Cossacks write petitions to Orenburg and St. Petersburg, send so-called "winter villages" - delegates from the army with a complaint about the atamans and local authorities. Sometimes they achieved their goal, and especially unacceptable chieftains changed, but on the whole the situation remained the same. In 1771, the Yaik Cossacks refused to go in pursuit of the Kalmyks who had migrated outside Russia. General Traubenberg with a detachment of soldiers went to investigate direct disobedience to the order. The result of his punishments was the Yaitsk Cossack uprising of 1772, during which General Traubenberg and the army chieftain Tambovtsev were killed. Troops under the command of General F. Yu. Freiman were sent to suppress the uprising. The rebels were defeated at the Embulatovka River in June 1772; As a result of the defeat, the Cossack circles were finally eliminated, a garrison of government troops was deployed in the Yaitsky town, and all power over the army passed into the hands of the commandant of the garrison, Lieutenant Colonel I.D.Simonov. The massacre of the captured instigators was extremely cruel and made a depressing impression on the army: never before had the Cossacks been branded, they had not cut out their tongues. A large number of participants in the performance took refuge in distant steppe farms, excitement reigned everywhere, the state of the Cossacks was like a compressed spring.

No less tension was present among the peoples of other religions in the Urals and the Volga region. The development of the Urals, which began in the 18th century and the active colonization of the Volga region, the construction and development of military border lines, the expansion of the Orenburg, Yaitsk and Siberian Cossack troops with the allocation of lands to them that previously belonged to local nomadic peoples, intolerant religious policy led to numerous unrest among the Bashkirs, Tatars, Kazakhs, Mordovians, Chuvashes, Udmurts, Kalmyks (most of the latter, having broken through the Yaitskaya border line, migrated to Western China in 1771).

The situation at the fast-growing factories in the Urals was also explosive. Starting with Peter, the government solved the problem of labor in metallurgy mainly by attributing state peasants to state and private mining plants, allowing new breeders to buy serf villages and granting the unofficial right to keep fugitive serfs, since the Berg Collegium, which was in charge of the factories , tried not to notice violations of the decree on the capture and expulsion of all fugitives. At the same time, it was very convenient to use the powerlessness and desperate situation of the fugitives, and if someone began to express dissatisfaction with their position, they were immediately handed over to the authorities for punishment. Former peasants resisted forced labor in factories.

The peasants assigned to state and private factories dreamed of returning to their usual village work, while the situation of the peasants in serf estates was not much better. The economic situation in the country, almost continuously waging one war after another, was difficult, in addition, the gallant century required the nobles to follow the latest fashions and trends. Therefore, the landowners are increasing the area under crops, and the corvee is increasing. The peasants themselves are becoming a marketable commodity, they are mortgaged, exchanged, simply lost by whole villages. To top it off, this was followed by the Decree of Catherine II of August 22, 1767 prohibiting the peasants from complaining about the landlords. In conditions of complete impunity and personal dependence, the slavery position of the peasants is aggravated by whims, whims or real crimes occurring in the estates, and most of them were left without investigation and consequences.

In this situation, the most fantastic rumors about imminent freedom or about the transfer of all the peasants to the treasury, about the ready decree of the tsar, who was killed for this by his wife and boyars, about the fact that the tsar was not killed, and he was hiding until better times, all of them easily found their way fell on the fertile soil of general human dissatisfaction with their present situation. All groups of future participants in the performance simply did not have any legal opportunity to defend their interests.

The beginning of the uprising

Emelyan Pugachev. Portrait attached to the publication of "History of the Pugachev rebellion" by A. Pushkin, 1834

Despite the fact that the internal readiness of the Yaik Cossacks for the uprising was high, the performance lacked a unifying idea, a core that would rally the hiding and hidden participants in the 1772 unrest. The rumor that the emperor Pyotr Fyodorovich, who miraculously escaped after a six-month reign, had appeared in the army, instantly spread throughout Yaik.

Few of the Cossack leaders believed in the resurrected tsar, but everyone looked closely to see if this man was able to lead, to gather under his banner an army capable of equal to the government one. The man who called himself Peter III was Emelyan Ivanovich Pugachev, a Don Cossack, a native of the Zimoveiskaya village (Stepan Razin and Kondraty Bulavin, who had already given Russian history before that), a participant in the Seven Years' War and the 1768-1774 war with Turkey.

Finding himself in the Trans-Volga steppes in the fall of 1772, he stopped at the Mechetnaya Sloboda and here from the abbot of the Old Believer skete Filaret he learned about the unrest among the Yaik Cossacks. It is not known for certain where the idea of ​​calling himself tsar was born in his head and what his initial plans were, but in November 1772 he arrived in Yaitsky town and at meetings with the Cossacks called himself Peter III. Upon his return to Irgiz, Pugachev was arrested and sent to Kazan, from where he fled at the end of May 1773. In August, he reappeared in the army, at the inn of Stepan Obolyaev, where his future closest associates - Shigaev, Zarubin, Karavaev, Myasnikov - visited him.

In September, hiding from the search detachments, Pugachev, accompanied by a group of Cossacks, arrived at the Budarinsky outpost, where on September 17 his first decree to the Yaitsky army was announced. The author of the decree was one of the few literate Cossacks, 19-year-old Ivan Pochitalin, sent by his father to serve the "Tsar". From here a detachment of 80 Cossacks headed up the Yaik. On the way, new supporters joined, so that by the time of the arrival of September 18 to the Yaitsky town, the detachment already numbered 300 people. On September 18, 1773, an attempt to cross the Chagan and enter the city ended in failure, but at the same time a large group of Cossacks, from among those sent by the commandant Simonov to defend the town, went over to the side of the impostor. The second insurgent attack on 19 September was also repulsed with artillery. The insurgent detachment did not have its own guns, so it was decided to move further up the Yaik, and on September 20 the Cossacks camped near the Iletsk town.

A circle was convened here, at which the troops elected Andrei Ovchinnikov as the marching chieftain, all the Cossacks swore allegiance to the great Emperor Peter Fedorovich, after which Pugachev sent Ovchinnikov to the Iletsk town with decrees to the Cossacks: “ And whatever you wish, you will not be denied all benefits and salaries; and your glory will not expire forever; and both you and your descendants are the first to be the first with me, the great, sovereign, to commit". Despite the opposition of the Iletsk ataman Portnov, Ovchinnikov persuaded the local Cossacks to join the uprising, and they greeted Pugachev with bell ringing and bread and salt.

All Iletsk Cossacks swore allegiance to Pugachev. The first execution took place: according to the complaints of the residents - “I hurt them great and ruined them” - Portnov was hanged. A separate regiment was formed from the Iletsk Cossacks, headed by Ivan Tvorogov, the army got all the artillery of the town. The Yaik Cossack Fyodor Chumakov was appointed head of artillery.

Rebellion Initial Stage Map

After a two-day meeting on further actions, it was decided to send the main forces to Orenburg, the capital of a huge region under the control of the hated Reinsdorp. On the way to Orenburg lay small fortresses of the Nizhne-Yaitskaya distance of the Orenburg military line. The garrison of fortresses was, as a rule, mixed - Cossacks and soldiers, their life and service are perfectly described by Pushkin in "The Captain's Daughter".

And on October 5, Pugachev's army approached the city, setting up a temporary camp five miles from it. The Cossacks were sent to the rampart, who managed to convey Pugachev's decree to the troops of the garrison with an appeal to lay down their arms and join the "sovereign". In response, the cannons from the city rampart began shelling the rebels. On October 6, Reinsdorp ordered a sortie, a detachment of 1,500 men under the command of Major Naumov returned to the fortress after a two-hour battle. At the military council convened on October 7, it was decided to defend behind the walls of the fortress under the cover of fortress artillery. One of the reasons for this decision was the fear of soldiers and Cossacks going over to the side of Pugachev. The sortie showed that the soldiers were reluctant to fight, Major Naumov reported that he had found "Shyness and fear in their subordinates".

Together with Karanai Muratov, Kaskin Samarov captured Sterlitamak and Tabinsk, from November 28, the Pugachevites under the command of ataman Ivan Gubanov and Kaskin Samarov besieged Ufa, from December 14 the ataman Chika-Zarubin commanded the siege. On December 23, Zarubin, at the head of a 10-thousandth detachment with 15 cannons, began an assault on the city, but was repulsed by cannon fire and vigorous counterattacks from the garrison.

Ataman Ivan Gryaznov, who took part in the capture of Sterlitamak and Tabynsk, gathered a detachment of factory peasants and seized factories on the Belaya River (Voskresenskiy, Arkhangelskiy, Epiphany factories). In early November, he proposed to organize the casting of cannons and cannonballs for them at the nearby factories. Pugachev promoted him to the rank of colonel and sent him to organize detachments in the Isetskaya province. There he took the Satka, Zlatoust, Kyshtym and Kaslinsky factories, the Kundravinsky, Uvelsky and Varlamov settlements, the Chebarkul fortress, defeated the punitive teams sent against him, and by January with a four-thousandth detachment approached Chelyabinsk.

In December 1773, Pugachev sent the ataman Mikhail Tolkachev with his decrees to the rulers of the Kazakh Junior Zhuz Nurali Khan and Sultan Dusala with an appeal to join his army, but the khan decided to wait for the development of events, only riders of the Sarym Datula clan joined Pugachev. On the way back, Tolkachev gathered Cossacks in his detachment in fortresses and outposts on the lower Yaik and went with them to Yaitsky town, collecting guns, ammunition and provisions in passing fortresses and outposts. On December 30, Tolkachev approached the Yaitsky town, seven miles from which he defeated and captured the Cossack command of Sergeant Major N.A. Most of the Cossacks greeted their comrades and joined the Tolkachev detachment, the Cossacks of the elders' side, the soldiers of the garrison, led by Lieutenant Colonel Simonov and Captain Krylov, locked themselves in the "retransmission" - the fortress of the Archangel Michael Cathedral, the cathedral itself was its main citadel. Gunpowder was stored in the basement of the bell tower, and cannons and arrows were installed on the upper tiers. It was not possible to take the fortress on the move.

In total, according to the approximate calculations of historians, in the ranks of the Pugachev army by the end of 1773 there were from 25 to 40 thousand people, more than half of this number were Bashkir detachments. To control the troops, Pugachev created the Military Collegium, which served as an administrative-military center and conducted extensive correspondence with remote areas of the uprising. A.I. Vitoshnov, M.G. Shigaev, D.G. Skobychkin and I.A.

