Why there are two people on the monument to Minin and Pozharsky, and the holiday is called Day of National Unity

At the end of May 1817, five half-barracks were sent from St. Petersburg. One of them carried a very strange cargo. Two bronze figures, cast together, in one group, were taller than any human being by more than two times. This was the sculptural group of Minin and Pozharsky, and it was being transported to Moscow.

It took a long time, almost all summer. There is no direct road by water from St. Petersburg to Moscow; we had to make a huge loop through half the country. The ships traveled along the Mariinsky Water System to Rybinsk, then along the Volga through Nizhny Novgorod, along the Oka River and the Moscow River. The ships only reached Moscow in early September.

If you take the map and trace this route with your finger, at some point your finger will hit Nizhny Novgorod. The ships had to go past it to turn from the Volga to the Oka, and from there to the Moscow River. And this is where the story takes a turn, which is why it is worth telling it to a child.

The monument passed by its city

Kuzma Minin was from Nizhny Novgorod. It was in Nizhny Novgorod that he once began to gather people and money for an uprising that later, together with Prince Pjarsky, drove the invaders out of Moscow. And when it was decided two hundred years later to erect a monument to them, it was precisely in Nizhny Novgorod that they first seriously began talking about it. It was there that they decided to erect it.

Later, at Martos's request, it was decided to erect a monument in Moscow, and in Nizhny Novgorod to build a monument. And that is exactly what happened.

And in the summer of 1817, the bronze Minin sailed down the Volga past his own city. The Nizhny Novgorodians greeted him solemnly. Then the ships sailed on, to Oku. The monument they had planned for them was taken to another city, leaving them with only the obelisk that was erected later.

An adult usually gets a little sad about the Nizhny Novgorod residents in this story. A child, on the other hand, is more interested in something else. How can a monument be transported down the river? It will drown. Why not by car? But there were no cars back then. And why not by sled? The answer to that is better to find out together. Each such question leads to the next, and somewhere between Rybinsk and Nizhny Novgorod the child is already looking at the map of Russian rivers for half an hour, without ever asking about it.

Who paid for it?

It cost a huge amount of money to cast such a machine and transport it over a thousand miles. The money for the monument was raised through subscriptions. In 1809, it was announced that people across Russia were to contribute, ranging from a quarter of a ruble to five thousand rubles.

It turns out that the monument to the people who once raised money for the militia was also built with the money they raised. Two collections, almost two hundred years apart. One saved Moscow, the other preserved its memory.

And this is evident at the very monument itself, not limited to the two figures at the top. Beneath them, on the pedestal, is a bronze scene. The residents of Nizhny Novgorod bring their offerings; some extend their hands, others bring their sons. On the reverse side of the stone, there is a horseman on the Fire Marshal’s side, leading an army. There are no names on these people’s pedestals. Only two are named on the pedestal: «Thanksgiving Russia to Citizen Minin and Prince Pjazarski. Year 1818.».

An extra year

This inscription is also associated with a small detail that was noticed during the restoration. Under the date on the stone there were holes from another set of metal numerals. That set of numerals should have read «1817.» The monument was supposed to be opened a year earlier, but the emperor did not come that time, and the opening was postponed. The numerals were changed, but the holes remained.

The monument was unveiled at the end of the winter of 1818, with a parade. The crowd was so large that people sat on the roofs and even on the Kremlin towers. And in 1931, the monument itself was moved from the center of Red Square to the Pokrovsky Cathedral, where it stands today.

Two and all the rest

Now we can return to the question from the title. Why are there two people on the monument, and the holiday is not named after them?

Because this story, if you look closely, has many participants; they lived in different centuries. In 1612 it was the Novgorodians who donated money for the militia, and everyone who joined the militia and liberated Moscow. And two hundred years later, other people from different provinces chipped in a quarter of a ruble for the monument; foundry worker Vasily Ekimov cast the entire huge group at once, which at that time in Europe, it seems, no one had done before; the crews of ships carried the load along the rivers and canals all summer, and the Novgorodians solemnly welcomed the monument that was being carried away from them.

The holiday commemorates the people who together liberated Moscow in 1612. Those who two centuries later raised the money, cast the monument and brought it to the site have preserved the memory of this event.

Minin and Pozharsky are at the top because they started and led the way. And the holiday of November 4, National Unity Day, is a day off in Russia, and there is no name of any of the people in its title. For a child, this is a good reason to ask themselves who else was involved in this story. The list, as you can see, will be long.