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Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov
(lang-ru|Алекса
;́ндр
Васи́ль&#
1077;вич
Суво́ро&#
1074;) (sometimes transliterated as Aleksandr,
Aleksander and Suvarov), Count Suvorov of Rymnik,
Prince of Italy (граф
Рымникс&
#1082;ий,
князь
Италийс&
#1082;ий) (November 24, 1729–May
18, 1800), was a Russian Generalissimo, reckoned
one of a few great generals in history who never
lost a battle. He was famed for his manual The
Science of Victory, and noted for the saying
"Train hard, fight easy."
==Early life and career==
Suvorov was born in Moscow into a noble family of
Novgorod descent. He entered the army as a boy,
served against the Sweden | Swedes in Finland and
against the Prussians during the Seven Years' War
(1756 - 1763). After repeatedly distinguishing
himself in battle he became a colonel in 1762. 

Suvorov next served in Poland during the
Confederation of Bar, dispersed the Polish forces
under Kazimierz Pulaski | Pułaski, stormed
Kraków (1768) and reached the rank of 
major-general. The Russo-Turkish War,
1768-1774|Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774 saw
his first campaigns against the Ottoman Empire |
Turks in 1773–1774, and particularly in the
battle of Kozludji in the latter year, he laid the
foundations of his reputation.

In 1775, Suvorov was dispatched to suppress the
rebellion of Yemelian Ivanovich Pugachev |
Pugachev but arrived at the scene only in time to
conduct the first interrogation of the rebel
leader who had been betrayed by his fellow
Cossacks and later on suffered decapitation in
Moscow. 
==Scourge of the Poles and the Turks== 
From 1777 to 1783 Suvorov served in the Crimea and
in the Caucasus, becoming a lieutenant-general in
1780, and general of infantry in 1783, on the
conclusion of his work there. From 1787 to 1791 he
again fought the Turks during the Russo-Turkish
War, 1787-1792|Russo-Turkish War of
1787–1792 and won many victories; he was
wounded twice at Kinburn (1787), took part in the
siege of Ochakov, and in 1788 won two great
victories at Focsani and by the river Râmnicu
Sărat|Rimnik. 

In both these battles an Austrian corps under
Prince Prince Josias of Coburg | Josias of
Saxe-Coburg participated but at Rimnik Suvorov was
in command of the whole allied forces. For the
latter victory Catherine II of Russia | Catherine
II the Great made Suvorov a count with the name
"Rimniksky" in addition to his own name, and the
Emperor Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor | Joseph II
created him a count of the Holy Roman Empire. On
22 December 1790 Suvorov stormed the impenetrable
fortress of Ismail (fortress)|Ismail in
Bessarabia. Turkish forces inside the fortress had
the orders to stand their ground to the end and
haughtily declined Russian ultimatum. The defeat
was seen as a major catastrophe in the Ottoman
empire, but in Russia it was glorified in the
first national anthem, Grom pobedy,
razdavajsya!|Let the thunder of victory sound!

Immediately after the peace with Turkey was
signed, Suvorov was again transferred to Poland,
where he assumed the command of one of the corps
and took part in the Battle of Maciejowice, in
which he captured the Polish commander-in-chief
Tadeusz Kosciuszko|Tadeusz Kościuszko. On
November 4, 1794, Suvorov's forces stormed Warsaw
and in what became known as the Massacre of Praga
captured one of its boroughs. The alleged massacre
of many civilians broke the spirits of the
defenders and soon put an end to the Kosciuszko
Uprising|Kościuszko Uprising. 



It is said that the Russian commander sent a
report to his sovereign consisting of only three
words: hurrah from Warsaw, Suvorov. The Empress of
Russia replied equally briefly: Congratulations,
Field Marshal. Catherine. The newly-appointed
field marshal remained in Poland until 1795, when
he returned to Saint Petersburg. But his sovereign
and friend Catherine II of Russia | Catherine died
in 1796, and her successor Paul of Russia | Paul
dismissed the veteran in disgrace.

==Suvorov's Italian campaign==
Suvorov then lived for some years in retirement on
his estate of Konchanskoe, near Novgorod. He
criticised the new military tactics and dress
introduced by the emperor, and some of his caustic
verse reached the ears of Paul. His conduct 
therefore came under surveillance and his
correspondence with his wife, who had remained at
Moscow - for his marriage relations had not been
happy - was tampered with. On Sundays he tolled
the bell for church and sang among the rustics in
the village choir. On week days he worked among
them in a smock frock. But in February 1799 the
Emperor Paul I of Russia summoned him to take the
field again, this time against the French
Revolutionary armies in Italy.

The French Revolutionary Wars|campaign opened with
a series of Suvorov's victories (battle of Cassano
d'Add|Cassano d'Adda, Battle of Trebia
(1799)|Trebbia, Battle of Novi|Novi) which reduced
the French government to desperate straits and
drove every French soldier from Italy, save for
the handful under Jean Victor Marie Moreau |
Moreau, which maintained a foothold in the
Maritime Alps and around Genoa. Suvorov himself
gained the rank of "prince of the House of Savoy"
from king of Sardinia. 


But the later events of the eventful year went
uniformly against the Russians. General Korsakov's
force was defeated by André Masséna | Masséna
at Zürich. Betrayed by the Austrians, the old
field marshal, seeking to make his way over the
Swiss passes to the Upper Rhine, had to retreat to
Vorarlberg, where the army, much shattered and
almost destitute of horses and artillery, went
into winter quarters. When Suvorov battled his way
through the snow-capped Alps his army was checked
but never defeated. For this marvel of strategic
retreat, unheard of since the time of Hannibal,
Suvorov was raised to the unprecedented rank of
generalissimo. He was officially promised to be
given the military triumph in Russia but the court
intrigues led the Emperor Paul to cancel the
ceremony. 

