Elizaveta Vorontsova

Countess Elizaveta Romanovna Vorontsova (; 13 August 1739 – 2 February 1792) was a Russian noblewoman and lady-in-waiting. She was a mistress of Emperor Peter III of Russia (reigned February to July 1762). During their affair, rumors suggested that Peter had intentions of divorcing his wife Catherine (the future empress) in order to marry Vorontsova. Life She belonged to the celebrated Vorontsov family that reached the pinnacle of power during the last years of the reign of Empress Elizabeth—Elizaveta's uncle, Mikhail Illarionovich, served as Imperial Chancellor from 1758 to 1765. Her father, General Roman Vorontsov (1717–1783), governed the provinces of Vladimir, Penza, Tambov (1778–1783), and Kostroma, where his name became a byword for graft and inefficiency. Court life Following her mother's death in 1750, the 11-year-old Elizaveta was attached to the Oranienbaum court of Grand Duke Peter's wife, Grand Duchess Catherine Alekseyevna (at this time, Peter was the heir to the Russian Imperial throne). Accounts portray Elizaveta as extremely uncouth: She "swore like a soldier, squinted her eyes, smelled bad, and spit while talking". Baron de Breteuil compared her appearance to that of a "scullery maid of the lowliest kind". Catherine wrote of her as "very ugly, extremely dirty child with an olive skin". Peter, however, developed a fondness for her, which the court was at a loss to explain. Catherine called Elizaveta a "new Madame de Pompadour" (of whom she greatly disapproved), and the Grand Duke took to calling her "my Romanova" (a pun on her patronymic, Romanovna: his own surname was Romanov). After Elizaveta's lover became emperor in January 1762, he invested her with the Order of Saint Catherine and had rooms prepared for her next to his own in the newly built Winter Palace. She accompanied Peter in all his excursions and adventures, and foreign ambassadors reported to their governments that the emperor intended to banish his wife to a convent in order to marry Vorontsova. Some claim that these rumors drove Catherine to join efforts with Vorontsova's sister, Princess Ekaterina Dashkova, and to stage the palace coup which removed her husband from power in July 1762. Controversy endures to the present day as to whether Catherine took any part in Peter's death 8 days later on 17 July 1762.