ARCHBISHOP`S RESIDENCE (MINOR NICHOLAS PALACE)

Starting from 1742, when the Moscow Episcopate was established, Moscow archbishops had been living in the Kremlin, in Chudov Monastery's chambers prepared specially for them. In 1776, there was built an Archbishop’s Residence on the site of the archbishop's private quarters, destroyed in 1771 during the Plague Riot. Its construction occupied a corner adjoining the territory of the Chudov Monastery and the Ascension Convent. Simple in form and modestly decorated, the two-storey building was designed in classical forms and was one of the first structures of this style in the Kremlin.

Later, probably after 1787, when Platon was elevated to the rank of Metropolitan, a private church in the name of the Apostles Peter and Paul was arranged in the eastern part of the Archbishop's Residence. In 1797, during the coronation of Emperor Paul I, Grand Prince Alexander Pavlovich and his wife were accommodated in the house because of the shortage of palace premises. In 1817 it joined the palace department and was adapted as a residence for Grand Prince Nikolay Pavlovich in the Kremlin.

The future emperor Alexander II was born there in 1818. In 1824 the building was added a third wooden storey, and in 1831 it was renamed the Minor Kremlin (Nicholas) Palace. In the 1870s, architect N.A.Shokhin executed the palace restoration project. During the 1917 Revolutionary War, the building was damaged in artillery fire. In 1929, the palace, along with the Chudov and the Ascension Monasteries, was dismantled to erect the building of the Military School named after the Central Executive Committee on this territory.