Elena Pavlovna, née Princess Frederica Charlotte Maria of Württemberg, married the youngest son of Paul I, Grand Duke Mikhail Pavlovich in 1823, and converted to Orthodox Christianity, taking the name Elena Pavlovna. She was a prominent philanthropist and public figure who supported the abolition of serfdom and other liberal reforms. Elena Pavlovna received Russian lessons from Vasily Andreyevich Zhukovsky and Pyotr Alexandrovich Pletnyov.

After learning about Pushkin’s deadly injury in his last duel, Elena Pavlovna sent several letters to Vasily Zhukovsky, who was staying at that time at Pushkin’s residence on the Moika Street,

Later on, Vasily Zhukovsky recalled the following,

Despite the lack of extensive documentary evidence available to fully reconstruct the history of the relationship between Alexander Pushkin and Grand Duchess Elena Pavlova, one thing is clear: Pushkin’s diaries, his letters, the letters from Elena Pavlova to her husband, and memoirs, as well as the text of “Commander” handwritten by the author in her album, — all that irrefutably attests to the spiritual affinity between these two remarkable individuals and their frequent meetings and conversations.