Caucasian war of the 19th century. Caucasian war briefly

The Caucasian War of 1817-1864 in Russian history was essentially an aggressive operation of Russia, undertaken by the country's top leadership to subjugate this region to itself.
The difficulty was that all the peoples inhabiting the North Caucasus were representatives of the Muslim world, their customs, customs and traditions differed significantly from Russian ones.
However, it turned out to be “overlapping” the Caucasus simply because, following the results of two wars with Turkey and Iran, Russian influence has significantly advanced deep into its territories.
The causes of the Caucasian War were expressed mainly in the fact that the highlanders constantly expressed their dissatisfaction and opposed submission to the Russian emperors. Moreover, the peoples of Chechnya and Dagestan constantly carried out robbery attacks on the border Russian villages, Cossack villages, military garrisons. Provoking conflicts, they took civilians into captivity, killed employees on the border. As a result, the leadership of the southern districts decided to resolutely fight back.
The beginning of the war was marked by the fact that the Russian punitive detachments, specially formed within the imperial army to fight the local population, systematically made oncoming raids on the villages of the highlanders. Such measures of the Russian tsars only incited Muslim hatred for the Russian nation. Then the state decided to soften its tactics - to try to negotiate with the highlanders. These measures also did not bring tangible results. Then, directed to the south, General A.P. Yermolov, who began a methodical, systematic policy of joining the Caucasus to Russia. Emperor Nicholas I counted on this man very much, since he was distinguished by tough command, due restraint and a talented organizer of military campaigns. Discipline in the army under Yermolov was at the highest level.
During the first period of the war in 1817 Yermolov ordered his troops to cross the Terek River. Ranks of armed detachments of Cossacks lined up in an offensive line along the flanks and with specially equipped troops in the center. In the conquered territories, the Russians created temporary fortifications and fortresses. So on the river Sunzha in 1818, the Groznaya fortress arose.
The Cossack unit in the western Black Sea region also fell under the influence of Russia.
All the main forces were thrown into the fight against the Circassians in the Trans-Kuban region in 1822.
The results of the first period of the war can be summarized as follows:
- Almost all of Dagestan, Chechnya and Zakubanye obeyed.
However, to replace A.P. Yermolov was sent in 1826 by another general - General I.F. Paskevich. He created the so-called Lezgin line, but did not continue the systematic policy of moving deep into the Caucasus.
- the Military Sukhumi road was built;
- Violent protests of the highlanders, uprisings in all conquered territories became more frequent. These peoples were dissatisfied with the tough tsarist policy.
It should be noted that the military skills of the militant mountain population were exceptionally honed. Their hatred was reinforced by their religion: all "infidels" - Russians, as well as all representatives of the Christian world should be severely punished for the colonization of the Caucasus and destroyed. This is how the movement of the highlanders - jihad - arose.
The second period of the Caucasian War is a bloodier stage of confrontation between the regular units of the Russian army and the highlanders. The movement of muridism, which "shod" the population theoretically, has entered its bloody and formidable time. The people of Chechnya, Dagestan and the adjacent territories blindly believed that they were presented with the main content of the lectures in the fight against those who profess the Christian (in particular, the Orthodox) faith. According to the Murids, the true and most correct religion of the world is Islam, and the Muslim world must enslave the entire globe and subdue it.
Thus, the more confident attacks of the followers of Muridism to the north began - to recapture their fortresses and establish their former dominance there. But over time, the offensive forces weakened due to insufficient funding, food and weapons. Also among the warring highlanders, many began to pass under the Russian banners. The main part of those dissatisfied with Islamic Muridism is the active mountain peasantry. The imam promised to fulfill one significant obligation to them - smoothing out the class inequality between them and the feudal lords. However, their dependence on the owners not only did not disappear, but even worsened.
During the second offensive operation of the Russian troops under the command of General G.V. Rosen, some Chechen regions fell and again submitted to Russia. The remnants of the mountaineer detachments are pushed back into the Dagestan mountains. But this victory was not won for long.
In 1831, it was discovered that the Circassians were actively assisted by Turkey, Russia's longtime external enemy. All attempts to stop their interaction were crowned with success for the Russians. As a result of such active actions, the following strategically important fortifications appeared: Abinsk and Nikolaev.
However, the next imam of the highlanders was Shamil. He was unusually cruel. Most of the Russian reserves were sent to fight him. It was supposed to destroy Shamil as a huge ideological, political and military force of the peoples of Dagestan and Chechnya.
At first it seemed that Shamil, pushed back from the Avar territory, did not take any retaliatory military actions, but he made up for lost time: he actively cracked down on those feudal lords who at one time did not want to go under his subjugation. Shamil gathered large forces and waited for the right moment to attack the Russian fortifications.
The attack on the Russians was undertaken, which took them by surprise: there was no food, the reserves of weapons and ammunition were also not replenished. Therefore, the losses were obvious. Shamil thereby strengthened his authority and took possession of the still unreconquered territory of the North Caucasus. A short truce was concluded between the two camps.
General E. A. Golovin, who appeared in the Caucasus, created in 1838 the fortifications Navaginskoye, Velyaminovskoye, Tenginskoye and Novorossiyskoye.
He also resumed hostilities against Shamil. On August 22, 1839, Shamil's residence was taken under the name of Akhulgo. Shamil was wounded, but the murids transported him to Chechnya.
Meanwhile, the fortifications of Lazarevskoe and Golovinskoe were organized on the Black Sea coast. But soon the Russian troops began to suffer new military setbacks.
Shamil recovered, in the course of successful military operations against the Russians, he captured Avaria and subjugated a significant part of Dagestan.
With the onset of October 1842. instead of Golovin, General A.I. was sent to the Caucasus. Neugardt with an additional infantry reserve. Territories passed from one hand to another for a long time. General M.S. was sent from St. Petersburg to replace Neigard. Vorontsov at the end of 1844. He successfully took the residence of Shamil, but his detachment escaped with difficulty, breaking out of the encirclement, losing two-thirds of the people, ammunition and other army food.
From that moment, active offensive operations of the Russian troops began. Shamil tried to disrupt the resistance, but to no avail. The uprisings of the Circassians were also brutally suppressed. In parallel with this war, the Crimean War began. Chamil hoped to get even with the Russian generals with the assistance of Russian opponents, in particular England and Turkey.
The Turkish army was completely defeated in 1854-55, so Shamil decided on foreign support. Also, the imamate and jihad as movements began to weaken their positions and not so much influence the minds and worldview of the highlanders. Social contradictions torn apart the peoples of Dagestan and Chechnya. Dissatisfied peasants and feudal lords increasingly thought that the patronage of Russia would be very helpful. Thus, the majority of the people of the territories accountable to him rebelled against the power of Shamil.
As a result, the surrounded Shamil and his entourage were forced to surrender.
Further, the tsarist troops should have united all the Circassians who rebelled against Shamil under their command.
Thus ended the Caucasian War at the end of the 19th century. Its results were that new lands, strategically important for the construction of defensive fortifications of Russia, joined the territory of the Russian Empire. The country also gained dominance on the eastern coast of the Black Sea.
Specifically, Dagestan and Chechnya joined Russia. Now, no one attacked the civilians of the Prikazkazie, on the contrary, a cultural and economic exchange began between the Russians and the highlanders.
In general, the nature of the hostilities was distinguished by the stability of the transition of the occupied territories from one hand to another. The war also took on a protracted character and brought many casualties both from the population of the mountain peoples of the Caucasus and from the soldiers of the regular Russian army.

