Badge of the Order of St. Anna on the sword: new data on the time of appearance and the first awards

Abstract

The article examines the previously unpublished decree of Emperor Paul I on the establishment of the badge of the Order of St. Anna on the sword and the infantry officer sword from the Chapter of the Russian Orders, from the Armory of the Moscow Kremlin Museums. It can be assumed that it could belong to one of the thirteen people awarded the badge of the Order of St. Anne for a sword in September-October 1796, or to someone else who received a badge for weapons before the end of 1796, when the first batch of infantry swords was made for the Chapter. A sword with the sign of the order could enter the Chapter in 1798, when one of the first recipients of the sword sign, Evgraf Osipovich Gruzinov, was disgraced. All the awards he received from PaulI were confiscated. Only the study of the parish books of the Chapter of Russian orders can confirm or refute this version, which will be the next stage in the study of this monument. It is also possible to argue that the sword entered the Chapter at the very beginning of the reign of Paul I, before in 1797 the first batches of award Anninsky swords began to be made, also made by Theremin’s enterprise according to the model, an infantry officer’s sword, conventionally called the 1798 model, which have a hook at the mouth of the sheath for suspension.