Born in 1742 on the Don, in the village of Zimoveyskaya. Despite the fact that Pugachev was a Don Cossack, an uprising under his leadership began among the Cossacks of the Yaik (Ural) River. In the middle of the 18th century, the wealthy military foreman 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 in the late 1760s, armed skirmishes broke out between the tops and bottoms of the Yaitsky army. Empress Catherine II helped the foreman to pacify the poor, but sent an investigative commission to Yaik, removed the ataman Borodin, who was accused of abuse, and ordered the military office to pay the Cossack salary 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 beaten with a whip.

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

At that moment, a native of the 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 was in close contact with the runaway Old Believers and became imbued with sympathy for the schism. Released from the Turkish war due to illness, Pugachev went to his sister in Taganrog. There he helped his 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 at first began to incite part of the Cossacks to leave Yaik for the Turks (as the Nekrasov Cossacks recently did in the Caucasus). This plan did not materialize, but Pugacheva noticed some of the wealthy Yaik foremen who wanted to expand the autonomy of their army, which had been curtailed in recent years, through a rebellion. Pugachev proclaimed himself the overthrown husband of Catherine II, Emperor Peter III. There were vague (and unfounded) rumors among the people that Tsar Peter stood for ordinary people against the nobles, so Pugachev's imposture was a great success.

September 18, 1773 Pugachev with a detachment of 300 people approached the Yaik 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. All those who refused to swear allegiance to Tsar "Pyotr Fedorovich" were executed, and the soldiers and peasants who swore allegiance were declared "free Cossacks." The army of Emelyan Pugachev soon increased to 7 thousand and laid siege to Orenburg. Another part of it again approached the Yaitsky town.

Map of the uprising led by Pugachev

Pugachev was heavily dependent on his entourage of wealthy Yaik foremen - Zarubin, Shigaev, Padurov, Chumakov, Perfilyev. To prevent the impostor from getting out of their influence, they drowned their rival, Sergeant Karmitsky, and killed Pugachev's mistress, the officer's widow Kharlova. This circle of leaders 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 against the Pugachev uprising, led by an experienced general A. Bibikov. March 22, 1774 Emelyan Pugachev was defeated by Bibikov near Tatishcheva, losing one and a half thousand killed and 36 guns. The foreman who controlled 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.

Taking advantage of the spring thaw and the sudden death of Bibikov, Pugachev broke away from the chase and, with a small number of adherents, made a quick rush to the north - to the Ural factories. With his arrival, bonded workers and peasants began to revolt there. Many Bashkirs joined the rebellion with their long-standing tribal hostility to the Russian authorities. 5-10 thousand people again gathered around Pugachev, although these were no longer Cossacks, but a crowd devoid of any fighting qualities. The government detachment of Michelson, who rushed after Pugachev, effortlessly beat the rebels, but Emelyan began to quickly leave to the north, and then to the west, where instead of defeated supporters, new crowds joined him everywhere. Having reached the Kama, Pugachev took the cities of Osa, Izhevsk, Votkinsk, and then unexpectedly showed up at Kazan, whose garrison left to fight him near Orenburg. The impostor captured and terribly ruined Kazan, but Mikhelson, who soon arrived in time, inflicted a new severe defeat on him.

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

In total, with 500 people, Pugachev went beyond the Volga, and here the uprising flared up again. Emelyan had already traveled 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. Along 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 new forces against the uprising, 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 attached their regiments to the government forces.

Having ravaged the Don villages of Berezovskaya, Orlovskaya, Malodelskaya, Razdorskaya, Emelyan Pugachev turned to Tsaritsyn, but was repulsed from this city and finally finished off by Michelson near Cherny Yar. With 30 Cossacks, Pugachev crossed to the eastern bank of the Volga, thinking of fleeing 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 (out of humanity, Catherine II ordered that their heads 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 Potemkinskaya. Having suppressed the last centers of the Pugachev uprising, Catherine at the end of 1775 announced forgiveness to the surviving participants, but ordered to completely destroy the memory of the rebellion, rename the Yaik River to the Urals, the Yaitsky town to Uralsk, and the Yaitsky Cossack army to the Ural. The general Cossack circles of the former Yaik army were abolished after the Pugachev uprising, and atamans began to be appointed by the authorities.

Pugachev's Peasant War can be briefly characterized as a mass popular uprising that shook the Russian Empire from 1773 to 1775. Unrest took place in vast territories, including the Urals, the Volga region, Bashkiria and the Orenburg Territory.

The uprising was led by Yemelyan Pugachev, a Don Cossack who declared himself Emperor Peter III. The reasons for the uprising were the dissatisfaction of the Yaik Cossacks, associated with the loss of liberties, unrest among indigenous peoples such as the Bashkirs and Tatars, the tense situation in the Ural factories and the extremely difficult situation of the serfs.

The uprising began on September 17, 1773, when Pugachev, on behalf of the dead Emperor Peter III, announced his first decree to the Yaitsky army and, together with a detachment of 80 people, advanced to the Yaitsky town. Along the way, more and more supporters join him. It is not possible to take the Yaitsky town due to the lack of artillery, and Pugachev decides to move further along the Yaik River.

The Iletsk town is greeted as a legitimate sovereign. His army is replenished with garrison Cossacks and cannons of city artillery. The rebel troops continue to move, occupying with or without a fight all the fortresses that come across on the way. Soon, Pugachev's army, which had reached an impressive size by that time, approaches Orenburg and on October 5 begins the siege of the city.

The punitive corps of Major General Kara, sent to suppress the rebellion, is defeated and hastily retreats. Encouraged by success, the rebels occupy more and more new settlements, their forces are growing rapidly. However, it is not possible to take Orenburg. The next military expedition led by Bibikov forced the rebels to lift the siege from the city. The rebels gather the main forces in the Tatishchevskaya fortress. As a result of the battle, which took place on March 22, 1774, the rebels suffered a crushing defeat.

Pugachev himself fled to the Urals, where, having again gathered a significant army, he again goes on a campaign. On July 12, the rebels approach Kazan and occupy the city, with the exception of the Kazan Kremlin, where the remnants of the garrison settled. However, the government troops arrived in time for the evening, forcing Pugachev to retreat. During the ensuing battle, the rebels were utterly defeated. Pugachev runs across the Volga, where he gathers a new army and announces a decree on the liberation of the serfs. This causes mass unrest among the peasants.

Pugachev talks about marching on Moscow, but turns south. During the battle at the Solenikova gang, the rebels suffer a crushing defeat. Pugachev flees to the Volga, but his own associates betray him and hand him over to the government. On January 10, 1775, the leader of the uprising was executed. At the beginning of the summer, the Pugachev rebellion was finally crushed. The result of the uprising was the death of thousands of people and multimillion-dollar damage to the economy. Its result was the transformation of the Cossacks into regular military units, as well as some improvement in the lives of workers in the factories of the Urals. The situation of the peasants practically did not change.

The Pugachev uprising (Peasant War of 1773-1775) is an uprising of the Cossacks, which developed into a full-scale peasant war led by Emelyan Pugachev. The main driving force behind the uprising was the Yaik Cossacks. Throughout the 18th century, they lost their privileges and liberties. In 1772, an uprising broke out among the Yaitsky Cossacks, it was quickly suppressed, but the protest mood did not subside. Emelyan Ivanovich Pugachev, a Don Cossack, a native of the Zimoveyskaya village, pushed the Cossacks to further struggle. Finding himself in the trans-Volga steppes in the autumn of 1772, he stopped in Mechetnaya Sloboda and learned about unrest among the Yaik Cossacks. In November of the same year, he arrived in the Yaitsky town and, at meetings with the Cossacks, began to call himself the miraculously saved Emperor Peter III. Shortly thereafter, Pugachev was arrested and sent to Kazan, from where he fled at the end of May 1773. In August, he reappeared in the army.

