In 1935, T. A. Bakunina's book "Famous Russian Masons" was published in Paris. The writer, who belonged to the Russian emigration, created in this book a very attractive image of the order of the "free masons".
The preface to the book says literally the following: "People's hero, a man of unsurpassed glory, Generalissimo Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov - that's who should discover a number of famous Russian Masonic figures."
It is on this book and on these lines that all researchers up to the present day rely, who support the version that the famous Russian commander belonged to the Masonic lodge.
But was Suvorov really a Freemason?
Certificates for
The following fact speaks in favor of the version of Alexander Suvorov's Freemasonry. In January 1761, the lodge "Zu den Drei Kronen" ("To the Three Crowns"), which was located in Konigsberg, was visited, as recorded in the archive of the lodge, by Lieutenant Alexander von Suvorov. He introduced himself as a master of the St. Petersburg box "Three stars".
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The record from the archives of the "free masons" coincides with a fact well known to all of Suvorov's biographers. Just in January 1761, during the Seven Years' War, Suvorov actually visited Konigsberg. The territory of East Prussia was then occupied by Russian troops, and the commander's father was appointed governor-general of these lands. The future generalissimo came to visit the priest. If he really was a master of the Petersburg lodge, could he visit brothers in spirit? Of course.
From the day of the first visit to the very departure from Konigsberg, which took place at the beginning of 1762, Suvorov was a member of the "To the Three Crowns" lodge. In the list of its members, presented on March 16, 1761 in the box of Three Globes, Alexander Suvorov appears under No. 6.
Evidence against
Historians of Freemasonry are completely unknown to the Three Stars Lodge in St. Petersburg. And this despite the fact that in St. Petersburg there was more than one lodge, and contemporaries left many testimonies about who exactly were their members. Freemasonry was in vogue, and with all the closeness of the rituals, it was impossible to hide an sewn in a sack. There were lodges "Silence", "Constancy", "Happy Consent", and others, but no traces of the "Three Stars" lodge except for the record in the papers of the Konigsberg lodge were never found.
Further. At the time of his visit to Konigsberg, Alexander Suvorov was a lieutenant colonel, and not a lieutenant (lieutenant), as stated in the document on a visit by a certain Suvorov to the lodge "To the Three Crowns".
And, finally, all his life, all the statements and actions of Suvorov testify that he had a strong dislike for Freemasonry, if not more sharply. The very word "Freemason" meant for him a curse. Prince Repnin, one of the most influential Freemasons of that time, Suvorov calls "Lucifer" in his letters. There is one more striking evidence of exactly how Suvorov treated Freemasonry. Once, in a circle of officers, they talked about one of the adjutants, who somehow fell from a great height into the abyss and did not suffer at all. “Do you know,” the author of the memoirs conveys the words of Suvorov, “who pulled him out of there? Damn, because he's a Freemason."
Suvorov was a very religious person, he constantly attended services in the church, fasted, bowed down to the ground, during the services he read the "Apostle" and sang in the kliros. Such a simple, practically peasant religiosity is not at all similar to the mysticism of the Freemasons, who rejected the idea of the God-Man Christ and worshiped some abstract Supreme Reason.
So was Suvorov in the box "To the Three Crowns" or not?
The easiest way to figure out is that Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov never visited the house in Konigsberg, where the box "To the Three Crowns" was located, but there was some other Suvorov who had the rank of chief lieutenant (ie lieutenant). But what if there was an error, or rather a slip of the tongue? In German, the names of the ranks "lieutenant" and "lieutenant colonel" both sound and are written very similarly: lieutenant - "oberleutnant" (Oberleutnant), lieutenant colonel - "oberstleutnant" (Oberstleutnant). Making a mistake by one letter is not difficult at all. And if we admit that the clerk of the Konigsberg Masons was really mistaken, then it turns out that Suvorov really came to the box "To the Three Crowns". Why?
Historian Vyacheslav Lopatin offers an interesting version.
At that time, the question of whether East Prussia would become part of the lands under the rule of the Russian crown was still being decided. In Konigsberg, a variety of political groupings and trends took place. Governor-General Vasily Suvorov, of course, needed information about the mood of the influential part of society. And a very influential public always came to the Masons. The son who came to visit could well help the Governor-General in this. Alexander Suvorov knew German perfectly, had experience in military service and knew a lot about intelligence. Having visited the local lodge, Alexander Vasilyevich referred to his belonging to the Petersburg Three Stars Lodge, which he probably invented right there. Prussian Masons did not demand formal proof from the son of the Governor-General himself.
Having fulfilled his father's instructions, Alexander Vasilyevich left for the active army, and was not seen in the Masonic organizations again. However, the Koenigsberg brothers included Suvorov on their lists for two more months.