Aleksey Arakcheyev Count Alexey Andreyevich Arakcheyev or Arakcheev ( ) ( – ) was a Russian general and statesman under the reign of Alexander I . He served under Paul I and Alexander I as army leader and artillery inspector respectively . He had a violent temper , but was otherwise a competent artillerist , and is known for his reforms of tzarist artillery known as the " System of 1805 " . After the Tsar ' s death and Nicholas I ' s coronation , he lost all his powers and properties . Early years . Count Arakcheyev was born on his father ' s estate in the Novgorod Governorate . His school formation consisted in studying arithmetic under a podyachiy ( dyak ) , a knowledgeable and schooled man . Arakcheev ' s father moved with the family to Saint - Petersburg for his son to be educated in a military artillery school . Later Alexey had to continue his education at home since the military school was too expensive . Alexey ' s father brought Melissino as a teacher for Alexey . Later Melissino gave artillery and fortification lessons to Prince Nicholas Saltykov ' s sons and Alexey Arakcheyev earned some money assisting Melissino in teaching the sons arithmetic and geometry . As he grew up , he was Peter Ivanovich Melissino ' s pupil and rapidly started teaching arithmetic and geometry . His military career started when he was sought after by Paul I as an artillery officer . When Pavel Petrovich , heir to the throne of Russia , was in search for an artillery officer , Saltykov recommended Arakcheyev as a man that had learned military discipline . Arakcheyev was thereafter appointed officer to the commandant of Gatchina and later became the chief of the ground forces of the heir . Paul I ' s reign . From 1790 and onward Arakcheyev was rapidly promoted in the army and in September 1792 , Melissino recommended him as a senior adjutant to the inspector of artillery under Pavel Petrovich . By 1794 , he was Gatchina ' s artillery inspector and two years later , was also the infantry inspector under the Empress Catherine II . All his ascensions in the army were attributed to his ruthless manners and his zealousness . After Paul I ' s coronation , on November 7 , 1796 , Arakcheyev was appointed as the commandant of Saint - Petersburg ' s garrison and received other army functions during the months of November and December . In April 1797 , he was promoted to general - quartermaster and thus leader of the army , and at the same time he received the title of baron from the Tsar . A year later , after some troops mutinied and an officer committed suicide , he was demoted to lieutenant - general . In 1799 he was brought back to his former Inspector of the Artillery position , reinstated to his general - quartermaster ' s functions and given the title of count . He finally would serve as the War Minister , the Head of the War Department of the State Council of Imperial Russia , and the head of the Imperial Chancellery . He was disgraceful in leading the army by hiding misdeeds that were done by his army officers and thus , was stripped of his army functions , later to be reinstated by the next emperor . His name became synonymous with military voluntarism and despotism , known in Russian as " Arakcheyevshchina " . Alexander I ' s reign . In May 1803 , his services were requested by the new Tsar Alexander I , restoring his position as Inspector of the Artillery . During the first years he reorganized the artillery units , improved the officer training , and issued new regulations . After the lessons learned at the Battle of Austerlitz , where Russian artillery had performed poorly , Arakcheyev devised the " System of 1805 " . Under this arrangement , 6 - and 12 - punder guns were employed thorught the army , as well as 2 - , 10 - , and 18 - pounder licorne s . Under the new system , a single Russian division had as much artillery as an entire French corps . A foot artillery battalion was composed of two light and two heavy companies . A light foot artillery company consisted of four 10 - pounder licornes , four light and four medium 6 - pounder guns ; a heavy artillery company had four light and four heavy 12 - pounder guns and four 18 - and two 2 - pounder licornes . Six light 6 - pounder guns and six 10 - pounder licornes made a company of horse artillery . Licornes were usually deployed on the flanks of the batteries . All these guns used a screw elevating mechanism instead of the old system of wedges and had an improved sighting apparatus . During the campaign of 1805 against France , Arakcheyev worked on supplying the army with enough artillery ammunition . Promoted in January 1808 to Defense Minister and inspector - general of the entire infantry and artillery , he once more reorganized the army and the grading of the army staff . In 1808 he created a publication called the " artillery periodical " . By 1810 , Arakcheev had resigned from his Defense Minister ' s post and was sitting on the board of the Council of State as chairman in military science . During the Patriotic War of 1812 , he oversaw recruitment and management of army supplies . He introduced several useful military reforms , which proved themselves during the wars of 1812 - 1814 . Throughout his service , Arakcheyev was known for his meticulous following of the will of the tsar . Starting in 1816 , he organized military - agricultural colonies , an idea initially conceived by Alexander I . At first Arakcheyev tried to oppose them , but when he agreed , he did so with unrelenting rigor . The hardships of military service combined with the hardships of peasant life created terrifying conditions in those settlements . The ruthlessness he exhibited in the military extended to his home . The women peasants in Arakcheyev ' s own Gruzino estate near Novgorod were required to produce one child each year . Arakcheyev even ordered the hanging of all cats , on account of his fondness for nightingale s . From 1815 to the tsar ' s death , Arakcheyev continued to be present around the emperor as member of the state council and an influential voice in the leader ' s entourage . During Alexander I ' s journeys abroad , Arakcheev would follow , giving his accord to every law passed . Later years . After the death of Tsar Alexander I on December 1 , 1825 , and the coronation of Nicholas I , Arakcheyev lost all his positions in the government , such as member of the State Council and inspector of the army artillery and infantry . This led to his removal from the court and the exile to his estate of Gruzino near Novgorod . There he lived until his death in 1834 , when he was interred in a local church . Furthermore , after Arakcheyev ' s death the tsar requisitioned his land and property due to the inability to find legal heirs . Temper and " Arakcheevschina " . Arakcheyev is said to have executed two junior officers by having them buried up to their necks and leaving them to die of starvation and thirst . On another occasion he is said to have personally cut off another officer ' s head with his sword after a perceived infraction . " Arakcheevschina " ( ) , roughly translated as " the Arakcheev regime " , became a derogatory term for a military state , denoting " the atmosphere of reactionary repression closing over Russian society " . This label was routinely applied by Soviets authors to characterize a regime of reactionary oppression . For instance , Joseph Stalin used the term " Arakcheevschina " to describe the sway held by Ivan Meshchaninov in the Soviet Institute of Language and Thought in 1950 .