In September, Pugachev arrived at the Budarinsky outpost, where his first decree to the Yaik army was announced. From here, a detachment of 80 Cossacks headed up the Yaik. New supporters joined along the way, so that by the time they arrived at 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. A second attack by the rebels on September 19 was also repulsed with the help of artillery. The rebel detachment did not have its own cannons, so it was decided to move further up the Yaik, and on September 20 the Cossacks camped near the Iletsk town. Here a circle was convened, at which Andrey Ovchinnikov was elected as a marching ataman, all the Cossacks swore allegiance to the great sovereign, Emperor Peter Fedorovich.

After a two-day meeting on further actions, it was decided to send the main forces to Orenburg. On the way to Orenburg, there were small fortresses of the Nizhne-Yaitskaya distance of the Orenburg military line.

2 Capture of the Tatishchev fortress

On September 27, the Cossacks appeared in front of the Tatishchev fortress and began to convince the local garrison to surrender and join the army of the "sovereign" Peter. The garrison of the fortress was at least a thousand soldiers, and the commandant, Colonel Yelagin, hoped to fight back with the help of artillery. The shooting continued throughout the day. A detachment of Orenburg Cossacks, sent on a sortie, under the command of the centurion Podurov, went over in full force to the side of the rebels. Having managed to set fire to the wooden walls of the fortress, which started a fire in the town, and taking advantage of the panic that had begun in the town, the Cossacks broke into the fortress, after which most of the garrison laid down their arms.

With the artillery of the Tatishchev fortress and replenishment in people, the 2,000-strong detachment of Pugachev began to pose a real threat to Orenburg.

3 Siege of Orenburg

The road to Orenburg was open, but Pugachev decided to go to Seitov settlement and the Sakmarsky town, since the Cossacks and Tatars who arrived from there assured him of universal devotion. On October 1, the population of Seitova Sloboda solemnly welcomed the Cossack army, placing a Tatar regiment in its ranks. And already on October 2, the rebel detachment entered the Sakmara Cossack town to the sound of bells. In addition to the Sakmara Cossack regiment, workers from neighboring copper mines, miners Tverdyshev and Myasnikov, joined Pugachev. On October 4, the army of the rebels headed for the Berdskaya Sloboda near Orenburg, whose inhabitants also swore allegiance to the "resurrected" tsar. By this time, the impostor's army numbered about 2,500 people, of which about 1,500 were Yaik, Iletsk, and Orenburg Cossacks, 300 soldiers, and 500 Kargaly Tatars. The artillery of the rebels consisted of several dozen cannons.

Orenburg was quite a powerful fortification. An earth rampart was erected around the city, fortified with 10 bastions and 2 semi-bastions. The height of the shaft reached 4 meters and more, and the width - 13 meters. On the outer side of the rampart there was a ditch about 4 meters deep and 10 meters wide. The garrison of Orenburg was about 3,000 men and about a hundred guns. On October 4, a detachment of 626 Yaitsky Cossacks, who remained loyal to the government, with 4 guns, led by the Yaitsky military foreman M. Borodin, managed to freely approach Orenburg from the Yaitsky town.

On October 5, Pugachev's army approached the city, setting up a temporary camp five miles from it. Cossacks were sent to the ramparts, who managed to convey Pugachev's decree to the garrison troops with an appeal to lay down their arms and join the "sovereign". In response, cannons from the city rampart began shelling the rebels. On October 6, Governor Reinsdorp ordered a sortie, a detachment under the command of Major Naumov returned to the fortress after a two-hour battle. On October 7, a military council 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 the transition of soldiers and Cossacks to the side of Pugachev. The sortie showed that the soldiers fought reluctantly, Major Naumov reported that he found "timidity and fear in his subordinates."

The siege of Orenburg that began for six months fettered the main forces of the rebels, without bringing any of the parties a military success. On October 12, Naumov's detachment re-sally was made, but successful artillery operations under the command of Chumakov helped repulse the attack. Pugachev's army, due to the onset of frost, moved the camp to Berdskaya Sloboda. On October 22, an assault was launched; rebel batteries began shelling the city, but strong return artillery fire did not allow them to get close to the rampart. At the same time, during October, the fortresses along the Samara River - Perevolotskaya, Novosergievskaya, Totskaya, Sorochinsky, and in early November - the Buzuluk fortress passed into the hands of the rebels.

On October 14, Catherine II appointed Major General V. A. Kara as commander of a military expedition to suppress the rebellion. At the end of October, Kar arrived in Kazan from St. Petersburg and, at the head of a corps of two thousand soldiers and one and a half thousand militiamen, headed for Orenburg. On November 7, near the village of Yuzeeva, 98 versts from Orenburg, detachments of the Pugachev chieftains Ovchinnikov and Zarubin-Chiki attacked the vanguard of the Kara corps and, after a three-day battle, forced him to retreat back to Kazan. On November 13, a detachment of Colonel Chernyshev was captured near Orenburg, numbering up to 1100 Cossacks, 600-700 soldiers, 500 Kalmyks, 15 guns and a huge convoy. Realizing that instead of a prestigious victory over the rebels, he could get a complete defeat, Kar, under the pretext of illness, left the corps and went to Moscow, leaving command to General Freiman. The successes inspired the Pugachevites, the victories made a great impression on the peasantry and the Cossacks, increasing their influx into the ranks of the rebels.

By January 1774, the situation in the besieged Orenburg became critical, famine began in the city. Having learned about the departure of Pugachev and Ovchinnikov with part of the troops to the Yaitsky town, the governor decided to make a sortie on January 13 to the Berdskaya settlement to lift the siege. But the unexpected attack did not work, sentinel Cossacks managed to raise the alarm. The chieftains who remained in the camp led their detachments to the ravine that surrounded the Berdskaya settlement 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.

When news of the defeat of the Kara expedition reached St. Petersburg, Catherine II, by decree of November 27, appointed AI 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 northwestern borders of the empire to Kazan and Samara, and besides them, all the garrisons and military units located in the uprising zone, and remnants of the Kara Corps. Bibikov arrived in Kazan on December 25, 1773, and immediately began the movement of troops to Samara, Orenburg, Ufa, Menzelinsk, Kungur, besieged by the Pugachevites. Having received information about this, Pugachev decided to withdraw the main forces from Orenburg, in fact lifting the siege.

4 Siege of the fortress of Michael the Archangel Cathedral

In December 1773, Pugachev sent Ataman Mikhail Tolkachev with his decrees to the rulers of the Kazakh Younger 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 horsemen of the Sarym Datula clan joined Pugachev. On the way back, Tolkachev gathered Cossacks into his detachment in the fortresses and outposts on the lower Yaik and went with them to the Yaitsky town, collecting cannons, ammunition and provisions in the accompanying fortresses and outposts.

On December 30, Tolkachev approached the Yaitsky town and in the evening of the same day occupied the ancient district of the city - Kuren. Most of the Cossacks greeted their comrades and joined Tolkachev's detachment, but the Cossacks of the foremen's side, the soldiers of the garrison, led by Lieutenant Colonel Simonov and Captain Krylov, locked themselves in the "retrenchment" - the fortress of the Mikhailo-Arkhangelsk Cathedral. 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 January 1774, Pugachev himself arrived in the Yaitsky town. He took over the leadership of the protracted siege of the city fortress of the Mikhailo-Arkhangelsk Cathedral, but after an unsuccessful assault on January 20, he returned to the main army near Orenburg.

In the second half of February and early March 1774, Pugachev again personally led attempts to capture the besieged fortress. On February 19, the bell tower of St. Michael's Cathedral was blown up and destroyed by a mine dig, but each time the garrison managed to repulse the attacks of the besiegers.