the struggle of the Russian Empire for the accession of the North Caucasus to Russia.

The North Caucasus was inhabited by many peoples who differed in language, customs, customs and level of social development. At the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th centuries. The Russian administration concluded agreements with the ruling elite of the tribes and communities on their entry into the Russian Empire.

As a result of the Russian-Turkish and Russian-Iranian wars of the late 20s. 19th century Russia was joined by Georgia, Eastern Armenia, Northern Azerbaijan. (See the historical map "The territory of the Caucasus, ceded to Russia by the 1830s")

However, the mountainous regions of the North Caucasus remained out of control. Therefore, after joining the Transcaucasus and the Black Sea coast during the wars with Persia (Iran) and Turkey, Russia faced the task of ensuring a stable situation in the North Caucasus. Under Alexander I, General A.P. Yermolov began to advance deep into Chechnya and Dagestan, building military strongholds. The resistance of the mountain peoples resulted in a religious and political movement - muridism, which implies religious fanaticism and an uncompromising struggle against the "infidels", which gave it a nationalist character. In the North Caucasus, it was directed exclusively against Russians and was most widespread in Dagestan. A kind of state on religious grounds, the imamate, has developed here. (See the historical map "Caucasus in 1817 - 1864")

In 1834, Shamil became the imam - the head of state. He created a strong army and concentrated administrative, military and spiritual power in his hands. Under his leadership, the struggle against the Russians intensified in the North Caucasus. It continued with varying success for about 30 years. In the 1840s Shamil managed to expand the territories subject to him, establishing ties with Turkey and some European states.

The conquest of the highlanders of the North Caucasus and the protracted war brought significant human and material losses to Russia. During the whole time, up to 80 thousand soldiers and officers of the Caucasian corps died, were taken prisoner and went missing. The maintenance of the military contingent cost 10-15 million rubles. annually. Undoubtedly, it worsened the financial situation of Russia. However, prolonged resistance undermined the strength of the mountaineers. By the end of the 50s. 19th century the situation worsened for them. The internal decomposition of Shamil's state began. The peasantry and other strata of the population, tortured by the war, countless military exactions, severe religious restrictions, began to move away from Muridism. In August 1859, the last refuge of Shamil, the village of Gunib, fell. The Imamat ceased to exist. In 1863 - 1864. Russians occupied the entire territory along the northern slope of the Caucasus Range and crushed the resistance of the Circassians. The Caucasian war is over.

Great Definition

Incomplete definition ↓

CAUCASIAN WAR (1817-1864)

The war of the Russian Empire against the Muslim peoples of the North Caucasus in order to annex this region.

As a result of the Russian-Turkish and Russian-Iranian wars, the North Caucasus was surrounded by Russian territory. However, the imperial government failed to establish effective control over it for many decades. The mountain peoples of Chechnya and Dagestan have long lived to a large extent by raiding the surrounding flat territories, including Russian Cossack settlements and soldier garrisons. In 1819, almost all the rulers of Dagestan united in an alliance to fight against the Russians. In 1823, Kabardian princes rose up against Russian rule, and in 1824 an uprising in Chechnya was raised by Beibulat Taymazov, who had previously served as an officer in the Russian army. In 1828, the struggle of the highlanders was led by the Avar Gazi-Magomed, who received the title of imam (spiritual leader) of Chechnya and Dagestan. He fought against other Avar khans who took the side of Russia, but could not capture the Avar capital Khunzakh, to whose aid Russian troops came. The highlanders acted against them in small cavalry partisan detachments, which quickly dispersed in the mountains if the enemy had a significant superiority in people and artillery.

