Cruelty and Murder, War and Peace

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0:31a.k.a. neurolinguistic programming. Is it a self-help miracle, a shady hypnosis scam, or both? Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, host of the On Purpose podcast. On a recent episode, I sat down with Nick Jonas, singer, songwriter, actor, and global superstar. I went blank. I hit a bad note, and then I couldn't kind of recover. And I built up this idea that music and being a musician was my whole identity. I had to sort of relearn who I was if you took this thing away. Who am I? Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:15The Volkswagen Beetle started out as Hitler's dream car. It wound up as a beloved hippie icon and the best-selling car of all time. How did that happen? I'm Jacob Goldstein. And I'm Robert Smith. On Business History, we tell the surprising stories behind the inventions and entrepreneurs that shaped our economy. And the story of the beetle is truly surprising. It has so much in it. He says you should be able to mount machine guns on it. Sure. Not for the family vacation, but, you know, for other things. You never know. Other plans. Listen to Business History on America's number one podcast network, iHeart.

1:47Follow Business History and start listening on the free iHeartRadio app today. Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Menke, listener discretion advised. For most, it was just another very early morning in Imperial Russia. The large estate was beginning to come to life as servants woke up and started their morning work. But the true hustle and bustle of the day was still a ways off. Still, in the silence, there was a man creeping towards one of the mansion's many bedrooms. There was a woman asleep inside the bedroom, completely unaware as to what was about to happen to her.

2:37Perhaps she should have had an inkling. The woman, still asleep in bed, was the de facto lady of the house, the mistress of the estate's owner, and she, Natasya Minkin, was so cruel that she had pushed the staff to the breaking point. She was abusive, petty, vindictive, and violent, and now there was a man standing over her bed, brandishing a large kitchen knife. What happened next was intimate, visceral, and brutal. The murder was so brutal, it would traumatize even the man who carried it out, and it would devastate Natasya's lover, a man many people considered to be the cruelest man in Tsarist Russia.

3:29Back when he and Natasia had both been alive, it must have seemed like a perfect match. I'm Dana Schwartz, and this is Noble Blood.

3:44Very little information has survived about the woman known as Madame Minkin. I first encountered her name as a partygoer at Satan's Ball in Mikhail Bulgokov's novel The Master and Margarita. Even if you haven't read the novel, you can probably guess that no one portrayed as a guest of the devil is considered one of history's good guys. Like so many women from history, the most famous thing about Madame Minkin was her association with a powerful man. In her case, that man was Alexei Arekcheyev, the infamously cruel military advisor to Tsar Alexander I. Though she's referred to frequently as Madame Minkin, she wasn't technically a madam in the formal sense, but rather the mistress of the man whose cruelty became legendary.

4:44While his reign of terror operated on a national scale, hers was contained to the domestic sphere, but it was no less brutal within those confines. Arakchev's rise to power began under Tsar Paul I in the 1790s, under whom he quickly gained favor thanks to his artillery expertise and rigid discipline. He was given the title of Count. When Paul was murdered in 1801, the new young Tsar Alexander inherited not just a throne, but also his father's most capable and most ruthless military advisor. Tsar Alexander I was a complicated ruler, a man who spoke eloquently about liberal reforms and Enlightenment ideals in his early years.

5:40He created new universities, made improvements to the country's legal system, and appointed progressive advisors. He dreamed, at least publicly, of modernizing Russia into a European-style state where even peasants might enjoy citizenship rights. But he never followed through on the most meaningful reforms, and eventually he lost interest in effecting positive change. That impulse grew exponentially after the war with Napoleon, which left Alexander increasingly conservative and religiously fervent. He created the Holy Alliance to squash potential revolutionary uprisings across Europe and reversed many of his earlier progressive policies.

6:31Into that moral swamp stepped Arachchev, whose power grew in direct correlation with his Tsar's descent into reactionary conservatism. For over a decade, Arachchev was arguably the most influential figure in the Russian government, with authority that, at times, seemed to exceed the Tsar's own. Those who once dreamed of bringing European enlightenment back to Russia found their country unchanged, with peasants still treated as slaves and Arachchev's military colonies imposing forced labor under violent discipline. One officer wrote that returning to Russia after Paris and London, quote, felt like going back to a prehistoric past.

7:24One contemporary described the era as, quote, an iron age of gloom and cruelty, beneath which almost the whole of Russia groaned. The gratuitous and arbitrary violence was perhaps the worst feature of the country. Beatings everywhere, from army camps to schools, from market squares to family homes. Stories of Count Arachchev's own personal cruelty were widespread and, frankly, stomach-turning. He allegedly executed two junior officers by burying them up to their necks and leaving them to die. Another officer lost his head entirely. At Grazino, the expansive estate given to Arachchev by Tsar Paul, the count imposed bizarre and tyrannical rules.

