Nikolay Konstantinovich Muravyov (1870–1936) was a Russian lawyer, public figure, and Freemason, one of the most prominent representatives of Moscow political defense at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He is connected to the Nizhny Novgorod region through a number of high-profile political trials, including the case concerning anti-government demonstrations in Nizhny Novgorod and Sormovo (1902).[1]
Biography and Education
A hereditary nobleman, he was born on 21 March 1870 in the selo of Shcherbinino, Tver Uyezd (14 versts from Tver), where the modest Muravyov family estate was located. His father, Konstantin Gavrilovich, rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel and served in the criminal police; his mother, Varvara Fyodorovna, came from the noble Lavrov family.[2]
In 1887 he graduated from the 1st Moscow Gymnasium and enrolled in the medical faculty of Moscow University. In the spring of 1891 he took part in the Shelgunov demonstration, was expelled, and exiled to Kazan under covert police surveillance. He studied for a year in the medical faculty of Kazan University but again came under agent surveillance. In the autumn of 1892 he returned to Moscow and transferred to the law faculty; however, on 28 October 1894 he was arrested again — for ties with political émigrés and the distribution of proclamations — and exiled, this time to his native Shcherbinino. He received his higher education diploma in 1896, having passed the examinations for the law faculty of Kazan University as an external candidate.[1][2]
Legal Career
In the autumn of 1896 Muravyov was taken on as an assistant to sworn attorney N. P. Rozhdestvenskiy. From 1900 he was a sworn attorney at the Moscow Judicial Chamber, and from 1910 to 1916 he served continuously as a member of the Moscow Council of Sworn Attorneys.[2]
In 1896, together with four colleagues — P. N. Malyantovich, V. A. Maklakov, N. V. Teslenko, and M. F. Khodasevich (brother of the poet Vladislav Khodasevich) — he founded a circle of young lawyers that entered history as the "Moscow quintet." This association became the first and most authoritative circle of political defense in Russia.[1] Between 1900 and 1905, Muravyov appeared in 16 major political trials — more than any of his colleagues. His cases included the trial concerning the anti-government demonstrations in Nizhny Novgorod and Sormovo), the case of the sailors' uprising in Sevastopol, and many others.[1] Among those he defended were N. E. Bauman, L. D. Trotsky, N. I. Bukharin, A. I. Rykov, M. N. Pokrovskiy, and N. A. Rozhkov.[2]
Public Activity
Muravyov served as chairman of the Committee of the Political Red Cross and as executor of Leo Tolstoy's estate.[2] After the The February Revolution he was appointed chairman of the Extraordinary Investigative Commission of the Provisional Government; the commission had not completed its work October Revolution.[1] After 1917 he served as legal counsel to a number of Soviet institutions: the Moscow People's Bank, the Kustarsouz, the organization Eksportlkheb, the People's Commissariat of Education, and the People's Commissariat of Foreign Trade.[1]
In 2004, through the efforts of Muravyov's granddaughter T. A. Ugrimova and his grandson A. G. Volkov, a collection of materials about him was published — the first systematic compilation of sources on the lawyer's life and work.[2]
Sources
- homsk.com — Who was Nikolay Konstantinovich Muravyov
- secrethistory.su — Muravyov Nikolay Konstantinovich (1870–1936)