Pozen, Mikhail

Pozen, Mikhail Pavlovich 

Born 1798; died 1871. Russian statesman. Participant in the peasant reform of 1861. Privy councillor (1842) and head of a state chancery department (1836).

A member of the dvorianstvo from Poltava Province, Pozen was a large landowner. He entered the state service in 1817 and served in the Ministry of Public Education, the Ministry of State Domains, and the Ministry of War. He helped draft the Code of Military Laws and in the 1840’s served on the Committee on the Organization and Settlement of Transcaucasian Krai. He retired in 1845. In 1856 and 1857, Pozen presented plans for the gradual abolition of serfdom to the tsar. According to these plans, landowners would retain ownership of peasants’ allotment lands, which would be granted to the peasants for use in return for specified obligatory services and without the right of redemption. From 1859 to 1861, Pozen was a member of the Poltava Provincial Committee and expert member of the Editing Commissions, where he adopted a conservative position and opposed the redemption of allotments by the peasants.

WORKS

Bumagi po krest’ianskomu delu. Dresden, 1864.

REFERENCES

Fedorov, V. A. Padenie krepostnogo prava ν Rossii: Dokumenty i materialy, fasc. 1. Moscow, 1966. Pages 83–86.
Zaionchkovskii, P. A. Otmena krepostnogo prava ν Rossii, 3rd ed. Moscow, 1968. Pages 69–70, 92.