Prince Mikhail Semyonovich Vorontsov (; ) was a Russian nobleman and field marshal, renowned for his success in the Napoleonic Wars and most famous for his participation in the Caucasian War from 1844 to 1853.

Early life

Vorontsov was born on 30 May 1782, in Saint Petersburg in the Russian Empire. He was the only son of Ekaterina Alekseevna Seniavina and Count Semyon Vorontsov. Mikail and his sister, Catherine (who later became the wife of George Herbert, 11th Earl of Pembroke), spent their childhood and youth with his father in London, where his father was the Russian Ambassador to Great Britain.

He was the nephew of Imperial Chancellor Alexander Vorontsov, Elizaveta Vorontsova and Princess Dashkova, a friend of Catherine the Great and a conspirator in the coup d'état that deposed Tsar Peter III and put his wife on the throne.

Career

thumb|upright|[[Portrait of Mikhail Vorontsov by Thomas Lawrence, 1821]]

From 1803 to 1804, he served in the Caucasus under Pavel Tsitsianov and Gulyakov.

thumb|Vorontsov is shown second from the left in [[George Cruikshank's The Allied Bakers, illustrating the final defeat of Napoleon]]

He commanded the composite grenadiers division in Prince Petr Bagration's Second Western Army during Napoleon's invasion of Russia in 1812. At the Battle of Borodino, his division was on the front line and was attacked by three French divisions under Marshal Davout. Of the 4,000 men in his division, only 300 survived the battle. Vorontsov was wounded but recovered to rejoin the army in 1813. He commanded a new grenadiers division and fought at the Battle of Dennewitz and the Battle of Leipzig. At the Battle of Craonne, his corps was able to give a fit rebuff to Napoleon, however, the battle ended with the Russian retreat, it is considered "Pyrrhic", but a victory for Napoleon. He was the commander of the corps of occupation in France from 1815 to 1818. The palace is located at the foot of the Crimean Mountains near the town of Alupka in Crimea. Today, it is one of the oldest and largest palaces in Crimea and one of the most popular tourist attractions on Crimea's southern coast. It was designed in a loose interpretation of the English Renaissance revival style by English architect Edward Blore and his assistant William Hunt. The building is a hybrid of several architectural styles, but faithful to none. Among those styles are elements of Scottish Baronial, Indo-Saracenic Revival Architecture, and Gothic Revival architecture.

Notes

References

  • Gammer, Moshe. Muslim Resistance to the Tsar: Shamil and the Conquest of Chechnia and Daghestan. Frank Cass & Co., London, 1994. .
  • Online museum of the Vorontsov Family
  • Mikeshin, Mikhail. "Mikhail Vorontsov: A Metaphysical Portrait in the Landscape".