8:21Local peasant women were required to produce a child each year, and because he enjoyed hearing nightingales sing, he ordered all cats on his property to be exterminated. In this world of systemic brutality, we meet Natasia Minkin. Details about her background are scarce and contradictory. What we know is that she was physically striking, with dark features, and what one observer called, quote, the figure of a grenadier. No one at Grisino seemed to know where she came from, but one thing was certain, she wasn't one of them. According to one account, Arachchev had purchased her from an advertisement in a St.

9:12Petersburg newspaper. It's not explicitly stated what her advertised services were, but based on the quick progression of their relationship, we can make some assumptions about their general nature. Although it's possible the original arrangement with her started with her merely working as a servant. Immediately smitten with Natasya, Arachchev granted her freedom and provided her with an endowment of several thousand rubles. The peasants at Grazino, unable to explain the influence she wielded over their master, became convinced she was a Romani witch with magical abilities. It's possible that she was a master manipulator, but it's also possible that the count saw something in Natasya Mencken that he recognized in himself, a boundless capacity for cruelty.

10:10Either way, he needed her in his life. He installed her at Grazino as his housekeeper and gave her ultimate authority. When Arachchev was called back to public service, he left the estate entirely in Natasya's hands, with complete confidence in her managerial ability. It's unclear how much experience she had at managing an estate of that size, but she took to it like a natural. She ran the place straight out of an Arachchev playbook. She was strict, exacting, and punishingly cruel. In this way, she was a perfect mirror of Arachchev himself, but she was also sowing the seeds of her own destruction.

11:00In the spring of 1803, Irakcheyev left for St. Petersburg. No sooner was he back in the capital than he received word from home. Natasya was pregnant with his child. The news created immediate suspicion among the local population. Natasia had already made herself deeply unpopular at Grazino, ruling the household with the same iron discipline Arachchev himself employed. The serfs didn't trust her. Horrendous behavior aside, her exotic looks and murky origins certainly didn't help endear her to the local peasant population. Rumors spread that she had faked the pregnancy, orchestrating an elaborate deception involving a widowed peasant woman and a stolen infant, though such a scheme would have required near-impossible coordination and secrecy.

12:00But when the child finally came, the gossip only intensified. The baby was a boy named Shumsky, with bright red hair and blue eyes, neither of which were seen in his parents. Despite the physical irregularities, Arakcheyev never questioned the child's parentage and raised Shumsky as his son. A couple of years later, still in St. Petersburg, Arakcheyev made the unexpected decision to take a wife. His bride was Anastasia Vasilyevna Kumatova, 18 years old, the shy and beautiful daughter of wealthy landowners. His plan was to bring his new wife to Grusino and arrange a marriage for his former mistress Natasia.

12:51He saw no reason why everyone couldn't coexist on the large estate. For Natasia, we can imagine the situation would have been panic-inducing. Whatever security she thought she'd built through her position and her son now seemed threatened by a legitimate wife with good social standing and imperial connections. But Natasya didn't need to worry for long. The marriage collapsed quickly. Arachchev's controlling nature proved too much for the young woman, and his wife soon withdrew to the countryside. One has to wonder if the presence of Madame Minkin at the estate had anything to do with the bride's eagerness to get away.

13:41With the marriage dissolved, the bond between Arachchev and Natasya only intensified. He managed government business in St. Petersburg while she ran Grazino, sending him regular correspondence about estate operations. Her letters also revealed deep emotion mixed with constant anxiety about his fidelity. She wrote of her complete devotion while acknowledging her fear that younger women might replace her in his affections. But while Natasya's emotional position remained vulnerable and dependent on favor, she held complete authority over the household staff, and she exercised that authority with increasing cruelty.

14:31By the summer of 1825, conditions at Grazino had deteriorated to a crisis point. Natasia became more erratic and more vicious, dishing out harsh punishments for trivial offenses. The staff understood a grim reality. Arakcheyev was either unaware of Minkin's behavior, or he was aware and simply didn't care, and given his history, possibly even encouraged her behavior. The staff knew that any complaint to him would surely result in far worse treatment. They were trapped with no avenue for appeal. Three young maids in particular suffered under Natasha's rule. She tormented them constantly, no doubt fueled by jealousy of their youth and beauty, as well as the rage she couldn't direct at her benefactor.