House of the "Tsar's father-in-law" of the Cossack Kuznetsov - now the Pugachev Museum in Uralsk

In January 1774, Ataman Ovchinnikov led a campaign to the lower reaches of the Yaik, to the Guryev town, seized its Kremlin by storm, captured rich trophies and replenished the detachment with local Cossacks, bringing them to the Yaitsky town. At the same time, Pugachev himself arrived in Yaitsky town. He took over the leadership of the protracted siege of the city fortress of the Archangel Michael Cathedral, but after a failed assault on January 20 he returned to the main army at Orenburg. At the end of January, Pugachev returned to the Yaitsk town, where a military circle was held, in which N.A. Kargin was chosen as a military ataman, and A.P. Perfiliev and I.A.Fofanov were foremen. At the same time, the Cossacks, wanting to finally make the king with the army, married him to a young Cossack woman Ustinya Kuznetsova. In the second half of February and early March 1774, Pugachev again personally led the attempts to seize the besieged fortress. On February 19, an explosion of a mine tunnel blew up and destroyed the bell tower of the Mikhailovsky Cathedral, but the garrison each time managed to repel the attacks of the besiegers.

Detachments of the Pugachevites under the command of Ivan Beloborodov, who grew up to 3 thousand people in the campaign, approached Yekaterinburg, seizing a number of nearby fortresses and factories on the way, and on January 20, as the main base of their operations, they seized the Demidov Shaitan plant.

The situation in besieged Orenburg by this time was already critical, famine began in the city. Having learned about the departure of Pugachev and Ovchinnikov with part of the troops to the Yaitsky town, Governor Reinsdorp decided to make a sortie on January 13 to the Berdskaya Sloboda to lift the siege. But the unexpected attack did not work, the patrol Cossacks managed to raise the alarm. The atamans M. Shigaev, D. Lysov, T. Podurov and Khlopusha who remained in the camp led their detachments to the ravine that surrounded the Berdskaya Sloboda and served as a natural defense line. The Orenburg corps were forced to fight in unfavorable conditions and suffered a severe defeat. With heavy losses, throwing guns, weapons, ammunition and ammunition, the semi-encircled Orenburg troops hastily retreated to Orenburg under the cover of the city walls, having lost only 281 people killed, 13 cannons with all the shells for them, many weapons, ammunition and ammunition.

On January 25, 1774, the Pugachevites undertook the second and last assault on Ufa, Zarubin attacked the city from the south-west, from the left bank of the Belaya River, and the ataman Gubanov from the east. At first, the detachments were successful and even broke into the outskirts of the city, but there their offensive impulse was stopped by the defenders' grape fire. Having pulled all available forces to the places of the breakthrough, the garrison drove out of the city first Zarubin, and then Gubanov.

In early January, the Chelyabinsk Cossacks revolted and tried to seize power in the city, hoping for the help of the detachments of Ataman Gryaznov, but were defeated by the city garrison. On January 10, Gryaznov unsuccessfully tried to take Chelyaba by storm, and on January 13, the two thousandth corps of General I.A.Decolong, who had approached from Siberia, entered Chelyaba. Throughout January, battles unfolded on the outskirts of the city, and on February 8, Decolong took it for the best to leave the city to the Pugachevites.

On February 16, Khlopushi's detachment stormed the Iletsk Defense, killing all the officers, taking possession of weapons, ammunition and provisions and taking with them convicts, Cossacks and soldiers fit for military service.

Military defeats and expansion of the Peasant War area

When news reached St. Petersburg about the defeat of the expedition of V.A.Kara and the unauthorized departure of Kara himself to Moscow, Catherine II, by a decree of November 27, appointed A.I.Bibikov as the new commander. The new punitive corps included 10 cavalry and infantry regiments, as well as 4 light field teams, hastily sent from the western and north-western borders of the empire to Kazan and Samara, and besides them - all the garrisons and military units located in the uprising zone, and the remains of Kara's corps. Bibikov arrived in Kazan on December 25, 1773, and immediately began the movement of regiments and brigades under the command of P.M.Golitsyn and P.D. Already on December 29, the 24th light field command, led by Major K.I. Arapov with several dozen Pugachevites who remained with him retreated to Alekseevsk, but the brigade led by Mansurov defeated his troops in battles near Alekseevsk and at the Buzuluk fortress, after which in Sorochinskaya it united on March 10 with the corps of General Golitsyn, who approached there, advancing behind near Menzelinsky and Kungur.

Having received information about the advancement of the Mansurov and Golitsyn brigades, Pugachev decided to withdraw the main forces from Orenburg, effectively lifting the siege, and concentrate the main forces in the Tatishchev fortress. Instead of burnt walls, an ice wall was built, all available artillery was collected. Soon a government detachment of 6,500 men and 25 cannons approached the fortress. The battle took place on March 22 and was extremely fierce. Prince Golitsyn wrote in his report to A. Bibikov: "The matter was so important that I did not expect such impudence and orders in such unenlightened people in the military craft as these defeated rebels are."... When the situation became hopeless, Pugachev decided to return to Berdy. His departure remained to cover the Cossack regiment of Ataman Ovchinnikov. With his regiment, he staunchly defended himself until the cannon charges ran out, and then with three hundred Cossacks managed to break through the troops that surrounded the fortress and retreated to the Lower Lake Fortress. This was the first major defeat of the rebels. Pugachev lost about 2 thousand people killed, 4 thousand wounded and prisoners, all the artillery and baggage. Ataman Ilya Arapov was among the dead.

Map of the second stage of the Peasant War

At the same time, the St. Petersburg Carabinier Regiment under the command of I. Mikhelson, previously stationed in Poland and aimed at suppressing the uprising, arrived in Kazan on March 2, 1774 and, reinforced by cavalry units, was sent on the march to suppress the uprising in the Kama region. On March 24, in a battle near Ufa, near the village of Chesnokovka, he defeated the troops under the command of Chiki-Zarubin, and two days later captured Zarubin himself and his entourage. Having won victories on the territory of the Ufa and Isetskaya provinces over the detachments of Salavat Yulaev and other Bashkir colonels, he did not succeed in suppressing the Bashkir uprising as a whole, since the Bashkirs switched to partisan tactics.

Leaving the brigade of Mansurov in the Tatishchev fortress, Golitsyn continued his march to Orenburg, where he entered on March 29, while Pugachev, having collected his troops, tried to break through to the Yaitsky town, but meeting government troops near the Perevolotskaya fortress, he was forced to turn to the Sakmarsky town. where he decided to fight Golitsyn. In the battle on April 1, the rebels were defeated again, over 2,800 people were captured, including Maxim Shigaev, Andrei Vitoshnov, Timofey Podurov, Ivan Pochitalin and others. Pugachev himself, breaking away from the enemy's pursuit, fled with several hundred Cossacks to the Prechistenskaya fortress, and from there he went beyond the bend of the Belaya River, to the mining region of the Southern Urals, where the rebels had reliable support.

In early April, PD Mansurov's brigade, reinforced by the Izyum hussar regiment and the Cossack detachment of the Yaik foreman M.M. Borodin, headed from the Tatishcheva fortress to the Yaitsky town. The fortresses of Nizhneozernaya and Rassypnaya, Iletsk town were taken from the Pugachevites, on April 12, the Cossack insurgents were defeated at the Irtetsk outpost. In an effort to stop the advance of the punishers to their native Yaitsky town, the Cossacks, led by A.A. Ovchinnikov, A.P. Perfiliev and K.I.Dekhtyarev, decided to meet Mansurov. The meeting took place on April 15, 50 versts east of Yaitsky town, near the Bykovka river. Having got involved in the battle, the Cossacks could not resist the regular troops, a retreat began, which gradually turned into a panicky flight. Pursued by the hussars, the Cossacks retreated to the Rubezhny outpost, having lost hundreds of people killed, among whom was Dekhtyarev. Gathering people, the ataman Ovchinnikov led the detachment to the South Urals in the wilderness steppes, to join the troops of Pugachev, who had gone beyond the Belaya River.

On the evening of April 15, when in Yaitsky town they learned about the defeat at Bykovka, a group of Cossacks, wanting to curry favor with the punishers, tied up and gave Simonov the atamans Kargin and Tolkachev. Mansurov entered the Yaitsky town on April 16, finally liberating the city fortress, which had been besieged by the Pugachevites on December 30, 1773. The Cossacks who fled to the steppe could not make their way to the main area of ​​the uprising, in May-July 1774 the teams of the Mansurov brigade and the Cossacks of the elders' side began to search and defeat in the Priyaitskaya steppe, near the Uzen and Irgiz rivers, the rebel detachments of F.I.Derbetev, S.L Rechkina, I. A. Fofanova.

In early April 1774, the corps of Seconds-Major Gagrin, which approached from Yekaterinburg, defeated Tumanov's detachment located in Chelyab. And on May 1, the command of Lieutenant Colonel D. Kandaurov, who approached from Astrakhan, recaptured Guryev town from the rebels.

On April 9, 1774, the commander of military operations against Pugachev, A.I.Bibikov, died. After him, Catherine II entrusted the command of the troops to Lieutenant-General FF Shcherbatov, as the senior in rank. Offended that he was not appointed to the post of commander of the troops, sending small teams to the nearest fortresses and villages to conduct investigations and punishments, General Golitsyn with the main forces of his corps stayed for three months in Orenburg. Intrigues between the generals gave Pugachev a much-needed respite, he managed to gather scattered small detachments in the South Urals. The pursuit was also suspended by the spring thaw and floods on the rivers, which became impassable roads.

Ural mine. Painting by Demidov serf artist V.P. Khudoyarov

On the morning of May 5, Pugachev's five-thousandth detachment approached the Magnetic Fortress. By this time, Pugachev's detachment consisted mainly of weakly armed factory peasants and a small number of personal egg guards under the command of Myasnikov, the detachment did not have a single cannon. The beginning of the assault on Magnitnaya was unsuccessful, about 500 people died in the battle, Pugachev himself was wounded in his right arm. After withdrawing the troops from the fortress and discussing the situation, the rebels, under the cover of the darkness of the night, made a new attempt and were able to break into the fortress and capture it. As trophies, they got 10 guns, rifles, ammunition. On May 7, detachments of atamans A. Ovchinnikov, A. Perfilyev, I. Beloborodov and S. Maksimov pulled up to Magnitnaya from different sides.

Heading up the Yaik, the rebels captured the fortresses of Karagai, Peter and Paul and Stepnaya, and on May 20 approached the largest Troitskaya. By this time, the detachment numbered 10 thousand people. During the onset of the assault, the garrison tried to repel the attack with artillery fire, but overcoming desperate resistance, the rebels broke into Troitskaya. Pugachev got artillery with shells and supplies of gunpowder, supplies of provisions and fodder. On the morning of May 21, the Decolong corps attacked the rebels who were resting after the battle. Taken by surprise, the Pugachevites suffered a heavy defeat, losing 4,000 people killed and just as many wounded and captured. Only fifteen hundred mounted Cossacks and Bashkirs were able to retreat along the road to Chelyabinsk.