Until 1827, the fight against the highlanders, who called themselves murids (“those who seek the path of salvation” in the holy war against the infidels - ghazavat), was led by the commander of the Separate Caucasian Corps, General Yermolov, and later by General Paskevich. Yermolov built fortresses, laid roads between them, cut down forests and bit deeper into the mountainous territory. Paskevich began to build a road along the Black Sea coast. Russian troops established control over Pitsunda, Gagra and Sukhumi, but in fact they were blocked in these settlements by detachments of Dzhigets, Ubykhs, Shapsugs and Natukhians. Thousands of Russian soldiers died from malaria and typhus.

On October 17, 1832, in one of the battles near the village of Gimry, Gazi-Magomed was killed. His successor was Gamzat-bek, who two years later was hacked to death by the Avars in a mosque in retaliation for the murder of the Avar khans. In 1834, the closest friend of Gazi-Magomed Shamil was elected imam. He was the first of the imams who managed to organize the highlanders into a regular army, consisting of tens and hundreds. Hundreds, in turn, united into larger detachments of different numbers. He introduced Sharia law in the subject territory and established iron discipline in the army. The slightest disobedience was punishable by corporal punishment or death. Shamil equipped his troops with artillery both from captured cannons and from new ones, which Dagestan masters learned to cast. However, he also experienced some serious setbacks. In 1839, after a three-month siege, the Russians stormed the fortified residence of the imam - the village of Akhulgo. During the assault, the youngest son of Shamil Sagid and many other relatives of the imam died. Shamil was forced to give his younger 7-year-old son Jamalut-din as a hostage to the Russian Tsar. But eight months later, the imam launched a new uprising in Chechnya. His supporters also managed to capture several Russian fortifications on the Black Sea coast in 1840. In 1845, Shamil defeated an expeditionary force led by the governor of the Caucasus himself, Prince Mikhail Vorontsov. The highlanders at the same time captured rich booty.

In 1848, the Trans-Kuban highlanders united around Shamil's colleague Magomed-Emin, who became the ruler of the North-Western Caucasus. During the Crimean War, in the summer of 1854, Shamil's son Gazi-Magomed raided Georgia, hoping to join the Turkish troops. But the Russian Caucasian army did not allow the Turks into Georgia, and the soldiers of Gazi-Magomed were forced to limit themselves to rich booty. They captured about 900 prisoners, among whom were representatives of noble Georgian families. More than a thousand Georgian militias and civilians died. Princesses Chavchavadze and Orbeliani were exchanged for Shamil's son Jamalutdin, who returned from St. Petersburg, where he served as a lieutenant in the Ulan Guards Regiment. A large ransom was also paid for the rest of the captives. After that, a cash crisis began in Georgia, and in Chechnya and Dagestan, on the contrary, silver coins depreciated.

Oddly enough, a successful raid into Georgia brought the end of the struggle against the highlanders closer. Realizing that they could not capture such booty a second time, the soldiers demanded peace, provided that no one forced them to return the loot. The new governor in the Caucasus, Prince Alexander Baryatinsky, a personal friend of Emperor Alexander II, applied a flexible policy, attracting local feudal lords (naibs) to his side with a promise to keep their possessions and privileges intact.

A three-year offensive in the mountains of southern Chechnya ended with the encirclement of Shamil in the high mountain village of Gunib. The superiority in artillery and small arms affected. The new rifled rifles of the 1856 model of the year surpassed the guns of the highlanders in range and rate of fire. On September 7, 1859, Shamil, at the head of 400 defenders of Gunib, surrendered to the army of Baryatinsky. At the same time, the proud imam told Baryatinsky: “I fought for the faith for thirty years, but now my peoples have betrayed me, and the naibs have fled. I myself am tired. I am sixty-three years old, I am already old and gray, even though my beard is black. the conquest of Dagestan. May the sovereign emperor own the highlanders for their benefit. "

After Shamil, it was the turn of Magomed-Emin. The landing party, landed from the ships, captured Tuapse - the only port through which the highlanders of the North-Western Caucasus were supplied with weapons and ammunition. On December 2, 1859, Magomed Emin and the elders of the Abadzekhs swore allegiance to the Russian Empire. However, the appearance of Russian settlers in the Caucasus led to the discontent of the local population and the uprising in 1862 of the peoples of Abkhazia. It was suppressed only in June 1864. After that, individual partisan detachments in the Caucasus fought against the Russians until 1884, but large-scale hostilities ended 20 years earlier.

During the Caucasian War, the Russian army lost 25 thousand people killed and more than 65 thousand wounded. About 120 thousand soldiers and officers died from diseases. There is no exact data on the losses of the armed highlanders, but there is no doubt that they were several times smaller than the Russians, especially in terms of those who died from diseases. In addition, a number of the civilian mountain population became victims of Russian punitive operations. But even as a result of the mountain raids, there were losses among the peaceful inhabitants of the Cossack villages and fortifications and among the Christian population of Georgia. There is no exact data on this.

Great Definition

Incomplete definition ↓

In 1817, the Caucasian War began for the Russian Empire, which lasted 50 years. The Caucasus has long been a region in which Russia wanted to expand its influence, and Alexander 1 decided on this war. This war was caught by three Russian emperors: Alexander 1, Nicholas 1 and Alexander 2. As a result, Russia emerged victorious.

The Caucasian war of 1817-1864 is a huge event, it is divided into 6 main stages, which are discussed in the table below.

Caucasian War 1817-1864

"It is just as difficult to enslave the Chechens and other peoples of the region as it is to smooth out the Caucasus.
This work is carried out not with bayonets, but with time and enlightenment.
So<….>they will make another expedition, knock down several people,
they will smash a crowd of unsettled enemies, lay down some kind of fortress
and return home to wait for autumn again.
This course of action can bring Yermolov great personal benefits,
and no Russia<….>
But quite so, in this continuous war there is something majestic,
and the temple of Janus for Russia, as for ancient Rome, will not be lost.
Who, besides us, can boast that he saw the eternal war?
From a letter to M.F. Orlov - A.N. Raevsky. 10/13/1820

There were still forty-four years left before the end of the war.
Isn't it something reminiscent of the current situation in the Russian Caucasus?

by the time of the appointment of Lieutenant General Alexei Petrovich Yermolov,
hero of the Battle of Borodino, commander-in-chief of the Caucasian army.