15:30She ordered the young women beaten and imprisoned in the house jail for the slightest of infractions. One account describes her attacking a maid's face with a heated curling tong. At least one maid unsuccessfully attempted to poison Natasya. The situation reached critical breaking point in August, when the butler took his own life, after Natasya threatened to report him to Urakcheyev over a disorganized cellar. A member of the staff approached Vasily Antonov, whose sister Preskovia was one of the three tormented maids. Vasily was offered money to kill the lady of the house, but he couldn't bring himself to do it.

16:21Not yet, anyway. Shortly after Urakcheyev departed for the Novgorod colonies one Sunday, Natasya unleashed her rage on her maids again. Praskovia was beaten twice, the others locked up. Days later, early Thursday morning, Praskovia found Natasya asleep. Her own body was still riddled with aches and pains from her recent beating, and as she looked down on her sleeping mistress, something snapped inside her. She ran to find her brother, Vasily, and begged him to act now, insisting that she would accept all of the blame. Her brother Vasily took a kitchen knife and followed his sister to Madame Minkin's quarters.

17:10He tried to move quietly, but a small dog started barking and had to be carried out by Prascovia. Alone with his target, Vasily summoned the courage and attacked. His first attempt missed the mark and he slashed Natasya on the cheek. She woke immediately and threw herself from the bed, screaming. The struggle was violent and ugly, but ultimately, Madame Minkin lost the fight to keep her life. Vasily threw down the knife and ran from her chambers in a panic. No one at Grazino would later admit to hearing their mistress's screams, despite people being awake and the windows not yet fitted with winter insulation.

17:58Eventually, Praskovia's sobbing was impossible to ignore. The gruesome scene was discovered, and the household was thrown into panic. Arachchev was expected back that evening. How could they tell Russia's most fearsome man that his beloved companion of two decades had been murdered by servants? They sent a messenger to find him and bring him the news that Natasya had fallen gravely ill. When his carriage neared Grazino, Arachchev stopped a man from the estate to ask about Natasya's condition. The man, unaware that the truth had been withheld, answered directly. Her head had barely remained attached to her body.

18:46Arekcheyev's response was immediate and total. He threw himself onto the ground, tearing at his hair and the earth, shouting, You have killed her! Kill me too! Kill me and kill me quickly! The people traveling with him stood frozen, watching something no one had thought possible. the cruelest man in Russia, reduced to a sobbing, broken figure at their feet. When Arachchev reached Grazino, he went straight to Natasya's room and threw himself onto her body. He stopped eating and refused to shave. He took a handkerchief, stained with his slain mistress's blood, tied it around his neck, and refused to remove it.

19:31The household staff were placed under arrest while officials worked to identify who was responsible. In a bizarre decision, Vasily Antonov chose not to flee. Instead, he remained at the estate, even helping prepare Natasya's body for burial, apparently betting that his sister's confession would be treated as the complete story. Questions arose about the burial itself. Given the nature of Natasya's relationship with Arachchev was never formalized by marriage, the local priest sought guidance from church authorities about whether she could be buried on consecrated ground. When Arachchev found out, he erupted, declaring that a priest who would ask such a question had no place anywhere on earth.

20:23Even through his grief, the Tsar's Grand Vizier always had a death threat at the ready. At the funeral, Natasya was lowered into a grave next to the one Arachchev had long ago earmarked for himself. He rushed forward as the coffin descended, bending over it and crying out, Kill me, you villains! You have taken my only friend from me. Now I have lost everything. The next day, Arachchev composed a message to Tsar Alexander I. In it, he described himself as destroyed, his health and reason shattered by loss. He wrote that he only wanted to die and could no longer handle any official responsibilities.

21:08Without authorization, he immediately transferred his military and administrative duties to subordinates, a legally questionable action that would have brought severe consequences for anyone else. When Alexander received word of the tragedy at Grazino, the Tsar's first assumption was political. He guessed that Natasya had been killed as part of a scheme to force Arachchev from power, not that she was murdered in response to her own actions. The Tsar was initially displeased by Rakcheyev's unauthorized transfer of power, but he ultimately forgave him, chalking it up to his grief-stricken state.

21:55Justice came quickly for the murderous siblings, and as to be expected, it was extreme. Though Preskovia confessed, Vasily was unable to avoid blame, and he received a sentence of 175 lashes. Praskovia received 125. Both punishments proved fatal, as they were surely designed to be. The system had completed its cycle, cruelty leading to desperation, which led to cruelty of a deadlier nature, which in turn was met with deadly cruelty again. Tsar Alexander I died in November 1825, just months after Natasya's murder, and the new Tsar, Nicholas I, had different advisors and different priorities. Arachchev returned to Grusino permanently, living at the scene of the crime, until his own death in 1834.