5 Assault on the Magnetic Fortress

On April 9, 1774, the commander of military operations against Pugachev, Bibikov, died. After him, Catherine II entrusted the command of the troops to Lieutenant General F.F. Shcherbatov. Offended by the fact that it was not him who was 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 in Orenburg for three months. The intrigues between the generals gave Pugachev a much-needed respite, he managed to gather scattered small detachments in the Southern Urals. The pursuit was also suspended by the spring thaw and floods on the rivers, which made the roads impassable.

On the morning of May 5, Pugachev's 5,000-strong detachment approached the Magnetic Fortress. By this time, the detachment of the rebels consisted mainly of poorly armed factory peasants and a small number of personal Yaik guards under the command of Myasnikov, the detachment did not have a single gun. The beginning of the assault on Magnitnaya was unsuccessful, about 500 people died in the battle, Pugachev himself was wounded in his right hand. After withdrawing the troops from the fortress and discussing the situation, the rebels, under the cover of night darkness, made a new attempt and were able to break into the fortress and capture it. As trophies got 10 guns, guns, ammunition.

6 Battle for Kazan

In early June, Pugachev headed for Kazan. On June 10, the Krasnoufimskaya fortress was taken, on June 11, a victory was won in the battle near Kungur against the garrison that had made a sortie. Without attempting to storm Kungur, Pugachev turned to the west. On June 14, the vanguard of his troops under the command of Ivan Beloborodov and Salavat Yulaev approached the Kama town of Ose and blocked the city fortress. Four days later, the main forces of Pugachev came here and started siege battles with the garrison settled in the fortress. On June 21, the defenders of the fortress, having exhausted the possibilities of further resistance, capitulated.

Having mastered the Wasp, Pugachev ferried the army across the Kama, took the Votkinsk and Izhevsk factories, Yelabuga, Sarapul, Menzelinsk, Agryz, Zainsk, Mamadysh and other cities and fortresses along the way, and in the first days of July approached Kazan. 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 in the battle. The next day, a detachment of rebels camped near the city.

On July 12, as a result of the assault, the suburbs and the main districts of the city were taken, the garrison remaining in the city locked itself in the Kazan Kremlin and prepared for the siege. A strong fire began in the city, in addition, Pugachev received news of the approach of Michelson's troops, who were following 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 garrison of Kazan, 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 lightly armed peasants who had just joined the uprising, Tatar and Bashkir cavalry armed with bows, and a small number of remaining Cossacks. The competent actions of Mikhelson, who first of all hit 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.

7 Battle at the Solenikova gang

On July 20, Pugachev entered Kurmysh, on the 23rd he entered Alatyr without hindrance, after which he headed for Saransk. On July 28, a decree on freedom for the peasants was read out on the central square of Saransk, and stocks of salt and bread were distributed to the residents. On July 31, the same solemn meeting awaited Pugachev in Penza. The decrees caused numerous peasant uprisings in the Volga region.

After Pugachev's triumphant entry into Saransk and Penza, everyone expected him to march on Moscow. But Pugachev turned south from Penza. On August 4, the impostor's army took Petrovsk, and on August 6 surrounded Saratov. On August 7 he was taken. On August 21, Pugachev tried to attack Tsaritsyn, but the assault failed. Having received news of the arriving Michelson's corps, Pugachev hastened to lift the siege from Tsaritsyn, the rebels moved to the Black Yar. On August 24, at the Solenikov fishing gang, Pugachev was overtaken by Mikhelson.

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 died, among them Ataman Ovchinnikov. Over 6,000 people were taken prisoner. Pugachev and the Cossacks, breaking up into small detachments, fled across the Volga. In pursuit of them, search detachments of generals Mansurov and Golitsyn, the Yait foreman Borodin and the Don colonel Tavinsky were sent. During August-September, most of the participants in the uprising were caught and sent for investigation to Yaitsky town, Simbirsk, Orenburg.

Pugachev fled to Uzen with a detachment of Cossacks, not knowing that since mid-August Chumakov, Tvorogov, Fedulev 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 chase, they divided the detachment in such a way as to separate the Cossacks loyal to Pugachev, along with Ataman Perfilyev. On September 8, near the Bolshoy Uzen River, they pounced and tied Pugachev, after which Chumakov and Curds 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 delivered Pugachev to the Yaitsky town.

In a special cage, under escort, Pugachev was taken to Moscow. On January 9, 1775, the court sentenced him to death. On January 10, on Bolotnaya Square, Pugachev ascended the scaffold, bowed on all four sides and laid his head on the chopping block.

Reasons for the uprising of Yemelyan Pugachev

The discontent of the people is the main reason for the uprising. And each part of the social group that participated in the peasant war had its own grounds for discontent.

1. The peasants were outraged by their lack of rights. They could be sold, played at cards, given away without their consent to work at a factory, etc. The situation was aggravated by the fact that in 1767 Catherine II issued a decree forbidding peasants to complain to the court or the empress about the landowners.

2. The annexed nationalities (Chuvash, Bashkirs, Udmurts, Tatars, Kalmyks, Kazakhs) were dissatisfied with the oppression of their faith, the seizure of their lands and the construction of military installations on their territories.

3. The Cossacks did not like that their freedom was being infringed upon. Their rights were increasingly limited: for example, they could no longer choose and remove the chieftain as before. Now the Military Collegium did it for them. The state also established a monopoly on salt, which undermined the economy of the Cossacks. The fact is that the Cossacks mainly lived by selling fish and caviar, and salt played an important role in increasing their shelf life. The Cossacks were not allowed to extract salt themselves, the Cossacks were also not happy with this. Finally, the Cossack army abandoned the pursuit of the Kalmyks, which was ordered to them by the top. The government sent a detachment to pacify the Cossacks. The Cossacks responded to this only with a new uprising, which was brutally suppressed. People were horrified by the punishments of the main instigators and were tense.

The reasons for the uprising can also include all kinds of rumors that circulated among the people. It was rumored that Emperor Peter III survived, that it was planned to soon release the serfs and grant them lands. These words, unconfirmed by anything, kept the peasants in tension, which was ready to turn into an uprising.

Also speaking about the reasons for the Pugachev uprising, one cannot but say about the leader himself. After all, in those days there were many impostors, and only he was able to gather thousands of people around him. All this thanks to his mind and personality.

Going through your eyes again on the reasons for the Pugachev uprising, you yourself can name the participants. But, nevertheless, let's mention them again.

By social composition: Cossacks, peasants, factory workers

By ethnic composition: Russians, Chuvashs, Kalmyks, Tatars, Kazakhs, Bashkirs, Udmurts

Years of the Pugachev uprising: 1773-1775

Pugachev escaped from prison (he was imprisoned for numerous petitions) and headed for Yaik, where he introduced himself to the Cossacks as Peter III. The Yaik Cossacks were the first to join Pugachev, and then his army grew very rapidly. In two weeks it grew from 80 people to 2.5 thousand. Having captured several small towns, the rebels headed for Orenburg.

It was not possible to take Orenburg right away, they had to besiege the city. Here the rebels "stuck" for a long time. Part of Pugachev's army from time to time left the main target and captured small settlements, including attempts to take Ufa and Chelyabinsk.

At the first stage, the organization of Pugachev's army was going on, which, according to some data, reached 30 thousand people, according to others - 40. For example, a Military Collegium was created in the camp of the rebels. The territories involved in the uprising were constantly expanding. But despite this, on March 22, 1774, Pugachev suffered a major defeat near the Tatishchevskaya fortress and was forced to flee.
Stage II (April 1774 - mid-July 1774) The flight of Pugachev, the return and failure of the uprising

Pugachev quickly replenished his ranks, as people themselves rushed to join his army. The rebels captured several fortresses and factories in the Urals. But the biggest problem for Pugachev was the royal army. After the capture of Kazan by the rebels, they were defeated by the government detachments of Michelson.