Recovered after being wounded, Salavat Yulaev managed to organize at this time in Bashkiria, east of Ufa, resistance to Mikhelson's detachment, covering Pugachev's army from his stubborn pursuit. In the battles that took place on May 6, 8, 17, 31, Salavat, although he did not have success in them, did not let his troops inflict significant losses. On June 3, he united with Pugachev, by this time the Bashkirs made up two-thirds of the total number of the army of the rebels. On June 3 and 5, on the Ai River, they gave new battles to Michelson. Neither side got the desired success. Retreating to the north, Pugachev regrouped his forces while Mikhelson retreated to Ufa in order to drive off the Bashkir detachments operating near the city and replenish ammunition and provisions.

Taking advantage of the respite, Pugachev headed for Kazan. On June 10, the Krasnoufimskaya fortress was taken, on June 11, a victory was won in the battle at Kungur against the garrison that made a sortie. Without attempting to storm Kungur, Pugachev turned west. On June 14, the vanguard of his troops under the command of Ivan Beloborodov and Salavat Yulaev approached the Kama town of Osa and blocked the city fortress. Four days later, the main forces of Pugachev came here and engaged in siege battles with the garrison entrenched in the fortress. On June 21, the defenders of the fortress, having exhausted the possibilities of further resistance, surrendered. During this period, the adventurer merchant Astafiy Dolgopolov ("Ivan Ivanov") appeared to Pugachev, posing as the emissary of the Tsarevich Paul and thus decided to improve his financial situation. Pugachev figured out his adventure, and Dolgopolov, by agreement with him, acted for some time as a "witness to the authenticity of Peter III."

Having mastered Wasp, Pugachev ferried the army across the Kama, took the Votkinsk and Izhevsk ironworks, Elabuga, Sarapul, Menzelinsk, Agryz, Zainsk, Mamadysh and other cities and fortresses along the way, and in early July approached Kazan.

View of the Kazan Kremlin

A detachment under the command of Colonel Tolstoy came out to meet Pugachev, and on July 10, 12 versts from the city, the Pugachevites won a complete victory. The next day, a detachment of rebels camped outside the city. "In the evening, in view of all Kazan residents, he (Pugachev) himself went to look out for the city, and returned to the camp, postponing the attack until the next morning."... On July 12, as a result of the assault, the suburbs and the main areas of the city were taken, the garrison that remained in the city locked itself in the Kazan Kremlin and prepared for a siege. A strong fire began in the city, in addition, Pugachev received news of the approach of Michelson's troops, who followed him on the heels of Ufa, so the Pugachev troops left the burning city. As a result of a short battle, Mikhelson made his way to the Kazan garrison, Pugachev retreated across the Kazanka River. Both sides were preparing for the decisive battle, which took place on 15 July. Pugachev's army numbered 25 thousand people, but most of them were weakly armed peasants who had just joined the uprising, the Tatar and Bashkir cavalry, armed with bows, and a small number of the remaining Cossacks. The competent actions of Mikhelson, who struck first of all on the Yaik core of the Pugachevites, led to the complete defeat of the rebels, at least 2 thousand people died, about 5 thousand were taken prisoner, among whom was Colonel Ivan Beloborodov.

Announced in the national news

We grant this named decree with our royal and paternal
by the mercy of all who were previously in the peasantry and
in the citizenship of landlords, to be loyal slaves
our own crown; and reward with the ancient cross
and prayer, heads and beards, liberty and freedom
and forever by the Cossacks, without requiring recruitment, capitation
and other cash taxes, land ownership, forestry,
grasslands and fishing grounds and salt lakes
no purchase and no rent; and free everyone from the previously repaired
from the villains of the nobles and the bribe-taker-judges from the villains to the peasants and everything
to the people of imposed taxes and burdens And we wish you the salvation of souls
and calm in the light of life for which we have tasted and endured
from the prescribed villains-nobles wandering and no small calamity.

And what is our name now to the power of the Most High right hand in Russia
thrives, for that sake we command this by our named decree:
koi were previously nobles in their estates and vodchinas - these
opponents of our power and the troublemakers of the empire and the renegades
peasants, to catch, execute and hang, and act in the same way,
how they, not having Christianity in themselves, repaired with you peasants.
By the extermination of which opponents and villains-nobles, everyone can
to feel the silence and calm life, which will continue until the century.

Given July 31 days 1774.

By the grace of God, we, Peter the Third,

Emperor and autocrat of All Russia and passing,

And through and through.

Even before the start of the battle on July 15, Pugachev announced in the camp that he would go from Kazan to Moscow. Rumors about this instantly spread throughout all the nearby villages, estates and towns. Despite the major defeat of the Pugachev army, the flames of the uprising engulfed the entire western bank of the Volga. Having crossed the Volga at Kokshaisk, below the village of Sundyr, Pugachev replenished his army with thousands of peasants. By this time, Salavat Yulaev with his detachments continued the hostilities near Ufa, the Bashkir detachments in the Pugachev detachment were led by Kinzya Arslanov. On July 20, Pugachev entered Kurmysh, on the 23rd entered Alatyr without hindrance, after which he headed for Saransk. On July 28, on the central square of Saransk, a decree on freedom for the peasants was read, the residents were given supplies of salt and bread, the city treasury “Driving through the city fortress and along the streets ...... On July 31, the same solemn meeting awaited Pugachev in Penza. The decrees provoked numerous peasant revolts in the Volga region; in total, scattered detachments operating within their estates numbered tens of thousands of fighters. The movement covered most of the Volga districts, approached the borders of the Moscow province, and really threatened Moscow.

The publication of decrees (in fact, manifestos on the emancipation of the peasants) in Saransk and Penza is called the culmination of the Peasant War. The decrees made a strong impression on the peasants, on the Old Believers hiding from persecution, on the opposite side - the nobles and on Catherine II herself. The enthusiasm that gripped the peasants of the Volga region led to the fact that a population of more than a million people was involved in the uprising. They could not give anything to Pugachev's army in the long-term military plan, since the peasant detachments operated no further than their estate. But they turned Pugachev's campaign along the Volga region into a triumphal procession, with bells ringing, the blessing of the village priest and bread and salt in every new village, village, town. When Pugachev's army or its individual detachments approached, the peasants knitted or killed their landlords and their clerks, hanged local officials, burned estates, smashed shops and shops. In total, in the summer of 1774, at least 3 thousand nobles and government officials were killed.

In the second half of July 1774, when the flames of the Pugachev uprising approached the borders of the Moscow province and threatened Moscow itself, the alarmed empress was forced to agree to the proposal of Chancellor N.I. rebels. General F.F. Shcherbatov was expelled from this post on July 22, and by a decree of July 29, Catherine II endowed Panin with extraordinary powers "In suppressing the riot and restoring internal order in the provinces of Orenburg, Kazan and Nizhny Novgorod"... It is noteworthy that under the command of P.I. Panin, who received the Order of St. George I class, distinguished in that battle and the Don cornet Emelyan Pugachev.

To speed up the conclusion of peace, the conditions of the Kuchuk-Kainardzhi peace treaty were relaxed, and the troops liberated on the Turkish borders - a total of 20 cavalry and infantry regiments - were withdrawn from the armies for action against Pugachev. As Catherine noted, against Pugachev "So many troops are dressed up that such an army was almost scary and the neighbors were"... It is noteworthy that in August 1774, Lieutenant General Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov, at that time already one of the most successful Russian generals, was recalled from the 1st Army, which was in the Danube principalities. Panin entrusted Suvorov with command of the troops that were to defeat the main Pugachev army in the Volga region.

Suppression of the uprising

After the triumphant entry of Pugachev into Saransk and Penza, everyone expected his march to Moscow. In Moscow, where memories of the Plague Riot of 1771 were still fresh, seven regiments were pulled together under the personal command of P.I. Panin. The Moscow governor-general, Prince M.N. Volkonsky, ordered to place artillery near his house. The police increased their supervision and sent informants to crowded places in order to grab all those who sympathized with Pugachev. Mikhelson, who was promoted to colonel in July and pursued the rebels from Kazan, turned to Arzamas to block the road to the old capital. General Mansurov set out from Yaitsky town to Syzran, General Golitsyn to Saransk. The punitive teams of Muffel and Mellin reported that everywhere Pugachev left rebellious villages behind him and they did not have time to pacify them all. "Not only peasants, but priests, monks, even archimandrites outrage sensitive and insensitive people"... Excerpts from the report of the captain of the Novokhopyorsk battalion Butrimovich are indicative:

“... I went to the village of Andreevskaya, where the peasants kept the landowner Dubensky under arrest for his extradition to Pugachev. I was about to free him, but the village rebelled and dispersed the team. Ottol I went to the villages of Mr. Vysheslavtsev and Prince Maksyutin, but I also found them under the arrest of the peasants, and I freed them, and took them to Verkhniy Lomov; from the village of kn. I saw Maksyutin as a mountain. Kerensk was on fire and, returning to Verkhniy Lomov, he learned that in it all the inhabitants, except for the clerks, had rebelled when they learned about the burning of Kerensk. Engineers: one-yard man Yak. Gubanov, Matv. Bochkov, and Streletskaya Sloboda Desyatskaya Bezboroda. I wanted to grab them and present them to Voronezh, but the residents not only did not let me in before, but almost put me under their guard myself, but I left them and 2 miles away from the city I heard the cry of the rioters. I don’t know how it ended, but I heard that Kerensk, with the help of the captured Turks, fought off the villain. In my passage everywhere I noticed among the people a spirit of rebellion and a tendency towards the Pretender. Especially in the Tanbow district, the department of the prince. Vyazemsky, in the economic peasants, who for the arrival of Pugachev and bridges everywhere were fixed and the roads were repaired. On top of that, the Lipnei village elder sat down with the tenants, having considered me an accomplice of the villain, came to me, and fell to their knees. "

Final Stage of the Rebellion Map

But from Penza, Pugachev turned south. Most historians point to the reason for this Pugachev's plans to attract the Volga and, especially, the Don Cossacks into his ranks. It is possible that another reason was the desire of the Yaik Cossacks, who were tired of fighting and had already lost their chief chieftains, to hide again in the remote steppes of the lower Volga and Yaik, where they once took refuge after the uprising of 1772. An indirect confirmation of such fatigue is the fact that it was on these days that a conspiracy of Cossack colonels began with the aim of surrendering Pugachev to the government in return for receiving a pardon.

On August 4, the army of the impostor took Petrovsk, and on August 6, Saratov was surrounded. The voivode with part of the people along the Volga managed to get out to Tsaritsyn and after the battle on August 7, Saratov was taken. Saratov priests in all churches served prayers for the health of Emperor Peter III. Here, Pugachev sent a decree to the ruler of the Kalmyks Tsenden-Darzha with an appeal to join his army. But by this time, the punitive detachments under the general command of Mikhelson were literally on the heels of the Pugachevites, and on August 11 the city came under the control of government troops.