22:58He built a monument to Natasya on the grounds and visited it often. What happened at Grazino wasn't just a domestic tragedy. It reflected the larger system Urakcheyev had spent decades constructing and maintaining. For more than 20 years, he had been among Russia's most powerful figures, creating an environment where violence functioned as the default method of control. The culture of systemic brutality that Arachchev helped establish at the national level had filtered into his own household. When looking at what you might call complicated women in history, there is often the urge to rationalize behavior by looking at the bigger picture.

23:46Systemic injustices and historical circumstances can often go a long way towards viewing someone's life through a more generous lens. But Natasya Mencken had a well-documented history of cruelty and abuse, and no amount of context can justify the pain that she caused for others. She certainly did not deserve to be violently murdered for it, of course. But for the serfs at Grazino, there was nowhere else to turn, and the chronic abuse had pushed them far beyond what people can be expected to endure. The Russian Revolution wouldn't arrive for nearly another century, but common themes were already visible.

24:33Sustained oppression with no possibility of relief eventually produces violent resistance. Natasya Minkin's death was a small-scale demonstration of what occurs when systemic cruelty becomes intolerable and people don't see any other ways out. That's the tragic story of Madame Minkin, but keep listening after a brief sponsor break to hear a little bit more about her legacy in literature.

25:12What if mind control is real? If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have? Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car? When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings. Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you? I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused. Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. NLP, aka Neuro Linguistic Programming, is a blend of hypnosis, linguistics, and psychology. Fans say it's like finally getting a user manual for your brain.

25:48It's about engineering consciousness. Mind Games is the story of NLP. It's crazy cast of disciples and the fake doctor who invented it at a new age commune and sold it to guys in suits. He stood trial for murder and got acquitted. The biggest mind game of all? NLP might actually work. This is wild. Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, host of the On Purpose podcast. On a recent episode, I sat down with Nick Jonas, singer, songwriter, actor, and global superstar. The thing I would say to my younger self is, congratulations, you get to marry Priyanka Chopra Jonas.

26:31and also you know your daughter's incredible that's beautiful man yeah thank you that's so beautiful i can see that got you a little yeah for sure our daughter she came to the world under sort of very intense circumstances which i've not really talked about ever growing up on disney in front of million how did that shape your sense of self i went blank i hit a bad note then i couldn't kind of recover. And I built up this idea that music and being a musician was my whole identity. I had to sort of relearn who I was if you took this thing away. Who am I? Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

27:16Segregation in the day, integration at night. When segregation was the law, one mysterious Black club owner had his own rules. We didn't worry about what went on outside. It was like stepping in another world. Inside Charlie's place, black and white people danced together. But not everyone was happy about it. You saw the KKK? Yeah, they were dressed up in their uniform. The KKK set out to raid Charlie, take him away from here. Charlie was an example of power. they had to crush you from Atlas Obscura Rococo Punch and Visit Myrtle Beach comes Charlie's Place a story that was nearly lost to time until now listen to Charlie's Place on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts

28:15what if mind control is real if you could control the behavior of anybody around you what kind of life would you have Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car? When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings. Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you? I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused. Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. NLP, aka Neuro Linguistic Programming, is a blend of hypnosis, linguistics, and psychology. Fans say it's like finally getting a user manual for your brain.

28:51It's about engineering consciousness. Mind Games is the story of NLP. It's crazy cast of disciples and the fake doctor who invented it at a New Age commune and sold it to guys in suits. He stood trial for murder and got acquitted. The biggest mind game of all? NLP might actually work. This is wild. Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, host of the On Purpose podcast. On a recent episode, I sat down with Nick Jonas, singer, songwriter, actor, and global superstar. The thing I would say to my younger self is congratulations, you get to marry Priyanka Chopra Jonas.

29:34And also, you know, your daughter's incredible. That's beautiful, man. Yeah. Thank you. That's so beautiful. I can see that got you a little... Yeah, for sure. Our daughter, she came to the world under sort of very intense circumstances, which I had not really talked about ever. Growing up on Disney in front of a million, how did that shape your sense of self? I went blank. I hit a bad note, then I couldn't kind of recover. And I built up this idea that music and being a musician was my whole identity. I had to sort of relearn who I was if you took this thing away. Who am I? Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

30:19Segregation in the day, integration at night. When segregation was the law, one mysterious Black club owner had his own rules. We didn't worry about what went on outside. It was like stepping in another world. Inside Charlie's place, black and white people danced together. But not everyone was happy about it. You saw the KKK? Yeah, they were dressed up in their uniform. The KKK set out to raid Charlie, take him away from here. Charlie was an example of power. They had to crush him. From Atlas Obscura, Rococo Punch, and Visit Myrtle Beach comes Charlie's Place, a story that was nearly lost to time.

31:06Until now. Listen to Charlie's Place on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.