The defeated Pugachev with a detachment of 500 people crossed to the other (right) bank of the Volga.

Stage III (July 1774 - early September 1775) Defeat of the uprising

The peoples and peasants of the Volga region gladly joined Pugachev's army. So they were to take (many without a fight) the cities of Saransk, Saratov, Penza.

The rebels were already near Moscow. Catherine and the authorities were already waiting for Pugachev's campaign against the old capital, but he moved south in order to raise the Don Cossacks to revolt. In August, Pugachev and his exhausted army tried to take Tsaritsyn, but they failed. Soon the army of the rebels was defeated by Michelson's army. Pugachev fled with a small detachment.
Stage IV (September - January 1775) Reprisal against small outbreaks of the uprising and the execution of Pugachev

In September 1775, Pugachev's associates, in order to earn a pardon, handed over the leader to the government. Pugachev was taken to Moscow, where on January 10, on Bolotnaya Square, he was executed along with other major participants in the uprising. Ordinary people of Pugachev were also severely punished - many were hanged and floated rafts with gallows along the main rivers (to intimidate the population)

A garrison of government troops was deployed, all power over the army passed into the hands of the commandant of the garrison, Lieutenant Colonel I. D. Simonov. The perpetrated massacre of the captured instigators was extremely cruel and made a depressing impression on the army, the Cossacks had never been stigmatized before, their tongues had not been cut out. A large number of participants in the speech 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 heterodox peoples of the Urals and the Volga region. The development of the Urals that began in the 18th century and the active colonization of the lands of the Volga region, the construction and development of military border lines, the expansion of the Orenburg, Yaik and Siberian Cossack troops with the allocation of land that previously belonged to local nomadic peoples, intolerant religious policy led to numerous unrest among the Bashkirs, Tatars, Mordovians, Chuvashs, Udmurts, Kazakhs, Kalmyks (most of the latter, having broken through the Yaik border line, migrated to Western China in 1771).

The situation in the rapidly growing factories of the Urals was also explosive. Starting from Peter the Great, the government solved the problem of labor in metallurgy mainly by assigning state peasants to state-owned and private mining plants, allowing new breeders to buy serf villages and granting an 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 take advantage of the lawlessness and hopeless 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.

Peasants assigned to state and private factories dreamed of returning to their usual village labor, while the situation of peasants in serf estates was little better. The economic situation in the country, almost continuously waging one war after another, was difficult. The landowners increase the area of ​​crops, corvee increases. On top of this, there followed the Decree of Catherine II of August 22, 1767 on the prohibition of peasants from complaining about the landowners personally to the Empress (the decree did not forbid complaining about the landowners in the usual way).

In this situation, the most fantastic rumors about imminent liberty or about the transition of all peasants to the treasury easily found their way, about the ready decree of the tsar, who was killed by his wife and boyars for this, that the tsar was not killed, but he hides until better times - they all fell on the fertile ground of general human dissatisfaction with their present position.

The beginning of the uprising

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

Despite the fact that the internal readiness of the Yaik Cossacks for the uprising was high, the speech lacked a unifying idea, a core that would rally the hiding and hiding participants in the unrest of 1772. The rumor that the miraculously saved emperor Pyotr Fedorovich appeared in the army instantly spread throughout Yaik. Pyotr Fedorovich was the husband of Catherine II, after the coup, he abdicated the throne and died mysteriously at the same time.

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

Finding himself in the Trans-Volga steppes in the autumn of 1772, he stopped in Mechetnaya Sloboda and here, from the abbot of the Old Believer skete Filaret, he learned about unrest among the Yaik Cossacks. It is not known for certain where the idea to call himself a tsar was born in his head and what his initial plans were, but in November 1772 he arrived in the Yaitsky town and called himself Peter III at meetings with the Cossacks. Upon returning to the 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 he was visited by his future closest associates - Shigaev, Zarubin, Karavaev, Myasnikov.

In September, hiding from search parties, Pugachev, accompanied by a group of Cossacks, arrived at the Budarinsky outpost, where on September 17 his first decree to the Yaik 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 "king". From here, a detachment of 80 Cossacks headed up the Yaik. New supporters joined along the way, so that by the time September 18 arrived at 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. A second attack by the rebels on September 19 was also repulsed with the help of artillery. The rebel detachment did not have its own cannons, 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, on which Andrey Ovchinnikov was elected as a marching ataman, all the Cossacks swore allegiance to the great sovereign Emperor Peter Fedorovich, after which Pugachev sent Ovchinnikov to the Iletsk town with decrees to the Cossacks: “ And whatever you wish, all benefits and salaries will not be denied to you; and your glory will not expire until forever; and both you and your descendants are the first in my presence, the great sovereign, learn» . Despite the opposition of the Iletsk ataman Portnov, Ovchinnikov convinced the local Cossacks to join the uprising, and they greeted Pugachev with bells and bread and salt.

All Iletsk Cossacks swore allegiance to Pugachev. The first execution took place: according to the complaints of the inhabitants - "he did great offenses to them 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 the artillery.

Map of the initial stage of the uprising

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

The fortress of Rassypnaya was taken by a lightning assault on September 24, and the local Cossacks, in the midst of the battle, went over to the rebellious side. On September 26, the Lower Lake Fortress was taken. On September 27, patrols of the rebels appeared in front of the Tatishchev fortress and began to convince the local garrison to surrender and join the army of the “sovereign” Pyotr Fedorovich. The garrison of the fortress was at least a thousand soldiers, and the commandant, Colonel Yelagin, hoped to fight back with the help of artillery. The skirmish continued throughout the day on 27 September. A detachment of Orenburg Cossacks, sent on a sortie, under the command of the centurion Podurov, went over in full force to the side of the rebels. Having managed to set fire to the wooden walls of the fortress, which started a fire in the town, and taking advantage of the panic that had begun in the town, the Cossacks broke into the fortress, after which most of the garrison laid down their arms. The commandant and officers resisted to the last, dying in battle; those captured, including members of their families, were shot after the battle. Commandant Elagin's daughter Tatyana, the widow of the commandant of the Lower Lake Fortress Kharlov, who was killed the day before, was taken by Pugachev as a concubine. With her, they left her brother Nikolai, in front of whom, after the battle, their mother was killed. The Cossacks shot Tatyana and her infant brother a month later.

With the artillery of the Tatishchev fortress and replenishment in people, the 2,000-strong detachment of Pugachev began to pose a real threat to Orenburg. On September 29, Pugachev solemnly entered the Chernorechensk fortress, the garrison and inhabitants of which swore allegiance to him.

The road to Orenburg was open, but Pugachev decided to head to Seitov settlement and the Sakmarsky town, as the Cossacks and Tatars who arrived from there assured him of universal devotion. On October 1, the population of Seitova Sloboda solemnly welcomed the Cossack army, placing a Tatar regiment in its ranks. In addition, a decree was issued in the Tatar language, addressed to the Tatars and Bashkirs, in which Pugachev granted them "lands, waters, forests, residences, herbs, rivers, fish, bread, laws, arable land, bodies, monetary salaries, lead and gunpowder ". And already on October 2, the rebel detachment entered the Sakmara Cossack town to the sound of bells. In addition to the Sakmara Cossack regiment, Pugachev was joined by workers from neighboring copper mines, miners Tverdyshev and Myasnikov. Khlopusha appeared in the Sakmarsky town as part of the rebels, originally sent by Governor Reinsdorp with secret letters to the rebels with a promise of pardon if Pugachev was extradited.

On October 4, the army of the rebels headed for the Berdskaya Sloboda near Orenburg, whose inhabitants also swore allegiance to the "resurrected" tsar. By this time, the impostor's army numbered about 2,500 people, of which about 1,500 Yaik, Iletsk and Orenburg Cossacks, 300 soldiers, 500 Kargaly Tatars. The artillery of the rebels consisted of several dozen cannons.

