“The Fierce Man” Nikolai Martynov. Vitebsk oligarch Nikolai Martynov

Nikolai Martynov, father of 11 children, drank to the point of insensibility on the day of the poet’s murder

There is no need to prove how politicized our entire life has been for decades. This applies not only to fiction, but also to literary criticism. According to the version, which was, in essence, official, the main reason for the death of Lermontov was the tsar’s hatred of the rebel poet, and the efforts of Lermontov researchers were aimed mainly at substantiating this version. Moreover, the role of the organizer of the duel was assigned to Prince Alexander Vasilchikov, the son of one of the royal favorites. Thus, Emma Gerstein calls Vasilchikov the poet’s hidden enemy and devotes an entire chapter of her book “Lermontov’s Fate” entitled “The Secret Enemy” to him. Oleg Popov believes that the role of Prince Vasilchikov “was more composed than studied, and was unlikely to be significant.” (See: Popov O.P. “Lermontov and Martynov”).

The main role in the tragedy at the foot of Mashuk, of course, was played by Nikolai Martynov, and we should first of all turn to his personality and the history of his relationship with the poet, while abandoning the primitive characterization that was given to him for a long time: he was supposedly stupid, proud , an embittered loser, a graphomaniac, always under someone else's influence.

Firstly, one cannot call him a failure - after all, at the age of 25 he already had the rank of major, while Lermontov himself was just a lieutenant of the Tengin regiment, and his literary hero - Maxim Maksimych, who served all his life in the Caucasus, as a staff captain . He most likely wasn't stupid either. For example, the Decembrist Nikolai Lorer, who knew him, wrote that Nikolai Solomonovich had a brilliant secular education. The very fact of long-term communication between Lermontov and Martynov suggests that the latter was not a primitive person and was somehow interesting to the poet.

Prince Alexander Vasilchikov. He was accused of organizing the fatal duel

In fact, Lermontov’s classmate at the School of Junkers was Nikolai Solomonovich’s older brother Mikhail (1814-1860). However, it was Nikolai who was destined to become the poet’s killer. They were both born in October (only Lermontov a year earlier), both graduated from the School of Junkers, were released into the Horse Guards (Martynov, by the way, happened to serve in the same regiment with Georges Dantes), and they went to the Caucasus at the same time. In heavy company in 1840, they took part in expeditions and numerous skirmishes with the mountaineers. And both wrote poems about this war.

It is customary to speak disparagingly about Martynov’s poetic experiments. He himself is often called a “graphomaniac” and a “mediocre rhymer.” It's hardly fair to call him that. Martynov rarely put pen to paper, and everything he wrote could fit into a very small book. His poems really cannot stand comparison with Lermontov’s. And whose, in fact, can withstand such a comparison? Although he has quite good stanzas. Here, for example, is how ironically he describes the parade in his poem “Bad Dream”:

Peaks flash by like a slender forest.
The weather vanes are colorful,
All people and horses are great,
Like a monument to Tsar Peter!
All faces have the same cut,
And he will become like the other,
All the ammunition is new,
Horses look arrogant
And from the tail to the withers
The fur is equally shiny.
Any soldier is the beauty of nature,
Any horse is a breed type.
What about the officers? - a number of paintings,
And everything - as if alone!

Imagine, Martynov, she’s only 11 years old! But what a wondrous and sweet creature this is!

And his gaze at these words was full of inexpressible tenderness.

Here, Prince, girls are married off at the age of 11... Don’t forget that we are not in Russia here, but in the Caucasus, where everything soon matures...

Lermontov was like that

From the first day that Dolgoruky saw Guasha (as the young Circassian woman was called), he felt an irresistible attraction to her; but what’s strangest of all: she, for her part, immediately fell in love with him... It happened that in fits of noisy gaiety she would run up behind him, suddenly grab him by the head and, kissing him deeply, burst into loud laughter. And all this happened in front of everyone; At the same time, she did not show either childish timidity or feminine bashfulness, and was not even somewhat embarrassed by the presence of her family.

Everything I heard extremely surprised me: I did not know how to reconcile in my mind such a free attitude of the girl with those stories about the inaccessibility of Circassian women and about the severity of morals in general... Subsequently, I became convinced that this severity exists only for married women, but they have girls enjoy extraordinary freedom..."

Martynov’s main work, the poem “Gerzel-aul,” is based on personal experience. It is a documented accurate description of the June campaign in Chechnya in 1840, in which Martynov himself took an active part:

The baptism of gunpowder took place,
Everyone was in action;
And so they fell in love with the business,
That the talk is only about him;
Tom had to fight with hostility
With the fourth company to the blockage,
Where hand-to-hand combat took place,
As they aptly called,
Act two finale.
Here's what we learned from him:
They shot at us point blank,
Kura officer killed;
We have lost a lot of people
A whole platoon of carabinieri lay down,
The colonel and the battalion arrived
And he carried the company on his shoulders;
The Chechens were knocked out with damage,
Twelve bodies in our hands...

It is interesting that Martynov’s work also truthfully reflected the realities of that time. There is, for example, a mention of the famous Caucasian chain mail:

Horsemen ride around boldly,
They prance briskly ahead;
Our people are shooting at them in vain...
They only answer with abuse,
They have chain mail on their chest...

He quite realistically describes the scene of the death of a Russian soldier wounded in battle:

Silent confession, communion,
Then we read the dismissal note:
And this is earthly happiness...
Is there much left? A handful of earth!
I turned away, it hurt
This drama is for me to watch;
And I asked myself involuntarily:
Am I really going to die like this...

This was his killer - retired major Nikolai Martynov

However, views on the war were different. Lermontov perceived what was happening in the Caucasus as a tragedy, tormented by the question: “Why?” Martynov was unaware of these doubts. He was fully confident in Russia’s right to use scorched earth tactics against the enemy (an issue on which Russian society is split into two camps even today):

A village is burning not far away...
Our cavalry walks there,
Judgment is carried out in foreign lands,
Invites children to warm up,
He cooks gruel for the housewives.
All the way we go
The saklyas of the fugitives are burning.
If we find the cattle, we take them away,
There is profit for the Cossacks.
Fields sown under trample,
We destroy everything they have...

Probably, it is up to future researchers to appreciate such works as a historical source. However, we must admit that there is a lot of truth in them.

It is believed that the same poem by Martynov contains a cartoon portrait of Lermontov:

Here the officer lay down on his burqa
With a scholarly book in hand,
And he himself dreams of a mazurka,
About Pyatigorsk, about balls.
He keeps dreaming about the blonde,
He is head over heels in love with her.
Here he is the hero of the duel,
Guardsman, immediately removed.
Dreams give way to dreams
Space is given to the imagination
And the path strewn with flowers
He galloped at full speed.

We can only guess which blonde Martynov writes about in his poems...

Returning to the question of the causes and occasion of the fatal duel at the foot of Mashuk, I would like to note that, perhaps, of all the researchers who devoted entire volumes to this problem, Oleg Popov came closest to solving the long-standing mystery. In his article “Lermontov and Martynov” he analyzed all possible causes of the collision. And all of them do not seem weighty enough to him to dictate such harsh conditions for the fight.

The story of Salieri and Mozart? Of course not. “It is impossible to find anything like this in Martynov,” writes Popov, “and he is not suitable for the role of Salieri.” Indeed, Martynov, in fact, did not finish a single literary work of his. Apparently, he did not consider his literary calling to be the main thing. Although... Every Mozart has his own Salieri. It is not without reason that Popov also refutes the version of Vadim Vatsuro, who wrote at one time: “Neither Nicholas I, nor Benckendorff, nor even Martynov hatched plans to kill Lermontov the man. But all of them - each in their own way - created an atmosphere in which there was no place for Lermontov the poet.”

Mikhail Lermontov. Funeral of killed soldiers under Valerik

Martynov killed Lermontov the man. How it was possible to create an atmosphere in which there would be no place for Lermontov the poet is unclear. So it turns out that, if we discard the absurd fiction that there was no duel at all, but that the poet was killed by a bribed Cossack (version by Stepan Korotkov, Viktor Schwemberger), there remains in Lermontov studies an unresolved mystery with the name “Adel”, and even a version of Martynov’s defense sister's honor. Refuting the latter, Oleg Panteleimonovich Popov says that “the sister was proud of being considered the prototype of Princess Mary,” and, therefore, did not need to defend her honor. Well, maybe my sister was proud. But the relatives didn’t like it at all. Again, a question of the culture and mentality of that time. After all, there is evidence that not only idle gossips, but also quite serious readers of Lermontov’s novel (Timofey Granovsky, Mikhail Katkov) saw in Princess Mary Martynov’s younger sister, and they believed that the princess, like her mother, was depicted in an unfavorable light . And as for the story with the package of letters from Natalya, transferred from Martynov’s house through the poet, which apparently left a negative imprint on the relationship between friends, even though Lermontov scholars convincingly prove that Lermontov was not at fault here - he did not open the package, did not read the letters and didn’t destroy it, but Martynov’s mother thought differently...

In our opinion, two points turned out to be very important in discussions about the pre-duel situation: firstly, the need to combine the version of the history of Lermontov’s relationship with the French woman Adel with the version about Martynov’s defense of his sister’s honor, Secondly, it was no less important to understand the issue of dating Adele’s stay Ommer de Gell in the Caucasus, which Lermontov scholars have so far failed to do. And only the introduction of Karl Baer’s materials into scientific circulation (in relation to Lermontov studies, this was done for the first time by us) made it possible to reasonably say that the French traveler was in the Caucasus from 1839 to 1841 inclusive.

Thus, in our opinion, a completely convincing version of Lermontov’s quarrel with Martynov emerges. After all, the real cause of the quarrel could not have been a trivial, not even offensive joke, said by Lermontov in French at an evening in the house of General Pyotr Verzilin: “A highlander with a large dagger” (montaqnard au qrand poiqnard). “Martynov, when he wanted, knew how to laugh it off; in the end, he could end the acquaintance, maintaining his dignity,” writes Popov.

It was this image of Martynov that Lermontov ridiculed.

We regard what happened in Pyatigorsk as a great human tragedy. The tragedy of misunderstanding. Discrepancies between two mentalities, two views on life. A respectable Martynov, integrated into the social structure of the society of his time, and a transcendental lyricist who was destined to become the music of the soul of his people. He was not born to reproduce biological mass. He had a different purpose, which is given to one out of millions. Many of Lermontov’s contemporaries failed to realize this purpose.

Even today you can still hear many questions about this complex, multifaceted nature. Probably, it can only be understood from the standpoint of philosophical knowledge. That is why we turn, with a noticeable delay, to the works of Russian religious philosophers Danilevsky and Solovyov. With their help, we will have to understand in all depth both the life of the great Lermontov and his work, which has become the most expensive stone in the treasury of Russian literature.

Addition. We find an interesting episode in the work of Dmitry Pavlov “Prototypes of Princess Mary” (separate reprints from the newspaper “Caucasian Territory” Nos. 156 and 157 of 1916). He cites the joke that Lermontov and Martynov allegedly exchanged: “Marry Lermontov,” his self-confident comrade told him, “I will make you a cuckold.” “If my most ardent desire,” the poet allegedly answered, “comes true, then for you, dear friend, it will be impossible.”

Further, Pavlov writes: “From these words, Martynov concluded that Lermontov “has designs on his sister’s hand.” These guesses, however, were not justified. In 1841, Lermontov became interested in other prominent beauties and did this in front of the brother of his former crush...

Princess Mary. The poet's romanticized heroine

It is quite possible that it was this change of front that gave the Martynov family the imaginary right to express the claim that “Lermontov compromised the sisters of his future murderer.” And this circumstance, in connection with the inflated story about the letter and diary of Natalya Solomonovna allegedly printed by the poet, played, as we know, the role of the most important reason in the history of Martynov’s hatred of his former friend...

It was not for nothing that the crowd gathered in the courtyard of the Chilaevskaya estate, to which the poet’s lifeless body was brought, repeated the rumor that the reason for the duel was the young lady. “The duel happened because of a young lady!” someone shouted to Lieutenant Colonel Philip Untilov, who was conducting the investigation...

P.S. On July 15, 1841, at the age of 26, Mikhail Lermontov was killed in a duel by Nikolai Martynov. It is still not completely clear what happened on that fateful Tuesday at the foot of Mount Mashuk. And very different versions are put forward, sometimes fantastic...

How it was. But first, let's remember what preceded the duel. For the first time, the paths of Lermontov and Martynov crossed at the St. Petersburg school of cadets. Lermontov expert Vladimir Zakharov claims that the boys were friends and tells the following story. In November 1832, young Michel fell from his horse and broke his leg. He was admitted to the hospital. Once, while checking the posts of the cadets, the authorities did not find one of them on site. They found him at Lermontov’s bedside. This cadet turned out to be Kolya Martynov.

The friendly relationship continued after graduation. Thus, in 1837, Martynov, who was sent to the Caucasus, stayed in Moscow and met with the poet almost every day. They continued to communicate in St. Petersburg in 1838-1839, and, apparently, in the Caucasus in the summer and autumn of 1840.

Lermontov was always lonely. But he was friends with Martynov

As contemporaries recall, Martynov was very ambitious, dreaming of orders and the rank of general. But in February 1841 he got into an ugly story. His colleagues accused him of card cheating. “Marquis de Schulerhof” - and this was the nickname Nikolai was given in the regiment - was forced “for family reasons” to resign. In April 1841, Major Martynov arrived in Pyatigorsk, where he began to show off in an extravagant Circassian coat and astrakhan fur hat. This outfit was certainly completed with a long Chechen dagger.

When Lermontov appeared in Pyatigorsk in May 1841, he found the new image of his old friend very comical. The poet began to make fun of Martynov, drew caricatures of him, including those with indecent overtones, wrote epigrams - “Throw off your beshmet, friend Martysh” and “He’s right! Our friend Martysh is not Solomon.”

That season, young people gathered almost every day in the house of General Verzilin, who had three beautiful daughters. One evening a fatal quarrel occurred. According to the eldest young lady, the beautiful Emilia, it was like this. Lermontov and Pushkin's brother Lev practiced their wit. Then Martynov came into their field of vision, talking with the youngest Verzilina, Nadezhda. Lermontov quite loudly called him “a highlander with a big dagger,” and Martynov heard it. “How many times have I asked you to leave your jokes in front of the ladies,” he angrily remarked to Lermontov and quickly walked away.

But he waited for the poet on the street and told him: “You know, Lermontov, that for a very long time I endured your jokes, which continued despite my repeated demands that you stop them. I'll make you stop." “I am not afraid of a duel and will never refuse it. So, instead of empty threats, it’s better for you to act,” the poet answered.

And so on July 15, around seven in the evening, the opponents met at the foot of Mount Mashuk. According to the seconds, when they gave the order to converge, Lermontov remained motionless and, cocking the hammer, raised the pistol with the muzzle up, shielding himself with his hand and elbow according to all the rules of an experienced duelist. Another, more common version says that at the beginning of the duel, Lermontov discharged his pistol into the air, refusing to shoot at the enemy.

Murdered Lermontov in a coffin

One way or another, Martynov approached the barrier and froze in confusion. Here one of the seconds said: “Will this end soon?” Martynov looked at Lermontov - a smile played on his face - and pulled the trigger...

Lermontov died instantly.

Now let's move on to the versions.

Version 1. Lermontov was “removed” by order of Nicholas I. The version that Martynov was only a tool in the hands of Lermontov’s influential ill-wishers appeared at the end of the 19th century. The same point of view was shared by prominent Lermontov scholar Irakli Andronikov, who believed that Lermontov’s death was the result of a conspiracy organized on the orders of Nicholas I by the head of the police, Alexander Benkendorf. He allegedly sent gendarme lieutenant colonel Alexander Kushinnikov to Pyatigorsk. According to another version, Minister of War Alexander Chernyshev used Colonel Alexander Traskin, who had been undergoing treatment in Pyatigorsk since July 12, for this purpose. But no reliable materials confirming these versions were found.

