Pavel Pestel (1825) The Southern wing of the Decembrists was based in Tulchin and was led by Pavel Pestel. Pestel wanted a republic that embraced Russian language and culture. His republic would force minorities to abandon their language and culture. Pestel's republic would endorse the abolition of monarchy (of course), universal male suffrage, the abolition of serfdom and equality before the law. Pestel believed violence would be necessary to achieving his goals as would an authoritarian provisional government. Pestel was Russia's first radical revolutionary. Muraviev was replaced in the St. Petersburg by a radical sympathetic to Pestel in 1825