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
Grand Duchess Catherine Mikhailovna of Russia Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (1779–1860) and Princess Marie of Hesse-Kassel (1796–1880). They had four children: She died in St. Petersburg, aged 66. Grand Duchess Catherine Mikhailovna of Russia Grand Duchess Catherine Mikhailovna of Russia (Ekaterina Mikhailovna Romanova), () (28 August 1827 – 12 May 1894), was the third of five daughters of Grand Duke Michael Pavlovich of Russia, youngest son of Tsar Paul I, and Princess Charlotte of Württemberg. She was born in St. Petersburg. She had two elder sisters, Grand Duchess Maria and Grand Duchess Yelizaveta, called "Lili". Two more sisters were born after her, Alexandra and Anna, who