The siege of Orenburg and the first military successes

The capture of Orenburg became the main task of the rebels in connection with its importance as the capital of a vast region. If successful, the authority of the army and the leader of the uprising would have grown significantly, because the capture of each new town contributed to the unhindered capture of the next. In addition, it was important to capture the Orenburg weapons depots.

Panorama of Orenburg. 18th century engraving

But Orenburg, militarily, was a much more powerful fortification than even the Tatishchev fortress. An earthen rampart was erected around the city, fortified with 10 bastions and 2 semi-bastions. The height of the shaft reached 4 meters and above, and the width - 13 meters. On the outer side of the shaft there was a ditch about 4 meters deep and 10 meters wide. The garrison of Orenburg was about 3,000 people, of which about 1,500 soldiers, about a hundred guns. On October 4, a detachment of 626 Yaitsky Cossacks, who remained loyal to the government, with 4 guns, led by the Yaitsky military foreman M. Borodin, managed to freely approach Orenburg from the Yaitsky town.

And already on October 5, Pugachev's army approached the city, setting up a temporary camp five miles from it. Cossacks were sent to the ramparts, who managed to convey Pugachev's decree to the troops of the garrison with a call to lay down their arms and join the "sovereign". In response, cannons from the city rampart began shelling the rebels. On October 6, Reinsdorp ordered a sortie, a detachment of 1,500 people under the command of Major Naumov returned to the fortress after a two-hour battle. On October 7, a military council 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 the transition of soldiers and Cossacks to the side of Pugachev. The raid showed that the soldiers fought reluctantly, Major Naumov reported on the discovered “in his subordinates timidity and fear”.

The siege of Orenburg that began for six months fettered the main forces of the rebels, without bringing any of the parties a military success. On October 12, Naumov’s detachment made a second sortie, but successful artillery operations under the command of Chumakov helped repulse the attack. Pugachev’s army moved the camp to Berdskaya Sloboda due to the onset of frost, on October 22 an assault was launched, rebel batteries began shelling the city, but strong artillery return fire did not allowed to come close to the shaft.

At the same time, during October, the fortresses along the Samara River - Perevolotskaya, Novosergievskaya, Totskaya, Sorochinskaya - passed into the hands of the rebels, in early November - the Buzuluk fortress. On October 17, Pugachev sends Khlopusha to the Demidov Avzyan-Petrovsky factories. Khlopusha collected guns, provisions, money there, formed a detachment of artisans and factory peasants, as well as chained clerks, and in early November, at the head of the detachment, returned to Berdskaya Sloboda. Having received the rank of colonel from Pugachev, Khlopusha, at the head of his regiment, went to the Verkhneozernaya line of fortifications, where he took the Ilyinsky fortress and unsuccessfully tried to take Verkhneozernaya.

On October 14, Catherine II appointed Major General V. A. Kara as commander of a military expedition to suppress the rebellion. At the end of October, Kar arrived in Kazan from St. Petersburg and, at the head of a corps of two thousand soldiers and one and a half thousand militiamen, headed for Orenburg. On November 7, near the village of Yuzeeva, 98 versts from Orenburg, detachments of the Pugachev chieftains A. A. Ovchinnikov and I. N. Zarubin-Chiki attacked the vanguard of the Kara corps and, after a three-day battle, forced him to retreat back to Kazan. On November 13, a detachment of Colonel Chernyshev was captured near Orenburg, numbering up to 1100 Cossacks, 600-700 soldiers, 500 Kalmyks, 15 guns and a huge convoy. Realizing that instead of a non-prestigious, but victory over the rebels, he could get a complete defeat from untrained peasants and the Bashkir-Cossack irregular cavalry, Kar left the corps under the pretext of illness and went to Moscow, leaving command to General Freiman.

Such great successes inspired the Pugachevites, made them believe in themselves, the victory made a great impression on the peasantry, the Cossacks, increasing their influx into the ranks of the rebels. True, at the same time on November 14, the corps of brigadier Korf, numbering 2,500 people, managed to break into Orenburg.

Mass joining the uprising of the Bashkirs began. The Bashkir foreman Kinzya Arslanov, who entered the Pugachev Secret Duma, sent messages to the foremen and ordinary Bashkirs, in which he assured that Pugachev was giving all possible support to their needs. On October 12, foreman Kaskin Samarov took the Voskresensky copper smelter and, at the head of a detachment of Bashkirs and factory peasants of 600 people with 4 guns, arrived in Berdy. In November, as part of a large detachment of Bashkirs and Mishars, Salavat Yulaev went over to the side of Pugachev. In December, Salavat Yulaev formed a large rebel detachment in the northeastern part of Bashkiria and successfully fought the tsarist troops in the area of ​​the Krasnoufimskaya fortress and Kungur.

Together with Karanai Muratov, Kaskin Samarov captured Sterlitamak and Tabynsk, from November 28, the Pugachevites under the command of Ataman Ivan Gubanov and Kaskyn Samarov laid siege to Ufa, from December 14, the siege was commanded by Ataman Chika-Zarubin. On December 23, Zarubin, at the head of a 10,000-strong detachment with 15 cannons, began an assault on the city, but was repulsed by cannon fire and energetic counterattacks from the garrison.

Ataman Ivan Gryaznov, who participated in the capture of Sterlitamak and Tabynsk, having gathered a detachment of factory peasants, captured the factories on the Belaya River (Voskresensky, Arkhangelsk, Bogoyavlensky factories). In early November, he proposed to organize the casting of cannons and cannonballs for them at the surrounding factories. Pugachev promoted him to colonel and sent him to organize detachments in the Iset province. There he took Satkinsky, Zlatoustovsky, Kyshtymsky and Kasli factories, Kundravinsky, Uvelsky and Varlamov settlements, the Chebarkul fortress, defeated the punitive teams sent against him, and by January with a detachment of four thousand approached Chelyabinsk.

In December 1773, Pugachev sent Ataman Mikhail Tolkachev with his decrees to the rulers of the Kazakh Younger 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 horsemen of the Sryma Datov family joined Pugachev. On the way back, Tolkachev gathered Cossacks in his detachment in the fortresses and outposts on the lower Yaik and went with them to the Yaitsky town, collecting cannons, ammunition and provisions in the accompanying fortresses and outposts. On December 30, Tolkachev approached the Yaitsky town, seven miles from which he defeated and captured the Cossack team of foreman N.A. Mostovshchikov sent against him, in the evening of the same day he occupied the ancient district of the city - Kuren. Most of the Cossacks greeted their comrades and joined Tolkachev's detachment, the Cossacks of the senior side, the soldiers of the garrison, led by Lieutenant Colonel Simonov and Captain Krylov, locked themselves in the "retrenchment" - the fortress of the Mikhailo-Arkhangelsk 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 rough estimates of historians, by the end of 1773, there were from 25 to 40 thousand people in the ranks of the Pugachev army, more than half of this number were Bashkir detachments. To control the troops, Pugachev created the Military Collegium, which served as an administrative and military center and conducted extensive correspondence with remote areas of the uprising. A. I. Vitoshnov, M. G. Shigaev, D. G. Skobychkin and I. A. Tvorogov were appointed judges of the Military Collegium, I. Ya. Pochitalin, secretary, M. D. Gorshkov.

The 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 Yaik, to Guryev town, stormed his Kremlin, captured rich trophies and replenished the detachment with local Cossacks, bringing them to Yaitsky town. At the same time, Pugachev himself arrived in the Yaitsky town. He took over the leadership of the protracted siege of the city fortress of the Mikhailo-Arkhangelsk Cathedral, but after an unsuccessful assault on January 20, he returned to the main army near Orenburg. At the end of January, Pugachev returned to the Yaitsky town, where a military circle was held, on which N. A. Kargin was chosen as the military chieftain, and A. P. Perfilyev and I. A. Fofanov as foremen. At the same time, the Cossacks, wanting to finally intermarry the tsar with the army, married him to the young Cossack woman Ustinya Kuznetsova. In the second half of February and early March 1774, Pugachev again personally led attempts to capture the besieged fortress. On February 19, the bell tower of St. Michael's Cathedral was blown up and destroyed by a mine dig, but each time the garrison managed to repulse the attacks of the besiegers.

