History of Russia (1721–96) drills on the Russian army, and depriving Russia of a military victory by establishing his sudden alliance with Prussia. Making use of the discontent and fearing for her own position, Peter III's wife, Catherine, deposed her husband in a coup, and her lover's brother, Aleksey Orlov, subsequently murdered him, so in June 1762 Catherine became Catherine II, empress of Russia. Peter the Great had two wives, Yevdokiya Lopukhina (the daughter of a minor noble) and Marfa Skavronskaya (a Lithuanian peasant, renamed Catherine after her conversion to Orthodoxy). Catherine I's rise through Peter I's Table of Ranks from a simple peasant
Catherine I of Russia her undergarments to Brigadier General Rudolph Felix Bauer, later the Governor of Estonia, to be his mistress. She may have worked in the household of his superior, Sheremetev. It is not known whether she was his mistress, or household maid. She travelled back to the Russian court with Sheremetev's army. Afterwards she became part of the household of Prince Alexander Menshikov, who was the best friend of Peter the Great of Russia. Anecdotal sources suggest that she was purchased by him. Whether the two of them were lovers is disputed, as Menshikov was already engaged to Darya Arsenyeva, his future