Grigory Potemkin was a minister and lover of the Russian Empress
Catherine II.
[2] After the 1783 Russian
annexation of Crimea from the
Ottoman Empire and liquidation of the Cossack
Zaporozhian Sich (see
New Russia), Potemkin became governor of the region. Crimea had been devastated by the war, and the Muslim
Tatar inhabitants of Crimea were viewed as a potential
fifth column of the Ottoman Empire. Potemkin's major tasks were to pacify and rebuild by bringing in Russian settlers. In 1787, as a new war was about to break out between Russia and the Ottoman Empire, Catherine II, with her court and several ambassadors, made an unprecedented
six-month trip to New Russia. One purpose of this trip was to impress Russia's allies prior to the war. Another purpose was to familiarize herself, supposedly directly, with her new possessions.
[3] To help accomplish this, Potemkin set up "mobile villages" on the banks of the
Dnipro River.
[4] As soon as the barge carrying the Empress and ambassadors arrived, Potemkin's men, dressed as peasants, would populate the village. Once the barge left, the village was disassembled, then rebuilt downstream overnight.
[2]