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Contact information • History • Access & Facilities • Bibliography
ArcheoBiblioBase: Archives in Russia: H-210Last update of repository: 18 March 2020Voenno-istoricheskii muzei artillerii, inzhenernykh voisk i voisk sviazi (VIMAIViVS)Previous names
One of the richest military history museums in Russia, and certainly the richest in terms of its archival holdings, the museum began its history under Peter I in 1703 as the Store House in the Peter and Paul Fortress, known by its German name “Tseikhgaus” (German, Zeichhaus), sometimes referred to as the Store House for Memorabilia and Curiosities, which was a collecting point for exhibits from the Artillery Corps, including foreign trophies. After 1756 it was known as the Repository for Memorabilia under the St. Petersburg Arsenal. In 1868 the collections were moved and installed in the building of the former Kronwerk (Kronverk) Arsenal (1850–1860, designed by the architect P.I. Tamanskii), adjoining the Peter and Paul Fortress, and the exhibits were renamed the Artillery Museum. Starting in 1903 it was known as the Artillery History Museum (AIM). In 1917 and 1918 the museum exhibits and archive were evacuated to Iaroslavl and returned in 1919. There were some losses from a fire in AIM in the 1930s. In 1918, a separate Military Historical Daily-Life Museum was established, which in 1937 was consolidated with AIM. During World War II, the museum holdings were evacuated to Novosibirsk, and also suffered some losses en route. The Historical Archive (documentary fond) and library were established in 1872, by the military historian N.E. Brandenburg, who then directed the museum. Brandenburg arranged the transfer to the museum of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century records from the archive of the Main Artillery Administration (Glavnoe artilleriiskoe upravlenie), which he described in published catalogues, and he also encouraged the acquisition of other materials including books for the library. As a result of subsequent accessions, the museum consolidated a major complex of records from various organs of artillery administration in Russia, beginning with the Gunnery (Pushkarskii) prikaz and extending through 1910. Currently these documentary materials comprise the Division of Processing and Storage of Fonds (Scientific Archive). The original collection of documents relating to the history of the Corps of Engineers (now the Division of Fonds, Processing and Storage of Exhibits of the Corps of Engineers) was begun in 1758, with the foundation of a museum for the consolidated artillery and engineering schools, which from 1855 was called the Museum of the Nicholas Engineering Academy and School (Muzei Nikolaevskoi inzhenernoi akademii i uchilishcha). After the Revolution it was known as the Military-Engineering History Museum (1920–1946), and later the Central Historical Museum of Military Engineering (1946–1963). In 1963 after that museum was consolidated with AIM, the combined museum was renamed the Military History Museum of the Artillery and the Corps of Engineers. The museum received its present name in 1965 when the additional Division for the History of the Signal Corps was added on the basis of the Military Museum of Communications, which had been founded in 1944. The graphic materials in the museum include displays acquired from the abolished Military Historical Daily-Life Museum, which in 1918 was organized in the process of transfer to state custody the holdings of prerevolutionary museums of various Army units. That museum also received the collection of General-Field Marshal Grand Duke Michael (Mikhail) Nikolaevich, materials from the Trophy Commission from World War I, the museums of the First and Second Cadet Corps, the museum of other military schools, productions from the M.B. Grekov Studio of Military Artists, and the graphic arts collection of the Military Museum of the Military Communication Academy. The branch of VIMAIViVS—Museum of the History of Military Schools (Cadet Corps) of Russia—is located in the building of the Malta Chapel, which is part of the Vorontsov Palace complex (ul. Sadovaia, 26; website: http://www.artillery-museum.ru/branch...). |
