Spaso-Borodinsky Monastery, the first monument to the fallen heroes of the Battle of Borodino, was founded by Margarita Mikhailovna Tuchkova in 1839 in memory of her husband, Major General Alexander Alekseevich Tuchkov, who died in battle against Napoleon Bonaparte's army near this site. The general was 34 years old, and Margarita was 32.

Before the Battle of Borodino, Margarita Tuchkova sensed her husband's demise and even had a prophetic dream. After his death, she searched for his remains for a long time but was unable to bury her husband. The sight of the mountain of mutilated bodies on the Borodino field forever changed her life. She sold her jewelry and began the construction of a church at the site of the Semenovskaya fleshes, where her husband fell. Emperor Alexander I and his wife helped the widow financially, allowing for the construction of the Church of the Savior Not Made by Hands instead of a small chapel, and a symbolic grave for Alexander Tuchkov was arranged nearby.

The death of her young husband was not the only blow in Margarita's fate: in 1826, her 15-year-old son Nikolai died. After that, her social life came to an end. Margarita settled in a small house next to the church, freed her peasants, and sold part of her property, directing the proceeds to the needs of the future monastery, which was initially established as a communal Spaso-Borodinsky women's hermitage. In 1836, she took monastic vows under the name Melania and soon began the creation of the monastery. With the help of Nicholas I, the monastery walls and towers were erected, and in 1839, a full-fledged women's monastery was founded. Tuchkova herself became the abbess, receiving the rank of Igumen Maria, and led the Spaso-Borodinsky monastery until her death in 1852, when the number of sisters exceeded 200 in 1840.

In 1912, the monastery became a site of great celebrations, with Emperor Nicholas II visiting with his family. However, five years later, the Bolsheviks came to power and began their struggle against Orthodoxy. Up to three hundred sisters lived in the monastery, who were forced to leave the convent, and in 1926, the monastery was closed. The Spaso-Borodinsky Monastery was revived only in our time and once again impresses with its beauty.