Plans of Field Marshal Pyotr Ivanovich Shuvalov to transform the artillery training system at the beginning of the second half of the XVIII century

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to consider the specifics of P.I. Shuvalov’s project on the organization of a special military educational institution at the artillery corps, in which it was supposed to organize the training of officers for artillery and engineering corps with a high and high–quality level of education. Based on previously unknown archival documents from the Scientific Archive of the Military Historical Museum of Artillery, Engineering and Communications Troops, and other little-studied sources, the article examines certain aspects that characterize the formation of prerequisites for the establishment of a new military educational institution of artillery and engineering. The main attention is paid to the analysis of the content of P.I. Shuvalov’s plan “On the establishment of a noble Cadet corps at the artillery. The author draws attention to the fact that in some works on the history of the development of the Russian artillery of military special education there are some inaccuracies concerning both the very name of the P.I. Shuvalov project and the inconsistency of the information contained in them with the original document. Attention is focused on the fact that the list of subjects studied in the corps was selected in such a way that, with sufficient general education, solid military special education was also given to artillery and engineering officers. It is concluded that the creation of a special military class in the general teaching system can be considered as a prototype of the military academies founded later in Russia. New archival and other little-studied sources are being introduced into scientific circulation.