Vyacheslav Konstantinovich von Plehve (Вячесла́в Константи́нович фон Пле́ве), also Pléhve, or Pleve (20 April [O.S. 8 April] 1846 in Meshchovsk, Kaluga Guberniya – 28 July [O.S. 15 July] 1904 in St Petersburg) was the director of Imperial Russia's police and later Minister of the Interior.
Contents |
He was the only son of schoolteacher Konstantin von Plehve and Elizaveta Mikhailovna Shamaev, daughter of a minor landowner. In 1851 Plehve's family moved from Meshchovsk to Warsaw, where his father accepted a job as instructor in a gymnasium.
After studying law at the Moscow University, he became a prosecutor's assistant in 1867 and served in various positions in the Ministry of Justice. He served as assistant prosecutor in the Vladimir circuit court and as prosecutor in Vologda. In 1876 he was appointed assistant prosecutor of the Warsaw Chamber of Justice, and - in 1879 - prosecutor of the St. Petersburg Chamber of Justice.
In 1881 he investigated the murder of Alexander II and then joined the MVD as a Director of the Department of Police, also in charge of Okhrana. He is credited with the destruction of numerous "People's Will" terrorist groups.
He became a member of the Governing Senate in 1884 and Assistant Minister of Interior in 1885. As Assistant Minister, at first under Count Dmitry Tolstoy and later under his successor, Ivan Durnovo, Plehve had shown definite administrative talent.
Made an Actual Privy Counsellor in 1899, he was Finnish Minister Secretary of State from that year until 1904. He supported the abolition of the separate Finnish army in 1901.
In April 1902, following the assassination of Dmitry Sipyagin, he was appointed Minister of the Interior and Chief of Gendarmes. After a brief attempt at conciliation with the zemstvo conservatives failed, he relapsed - disbanding the police-supported labour unions (zubatovshchina).
In August 1903 he met with Theodor Herzl in Saint Petersburg, discussing the establishment of Zionist societies in Russia and proposed a Russian government request to the Turks to obtain a charter for Jewish colonisation of Palestine.[1]
Plehve was an obvious target for revolutionaries. After he did nothing to prevent a bloody wave of anti-Jewish violence in 1903, the known double agent Evno Azef decided not to inform on the SR plans to kill Plehve. He survived one attack in 1903 and two in 1904 before the Socialist-Revolutionary Combat Group succeeded. On 15 July 1904 a bomb was thrown into Plehve's carriage by Yegor Sazonov, in Saint Petersburg, killing him. He was 58 years old.
Plehve had used his position as Minister of Interior to insist that Hirsh Lekert, the assassin of the governor of Vilna, Victor von Wahl, be tried under wartime law. This virtually guaranteed a death sentence.[2]
| Preceded by Dmitry Sergeyevich Sipyagin |
Minister of Interior 1902 – 1904 |
Succeeded by Prince Pyotr Dmitrievich Sviatopolk-Mirskii |
| Preceded by Victor Napoleon Procopé |
Finnish Minister Secretary of State 1899 – 1904 |
Succeeded by Edvard Oeström |