After Saratov, we went down the Volga to Kamyshin, which, like many cities before him, met Pugachev with bell ringing and bread and salt. Near Kamyshin in the German colonies, Pugachev's troops collided with the Astrakhan astronomical expedition of the Academy of Sciences, many members of which, together with the leader, Academician Georg Lovitz, were hanged along with local officials who had failed to escape. The son of Lovitz, Tobias, later also an academician, managed to survive. Having joined a detachment of 3,000 Kalmyks, the rebels entered the villages of the Volga army, Antipovskaya and Karavainskaya, where they received wide support and from where messengers were sent to the Don with orders to join the Donets to the uprising. A detachment of government troops who had approached from Tsaritsyn was defeated on the Proleika River near the village of Balyklevskaya. Further along the road was Dubovka, the capital of the Volga Cossack army. Since the Volga Cossacks, led by the ataman, remained loyal to the government, the garrisons of the Volga cities strengthened the defense of Tsaritsyn, where the thousandth detachment of the Don Cossacks arrived under the command of the marching ataman Perfilov.

"The true image of the rebel and deceiver Emelka Pugachev." Engraving. Second half of the 1770s

On August 21, Pugachev tried to attack Tsaritsyn, but the assault failed. Having received news of the arriving corps of Michelson, Pugachev hastened to lift the siege from Tsaritsyn, the rebels moved to the Black Yar. Panic began in Astrakhan. On August 24, at the Solenikova fishing band, Pugachev was overtaken by Michelson. Realizing that the battle could not be avoided, the Pugachevites lined up battle formations. On August 25, the last major battle of the troops under the command of Pugachev with the tsarist troops took place. The battle began with a major setback - all 24 guns of the rebel army were repulsed by a cavalry attack. In a fierce battle, more than 2,000 rebels were killed, among them Ataman Ovchinnikov. More than 6,000 people were taken prisoner. Pugachev and the Cossacks, breaking up into small detachments, fled across the Volga. In pursuit of them, the search detachments of Generals Mansurov and Golitsyn, the Yaik foreman Borodin and the Don Colonel Tavinsky were sent. Not having time for the battle, Lieutenant-General Suvorov also wished to participate in the capture. During August-September, most of the participants in the uprising were caught and sent for investigation to Yaitskiy gorodok, Simbirsk, Orenburg.

Pugachev with a detachment of Cossacks fled to the Uzens, not knowing that since mid-August Chumakov, Tvorogov, Fedulyov and some other colonels had been discussing the possibility of earning forgiveness by surrendering the impostor. Under the pretext of facilitating the escape from the pursuit, they divided the detachment so as to separate the Cossacks loyal to Pugachev along with the ataman Perfiliev. On September 8, near the Bolshoy Uzen River, they attacked and tied Pugachev, after which Chumakov and Tvorogov went to the Yaitsky town, where on September 11 they announced the capture of the impostor. Having received promises of pardon, they notified the accomplices, and on September 15 they brought Pugachev to Yaitsky town. The first interrogations took place, one of them was conducted personally by Suvorov, he also volunteered to escort the impostor to Simbirsk, where the main investigation was underway. To transport Pugachev, a cramped cage was made, installed on a two-wheeled cart, in which, shackled hand and foot, he could not even turn around. In Simbirsk, he was interrogated for five days by P.S. Potemkin, head of secret commissions of inquiry, and Count P.I. Panin, commander of the government's punitive troops.

Perfiliev with his detachment were captured on September 12 after a battle with punitive forces near the Derkul River.

Pugachev under escort. 1770s engraving

At this time, in addition to the scattered centers of the uprising, hostilities in Bashkiria had an organized character. Salavat Yulaev, together with his father Yulai Aznalin, led the rebel movement on the Siberian road, Karanay Muratov, Kachkyn Samarov, Selyausin Kinzin - on Nogai, Bazargul Yunaev, Yulaman Kushaev and Mukhamet Safarov - in the Bashkir Trans-Urals. They pinned down a significant contingent of government troops. In early August, even a new assault on Ufa was undertaken, but as a result of the weak organization of interaction between the various detachments, it was unsuccessful. Along the entire length of the border line, Kazakh detachments were alarmed by raids. Governor Reinsdorp reported: “The Bashkir and Kyrgyz people are not pacified, the latter are crossing the Yaik every minute, and they grab people from outside Orenburg. The local troops are either pursuing Pugachev, or blocking his path, and I do not admonish the Kyrgyz to go to the Kyrgyz people, I admonish the khan and the Saltans. They replied that they could not keep the Kyrgyz, whom the whole horde was revolting. "... With the capture of Pugachev, the dispatch of the liberated government troops to Bashkiria, the Bashkir elders began to go over to the side of the government, many of them joined the punitive detachments. After the capture of Kanzafar Usaev and Salavat Yulaev, the uprising in Bashkiria began to decline. Salavat Yulaev gave his last battle on November 20 under the besieged Katav-Ivanovsk plant and after defeat was captured on November 25. But individual insurgent groups in Bashkiria continued to resist until the summer of 1775.

Until the summer of 1775, unrest continued in the Voronezh province, in the Tambov district and along the rivers Khopru and Vorona. Although the operating units were small and there was no coordination of joint actions, according to an eyewitness, Major Sverchkov, "Many landowners, leaving their houses and savings, move to remote places, and those who are left in their houses save their lives from threatening death, spend the night in the forests"... The terrified landowners stated that "If the Voronezh provincial chancellery does not speed up the extermination of those villainous gangs that turned out to be, then such bloodshed will inevitably follow as it did in the last mutiny."

To bring down the wave of riots, punitive squads began mass executions. In every village, in every town that received Pugachev, on the gallows and "verbs" from which they barely managed to remove the officers, landowners, and judges who were hanged by the impostor, the leaders of the riots and the city heads and chieftains of local detachments appointed by the Pugachevites began to be hanged. To enhance the frightening effect, the gallows were installed on rafts and launched along the main rivers of the uprising. In May, Khlopushi was executed in Orenburg: his head was placed on a pole in the center of the city. During the investigation, the entire medieval set of tested means was used. In terms of cruelty and the number of victims, Pugachev and the government did not yield to each other.

In November, all the main participants in the uprising were transported to Moscow for a general investigation. They were placed in the building of the Mint at the Iberian Gate of Kitai-Gorod. The interrogations were supervised by Prince M. N. Volkonsky and chief secretary S. I. Sheshkovsky. During interrogation, E.I. Pugachev gave detailed testimony about his relatives, about his youth, about his participation in the Don Cossack army in the Seven Years and the Turkish Wars, about his wanderings in Russia and Poland, about his plans and intentions, about the course of the uprising. Investigators tried to find out whether the instigators of the uprising were agents of foreign states, or schismatics, or someone from the nobility. Catherine II showed great interest in the course of the investigation. In the materials of the Moscow investigation, several notes of Catherine II to M.N. Volkonsky have been preserved with wishes about the plan in which the inquiry should be conducted, which issues require the most complete and detailed investigation, which witnesses should be additionally interviewed. On December 5, M.N. Volkonsky and P. S. Potemkin signed a ruling to terminate the investigation, since Pugachev and other defendants could not add anything new to their testimony during interrogations and could neither alleviate nor aggravate their guilt in any way. In a report to Catherine, they were forced to admit that they “… During this investigation they were trying to find the beginning of the evil undertaken by this monster and his accomplices, or… to that evil undertaking by mentors. But for all that, nothing else was revealed, somehow, that in all his villainy the first beginning took its origin in the Yaitsky army ".

Execution of Pugachev on Bolotnaya Square. (Drawing of an eyewitness to the execution of A.T. Bolotov)

On December 30, judges in the case of E.I.Pugachev gathered in the Throne Room of the Kremlin Palace. They heard the manifesto of Catherine II on the appointment of the court, and then the indictment was announced in the case of Pugachev and his associates. Prince A.A. Vyazemsky offered to bring Pugachev to the next court session. Early in the morning of December 31, under a reinforced escort, he was transported from the casemates of the Mint to the chambers of the Kremlin Palace. At the beginning of the meeting, the judges approved the questions that Pugachev was supposed to answer, after which he was led into the courtroom and forced to kneel. After a formal interrogation, he was taken out of the hall, the court ruled: "To quarter Emelka Pugachev, stick his head on a stake, smash the body parts in four parts of the city and put them on wheels, and then burn them in those places." The rest of the defendants were divided according to the degree of their guilt into several groups for the imposition of each appropriate type of execution or punishment. On Saturday, January 10, on Bolotnaya Square in Moscow, an execution was carried out with a huge crowd of people. Pugachev held himself with dignity, ascending to the place of execution, crossed himself at the Kremlin cathedrals, bowed to four sides with the words "Forgive me, Orthodox people." Sentenced to quartering E.I. Pugachev and A.P. Perfiliev, the executioner chopped off the head first, such was the wish of the empress. On the same day they hanged M. G. Shigaev, T. I. Podurov and V. I. Tornov. I.N. Zarubin-Chika was sent for execution to Ufa, where he was quartered at the beginning of February 1775.

Sheet-cutting shop. Painting of Demidov serf artist P.F.Hudoyarov

The Pugachev uprising caused enormous damage to the metallurgy of the Urals. 64 out of 129 factories existing in the Urals fully joined the uprising, the number of peasants assigned to them was 40 thousand people. The total amount of losses from destruction and downtime of factories is estimated at 5,536,193 rubles. And although the factories were quickly restored, the uprising forced them to make concessions in relation to the factory workers. The chief investigator in the Urals, Captain S. I. Mavrin, reported that the assigned peasants, whom he considered the leading force of the uprising, supplied the impostor with weapons and joined his troops, because the breeders oppressed their assigned peasants, forcing the peasants to overcome long distances to factories, did not allow them to cultivate and sell them food at inflated prices. Mavrin believed that decisive measures must be taken to prevent such unrest in the future. Catherine wrote to G.A. Potemkin that Mavrin "What he says about the factory peasants, then everything is very thorough, and I think that there is nothing else to do with these, how to buy factories and, when there are state-owned ones, then the peasants will be cleaned up"... On May 19, 1779, a manifesto was issued on the general rules for the use of peasants assigned to state and private enterprises, which somewhat limited breeders in the use of peasants assigned to factories, limited the working day and increased wages.

There were no significant changes in the position of the peasantry.

Research and collections of archival documents

• Pushkin A. S. "History of Pugachev" (censored title - "History of the Pugachev revolt")
• Groth Ya. K. Materials for the history of the Pugachev rebellion (Papers of Kara and Bibikov). Saint Petersburg, 1862
• Dubrovin N.F. Pugachev and his accomplices. An episode from the reign of Empress Catherine II. 1773-1774 According to unpublished sources. T. 1-3. SPb., Type. N. I. Skorokhodova, 1884
• Pugachevshchina. Collection of documents.

