The Fate of a Small Town in the Context of a Big War: the Town of Vereya and its inhabitants in 1812
Keywords:
Patriotic War of 1812, Vereya, spatial and settlement structure, Russian city, pre-reform period, urban population, urban economy, Russia at the beginning of the 19th centuryAbstract
The work analyses the impact of the Patriotic War of 1812 (Napoleon’s invasion) on Vereya, one of the most dynamic towns in Central Russia. The events described and the processes analyzed can be summed in three main groups. Firstly, the pre-war condition of the town and a set of factors determining its regional importance. Secondly, the events of the War of 1812. Finally, the consequences of the invasion: the situation in the town (among its population) immediately after the end of the war, and the impact of hostilities on further developments in the town. Documents from three different archives are studied, many of them for the first time. The author tries to abandon the traditional poetic and solemn description of the events of 1812 and show their disruptive character, evaluating the impact of the invasion on the further life of the town, of its inhabitants, and of the country.