Finally, the well-known order of Nicholas I of June 30, 1841 - “so that Lieutenant Lermontov would certainly be present at the front and that his superiors would not dare, under any pretext, to remove him from front-line service in his regiment” - does not really fit with the version of the conspiracy. It is absurd to believe that Nicholas I sanctioned a conspiracy against Lermontov in Pyatigorsk and at the same time demanded that he not leave his service on the Black Sea coast.

Version 2. Martynov killed Lermontov out of envy. Another popular version is based on the fact that Martynov was wildly jealous of Lermontov’s talent all his life. The fact is that Nikolai himself wrote poetry from his early youth. His poem “Gerzel-aul” has survived to this day, in which, according to some researchers, Martynov imitated Lermontov’s poem “Valerik”.

Georgian Military Road near Mtskheta. Lermontov was also an excellent painter

Version 3. Martynov exploded from constant humiliation. At the investigation after the duel, Martynov testified: “From his very arrival in Pyatigorsk, Lermontov did not miss a single occasion where he could say something unpleasant to me. Wit, barbs, ridicule at my expense... He drove me out of patience, attached to my every word, at every step showing a clear desire to annoy me. I decided to put an end to this." Well, it’s a completely logical reaction from a person who has endured ridicule for a long time.

Version 4. Martynov took revenge for the dishonor of his sister Natalya. When, in front of Martynov’s eyes, the poet began to hit on other beauties, he may have considered that Lermontov had compromised his sister by refusing to take her as his wife.

There is also an assumption that Martynov was offended by Natalya, considering her the prototype of Princess Mary. Meanwhile, Lermontov expert Oleg Popov says that Natalya Solomonovna, on the contrary, was proud of the fact that she was considered the prototype of Princess Mary, and, therefore, did not need to defend her honor.

Lermontov was also involved in the dark story of the “missing” letters. According to the Martynov family, in 1837 they gave Lermontov, who was leaving for an expedition, a package of letters, in which Natalya Solomonovna put her diary, and her father added 300 rubles. However, upon arriving at the regiment, the poet told Martynov that the package with letters had been stolen from him, and reimbursed his colleague for the missing money. Then, when Nikolai told about this story in the family circle, Solomon Martynov seemed surprised: how could Lermontov know about the invested amount? In a word, the Martynovs suspected Lermontov of opening a package of letters to find out what Natalya Solomonovna was writing about him.

The suspicion remained a suspicion, but later, when Lermontov made fun of Martynov, he sometimes hinted to him about the letter. However, it is unlikely that this incident could have been the reason for the duel. Indeed, in 1940, Martynov’s mother wrote to her son that Lermontov often visited them, and the young ladies really enjoyed his company. Could Lermontov have been allowed into the Martynovs' house if his unsightly role in the missing letters had been proven? I think it's unlikely.

The killer's sister - Natalya Martynova

Version 5. Lermontov was shot not by Martynov, but by a sniper. This version was put forward back in the 1930s by the then director of the Pyatigorsk museum “Lermontov’s House” Stepan Korotkov. And he was immediately removed from his post with the wording “for the vulgar version of Lermontov’s murder.”

However, in 1952, Konstantin Paustovsky wrote a story about Lermontov, “River Floods,” which ended with a strange hint: “simultaneously with Martynov’s shot, he imagined a second shot, from the bushes under the cliff over which he was standing.”

Soon works by other authors appeared who claimed that Lermontov was shot from behind bushes, from under a cliff, from behind from a cliff. The essence of the variants of this version boils down to the following: a hired killer armed with a rifle was secretly present at the duel between Martynov and Lermontov. Allegedly, he fired at the same time as Martynov and fatally killed the poet.

Supporters of this version find the nature of the fatal wound that pierced Lermontov’s body right through at an angle of about 35° to the horizon strange. The bullet hit the right side under the lower, 12th rib, and came out between the 5th and 6th ribs on the opposite, left side of the chest, almost at the left shoulder. This is written down in the certificate of examination of Lermontov’s body. But such a trajectory is supposedly impossible given the known position of the duelists, according to the seconds. This means, supporters of the version conclude, the killer shot while being below and to the side of Lermontov, and the bullet followed an upward trajectory and came out high from the left half of the chest.

However, there is an explanation for this. It is known that, due to the unevenness of the dueling ground, Lermontov stood higher than Martynov and was turned with his right side towards the enemy. His right hand, with the pistol clutched in it, was raised upward, as he had just fired a shot into the air. With this position of the body, the opposite, left part of the chest and left shoulder, according to the laws of anatomy, descend downwards. In addition, at the moment of an opponent’s shot, Lermontov could instinctively deviate, bending even more to the left. Finally, the bullet could ricochet off the edge of the rib and change its direction.

The second “suspicious” circumstance that supporters of this version focus on is a through wound to the chest. When shooting from a dueling pistol, it is supposedly impossible, but if you shoot from a rifle... However, experiments by scientists have shown that in terms of penetration ability, a dueling pistol of the Kuchenreuther system is practically not inferior to a modern TT pistol, and at close range it can penetrate through human chest.

Dueling pistols of the Kuchenreuther system

Version 6. Lermontov fought to get his resignation. There is an opinion that the duel was specially arranged so that Lermontov would receive his resignation, which Nicholas I did not give him. The quarrel between the poet and his friend Martynov was played out “for fun.” The excellent marksman Martynov was supposed to wound the poet, after which a reconciliation of the parties was supposed to take place, for the sake of which they even took a box of champagne with them to the place of the duel. However, a thunderstorm happened, Martynov missed, killing Michel’s friend on the spot...

Instead of a postscript. The military court demanded that Lermontov's killer be deprived of his ranks and rights of fortune. However, Nicholas I made an unprecedentedly lenient decision: “Major Martynov should be put in a guardhouse in the Kyiv fortress for three months and brought to church repentance.”

Martynov served his sentence in the Kyiv fortress, then the Kiev consistory determined the period of penance at 15 years. In 1943, the confessor reduced this period to seven years. After another three years, Metropolitan Philaret of Kiev allowed Martynov to receive the holy mysteries, and on November 25 of the same year, the Synod determined: “To release Martynov, as having brought worthy fruits of repentance, from further public penance.”

In 1845, Nikolai Martynov married the daughter of the Kyiv provincial leader Sofya Proskur-Sushchanskaya. His wife bore him five daughters and six sons.

According to the memoirs of contemporaries, Nikolai Solomonovich suffered until the end of his life because he was responsible for Lermontov’s death. And as some of them claim, every year on July 15, he locked himself in his office and drank himself into unconsciousness...

Monument to Mikhail Lermontov in Pyatigorsk

By the way. Nikolai Martynov was a native of Nizhny Novgorod. The house of his father Solomon Mikhailovich, who was engaged in wine farming, was one of the richest in Nizhny. It was located between what is now Semashko Street and Verkhne-Volzhskaya Embankment. Martynov Sr. was remembered in Nizhny as a generous philanthropist. Leaving the city, he transferred his house to the city hospital, which was long called “Martynovskaya”. Solomon's sister, Daria Mikhailovna, was captured by the Pugachevites, and later became a nun and became the abbess of the Holy Cross Monastery on the current Lyadov Square in Nizhny Novgorod...

Abstract from the site “Lermontov.info”

On Friday, the Kommersant newspaper reported the completion of the investigation into the murder of Moscow region businessman Nikolai Martynov, who died in Iksha two years ago. The Investigative Committee of the Moscow Region was able to identify the person who ordered the murder and the direct perpetrator of the crime.

The customer turned out to be Moscow businessman Anton Erokhin, a business partner of the murdered Martynov. And the executor was retired GRU colonel, centurion of the Volga Cossack army Gennady Korotenko. Friends and relatives of the veteran do not believe in his involvement and deny Korotenko’s participation in the crime.

However, the investigation considers the Cossack guilty. The fact is that operational activities in the Avtozavodsky district of Nizhny Novgorod, which took place in August 2015, helped uncover the contract killing.

Then representatives of the local FSB opened a private garage, which revealed an entire arsenal of weapons. In the garage there were Kalashnikov assault rifles, two machine guns, under-barrel grenade launchers, assault rifles with optical sights, a variety of bladed weapons, as well as an Igla portable anti-aircraft missile system.

The owner of the garage turned out to be local resident Gennady Korotenko. He was detained on the same day, and Korotenko had a Makarov pistol with him. The detainee explained that he needed the pistol to protect garden plots, which was carried out by the organization he created, “Cossack Freemen named after Ermak Timofeevich.” And the arsenal in the garage does not belong to him, but to a casual acquaintance who rented it from Korotenko.

Police arrested Korotenko on charges of illegal weapons trafficking. Later it was found out that a businessman from the Moscow region, Nikolai Martynov, was shot with a Makarov pistol, which the centurion carried with him. Thus, the case of illegal arms trafficking in Nizhny Novgorod was combined into one proceeding with the investigation of a contract killing in the Moscow region. Korotenko was also accused of murder.

Later, the alleged mastermind of the crime was identified and detained. He turned out to be business partner Anton Erokhin, who owned Clinolia Holding Limited in equal shares with Martynov. The partners could not divide the company and its assets, which included several enterprises in the Nizhny Novgorod region that produced various components for household chemicals.

Erokhin was going to buy out Martynov’s share for 2.6 billion rubles, however, as investigators believe, he decided to eliminate his partner by paying 1 million rubles for the contract killing. Retired military man Gennady Korotenko was appointed executor.

Lawyers for the accused party did not agree with the position of the investigators. In particular, Erokhin’s representatives stated that he had no motive, noting that with Martynov’s death, his partner’s financial situation worsened. The Moscow Arbitration Court declared Erokhin bankrupt.

Representatives of the Volga Cossacks also disagreed with the conclusions of the investigation. They consider Gennady Korotenko a hero and an example to follow.

“Old Man Korotenko is not a mummer, of which there are many now, but a real ancestral Cossack. In the past - a combat officer, GRU colonel. He was seriously wounded, has a disability, but the investigation ignores his illness, since the dad is still in Abkhazia during his medical studies, being a hero and an honorary citizen of this country,” said Volnitsa board chairman Sergei Akimov in an interview with Kommersant.

He drew attention to the fact that Korotenko participated in the Afghan, Abkhaz and Chechen wars. The centurion has many awards. Including - orders of Courage, the Red Banner and the Red Star, medals “For Courage” and “For Military Merit”.

According to Akimov, the police decided to simply pin the crime on Korotenko by detaining him with a weapon. Cossack suggests that the investigation has no evidence of the Nizhny Novgorod centurion’s involvement in Martynov’s murder, since no fingerprints were found on the pistol, and the tenant of his garage could not be found.

Akimov knows nothing about where his comrade in arms got the Makarov pistol. However, he suggested that the Cossack needed firearms to protect his summer cottages and business trips to Moscow, where Korotenko occasionally guarded businessmen.

The Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee for the Moscow Region confirmed information about the completion of the investigation. The case materials were handed over to the defendants for review.

In 1871, 30 years after the fatal duel, Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov (the killer of Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov) once again tried to shed light on the circumstances that prompted him to clash with the poet in a duel. He begins to write the so-called “Confession”, but he never finished his repentance on paper. All that has survived to this day is 6-7 paragraphs in which the unbearable character of Lermontov is clearly visible - “a man with good inclinations, but spoiled by the “light”.” From the very beginning of his “written repentance,” the author seems to be hinting that he had no choice, it was impossible to avoid a duel...

The death of Mikhail Lermontov still remains one of the most mysterious. Since the day of the poet’s death (over 176 years), so many rumors and conjectures, myths and legends have been invented and inflated that in their scale they are comparable to the secrets and mysteries of the deaths of Pushkin and Gogol, Yesenin and Mayakovsky combined.

Martynov’s relatives, Lermontov’s enemies, eyewitnesses and so-called witnesses to the conflict are partly responsible for such a large generation of rumors. After all, it is from their words and testimony that we suddenly become aware of the intolerability and arrogance of the Russian poet... After all, it is from the words of these dubious sources that in the late 20th and early 21st centuries opinions are formed about Martynov’s innocence, about his snow-white reputation, and about that in this whole story there is only one person to blame - the unrestrained, bold-tongued and restless bully Mikhail Lermontov.

Is it so? And what do we really know about Lermontov’s duel with Martynov? Did Martynov want to shoot his opponent? And was it possible to prevent the fatal event that led to the death of one of the most prominent “heirs” of the Great Pushkin - Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov?

The answers to all these questions can be found on the Internet, in school textbooks, encyclopedias - there are a lot of sources, and almost all of them are based on versions under the general name “it’s your own fault”...

The most interesting thing is that for the most part all these sources have one thing in common - superficial study, or even simpler - reprinting and copying of opinions and versions about such a complicated matter.

I wanted to distance myself from the main versions that whitewash the murder of the poet by Nikolai Martynov, and try to find materials based on the opinions of Lermontov’s own contemporaries. Filtering out all the unnecessary things, I discovered a most interesting article - capacious in content and full of convincing evidence and facts. The investigative article was written back in 2012 by Vladimir Bondarenko - Russian literary critic, publicist, and journalist. After reading it, it becomes obviously clear that on Tuesday, July 15, 1841, near Pyatigorsk, at the foot of Mount Mashuk, Nikolai Martynov deliberately killed Mikhail Lermontov in an unfair duel.

Vladimir Bondarenko: “But Solomon’s son...”

In 1841, Mikhail Lermontov wrote a comic epigram on Nikolai Martynov:

He is right! Our friend Martysh is not Solomon,
But Solomon's son,
Not wise like King Shalim, but smart,
Smarter than the Jews.
That temple was erected and became known to everyone
Harem and court,
And this temple, and the court, and your harem
Carries within itself.

Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov (1815 – 1875).

Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov, in fact, amazed many with his narcissism, was not interested in anything that was not part of his world. He carried everything within himself. From his youth, he was going to amaze everyone with his achievements, dreamed of a high career, general's shoulder straps, was confident in his literary talents, and was going to win the hearts of beauties.

Lermontov and Martynov met, most likely in childhood. Near Tarkhany there was the Martynov estate at the Nizhnelomovsky monastery. Later they met in their estates near Moscow, located not far from each other (Serednikovo and Znamenskoye), but became close at the cadet school, because Nikolai Solomonovich, a fairly educated young man with literary taste, felt the high talent of his peer, but was still confident and in mine too.

They were friends and rivals for a long time. They were going to be friends as equals. They were both ambitious, and both were attracted to women. As one of Martynov’s fiercest defenders, D. D. Obolensky, wrote in his article “N.S. Martynov” in the 1890s for the Brockhaus and Efron dictionary:

Lermontov’s killer “received an excellent education, was a very well-read person and wrote poetry from an early youth.”

They both participated in the cadet literary magazine, easily joked with each other, and indulged in drinking. But it gradually became clear: what came naturally to Michel, what became brighter and more talented for him every year, was given to Martysh with great effort. It would be good if he was deprived of literary taste, sense of words, and would believe, like some of their colleague Arnoldi, that his poems are no worse than Lermontov’s. There would be no hatred towards a friend. The fact that he understood literature only aggravated their confrontation; Martynov understood more and more clearly his mediocrity, his imitation. Not only in poetry, but also in behavior, in military glory. In addition, Lermontov was clearly ironic about Martynov’s romantic “pose” and his poems.

They became hidden antagonists. Lermontov begins publishing the novel that brought him worldwide fame - “A Hero of Our Time.” The first story to come out is “Bela”. Martynov simultaneously begins a story with a similar plot “Guasha”, the main character of which - Prince Dolgoruky with his nobility and good nature - is clearly consciously contrasted with Lermontov’s egocentric Pechorin...

