During the Russian campaign of 1812 and the War of the Sixth Coalition in 1813-1813 many officers of the Russian army made an impressive career becoming generals. Later some of them passed to the civil service and headed central ministries and departments. Heroes of Napoleonic wars formed a narrow circle of confidants of Russian emperor Nicholas I. The article poses several questions concerning the presence of former generals in the ruling elite: how did this phenomenon correspond with the development of Russian civil service, what views united these generals-ministers and how were they estimated by their contemporaries.