The year 1786 was fatal for Little Russian monasticism. The 4th paragraph of the Empress’s decree of April 10 of this year stated: the stauropegial Kyiv-Meokyaporsky monastery should be transferred to the Tauride region, where it would be established in the 1st class; the building will be used to house retired officers who require charity due to their decrepitude and lack of property. Of course, the government had in mind to place the Mezhigorsk monastery in the vicinity of the former inhabitants of Zaporozhye, who now inhabited the Land of the Black Sea army. But transferring to Taurida and studying in the 1st grade was still a sweet promise for the Mezhigorsky monastery, and meanwhile a bitter reality had already set in. There was no place yet allocated in Taurida for the transfer of the Mezhigorsky monastery; there was no allocation for the monastery and no salaries in accordance with its projected 1st-class staff. The government, obviously, did not consider this matter urgent, and yet the inexorable directors of housekeeping, according to the highest decree of April 10, 1786, were already planning to take the monastic property and revenue items into their own hands from July 1 of this year. The novices, seeing the trouble coming to the monastery, wandered separately, the archimandrite and the monks feared, in their words, that the monastery, “located at a distance from the villages and between the forest, would be left without any proper protection.” In such circumstances, the Mezhigorsky archimandrite Amfilohiy turned to the Little Russian Governor-General Count P. A. Rumyantsev with a request to take part in the difficult situation of the monastery. Rumyantsev, in a letter dated May 28, replied that he could do nothing for the monastery, and advised the archimandrite to
F. A. TVRNOVSYY,
to go either by spiritual command, or to the head of the region where the monastery is being transferred, that is, to Prince G. A. Potemkin. The archimandrite turned to St. Synod and dated May 30, 1786, asked “not to leave the resolution as a merciful decree, so that, beyond expectations, the lack of people at the monastery would not lead to attacks and slavery.” The Synod on June 19 instructed its first member Gabriel, Metropolitan of Novgorod, to explain this subject with Prince G.A. Potemkin and even supplied the Metropolitan with a memo outlining the essence of the matter.
When this explanation took place and how it ended is not clear from the case; but it is clear that Prince G. A. Potemkin began to assume some rights over the church property of the monastery, without at the same time taking on the corresponding responsibilities. Rivnida and the utensils of the Mezhigorsky Monastery, temporarily transported to the Kyiv-Sophia Cathedral, at the written request of Prince Potemkin, all without removal, on April 20, 1787, were given to the collegiate assessor Mikhail Zavyalov sent by his lordship with a copy of the inventory and painting. And in the summer of 1789, Prince Potemkin ordered the Kyiv chief commandant Vigel to take and transport by water to Boydan the bells of the abolished Viev-Mezhigorsvo monastery; why were all those bells without seizure and were taken by Sergeant Philip Voronov, sent from the Chief Commandant >2). We don’t know where the sacristy, utensils and bells went. It is very likely that Prince Potemkin, who loved to do everything on a large scale and, moreover, himself once intended to be a monk, really intended to build a monastery in Taurida for glory, but first the 2nd Turkish War, and then the death of Prince Potemkin himself, prevented the execution of the enterprise.
What was the further fate of the monastery buildings, the archimandrite and the monks?
The construction of the Mezhigorsky monastery was intended for the government
') To the father of the famous autobiographer and publicist.
*) Reports of M. Samuil dated April 24. 1787 and August 18, 1789 in the archives of St. Synod. The case of the establishment of the Little Russians. dioceses and monasteries.
F THE Kyiv DIOCESE IN KHTSH OTOLTSH.