Mikhail Lermontov, with insane courage, climbed into battles in the Caucasus and became the commander of a reconnaissance detachment, the current special forces. This is what the historian of the Tengin infantry regiment D. Rakovich writes about Lermontov’s detachment:

“

Lermontov accepted from him (Dorokhov. - V.B.) command of the hunters, selected among forty people from the entire cavalry. This team of thugs, called the “Lermontov detachment,” prowling in front of the main column of troops, revealed the presence of the enemy, falling like snow into the villages of the Chechens... Having dashingly thrown back his white canvas hat, in a frock coat that was always unbuttoned and without shoulder straps, from under which a red cane coat peeked out shirt, Lermontov on a white horse more than once rushed to attack the rubble. He spent moments of rest among his thugs and ate with them from the same cauldron, rejected excessive luxury, thereby serving as the best example of abstinence for his subordinates. A contemporary says that during the campaign Lermontov did not pay attention to the uniform that existed at that time - he let his sideburns and beard grow and wore long hair, without combing it at the temples.

M. Yu. Lermontov in a cap. Drawing by D. P. Palen. Pencil. 1840

After the first battle, Nikolai Martynov was afraid for his life, and avoided battles, openly being a coward. At the same time, their attitude towards the enemy, towards the same highlanders, was extremely different. The fearless warrior Mikhail Lermontov, who obviously put a lot into the battles of his opponents, admired their courage and desire for freedom, and sympathized with the peaceful life of the highlanders, forced to defend themselves from the Russians. “The villages are burning, they have no protection.” Mikhail Lermontov writes his brilliant “Valerik”, where after the description of the bloody battle there are such humane lines:

And there in the distance, a discordant ridge,
But forever proud and calm,
The mountains stretched - and Kazbek
The pointed head sparkled.
And with secret and heartfelt sadness
I thought: pathetic man.
What does he want!.. the sky is clear,
There's plenty of room for everyone under the sky,
But incessantly and in vain
He is the only one who is at enmity - why?..

His antagonist Nikolai Martynov, who avoided battles, on the contrary, admires punitive expeditions:

Martynov's poem "Gerzel-aul" was written clearly in contrast to Lermontov's "Valerik". The poem also contains a direct caricature of Lermontov:

If in Lermontov’s “Valerik” we read: “there is no room for imagination,” his envious man, on the contrary, gives his wretched imagination space. He writes, and often does not finish his works, because he feels their wretchedness. Hence the hatred for his friend-rival. In the same “Mountain Song” Martynov sweetly dreams:

I will kill the bridle!
He won't live to see the day!
Virgo, cry for him in advance!..
Love is like a madman
I need his blood
With him in the world we are cramped together!..

This is again a response to Lermontov’s “there is a lot of room for everyone in the world,” and at the same time, altered words of Grushnitsky, in whose role Nikolai Solomonovich felt himself: “There is no place in the world for the two of us.”

I think Martynov’s reading of “A Hero of Our Time” did not bring him much joy. And the point is not that he was allegedly offended by his sister, who was bred under the name of Princess Mary. My sister was just happy when she was connected with the heroine of Lermontov’s novel.

Martynov saw himself in the image of Grushnitsky, and... killed in a duel. Martynov decided to change everything in life. Don't let the poet live to achieve worldwide fame. With great resentment, he considered himself the prototype of Grushnitsky in “A Hero of Our Time.”

In addition, Lermontov found offensive nicknames for him, calling him Marquis de Schulerhoff, Aristocrat Monkey, Vyshenosov...

Lermontov has two impromptu songs from 1841 ridiculing Martynov - “Our friend Martysh is not Solomon” and “Throw off the beshmet, my friend Martysh”, and Martynov has an evil epigram “Mon cher Michel”. If it were not for this confrontation between a genius and a vulgar, a brave man and a coward, a military officer and a retired crook, it is unlikely that a duel could have occurred because of some joke. Mikhail Lermontov joked:

Throw off your beshmet, friend Martysh,
Unbelt yourself, throw off your daggers,
Pull up the armor, take the berdysh
And watch over us like a stranger!

Like, take off all your mountain clothes, in which you look like some kind of clown, you are a Russian officer, not a mountaineer, and this is not yours. Put on your Russian armor, take your Russian weapons. And then watch over us like a policeman.

The famous Lermontov expert Emma Gershtein writes:

“

Based on the skill with which this impromptu crosses different meanings, we can say with confidence that Lermontov really composed it. Along with a direct invitation to change the Caucasian folk costume to ancient Russian military clothing (the idea of a “Caucasian”), there is a hint of Martynov’s unimportant fighting qualities - he would only have to perform police service (hozhaly) - and a mockery of his suspicious attitude towards the jokes of his comrades ( "watch over us")...

Martynov Nikolai Solomonovich (Watercolor by T. Wright) 1843.

However, Martynov also tried, as best he could, to pinch Lermontov. In 1963, an epigram was found by Nikolai Martynov, playing up Lermontov’s love affairs. Most likely, the epigram was written in 1841; it mentions three women familiar to Lermontov: E. A. Klingenberg (stepfather - Verzilina), N. A. Rebrova and Adele Ommer de Gelle:

Mon cher Michel!
Leave Adel...
But there is no strength,
Drink the elixir...
And will come back again
Rebrova to you.
Return recipe is not different
Only Emil Verzilina.

The text of the epigram is known from the manuscript, at the beginning of which there is "Recipe. How to make an elixir of life" , written much earlier and by a different hand. Next to the text of the epigram there is an inscription, apparently made by Lermontov himself: "Scoundrel Monkey" .

Perhaps some mutually offensive epigrams have not reached us.

Mikhail Lermontov was indifferent to living conditions, could sleep in any conditions, ate with the soldiers, and wore whatever came to hand. Although he valued good weapons and good horses, he had a taste for life, and on occasion he could push himself.

Nikolai Martynov dressed pretentiously and loudly, causing smiles among those around him with his colorful outfits, and, naturally, becoming the subject of Lermontov’s jokes. As A.I. Arnoldi recalls:

“The naughty comrades then showed me a whole notebook of caricatures of Martynov, which they drew and colored together. It was a whole story in faces like French caricatures..."

Of course, it’s a shame when you see yourself in a caricature, depicted in a uniform with gazyrs and with a huge dagger sitting on a chamber pot. Of course, Lermontov’s witticisms and caricatures angered Martynov, he had the right to respond in kind, but... he also lacked talent for a witty response. Lermontov’s last girlfriend E. G. Bykhovets wrote:

“

That Martynov was terribly stupid, everyone laughed at him; he is terribly proud; his caricatures were constantly being added; Lermontov had a bad habit of making jokes... This was in a private house. Coming out of there, stupid Martynka called Lermontov. But no one knew. The next day Lermontov was fine with us, cheerful; he always told me that he was terribly tired of life, fate drove him so hard, the sovereign did not love him, the Grand Duke hated him,<они>they couldn’t see him - and then there was love: he was passionately in love with V.A. Bakhmetyeva; she was his cousin...

N. S. Martynov. Illustration from the book by V.A. Zakharov “The Mystery of the Last Duel”

If it was impossible to stand on a par with Lermontov, then it was necessary to destroy him. Therefore, Martynov willingly followed the lead of the people provoking their duel.

S.N. Filippov in the article "Lermontov on the Caucasian waters" (Russian Thought magazine, December 1890), describes Martynov, confirming the keen observation of the mocking poet:

“

Then he was the first dandy on our waters. Every day he wore alternating Circassian shorts made of the most expensive cloth and all in different colors: white, black, gray, and to go with them silk arkhaluks, the same or even blue. The best karakul hat, black or white. And it was always different - today I didn’t wear what I wore yesterday. To such a suit he hung on a silver belt a long Chechen dagger without any decorations, which fell below the knees, and rolled up the sleeves of his Circassian coat above the elbow. This seemed so original that it attracted everyone’s attention: as if he was preparing every minute to fight with someone... Martynov enjoyed great attention from the female sex. I won’t say this about Lermontov. They were rather afraid of him, i.e. his sharp tongue, ridicule, puns...

It would seem that from their youth they knew each other’s habits and characteristics well. Znamenskoye, the Martynovs' estate, was located next to Serednikovo, the Stolypins' estate, where Lermontov spent three summers in a row (1828-1830). Seventeen-year-old Lermontov dedicated a poem to Martynov’s older sister, in which he pays tribute to her intelligence. And in the future, fate in a strange way brought them together again and again, until a fatal duel.

Almost simultaneously they entered military school. There they competed more than once in strength and dexterity; it is unlikely that the strong, tall Martynov liked the fact that the short, clumsy-looking “Mayoshka” (Lermontov was nicknamed after the hunchback - the hero of French cartoons) often turned out to be both more dexterous and stronger. They competed not only in dexterity (in the entire school, besides them, only one cadet owned a saber, the rest preferred the sword), but also in poetry. Everyone is equal at first. And yet, most of all, Martynov was irritated by Lermontov’s literary genius, which was growing stronger in his sight.

This was not the envy of the great worker Salieri towards the airy, light genius of Mozart. It was the hatred of a secular man in the street, the hatred of an arrogant but empty nobleman, and also a loser who had been dismissed, for high talent.

Undoubtedly, Nikolai Martynov consciously wanted to kill Lermontov, and deliberately shot at him. Moreover, Martynov knew that the experienced warrior and excellent shooter Mikhail Lermontov was not going to shoot at him. This means that all you need to do is aim accurately at the poet. Alas, he succeeded...

So at all times, ordinary people hate talented people: Dostoevsky and Chekhov, Gumilyov and Yesenin, Rubtsov and Brodsky... Without them, the average person lives easier. Martynov dreamed, if not of a literary career, then of a military career, dreamed of becoming a general, alas, he was sent into retirement as a simple major without an order and without glory. Mikhail Lermontov dreamed of retirement, wanted to found a new literary magazine, this time for Russian talents, without borrowed French handicrafts. Martynov hated his resignation. And therefore he secretly hated Mikhail Lermontov more and more deeply.

He was, of course, offended by both the poet’s jokes addressed to himself and the caricatures, but it is unlikely that these light and gentle ridicule became a reason for a duel. And was there any ridicule? Everything is covered in darkness. Unlike the no less tragic, but extremely clear and recorded duel of Pushkin, in Lermontov’s duel there are only riddles, hypotheses and assumptions. Rather, Emma Gerstein is right when she says:

“The inconsistency of the stories of Martynov’s defenders about the duel, the artificial concept of Natalya Martynova and the missing letters, the ignorance of the most important biographical moments in the life of N. S. Martynov indicate that the true background of the history of the duel was hidden... All these data emphasize the participation of other forces in this duel, for which Martynov turned out to be a convenient instrument for execution.”

Was there a quarrel in the Verzilins' house? No one was a witness, everything was hearsay. What was the reason for the duel? Who was the second? And how many of them were there: either Mikhail Glebov alone, or the two of them with Prince Vasilchikov, or were there also Prince Sergei Trubetskoy and Lermontov’s close friend Alexei Stolypin (Mongo)? Was there anyone else who witnessed the duel, the same Dorokhov? Or did the duel take place without seconds? As in the case of Prince Golitsyn?

“On the occasion of Lermontov’s duel,” wrote Vyazemsky, “Prince Alek. Nick. Golitsyn told me that under Catherine there was a duel between Golitsyn and Shepelev. Golitsyn was killed, and not entirely correctly, at least that’s what they said in the city and accused Shepelev. They also said that Potemkin did not like Golitsyn and took some part in this fight.”

Why does Prince P.A. Vyazemsky connect Lermontov’s duel with Golitsyn’s duel? Or was it really the forced resignation, combined with a negative perception of Lermontov’s novel, and even with offensive epigrams, that served as the reason for the outbreak of Martynov’s hatred? Is there really not enough wisdom? “Not wise like King Shalim, but smart, // Smarter than the Jews...” Alas, Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov’s Jewish mind was only enough to shoot at him at close range, knowing full well that Lermontov would not shoot at him will, take aim and kill his former friend.

"There was no duel - there was a murder."

The history of this duel will forever have more mysteries than solutions. Neither the exact location of the duel nor the location of the first burial is known. What was said at the duel, who shot and when - everything is covered in darkness. I will try, based on reliable facts, to tell the story of the relationship between Lermontov and Martynov.

To be honest, I am closer to the versions expressed shortly after the poet’s death, or during the life of his contemporaries in the 19th century. A closer version of the same famous duelist and friend of Mikhail Lermontov, Rufin Dorokhov. Dorokhov summed it up with one phrase: “There was no duel - there was murder.” Surely he shouldn’t know the intricacies of all dueling.

When today Lermontov experts Zakharov or Ochman, justifying Martynov in everything, prove compliance with all the rules of a duel, and the impossibility for Martynov to shoot somewhere to the side or in the air, I am amazed: what kind of new guardians of the dueling code are these. Maybe challenge one of them to a duel?

I re-read all possible documents, memoirs, books, both from the tsarist period, and the Soviet period, and the current ones. I was struck by the obvious anti-Lermontov position of modern scientists. I explain the current turn to glorifying the poet’s murderer with a general desire to discredit everything Russian. I am not going to idealize the complex character of our national genius. However, which of the great writers had a gentle character? Maybe ordinary people did the right thing at all times when they mercilessly killed writers, from Pushkin to Mandelstam? It would be nice if they focused on the accident of duel death. Martynov could have died, Lermontov could have died... But it is Mikhail Lermontov who is blamed for everything. Recognizing all the pranks and ridicule of Mikhail Lermontov, I do not see in them a worthy reason for a duel, according to all the noble rules of honor.

Mikhail Yurjevich Lermontov

The most offensive thing in our time is the glorification of a murderer. Open the all-Russian website “Great Russian Names”, you will find among the great Russian names - ... Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov... Obviously, if he had not killed Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov, his imitative poems and poems would not have been published, they would not have been remembered among the outstanding people of the Nizhny Novgorod region, alas, I would not have had such success with secular beauties, I would not have become a regular at the English Club in Moscow.

"Happy Unlucky"

And what made him famous: on all academic official websites today it is written: “an officer who had the misfortune of killing Lermontov in a duel.” This is, in fact, a “happy unlucky man,” as Mikhail Lermontov nicknamed him. Unhappy Russian officer. For some reason, he spent only a few years under repentance in Kyiv and was released already in 1846 to live a rich lordly life. But in Nikolaev’s time, for a duel they were given hard labor and were deprived of their nobility. Why is he so merciful?

Nowadays it is believed that duels were a constant occurrence at that time. Alas. No. In Nikolaev's time, in the same Pyatigorsk, duels were extremely rare. And the punishments for them were severe. Nicholas the First hated duels and considered them a manifestation of savagery. But I easily forgave Martynov...

Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov (as well as his father, Solomon Mikhailovich, who rose to the rank of colonel) was an Orthodox man and a nobleman. The Martynov family descended from a native of Poland who arrived in Muscovy in 1460. In the “General Arms of Arms of the Noble Families of the All-Russian Empire” one can read that “many of the Martynov families served the Russian Throne as stewards, governors and in other ranks and were granted estates by the Sovereigns in 1631 and other years.”

Among Nicholas’s ancestors is Savluk Fedorovich Martynov, a participant in military operations against the Poles near Smolensk in 1634, who received an estate in the Ryazan district;
Pyotr Ivanovich, voivode in Kadoma in 1704;
Fyodor Mikhailovich, prosecutor of the Penza Upper Court, who retired in 1777 with the rank of second major;
Solomon Martynov's brother, Dmitry Mikhailovich, was Kirsanovsky (Tambov province) leader of the nobility.

His father, Solomon Mikhailovich, as befits Solomon, got rich from wine farming, that is, he was engaged in an occupation that was not the most respected for a Russian nobleman: getting the Russian people drunk. After retiring, Solomon Martynov invested all his money in wine farming. At the end of the 18th century, many resourceful nobles became rich through wine farming. For example, the owner of the Penza winery A.E. Stolypin, a relative of Lermontov.

Prince I.M. Dolgorukov recalled about Solomon Martynov that “the entire Nizhny Novgorod province is at his mercy...”.

At the beginning of the 19th century, he bought a house on the Volga slope, not far from the Nizhny Novgorod Kremlin. The house of Solomon Mikhailovich was one of the richest in Nizhny. It was located between what is now Semashko Street and Verkhne-Volzhskaya Embankment. He had tenement houses.

