Exiles to Siberia

The first political exile to Tobolsk was a church bell from the town of Uglitch. It was a symbolic punishment for the rebellious alarm bell against boyars, when the Tsar’s son Dimitri was killed. In 1593 the bell was transported to Tobolsk by the disgraced Uglitch residents. The chapel was specially built to keep the bell confined. So the dramatic history of exiles to Siberia began, due to which a remote and underdeveloped province got in touch with a lot of prominent persons.

In different periods the protopope Abbacum, and the spiritual tutor-guide of the Old Believers Miron Galanin were exiled to Tobolsk. The Prince Menshikov and the Dolgorukis family passed through Tobolsk further in exile to Beryozovo. Hannibal, ‘The Negro of Peter the Great’, served in the Tobolsk regiment after he had got out of favour. Since December 1790, over seven months Alexander Radishev had been living in the Tobolsk exile.

Decembrists’ exile to Tobolsk is considered a vivid and dramatic page in the history of Siberia. On the whole 36 Decembrists lived in Tobolsk in different periods. In 1850 a new wave of political exiles called ‘petrashevtsy’ were convoyed to Tobolsk. Among them was Feodor Dostoyevski. In Tobolsk Dostoyevski was given the Gospel as a present from the Decembrists’ wives, which he kept about all his life and read on his last day. Nikolai Chernyshevski, Vladimir Korolenko, and other writers, publicists, and public figures of the XIXth century were exiled to Tobolsk. Years later Tobolsk was still regarded, though unofficially, an exile town.

The inhabitants of the Tobolsk province had numerous possibilities to get in touch with outstanding intellects, which resulted in noticeable impact upon local culture, and refined many talented people born in Siberia.