In fact, the penetration of Russia into the North Caucasus region
began long before and proceeded slowly but steadily.

Back in the 16th century, after the capture of the Astrakhan Khanate by Ivan the Terrible,
on the western coast of the Caspian Sea at the mouth of the Terek River, the Tarki fortress was founded,
which became the starting point for penetration into the North Caucasus from the Caspian,
birthplace of the Terek Cossacks.

In the kingdom of Grozny, Russia acquires, although more formally,
mountainous region in the Center of the Caucasus - Kabarda.

The chief prince of Kabarda, Temryuk Idarov, sent an official embassy in 1557
with a request to take Kabarda "under the high hand" of powerful Russia
to protect against the Crimean-Turkish conquerors.
On the eastern shore of the Sea of ​​Azov, near the mouth of the Kuban River, there is still
the city of Temryuk, founded in 1570 by Temryuk Idarov,
as a fortress to protect against the raids of the Crimeans.

Since Catherine's time, after the victorious Russo-Turkish wars for Russia,
annexation of the Crimea and the steppes of the Northern Black Sea coast,
the struggle for the steppe space of the North Caucasus began
- for the Kuban and Terek steppes.

Lieutenant General Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov,
appointed in 1777 commander of the corps in the Kuban,
led the capture of these vast expanses.
It was he who introduced the practice of scorched earth in this war, when everything recalcitrant was destroyed.
The Kuban Tatars as an ethnic group disappeared forever in this struggle.

To consolidate the victory on the conquered lands, fortresses are founded,
interconnected by cordon lines,
separating the Caucasus from the already annexed territories.
Two rivers become a natural border in the south of Russia:
one flowing from the mountains to the east in the Caspian - Terek
and the other, flowing west to the Black Sea - Kuban.
By the end of the reign of Catherine II along the entire space from the Caspian Sea to the Black Sea,
at a distance of almost 2000 km. along the northern shores of the Kuban and the Terek
there is a chain of defensive structures - the "Caucasian Line".
For cordon service, 12 thousand Black Sea people were resettled,
former Cossack Cossacks, who located their villages along the northern coast
Kuban rivers (Kuban Cossacks).

The Caucasian line is a chain of small fortified Cossack villages surrounded by a moat,
in front of which there is a high earthen rampart, on it is a strong wattle fence made of thick brushwood,
watchtower, yes a few guns.
From fortification to fortification, a chain of cordons - several dozen people in each,
and between the cordons small guard detachments "pickets", ten people each.

According to contemporaries, this region was distinguished by unusual relationships.
- many years of armed confrontation and at the same time mutual penetration
completely different cultures of the Cossacks and mountaineers (language, clothing, weapons, women).

"These Cossacks (Cossacks living on the Caucasian line) are different from the highlanders
only with an unshaven head ... weapons, clothes, harness, tacks - everything is mountain.< ..... >
Almost all of them speak Tatar, make friends with the highlanders,
even kinship through mutually kidnapped wives - but in the field the enemies are inexorable.
A.A. Bestuzhev-Marlinsky. Ammalat-back. Caucasian story.
Meanwhile, the Chechens were no less afraid and suffered from the raids of the Cossacks,
than those from them.

The king of united Kartli and Kakheti, Irakli II, turned in 1783 to Catherine II
with a request to accept Georgia into Russian citizenship
and about its protection by Russian troops.

Treaty of Georgievsky of the same year establishes a protectorate of Russia over Eastern Georgia
- Russia's priority in Georgia's foreign policy and its protection from the expansion of Turkey and Persia.

The fortress on the site of the village Kapkay (mountain gate), built in 1784,
receives the name Vladikavkaz - owning the Caucasus.
Here, near Vladikavkaz, the construction of the Georgian Military Highway begins
- mountain road through the Main Caucasian Range,
linking the North Caucasus with the new Transcaucasian possessions of Russia.

The Artli-Kakheti kingdom no longer exists.
The response of the neighboring countries of Georgia, Persia and Turkey, was unequivocal.
Supported alternately by France and England
depending on events in Europe, they enter a period of long-term wars with Russia,
ended in their defeat.
Russia has new territorial acquisitions,
including Dagestan and a number of khanates of northeastern Transcaucasia.
By this time, the principalities of Western Georgia:
Imereti, Mingrelia and Guria voluntarily became part of Russia,
while maintaining its autonomy.

But the North Caucasus, especially its mountainous part, is still far from subjugation.
Oaths given by some North Caucasian feudal lords,
were mostly declarative.
practically the entire mountainous zone of the North Caucasus did not obey
Russian military administration.
Moreover, dissatisfaction with the tough colonial policy of tsarism
all strata of the mountain population (the feudal elite, the clergy, the mountain peasantry)
caused a number of spontaneous uprisings, which were sometimes massive.
A reliable road linking Russia with its now vast
There are no Transcaucasian possessions yet.
Traffic on the Georgian Military Highway was dangerous
- the road is subject to attacks by mountaineers.

With the end of the Napoleonic Wars, Alexander I
forcing the conquest of the North Caucasus.

The first step on this path is the appointment of Lieutenant General A.P. Yermolova
commander of the Separate Caucasian Corps, head of the civilian unit in Georgia.
In fact, he is the governor, the full ruler of the entire region,
(officially, the post of governor of the Caucasus will be introduced by Nicholas I only in 1845).

