1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Paskevich, Ivan Fedorovich

PASKEVICH, IVAN FEDOROVICH (1782–1856), count of Erivan, prince of Warsaw, Russian field marshal, descended from an old and wealthy family, was born at Poltava on the 19th (8th) of May 1782. He was educated at the imperial institution for pages, where his progress was rapid, and in 1800 received his commission in the Guards and was named aide-de-camp to the tsar. His first active service was in 1805, in the auxiliary army sent to the assistance of Austria against France, when he took part in the battle of Austerlitz. From 1807 to 1812 he was engaged in the campaigns against Turkey, and distinguished himself by many brilliant and daring exploits, being made a general officer in his thirtieth year. During the French War of 1812–14 he was present, in command of the 26th division of infantry, at all the most important engagements; at the battle of Leipzig he won promotion to the rank of lieutenant-general. On the outbreak of war with Persia in 1826 he was appointed second in command, and, succeeding in the following year to the chief command, gained rapid and brilliant successes which compelled the shah to sue for peace in February 1828. In reward of his services he was named by the emperor count of Erivan, and received a million of roubles and a diamond-mounted sword. From Persia he was sent to Turkey in Asia, and, having captured in rapid succession the principal fortresses, he was at the end of the campaign made a field marshal at the age of forty-seven. In 1830 he subdued the mountaineers of Daghestan. In 1831 he was entrusted with the command of the army sent to suppress the revolt of Poland, and after the fall of Warsaw, which gave the death-blow to Polish independence, he was raised to the dignity of prince of Warsaw, and created viceroy of the kingdom of Poland. On the outbreak of the insurrection of Hungary in 1848 he was appointed to the command of the Russian troops sent to the aid of Austria, and finally compelled the surrender of the Hungarians at Világos. In April 1854 he again took the field in command of the army of the Danube, but on the 9th of June, at Silistria, where he suffered defeat, he received a contusion which compelled him to retire from active service. He died on the 13th (1st) of February 1856 at Warsaw, where in 1869 a memorial was erected to him. He held the rank of field marshal in the Prussian and Austrian armies as well as in his own service.

See Tolstoy, Essai biographique et historique sur le feld-maréchal Prince de Varsovie (Paris, 1835); Notice biographique sur le Maréchal Paskévitch (Leipzig, 1856); and Prince Stcherbatov’s Life (St Petersburg, 1888–1894).