In April 1876, Nastasya V. Kairova was accused of attempted murder for cutting the throat of her lover's wife. The judicial case raised to national relevance. Writers such as F. M. Dostoevsky and A. S. Suvorin discussed the trial’s outcomes in their articles. However, Kairova was not only the defendant of one of the most heated court cases of the 19th century, but she was also a pioneer in Russian journalism. Using a microhistorical approach - through an attentive reading of archive materials, letters from the front and newspapers - I will approach one of the most interesting female characters of that time. Kairova not only wrote as a war correspondent for Novoye Vremya, Golos, Birzhevyie Vedomosti - newspapers among the most important - but she also left two high-value literary works, a sketch story and a diary, which in their style recall Dostoevsky’s Notes from Underground and the more modern Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. Journalism in the autocratic Russia had a primary and peculiar role. It amounted to a parliament, having a direct influence on Russian history and society. If so, which role Kairova and other women journalists (O. A. Novikova, V. N. Mak-Gakhan) had in this development? This study aims to bring to light a writer and a journalist who was ahead of her time and to clarify the woman’s role in Russian journalism and their influence on historical and social changes in the country.