For the successful completion of a diplomatic mission to Persia,
which prevented the Shah's attempts to return to Persia at least part of the lands that had gone to Russia,
Yermolov was promoted to general from infantry and according to Peter's "table of ranks"
becomes a full general.

Yermolov began fighting in 1817.
"The Caucasus is a huge fortress, defended by a half-million garrison.
The assault will be costly, so let's lead the siege"
- he said and switched from the tactics of punitive expeditions
to a systematic advance deep into the mountains.

In 1817-1818. Yermolov carried out an advance deep into the territory of Chechnya,
pushing the left flank of the "Caucasian Line" to the border of the Sunzha River,
where he founded several fortified points, including the Groznaya fortress,
(since 1870 the city of Grozny, now the ruined capital of Chechnya).
Chechnya, where the most warlike of the mountain peoples lived,
covered at that time by impenetrable forests, was
natural hard-to-reach fortress and in order to overcome it,
Yermolov cut down wide clearings in the forests, providing access to the Chechen villages.

Two years later, the "line" was moved to the foot of the Dagestan mountains,
where fortresses were also built, connected by a system of fortifications
with the Groznaya fortress.
The Kumyk plains are separated from the highlanders of Chechnya and Dagestan, who were pushed into the mountains.

In support of the armed uprisings of Chechens defending their land,
most of the Dagestan rulers in 1819 are united in a military Union.
Persia, extremely interested in confronting the highlanders of Russia,
behind which England also stood, provides the Union with financial assistance.

The Caucasian Corps was reinforced to 50 thousand people,
the Black Sea Cossack army, another 40 thousand people, was given to help him.
In 1819-1821 Ermolov undertook a series of punitive raids
in the mountainous regions of Dagestan.
The mountaineers resist desperately. Independence for them is the main thing in life.
Nobody expressed humility, even women and children.
It can be said without exaggeration that in these battles in the Caucasus every man
was a warrior, each aul was a fortress, each fortress was the capital of a warlike state.

There is no talk about losses, the result is important - Dagestan, it would seem, is completely subdued.

In 1821-1822 the center of the Caucasian line was advanced.
Fortifications built at the foot of the Black Mountains,
closed the exits from the gorges of Cherek, Chegem, Baksan.
Kabardians and Ossetians have been pushed back from the areas convenient for agriculture.

An experienced politician and diplomat, General Yermolov, understood that with one force of arms,
only by punitive expeditions to put an end to the resistance of the highlanders
almost impossible.
Other measures are also needed.
He declared the rulers subject to Russia free from all duties,
free to dispose of the land at their discretion.
For the local princes, shahs, who recognized the authority of the king, the rights
over former subservient peasants.
However, this did not lead to peace.
The main force resisting the invasion was still not the feudal lords,
and the mass of free peasants.

In 1823, an uprising broke out in Dagestan, raised by Ammalat-bek,
which Yermolov takes several months to suppress.
Before the start of the war with Persia in 1826, the region was relatively calm.
But in 1825, in the already conquered Chechnya, a vast uprising broke out,
led by the famous rider, the national hero of Chechnya - Bay Bulat,
covering the whole of Greater Chechnya.
In January 1826, a decisive battle took place on the Argun River,
in which the forces of many thousands of Chechens and Lezgins were dispersed.
Yermolov went through the whole of Chechnya, cutting down forests and severely punishing recalcitrant auls.
Involuntarily, the lines come to mind:

But behold - the East raises a howl! ...

Hang with your snowy head

Humble yourself, Caucasus: Yermolov is coming! A.S. Pushkin. "Prisoner of the Caucasus"

How this war of conquest was waged in the mountains is best judged by
in the words of the commander-in-chief himself:
"The rebellious villages were ravaged and burned,
orchards and vineyards cut down to the roots,
and after many years the traitors will not return to their original state.
Extreme poverty will be their punishment ... "

In Lermontov's poem "Izmail-bek" it sounds like this:

Villages are burning; they have no protection...

Like a beast of prey, to a humble abode

The winner breaks in with bayonets;

He kills old people and children

Innocent maidens and mothers

He caresses with a bloody hand ...

Meanwhile, General Yermolov
- one of the most progressive major Russian military leaders of that time.
Opponent of the Arakcheev settlements, drill and bureaucracy in the army,
he did a lot to improve the organization of the Caucasian Corps,
to facilitate the life of soldiers in their essentially indefinite and disenfranchised service.

"December events" of 1825 in St. Petersburg
affected the leadership of the Caucasus.

Nicholas I recalled, as it seemed to him, unreliable,
close to the circles of the Decembrists "lord over the entire Caucasus" - Yermolov.
He was unreliable since the time of Paul I.
For belonging to a secret officer's circle opposed to the emperor,
Yermolov spent several months in the Peter and Paul Fortress
and left the exile in Kostroma.

In his place, Nicholas I appointed a general from the cavalry I.F. Paskevich.

During his command
there was a war with Persia in 1826-27 and with Turkey in 1828-29.
For the victory over Persia, he received the title of Count of Erivan and the epaulettes of a field marshal,
and three years later, having brutally suppressed an uprising in Poland in 1831,
he became the Most Serene Prince of Warsaw, Count Paskevich-Erivan.
A rare double title for Russia.
Only A.V. Suvorov had such a double title:
Prince of Italy, Count Suvorov-Rymniksky.

From about the mid-twenties of the nineteenth century, even under Yermolov,
the struggle of the highlanders of Dagestan and Chechnya acquires a religious coloring - muridism.