• Peasant War 1773-1775 in Russia. Documents from the collection of the State Historical Museum. M., 1973
• Peasant War 1773-1775 on the territory of Bashkiria. Collection of documents. Ufa, 1975
• Peasant war led by Yemelyan Pugachev in Chuvashia. Collection of documents. Cheboksary, 1972
• Peasant war led by Yemelyan Pugachev in Udmurtia. Collection of documents and materials. Izhevsk, 1974
• Gorban N.V. The peasantry of Western Siberia in the peasant war of 1773-75. // Questions of history. 1952. No. 11.
• Muratov Kh. I. Peasant War of 1773-1775 in Russia. M., Military Publishing, 1954

Art

The Pugachev uprising in fiction

• A. Pushkin "The Captain's Daughter"
• S. A. Yesenin "Pugachev" (poem)
• S. P. Zlobin "Salavat Yulaev"
• E. Fedorov "Stone Belt" (novel). Book 2 "The Heirs"
• V. Ya. Shishkov "Emelyan Pugachev (novel)"
• V. I. Buganov "Pugachev" (biography in the series "Life of Remarkable People")
• V. I. Mashkovtsev "The Golden Flower - Overcome" (historical novel). - Chelyabinsk, South Ural Book Publishing House,,.

Cinema

• Pugachev () - feature film. Director Pavel Petrov-Bytov
• Emelyan Pugachev () - historical dilogy: "Prisoners of Freedom" and "Will, Washed in Blood" directed by Alexei Saltykov
• The Captain's Daughter () - a feature film based on the story of the same name by Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin
• Russian revolt () - a historical film based on the works of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin "The Captain's Daughter" and "The Story of Pugachev"
• Salavat Yulaev () - feature film. Director Yakov Protazanov

Links

• Bolshakov L.N. Orenburg Pushkin Encyclopedia
• Vaganov M. Major Mirzabek Vaganov's report on his mission to Nurali Khan. March-June 1774 / Commun. V. Snezhnevsky // Russian antiquity, 1890. - T. 66. - No. 4. - P. 108-119. - Under the headline: On the history of the Pugachev rebellion. In the steppe near the Kirghiz-Kaisaks, March - 1774 - June.
• Military-marching journal of the commander of the punitive corps, Lieutenant Colonel Mikhelson I.I., about military operations against the rebels in March - August 1774.// Peasant War of 1773-1775 in Russia. Documents from the collection of the State Historical Museum. - M .: Nauka, 1973 .-- S. 194-223.
• Gvozdikova I. Salavat Yulaev: a historical portrait ("Belskie open spaces", 2004)
• Diary of a member of the noble militia of the Kazan province “About Pugachev. His evil deeds "// Peasant War of 1773-1775 in Russia. Documents from the collection of the State Historical Museum. - M .: Nauka, 1973 .-- S. 58-65.
• Dobrotvorskiy I.A. Pugachev on the Kama // Historical Bulletin, 1884. - T. 18. - No. 9. - P. 719-753.
• Catherine II. Letters of Empress Catherine II to A.I.Bibikov during the Pugachev revolt (1774) / Soobshch. V.I. Lamansky // Russian Archive, 1866. - Issue. 3. - Stb. 388-398.
• Peasant war led by Pugachev on the website History of the Orenburg region
• Peasant War led by Pugachev (TSB)
• Kulaginsky P.N. The Pugachevites and Pugachev in Tresvyatsky-Yelabuga in 1773-1775 / Message P. M. Makarov // Russian antiquity, 1882. - T. 33. - No. 2. - P. 291-312.
• Lopatin. Letter from Arzamas dated September 19, 1774 / Commun. A. I. Yazykov // Russian antiquity, 1874. - T. 10. - No. 7. - P. 617-618. - Under the title: Pugachevshchina.
• D. B. Mertvago Notes of Dmitry Borisovich Mertvago. 1790-1824. - M .: type. Gracheva and K, 1867. - XIV, 340 stb. - adj. to the "Russian Archive" for 1867 (Issue 8-9).
• Determination of the Kazan nobility about the assembly of the cavalry corps of troops from their own people against Pugachev// Readings in the Imperial Society of Russian History and Antiquities at Moscow University, 1864. - Book. 3/4. Dept. 5. - S. 105-107.
• Oreus I. I. Ivan Ivanovich Mikhelson, the winner of Pugachev. 1740-1807 // Russian antiquity, 1876. - T. 15. - No. 1. - S. 192-209.
• Pugachev's sheets in Moscow. 1774 Materials// Russian antiquity, 1875. - T. 13. - No. 6. - S. 272-276. , No. 7. - S. 440-442.
• Pugachevshchina. New materials for the history of the Pugachev region// Russian antiquity, 1875. - T. 12. - No. 2. - S. 390-394; No. 3. - S. 540-544.

• Collection of documents on the history of the Pugachev uprising on the site Vostlit.info
• Cards: Map of the lands of the Yaitsk army, the Orenburg region and the Southern Urals, Map of the Saratov province (maps of the early XX century)

Notes (edit)

1. Chelobitnaya yaik troops imp. Catherine II on the oppression of ordinary Cossacks
2. Complaints of the Yaik Cossacks imp. Catherine II, 1772 January 15, 1772, text on the site "Eastern Literature"

In the fall of 1773, the Pugachev uprising broke out. Until today, the events of those years do not reveal all their secrets. Was it a Cossack revolt, a peasant uprising, or a civil war?

Peter III

Winners write history. The history of the Pugachev uprising is still considered a controversial moment in Russian history. According to the official version, Pugachev and Peter III are different people, they had neither physiognomic similarity, nor similarity of characters, and their upbringing was excellent. Nevertheless, some historians are still trying to prove the version that Pugachev and Emperor Peter are one person. The story of Emelka, a fugitive Cossack, was written by order of Catherine. This version, albeit a fantastic one, is confirmed by the fact that during the "investigation" of Pushkin, none of those whom he asked about Pugachev knew about him. People were absolutely convinced that the emperor himself was the head of the army, no more, no less. According to sources, the decision to call himself Peter III came to Pugachev not by chance. He, in principle, loved to mystify. Back in the army, for example, showing off his saber, he claimed that it was given to him by Peter I. It is not known for certain whose idea it was to assign a name, but that it was strategically beneficial is obvious. The people would not have followed the fugitive Cossack, but would have followed the Tsar. In addition, there were rumors among the people at that time that Peter wanted to give the peasants freedom, but "Katka ruined him." The promise of freedom to the peasants, in the end, became the trump card of Pugachev's propaganda.

Peasant War?

Was the war of 1773-1775 a peasant war? The question is, again, open. The main force of Pugachev's troops were, of course, not the peasants, but the Yaik Cossacks. Once free, they endured more and more oppression from the state and lost their privileges. In 1754, a monopoly on salt was introduced by Elizabeth's decree. This step dealt a strong blow to the economy of the Cossack army, which raised money by selling salted fish. Even before the Pugachev uprising, the Cossacks organized uprisings, which over and over again became more massive and coordinated.

Pugachev's initiative fell on fertile soil. The peasants really took an active part in the campaigns of the Pugachev army, but they defended their interests and solved their problems: they slaughtered the landowners, burned the estates, but, as a rule, did not go beyond their allotments. The binding of the peasantry to their land is a very strong thing. After Pugachev read out a manifesto on liberty in Saransk, many peasants joined him, they turned Pugachev's campaign along the Volga region into a triumphal procession, with bells ringing, the blessing of the village father and bread and salt in every new village, village, town. But weakly armed, tied to their land, they could not provide a long-term triumph for the Pugachev uprising. In addition, it should be noted that Pugachev did not manage his troops alone. He had a whole headquarters of specialists who were definitely not of peasant origin, and some were not even Russian, but this side of the issue is a separate conversation.

Money question

The Pugachev uprising was the most massive uprising in the entire history of Russia (not counting the 1917 revolution). Such a rebellion could not take place in an empty place. Raising thousands and thousands of people into an armed long-term revolt is not a rally; this requires resources, and considerable resources. The question is: where did the fugitive Pugachev and the Yaik Cossacks get these resources from?

It has now been proven that the Pugachev uprising had foreign funding. First of all - the Ottoman Empire, with which Russia was at that time at war. Secondly, the help of France; During that historical period, she was the main opponent of the growing Russian Empire. From the correspondence of French residencies in Vienna and Constantinople, the figure of an experienced officer of the Navarre regiment emerges, who had to be transported from Turkey to Russia as soon as possible with instructions for the "so-called Pugachev's army." Paris allocated 50 thousand francs for the next operation. Supporting Pugachev was beneficial to all forces for which Russia and its growth posed a danger. There was a war with Turkey - forces were transferred from the fronts to fight Pugachev. As a result, Russia had to end the war on unfavorable terms. Such is the "peasant war" ...

To Moscow

After the triumph of Pugachev's troops in Penza and Saransk, everyone was waiting for his "Moscow campaign". They were also expecting him in Moscow. They were waiting and afraid. Seven regiments were pulled into the old capital, Governor-General Volkonsky ordered to put cannons near his house, “mopping-ups” were carried out among the inhabitants of Moscow, and all those who sympathized with the rebellious Cossack were seized.

Finally, in August 1774, Lieutenant General Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov, at that time already one of the most successful Russian generals, was recalled from the 1st Army, which was in the Danube principalities. Panin entrusted Suvorov with command of the troops that were to defeat the main Pugachev army in the Volga region. Moscow "exhaled", Pugachev decided not to go there. The reasons are still not clear. It is believed that the main reason for this was Pugachev's plans to attract the Volga and, especially, the Don Cossacks into his ranks. The Yaik Cossacks, who had lost many of their chieftains in the battles, were tired and began to grumble. Pugachev's "surrender" was brewing.

Salavat Yulaev

The memory of the Pugachev uprising is preserved not only in the archives, but also in toponyms and in the memory of the people. Salavat Yulaev is still considered the hero of Bashkiria. One of the strongest ice hockey teams in Russia bears the name of this extraordinary man. His story is amazing. Salavat became Pugachev's "right hand" when he was not 20 years old, took part in all major battles of the uprising, Pugachev conferred the rank of brigadier general on his young handy. In the army of Pugachev, Salavat ended up with his father. Together with his father, he was captured, sent to Moscow, and then into eternal exile in the Baltic city of Rogervik. Salavat was here until his death in 1800. He was not only an outstanding warrior, but also a good poet who left a solid literary heritage.

