After service in the French and Polish-Saxon armies, Munnich entered the service of Peter I the Great of Russia in 1721 and participated in the construction of the Ladoga Canal. In 1728 he was given the title of count and was appointed commander in chief of the Russian Army by Peter II. Subsequently, Munnich was made a field marshal and president of the war council (1732) by Anna Ivanovna, whose government was dominated by German advisers. During the War of the Polish Succession (1733-35), Munnich captured Gdansk (1734), and then, after persistently advocating an aggressive policy toward the Ottoman Empire, he led the Russian Army into the Crimea and Moldavia to fight the Turks. Despite complications resulting from fighting a war at a great distance from the political centre of Russia, Munnich conquered Perekop, Ochakov (1737), and Azov (1736-38), won a major victory at Stavuchany near Khotin in northern Bessarabia (1739), and earned a reputation for being an outstanding military leader.
At
the conclusion of the war (September 1739), he returned to St. Petersburg
and resumed his influential position in the government. He also founded
the cadet corps which was destined to supply the future generations
of officers.
When Anna Ivanovna died (Oct. 17 [Oct. 28] 1740), leaving the throne
to her infant grandnephew Ivan VI Antonovich and naming her favourite
and chief adviser, Ernst Johann Biron duke of Courland as regent, Munnich
feared that Biron's widespread unpopularity would cause the entire ruling
German clique to lose power. He, therefore arrested Biron in the middle
of the night of Nov. 8-9 (Nov. 19-20) 1740, and sent him to the city
of Pelim in Siberia. Munnich made Ivan's mother Anna Leopoldovna regent
and he personally assumed the role of first minister. One year later
in the revolts of 1741 he and Anna Leopoldovna were deposed by Elizabeth,
daughter of Peter I. Count Munnich was arrested on his way to the frontier
and condemned to death. He was brought out for execution and withdrawn
from the scaffold; it was then his turn to be sent to Siberia, where
he remained for several years, until the accession of Peter III brought
about his release in 1762. Catherine II (who soon displaced Peter III)
employed the old field-marshal as director-general of the Baltic ports.
Field Marshall Munnich was a fine soldier of the professional type,
and many future commanders, notably Loudon and Lacy,
served their apprenticeship at Ochakov and Khotin. As a statesman he
is regarded as the founder of Russian Philhellenism. He had the grade
of count of the Holy Roman Empire. The Russian 37th Dragoons bear his
name. He died in 1767.
He had many children and one of them Sergey Christoforovich, count von
Munich had five sons among them Guard Captain Count Ludwig Anton Sergeyevich
Munnich (January, 5th 1748- †1800?/1810?). This one was married to Vera
Nikolaevna Choglokova and they five children, four daughers and one
son. The youngest daugther, Natalia Antonovna Munnich married to
Irakly Ivanovich Morkov
in early 1790.