The long-awaited path to the “monument of federal significance” was opened in the Moscow region

The Moscow region has grown into another public attraction. On August 8, the grand opening of the historical trail of Vasily Tatishchev, a historian, an outstanding statesman of the Petrine era, took place. For several decades, his grave remained hidden from almost everyone in the wilderness, on an abandoned old churchyard. But now there is a convenient pedestrian road.

This year, special attention is paid to Tatishchev. After all, it was thanks to the efforts of this energetic person that 300 years ago, the Yekaterinburg iron and mechanical plant was laid on the Ural river Iset. So the foundation was laid for the capital of the Urals, Yekaterinburg.

Vasily Nikitich has many other merits to the Motherland. He was an amazingly versatile person – one of those “sovereign people” who devoted his life to serving Russia, whose energy, successful work contributed to the implementation of the most daring plans of Peter the Great to build an empire.

Metallurgist, engineer, organizer of the mining industry. The founder of not only Yekaterinburg, but also several other large cities – Perm, modern Togliatti … The organizer of important innovations in the financial system of the state. And also a bibliophile, connoisseur and collector of ancient manuscripts, author of the first Russian history.

Tatishchev erected a miraculous monument to himself with his deeds and embodied projects. But with the “folk trail” to it, the situation turned out to be much worse. Vasily Nikitich, who died in 1750, was buried not far from his Boldino estate near Moscow, at the Christmas churchyard. After some time, this cemetery was abandoned. For almost 200 years, the grave of an outstanding statesman was considered lost and was discovered and brought into at least relative order by the efforts of enthusiasts only in the 1970s. This burial was then declared a monument of history and culture of federal significance. However, even after that, only a few were able to visit there. After all, there are no normal roads to the Christmas churchyard.

The MK correspondent ended up in those places in the fall of 2021. Such an expedition was prompted by communication with activists of the regional public organization “Ural community”, who were concerned about the problem of returning “from oblivion” the memory of this wonderful person. The search for the burial place of Tatishchev turned into a real adventure for the reporter. From the nearest village, Shakhmatovo, we had to walk through fields, forests, and ravines. At the same time, only a barely noticeable path remained as a guiding thread, sometimes “treating” difficult areas – with mud and steep slopes of ravines. And at the end of such a “quest” – an old cemetery overgrown with forest and a grave with an ancient white stone tombstone. On one of its faces there is an inscription in a half-erased ornate font: “Vasily Nikitich Tatishchev was born in 1686. … in Boldino in 1750 he died on July 15th. I described my impressions of this “missing place” in an article published in our newspaper. Frankly speaking, there was no particular hope that the situation would change for the better in the foreseeable future, but…

Almost two years have passed since then, and now the problem with the availability of this “monument of federal significance” in the Solnechnogorsk region has been successfully resolved. Through the efforts of the authorities of Yekaterinburg, with the support of the Government of the Moscow Region and thanks to the help of the activists of the “Ural community” to the burial place of Vasily Tatishchev, the Tatishchevskaya trail was laid from the outskirts of the village of Shakhmatovo – a special footpath that can be used all year round. We hope that that publication in MK two years ago played a role in promoting such a project.

On August 8, the “road to Tatishchev” was opened. Aide to the President of the Russian Federation, Chairman of the Russian Military Historical Society Vladimir Medinsky, Governors of the Moscow and Sverdlovsk Regions Andrei Vorobyov and Evgeny Kuyvashev, Chairman of the State Duma Committee Pavel Krasheninnikov, Head of Yekaterinburg Alexei Orlov, President of the Ural Community in Moscow Vladimir Scary…

– Vasily Nikitich Tatishchev is a truly unique person, – Vladimir Medinsky emphasized in his speech. – Among other things, his merit in the study of the history of Russia is great. After all, this is “pre-Karamzin” – in fact, the first domestic system historian. Here, nearby in the village of Boldino are the ruins of the Tatishchev estate. RVIO has now begun to restore it. Within a few years, a whole complex of attractions will appear in this area of ​​​​the Moscow region, which will attract masses of tourists here.

– I really hope that this project, the Tatishchevskaya trail, will give an additional impetus to the knowledge of our national history by our citizens, – Evgeny Kuyvashev continued the topic. – In fact, here, in the Solnechnogorsk district of the Moscow region, we are joining our efforts with the RVIO in order to restore the memory of the remarkable statesman and scientist of the Petrine era, Vasily Nikitich Tatishchev, who did so much for our Ural region.

And the head of Yekaterinburg, Alexei Orlov, told the audience about how the Tatishchevskaya trail, now open to visitors, was “born”.

– Two years ago I met with Vladimir Petrovich Strashko, head of the Ural community in Moscow, and he fascinated me with the idea of ​​making Tatishchev’s forgotten and abandoned grave accessible for mass visits. We managed to agree on all organizational and legal issues with the leadership of the Moscow Region and this summer we began the construction of an all-weather footpath. We really wanted to be in time for the upcoming anniversary – the 300th anniversary of our Yekaterinburg. And we did it! Now here, in the north of the Moscow region, a “piece of the Urals” has appeared …

Laying a new, no longer overgrown “folk path” to the burial place of the famous Russian historian and statesman was by no means the easiest thing from a technical point of view. Some details on whose account the MK correspondent managed to learn from Fedor Sterkhov, who supervised the construction work, being a representative of the customer – the leadership of Yekaterinburg.

– The total length of the new memorial trail is 1225 meters. I had to clear the old, thoroughly overgrown path. For the convenience of future visitors, it was decided to build two bridges across the ravines on the way. The length of each of them is about 30 meters, and the height is 3-4 meters. Difficulties were added by the inaccessibility of many sites. Only for the first 400 meters of the trail was it possible to bring equipment and building materials by car. And the laying of the remaining two-thirds of the trail is entirely manual labor. The workers themselves carried metal piles, supports, boards for wooden flooring there … In total, all the work took 24 days.

The participants of the solemn ceremony walked along a new historical path to the burial place of V. Tatishchev. Here, indeed, everything is done with maximum care for visitors. The flooring is such that the feet do not slip even in wet weather, fences and railings are made along the edges of the roadbed raised above the ground, thanks to poles with lamps, the route is accessible even if dusk has come. Information boards have been installed in several places, telling about the various aspects of Vasily Tatishchev’s activities.

The grave of the historian and statesman has also been landscaped. Laying flowers to her, Vladimir Medinsky could not resist commenting approvingly: “Vasily Nikitich would be glad if he saw all this: after all, his truth has triumphed!”

Among those dozens of people who walked along the Tatishchevskaya path on the very first day, there was also a representative of the Tatishchev family. Marianna Dmitrievna Tatishcheva is the great-granddaughter of the founder of Yekaterinburg in the ninth generation.

– In the past years, I have repeatedly been here, making my way along the impassability to an abandoned graveyard, with my own hands clearing a stone on the grave of my great ancestor. To be honest, I was afraid that I would not live to see that happy moment when a more or less decent road would be laid to the resting place of Vasily Nikitich. And now – survived! Today is a holiday not only for me, but for everyone who cares about preserving historical memory in Russia.