Detachments of the Pugachevites under the command of Ivan Beloborodov, who grew up to 3 thousand people on the campaign, approached Yekaterinburg, capturing a number of surrounding fortresses and factories along the way, and on January 20 captured the Demidov Shaitansky plant as the main base of their operations.

The situation in the besieged Orenburg by this time was already critical, famine began in the city. Upon learning of 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 Berdskaya Sloboda to lift the siege. But the unexpected attack did not work, sentinel Cossacks managed to raise the alarm. The chieftains M. Shigaev, D. Lysov, T. Podurov and Khlopusha, who remained in the camp, led their detachments to the ravine that surrounded the Berdskaya settlement 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 cannons, weapons, ammunition and ammunition, the semi-encircled Orenburg troops hastily retreated to Orenburg under the cover of the city walls, losing only 281 people killed, 13 cannons with all the shells for them, a lot of weapons, ammunition and ammunition.

On January 25, 1774, the Pugachevites undertook the second and last assault on Ufa, Zarubin attacked the city from the southwest, from the left bank of the Belaya River, and Ataman Gubanov attacked from the east. At first, the detachments were successful and even broke into the outlying streets of the city, but there their offensive impulse was stopped by the defenders' canister fire. Having pulled all the 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 rebelled and tried to seize power in the city in the hope of getting help from 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 2,000-strong corps of General I. A. Dekolong, who had approached from Siberia, entered Chelyaba. Throughout January, battles unfolded on the outskirts of the city, and on February 8, Dekolong took it for the best to leave the city to the Pugachevites.

On February 16, the Khlopushi detachment stormed the Iletsk Protection, 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 Peasants' War area

When news reached Petersburg about the defeat of the expedition of V. A. Kara and the unauthorized departure of Kara himself to Moscow, Catherine II, by 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 northwestern borders of the empire to Kazan and Samara, and besides them, all the garrisons and military units located in the uprising zone and the remnants of the corps Kara. 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. Mansurov to Samara, Orenburg, Ufa, Menzelinsk, Kungur, besieged by the Pugachev troops. Already on December 29, led by Major K.I. Mufel, the 24th light field team, reinforced by two squadrons of Bakhmut hussars and other units, recaptured Samara. Arapov retreated to Alekseevsk with several dozens of Pugachev’s men who remained with him, but the brigade led by Mansurov defeated his detachments in the battles near Alekseevsk and at the Buzuluk fortress, after which in Sorochinskaya it joined on March 10 with the corps of General Golitsyn, who approached there, advancing from Kazan, defeating the rebels near Menzelinsk and Kungur.

Having received information about the advance of the Mansurov and Golitsyn brigades, Pugachev decided to withdraw the main forces from Orenburg, actually lifting the siege, and concentrate the main forces in the Tatishchev fortress. Instead of the burnt walls, an ice rampart was built, and all available artillery was assembled. Soon a government detachment of 6500 people and 25 guns approached the fortress. The battle took place on March 22 and was extremely fierce. Prince Golitsin in his report to A. Bibikov wrote: “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 retreat was left to cover the Cossack regiment of Ataman Ovchinnikov. With his regiment, he staunchly defended until the cannon charges ran out, and then, with three hundred Cossacks, he managed to break through the troops surrounding the fortress and retreated to the Nizhneozernaya fortress. This was the first major defeat of the rebels. Pugachev lost about 2 thousand people killed, 4 thousand wounded and captured, all artillery and convoy. Among the dead was ataman Ilya Arapov.

Map of the second stage of the Peasants' War

At the same time, the St. Petersburg Carabinieri Regiment under the command of I. Mikhelson, stationed before that in Poland and aimed at suppressing the uprising, arrived on March 2, 1774 in Kazan and, reinforced by cavalry units on the move, was sent 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 Iset provinces over the detachments of Salavat Yulaev and other Bashkir colonels, he failed to suppress the uprising of the Bashkirs as a whole, since the Bashkirs switched to partisan tactics.

Leaving the Mansurov brigade in the Tatishchev fortress, Golitsyn continued his march to Orenburg, where he entered on March 29, while Pugachev, having gathered his troops, tried to break through to the Yaik town, but having met government troops near the Perevolotsk fortress, he was forced to turn to the Sakmar town, where he decided to give battle to Golitsyn. In the battle on April 1, the rebels were again defeated, over 2800 people were captured, including Maxim Shigaev, Andrey Vitoshnov, Timofey Podurov, Ivan Pochitalin and others. Pugachev himself, breaking away from the enemy 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, the brigade of P. D. Mansurov, reinforced by the Izyumsky hussar regiment and the Cossack detachment of the Yaik foreman M. M. Borodin, headed from the Tatishchev fortress to the Yaitsky town. The fortresses Nizhneozernaya and Rassypnaya, the Iletsk town were taken from the Pugachevites, on April 12 the Cossack rebels were defeated at the Irtets outpost. In an effort to stop the advance of the punishers to their native Yaik town, the Cossacks, led by A. A. Ovchinnikov, A. P. Perfilyev and K. I. Dekhtyarev, decided to meet Mansurov. The meeting took place on April 15, 50 versts east of the 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 stampede. Pursued by the hussars, the Cossacks retreated to the Rubizhny outpost, losing hundreds of people killed, among whom was Dekhtyarev. Gathering people, Ataman Ovchinnikov led a detachment through the deaf steppes to the Southern Urals, to join the troops of Pugachev, who had gone beyond the Belaya River.

On the evening of April 15, when in the Yaik town they learned about the defeat at Bykovka, a group of Cossacks, wanting to curry favor with the punishers, tied up and handed over to Simonov atamans Kargin and Tolkachev. Mansurov entered the Yaitsky town on April 16, finally liberating the city fortress, besieged by the Pugachevites from December 30, 1773. The Cossacks who fled to the steppe were unable to break through to the main area of ​​the uprising, in May-July 1774, the teams of the Mansurov brigade and the Cossacks of the foreman's 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 Second Major Gagrin, who approached from Yekaterinburg, defeated Tumanov's detachment located in Chelyaba. And on May 1, the team of Lieutenant Colonel D. Kandaurov, who approached from Astrakhan, recaptured the Guryev town from the rebels.

On April 9, 1774, AI Bibikov, commander of military operations against Pugachev, died. After him, Catherine II entrusted the command of the troops to lieutenant general F. F. Shcherbatov, as a senior in rank. Offended by the fact that it was not him who was 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 in Orenburg for three months. The intrigues between the generals gave Pugachev a much-needed respite, he managed to gather scattered small detachments in the Southern Urals. The pursuit was also suspended by the spring thaw and floods on the rivers, which made the roads impassable.

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

On the morning of May 5, Pugachev's 5,000-strong detachment approached the Magnetic Fortress. By this time, Pugachev's detachment consisted mainly of poorly armed factory peasants and a small number of personal Yaik guards under the command of Myasnikov, the detachment did not have a single gun. The beginning of the assault on Magnitnaya was unsuccessful, about 500 people died in the battle, Pugachev himself was wounded in his right hand. After withdrawing the troops from the fortress and discussing the situation, the rebels, under the cover of night darkness, made a new attempt and were able to break into the fortress and capture it. As trophies got 10 guns, guns, ammunition. On May 7, detachments of chieftains 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, Petropavlovsk and Stepnoy, and on May 20 they approached the largest Troitskaya. By this time, the detachment consisted of 10 thousand people. During the assault that began, the garrison tried to repulse the attack with artillery fire, but overcoming desperate resistance, the rebels broke into Troitskaya. Pugachev got artillery with shells and stocks of gunpowder, stocks of food and fodder. On the morning of May 21, the insurgents who were resting after the battle were attacked by the Dekolong corps. Taken by surprise, the Pugachevites suffered a heavy defeat, losing 4,000 people killed and the same number wounded and captured. Only one and a half thousand mounted Cossacks and Bashkirs were able to retreat along the road to Chelyabinsk.

