ABSTRACT
Few European military units have enjoyed as illustrious or as interesting a history as Russia's Semenovsky regiment of Infantry Guards. Of all his military units, the Emperor Alexander had a special affection for the Semenovsky. "The Preobrazhensky regiment is a royal regiment", he once remarked, "but the Semenovsky regiment is my own". Mindful of this imperial favor, the Semenovsky soldiers discharged their duties with an enthusiasm and decorum that justified their regimental motto: "What is good for others is little for the Semenovsky regiment". At the time of the mutiny the Emperor Alexander was attending the Congress of Troppau, where the assembled statesmen of Europe were assessing the dangers to the peace of Europe posed by the revolutionary activities of the Neapolitan Carbonari. Metternich, the Austrian foreign minister who had more than anyone created and implemented the reactionary policies embodied in the settlement at Vienna in 1815, hoped to enlist Alexander's more enthusiastic support for his own counterrevolutionary programs.
