Alexey Bestuzhev - Ryumin Count Alexey Petrovich Bestuzhev - Ryumin ( ) ( 1 June 1693 – 21 April 1768 ) , Grand Chancellor of Russia , was one of the most influential and successful European diplomats of the 18th century . He was chiefly responsible for Russian foreign policy during the reign of Empress Elizaveta Petrovna . Early life and career . Alexey was born at Moscow to an old noble family of Novgorod descent . His father , Pyotr Bestuzhev , was later to become the Russian ambassador to the duchy of Courland . Educated abroad with his elder brother Mikhail at Copenhagen and Berlin , Aleksey especially distinguished himself in languages and the applied sciences . In 1712 , Peter the Great attached Bestuzhev to Prince Kurakin at the Utrecht Congress , that he might learn diplomacy ; and for the same reason permitted him in 1713 to enter the service of the elector of Hanover . The elector , who became King George I of Great Britain , took him to London in 1714 , and sent him to Saint Petersburg as his accredited minister with a notification of his accession . Bestuzhev then returned to England , where he remained four years . This period laid the necessary groundwork for his brilliant diplomatic career . Bestuzhev curiously illustrated his passion for intrigue in a letter to the tsarevich Alexey Petrovich at Vienna , assuring his " future sovereign " of his devotion , and representing his sojourn in England as the deliberate seclusion of a zealous but powerless well - wisher . This extraordinary indiscretion might well have cost him his life , but the tsarevich destroyed the letter . ( A copy of the letter taken by way of precaution , beforehand , by the Austrian ministers , survived in the Vienna archives . ) On his return to Russia , Bestuzhev served for two years without any salary as chief gentleman of the Bedchamber at the court of Anne of Courland . In 1721 , he succeeded Vasily Dolgorukov as Russian minister at Copenhagen . Copenhagen at that time formed a nexus of diplomatic intrigue , for George I of Great Britain had the aim of arming the northern powers against Peter the Great , and Bestuzhev received the commission to counteract this . On the occasion of the peace of Nystad ( 1721 ) , which terminated the Great Northern War ' s 21 years of struggle between Russia and Sweden , Bestuzhev designed and had minted a commemorative medal with a panegyrical Latin inscription , which so delighted Peter ( then at Derbent ) that he sent a letter of thanks written with his own hand and his portrait set in brilliants . It was at this time that the many - sided Bestuzhev invented his famous " drops " , or " tincture toniconervina Bestuscheffi " . ( The French brigadier Lamotte stole the recipe and made his fortune by introducing it at the French court , where it was known as " Elixir d ' Or " ) . The sudden death of Peter the Great ( 8 February 1725 ) seriously injured Bestuzhev ' s prospects . For more than ten years he remained at Copenhagen , looking vainly towards Russia as a sort of promised land from which he was excluded by enemies or rivals . He rendered some important services , however , to the empress Anne ( reigned 1730 – 1740 ) , who decorated him and made him a privy councillor . He also won the favour of Ernst von Biren , and on the tragic fall of Artemy Petrovich Volynsky in 1739 , Bestuzhev returned to Russia to take Volynsky ' s place in the council . He assisted Biren to obtain the regency in the last days of the empress Anne , but when his patron fell three weeks later ( November 1740 ) , his own position became extremely precarious . Grand Chancellor of the Russian Empire . Bestuzhev ' s chance came when the empress Elizabeth , immediately after her accession ( 6 December 1741 ) , summoned him back to court and appointed him vice - chancellor . For the next twenty years , during a period of exceptional difficulty , Bestuzhev practically controlled the foreign policy of Russia . At this time , Bestuzhev judged France the natural enemy of Russia . The interests of the two states in Turkey , Poland and Sweden clashed diametrically , and Russia needed always to fear the intrigues of France in these three countries , all of which bordered it . The enemies of France thus necessarily became the friends of Russia , and her friends were conversely viewed as Russia ' s enemies . Consequently , Great Britain and Austria became Russia ' s " natural " allies , while the aggressive and energetic king Frederick II of Prussia , then engaged in the War of the Austrian Succession of 1740 – 1748 , presented a danger to guard against . Bestuzhev therefore adopted the policy of bringing about a quadruple alliance between Russia , Austria , Great Britain and Saxony , to counterpoise the Franco - Prussian league . He however stood on dangerous ground . The empress Elizabeth herself had an aversion to an alliance with Great Britain and with Austria , whose representatives had striven to prevent her accession ; many of her personal friends , in the pay of France and Prussia , took part in innumerable conspiracies to overthrow Bestuzhev . Despite these hindrances , Bestuzhev , aided by his elder brother Mikhail , carried out his policy step by step . Russia and Sweden had commenced hostilities in 1741 . On 11 December 1742 Bestuzhev concluded a defensive alliance between Great Britain and Russia . He had previously rejected with scorn the proposals of the French government to mediate between Russia and Sweden on the basis of a territorial surrender on the part of the former . Bestuzhev conducted the war so vigorously that by the end of 1742 , Sweden lay at the mercy of the empress . At the peace congress of Åbo ( January — August 1743 ) Bestuzhev insisted that Sweden cede the whole of Finland to Russia , thus completing the work of Peter the Great . But the French party contrived to get better terms for Sweden by artfully appealing to the empress Elizabeth ' s fondness for the house of Holstein . The Swedes , at the desire of Elizabeth , accepted Adolphus Frederick , duke of Holstein , as their future king , and , in return , received back Finland , with the exception