Nikolay Alexeyevich Milyutin (; 6 June 1818 – 26 January 1872) was a Russian statesman remembered as the chief architect of the great liberal reforms undertaken during Alexander II's reign, including the emancipation of the serfs and the establishment of

zemstvo A zemstvo (, , , ''zemstva'') was an institution of local government set up in consequence of the emancipation reform of 1861 of Imperial Russia by Emperor Alexander II of Russia. Nikolay Milyutin elaborated the idea of the zemstvo, and the fi ...

Peter Kropotkin Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin (9 December 1842 – 8 February 1921) was a Russian anarchist and geographer known as a proponent of anarchist communism. Born into an aristocratic land-owning family, Kropotkin attended the Page Corps and later s ...

, an anarchist, described him as "the soul of the emancipation of the Serfs in bureaucratic circles."

Early life

Nikolay Milyutin was born in

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

on 6 June 1818, the scion of an influential, but impoverished, aristocratic Russian family. He was the nephew of Count Pavel Kiselyov, the most brilliant Russian reformer of Nicholas I's reactionary reign. Milyutin's brothers were Vladimir Milyutin (1826–55), a social philosopher, journalist and economist, and Dmitry Milyutin (1816–1912), who served as Minister of War under Alexander II. Milyutin's formative years were spent on his father's estate, Titovo, in

Kaluga Oblast Kaluga Oblast () is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of Russia (an oblast). Its administrative center is the types of inhabited localities in Russia, city of Kaluga. The Russian Census (2021), 2021 Russian Census found a population o ...

Serfs Serfdom was the status of many peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to manorialism and similar systems. It was a condition of debt bondage and indentured servitude with similarities to and differences from slavery. It developed dur ...

worked the land at Titovo, while Milyutin's father occupied most of his time hunting and carousing with friends. Milyutin's mother was left to oversee most aspects of life on their estate. According to Milyutin, there were so many serfs at Titovo that "to list all would be impossible." While Milyutin largely omitted the more unsavory aspects regarding life at Titovo from his published memoirs, an unpublished draft, detailing his childhood, discusses the brutality with which his father treated his serfs. On one occasion Milyutin witnessed his father "mercilessly" flog one their serfs, as he later explained: "''But thus were the mores in those times: a good landowner considered

logging Logging is the process of cutting, processing, and moving trees to a location for transport. It may include skidder, skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or trunk (botany), logs onto logging truck, trucks

Career

Milyutin graduated from

Moscow University Moscow State University (MSU), officially M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University,. is a public research university in Moscow, Russia. The university includes 15 research institutes, 43 faculties, more than 300 departments, and six branches. Al ...

and joined the Ministry of the Interior in 1835. A man of liberal views who sympathized with the Slavophile cause, Milyutin helped reform the municipal administration in

St Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

, and

Odessa ODESSA is an American codename (from the German language, German: ''Organisation der ehemaligen SS-Angehörigen'', meaning: Organization of Former SS Members) coined in 1946 to cover Ratlines (World War II aftermath), Nazi underground escape-pl ...

during the 1840s. As an Assistant Minister of Interior since 1859, he succeeded in defending his vision of ambitious liberal reforms against attacks by conservatives and disconcerted nobility. The Emancipation Manifesto of 1861 was largely drafted by him. Up to the passage of the act, Milyutin had served as Adjunct of the Minister of the interior, Sergey Lanskoy. However, Milyutin was distrusted by the Czar as "a restless and uncompromising reformer." After passage of this act, though, Milutin was dismissed from office. In regards to the Liberal Party, "As you know, the hopes of the party were dashed to the ground by the dismissal -- one might also say disgrace -- of Nicholas Milutine the day after the mancipationEdict was published..." During the

January Uprising The January Uprising was an insurrection principally in Russia's Kingdom of Poland that was aimed at putting an end to Russian occupation of part of Poland and regaining independence. It began on 22 January 1863 and continued until the last i ...

he was dispatched to

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

in order to implement reforms there. He devised a program which involved the emancipation of the peasantry at the expense of the nationalist landowners and the expulsion of

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

priests from schools. Over seven hundred thousand Polish peasants were granted freehold land to farm as the result of Milyutin's reforms. A Russian university was established at

Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...

, and all secondary school lessons were required to be given in

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

, not Polish. Finally, the property of the Catholic Church was confiscated and sold. Although Milyutin had previously opposed the "direct and outright

Russification Russification (), Russianisation or Russianization, is a form of cultural assimilation in which non-Russians adopt Russian culture and Russian language either voluntarily or as a result of a deliberate state policy. Russification was at times ...

" of Poland, according to one biographer, historian W. Bruce Lincoln, Milyutin's reforms effectively "hastened the coming of stern Russification policies" in Poland. Milyutin resigned his office in December 1866, after having suffered a paralytic stroke, and spent the rest of his life in seclusion. He died on 26 January 1872 in Moscow.Lincoln, W. Bruce (1977) ''Nikolai Miliutin, an enlightened Russian Bureaucrat.'' p. 90, 94, 100 New York: Oriental Research Partners.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Milyutin, Nikolay Politicians from the Russian Empire Nobility from the Russian Empire Government officials of Congress Poland 1818 births 1872 deaths Privy Councillor (Russian Empire)

Early life

See also

References

Further reading

External links