Salavat Yulaev, who had recovered from his wound, managed to organize at that time in Bashkiria, east of Ufa, resistance to the Michelson 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 succeed in them, did not allow significant losses to be inflicted on his troops. On June 3, he joined up with Pugachev, by which time the Bashkirs made up two-thirds of the total number of the rebel army. On June 3 and 5, on the Ai River, they gave new battles to Michelson. Neither side achieved the desired success. Retreating north, Pugachev regrouped his forces while Mikhelson withdrew to Ufa to drive off the Bashkir detachments operating near the city and resupply 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 near Kungur against the garrison that had 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 Ose and blocked the city fortress. Four days later, the main forces of Pugachev came here and started siege battles with the garrison settled in the fortress. On June 21, the defenders of the fortress, having exhausted the possibilities of further resistance, capitulated. During this period, the adventurer merchant Astafy Dolgopolov (“Ivan Ivanov”) appeared to Pugachev, posing as the envoy of Tsarevich Paul and thus deciding to improve his financial situation. Pugachev unraveled his adventure, and Dolgopolov, by agreement with him, acted for some time as a "witness to the authenticity of Peter III."

Having mastered the Wasp, Pugachev ferried the army across the Kama, took along the way the Votkinsk and Izhevsk ironworks, Yelabuga, Sarapul, Menzelinsk, Agryz, Zainsk, Mamadysh and other cities and fortresses, and in the first days of 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 miles from the city, the Pugachevites won a complete victory. The next day, a detachment of rebels camped near 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 districts of the city were taken, the garrison remaining in the city locked itself in the Kazan Kremlin and prepared for the siege. A strong fire began in the city, in addition, Pugachev received news of the approach of Michelson's troops, who were following him on the heels of Ufa, so the Pugachev detachments left the burning city. As a result of a short battle, Mikhelson made his way to the garrison of Kazan, 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 lightly armed peasants who had just joined the uprising, Tatar and Bashkir cavalry armed with bows, and a small number of remaining Cossacks. Competent actions of Mikhelson, who first of all hit 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 to the public

We welcome this nominal decree with our royal and paternal
the mercy of all who were formerly in the peasantry and
in the citizenship of the landowners, to be loyal slaves
our own crown; and reward with an ancient cross
and prayer, heads and beards, liberty and freedom
and forever Cossacks, without requiring recruitment kits, capitation
and other monetary taxes, possession of lands, forests,
hayfields and fishing grounds, and salt lakes
without purchase and without quitrent; and we free everyone from the previously committed
from the villains of the nobles and Gradtsk bribe-takers-judges to the peasant and everything
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, wanderings and considerable disasters.

And how is our name now by the power of the Almighty right hand in Russia
flourishes, for this sake we command this by our nominal decree:
who used to be nobles in their estates and vodchinas - these
opponents of our power and rebellions of the empire and despoilers
peasants, to catch, execute and hang, and to do likewise
how they, not having Christianity in themselves, repaired with you, the peasants.
After the extermination of which opponents and villainous nobles, anyone can
to feel the silence and calm life, which will continue until the century.

Given on July 31st, 1774.

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

emperor and autocrat of the All-Russian and other,

And passing, and passing.

Even before the start of the battle on July 15, Pugachev announced in the camp that he would go from Kazan to Moscow. The rumor of this instantly spread to all the nearest 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 and his detachments continued fighting near Ufa, the Bashkir detachments in the Pugachev detachment were led by Kinzya Arslanov. On July 20, Pugachev entered Kurmysh, on the 23rd he entered Alatyr without hindrance, after which he headed for Saransk. On July 28, a decree on freedom for the peasants was read out on the central square of Saransk, the residents were given supplies of salt and bread, the city treasury “driving through the city fortress and along the streets ... they threw the mob that had come from different districts”. On July 31, the same solemn meeting awaited Pugachev in Penza. The decrees caused numerous peasant uprisings 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, really threatened Moscow.

The publication of decrees (in fact, manifestos on the liberation 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 seized 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 Pugachev's army anything in the long-term military plan, since the peasant detachments acted 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 the army of Pugachev or its individual detachments approached, the peasants knitted or killed their landowners and their clerks, hanged local officials, burned estates, smashed shops and shops. In total, at least 3 thousand nobles and government officials were killed in the summer of 1774.

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 decree of July 29, Catherine II endowed Panin with emergency powers "in suppressing the rebellion 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 in 1770 received the Order of St. George I class, distinguished himself in that battle and the Don cornet Emelyan Pugachev.

To speed up the conclusion of peace, the terms of the Kuchuk-Kaynarji peace treaty were softened, and the troops released on the Turkish borders - only 20 cavalry and infantry regiments - were withdrawn from the armies for action against Pugachev. As Ekaterina noted, against Pugachev “there are so many troops dressed up that such an army was almost terrible to the neighbors”. It is a remarkable fact that in August 1774 Lieutenant General Alexander Vasilievich Suvorov, at that time already one of the most successful Russian generals, was recalled from the 1st Army, which was in the Danubian principalities. Panin instructed Suvorov to command the troops that were supposed to defeat the main Pugachev army in the Volga region.

Suppression of the uprising

After Pugachev's triumphant entry into Saransk and Penza, everyone expected him to march on Moscow. In Moscow, where the 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 that artillery be placed near his house. The police stepped up surveillance and sent informants to crowded places in order to grab all those who sympathized with Pugachev. Mikhelson, who received the rank of colonel in July and pursued the rebels from Kazan, turned to Arzamas in order 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 Mufel 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 revolt sensitive and insensitive people”. Excerpts from the report of the captain of the Novokhopyorsky battalion Butrimovich are indicative:

“... I went to the village of Andreevskaya, where the peasants kept the landowner Dubensky under arrest to extradite him to Pugachev. I wanted to free him, but the village rebelled and dispersed the team. From that moment I went to the villages of Mr. Vysheslavtsev and Prince Maksyutin, but I also found them under arrest by the peasants, and I freed them, and took them to Verkhniy Lomov; from the village Maksyutin I saw as mountains. Kerensk was on fire, and returning to Verkhniy Lomov, he found out that all the inhabitants, except for the clerks, had rebelled when they learned about the construction of Kerensk. Instigators: one-palace Yak. Gubanov, Matv. Bochkov, and the Streltsy settlement of the tenth Bezborod. I wanted to seize them and introduce them to Voronezh, but the inhabitants not only did not allow me to do so, but they almost put me under their own guard, but I left them and heard the cry of the rioters 2 miles from the city. I don’t know how it all ended, but I heard that Kerensk, with the help of captured Turks, fought off the villain. On my journey everywhere I noticed among the people the spirit of rebellion and a tendency to the Pretender. Especially in the Tanbovsky district, the departments of Prince. Vyazemsky, in economic peasants, who, for the arrival of Pugachev, fixed bridges everywhere and repaired roads. In addition to that village of Lipny, the headman with the tenths, considering me an accomplice of the villain, came to me and fell on their knees.