Early in 1800 Suvorov returned to Saint
Petersburg. Paul refused to give him an audience,
and, worn out and ill, the old veteran died a few
days afterwards on 18 May 1800, at Saint
Petersburg. Lord Whitworth, the English
ambassador, and the poet Derzhavin were the only
persons of distinction present at the funeral. 

Suvorov lies buried in the church of the
Annunciation in the Alexander Nevsky Monastery,
the simple inscription on his grave stating,
according to his own direction, "Here lies
Suvorov". But within a year of his death the tsar
Alexander I of Russia | Alexander I erected a
statue to his memory in the Field of Mars, Saint
Petersburg.
==His progeny and titles==
His full name and titles (according to Russian
pronunciation), ranks and awards 
are the following:Aleksandr Vasiliyevich Suvorov,
Prince of Italy (Kniaz Italyiskiy), Count of
Rimnik (Graf Rimnikskiy), Count of the Holy  Roman
Empire, Prince of Sardinia, Generalissimo of
Russia's Ground and Naval forces, Field Marshal of
the Austrian and  Sardinian Armies; seriously
wounded six times, he was the recipient of the 
Order of St. Andrew the First Called Apostle,
Order of St. George the Triumphant First Class,
Order  of St. Vladimir First Class, Order of St.
Aleksandr Nevskiy, Order of St. Anna First Class,
Grand  Cross of the Order of St. Joan of
Jerusalem, (Austria) Order of Maria Teresia First
Class, (Prussia)  Order of the Black Eagle, Order
of the Red Eagle, the Pour le Merite, (Sardinia)
Order of the  Revered Saints Maurice and Lazarus,
(Bavaria) Order of St. Gubert, the Golden
Lionness, (France) Order of the Carmelite Virgin
Mary, St. Lasara, (Poland) Order of the White
Eagle, the  Order of St. Stanislaus. 

Suvorov's son Arkadi (1783 - 1811) served as a
general officer in the Russian army during the
Napoleonic and Turkish wars of the early 19th
century, and  drowned in the same river Rimnik
that had brought his father so much fame. His
grandson Alexander Arkadievich (1804 - 1882) also
became a Russian general.
==Assessment==

The Russians long cherished the memory of Suvorov.
A great captain, viewed from the standpoint of any
age of military history, he functions specially as
the great captain of the Russian nation, for the
character of his leadership responded to the
character of the Russian soldier. In an age when
war had become an act of diplomacy he restored its
true significance as an act of force. He had a
great simplicity of manner, and while on a
campaign lived as a private soldier, sleeping on
straw and contenting himself with the humblest
fare. But he had himself passed through all the
gradations of military service. 

His gibes procured him many enemies. He had all
the contempt of a man of ability and action for
ignorant favourites and ornamental carpet-knights.
But his drolleries served sometimes to hide, more
often to express, a soldierly genius, the effect
of which the Russian army did not soon outgrow. If
the tactics of the Russians in the Russo-Japanese
War of 1904 - 1905 reflected too literally some of
the maxims of Suvorov’s Turkish wars, the
spirit of self-sacrifice, resolution and
indifference to losses there shown formed a
precious legacy from those wars. Mikhail Ivanovich
Dragomirov declared that he based his teaching on
Suvorov's practice, which he held representative
of the fundamental truths of war and of the
military qualities of the Russian nation.

The magnificent
http://www.enlight.ru/camera/104/index_e.html
Suvorov museum of military history was opened in
1904. Apart from St Petersburg, other Suvorov
monuments have been erected in Ochakov (1907),
Sevastopol, Izmail, Tulchin, Kobrin, Ladoga,
Kherson, Timanovka, Simferopol, Kaliningrad,
Konchanskoe, Rymnik, and in the Swiss Alps. On
July 29, 1942 The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet
of the USSR established the Order of Suvorov. It
was awarded for successful offensive actions
against superior enemy forces.
----
1911
==External links and references==
*http://www.ganesha.org/hall/suvorov.html
Alexander V. Suvorov: Russian Field Marshal,
1729-1800
*http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/
aureview/1986/nov-dec/menning.html Speed,
Assessment, and Hitting Power: Suvorov's Art of
Victory
*http://www.enlight.ru/camera/222/index_e.html
Suvorov military musum in St Petersburg
*http://voyage.home.nov.ru/suvorovskoe.htm
Suvorov's home and family
*Anthing, Versuch einer Kriegsgeschichte des
Grafen Suworow (Gotha, 1796 - 1799)
*F. von Smut, Suworows Leben und Heerzüge (Vilna,
1833—1834) and Suworow and Polens Untergang
(Leipzig, 1858,)
*Von Reding-Biberegg, Der Zug Suworows durch die
Schweiz (Zürich 1896)
* Lieut.-Colonel Spalding, Suvorof (London, 1890)
*G. von Fuchs, Suworows Korrespondenz, 1799
(Glogau, 1835)
*Souvorov en Italie by Gachot, Masséna’s
biographer (Paris, 1903)
*The standard Russian biographies of Polevoi
(1853; Ger. trans., Mitau, 1853); Rybkin (Moscow,
1874), Vasiliev (Vilna, 1899), Meshcheryakov and
Beskrovnyi (Moscow, 1946), and Osipov (Moscow,
1955).
*The Russian examinations of his martial art, by
Bogolyubov (Moscow, 1939) and Nikolsky (Moscow,
1949).