I'm going to go. He's a sures, yes,

a ras, it yes shawras.

We're hush a hush. Welcome to the Russian rulers podcast, episode 46, leading by example. Last time, Catherine began to solidify her grip on power and both

her husband Peter the 3rd and the ill-fated Ivan the 6th were shall we say

dispatched. To call someone great you need to have before you not only a

person with intellect some luck and you need someone with a whole lot of

good timing.

You need someone with a whole lot of guts

willing to take major chances.

As we recounted over the past few episodes, Catherine had it and she had it in

spades. But what she does next is leading through a brave act, although it scared the hell out of everyone around her.

Throughout human history, one of the scourges which ravaged populations was the dreaded disease smallpox.

If it didn't kill you and back in Catherine's time

its kill rate was about 30 to 35 percent,

with an estimated 400,000 Europeans dying each year in the 18th

century, it would leave painful and permanent scars.

With no cure and no real understanding of the reason for the disease, all were fearful of it.

Even royalty, as Peter the third had contracted the disease which left him badly scarred and it did kill, saw Peter the 2nd.

Vaccines were unheard of in that time until Sir Thomas Dimsdale became somewhat famous in England for his for smallpox.

A Londoner, he was summoned to St. Petersburg to inoculate not some commoner or inmate to prove its value and usefulness,

but he was there to vaccinate none other than Empress Catherine.

She had wanted to mandate it for the people, but her advisors warned her that the people

...