Catherine II carried out a dual policy concerning the Jews. Being the ruler of a Christian state she was supposed to take into consideration public opinion which meant that Jews were still prohibited from living in St. Petersburg. But state interests induced Catherine to grant some exceptions to official policy. Those selected for residency in the capital usually represented not just themselves and their businesses but the whole Jewish community. For example, Catherine ordered Levi Wulf, a Jew who then lived in St. Petersburg, to implement a plan for Jewish settlements in unpopulated regions of Little Russia.
Catherine used the services of the same Levi Wulf when she needed to invite several Jewish merchants from Mitava, the capital of Kurland (at present Yelgava) to St. Petersburg. The General Governor of Riga was ordered to issue passports to several Jews who presented letters of recommendation from Wulf. Their religion was not indicated on their passports.
Then in 1773 seven Jews - merchants and contractors - came from Mitava to the capital in order to supply the Russian Army. They arrived with their servants, shoikhet and a rabbi, so they constituted a minyan. In order to keep their presense secret, the Empress at first ordered them to live in the house of her own priest at Nevsky Prospect, 15.
During the second part of the 18th century Jews became frequent visitors to the capital. They included not only merchants, but others who came for exams at the Medical Collegium in order to get a physician's license. Several deputations of Jews from the provinces visited the capital. In 1785 a delegation of six Jews from Byelorussia applied to the Empress for certain privileges for the Jewish population in the Pale