In the Caucasian version, Muridism proclaimed,
that the main path of rapprochement with God lies for every “seeker of truth - murid”
through the fulfillment of the precepts of the ghazavat.
Fulfillment of Sharia without ghazawat is not salvation.

The wide spread of this movement, especially in Dagestan,
was based on the rallying on religious grounds of a multilingual mass
free mountain peasantry.
By the number of languages ​​spoken in the Caucasus, it can be called
linguistic "Noah's ark".
Four language groups, more than forty dialects.
Especially motley in this regard is Dagestan, where even single-aul languages ​​existed.
Not a little contributed to the success of Muridism and the fact that Islam penetrated Dagestan in the XII century.
and had deep roots here, while in the western part of the North Caucasus he began
only in the 16th century, and two centuries later, the influence of paganism was still felt here.

What failed feudal lords: princes, khans, beks
- to unite the Eastern Caucasus into a single force
- succeeded the Muslim clergy, combining in one person
religious and secular origin.
The Eastern Caucasus, infected with the deepest religious fanaticism,
became a formidable force, to overcome which Russia with its two hundred thousandth army
took almost three decades.

At the end of the twenties, the imam of Dagestan
(imam in Arabic means standing in front)
Mullah Gazi-Mohammed was proclaimed.

A fanatic, a passionate preacher of ghazavat, he managed to excite the mountain masses
promises of heavenly bliss and, no less important,
promises of complete independence from any authorities other than Allah and Sharia.

The movement covered almost all of Dagestan.
Opponents of the movement were only the Avar khans,
not interested in the unification of Dagestan and acting in alliance with the Russians.
Gazi-Mohammed, who carried out a series of raids on the Cossack villages,
captured and devastated the city of Kizlyar, died in battle during the defense of one of the villages.
His ardent supporter and friend - Shamil, wounded in this battle, survived.

The Avar Bek Gamzat was proclaimed Imam.
The enemy and murderer of the Avar khans, he himself perishes at the hands of conspirators two years later,
one of which was Hadji Murad, the second figure after Shamil in the ghazawat.
The dramatic events that led to the death of the Avar khans, Gamzat,
and even Hadji Murad himself formed the basis of L. N. Gorskaya Tolstoy's story "Hadji Murad".

After the death of Gamzat, Shamil, having killed the last heir of the Avar Khanate,
becomes the imam of Dagestan and Chechnya.

A brilliantly gifted man who studied with the best teachers in Dagestan
grammar, logic and rhetoric of the Arabic language,
Shamil was considered an outstanding scientist of Dagestan.
A man with an unbending, firm will, a brave warrior, he knew how not only to inspire
and arouse fanaticism in the highlanders, but also to subordinate them to your will.
His military talent and organizational skills, endurance,
the ability to choose the right moment to strike created many difficulties
Russian command during the conquest of the Eastern Caucasus.
He was neither an English spy, much less someone's henchman,
as it was at one time represented by Soviet propaganda.
His goal was one - to preserve the independence of the Eastern Caucasus,
create your own state (theocratic in form, but, in fact, totalitarian) .

Shamil divided the regions subject to him into "naibstvos".
Each naib had to come to war with a certain number of soldiers,
organized into hundreds, tens.
Understanding the meaning of ar
tilleria, Shamil created a primitive production of cannons
and their ammunition.
But still, the nature of the war for the mountaineers remains the same - partisan.

Shamil moves his residence to the village of Ashilta, away from Russian possessions
in Dagestan and from 1835-36, when the number of his adherents increased significantly,
begins to attack Avaria, devastating its villages,
most of which swore allegiance to Russia.

In 1837, a detachment of General K.K. was sent against Shamil. Feze.
After a fierce battle, the general took and completely ruined the village of Ashilta.
Shamil, surrounded in his residence in the village of Tilitle,
sent truce envoys to express their obedience.
The general went to negotiations.
Shamil put up three amanats (hostages), including the grandson of his sister,
and swore allegiance to the king.
Having missed the opportunity to capture Shamil, the general extended the war with him for another 22 years.

In the next two years, Shamil made a series of raids on Russian-controlled villages.
and in May 1839, having learned about the approach of a large Russian detachment,
led by General P.Kh. Grabbe, hiding in the village of Akhulgo,
turned by him into an impregnable fortress for that time.

The battle for the village of Akhulgo, one of the fiercest battles of the Caucasian war,
in which no one asked for mercy, and no one gave it.

Women and children armed with daggers and stones,
fought alongside men or committed suicide,
preferring death to captivity.
In this battle, Shamil loses his wife, son, his sister, nephews die,
over a thousand supporters.
Shamil's eldest son, Dzhemal-Eddin, was taken hostage.
Shamil barely escapes from captivity, hiding in one of the caves above the river
with only seven murids.
The Russian battle also cost almost three thousand people killed and wounded.

At the All-Russian Exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod in 1896
in a specially built cylinder-shaped building with a circumference of 100 meters
with a high half-glass dome, a battle panorama was exhibited
"Assault on the village of Akhulgo".
Author - Franz Roubaud, whose name is well known to Russian fans
fine art and history from his two later battle panoramas:
"Defense of Sevastopol" (1905) and "Battle of Borodino" (1912).

The time after the capture of Akhulgo, the period of Shamil's greatest military successes.

Unreasonable policy towards the Chechens, an attempt to take away their weapons
lead to a general uprising in Chechnya.
Chechnya has joined Shamil - he is the ruler of the entire Eastern Caucasus.

His base is in the village of Dargo, from where he made successful raids into Chechnya and Dagestan.
Having destroyed a number of Russian fortifications and partly their garrisons,
Shamil captured hundreds of prisoners, including even high-ranking officers, dozens of guns.