It is believed that it was in this manor house on the Volga slope that the future killer of the great Russian poet Nikolai Martynov was born. Nowadays they generously write about him in all books on the history of Nizhny Novgorod. I think there will also be people who like to write about Chikatilo’s homeland. Black PR is also PR.

As current local historians write:

“Perhaps this is not something to be ashamed of... One way or another, but Nikolai Martynov, upon closer examination, turns out to be not at all the inveterate scoundrel that we have portrayed him as since school for many decades... At the age of 25, Martynov was already a major, while his classmate Lermontov, who was almost a year older, only rose to the rank of lieutenant (senior lieutenant)….”

It is amazing that this article about the valiant Martynov was published in a Vladimir newspaper on the occasion of a sad anniversary: the 170th anniversary of the death of Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov.

In 1825, the entire Martynov family, having profitably sold their Nizhny Novgorod house to the city authorities, moved to the Ievlevo-Znamenskoye estate near Moscow. In Nizhny Novgorod they still remember that the city hospital, built on the site of the Martynovs’ manor house, stood on Martynov Street. At the same time, many claim that the house was donated to the city by this rich wine merchant. Like, “Martynov Sr. was remembered in Nizhny as a generous philanthropist. Leaving the city, he transferred his house to the city hospital, which for a long time was called “Martynovskaya” ... "

Alas, for the Martyn-loving defenders, the city archives contain a deed of sale, proving that Solomon Martynov clearly did not undercut the sale of the house...

Maybe Jewish sources are right when they suggest that the Martynovs are descended from Dutch merchant Jews who eventually moved to Poland. But this is not so important. As a rule, either overly tough patriots or concerned Jewish historians who are looking for their heroes everywhere are concerned about the admixture of Jewish blood. So I didn’t find anything in Russian reports about Martynov’s Jewish roots, even though Solomonovich did, but in Israeli materials I found this trace of Dutch Jews. Although there is no exact information about the origin.

But there are many accurate documents about the close connection of the Martynovs with the Freemasons. The killer's father, Solomon Mikhailovich Martynov, was born in October 1774 in the village of Lipyagi, Penza province, into the family of a wealthy landowner who owns a good thousand peasant souls and considerable lands. He was friends with the Freemasons S.I. Gamaley, A.F. Labzin and N.I. Novikov himself. He was even related to the latter.

Solomon Martynov’s sister Daria Mikhailovna was married to a relative of one of the main masons in Russia N.I. Novikov. Her son, Staff Captain M.N. Novikov, is known both as a Decembrist and as the most zealous Freemason.

And Solomon Martynov himself was considered a great lover of bookish Masonic wisdom, all kinds of mysticism and occult sciences. Local writers associated with the Freemasons also visited him.

There is also a version about the origin of the name Solomon in the Martynov family. “Memories of Pugachev”, signed with the initials O.Z., seem to have come from the 18th century. (they seem to be stored in one of the US archives), which tells how Solomon Martynov got his name, which is not quite common for modern Russians. It is reported that the little baron Martynov was saved from the massacre of the Pugachevites by his nurse, who passed him off as her son. It was then that the mother decided to baptize the child and went to church. “What should I call him?” - asks the priest. “God knows! - the nurse answers, “I don’t even know.” “We’ll call it after the saint,” the priest decided. “To this day, King Solomon will be a saint—let’s call it that!”...

Still, it’s unclear, the Pugachevites left, the nurse could have waited for the baby’s direct relatives. It is up to them to decide what to name the baby. Somehow everything is mixed up, here is Pugachev, here is the wayward nurse, here is Solomon... They piled it up with exaggeration. After all, parents could have simply called Pugachev Solomon according to the calendar, and that’s all. You never know there were Marks, Rufinus, and Isaacs among the nobles. They looked at the calendar and called it that. After all, Ivan is a Hebrew name.

The feeling is that one of the Martynovs has been diligently justifying himself for two hundred years. And for Solomon, and for Solomon’s son Nikolai Solomonovich, an ordinary Russian man in the street who dreamed of a general’s career and literary fame.

As V. A. Belgart recalls:

“...there was a very handsome young guards officer, tall, blond with a slightly curved nose. He was always very kind, cheerful, sang romances decently, and kept dreaming of ranks, orders, and thought of no other way than to rise to the rank of general in the Caucasus.”

I am not going to attribute the organization of some kind of royal conspiracy to kill Mikhail Lermontov, although it cannot be denied that his death completely suited both Emperor Nicholas I and Benckendorff. By that time, by 1841, they already had an extremely negative attitude towards the poet, but were closely following him. It is no coincidence that Nikolai Martynov was forgiven so quickly, but it was forbidden to write anything about the duel itself for thirty years. Collections of poems were published, but no biography of the poet.

Lermontov had plenty of ill-wishers both during his lifetime and in Pyatigorsk itself; there was someone to provoke Nikolai Solomonovich into a duel.

Meeting of Count Ignatiev with Martynov in Paris

Many stories are told about Martynov himself. But all thirty or forty years after the duel. What to believe and what not to believe, everyone decides differently, according to the era, personal attitude towards Lermontov, and the talent of the researcher. However, about the duel itself we have either the official version of the state prosecution, in which almost everything is not true, everyone unanimously justified Martynov, or the stories of Martynov and another unreliable witness - Prince Vasilchikov, and then, as a rule, in the transmission of their relatives and acquaintances .

His Excellency, Lieutenant General of the Soviet Army Count Alexei Alekseevich Ignatiev.

For example, film director Andrei Konchalovsky once got into a conversation with Count A.A. Ignatiev, the author of the famous book of memoirs “Fifty Years in Service.” He told him about his meeting in Paris with Martynov.

“

M had been gone for fifteen years, and I was terribly amazed to hear about Lermontov, as if he were someone personally known to the speaker... I met Martynov in Paris. We, then young people, surrounded him, began to tease him, accuse him: “You killed the sun of Russian poetry! Aren't you ashamed?! “Gentlemen,” he said, “if you knew what kind of man he was!” He was unbearable. If I had missed then, I would have killed him later... When he appeared in society, his only goal was to ruin everyone's mood. Everyone was dancing and having fun, and he would sit somewhere in a corner and start laughing at someone, sending notes with vile epigrams from his corner. A scandal arose, someone began to cry, everyone’s mood deteriorated. That's when Lermontov felt okay...

Coat of arms of the Lermontov family

The young Count Ignatiev felt that Martynov was speaking quite sincerely. He hated Lermontov until the end of his days. From the mouths of his relatives (A.N. Nortsov and others), from the lips of his friends and patrons, there was rumor about the intolerable character of Mikhail Lermontov.

I wonder if those on whom their lives depended would go on reconnaissance with such an evil person? But when they went, they tried to persuade him to take him into their volunteer detachment. Well, did Lermontov communicate with them differently? If he really was evil and insidious, arrogant and spoiled, then how did volunteers ask for him to join intelligence, where they risk their lives every second? Or did they not pay attention to his kind jokes? They knew how to joke.

I fully believe Count Ignatiev’s story. This is exactly how this “unfortunate lucky man” Nikolai Martynov blamed all the blame for the duel on Mikhail Lermontov. He once wrote in one of his imitations of Lermontov:

Silent confession, communion,
Then we read the dismissal note:
And here it is, earthly happiness...
Is there much left? handful of earth
I turned away, it hurt
This drama is for me to watch;
And I asked myself involuntarily

Am I really going to die like this...

No, Nikolai Solomonovich did not want to die, neither in the duel nor later. First, for the duel, Nikolai Martynov was sentenced to demotion and imprisonment in a fortress. Then the imprisonment was canceled and replaced with a seemingly severe fifteen-year church punishment. But not somewhere in Siberia, but in the capital city of Kyiv. After his requests for pardon already in 1846, four years later the Holy Synod took pity on the “unfortunate murderer” and abolished the penance. The persistently published rumors about his repentance and almost monastic lifestyle are worthless. About his annual memorial services for Lermontov. All this information comes from the killer's relatives.

Firstly, immediately after the removal of church punishment, Nikolai Solomonovich happily married Sofya Proskur-Sushchanskaya. Soon he returned to his family estate in the Nizhny Novgorod province and gave birth to eleven children. Moved to Moscow. I became seriously interested in mysticism and spiritualism, and Masonic rituals. I don’t know how its defenders combine the supposedly almost monastic penitential life of an Orthodox parishioner with the practice of spiritualism and the occult sciences? He visited Tarkhany only once, on occasion, it’s a pity that he wasn’t torn to pieces there by local men who treated Mikhail Lermontov with great respect.

It is no coincidence that at the English Club in Moscow, of which Martynov was a regular, he was nicknamed "Commander's Statue" In fact, he was proud until the end of his days that he had become the killer of a Russian national genius. Perhaps even in the duel in Pyatigorsk, with his refined literary taste, when he killed Lermontov, he understood perfectly well that by doing so he was making history. There were no more chances to become famous. Pompous narcissistic poser. Although heroic, there is glory.

This free or unwilling servant of Satan is well described by the former Moscow mayor, Prince V.M. Golitsyn:

“

He lived in Moscow as a widower, in his house on Leontyevsky Lane, surrounded by a large family, of which two of his sons were my university friends. I often visited this house and I cannot help but say that Father Martynov perfectly justified the nickname “Statue of the Commander” given to him by the youth. Some kind of coldness wafted from his entire figure, white-haired, with a motionless face, a stern look. As soon as he appeared in the company of young people, who often gathered with his sons, the chatter, fun, noise and din suddenly stopped and the famous scene from Don Juan was reproduced. He was a mystic, apparently, was engaged in summoning spirits, the walls of his office were hung with paintings of the most mysterious content, but such a mood did not prevent him from leading a large game of cards at the club every evening, and his partners felt the cold that, apparently , was inherent in his very nature.

As they recall, this occultist tried to call and the spirit of Lermontov killed by him , but nothing good came of it. Our genius did not respond.

The reason for the duel and its refutation

Making excuses from the rapidly growing fans of Lermontov’s genius, Nikolai Martynov in the late forties began to say that the main true reason for the duel was a package with opened letters and the diary of the Martynov sisters. Doctor Pirozhkov in 1885 described his conversation with Martynov in the late forties. Lermontov's killer assured the doctor that the episode with the missing package was supposedly the only reason for the duel:

“This is actually the reason that put us at the barrier - and it gives me the right to consider myself not at all as guilty as they generally imagine me,” assured Doctor Martynov.

I will not describe in detail this whole story, which was convincingly and conclusively refuted by Emma Gerstein in her research on Lermontov. I’ll tell the readers briefly what the matter was.

In 1837, four years before the duel, the Martynov sisters gave Mikhail Lermontov in Pyatigorsk a package containing a letter and a diary for his brother, to whom Mikhail Lermontov was heading, and 300 rubles were also placed there from Father Solomon. Lermontov got to the location of his unit through Taman. In Taman he was robbed. This story is brilliantly conveyed by the poet in the story “Taman”. Having met Martynov, Mikhail Lermontov told him about the loss and gave him three hundred rubles from his own. Later, Martynov wrote to his parents about this loss. And they seemed surprised how Lermontov knew that there was money in the package. They suspected that Lermontov, wanting to find out what Natalya Martynova thought about him, opened the package.

Firstly, even if Lermontov, in his curiosity, had gone to such a violation of the rules, then in 1837 a duel should have arisen. Later, in 1838-40, Lermontov often communicated with Martynov in St. Petersburg; they could have sorted things out there too. Martynov’s sister Ekaterina Solomonovna Rzhevskaya told Y.K. Grot about this story in 1852:

“Lermontov loved Martynov’s sister, who dissuaded her from marrying him. Once, when Martynov was on an expedition, and Lermontov was about to go in the same direction, Mlle Martynova instructed him to deliver a letter to her brother and her diary in it; at the same time, their father gave a letter for his son, in which he enclosed 2,000 silver rubles, without telling Lermontov a word about the money. Lermontov, curious to find out the contents of the letters that could contain speech about him, allowed himself to print out the packages and did not deliver them: in the girl’s letter he read her review that she would be ready to love him if not for the warning of her brother, whom she believed. Having opened the money in his father’s letter, he could not help but hand it over, but he also kept the letter itself. Subsequently, he tried to convince the family that his suitcase with these letters was missing, but the delivery of the money incriminated him. However, at that time the matter remained without consequences"

As always, the later memories of anyone are confused and incorrect. And the amount of money is not the same, and Lermontov’s intention to marry Natalya Martynova is doubtful. But the package was missing. As well as all the property of Lermontov himself.

Secondly, the poet would not have invented an entire scene in the novel “A Hero of Our Time” to justify himself. Martynov is not worth it. In addition, the robbed Lermontov, having arrived in Stavropol, was unable, due to the theft, to immediately report to his superiors until he ordered himself a new uniform to replace the stolen one, for which he received a scolding, since the headquarters found that he should have appeared immediately in what I arrived.

The whole problem invented by Martynov was how Lermontov found out about the money invested in the package. Sister Martynova herself could have told about the money, and Nikolai could have mentioned it. The package could accidentally burst on the road. There is nothing terrible or shameful about this. Martynov’s mother wrote to her son on November 6, 1837:

“How upset we are all that our letters, written through Lermontov, did not reach you. He freed you from the trouble of reading them, because in fact you would have had to read a lot: your sisters wrote them all day; I think I said: “at this right opportunity.” After this incident, I vow never to write except by mail; at least you remain confident that you will not be read..."

But even if the whole family found out about Lermontov’s excessive curiosity, they could break off relations with him. But already in 1840, three years after the package went missing, the same E.M. Martynova writes to her son again:

“We have Lermontov almost every day. To tell the truth, I don't particularly like him; his tongue is too evil and, although he shows complete friendship for your sisters, I am sure that at the first opportunity he will not spare them either; these ladies find great pleasure in his company. Thank God he's leaving soon; His visits are unpleasant for me...”

Even though the mother is dissatisfied with Lermontov’s visits, it is for a completely different reason, for his evil tongue. The sisters find great pleasure in his company. And Martynov himself constantly meets with the poet. The episode with the package was either forgotten or explained, and it was proven that there was no guilt of the poet. In addition, back in 1839, Solomon himself, who sent money in a package, dies. And suddenly another year later, in 1841, an ill-fated duel takes place, and many years later Nikolai Martynov allegedly cites this long-forgotten story with the package as the only reason for the duel.

All Martynov’s defenders picked up this story; they didn’t even care about the four-year time difference between the loss of the package and the duel. They seriously believe that the brilliant “Taman” was written to justify Lermontov in the eyes of Martynov. If only then packages would disappear from our writers more often, and as a result, brilliant stories would be born. Martynov's relatives and his defenders are now blaming all the misfortunes of the family on the poor poet. The same elder sister of Martynov, E.S. Rzhevskaya, in a conversation with Y.K. Grot in 1852, claimed that Martynov was forced to resign because of a duel with Lermontov. This is already complete nonsense.

Seconds

It remains a mystery to me why none of the witnesses to the duel, or people close to him, wrote a word about the duel itself. I admit that during the life of Nicholas I it was forbidden to publish anything about Lermontov. Especially about his duel. But why is there nothing in diaries, letters, or oral retellings? Neither the poet’s seemingly closest friend Alexei Stolypin (Mongo), nor Sergei Trubetskoy, nor Mikhail Glebov.

The poet's fame grew at cosmic speed. Soon after Lermontov’s death, poetry was taught in all gymnasiums. And none of my friends said a word about the poet. Martynov himself twice began to make excuses, but both times he abruptly cut off his memories. The memories of Prince Vasilchikov and Emily Shan-Girey are too confusing, and are rather self-justifications of the people involved in the death of the poet. What were they hiding and what did they not want to talk about?

After Martynov challenged the poet to a duel, his friends hoped that Martynov would not find a second and the duel would be canceled by itself. Martynov made a request to Prince Vasilchikov and he readily agreed.

I agree with the version of perhaps the most meticulous Lermontov scholar of the twentieth century, Emma Gerstein, that most likely it was Prince Vasilchikov who provoked the duel. The prince hated Lermontov just for the epigrams addressed to him:

Grand Duke Xander is thin and flexible,
Like a young ear,
The silver moon is brightly illuminated,
But without grain - empty.

