§5
As a matter of course, Vitberg was soon surrounded by a swarm of rascals, men who look on state employment merely as a lucky chance to line their own pockets. It is easy to understand that such men would undermine Vitberg and set traps for him; yet he might have climbed out of these but for something else—had not envy in some quarters, and injured dignity in others, been added to general dishonesty.
There were three other members of the commission as well as Vitberg—the Archbishop Philaret, the Governor of Moscow, and Kushnikov, a Judge of the Supreme Court; and all three resented from the first the presence of this “whipper-snapper,” who actually ventured to state his objections and insist on his own opinions.
They helped others to entangle and defame him, and then they destroyed him without a qualm.
Two events contributed to this catastrophe, the fall of the Minister, Prince A. N. Golitsyn, and then the death of Alexander.
The Minister’s fall dragged Vitberg down with it. He felt the full weight of that disaster: the Commission complained, the Archbishop was offended, the Governor was dissatisfied. His replies were called insolent—insolence was one of the main charges brought against him on his trial—and it was said that his subordinates stole—as if there was a single person in the public service in Russia who refrains from stealing! It is possible, indeed, that his agents stole more than usual; for he was quite inexperienced in the management of reformatories or the detection of highly placed thieves.
Alexander ordered Arakchéyev to investigate the affair. He himself was sorry for Vitberg and sent a message to say that he was convinced of the architect’s honesty.
But Alexander died and Arakchéyev fell. Under Nicholas, Vitberg’s affair at once assumed a more threatening aspect. It dragged on for ten years, and the absurdity of the proceedings is incredible. The Supreme Court dismissed charges taken as proved by the Criminal Court, and charged him with guilt of which he had been acquitted; the committee of ministers found him guilty on all the charges; and the Emperor Nicholas added to the original sentence banishment to Vyatka.
So Vitberg was banished, having been discharged from the public service “for abusing the confidence of the Emperor Alexander and for squandering the revenues of the Crown.” A claim was brought against him for a million roubles—I think that was the sum; all his property was seized and sold by auction, and a report was spread that he had transferred an immense sum of money to America.
I lived for two years in the same house with Vitberg and kept up constant relations with him till I left Vyatka. He had not saved even enough for his daily bread, and his family lived in the direst poverty.