Suvorov

The danger that the Pugachev uprising lurked is indicated by the fact that Suvorov himself was not attracted to pacify it. Catherine understood that delaying the suppression of the uprising could result in serious geopolitical problems. Suvorov's participation in suppressing the riot played into the hands of Pushkin: when he was collecting material for his book about Pugachev, he said that he was looking for information about Suvorov. Alexander Vasilyevich personally escorted Pugachev. This indicates at least that Emelyan Ivanovich was not only an important person, but extremely important. It is highly unreasonable to regard the Pugachev uprising as another riot, it was a civil war, on the consequences of which the future of Russia depended.

A mystery shrouded in darkness

After the suppression of the riot and the executions of the main participants in the uprising, Catherine ordered to destroy all facts about the peasant war. The village where Pugachev was born was moved and renamed, Yaik was renamed Ural. All documents that could somehow shed light on the course of those events were classified. There is a version that it was not Pugachev who was executed, but another person. Yemelyan, however, was “eliminated” in the Butyrka prison. The authorities feared provocations. Whether it is true or not, it is no longer possible to prove it. Half a century after those events, Pushkin could not "find the ends", it remains to wait for new research.

Born in 1742 on the Don, in the village of Zimoveyskaya. Despite the fact that Pugachev was a Don Cossack, the uprising under his leadership began among the Cossacks of the Yaik River (Ural). In the middle of the 18th century, the wealthy military sergeant major Yaik prevailed over the democratic Cossack self-government. The foremen introduced arbitrary taxes on fishing, and began to delay the salaries of ordinary villagers. Already at the end of the 1760s, armed clashes broke out between the top and bottom of the Yaitsk army. Empress Catherine II helped the foreman to pacify the poor, but sent a commission of inquiry to Yaik, dismissed ataman Borodin, accused of abuses, and obliged the military office to pay Cossack salaries without delay. However, the arbitrariness of the foreman soon resumed. Ordinary Cossacks sent a deputation to the queen, but the president of the military collegium Chernyshev arrested her and ordered her to be whipped.

The authorities ordered that the Yaik army sent several hundred Cossacks to serve in the Kizlyar region of the Caucasus, and also delayed the movement of the Kalmyks, who then decided to leave Russia for their former homeland - Dzungaria. The foreman began to impose these heavy services on the poor villagers. On January 13, the Cossacks of the Yaitsk town moved with complaints to the house of the head of the commission of inquiry, General Traubenberg. He brought out the soldiers with cannons, but the Cossacks dispersed them, killed Traubenberg and hanged their own ataman Tambovtsev. This speech was soon suppressed by the detachment of General Freiman, but the dull ferment did not subside.

At that moment, a native of Don Emelyan Pugachev appeared on Yaik. The man is still young (about 30 years old), he has already managed to take part in the Seven Years War, in the fight against the Polish rebels and the Russian-Turkish war of 1768-1774, distinguished himself in battles and had the title of cornet. In Poland, Pugachev closely communicated with the fugitive Old Believers and was filled with sympathy for the schism. Released from the Turkish war due to illness, Pugachev went to his sister in Taganrog. There he helped her sister's husband, who did not want to serve, to hide in the Kuban, was arrested for this, but fled, lived in schismatic sketes, and then reached Yaik.

Showing the inclinations of an adventurer, Emelyan Pugachev first began to incite some of the Cossacks to leave Yaik to the Turks (as the Nekrasov Cossacks recently did in the Caucasus). This plan did not come true, but Pugacheva noticed some of the rich Yaik elders, who wanted to expand the autonomy of their troops, which had been cut in recent years, through a mutiny. Pugachev proclaimed himself the deposed husband of Catherine II, Emperor Peter III. Vague (and groundless) rumors circulated among the people that Tsar Peter stood for ordinary people against the nobles, so Pugachev's imposture was a great success.

On September 18, 1773, Pugachev with a detachment of 300 people approached the Yaitsky town, but failed to take it. Then Emelyan moved up the Yaik and captured several weak fortresses (Iletsky town, Tatishcheva, Chernorechenskaya, Sakmarsky town), whose garrisons consisted mostly of disabled soldiers or Cossacks who were in favor of the uprising. Anyone who refused to swear allegiance to Tsar "Peter Fedorovich" was executed, and the sworn soldiers and peasants were declared "free Cossacks." The army of Yemelyan Pugachev soon increased to 7 thousand and laid siege to Orenburg. Another part of it again approached the Yaitsky town.

Pugachev was highly dependent on his entourage of rich Yaik elders - Zarubin, Shigaev, Padurov, Chumakov, Perfilyev. To prevent the impostor from getting out of their influence, they drowned their rival, Sergeant Karmitsky, killed Pugachev's mistress, the officer's widow Kharlova. This circle of ringleaders intended to support Yemelyan himself only as long as it was convenient for him. The initial easy victories of the rebels were explained by the transfer of the best troops from the Urals to the theater of the Turkish war. But the government soon moved reliable units headed by the experienced general A. Bibikov against the Pugachev uprising. On March 22, 1774, Emelyan Pugachev was defeated by Bibikov at Tatishcheva, having lost fifteen hundred killed and 36 guns. The petty officer in charge of Pugachev started negotiations with the authorities on the extradition of the impostor, but he managed to escape, and the "traitors" Shigaev, Padurov and Zarubin, who wanted to sacrifice him, were captured. Government troops liberated Orenburg and Yaitsky town from the siege.

Map of the uprising led by Pugachev

Taking advantage of the spring thaw and the sudden death of Bibikov, Pugachev broke away from the pursuit and, with a small number of adherents, made a quick rush to the north - to the Ural factories. With his arrival, the assigned workers and peasants began to revolt there. Many Bashkirs with their long-standing tribal dislike of the Russian government joined the revolt. 5-10 thousand people again gathered around Pugachev, although they were no longer Cossacks, but a crowd devoid of any fighting qualities. The government detachment of Michelson, who rushed after Pugachev, beat the rebels without effort, but Emelyan began to quickly go north, and then west, where instead of defeated supporters new crowds joined him everywhere. Having reached the Kama, Pugachev took the cities of Osu, Izhevsk, Votkinsk, and then unexpectedly showed up at Kazan, whose garrison went to fight him at Orenburg. The pretender seized and devastated Kazan, but Mikhelson, who arrived in time, inflicted a new powerful defeat on him.

Pugachev's trial. Artist V. Perov, 1870s

With only 500 people, Pugachev went beyond the Volga, and here the uprising flared up again. Emelyan had already covered most of the way from Kazan to Nizhny Novgorod, but he did not dare to go to Moscow and turned south, towards the Don and Kuban. On the way, the peasant crowds of Pugachev brutally defeated Alatyr, Saransk, Penza, Saratov. Having concluded the Kuchuk-Karnadzhi peace with the Turks, Catherine II moved against the uprising new forces led by N. Panin and the famous Suvorov. Pugachev hoped that the Cossack Don would support the peasant war, but the Don army declared him an impostor and added their regiments to the forces of the government.

Having ruined the Don villages of Berezovskaya, Orlovskaya, Malodelskaya, Razdorskaya, Emelyan Pugachev turned to Tsaritsyn, but was repelled from this city and was finally finished off by Mikhelson near Cherny Yar. With 30 Cossacks, Pugachev crossed to the eastern bank of the Volga, thinking to flee to the Kazakh steppes. However, on the way, his escorts seized him and handed him over to the authorities.

Pugachev and Perfilyev were sentenced to quartering (Catherine II, out of humanity, ordered their heads to be cut off first, and only then their arms and legs), Zarubin - to beheading, Shigaev and Padurov - to the gallows. Pugachev was executed on January 10, 1775. His native village Zimoveyskaya was renamed Potemkin. Having suppressed the last centers of Pugachev's uprising, Catherine at the end of 1775 announced forgiveness to its surviving participants, but ordered to completely destroy the memory of the rebellion to rename the Yaik River to the Ural, the Yaitsky town to Uralsk, and the Yaitsky Cossack army to the Ural. The general Cossack circles of the former Yaitsk army were abolished after the Pugachev uprising, and the atamans began to be appointed by the authorities.

Scientists called the Pugachev land a historical phenomenon that covered the period from 1773 to 1775. and bore the features of a popular uprising. It was headed by the Don Cossack Emelyan Pugachev.

The uprising began with a revolt of the Cossacks of the Yaitsk army located in the Urals, and then, quickly spreading across the southeast of the country, in the territory of Orenburg, Siberia, Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod, Voronezh, Astrakhan, it grew into a popular war against the autocracy in the person of Catherine II.

This event is rated as one of the most powerful civil wars in the history of Russia.

The main reasons for the popular uprising lie in the socio-economic and political spheres.

Throughout the XVIII century. the state constantly limited the rights and freedoms of the freedom-loving Cossacks, which caused their discontent and insubordination.

The indigenous peoples living in the Urals experienced oppression from the tsarist authorities, who took their lands away from them and did not recognize their faith.

The peasants who worked in the Ural metallurgical plants suffered from hard forced labor.

So the power of the future revolt was concentrated, the core of which was the Yaik Cossacks. And it was put into action by the fugitive convict Emelyan Pugachev, calling himself Emperor Peter III, the legitimate heir to the throne, overthrown by Catherine II.

The goals of the uprising

Thus, under the pretext of restoring the highest justice, the Cossacks sought to eliminate the existing unrighteous government, Empress Catherine II, and to put on the throne a God-chosen king, representing the interests of the oppressed people.

The ideal of the Cossacks and the peasantry was a free state with a peasant tsar, giving the people freedom and all possible (land, forest, fishing) lands, abolishing military service and taxes and rewarding the oppressors: nobles and landowners.

Characteristic of Emelyan Pugachev

The personality of Pugachev played an important role in fomenting the popular uprising. Uncommon organizational abilities, which made it possible to repeatedly gather around huge masses of people, intelligence and the ability to find a way out of the most difficult situations - these are the main features of the people's leader.

His biography also testifies to them. Born on the Don and taking part in a number of state wars, Pugachev fled from service, was caught and fled again. Hiding with the Old Believers, he persuaded the Cossacks to leave for free lands beyond the Kuban, but he was arrested and sentenced to exile in Siberia.

Fleeing from hard labor by escape, Pugachev appears on Yaik and declares himself Emperor Peter III in order to raise a Cossack uprising. One of the many impostors who roamed all over Russia at that time, Pugachev became the one who managed to win popular confidence and ignite a spark of protest in the crowd.

Stages of the peasant war

The uprising led by E. Pugachev is usually divided into four stages:

Stage I(September 1773 - March 1774) - the formation and growth of the Pugachev army, the seizure of new territories by the rebels.

The center of the rebellion flared up in the Yaik lands, and then the rebels set off to storm Orenburg. Under the Tatishchevskaya fortress, Pugachev is defeated and flees.

II stage(April 1774 - mid-July 1774) - failure of the uprising and a new escape of Pugachev.

The rebellious people seize fortresses and factories in the Urals, take Kazan, but government troops smash the Cossack militia, and Pugachev manages to escape.

