There is disagreement about what happened next. Following Imperial Decrees of Alexander I of Russia in 1810/1811, the properties of Russian Grand Priory of Russia was nationalized, and the property basis of the until then hereditary commanderies became non-existent. Proponents of the view that a separate Russian order existed, see this as if a fiscal and legal separation of the Russian tradition of St John from the main Roman Catholic HQ was created (The main motive of these decrees was financial as Alexander sought to reduce his father's lavish expenditures and build up a war chest for his struggle against Napoleon. As early as May 1802, Lord St. Helens (British Minister to the Court of Russia) informed the Hon. Arthur Paget (Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Court of Austria) that the Russian Emperor was going to make the Russian Priory "an independent and separate Community", which would have stripped "perhaps nine-tenths of the Revenues that constituted the Order’s principal income!" Although the Emperor did not take this action in 1802, by 1810, necessity forced the independence. Proponents of the survival claim that a Russian Order came to exist from 1810 and was akin to the German Johanniter Order, a Johannine tradition, but legally separate.