of a small strip of land up to the Kymmene River . Nor could Bestuzhev prevent the signing of a Russo - Prussian defensive alliance in March 1743 . He however deprived it of all political significance by excluding from it the proposed guarantee of Frederick ' s Silesian conquests . Moreover , through Bestuzhev ' s efforts , the credit of the Prussian king ( whom he regarded as more dangerous than France ) at the Russian court fell steadily , and the vice - chancellor prepared the way for an alliance with Austria by acceding to the Treaty of Breslau of 11 June 1742 on 1 November 1743 ) . The bogus Lopukhina Conspiracy , however , got up by the Holstein faction , aided by France and Prussia , who persuaded Elizabeth that the Austrian ambassador had intrigued to restore Ivan VI to the throne , alienated the empress from Austria for a time . Thus Bestuzhev ' s ruin appeared certain when , in 1743 , the French agent , Jacques - Joachim Trotti , marquis de la Chétardie , arrived to reinforce his other enemies . But Bestuzhev found a friend in need in Mikhail Illarionovich Vorontsov , the empress ' s confidant , who shared his political views . Still his position remained most delicate , especially when the betrothal between the grand - duke Peter and Sophia of Anhalt - Zerbst ( afterwards Catherine II ) took place against his will , and Elizabeth of Holstein , the mother of the bride , arrived in the Prussian interests to spy upon him . Frederick II , conscious of the instability of his French ally , now keenly wished to contract an offensive alliance with Russia ; and the first step to its realization required the overthrow of Bestuzhev , " upon whom , " he wrote to his minister Axel von Mardefeld , " the fate of Prussia and my own house depends . " But Bestuzhev succeeded , at last , in convincing the empress of Chétardie ' s impudent intrigues , and on 6 June 1744 , that diplomatist received orders to quit Russia within twenty - four hours . Five weeks later Bestuzhev became grand chancellor ( 15 July 1744 ) . Before the end of the year Elizabeth of Holstein also suffered expulsion from Russia , and Bestuzhev remained supreme . Anti - Prussian coalition . European diplomacy at this time focused on the king of Prussia , whose apparently insatiable acquisitiveness disturbed all his neighbours . Bestuzhev ' s offer , communicated to the British government at the end of 1745 , to attack Prussia if Great Britain would guarantee subsidies to the amount of some £6 , 000 , 000 , carried no weight now that Austria and Prussia had started coming to terms . Then Bestuzhev turned to Austria , and on 22 May 1746 concluded an offensive and defensive alliance between the two powers manifestly directed against Prussia . In 1747 , he also signed alliances with Denmark and the Porte . At the same time Bestuzhev resisted any rapprochement with France , and severely rebuked the court of Saxony for its intrigues with that of Versailles . About this time he felt hampered by the persistent opposition of the vice - chancellor Mikhail Vorontsov , formerly his friend , now his jealous rival , whom Frederick the Great secretly supported . In 1748 , however , Bestuzhev got rid of Vorontsov by proving to the empress that Vorontsov had received money from Prussia . The hour of Bestuzhev ' s triumph coincided with the peace congress of Aix - la - Chapelle ( April to October 1748 ) , which altered the whole situation of European politics and introduced fresh combinations : the breaking away of Prussia from France and a " rapprochement " between England and Prussia , with the inevitable corollary of an alliance between France and the enemies of Prussia . Bestuzhev ' s violent political prejudices at first prevented him from properly recognizing this change . Passion had always been too large an ingredient in his diplomacy . His Anglomania also misled him . His enemies , headed by his elder brother Mikhail and the vice - chancellor Vorontsov , powerless while his diplomacy seemed faultless , quickly took advantage of his mistakes . When , on 16 January 1756 , the Anglo - Prussian , and on 2 May 1756 the Franco - Austrian alliances formed , Vorontsov advocated the accession of Russia to the latter league , whereas Bestuzhev insisted on a subsidy treaty with Great Britain . But his influence had started to wane . The totally unexpected Anglo - Prussian alliance had justified the arguments of his enemies that England seemed impossible , while his hatred of France prevented him from adopting the only alternative of an alliance with her . To prevent underground intrigues , Bestuzhev now proposed the erection of a council of ministers to settle all important affairs , and its first session ( 14 – 30 March 1756 ) proposed an alliance with Austria , France and Poland against Frederick II , though Bestuzhev opposed any composition with France . He endeavoured to support his failing credit by a secret alliance with the grand - duchess Catherine , whom he proposed to raise to the throne instead of her Holstein husband , Peter , from whom Bestuzhev expected nothing good either for himself or for Russia . He conducted negotiations through the Pole Stanislaus Poniatowski . The accession of Russia to the anti - Prussian coalition ( 1756 ) of the Seven Years ' War ( 1756 – 1763 ) occurred over Bestuzhev ' s head , and the cowardice and incapacity of his friend , the Russian commander - in - chief , Stephen Apraksin , after winning the Battle of Gross - Jägersdorf ( 30 August 1757 ) , became the pretext for overthrowing the chancellor . His unwillingness to agree to the coalition became magnified in opposition accounts into a determination to defeat it , though obviously that he could only gain by the humiliation of Frederick , and his opponents never proved anything against him . Nevertheless he lost the chancellorship and suffered banishment to his estate at Goretovo ( April 1759 ) , where he remained till the accession of Catherine II ( 28 June 1762 ) . Catherine recalled him to court and made him a field marshal . However , he took no leading part in affairs and died on 21 April 1768 , the last of his race .