His father, Chancellor of the Russian Empire Illarion Vasilchikov, a confidant of Nicholas the First, willingly supported his son’s dislike for the poet. Korf wrote in his diary:

“Prince Vasilchikov saw the sovereign and was very pleased with the result of the audience in relation to his son... Meanwhile, when I visited the prince today, I found Lermontov’s novel “A Hero of Our Time” open on the table in front of him. The prince generally reads very little, and especially in Russian; Probably, this book now interested him only from a psychological point of view: he wants to become better acquainted with the way of thinking of the person for whom his son has to suffer.”

And therefore the official version that Prince Vasilchikov was Lermontov’s second is clearly false.

“Shoot, or I’ll scout you...”

Mikhail Glebov, who lived in the same apartment in Pyatigorsk with Martynov, could not be the poet’s second. Who? If the version is true that Alexey Stolypin was a second, and he slowly commanded: one, two, three…. But there were still no shots, then according to the rules of the dueling code, the duel should have been over. Instead, Stolypin shouts, interfering in the duel: “Shoot, or I will scout you...” Thus, he provokes Martynov’s shot. Becomes an accomplice to murder. Even if it is the most involuntary.

But was Stolypin in a duel? Nobody can say. During his lifetime, his former closest friend did not utter a word. As self-justification, this supposed friend and relative of the poet, the noblest man of his time, Stolypin translated Lermontov’s novel “A Hero of Our Time” into French, but did not write any preface or memoirs.

Alexey Arkadyevich Stolypin. Portrait by Vladimir Ivanovich Gau, 1845

In 1843 friend and relative of Lermontov A. A. Stolypin , nicknamed by the poet “Mongo,” translated “A Hero of Our Time” into French. Stolypin, who lived in Paris at that time, was keen on Fourier’s ideas and published his translation in the Fourierist newspaper “La Democratic pacifique”. Why didn’t the already free Parisian say a word about the history of the duel? An editorial note published before the start of printing Lermontov's novel in the newspaper spoke about the reaction of the Russian reader to it. The note ended with the mysterious phrase: “G. Lermontov recently died in a duel, the reasons for which remained unclear.” And not a word about his participation or non-participation in the duel. "A noble anonymous memorial from a former friend."

What were they all silent about? Even in the most intimate notes and personal letters. All versions about the participation of Alexei Stolypin and Sergei Trubetskoy in the duel come only from Prince Vasilchikov, and then after the death of both of them.

Several quatrains written by Mikhail Lermontov at this time have survived:

They need my life, -
Well, well, let them take it,
I don't regret her!
As an inheritance they will acquire -
Poisonous Snake Club.

And one more, dedicated to his imaginary friends, that tragic summer of 1941:

My friends of yesterday are enemies,
Enemies are my friends
But may the good Lord forgive me my sin,
I despise them...

Professor A.A. Gerasimenko writes in the book “From God’s Light”:

“The intriguers developed the duel scenario in stages: at first they allegedly shot without seconds, no - with one (M.P. Glebov), no - with two (the same Glebov and he, Vasilchikov), and finally - with four (they also included A.A. Stolypin and S.V. Trubetskoy). About the latest version of A.I. Vasilchikov began to speak after their death..."

Prince A.I. VASILCHIKOV. Second at Lermotov's last duel. Drawing by G. Gagarin. Institute of Literature, Leningrad

Hot on the heels of the investigation into the duel case, P.K. Martyanov was convinced of Prince Vasilchikov’s involvement in the death of the poet:

“The prince played an evil role in this intrigue. Having harbored in his soul a dislike for the poet for the merciless exposure of his princely weaknesses, he, like a true knight of Jesuitism, maintaining his former friendly relations with him in appearance, undertook to lead the intrigue in the heart of the circle and, to be fair, masterfully completed the task entrusted to him. He managed to incite Martynov, curb the man who competed with him for the possession of the beauty, fan the outbreak and, despite the efforts of other comrades for reconciliation, bring the rivals to a duel, destroy the “upstart and bully” and after his death pretend to be considered one of his best friends. » I heard it from him himself,” said V.I. Chilyaev: “Michelle, no matter what they say, must be put into a framework!”

So, Martynov, it seems, became an instrument of revenge for the vengeful Vasilchikov, and at the same time a “scapegoat” during the investigation into the duel case.

I would like to note that the version about the pressure on Martynov from some external forces, who considered the poet a “poisonous reptile,” did not appear in Soviet times, and not in some revolutionary circles. The reactionary M. Katkov thought so, and the editor of Novoye Vremya A.S. Suvorin had the same opinion. In Suvorin’s diaries for 1899 we read about the most interesting remarks about Martynov by P. A. Efremov: “Vasilchikov about Lermontov:

“If Martynov had not killed him, then someone else would have killed him; he still wouldn’t have his head blown off.”

Vasilchikov met Martynov at the English Club. A recommendation was needed for the club. He asks one - he died, the other - not. Someone hits you on the shoulder. Turned around - Martynov. "I'll sign you up." He took him by the arm and said: “Please intercede. And then in St. Petersburg some Martyanov directly calls me a murderer.” - Well, what a blessing! They did the same with Pushkin. All the cavalry guards were for Dantes. Efremov said to Panchulidzev:

“You need to scatter the history of the regiment with the Decembrists. Otherwise, your regiment has two killers - Dantes and Martynov.”

Let’s not create a conspiracy theory about Dantes’s friendship with Martynov, about a secret club of cavalry guards killing Russian poets. But I still ask lovers of songs about cavalry guards not to forget that it was they who killed two brilliant Russian poets...

“It was not a duel, but a murder”

Another famous writer of the nineteenth century, Druzhinin, has the same opinion about the structure of the duel. He was one of the first to collect information about the fate of the poet, at a time when many of his contemporaries were alive. A meeting with Rufin Dorokhov, a desperate bully, a duelist, unlike Lermontov, but one of the few true friends of the poet, caused Druzhinin, who scrupulously adhered to all the rules of noble honor, a special outburst of despair due to the death of the poet:

“Why didn’t the people around him,” I thought with childish bitterness, “not appreciate and cherish the poet, didn’t realize his greatness, didn’t stand between him and grief, between him and danger! Isn’t it better to die for a great poet than to live for a whole century?..”

Dorokhov, unlike the poet’s imaginary friends, never justified Martynov. He was the first to say: “It was not a duel, but a murder.” Shouldn't he, a desperate duelist, know all the rules of a duel? Dorokhov called Martynov a “despicable instrument” of the poet’s murder.

Current researchers do not like to refer to letters from contemporaries of the duel. They say they didn’t see anything themselves. Who saw it? Why are the testimonies of distant relatives of the same Vasilchikov, almost half a century after the duel, more reliable than the letters, if not of eyewitnesses, then of people who lived in the same Pyatigorsk during these tragic events?

There is a known letter from a distant relative of the poet, E. Bykhovets, dated August 5, 1841, printed many years later, where she blames Martynov for everything.

Already in Soviet times, a researcher from Leningrad A. Mikhailova found in the Manuscripts Department of the State Public Library named after. M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, a letter from a certain Polevodin, who was being treated in those days in Pyatigorsk, and written just six days after the duel. This lively response is more valuable than all the later memories of Martynov’s defenders. By the way, the letter proves the enormous popularity of Lermontov and his poems among his contemporaries. (Which is not accepted nowadays in our Lermontov studies). The letter also refutes Martynov’s own statement that he was a “blind instrument of providence.”

“July 21st, 1841 Pyatigorsk.

Weep, dear sir Alexander Kononovich, weep, put on deep mourning, sew on blankets, turn your chapter into ashes, take “A Hero of Our Time” from your library and ride to Lorentz, have it bound in black velvet, read and weep. Our poet is gone - Lermontov was killed in a duel by retired Major Martynov on the 15th of this month at 7 pm. Mysterious are your fates, Lord! And this reborn genius must die at the hands of a scoundrel: Martynov is a pure copy of Dantes.

This Martynov had previously served in the cavalry guards, upon request he was transferred to the Caucasian Corps as a captain, in February he was discharged with the rank of major - and lived in Pyatigorsk, shaved his head, dressed completely in Circassian style and thereby captivated, or thought to captivate, the local public. Martynov was not tolerated by anyone in the circle, which was made up of young guardsmen. Lermontov, not tolerating Martynov’s stupid antics, always very smartly and sharply mocked Martynov, probably wanting to notice that he was behaving indecently to the title of nobleman.

Martynov never knew how to properly laugh it off - he got angry, Lermontov laughed at him more and more; but his laughter, although caustic, was always delicate, so that Martynov could not find fault with him.

At one time, Lermontov with Martynov and other young people were visiting the Verzilins (the family of a Cossack general). Lermontov, in the presence of the girls, made fun of Martynov the whole evening, to the point that Martynov became the subject of general laughter - the pretext for this was his, Martynov’s, suit. Martynov, leaving the Verzilins together with Lermontov, asked him to refrain from such jokes in the future, otherwise he would force him to do it. To this Lermontov replied that he could do it tomorrow and that his second would agree with him about the rest.

The next day, when the seconds (ensign Glebov of the Horse Guards and student Prince Vasilchikov) learned about the cause of the quarrel, they used all means to reconcile them. Lermontov agreed to leave, but Martynov did not agree.

Arriving at the place designated for the duel (two miles from the city at the foot of Mount Mashuka, near the cemetery), Lermontov said that he complied with Martynov’s wishes, but under no circumstances would he shoot at him.

The seconds measured out five steps for the barrier, then five steps away from the barrier, took them to the outermost trail, handed them pistols and gave the signal to converge. Lermontov very calmly walked up to the barrier first, folded his arms down, lowered the pistol and with his gaze challenged Martynov to shoot. Martynov, a scoundrel and a coward at heart, knowing that Lermontov always keeps his word, and rejoicing that he did not shoot, took aim at Lermontov.

took aim - shot... The poet was gone!

At this time, Lermontov cast such a look of contempt at Martynov that even the seconds could not withstand it and lowered their eyes (all this is the story of the seconds). Martynov's pistol dropped. Then he, gathering his courage and being instigated by Lermontov’s contemptuous gaze, took aim - a shot... The poet was gone! After the shot, he did not say a single word, sighed only three times and said goodbye to life. He is wounded right through the chest.

The next day, a crowd of people did not leave his apartment. The ladies all came with flowers and strewn him with them, some made the most beautiful wreaths and laid them near the body of the deceased. The spectacle was amazing and touching. On the 17th, at the hour of the duel, he was buried. Everything that was in Pyatigorsk took part in his funeral. The ladies were all in mourning, his coffin was carried to the cemetery by the headquarters and chief officers, and everyone, without exception, walked to the cemetery. The regrets and murmurs of the public did not cease for a minute.

Here I involuntarily remembered Pushkin’s funeral. Now is the 6th day after this sad event, but the murmur does not cease, they clearly demand that the culprit be brought to the full rigor of the law, as a vile murderer. Pushkin Lev Sergeevich, the brother of our immortal poet, was very sad by the death of Lermontov, he was his best friend. Lermontov dined that day with him and other young people in Shotlandka (6 versts from Pyatigorsk) and did not say a word about the duel that was to take place in an hour. Pushkin assures that this duel could never have taken place if the seconds had not been boys; it was done against all rules and honor<…>

LETTER OF P. T. POLEVODIN TO AN UNIDENTIFIED PERSON DATED JULY 21, 1841 WITH REPORT ABOUT THE DUEL AND DEATH OF LERMONTOV. Bottom half of the first sheet. Public Library named after M. E. Saltykova-Shchedrina, Leningrad

Lermontov is buried in the cemetery, a few fathoms from the site of the duel. A strange game of nature. Half an hour before the duel, the calm and beautiful weather suddenly turned into a great storm; the whole city and surrounding area were covered with dust, so that nothing could be seen. The storm subsided and five minutes later it started pouring rain. The seconds say that as soon as the storm subsided, the duel immediately began, and as soon as Lermontov took his last breath, heavy rain began to fall. Nature itself cried for this man.

I could tell you many more details about his life here in the Caucasus, but the page ends<…>It’s painful to remember that the Caucasus in a very short time deprived us of three of the most wonderful writers - Marlinsky, Verevkin and Lermontov ... "

Didn’t Prince P. A. Vyazemsky write about the same thing shortly after the duel on September 9, 1841 to A. I. Turgenev from Tsarskoye Selo abroad:

“...It’s a pity for poor Lermontov. I don’t think I wrote to you about him, but you probably already know that he was killed in a duel by Martynov in the Caucasus. I say that our poetry is better targeted than Louis Philippe. Here they do not allow a mistake: the Tsarevich told Myatlev: “Beware, the poets are in trouble, the cavalry guards are killing them (Martynov’s cavalry guard, like Dantes), be careful that they don’t kill you too.” “No,” he answered, it’s not my turn yet” (copy - IRLI, f. 309, item 4715, l. 136).

Even before receiving this letter, A. I. Turgenev reported to V. A. Zhukovsky on September 6, 1841 from Champroze:

“What terrible news from Russia! My heart ached: Lermontov was killed in a duel - by some Martynov, pour une affaire de gaimain I don’t know anything else<…>This is what Vyazemsky writes to Bulgakov about Lermontov’s duel: “He has already fulfilled a lot and promised even more. They shoot at our poetry more successfully than at Louis Philippe, they don’t miss a second time. At least a French hand was aiming at Pushkin, but it was a sin for a Russian hand to aim at Lermontov” (IRLI, f, 309, item 4714).

“Thank you for Lermontov’s last poems. Tell me, is his “Testament” a fantasy or was it really written before his death? It’s too dry and cold for a dying man, and besides, he says: “he died honestly for the Tsar,” while they wrote to me that he was killed in a duel with Martynov, who challenged him for Princess Mary (have you read?), in which Lermontov allegedly I introduced my sister to how I wrote to you about this. It's painfully sad. Nothing gifted holds in our Rus', while the Bulgarins are blooming in health” (IRLI, f. Yazykova - Language 1, 28).

The Moscow postal director, let's be honest, due to his secret official duties, having all the information at his disposal, having read all the letters from Pyatigorsk that arrived in Moscow after the duel, writes this based on his information:

“...The day and hour of the duel were set, the seconds were chosen. When they arrived at the place where it was necessary to fight, Lermontov, taking the pistol in his hands, solemnly repeated to Martynov that it had never occurred to him to offend him, even to upset him, that it was all just a joke, and that if Martynov was offended by this, he I’m ready to ask him for forgiveness not only here, but wherever he wants!.. “Shoot!” Shoot! - was the answer of the frantic Martynov. Lermontov should have started, he fired into the air, wanting to end this stupid quarrel amicably.

Martynov thought not so generously. He was quite inhuman and vicious to approach his enemy himself and shoot him right in the heart. The blow was so strong and sure that death was as sudden as a gunshot. The unfortunate Lermontov immediately gave up the ghost! It is surprising that the seconds allowed Martynov to commit his brutal act. He acted against all the rules of honor and nobility and justice. If he wanted the duel to take place, he should have told Lermontov:

“Please load your pistol again. I advise you to take good aim at me, because I will try to kill you.” This is what a noble, brave officer would do. Martynov acted like a murderer..."

Moscow postal director A. Ya. Bulgakov refers to a letter from V. S. Golitsyn received in Moscow on July 26. Consequently, Golitsyn described the murder of the poet according to the most recent traces, and hardly on the basis of any philistine speculation. It was only later, during the investigation and trial, that all of Martynov’s defenders brought the eyewitness testimony into line. Silencing dissenters. Later, Bulgakov wrote two more letters, repeating his story: to P. A. Vyazemsky in St. Petersburg and to A. I. Turgenev in France. He called N. S. Martynov “a bitter and bloodthirsty boy”, his father “not by wisdom, but only by the name Solomon.” In his diary, Bulgakov called Martynov “the son of the late Solomon Mikhailovich Martynov, known only because he became rich from wine farming.”

