Serge came into his inheritance at the age of 15, when his father died in 1818. At this time Serge was serving at court as a page to the Tsarina Elizaveta, wife of Tsar Alexander I. He later served in the Preobrazhensky Life Guards, according to his father’s and uncles’ wishes, but military life was not to his liking, and he soon resigned his commission, having reached only the lowly rank of praporshchik (often translated as “ensign”). Thereafter he devoted himself primarily to literary pursuits. Druzhnikov relates that after Poltoratzky's 1921 article, which mentioned Pushkin's poems "Liberty" and "The Village" and their criticism of Russian social conditions, appeared in France, he "was fired from his job and sent to live in the country under police supervision". This job may have been the Life Guards position, and the episode glossed for his children as a voluntary resignation.