The apogee was the capture by him at the end of 1843 of the village of Gergebil
- the main stronghold of the Russians in Northern Dagestan.
The authority and influence of Shamil increased so much that even the Dagestan beks
in the Russian service, having high ranks, passed to him.

In 1844, Nicholas I sent the commander of the troops to the Caucasus
and Viceroy of the Emperor with emergency powers, Count M.S. Vorontsova
(since August 1845 he is a prince),
that same Pushkin "half-my lord, half-merchant",
one of the best administrators of Russia of that time.

The chief of staff of the Caucasian Corps was Prince A.I. Baryatinsky
- comrade of childhood and youth of the heir to the throne - Alexander.
However, at the initial stages, their high ranks do not bring success.

In May 1845, the command of a unit aimed at capturing the capital of Shamil
- Dargo takes over the governor himself.
Dargo is captured, but Shamil intercepts food transport
and Vorontsov is forced to retreat.
During the retreat, the detachment was completely defeated, losing not only all property,
but also over 3.5 thousand soldiers and officers.
The attempt to regain the village of Gergebil was also unsuccessful for the Russians,
the assault on which cost very heavy losses.

The turning point begins after 1847 and is connected not so much
with partial military successes - taking after the secondary siege of Gergebil,
how much with the fall of Shamil's popularity, mainly in Chechnya.

There are many reasons for this.
This is dissatisfaction with the harsh Sharia regime in relatively wealthy Chechnya,
blocking predatory raids on Russian possessions and Georgia and,
as a result, a decrease in the income of the naibs, the rivalry of the naibs among themselves.

Significantly influenced by liberal policies and numerous promises
to the mountaineers who expressed obedience, especially inherent in Prince A.I. Baryatinsky,
who in 1856 became commander-in-chief and viceroy of the tsar in the Caucasus.
The gold and silver that he distributed was no less powerful,
than "fittings" - rifles with rifled barrels - a new Russian weapon.

Shamil's last major successful raid took place in 1854 against Georgia.
during the Eastern (Crimean) War of 1853-1855.
Turkish sultan, interested in joint actions with Shamil,
awarded him the title of Generalissimo of the Circassian and Georgian troops.
Shamil gathered about 15 thousand people and, breaking through the cordons,
went down to the Alazani valley, where he ruined several of the richest estates,
captured Georgian princesses: Anna Chavchavadze and Varvara Orbeliani,
granddaughters of the last Georgian king.

In exchange for the princesses, Shamil demands the return of the captive in 1839
son of Jemal Eddin,
by that time he was already a lieutenant of the Vladimir Lancers Regiment and a Russophile.
It is possible that under the influence of his son, but rather because of the defeat of the Turks near Karsk and in Georgia,
Shamil did not take active steps in support of Turkey.

With the end of the Eastern War, the active actions of the Russians resumed,
especially in Chechnya.

Lieutenant General N. I. Evdokimov, the son of a soldier and a former soldier himself
- the main associate of the prince. Baryatinsky on the left flank of the Caucasian line.
Capture by him of one of the most important strategic objects - the Argun Gorge
and the generous promises of the governor to the obedient highlanders, decide the fate of Greater and Lesser Chechnya.

In the power of Shamil in Chechnya, only wooded Ichkeria,
in the fortified village of which Vedeno he concentrates his forces.
With the fall of Vedeno, after its assault in the spring of 1859,
Shamil is losing the support of all of Chechnya, his main support.

The loss of Vedeno became for Shamil the loss of the naibs closest to him,
one after another who went over to the side of the Russians.
Expression of humility by the Avar Khan and the surrender of a number of fortifications by the Avars,
deprives him of any support in the Accident.
The last place of stay of Shamil and his family in Dagestan is the village of Gunib,
where about 400 murids loyal to him are with him.
After taking the approaches to the village and its complete blockade by troops under the command
the governor himself, Prince Baryatinsky, August 29, 1859 Shamil surrendered.
General N.I. Evdokimov receives from Alexander II the title of Russian count,
becomes an infantry general.

Shamil's life with his entire family: wives, sons, daughters and sons-in-law
in the Kaluga golden cage under the vigilant supervision of the authorities
this is someone else's life.
After repeated requests, he was allowed to leave with his family for Medina in 1870.
(Arabia), where he dies in February 1871.

With the capture of Shamil, the Eastern zone of the Caucasus was completely conquered.

The main direction of the war has shifted to the western regions,
where, under the command of the already mentioned General Evdokimov, the main forces were moved
200,000th Separate Caucasian Corps.

The events unfolding in the Western Caucasus were preceded by another epic.

The result of the wars of 1826-1829. were agreements concluded with Iran and Turkey,
along which Transcaucasia from the Black Sea to the Caspian Sea became Russian.
With the annexation of Transcaucasia, the eastern coast of the Black Sea from Anapa to Poti
- also a possession of Russia.
The Adzharian coast (principality of Adzharia) became part of Russia only in 1878.

The actual owners of the coast are the highlanders: Circassians, Ubykhs, Abkhazians,
for which the coast is vital.
Across the coast they receive help from Turkey, England
food, weapons, emissaries arrive.
Without owning the coast, it is difficult to subdue the highlanders.

In 1829, after signing an agreement with Turkey
Nicholas I, in a rescript addressed to Paskevich, wrote:
“Having thus ended one glorious deed (the war with Turkey)
you have another, in my eyes just as glorious,
and in reasoning, direct benefit is much more important
- the pacification of the mountain peoples forever or the extermination of the recalcitrant.

It's so simple - extermination.

Based on this command, Paskevich in the summer of 1830 made an attempt
take possession of the coast, the so-called "Abkhazian expedition",
occupying several settlements on the Abkhazian coast: Bombara, Pitsunda and Gagra.
Further advance from the Gagra gorges
crashed against the heroic resistance of the Abkhaz and Ubykh tribes.