Stage III(July 1774 - early September 1775) - the final defeat of Pugachev's troops.

The people of the Volga region themselves surrender their cities to the Cossacks, joining their army. The huge people's army almost got close to Moscow, but Pugachev decided to turn south in order to attract the Don population. As a result, his army lost a lot of strength and was defeated by the empress's army. However, Pugachev runs again.

Stage IV(September - January 1775) - the extinction of the last centers of the uprising and the execution of the people's leader.

Pugachev's accomplices surrender him to the government, after which in Moscow, on Bolotnaya Square, he was brutally executed along with his followers.

The reasons for the defeat of Pugachev

Historians tend to highlight the following reasons for the defeat of the popular uprising:

• Unclear goals (naive monarchism of the peasants).
• The spontaneity and fragmentation of the movement - The leaders of the uprising did not have a well-thought-out program, a clear and definite idea of ​​the organization of the new government.
• Lack of serious military training and discipline among the insurgent masses.

The leaders of the uprising did not have a unified plan of action, a clearly developed military strategy. The insurgent groups were scattered over a large area and were often not controlled by the center, acting in complete isolation from each other.

Emelyan I. Pugachev

“Emelyan Ivanovich Pugachev is a hero and an impostor, a sufferer and a rebel, a sinner and a saint ... But above all, he is the leader of the people, a personality, of course, an exceptional one - otherwise he would not have been able to drag armies of thousands with him and lead them into battle for two years. Raising the uprising, Pugachev knew that the people would follow him ”(GM Nesterov, ethnographer).

The artist T. Nazarenko expresses a similar idea in his painting. Her painting Pugachev, in which she did not strive for a truly historical reconstruction of events, depicts a scene reminiscent of an ancient folk oleography. On it are doll figures of soldiers in bright uniforms and a conventional cage with a rebellious leader in the pose of the crucified Christ. And in front, on a wooden horse, Generalissimo Suvorov: it was he who brought the "chief troublemaker" to Moscow. The second part of the picture was painted in a completely different manner, stylized as the era of the reign of Catherine II and the Pugachev revolt - the famous portrait from the Historical Museum, in which Pugachev is painted over the image of the empress.

“My historical pictures, of course, are connected with the present day,” says Tatiana Nazarenko. - "Pugachev" is a story of betrayal. It is at every turn. Pugachev was abandoned by his associates, condemning him to execution. It always happens that way. "

T. Nazarenko "Pugachev". Diptych

Numerous legends, traditions, epics, and legends circulate about Pugachev and his associates. The people pass them on from generation to generation.

The personality of EI Pugachev and the nature of the Peasant War have always been assessed ambiguously and in many respects contradictory. But for all the differences of opinion, the Pugachev uprising is a significant milestone in Russian history. And no matter how tragic the story is, it must be known and respected.

How it all began?

The reason for the start of the Peasant War, which covered vast territories and attracted several hundred thousand people to the ranks of the rebels, was the wonderful announcement of the escaped "Tsar Peter Fedorovich". You can read about him on our website:. But let us briefly recall: Peter III (Pyotr Fedorovich, born Karl Peter Ulrich Holstein-Gottorp, 1728-1762) - the Russian emperor in 1761-1762, was overthrown as a result of a palace coup that enthroned his wife, Catherine II, and soon lost his life. For a long time, the personality and activities of Peter III were regarded by historians as unanimously negative, but then they began to treat him more carefully, evaluating a number of state services of the emperor. During the reign of Catherine II, many pretended to be Peter Fedorovich impostors(about forty cases were recorded), the most famous of which was Emelyan Pugachev.

L. Pfanzelt "Portrait of Emperor Peter III"

Who is he?

Emelyan I. Pugachev- Don Cossack. Born in 1742 in the Cossack village of the Zimoveiskaya Don region (now the village of Pugachevskaya, Volgograd region, where Stepan Razin was born earlier).

He took part in the Seven Years War of 1756-1763, with his regiment was in the division of Count Chernyshev. With the death of Peter III, the troops were returned to Russia. From 1763 to 1767, Pugachev served in his village, where his son Trofim was born, and then his daughter Agrafena. He was sent to Poland with the team of the captain Elisey Yakovlev to search for and return to Russia the fugitive Old Believers.

He took part in the Russian-Turkish war, where he fell ill and was dismissed, but became involved in the escape of his son-in-law from the service and was forced to flee to the Terek. After numerous vicissitudes, adventures and escapes, in November 1772 he settled in the Old Believers' skete of the Presentation of the Mother of God in the Saratov region with the abbot Filaret, from whom he heard about the unrest in the Yaitsky army. After some time, in a conversation with one of the participants in the uprising of 1772, Denis Pyanov, for the first time, he called himself the escaped Peter III: “I’m not a merchant, but Tsar Peter Fedorovich, I was also in Tsaritsyno, that God and good people kept me, but instead of me they spotted a guard soldier, and in St.... Upon his return to the Mechetnaya Sloboda, on the denunciation of the peasant Filippov, Pugachev, who was with him on the trip, he was arrested and sent to conduct an investigation, first to Simbirsk, then in January 1773 to Kazan.

Portrait of Pugachev, painted from life with oil paints (inscription on the portrait: "The original image of the rebel and deceiver Emelka Pugachev")

Escaping again and again calling himself "Emperor Peter Fedorovich", he began to meet with the instigators of previous uprisings and discussed with them the possibility of a new uprising. Then he found a competent person to draw up "royal decrees". In Mechetnaya Sloboda, he was identified, but again managed to escape and get to Talovy Umet, where the Yaik Cossacks D. Karavaev, M. Shigaev, I. Zarubin-Chika and T. Myasnikov were waiting for him. He told them again the story of his "miraculous salvation" and discussed the possibility of an uprising.

At this time, the commandant of the government garrison in Yaitsky town, Lieutenant Colonel I. D. Simonov, having learned about the appearance in the army of a man posing as "Peter III", sent two teams to capture the impostor, but they managed to warn Pugachev. By this time, the ground for the uprising was ready. Not many Cossacks believed that Pugachev was Peter III, but everyone followed him. Concealing his illiteracy, he did not sign his manifestos; however, his "autograph" was preserved on a separate sheet, imitating the text of a written document, about which he told his literate companions that it was written "in Latin."

What caused the uprising?

As usual in such cases, there are many reasons, and all of them, when combined, create fertile ground for the event to happen.

Yaik Cossacks were the main driving force behind the uprising. Throughout the entire 18th century, they gradually lost their privileges and liberties, but they still remember the times of complete independence from Moscow and Cossack democracy. In the 1730s, there was an almost complete split of the army into the starshinskaya and military sides. The situation was aggravated by the monopoly on salt introduced by the tsar's decree in 1754. The army's economy was based entirely on the sale of fish and caviar, and salt was a strategic product. The ban on free mining of salt and the emergence of salt tax tax farmers among the top of the army led to a sharp stratification among the Cossacks. In 1763, the first major outburst of indignation occurred, the Cossacks wrote petitions to Orenburg and St. Petersburg, sent delegates from the army with a complaint about the atamans and local authorities. Sometimes they achieved their goal, and especially unacceptable chieftains changed, but on the whole the situation remained the same. In 1771, the Yaik Cossacks refused to go in pursuit of the Kalmyks who had migrated outside Russia. General Traubenberg with a detachment of soldiers went to investigate the disobedience to the order. The result was the Yaitsk Cossack uprising of 1772, during which General Traubenberg and the army chieftain Tambovtsev were killed. Troops were sent to suppress the uprising. The rebels were defeated at the Embulatovka River in June 1772; As a result of the defeat, the Cossack circles were finally eliminated, a garrison of government troops was deployed in the Yaitsky town, and all power over the army passed into the hands of the commandant of the garrison, Lieutenant Colonel I.D.Simonov. The massacre of the captured instigators was extremely cruel and made a depressing impression on the army: never before had the Cossacks been branded, they had not cut out their tongues. A large number of participants in the performance took refuge in distant steppe farms, excitement reigned everywhere, the state of the Cossacks was like a compressed spring.

V. Perov "Pugachev's trial"

Tension was also present in the environment peoples of other religions in the Urals and the Volga region. The development of the Urals and the colonization of the lands of the Volga region, which belonged to the local nomadic peoples, and intolerable religious policy led to numerous unrest among the Bashkirs, Tatars, Kazakhs, Erzyans, Chuvashes, Udmurts, Kalmyks.

The situation at the fast-growing factories of the Urals was also explosive. Starting with Peter, the government solved the problem of labor in metallurgy mainly by attributing state peasants to state and private mining plants, allowing new breeders to buy serf villages and granting the unofficial right to keep fugitive serfs, since the Berg Collegium, which was in charge of the factories , tried not to notice violations of the decree on the capture and expulsion of all fugitives. It was very convenient to take advantage of the powerlessness and desperate situation of the fugitives: if someone began to express dissatisfaction with their position, they were immediately handed over to the authorities for punishment. Former peasants resisted forced labor in factories.

Peasants, assigned to state and private factories, dreamed of returning to their usual village work. To top it all, there was a decree of Catherine II of August 22, 1767 prohibiting the peasants from complaining about the landlords. That is, there was complete impunity for some and complete dependence on others. And it becomes easier to understand how the current circumstances helped Pugachev to captivate so many people. Fantastic rumors about imminent freedom or about the transfer of all the peasants to the treasury, about the ready decree of the tsar, who was killed for this by his wife and boyars, about the fact that the tsar was not killed, but he was hiding until better times fell on the fertile soil of general human discontent with his present position ... All groups of future participants in the performance simply had no other opportunity to defend their interests.

Insurrection

First stage

The internal readiness of the Yaik Cossacks for the uprising was high, but the performance lacked a unifying idea, a core that would rally the hiding and hidden participants in the 1772 unrest. The rumor that the emperor Pyotr Fyodorovich, who miraculously escaped, appeared in the army, instantly spread throughout the Yaik.

The uprising began on Yaik. The starting point of Pugachev's movement was the Tolkachev farm located in the south of the Yaitsky town. It was from this farm that Pugachev, who by that time was already Peter III, Tsar Peter Fedorovich, addressed a manifesto, in which he bestowed upon all those who joined him “from the peaks to the mouth, and earth, and herbs, and monetary salary, and lead. , and gunpowder, and grain provisions ". At the head of his constantly growing detachment, Pugachev approached Orenburg and laid siege to it. Here the question arises: why did Pugachev restrain his forces with this siege?

For the Yaik Cossacks, Orenburg was the administrative center of the region and at the same time a symbol of a hostile government, since all the royal decrees came from there. It was necessary to take it. And so Pugachev creates a headquarters, a kind of capital of the insurgent Cossacks, in the village of Berda near Orenburg turns into the capital of the insurgent Cossacks.