The famous Slavophile Yu.F. Samarin writes almost the same thing in a letter to I.G. Gagarin dated August 3, 1841:

“I am writing to you, dear friend, under the bitter impression of the news that I have just received. Lermontov was killed in a duel in the Caucasus by Martynov. The details are heavy. He shot into the air, and his opponent killed him almost point-blank..."

In the Russian Archive, Vasilchikov wrote:

“Lermontov remained motionless and, cocking the trigger, raised the pistol with the muzzle up, shielding himself with his hand and elbow according to all the rules of an experienced duelist.” Later, in a conversation with Viskovatov, Vasilchikov added an important detail:

“He, still without moving, extended his arm upward, still pointing the muzzle of the pistol upward... When I asked him,” Viskovatov writes, “why didn’t he print about his outstretched arm, indicating that Lermontov showed a clear reluctance to shoot, The prince claimed that he did not want to emphasize this circumstance, but Martynov’s behavior relieves him of the need to spare him.”

But, according to Vasilchikov, it makes no sense to spare the memory of the great poet.

Why do all contemporaries, who had different attitudes towards the poet during his lifetime, write almost the same thing, assessing Martynov extremely negatively, while current researchers write something completely different? Who is more right? Still, contemporaries could learn the truth from witnesses to the duel, but where did modern scientists get all the information? From Martynov, Prince Vasilchikov and their entourage. Or from the official version of the investigation, where everything was rigged. Nobody could say anything more.

The resident of the Pyatigorsk military hospital, I.E. Barclay de Tolly, a distant relative of the famous field marshal general, examined the body and drew up an appropriate conclusion.

“On examination, it turned out,” he wrote, “that a pistol bullet, hitting the right side below the last rib, when the ribs fused with the cartilage, pierced the right and left lungs, rising upward, exited between the fifth and sixth ribs of the left side and, upon exiting, cut the soft parts of the left shoulder; from which wound Lieutenant Lermontov died instantly at the scene of the fight.” The document is sealed, marked July 17 and signed by a doctor and two investigators.

In accordance with the Code of Military Regulations, Martynov, Glebov and Vasilchikov were sentenced to “deprivation of ranks and rights of state.” However, the military authorities considered it necessary to soften the punishment: Martynov - to be deprived of “his rank, order and written up as a soldier until his length of service without being deprived of his noble dignity,” and Vasilchikov and Glebov “to be transferred from the guard to the army with the same rank.” The king decided that this punishment was too severe:

“Major Martynov should be placed in a guardhouse in the Kyiv fortress for three months and subjected to church repentance. The titular adviser to Prince Vasilchikov and the cornet Glebov should be forgiven, the first in consideration of his father’s merits, and the second out of respect for the serious wound he received.”

I think the version about the two statements of the emperor that were made after the death of the poet is reliable.

In a narrow circle of family and people close to the emperor, he spoke sharply in French. Something like “That’s where he belongs,” or “A dog’s death is a dog’s death.” Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna condemned her father for such words, and already going out into the living room, where a large number of people were waiting for him, the emperor said thoughtfully: “The one who could have become Pushkin’s heir has died.” Current researchers choose a version that is close to their own.

This version was confirmed already in 1911 by the editor of the “Russian Archive” P.I. Bartenev, who personally heard this story from Princess Vorontsova, who was then still married to Lermontov’s relative A.G. Stolypin:

“At the end of the liturgy, the Emperor, entering the inner chambers to have tea with his family, said loudly: “News has been received that Lermontov was killed in a duel.” - “For a dog - a dog’s death!” Sitting over tea, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna (of Weimar, “the pearl of the family”)... flushed and reacted to these words with bitter reproach. The Emperor listened to his sister (ten years older than him) and, entering back into the room in front of the church, where the people who were at the service still remained, said: “Gentlemen, news has been received that the one who could replace Pushkin for us has been killed”...

I note that Bartenev himself was considered a great defender of Nikolai Martynov.

Even then, duel experts were amazed by the lack of a compelling reason for the fight. After all, even in the opinion of Martynov himself, the poet only allowed himself “wit, barbs, ridicule at my expense, in a word, everything that can be done to annoy a person without touching his honor.” And if honor is not affected, then there is no reason for a duel?! It is not without reason that in a letter dated August 22, 1841, A. Elagin reports:

“Everyone says that this is a murder, not a duel...” And further: “Lermontov shot in the air, and Martynov came up and killed him.”

Of all the mysteries of the duel, only the behavior of Mikhail Lermontov himself is not mysterious. He didn’t intend to kill anyone, he didn’t intend to shoot, he perceived everything as an absurd misunderstanding... Martynov’s thoughts are much more difficult to understand. This man has never been straightforward. He understood that Lermontov, a brave officer, would accept his challenge, but would not shoot at him. The monkey was probably worried about Michel's jokes, but he was even more envious of him. Did he then, during the duel, dream of Herostratus' glory? I fully admit it. Alas, he perhaps foresaw that someday he would become one of the “great men of Russia” thanks to the fact that he killed the Russian genius.

Could it have been used by the poet’s ill-wishers from court circles? They could very well, just as they set the young officer Lisanevich against Lermontov. But, I think, Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov was not a figurehead. And now who has used whom? You can shoot at a target much more confidently if you know that there will be no severe punishment for participating in a duel, or even for murder.

“As has happened more than once in similar cases,” writes Viskovatov, “they were looking for some figurehead who, without knowing it, would be the executor of the planned intrigue. So, having learned about the antics and humorous pranks of Lermontov on the young Lisanevich, one of the admirers of Nadezhda Petrovna Verzilina,. He was told through some helpful persons that to endure the ridicule of Mikhail Yuryevich was not consistent with the honor of an officer. Lisanevich pointed out that Lermontov was friendly towards him and in cases when he got carried away and went too far in jokes, he was the first to apologize to him and try to correct his awkwardness. They pestered Lisanevich and persuaded him to challenge Lermontov to a duel - to teach him a lesson. “What are you saying,” Lisanevich objected, “for me to raise my hand against such a person.”

Many years later, Martynov told D. A. Stolypin that he “took the duel seriously, because he did not want to subsequently be subjected to ridicule, which is generally showered on people who make a duel an excuse for the useless waste of wads and Homeric drinking bouts.”

Mikhail Glebov writes to Martynov in prison: “... your other answers are consistent with ours, except for the fact that Vasilchikov went with me; just say so. Lermontov rode on my horse - that’s how we write... We don’t see anything wrong on your part in Lermontov’s case... especially since you fired pistols for the third time in your life; the second, when the pistols were torn in your hands and this is the third... We hope that you will say and write that we persuaded you by all means... you write that you were waiting for Lermontov’s shot.”

How unitedly all the seconds defend Martynov. However, this suits the investigation. In his last poem, Mikhail Lermontov writes:

Since the eternal judge
The prophet gave me omniscience,
I read in people's eyes
Pages of malice and vice.

I began to proclaim love
And the truth is pure teachings:
All my neighbors are in me
They threw stones madly...

These stones accompanied Mikhail Lermontov throughout his life. They continue to accompany us to this day. The son of N.S. Martynov believed that the seconds were largely to blame for the duel and did not want reconciliation. The correspondence between the seconds and Martynov during the investigation was considered by Martynov’s son to be “the hub of the whole case.” Maybe he's right. Without justifying Martynov’s killer in any way, let’s read carefully this correspondence, which only throws up mysteries for the duel. After all, it’s like Mikhail Lermontov’s closest friends write to Martynov.

As A.I. recalls Arnoldi, after the murder, his friends themselves cast lots as to who would be called a second in the duel. The first lot fell on M.P. Glebova. Then they added Prince A.I. Vasilchikov for credibility. M.P. Glebov writes to Martynov in prison:

“We are sending you a broth of Article 8. You can add to it according to your understanding; but this is the essence of our answer. Your other answers are completely consistent with ours, except for the fact that Vasilchikov rode on his own horse, and not in a racing droshky with me. Just say so. Lermontov rode on my horse: so we write... Vasilchikov and I, not only out of duty, protect you everywhere and to everyone... fate wanted it so much... that you fired a pistol... Definitely and definitely demand a military trial. Civilians will torture you. The police chief is angry with you, and you will be in his clutches. Ask the commandant to give your letter to Traskin... Stolypin was tried by a military court... Glebov.”

Martynov answers:

“I will be tried in a civil court; I am advised to ask a military man... Find out from Stolypin how he did it? It seems he was tried by a military court... And the beast lawyer tortured me to see if I’d spill the beans. When I see you, I'll tell you what. N.M."

The military court advises him in a friendly manner and A.A. Stolypin, recommending that he not leave the apartment:

“...I don’t advise you to go out. Let the noise die down. A. Stolypin"

Having listened to the advice, N.S. Martynov writes to A.H. Benkendorf:

“Most Excellent Count, Dear Sir. My disastrous story with Lermontov forces me to bother you with a most humble request. In this case I have now been transferred to a civil court. Having always served in military service until now, I have become accustomed to the course of affairs of the military departments and authorities, and therefore I would consider it happiness to be judged by military laws. Do not, Your Excellency, leave my request with blessed attention. I flatter myself with the hope of your gracious intercession, especially since the maxim of a military court may give me in the future the opportunity to atone for my offense with my own blood in the service of the Tsar and the Fatherland.” The count believed, heeded, and ordered “not to leave...”

Martynov handed this letter from prison to the same friends-seconds, and with an explanation:

“What can I expect from a civil court? Traveling to cold countries? The thing is not at all attractive. The southern climate is much more beneficial for my health, and an active life will make me forget what would be intolerable to my irritable character in any place!..”

Everything cannot be reduced to the independent and daring behavior of Mikhail Lermontov. In high society, Lermontov was “arrogant,” “eating,” “arrogant,” despising this entire society.

In the company of peers and colleagues - “he is kind, his speech is interesting.” In the company of friends, a faithful and devoted comrade. Yes, he allowed himself to joke even in the presence of Grand Duke Mikhail Pavlovich. Either he brings a small saber to the inspection, or, on the contrary, an extremely long one, trailing behind him along the floor. That's why he often sat in the guardhouses. He shone with wit, but also managed to write brilliant poetry, and in military affairs he showed himself to be a skilled craftsman. He put bullet into bullet during shooting.

He just felt sorry for the loser Martynov, and with what joy he settled all scores with him at once. And in fact, Grushnitsky took revenge on the literary Pechorin in life. Nikolai Martynov, who recognized himself in Grushnitsky, applied Pechorin’s words to himself:

“I decided to provide all the benefits to Grushnitsky; I wanted to experience it; a spark of generosity could awaken in his soul, and then everything would work out for the better; but pride and weakness of character had to triumph.”

“Highlander with a large dagger” (montaqnard au qrand poiqnard). Portrait of Martynov (aquatic) by G. G. Gagarin (1841; kept in Paris, in the collection of M. V. and A. P. Tuchkov), depicting him in a Circassian coat and with a large dagger.

... Nikolai Solomonovich remained Grushnitsky until the end of his days. The more the poet’s fame grew, the more Martynov’s deep hatred of him grew. This Grushnitsky was never able to repent. He began his confession twice:

“Today exactly thirty years have passed since I fought with Lermontov. Hard to believe! Thirty years is almost an entire human life, but I remember the smallest details of this day, as if the incident happened just yesterday. Going deeper into myself, transporting myself mentally back thirty years and remembering that I am now standing on the edge of the grave, that my life is over and the rest of my days are numbered, I feel a desire to speak out, a need to ease my conscience with a frank recognition of the most cherished thoughts and movements of my heart about this unfortunate event...

Impartially speaking, I believe that he was a kind man by nature, but the world completely spoiled him. Having been on very close terms with him, I had the opportunity to repeatedly notice that he tried to drown out all the good movements of his heart, every impulse of tender feeling, just as carefully within himself and hide them from others, just as others try to hide their vile vices.”

And every time, from confession, Martynov burst into denunciation of the “spoiled” poet, without even getting to the description of the duel.

These are brave and daring, free and independent heroes, like Mikhail Lermontov himself, who do not shoot at their friends. If Lermontov was in fact such an evil person as historians and literary critics now often portray him, then why did he have only two duels in his life, and both times he was challenged to a duel? to the air. Why didn't he kill the duelists? He considered himself superior to them, did not deign to take revenge, only laughed it off cheerfully.

I wonder, in life, the current haters of Lermontov would prefer to deal with in a dangerous moment, with people like the sufferer Martynov, or with people like Lermontov?

Maybe Lermontov’s brilliant prose served as the real reason for the duel?

With what joy all his secular friends, after his death, hastened to tell him what a quarrelsome and unkind fellow he was. During his short life he had already achieved all-Russian literary fame. Everyone who read anything knew and appreciated Lermontov’s great gift. But he was not in high ranks, was not respectable and important, how can such a young and dashing officer be recognized for his true significance?

It is no coincidence that at the end of A. Arnoldi’s life, one of the representatives of this brilliant generation was perplexed:

“I don’t understand that they talk so much about Lermontov; in essence he was a very empty fellow, a bad officer and an unimportant poet. At that time we all wrote such poems. I lived with Lermontov in the same apartment, I saw him write more than once. He sits, sits, chews a lot of pencils and writes a few lines. Well, is this a poet?

After the duel, everyone rushed to worry about poor Martynov. His friends seemed to have forgotten about the poet himself. The poet died, so what? And the sufferer Martynov, because of the penance imposed on him, had difficulty making his way to the capital to pose for the famous artist T. Wright, who already painted his portrait in 1843, two years after the duel. It is unlikely that the artist Wright himself, who worked in the capitals, went to see Martynov in Kyiv.

The story of Martynov’s resignation also remains mysterious. On February 23, 1841, the Tsar signed an imperial order for Martynov’s resignation “due to domestic circumstances.” What is this connected with? With his reputation as a card sharp? With Masonic activities? With the illegal activities of wine farming in the Caucasus? Now all of Martynov’s defenders have begun to explain his resignation by his concern for his sick brothers and sisters. But just recently this arrogant officer dreamed of the rank of general. And why, if you believe his current defenders, did he not leave the Caucasus after his resignation? I immediately forgot about my brothers and sisters. Why did the emperor deny Nikolai Martynov, as well as Mikhail Lermontov, a reward for the Battle of Valerik? Why did he transfer from the Cavalry Guards in 1839 to the Grebensky Cossack Regiment?

Rudolf Balandin, in his interesting study of the poet’s fate, writes:

“Is it not possible to assume that it was winemaking that was the main interest of Martynov in the Caucasus, who went there as a volunteer, that is, voluntarily? And the presence next to him of Prince Vasilchikov, the son of that nobleman Vasilchikov, who so actively took part in the formation of the wine farming business from the future Greek magnate Benardaki, does not speak for itself? And the fact that Martynov was not himself when Lermontov arrived in the Caucasus in the summer of 1841 is most likely explained not by his shame at his premature resignation, but by the fact that because of the war, winemaking among the Greben Cossacks was declining, depriving the son of a wine farmer of hope for wealth and the rank of general, apparently, is the same, civilian, that Lermontov’s great-uncle, the wine farmer Stolypin, earned for himself. And isn’t that why Martynov asked to return to military service, which was denied to him by the emperor? It’s easy to imagine the anger and disappointment of a young man who, hoping for mountains of gold, lost both his money and his career!”

Of course, this is just a version. But she has the right to life no less than others. No one will ever collect accurate evidence. It is clear that despite all his dislike for Lermontov, Emperor Nicholas the First did not organize the duel. Rather, on the contrary, he wanted to drive the poet into the Caucasian wilderness and not let him go to any capitals.

“so that Lieutenant Lermontov would certainly be present at the front and that the authorities would not dare, under any pretext, to remove him from front-line service in his regiment.”

The emperor was even against Lermontov’s participation in volunteer forays, and therefore refused a reward for the poet’s unauthorized participation in the battle near the Valerik River. The poet could have been wounded, and a forced resignation would have followed. He, already as a writer, would have appeared in the capital and founded a magazine. What to do with this then? Let him sit in his regiment.

