Presidential Library spotlights unique facts about the life of Denis Davydov

Denis Vasilyevich Davydov was born 235 years ago, on July 27, 1784, in Moscow. He was destined for military career. His father - brigadier V. D. Davydov, served in A. V. Suvorov’s army. Denis's childhood took place in a military camp in Borodino - the estate of his father and grandfather.

The Presidential Library’s portal features “The Patriotic War of 1812” collection, illustrating outstanding commanders of those years, a prominent place among which, of course, belongs to Denis Davydov. A separate selection is devoted to the partisan movement, initiated by the hero.

Essay about Davydov from V. A. Potto’s book “The Caucasian War in Selected Essays, Episodes, Legends and Biographies” provides description of the officer’s life from birth to death.  

Davydov began service in 1801 in the horse guard in St. Petersburg. The carefree life in the capital could have been dragged into the “mud of mediocrity”. Davydov eagerly took up books and soon became one of the most educated officers of his time. The beginning of poetic experiences also belongs to that time. Davydov wrote the first poem in 1803.

A year later, he was transferred to the Belarusian Hussars in Kiev province for writing satirical works affecting the emperor Alexander I and the court nobility. That occasion was the first evil mockery of the officer. Dreaming to fight on the front line, Denis Davydov could not take part in the famous battle of Austerlitz.  

Two years later, he manages to return to the guards to the hussars who fought near Austerlitz. But... A new war — and the Byelorussian regiment, which Davydov had just left, goes on a military campaign to Prussia, and the guard remains in place! In the hussar regiment, "we lived well: we had more friendship than services, more stories than deeds", - recalled the future partisan.

Finally, in 1806, his efforts provided success — he left the “celebrating service” and was appointed adjutant to Prince Bagration.

The first battles made an indelible impression on Davydov, he glorified the "noble tsar of blood" on the blade of his sword. His enthusiastic words are given in the essay by V. A. Potto.

As an adjutant of Bagration, Davydov managed to take part in the wars with France (1806–1807), Sweden (1808–1809), and Turkey (1809–1812).

He met the military campaign of 1812 by a lieutenant colonel of the Akhtyrsky hussar regiment. A few days before the famous battle of Borodino, Denis Davydov made one of the most important decisions in his life.

V. V. Jerve's book “Partisan-poet Denis Vasilyevich Davydov” (1913), available in the electronic reading rooms of the Presidential Library, states: “On August 21, 1812, in the village of Borodino, where Davydov grew up and where hastily dismantled his father’s house for fortifications, five days before the great battle, Denis Vasilyevich suggested to Bagration the idea of ​​his own partisan detachment”.

In part, it was probably an emotional decision. “There, on a hillock”, - Davydov wrote later, “where I once frolicked and dreamed, where I read the news about the conquest of Italy by Suvorov, about the shallows of thunder Russian weapons on the borders of France”, they laid out the Raevsky redoubt. A beautiful wood in front of a hillock turned into a notch and was boiled by huntsmen, as there used to be a pack of hound dogs with whom I ran about in mosses and marshes. Everything has changed!"

That evening, Bagration sent for Davydov and announced that Kutuzov had agreed to send partisans "for trial" to the rear of the French army, but, doubting success, he appointed only 50 hussars and 80 Cossacks to the Davydov command.

Kutuzov was not alone in his distrust - many doubted the success of the daring plan of the recent adjutant, wit, and poet, that is, a person who was not very capable, as he himself described himself at that moment...

However, the actions of Denis Davydov in the rear of the enemy were very successful. His detachment was constantly growing by people, and the French soon began to fear the partisans as fire.

The poetic gift of a partisan is reflected in the publication Poems and Articles / Denis Davydov (1942).

In addition to the poems there were also songs: “I love a bloody battle, / I was born for the service of the Tsar! / Saber, vodka, hussars’s horse, / my golden age!"

By the way, the poetic talent of Denis Davydov was greatly appreciated by Pushkin. Answering the question of how he managed in his youth not to succumb to the influence of Zhukovsky or Batyushkov and not to imitate either one or the other in his first experiments, Pushkin answered that he owes this to Denis Davydov, who “still in high school made him feel like an original". The Russian Archive publication on the Presidential Library’s portal contains Pushkin's letter to Davydov.