Later, in the village of Chesnokovka near Ufa, another center of movement was formed. Several more less significant centers arose as well. But the first stage of the war ended with two defeats of Pugachev - near the Tatishchev fortress and Sakmarsky town, as well as the defeat of his closest associate - Zarubin-Chika at Chesnokovka and the end of the siege of Orenburg and Ufa. Pugachev and his surviving associates leave for Bashkiria.

Peasant War Combat Map

Second phase

In the second stage, the Bashkirs massively participate in the uprising, who by that time already made up the majority in the Pugachev army. At the same time, government forces have become very active. This forced Pugachev to move towards Kazan, and then, in mid-July 1774, move to the right bank of the Volga. Even before the start of the battle, Pugachev announced that he would go from Kazan to Moscow. Rumors about this spread throughout the neighborhood. Despite the major defeat of the Pugachev army, the uprising engulfed the entire western bank of the Volga. Having crossed the Volga at Kokshaisk, Pugachev replenished his army with thousands of peasants. And Salavat Yulaev at this time with his detachments continued the hostilities near Ufa, the Bashkir detachments in the Pugachev detachment were led by Kinzya Arslanov. Pugachev entered Kurmysh, then freely entered Alatyr, and then headed for Saransk. On the central square of Saransk, a decree on freedom for the peasants was read, the residents were given supplies of salt and bread, the city treasury “Driving through the city fortress and along the streets ...... The same solemn meeting awaited Pugachev in Penza. The decrees provoked numerous peasant revolts in the Volga region, the movement covered most of the Volga districts, approached the borders of the Moscow province, and really threatened Moscow.

The publication of decrees (manifestos on the emancipation of the peasants) in Saransk and Penza is called the culmination of the Peasant War. The decrees made a strong impression on the peasants, nobles and Catherine II herself. The enthusiasm led to the fact that a population of more than a million people was involved in the uprising. They could not give anything to Pugachev's army in the long-term military plan, since the peasant detachments operated no further than their estate. But they turned Pugachev's campaign along the Volga region into a triumphal procession, with bells ringing, the blessing of the village priest and bread and salt in every new village, village, town. When Pugachev's army or its individual detachments approached, the peasants knitted or killed their landlords and their clerks, hanged local officials, burned estates, smashed shops and shops. In total, in the summer of 1774, about 3 thousand nobles and government officials were killed.

This is how the second stage of the war ends.

Third stage

In the second half of July 1774, when the Pugachev uprising was approaching the borders of the Moscow province and threatened Moscow itself, Empress Catherine II was alarmed by the events. In August 1774, Lieutenant General Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov was recalled from the 1st Army, which was in the Danube principalities. Panin entrusted Suvorov with command of the troops that were to defeat the main Pugachev army in the Volga region.

Seven regiments were sent to Moscow under the personal command of P. I. Panin. Moscow Governor-General Prince M.N. Volkonsky placed artillery next to his house. The police increased their supervision and sent informants to crowded places to grab all those who sympathized with Pugachev. Mikhelson, pursuing the rebels from Kazan, turned to Arzamas to block the road to the old capital. General Mansurov set out from Yaitsky town to Syzran, General Golitsyn to Saransk. Everywhere Pugachev leaves behind rebellious villages: "Not only peasants, but priests, monks, even archimandrites outrage sensitive and insensitive people"... But from Penza, Pugachev turned south. Perhaps he wanted to attract the Volga and Don Cossacks into his ranks - the Yaik Cossacks were already tired of the war. But it was on these days that a conspiracy of Cossack colonels began with the aim of surrendering Pugachev to the government in return for receiving a pardon.

Meanwhile, Pugachev took Petrovsk, Saratov, where priests in all churches served prayers for the health of Emperor Peter III, and government troops followed on his heels.

After Saratov, Kamyshin also met Pugachev with bell ringing and bread and salt. Near Kamyshin in the German colonies, Pugachev's troops collided with the Astrakhan astronomical expedition of the Academy of Sciences, many members of which, together with the leader, Academician Georg Lovitz, were hanged along with local officials who did not have time to escape. They were joined by a detachment of 3,000 Kalmyks, followed by the villages of the Volga Cossack army Antipovskaya and Karavinskaya. On August 21, 1774, Pugachev tried to attack Tsaritsyn, but the assault failed.

Michelson's corps pursued Pugachev, and he hastily lifted the siege from Tsaritsyn, moving to the Black Yar. Panic began in Astrakhan. On August 24, Pugachev was overtaken by Michelson. Realizing that the battle could not be avoided, the Pugachevites lined up battle formations. On August 25, the last major battle of the troops under the command of Pugachev with the tsarist troops took place. The battle began with a major setback - all 24 guns of the rebel army were repulsed by a cavalry attack. In a fierce battle, more than 2,000 rebels were killed, among them Ataman Ovchinnikov. More than 6,000 people were taken prisoner. Pugachev and the Cossacks, breaking up into small detachments, fled across the Volga. During August-September, most of the participants in the uprising were caught and sent for investigation to Yaitskiy gorodok, Simbirsk, Orenburg.

Pugachev under escort. 18th century engraving

Pugachev with a detachment of Cossacks fled to the Uzens, not knowing that since mid-August, some colonels had been discussing the possibility of earning forgiveness by surrendering the impostor. Under the pretext of facilitating the escape from the pursuit, they divided the detachment so as to separate the Cossacks loyal to Pugachev along with the ataman Perfiliev. On September 8, near the Bolshoy Uzen River, they attacked and tied Pugachev, after which Chumakov and Tvorogov went to the Yaitsky town, where on September 11 they announced the capture of the impostor. Having received promises of pardon, they notified the accomplices, and on September 15 they brought Pugachev to Yaitsky town. The first interrogations took place, one of which was conducted personally by Suvorov, he also volunteered to escort Pugachev to Simbirsk, where the main investigation was underway. To transport Pugachev, a cramped cage was made, installed on a two-wheeled cart, in which, shackled hand and foot, he could not even turn around. In Simbirsk, he was interrogated for five days by P.S. Potemkin, head of secret commissions of inquiry, and Count P.I. Panin, commander of the government's punitive troops.

Continuation of the Peasant War

With the capture of Pugachev, the war did not end - it developed too widely. The centers of the uprising were both scattered and organized, for example, in Bashkiria under the command of Salavat Yulaev and his father. The uprising continued in the Trans-Urals, in the Voronezh province, in the Tambov district. Many landowners left their homes and hid from the rebels. To bring down the wave of riots, punitive squads began mass executions. In every village, in every town that received Pugachev, on the gallows, from which they barely managed to remove those who were hanged by Pugachev, they began to hang the leaders of the riots and the city leaders and chieftains of local detachments appointed by the Pugachevites. To increase the intimidation, the gallows were installed on rafts and launched along the main rivers of the uprising. In May, Khlopushi was executed in Orenburg: his head was placed on a pole in the center of the city. During the investigation, the entire medieval set of tested means was used. In terms of cruelty and the number of victims, Pugachev and the government did not yield to each other.

"The Gallows on the Volga" (illustration by N. N. Karazin for "The Captain's Daughter" by A. S. Pushkin)

Investigation into the Pugachev case

All the main participants in the uprising were transported to Moscow for a general investigation. They were placed in the building of the Mint at the Iberian Gate of Kitai-Gorod. The interrogations were supervised by Prince M. N. Volkonsky and chief secretary S. I. Sheshkovsky.

Pugachev gave detailed testimony about himself and about his plans and designs, about the course of the uprising. Catherine II showed great interest in the course of the investigation. She even advised how best to conduct an inquiry and what questions to ask.

Sentence and execution

On December 31, Pugachev was transported under a reinforced escort from the casemates of the Mint to the chambers of the Kremlin Palace. He was then led into the conference room and forced to kneel down. After a formal interrogation, he was taken out of the hall, the court ruled: "To quarter Emelka Pugachev, stick his head on a stake, smash the body parts in four parts of the city and put them on wheels, and then burn them in those places." The rest of the defendants were divided according to the degree of their guilt into several groups for the imposition of each appropriate type of execution or punishment.

On January 10, 1775, on Bolotnaya Square in Moscow, an execution was carried out with a huge crowd of people. Pugachev was calm. On the frontal place he crossed himself at the Kremlin cathedrals, bowed on four sides with the words "Forgive me, Orthodox people." At the request of Catherine II, sentenced to quartering E.I. Pugachev and A.P. Perfiliev, the executioner first chopped off his head. On the same day they hanged M. G. Shigaev, T. I. Podurov and V. I. Tornov. I.N.Zarubin-Chika was sent to Ufa, where he was executed by beheading at the beginning of February 1775.

"Execution of Pugachev on Bolotnaya Square". Drawing of an eyewitness to the execution of A.T. Bolotov

Features of the Peasant War

This war was in many ways similar to the previous peasant wars. The Cossacks act as the instigator of the war; in many respects, both social requirements and the motives of the rebels are similar. But there are also significant differences: 1) the coverage of a huge territory, which had no precedents in the previous history; 2) organization of the movement different from the rest, the creation of central command and control bodies, the publication of manifestos, a fairly clear structure of the army.

Consequences of the Peasant War

In order to eradicate the memory of Pugachev, Catherine II issued decrees to rename all places associated with these events. Stanitsa Zimoveyskaya on the Don, where Pugachev was born, was renamed v Potemkin, the house where Pugachev was born was ordered to burn. Yaik river was renamed to Ural, Yaik army - to the Ural Cossack army, Yaitsky town - to Uralsk, Verkhne-Yaitskaya pier - to Verkhneuralsk... The name of Pugachev was anathematized in churches along with Stenka Razin.

Decree of the governing Senate

“... for the complete oblivion of this unfortunate incident that followed on Yaik, the Yaik river, along which both this army and the city had their name until now, due to the fact that this river flows from
The Ural Mountains, renamed the Ural, and therefore the army should be called Ural, and henceforth not called Yaitsky, and henceforth the Yaitsky city should be called Uralsk; what for information and execution
sim and is published. "

The policy in relation to the Cossack troops was adjusted, the process of their transformation into army units is accelerating. By the decree of February 22, 1784, the endorsement of the local nobility was fixed. Tatar and Bashkir princes and murzas are equated in rights and liberties with the Russian nobility, including the right to own serfs, but only of the Muslim faith.

The Pugachev uprising caused enormous damage to the metallurgy of the Urals. 64 of 129 factories existing in the Urals fully joined the uprising. In May 1779, a manifesto was issued on the general rules for the use of registered peasants in state and private enterprises, which limited breeders in the use of peasants assigned to factories, reduced working hours and increased wages.

There were no significant changes in the position of the peasantry.

Postage stamp of the USSR, dedicated to the 200th anniversary of the Peasant War of 1773-1775, E.I. Pugachev