But if the poet died in a duel, then “that’s where he belongs.” Emperor Nicholas I did not like this short, freedom-loving officer. There was a reason for it, after the January 1837 poems. Tired of sorting out relations with Pushkin... The tsar was also irritated by the fact that his wife Alexandra Fedorovna was crazy about Lermontov’s poetry and prose. And therefore, even after the death of the poet, not only Nicholas I, but also his son Alexander II did not allow prepared biographies of Lermontov to be published; the poet’s works were published without information about the author. Everyone read his poems, and no one knew who he was. First biographical book , prepared by Viskovatov, was published in 1891.

But why did the friends remain silent? What happened to the noble Alexei Stolypin? Or was the murderer Nikolai Martynov right, who admitted at the end of his life: “Friends did inflame the quarrel…”

“In 1837,” we read in the memoirs of I.P. Zabella, “thanks to the hated foreigner Dantes, Pushkin was no longer here, and four years later a Russian officer did the same to Lermontov; to lose two brilliant poets almost at once was too difficult, and public anger fell with all its might on Martynov and transferred the hatred of Dantes to him; no excuses, no time could soften it. It was transmitted successively from generation to generation and ruined the life of this unfortunate man, who lived to an old age. In the eyes of the majority, Martynov was some kind of leper..."

It is interesting that almost all Lermontov scholars of the nineteenth century are on the side of the poet, the most objective and famous Soviet Lermontov scholars, such as B. Eikhenbaum, E. Gerstein, V. Manuilov, also defend the poet, and only the current ones justify Martynov.

One of the first Lermontov experts who interviewed all eyewitnesses of the duel, P.K. Martyanov retold conversation that Lermontov had with his seconds:

“All the way from Shotlandka to the place of the duel, Lermontov was in a good mood. Glebov did not hear any dying orders from him. He seemed to be going to some kind of banquet. All that he expressed during the move was regret that he could not get a release from service in St. Petersburg and that he would hardly be able to carry out his planned work in military service. “I have already developed a plan,” he told Glebov, “of two novels.”

Life changes all plans. And then this mysterious countdown of the duel began: “one”: “two”: “three”. It is unclear who is counting. Stolypin, Glebov... But the main thing is that no one shoots. It's time to end the duel. And here is Stolypin or Trubetskoy, or maybe Glebov? - shouted: “Shoot or I’ll start a duel!” To which Lermontov (according to Vasilchikov’s son, half a century later?) replied: “I won’t shoot at this fool!”
“I lost my temper,” Martynov wrote. “They don’t joke about seconds or a duel: and he pulled the trigger.”

Lilliput shot Gulliver.

Lermontov's trouble was that he did not take seriously the very possibility of a duel, especially with Martysh. Besides, he was in no way interested in any duel. This is a new court, and there is no longer any hope for resignation and for your journal. Shortly before the duel, he had a hearty lunch, and before the duel he talked about his plans for the future. I believe that he fired first into the air, and Martynov was already shooting at the unarmed man. Grushnitsky killed his opponent. There is no place for dreamers in life.

According to E. Gernstein, when a storm began before the duel, Stolypin, Trubetskoy and, perhaps, Dorokhov did not have time to arrive at the place of the duel before it began for some minutes. None of them thought that the duel would begin in a thunderstorm, without waiting for their arrival. Martynov insisted on his own; he wanted to destroy the hated symbol of talent and freethinking.

Let us listen to the opinions of witnesses of that time:

“... There was no duel, but there was a murder...” (R.I. Dorokhov);
“... Martynov... tragically played out the life of Lermontov” (A.F. Tiran);
“... Martynov actually killed Lermontov, and the whole city was already talking about it...” (F.P. Conradi);
“... Many knew that M.Yu. Lermontov was killed almost point-blank by N.S. Martynov" (P.K. Martyanov);
“... Alas, Lermontov is not there, unfortunately, this is true, although we wish that these were false rumors - he was killed - killed in a vile way” (A.P. Smolyaninov);
“... They were going to fight without seconds” (A.S. Traskin - P.H. Grabbe);
“... Everyone says that this is a murder, not a duel...” (A.A. Elagin);
“... It was clear to Olshansky that there was no fight... as such...” (From an analysis of the investigation materials);
M.Yu. Lermontov fell from a bullet “sent to his heart by the firm hand of Martynov, who hated him fiercely” (F.F. Bodenstedt)

Andrey Delvig recalls:

“Sent to Kyiv for church repentance... Martynov took part in all the balls and evenings and even became a celebrity. Each century of Russian history gives birth to its herostrati. Some of them set fire, some kill from around the corner, some destroy states...”

A year after the crime, Colonel A.S. Traskin, who led the investigation in Pyatigorsk and quickly hushed up the case, was promoted to general...

Martynov’s relatives and Lermontov’s enemies, as soon as Vasilchikov died, set out to rehabilitate Martynov’s memory, place all the blame on Lermontov and denigrate him. The murderer's son published “The History of the Duel of M.Y.L. with N.S.M.” But no matter how hard they wanted to, they couldn’t report anything new. Nikolai Solomonovich Martynov quite consciously and fearlessly killed the great Russian poet. “Smarter than Jews...”

Found a mistake? Select it and press left Ctrl+Enter.

The retired major who killed M. Yu. Lermontov in a duel.

The son of a Penza landowner, colonel; born in N.-Novgorod, brought up in October 1832 at the School, from where three years later he was released as a cornet into the cavalry guards, on March 6, 1837, with the rank of lieutenant, he was sent to the Caucasus, where he participated in the expedition of General Velyaminov to lay the fortifications of Novotroitsky and Mikhailovsky, and awarded the Order of St. Anna 3rd Art. with a bow. In April 1838 he returned to the Cavalry Regiment; the following year he was enlisted in the cavalry as a captain with an assignment to the Grebensky Cossack Regiment, and on February 23, 1841 he was dismissed due to domestic circumstances as a major.

We have no information about Martynov’s time in the cavalry guards, but his Caucasian comrades speak of him this way: “Martynov was a kind-hearted fellow, not bad-looking, was very concerned with his appearance and loved the company of ladies.” According to another Caucasian, Martynov “was a very handsome young guards officer, tall, blond with a slightly curved nose. He was always very kind, cheerful, sang romances decently, wrote poetry well, and kept dreaming of ranks, orders and thought nothing less than rise to the rank of general in the Caucasus,” but suddenly in 1841 he retired and “from a cheerful, secular, graceful young man he became some kind of savage: he grew huge sideburns, in a simple Circassian costume, with a huge dagger, a pulled-down white cap, forever gloomy and silent." The author suggests that “the reason for Martynov’s strange course of action was the desire to play the role of Pechorin, the hero of that time, whom Martynov, unfortunately, actually completely personified.”

According to the memoirs of Ya. I. Kostenetsky, “at that time in the Caucasus there was a special well-known family of graceful young people - people of high society, who considered themselves superior to others in their aristocratic manners and secular education, who constantly spoke French, were cheeky in society, dexterous and brave with women and arrogantly despising the rest of the people; all these barchats from the height of their greatness proudly looked at our brother army officer and only came together with us on expeditions, where we, in turn, looked at them with pity and mocked their aristocracy. Most of the guards officers who were then sent annually to the Caucasus belonged to this category, and Lermontov also belonged to this category, who, moreover, by his nature did not like to make friends with people: he was always arrogant, caustic and hardly ever had a at least one friend."

“Lermontov,” testifies Prince A.I. Vasilchikov, “was a man of a strange and at the same time arrogant disposition... there were two people in him: one was good-natured for a small circle of his closest friends and for those few people to whom he had special respect, the other - arrogant and perky for all his other acquaintances... In his opinion, the entire human race belonged to the second category, and he considered it his best pleasure to tease and make fun of all sorts of small and large oddities, sometimes pursuing them with playful, and very often with caustic ridicule. This mood of his mind and feelings was unbearable for the people whom he chose as the target of his cavils and barbs without any apparent reason, but simply as an object over which he refined his observation."

We cannot dwell here on the reasons why Lermontov was like that, but we must admit that he really was like that.

Nikolai Martynov met Lermontov at the Junkers School, where they entered almost at the same time. “He (Lermontov) was a kind person by nature, but the light completely ruined him,” says Martynov. Being in a “very close relationship” with Lermontov, he “had the opportunity to repeatedly notice that he tried to drown out all the good movements of the heart, every impulse of tender feeling, just as carefully within himself and hide them from others, just as others try to hide their vile vices.”

The real reason for the duel is considered to be Lermontov’s courtship of Martynov’s sister Natalya and the resulting “disappearance” of the famous letter.

Is it so?

There is hardly any doubt that Lermontov liked Natalya Solomonovna, but there is no evidence to suggest that her parents and brother wanted this marriage. On the contrary, there is reason to believe that the parents did not want this marriage; therefore, the fact that Nikolai Martynov spoke in defense of his sister’s honor is out of the question for the simple reason that the sister’s honor was in no way affected.

The story of the “loss” of the letter is as follows: On October 5, 1837, Nikolai Martynov wrote to his father in Pyatigorsk about the end of the expedition in which he took part. In the same letter, he thanked his father for the money he had sent. “I received three hundred rubles,” writes Martynov, “which you sent me through Lermontov, but no letters, because he was robbed on the road, and this money, enclosed in the letter, also disappeared; but he, of course, gave me his . If you remember the contents of your letter, then do me a favor - repeat; also ask the sisters from me..."

“The whole point is,” says P.I. Bartenev, “that there was no letter from my father from Pyatigorsk to the expedition this time.” According to Martynov himself, in 1837, Lermontov from Pyatigorsk, where Martynov’s family was, leaving for an expedition (where Nikolai Martynov was already there), undertook to deliver a package in which Natalya Solomonovna enclosed her Pyatigorsk diary and a letter to her brother. Before sealing the letter, she asked her father if he would also like to write or attribute it. He took the package and went with it to his room, but did not write anything, but only invested the money and, having sealed the package, brought it back to hand it to Lermontov, who was not told anything about the money. Therefore, having received a letter from his son in October, old man Martynov was surprised by the lines that talked about money. When Nikolai Martynov, upon returning from the expedition, saw his father for the first time, he expressed his suspicions about Lermontov and added: “And I completely forgot to write on the package that 300 rubles were invested.” In a word, the Martynovs suspected Lermontov of being curious to find out what was being written about him...

Suspicion remained suspicion, but later, when Lermontov persecuted Martynov with ridicule, he sometimes hinted to him about the letter, resorting to such hints in order to get rid of his advances.

“In an explanation with Lermontov about the disappearance of N.S.’s letter, Martynov told L. that his father could not explain this story to himself, but that he (N.S.) answered his father that he did not allow the thought of L.’s immodesty, on which no decent person is capable of.Lermontov later said that during this explanation he tried to call N.S.M-va, feeling the irony in his intercession, but did not find anything to complain about.

At that time, the family of General Verzilin lived in Pyatigorsk, consisting of a mother and three adult girls, of whom Emilia Alexandrovna was especially distinguished by her beauty and wit. This was the only house in Pyatigorsk, in which all the elegant youth of Pyatigorsk visitors, including Lermontov and Martynov, gathered almost every day.

One day at the very end of June, at an evening at the Verzilins’, Lermontov and Martynov, as usual, were courting Emilia Alexandrovna.

“I danced with Lermontov,” she writes. “We were joined by a young man who was also distinguished by his evil tongue, and the two of them began vying with each other to sharpen their tongues. Despite my warnings, it was difficult to restrain them. They didn’t say anything particularly evil, but they said a lot of funny things.” Here they saw Martynov, talking very kindly to my younger sister Nadezhda, standing at the piano, which Prince Trubetskoy was playing. Lermontov could not resist and began to make jokes at his expense, calling him a montagnard au grand poignard (a highlander with a large dagger (fr. )) (Martynov wore a Circassian coat and a dagger of remarkable size.) It had to happen that when Trubetskoy struck the last chord, the word poignard was heard throughout the hall. Martynov turned pale, bit his lips, his eyes sparkled with anger; he came up to us and said , very restrained, said to Lermontov: “How many times have I asked you to leave your jokes in front of the ladies” - and he turned away so quickly and walked away that he did not even allow Lermontov to come to his senses; and in response to my remark: “The tongue is my enemy” - M. Yu. answered calmly: “Ce n”est fieri, demain nous serons bons amis” (“It’s nothing, tomorrow we will be friends again” (French)). The dancing continued, and I thought that was the end of the whole quarrel."

But the quarrel did not end there. When leaving the Verzilins' house, Martynov took Lermontov by the arm and walked alongside him along the boulevard. “Je vous ai prevenu, Lermontow, que je ne souffrirais plus vos sarcasmes dans le monde, et cependant vous recommencez de nouveau” (“You know, Lermontov, that I have endured your jokes for a very long time, which continue despite my repeated demand that “You stopped them” (French)), said Martynov and added in Russian: “I’ll make you stop.” “But you know, Martynov, that I am not afraid of a duel and will never refuse it: that means, instead of empty threats, it is better for you to act,” answered Lermontov. “Well, in that case, tomorrow you will have my seconds,” Martynov said and went home, where he invited Glebov, who was instructed to call Lermontov the next morning. The next day he informed Martynov that his challenge had been accepted and that Lermontov had chosen Prince Vasilchikov as his second.

Vasilchikov also conveys the conversation on the boulevard in almost the same terms. “Leaving the house on the street,” he says, “Martynov approached Lermontov and said to him in a very quiet and even voice in French: “You know, Lermontov, that I very often tolerated your jokes, but I don’t like them to be repeated in public.” ladies,” to which Lermontov responded in the same calm tone: “And if you don’t love me, then demand satisfaction from me.” We, Vasilchikov continues, “considered this quarrel insignificant and were sure that it would end in reconciliation.”

To consider a quarrel at the end of which the word satisfaction is uttered as insignificant is more than frivolous. However, if Prince Vasilchikov and others who were present during the conversation between Martynov and Lermontov on the street were only eyewitnesses, one or another of their attitudes to this conversation might not have had much significance. We must treat the same Vasilchikov, M.P. Glebov, A.A. Stolypin and Prince S.V. Trubetskoy completely differently when they assumed the duties of seconds.

With the exception of Prince Vasilchikov, none of the seconds left us a story about the duel; Vasilchikov’s story was compiled many years after the sad event, and this story was caused by Martynov’s insistence. The legal case remains. It should, as we will see below, be treated with even greater caution than Vasilchikov’s story, because the defendants (Martynov, Vasilchikov and Glebov) had every opportunity to agree in their testimony.

We continue the story of Prince Vasilchikov: despite the confidence that the quarrel would end in reconciliation, “nevertheless, all of us, and especially M.P. Glebov, exhausted our peace-loving efforts for three days without any success. Although a formal challenge to a duel followed from Martynov, but everyone will agree that the above words of Lermontov already contained an indirect invitation to a challenge, and then it remained to decide which of the two was the instigator and who should take the first step towards reconciliation before whom.”

We have no right to take Vasilchikov’s unfounded testimony about the three-day efforts of the seconds to end the matter peacefully, especially since his story is very unclear: who did the seconds ultimately consider to be the “instigator”? If - as it should have been - Lermontov, then it was necessary to insist that he “take the first step towards reconciliation.” It was impossible for the seconds not to know not only their right, but also their duty not to allow a duel over a quarrel “so insignificant”...

After the duel, Martynov learned from Glebov that Lermontov, during negotiations regarding the terms of the duel, told his second Vasilchikov: “No, I recognize myself so guilty before Martynov that I feel that my hand will not rise against him.” Whether Lermontov was hinting here at the opening of the letter or at the absurdity of his antics at the evening at the Verzilins’ remains unknown, but Martynov’s regret after the duel is known: “Tell me about these words from Vasilchikov or anyone else, I would extend the hand of reconciliation to Lermontov and our duel, Of course it wouldn't."

