10. Mary Hamilton was Catherine I’s Lady in Waiting and Peter the Great’s mistress — and executed for Infanticide.
Mary Hamilton was a member of a Scottish family that emigrated to Russia during the reign of Ivan the Terrible. In 1713, she became a lady in waiting to Peter the Great’s new wife, Catherine I — and then the tsar’s lover. However, Mary’s also had another lover, Ivan Mikhailovich Orlov — who had deserted her for another woman. The desperate Mary tried to bride Orlov back to her by stealing from Catherine. Over the next two years, the unfortunate lady became pregnant twice, aborting one child and drowning the other soon after its birth in 1717. All was revealed when the authorities interrogated Orlov regarding some missing papers. He quickly informed them of Mary’s abortion, and the whole story of theft and murder soon followed. Mary confessed to killing her child, and on March 14, 1719, was beheaded for abortion, Infanticide and theft.
