practice (as Milyutin noted in a report to the tsar) such offences
had been decided in an arbitrary manner; the number of strokes administered
'depended entirely on the personal whim of one's superior'.^66 In 1859 the
maximum was set at 200 and a written order was normally required. On
6 July 1863 Alexander II approved a set of regulations whose provisions
were developed in subsequent legislation (April 1865, July 1869): for instance,
an NCO in sole charge of a detachment could confine a man to his quarters for
24 hours, a sergeant-major could do so for 48 hours, and a company com-
mander for eight days.^67 A commanding officer could sentence a man to any
of the penalties listed, the most severe of which was 50 strokes with rods
(rozgi).^68 But the main point was that corporal punishment was henceforth to
_be the exception ratber th~n the rule. It could be administered only to persons
pllKed in a special category. Such men were termed-rather oddly, but in con-
formity with Prussian precedent-'punished' (shtrafovannye). In the Russian
historical context this meant that most soldiers were now legally in a situation
similar to that which their officers had enjoyed since 1762.^69 The 'punished'
were envisaged as a small class of hardened offenders who would serve their
term in their units, performing labour tasks, or else, in the most serious cases,
in detention companies or jails. The reformers shared the current Western
enthusiasm for imprisonment as a reformatory measure, and allowed for
rehabilitation once a certain period had elapsed.^70 While in his unit a man
could be placed in its punishment cell (kartser) for up to five days, or in a so-
called 'dark cell' for up to eight days. But the most usual penalties were
66 VOVM 1864, app. vi, p. 21; Kudryavtsev, 'O distsiplinarnom ustave 1875 g.', p. 91.
67 II PSZ xxxviii. 39830 {6 July 1863), V; Bogdanovich, /st. ocherk, iv. 463.
68 II PSZ xxxviii. 39508 {17 Apr. 1863), § 7; Bogdanovich, /st. ocherk, iv. 458.
69 The parallel should not be pushed too far, since this right was not granted to them as a social
estate (sosloviye); but even after 1762/ 1785 a nobleman could forfeit his privileged status and so
become liable to corporal punishment or other severe sanctions.
10 II PSZ xii. 43451 (2 July 1866); xliii. 45878 (20 May 1868).