Gendarme Staff Officers and Heads of the Provincial Gendarme Administration in Tomsk Province: The Practice of Appointment and the Social Portrait

The aim of the article is to study the practice of appointing chiefs of gendarme departments in Tomsk Province over the entire existence of the gendarme department in the region. To achieve this aim, the following objectives were set: (1) to identify all the gendarme staff officers and heads of the provincial Gendarme Administration in Tomsk Province, the periods of their leadership in the gendarme unit; (2) on the basis of biographical data, to compile a social portrait of gendarme chiefs in Tomsk Province by identifying categories such as their social origin, education, official activity before entering the gendarme service and the Gendarme Corps itself, their financial situation; (3) to determine the features of the practice of appointing heads of the gendarme department in Tomsk Province; (4) to answer the question about the prestige of the gendarme service in Tomsk Province. The main sources for the article were legal acts of Russian state authorities, Gendarme Corps orders, form and service records of gendarme ranks stored in the central archives of Russia; most of them are first introduced into scientific discourse. The main methods used in the study are a prosopographic method and comparative historical analysis. During the research, the author came to the following conclusions. The position of the head of the Gendarme Administration in Tomsk Province was held by middle-aged people (the average age was 43), as a rule, personal nobility, career military men, many of whom participated in military campaigns. Most of them did not have real estate and thus service was the only source of livelihood for themselves and their families. 30 people were heads of the Gendarme Administration in Tomsk Province. The average length of service was 2 years and 8 months. The average length of service in the ranks of gendarmes before being transferred to Tomsk was 10 years and 7 months. Over time, officers with a fairly long gendarme service and leadership experience were assigned to go to Tomsk Province. The short term of service in Tomsk Province testifies to a fairly high level of staff turnover, especially at the turn of the 20th century. By the beginning of the 20th century, the status of Tomsk Province changed: a remote province became a regional administrative center and a desirable place where one could make a successful gendarme career.

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