the serfs, the majority of the population still saw Elizabeth as a benevolent ruler, when compared to the German brutes who dominated the court during Anna Ivanonva's and Ivan VI's reigns. Elizabeth remained very interested in diplomacy and Russia's foreign affairs. Under her rule, Russia took part in the Seven Years' War from 1755 to 1762. Russia entered the war as an ally of Austria and France against Prussia. The campaign advanced successfully but ended as a result of mounting financial difficulties and Elizabeth's death in 1762. Her nephew and successor, Peter III (grandson of Peter I), took Russia out of the war. Peter III, ruled for six months in 1762 Peter III reigned for a mere six months before his wife, Catherine II, led a coup against him. He was born and raised in Germany in the court of his father, the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, and did not come to live in Russia until he was fourteen. It is difficult to ascertain his character because there exist many contradictory accounts. Catherine's journals describe him as incompetent bordering on mentally challenged, yet his acts as emperor illustrate a certain amount of shrewdness. Peter withdrew Russia from the Seven Years' War to salvage the remainder of the empire's finances and to save his beloved Prussia from complete defeat while depriving Russia of territorial advances. Instead, he threatened war with Denmark over his ancestral claims in Schleswig, though he was overthrown before fighting could begin. His “Manifesto on the Freedom of the Nobility” ended compulsory state service for the nobility. However, during his short reign Peter managed to irritate the nobility by dramatically decreasing the power of the Senate. He similarly angered the Church by his liberation of serfs on church land and his obvious contempt for Russian Orthodoxy. Peter's passion for Prussian style military ultimately terminated his reign. His delight for rigid discipline alienated the palace guards, and ultimately allowed Catherine II, with the help of her lover Grigori Orlov who led the palace guard regiments, to overthrow Peter III on July 9, 1762. Peter's assassination symbolically showed the end of the era of palace revolutions. Age of Catherine the Great Catherine the Great's reign featured imperial expansion, which brought the empire huge new territories in the south and west, and internal consolidation. She resolved her husband's conflict with Denmark by exchanging his claims in Schleswig-Holstein for control of the Duchy