Since 1831, the construction of defensive fortifications of the Black Sea coastline began:
fortresses, forts, etc., blocking the exit of the highlanders to the coast.
Fortifications were located at the mouths of rivers, in valleys or in long-standing
settlements that previously belonged to the Turks: Anapa, Sukhum, Poti, Redut-Kale.
Advancing along the seashore and building roads with the desperate resistance of the highlanders
cost countless victims.
It was decided to establish fortifications by landing troops from the sea,
and it took a lot of lives.

In June 1837, the fortification of the "Holy Spirit" was founded on Cape Ardil
(in Russian transcription - Adler).

During the landing from the sea, he died, went missing,
warrant officer Alexander Bestuzhev-Marlinsky - poet, writer, publisher, ethnographer of the Caucasus,
an active participant in the events of December 14th.

By the end of 1839 along the Russian coast in twenty places
there are fortifications:
fortresses, fortifications, forts that made up the Black Sea coastline.
Familiar names of the Black Sea resorts: Anapa, Sochi, Gagra, Tuapse
- places of former fortresses and forts.

But the mountainous regions are still unruly.

Events related to the foundation and defense of strongholds
Black Sea coastline, perhaps
most dramatic in the history of the Caucasian war.

There is no land road along the entire coast yet.
The supply of food, ammunition and other things was carried out only by sea,
and in the autumn-winter period, during storms and storms, it is practically absent.
The garrisons from the Black Sea line battalions remained in the same places
throughout the existence of the "line", in fact, without a change and, as it were, on the islands.
On the one hand the sea, on the other - the highlanders on the surrounding heights.
It was not the Russian army that held back the highlanders, but they, the highlanders, kept the garrisons of fortifications under siege.
Yet the biggest scourge was the damp Black Sea climate, diseases and,
First of all, malaria.
Here is just one fact: in 1845, 18 people were killed along the entire "line",
and 2427 died of diseases.

At the beginning of 1840, a terrible famine broke out in the mountains,
forcing the highlanders to look for food in the Russian fortifications.
In February-March, they raid a number of forts and capture them,
completely destroying the few garrisons.
Almost 11 thousand people took part in the assault on Fort Mikhailovsky.
Private Tenginsky regiment Arkhip Osipov blows up a powder magazine and dies himself,
dragging along another 3,000 Circassians.
On the Black Sea coast, near Gelendzhik, there is now a resort town
- Arkhipovoosipovka.

With the beginning of the Eastern War, when the position of forts and fortifications became hopeless
- supply is completely interrupted, the Russian Black Sea fleet is flooded,
forts between two fires - highlanders and the Anglo-French fleet,
Nicholas I decides to abolish the "line", withdraw the garrisons, blow up the forts,
which was promptly done.

In November 1859, after the capture of Shamil, the main forces of the Circassians
led by Shamil's emissary, Mohammed-Emin, capitulated.
The land of the Circassians was cut by the Belorechensk defensive line with the Maykop fortress.
Tactics in the Western Caucasus - Yermolov's:
deforestation, the construction of roads and fortifications, the displacement of the highlanders into the mountains.
By 1864, the troops of N.I. Evdokimov occupied the entire territory
on the northern slope of the Caucasus Range.

Pushed to the sea or driven into the mountains, the Circassians and Abkhazians were given a choice:
move to the plains or emigrate to Turkey.
More than 500 thousand of them went to Turkey, then they were repeated more than once.
But these are only riots of the subjects of His Highness the Sovereign Emperor,
requiring only pacification, and pacified.

And yet, in historical terms, the accession of the North Caucasus to Russia
was inevitable - such was the time.

But there was logic in Russia's fiercest war for the Caucasus,
in the heroic struggle of the highlanders for their independence.

The more pointless it seems
as an attempt to restore the Sharia state in Chechnya at the end of the twentieth century,
and Russia's methods of countering this.
Thoughtless, indefinite war of ambitions - countless victims and sufferings of peoples.
The war that transformed Chechnya, and not only Chechnya
into the range of Islamic international terrorism.

Israel. Jerusalem

Notes

Orlov Mikhail Fyodorovich(1788 - 1842) - count, major general,
participant in campaigns against Napoleon in 1804-1814, division commander.
Member of Arzamas, organizer of one of the first officers' circles, Decembrist.
He was close to the family of General N.N. Raevsky, to A.S. Pushkin.

Raevsky Alexander Nikolaevich(1795 - 1868) - the eldest son of the hero of the war of 1812
cavalry general N.N. Raevsky, Colonel.
Was on friendly terms with A.S. Pushkin
M. Orlov was married to the eldest of the sisters of A. Raevsky - Ekaterina
his other sister, Maria, was the wife of the Decembrist Prince. S. Volkonsky, who followed him to Siberia.

It all began in the 16th century, after the capture of the Astrakhan Khanate by Ivan the Terrible,
then Suvorov chopped off territories to a fig.
Formally, the beginning of this undeclared war between Russia and the mountain peoples
the northern slope of the Caucasus can be attributed to 1816,
that is, almost 200 years of incessant war ...

Visibility of the World is not the World.
In vain Putin and Co. hope for "good neighborliness"
and help in the fight against "dissenters."
Until the first storm... tzatski with beads... that "Allah has given" they will take and screw a knife INTO THE BACK.
So it was, so it will be.
The highlanders, apparently posted on the Internet, have not changed at all.
Civilization has not reached them.
They live by their own laws. Only "cunning" has grown.
In vain Putin feeds the Beast, no matter how they bite off that hand that gives ...