Editing Catherine the Great (section)

=== Poniatowski ===
[[File:Marcello Bacciarelli, Portret Stanisława Augusta Poniatowskiego (cropped).jpg|thumb|upright=.8|[[Stanisław August Poniatowski]], the last King of [[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth|Poland]]]]

[[Charles Hanbury Williams|Sir Charles Hanbury Williams]], the British ambassador to Russia, offered Stanisław Poniatowski a place in the embassy in return for gaining Catherine as an ally. Poniatowski, through his mother's side, came from the [[Czartoryski family]], prominent members of the pro-Russian faction in Poland; Poniatowski and Catherine were eighth cousins, twice removed, by their mutual ancestor King [[Christian I of Denmark]], by virtue of Poniatowski's maternal descent from the Scottish [[House of Stuart]]. Catherine, 26 years old and already married to the then-Grand Duke Peter for some 10 years, met the 22-year-old Poniatowski in 1755, well before encountering the Orlov brothers. They had a daughter named Anna Petrovna in December 1757 (not to be confused with [[Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia]], the daughter of Peter I's second marriage), although she was legally regarded as Grand Duke Peter's.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8ilWlLmsIukC&q=Stanis%C5%82aw+Poniatowski+Anna+Petrovna|title=Catherine the Great|first=Christine|last=Hatt|date=24 November 2017|publisher=World Almanac Library|access-date=24 November 2017|via=Google Books|isbn=978-0836855357}}</ref>

King [[Augustus III of Poland]] died in 1763, so Poland needed to elect a new ruler. Catherine supported Poniatowski as a candidate to become the next king. She sent the Russian army into Poland to avoid possible disputes. Russia invaded Poland on 26 August 1764, threatening to fight, and imposing Poniatowski as king. Poniatowski accepted the throne, and thereby put himself under Catherine's control. News of Catherine's plan spread, and Frederick II (others say the Ottoman sultan) warned her that if she tried to conquer Poland by marrying Poniatowski, all of Europe would oppose her. She had no intention of marrying him, having already given birth to Orlov's child and to the Grand Duke Paul by then.

Prussia (through the agency of [[Prince Henry of Prussia (1726–1802)|Prince Henry]]), Russia (under Catherine), and Austria (under [[Maria Theresa of Austria|Maria Theresa]]) began preparing the ground for the partitions of Poland. In the first partition, 1772, the three powers split {{convert|20000|sqmi|km2|order=flip|abbr=on}} among them. Russia got territories east of the line connecting, more or less, [[Riga]]–[[Polotsk]]–[[Mogilev]]. In the second partition, in 1793, Russia received the most land, from west of [[Minsk]] almost to [[Kiev]] and down the river Dnieper, leaving some spaces of [[steppe]] down south in front of [[Ochakiv|Ochakov]], on the [[Black Sea]]. Later uprisings in Poland led to the third partition in 1795. Poland ceased to exist as an independent nation<ref>Thomas McLean, ''The Other East and Nineteenth-Century British Literature: Imagining Poland and the Russian Empire'' (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012) pp. 14–40.</ref> until its post-World War I reconstitution.