What the “peaceful efforts” of the seconds consisted of can be seen from Nikolai Martynov’s draft answer to the investigators’ questions: “Vasilchikov and Glebov tried with all their might to reconcile me with him, but since they could not tell me anything on his behalf, they only wanted ( check me) persuade me to take back my challenge, I could not agree to this." Such a presentation was “somewhat unpleasant” for the seconds, and therefore Glebov wrote to Martynov: “We hope that you will say and write that we persuaded you by all means... Say that we persuaded you from beginning to end.”

Martynov agreed and answered the seconds that “at the trial he will show all their efforts to reconcile him with Lermontov, but demands that after the end of the duel case they restore the truth and, to clear his memory, publish the case as it really happened.”

We find some explanation for this strange behavior of the seconds from Prince Vasilchikov himself. “Friends” of Lermontov and Martynov “were convinced until the last minute that the duel would end in empty shots and that, having exchanged two bullets for the sake of honor, the opponents would shake hands with each other.”

Subsequently, Martynov explained this attitude of the seconds “by the noise that was caused by the previous duel between Lermontov and Barant in 1840, where the opponents fought with swords and pistols, and, apart from the empty scratch received by Lermontov, none of them were wounded, which made both duelists and their seconds are the laughing stock of all St. Petersburg."

The duel took place on July 15 at seven o'clock in the evening on the left side of Mount Mashuk, along the road leading to one of the German colonies. There was no doctor. Vasilchikov and Glebov measured the barrier at 15 steps and from it another 10 steps in each direction. Opponents stood at the extreme points. According to the terms of the duel, each of the opponents had the right to shoot whenever he wanted, standing still or approaching the barrier.

“They loaded the pistols. Glebov gave one to Martynov, I,” says Vasilchikov, “to Lermontov, and they commanded: “Get together!” Lermontov remained motionless and, cocking the trigger, raised the pistol with the muzzle up, shielding himself with his hand and elbow according to all the rules of an experienced duelist. minute I looked at him for the last time and will never forget that calm, almost cheerful expression that played on the poet’s face in front of the barrel of a pistol already pointed at him.” Martynov quickly walked up to the barrier. The opponents did not fire for so long that one of the seconds remarked: “Will this end soon?” Martynov looked at Lermontov - a mocking, half-contemptuous smile played on his face... Martynov pulled the trigger... A fatal shot rang out...

“Lermontov fell as if he had been knocked down on the spot, without making any movement either back or forward, without even having time to grab the sore spot, as wounded or bruised people usually do. We ran up...” Martynov “kissed him and immediately left home, believing that help could still reach him in time."

“Hand on heart,” Prince Vasilchikov ends his story, “an impartial witness must admit that Lermontov himself, one might say, asked for a duel and put his opponent in such a position that he could not help but challenge him.”

There is no doubt: Martynov could not respond to Lermontov’s challenge on the merits except by sending a formal challenge, but neither Vasilchikov nor the other seconds can be recognized as “impartial witnesses” to the duel. They showed their bias, and personal bias at that, not only during the duel itself, but also for many, many years after it...

N. S. Martynov was first brought before a civil court in Pyatigorsk, but at his request the case was transferred to the Pyatigorsk military court. The Emperor confirmed the sentence with the following resolution: “Major Martynov should be kept in the fortress for three months, and then brought to church repentance.”

Martynov served his punishment in the Kyiv fortress, and then the Kiev consistory determined the period of penance at 15 years. On August 11, 1842, Martynov submitted a petition to the Synod, asking “to ease his fate as much as possible.” The Synod rejected the request, pointing out that “in the event of Martynov’s true repentance, his spiritual father may, at his own discretion, reduce the time of penance.” The following year the term was reduced by the confessor to seven years.

In 1846, Metropolitan of Kiev Philaret allowed Martynov to be communed with the holy mysteries, and on November 25 of the same year the Synod determined: “To release Martynov, as having brought worthy fruits of repentance, from further public penance, allowing his own conscience to bring sincere repentance before God for this.” in the crime he committed..."

In Kyiv, N. S. Martynov in 1845 married the daughter of the Kyiv provincial leader Joseph Mikhailovich Proskur-Sushchansky, the girl Sofya Iosifovna, and had five daughters and six sons from this marriage.

From the memoirs of I. A. Arsenyev: “As a poet, Lermontov rose to genius, but as a person he was petty and unbearable. These shortcomings and a sign of reckless persistence in them were the cause of the death of the brilliant poet from a shot fired by the hand of a kind, warm-hearted man whom Lermontov brought him almost to madness with his ridicule and even slander. Martynov, whom I knew well, to the end of his life was tormented and suffered because he was the culprit in the death of Lermontov "...

Question “M.Yu. Lermontov and Mrs. Adele Ommer de Gelle" was reflected in many works about the poet. Most of them were written in the first half of the twentieth century, already in Soviet times, when it was ideologically fashionable to denounce the tsarist autocracy and, especially, the Nicholas era for all its sins. Let's remember some of them: the story “Shtos to Life” by Boris Pilnyak, “Michel Lermontov” by Sergei Sergeev-Tsensky, “The Thirteenth Tale about Lermontov” by Pyotr Pavlenko, the novel “The Flight of Prisoners, or the History of the Suffering and Death of Lieutenant Tenginsky Infantry Regiment Mikhail Lermontov” by Konstantin Bolshakova.
There is no need to prove how politicized our entire life has been for decades. This applies not only to fiction, but also to literary criticism. According to the version, which was essentially official, the main reason for the death of Lermontov was the tsar’s hatred of the rebel poet, and the efforts of Lermontov researchers were aimed mainly at substantiating this version. Moreover, the role of the organizer of the duel was assigned to Prince A. Vasilchikov, the son of one of the tsar’s favorites. Thus, E. Gershtein calls A.I. Vasilchikov the hidden enemy of the poet and devotes an entire chapter of his book “Lermontov’s Fate” entitled “The Secret Enemy” to him. O.P. Popov believes that the role of Prince Vasilchikov “was more composed than studied, and was unlikely to be significant.” (See: Popov O.P. Lermontov and Martynov // Measure. - St. Petersburg, 1994. - No. 4. - P.84-90).
The main role in the tragedy at the foot of Mashuk, of course, was played by Nikolai Martynov, and we should first of all turn to his personality and the history of his relationship with the poet, while abandoning his primitive characterization, which was given to him for a long time: supposedly he was stupid, proud, embittered loser, graphomaniac, always under someone else's influence.
Firstly, one cannot call him a failure - after all, at the age of 25 he already had the rank of major, while Lermontov himself was just a lieutenant of the Tengin regiment, and his literary hero - Maxim Maksimych, who served all his life in the Caucasus, was a staff captain .
He most likely wasn't stupid either. For example, the Decembrist N.I., who knew him. Lorer wrote that Nikolai Solomonovich had an excellent secular education. The very fact of long-term communication between Lermontov and Martynov suggests that the latter was not a primitive person and was somehow interesting to the poet.
In fact, Lermontov’s classmate at the School of Junkers was Nikolai Solomonovich’s older brother Mikhail (1814-111860). However, it was Nikolai who was destined to become the poet’s killer.
They were both born in October (only Lermontov a year earlier), both graduated from the School of Junkers, were released into the Horse Guards (Martynov, by the way, happened to serve in the same regiment with Dantes), and they went to the Caucasus at the same time. In heavy company in 1840, they took part in expeditions and numerous skirmishes with the mountaineers. And both wrote poems about this war.
It is customary to speak disparagingly about Martynov’s poetic experiments. He himself is often called a “graphomaniac” and a “mediocre rhymer.” Hardly fair
call him that. Martynov rarely put pen to paper, and everything he wrote could fit into a very small book. His poems really cannot stand comparison with Lermontov’s. And whose, in fact, can withstand such a comparison? Although he has quite good stanzas. Here, for example, is how ironically he describes the parade in his poem “Bad Dream”:
Peaks flash by like a slender forest.

The weather vanes are colorful,
All people and horses are great,
Like a monument to Tsar Peter!
All faces have the same cut,
And he will become like the other,
All the ammunition is new,
Horses look arrogant
And from the tail to the withers
The fur is equally shiny.
Any soldier is the beauty of nature,
Any horse is a type of breed.
What about the officers? - a number of paintings,
And everything – as if alone!

Martynov also tried his hand at prose: the beginning of his story “Guasha” has been preserved - which tells the sad story of a Russian officer falling in love with a “young Circassian woman of extraordinary beauty”: “Judging by the height and flexibility of her figure, she was a young girl; by the absence of forms and especially by facial expression, a perfect child; there was something childish, something unfinished in those narrow shoulders, in that flat, not yet engorged chest...
- Imagine, Martynov, she’s only 11 years old! But what a wondrous and sweet creature this is!
And his gaze at these words was full of inexpressible tenderness.
- Here, Prince, girls are married off at the age of 11... Don’t forget that we are not in Russia here, but in the Caucasus, where everything soon matures...
From the first day that Dolgoruky saw Guasha (as the young Circassian woman was called), he felt an irresistible attraction to her; but what’s strangest of all: she, for her part, immediately fell in love with him... It happened that in fits of noisy gaiety she would run up behind him, suddenly grab him by the head and, kissing him deeply, burst into loud laughter. And all this happened in front of everyone; At the same time, she did not show either childish timidity or feminine bashfulness, and was not even somewhat embarrassed by the presence of her family.
Everything I heard extremely surprised me: I did not know how to reconcile in my mind such a free attitude of the girl with those stories about the inaccessibility of Circassian women and about the severity of morals in general... Subsequently, I became convinced that this severity exists only for married women, but they have girls enjoy extraordinary freedom..."
Martynov’s main work, the poem “Gerzel-aul,” is based on personal experience. It is a documented accurate description of the June campaign in Chechnya in 1840, in which Martynov himself took an active part:

It is interesting that Martynov’s work also truthfully reflected the realities of that time. There is, for example, a mention of the famous Caucasian chain mail:

Horsemen ride around boldly,
They prance briskly ahead;
Our people are shooting at them in vain...
They only answer with abuse,
They have chain mail on their chest...

He quite realistically describes the scene of the death of a Russian soldier wounded in battle:

Similar scenes can be found in Lermontov’s famous poem “Valerik”, based on material from the same summer campaign of 1840. It is not surprising that Martynov was subsequently accused of both “attempting creative competition” with Lermontov and “direct imitation.”
However, views on the war were different. Lermontov perceived what was happening in the Caucasus as a tragedy, tormented by the question: “Why?” Martynov was unaware of these doubts. He was fully confident in Russia’s right to use scorched earth tactics against the enemy (an issue on which Russian society is split into two camps even today):

Probably, it is up to future researchers to properly evaluate such works as a historical source. However, we must admit that there is a lot of truth in them.
It is believed that the same poem by Martynov contains a cartoon portrait of Lermontov:

We can only guess about which blonde Martynov writes in his poems...
Returning to the question of the causes and occasion of the fatal duel at the foot of Mashuk, I would like to note that, perhaps, of all the researchers who devoted entire volumes to this problem, O.P. Popov came closest to solving the long-standing mystery. In his article “Lermontov and Martynov” he analyzed all possible causes of the collision. And all of them do not seem weighty enough to him to dictate such harsh conditions for the fight.
The story of Salieri and Mozart? - Of course not. “It is impossible to find anything like this in Martynov,” writes O.P. Popov, “and he is not suitable for the role of Salieri.” – Indeed, Martynov, in fact, did not finish a single literary work of his. Apparently, he did not consider his literary calling to be the main thing. Although... Every Mozart has his own Salieri. It is not without reason that Popov also refutes the version of V. Vatsuro, who wrote at one time: “Neither Nicholas 1, nor Benckendorff, nor even Martynov hatched plans to kill Lermontov, the man. But all of them - each in their own way - created an atmosphere in which there was no place for Lermontov the poet.”
Martynov killed Lermontov, the man. How it was possible to create an atmosphere in which there would be no place for Lermontov, the poet, is unclear. So it turns out that, if we discard the absurd fiction that there was no duel at all, and that the poet was killed by a bribed Cossack (Korotkov’s, Schwemberger’s version), there remains an unresolved mystery in Lermontov studies with the name “Adel”, and even a version about Martynov’s defense of his sister’s honor . Refuting the latter, Oleg Panteleimonovich Popov says that “the sister was proud of being considered the prototype of Princess Mary,” and, therefore, did not need to defend her honor. Well, maybe my sister was proud. But the relatives didn’t like it at all. Again, a question of the culture and mentality of that time. After all, there is evidence that not only idle gossips, but also quite serious readers of Lermontov’s novel (Granovsky, Katkov) saw in Princess Mary Martynov’s younger sister, and they believed that the princess, like her mother, was depicted in an unfavorable light. And as for the story with the package of letters from Natalya, transferred from Martynov’s house through the poet, which apparently previously left a negative imprint on the relationship between friends, even though Lermontov scholars convincingly prove that Lermontov was not at fault here, he did not open the package, he did not read the letters and didn’t destroy it, but Martynov’s mother thought differently...
In our opinion, two points turned out to be very important in discussions about the pre-duel situation: firstly, the need to combine the version of the history of Lermontov’s relationship with the French woman Adel with the version about Martynov’s defense of his sister’s honor, Secondly, it was no less important to understand the issue of dating Adele Ommer’s stay de Gelle in the Caucasus, which Lermontov scholars have so far failed to do. And only the introduction of Karl Baer’s materials into scientific circulation (in relation to Lermontov studies, this was done for the first time by us - E.S.) made it possible to reasonably say that the French traveler was in the Caucasus from 1839 to 1841 inclusive.
Thus, in our opinion, a completely convincing version of the quarrel between Lermontov and Martynov emerges. After all, the real cause of the quarrel could not have been a trivial, not even offensive joke, said by Lermontov in French at an evening in the house of General Verzilin: “A highlander with a large dagger” (montaqnard au qrand poiqnard). “Martynov, when he wanted, knew how to laugh it off; in the end, he could end the acquaintance, maintaining his dignity,” writes O.P. Popov.
We regard what happened in Pyatigorsk as a great human tragedy. The tragedy of misunderstanding. Discrepancies between two mentalities, two views on life. A respectable Martynov, integrated into the social structure of the society of his time, and a transcendental lyricist who was destined to become the music of the soul of his people. He was not born to reproduce biological mass. He had a different purpose, which is given to one out of millions. Many of Lermontov’s contemporaries failed to realize this purpose.
Even today you can still hear many questions about this complex, multifaceted nature. Probably, it can only be understood from the standpoint of philosophical knowledge. That is why we turn, with a noticeable delay, to the works of Russian religious philosophers Danilevsky and Solovyov. With their help, we will have to understand in all depth both the life of the great Lermontov and his work, which has become the most expensive stone in the treasury of Russian literature.

Addition.

We find an interesting episode in the work of D.M. Pavlov “Prototypes of Princess Mary” (separate prints from the newspaper “Caucasian Territory” Nos. 156 and 157, 1916). He cites the witticism that Lermontov and Martynov allegedly exchanged:
“Marry Lermontov,” his self-confident comrade told him, “I will make you a cuckold.”
“If my most ardent desire,” the poet allegedly answered, “comes true, then for you, dear friend, it will be impossible.”
Further, Pavlov writes: “From these words, Martynov concluded that Lermontov “has designs on his sister’s hand.” These guesses, however, were not justified. In 1841, Lermontov became interested in other prominent beauties and did this in front of the brother of his former crush...
It is quite possible that it was this change of front that gave the Martynov family the imaginary right to express the statement that “Lermontov compromised the sisters of his future murderer” (Russian Archive, 1893, book 2. - P. 610, prince D. Obolensky). And this circumstance, in connection with the inflated story about the letter and diary of Natalya Solomonovna allegedly printed by the poet, played, as we know, the role of the most important reason in the history of Martynov’s hatred of his former friend...
It was not for nothing that the crowd gathered in the courtyard of the Chilaevskaya estate, to which the poet’s lifeless body was brought, repeated the rumor that the reason for the duel was the young lady.
“The duel happened because of a young lady!” someone shouted to Lieutenant Colonel Untilov, who was conducting the investigation (Karpos, Rus.M., 78. – 1890., S.KhP).