Map of the final stage of the uprising

But Pugachev turned south from Penza. Most historians indicate that Pugachev's plans to attract the Volga and, especially, the Don Cossacks into their ranks are the reason for this. It is possible that another reason was the desire of the Yaik Cossacks, tired of fighting and having already lost their main chieftains, to hide again in the remote steppes of the lower Volga and Yaik, where they had already taken refuge once after the uprising of 1772. An indirect confirmation of such fatigue is the fact that it was during these days that a conspiracy of Cossack colonels began to surrender Pugachev to the government in exchange for receiving a pardon.

On August 4, the impostor's army took Petrovsk, and on August 6 surrounded Saratov. The governor with a part of the people along the Volga managed to get 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 Kalmyk ruler Tsenden-Darzhe with an appeal to join his army. But by this time, the punitive detachments under the general command of Michelson were already literally on the heels of the Pugachevites, and on August 11 the city came under the control of government troops.

After Saratov, they went down the Volga to Kamyshin, which, like many cities before it, met Pugachev with bells 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 of whose members, together with the leader, Academician Georg Lovitz, were hanged along with local officials who had not managed to escape. Lovitz's son, Tobias, later also an academician, managed to survive. Having attached a 3,000-strong detachment of Kalmyks to themselves, 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 decrees on joining the Donets to the uprising. A detachment of government troops approaching 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 Host. The Volga Cossacks, who remained loyal to the government, led by the chieftain, the garrisons of the Volga cities strengthened the defense of Tsaritsyn, where a thousandth detachment of Don Cossacks arrived under the command of the marching chieftain Perfilov.

Pugachev under arrest. Engraving from the 1770s

On August 21, Pugachev tried to attack Tsaritsyn, but the assault failed. Having received news of the arriving Michelson corps, Pugachev hastened to lift the siege from Tsaritsyn, the rebels moved to the Black Yar. Panic broke out in Astrakhan. On August 24, at the Solenikova fishing gang, Pugachev was overtaken by Mikhelson. 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 died, among them ataman Ovchinnikov. Over 6,000 people were taken prisoner. Pugachev with the Cossacks, breaking up into small detachments, fled across the Volga. In pursuit of them, search detachments of generals Mansurov and Golitsyn, the Yait 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 Yaitsky town, Simbirsk, Orenburg.

Pugachev fled to Uzen with a detachment of Cossacks, not knowing that since mid-August Chumakov, Curds, Fedulev 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 chase, they divided the detachment so as to separate the Cossacks loyal to Pugachev along with the ataman Perfilyev. On September 8, near the Bolshoi Uzen River, they pounced and tied Pugachev, after which Chumakov and Curds went to the Yaitsky town, where on September 11 they announced the capture of the impostor. Having received promises of pardon, they informed their accomplices, and on September 15 they took Pugachev to the Yaitsky town. The first interrogations took place, one of them was personally conducted by Suvorov, he also volunteered to escort the impostor to Simbirsk, where the main investigation was going on. For the transportation of Pugachev, a cramped cage was made, mounted on a two-wheeled cart, in which, chained hand and foot, he could not even turn around. In Simbirsk, for five days, he was interrogated by P. S. Potemkin, head of the secret investigative commissions, and count. PI Panin, commander of the punitive troops of the government.

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

Pugachev under escort. Engraving from the 1770s

At this time, in addition to 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, Karanai Muratov, Kachkyn Samarov, Selyausin Kinzin on Nogaiskaya, Bazargul Yunaev, Yulaman Kushaev and Mukhamet Safarov - in the Bashkir Trans-Urals. They fettered a significant contingent of government troops. In early August, even a new assault on Ufa was undertaken, but as a result of poor organization of interaction between various detachments, it turned out unsuccessfully. Kazakh detachments were alarmed by raids along the entire length of the border line. Governor Reinsdorp reported: “The Bashkirs and Kirghiz do not pacify, the latter are constantly crossing the Yaik, and people are being grabbed from near Orenburg. The local troops are either pursuing Pugachev or blocking his path, and I can’t go against the Kyrgyz, I exhort the Khan and the Saltans. They answered that they could not keep the Kirghiz, of whom the whole horde was revolting. With the capture of Pugachev, the direction of the liberated government troops to Bashkiria, the transition of the Bashkir elders to the side of the government began, many of them joined the punitive detachments. After the capture of Kanzafar Usaev and Salavat Yulaev, the uprising in Bashkiria began to wane. Salavat Yulaev gave his last battle on November 20 under the Katav-Ivanovsky plant besieged by him and, after the defeat, was captured on November 25. But individual rebel detachments in Bashkiria continued to resist until the summer of 1775.

Until the summer of 1775, unrest continued in the Voronezh Governorate, in the Tambov District, and along the Khopra and Vorona rivers. Although the detachments operating were small and there was no coordination of joint actions, according to the eyewitness Major Sverchkov, “many landowners, leaving their homes and savings, drive off to remote places, and those who remain in their houses save their lives from threatening death, spend the night in the forests”. Frightened landlords said that “If the Voronezh provincial office does not speed up the extermination of those villainous gangs that turned out to be, then the same bloodshed will inevitably follow as it happened in the past rebellion.”

To bring down the wave of rebellions, punitive detachments began mass executions. In every village, in every town that received Pugachev, on the gallows and "verbs", from which they barely had time to remove the officers, landowners, and judges hanged by the impostor, they began to hang the leaders of the riots and the city heads and chieftains of local detachments appointed by the Pugachevites. To enhance the frightening effect, the gallows were mounted 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 transferred to Moscow for a general investigation. They were placed in the building of the Mint at the Iberian Gates of Kitay-Gorod. The interrogations were led 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 participation in the Don Cossack army in the Seven Years and Turkish Wars, about his wanderings around Russia and Poland, about his plans and intentions, about the course of the uprising. The investigators tried to find out whether the initiators of the uprising were agents of foreign states, or schismatics, or anyone 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 were 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 close the investigation, since Pugachev and other persons under investigation could not add anything new to their testimony during interrogations and could neither alleviate nor aggravate their guilt. In a report to Catherine, they were forced to admit that they “... they tried, during this investigation, to find the beginning of the evil undertaken by this monster and his accomplices, or ... to that evil enterprise by mentors. But for all that, nothing else was revealed, somehow, that in all his villainy, the first beginning took its place in the Yaik army.

File:The execution of Pugachev.jpg

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

On December 30, the 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 deliver Pugachev to the next court session. Early in the morning of December 31, he was transported under heavy escort 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 had to answer, after which he was led into the courtroom and forced to kneel. After a formal questioning, he was taken out of the hall, the court made a decision: "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 each of them to receive the appropriate type of execution or punishment. On Saturday, January 10, on Bolotnaya Square in Moscow, with a huge gathering of people, an execution was carried out. Pugachev behaved with dignity, ascending the place of execution, crossed himself on the cathedrals of the Kremlin, bowed on four sides with the words "Forgive me, Orthodox people." Sentenced to quartering E. I. Pugachev and A. P. Perfilyev, the executioner first cut off his head, such was the wish of the empress. On the same day, M. G. Shigaev, T. I. Podurov and V. I. Tornov were hanged. I. N. Zarubin-Chika was sent for execution to Ufa, where he was quartered in early February 1775.

Leaf shop. Painting by the Demidov serf artist P.F. Khudoyarov

The Pugachev uprising caused great damage to the metallurgy of the Urals. 64 of the 129 factories that existed in the Urals fully joined the uprising, the number of peasants assigned to them was 40 thousand people. The total amount of losses from the 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 ascribed peasants, whom he considered the leading force of the uprising, supplied the impostor with weapons and joined his detachments, because the breeders oppressed their ascribed, forcing the peasants to travel long distances to the factories, did not allow them engage in arable farming and sell them products 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, everything is very thorough, and I think that there is nothing else to do with them, how to buy factories and, when there are state-owned ones, then make the peasants lighter”. On May 19, a manifesto was issued on the general rules for the use of assigned peasants at state-owned and particular 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.

Studies and collections of archival documents

• A. S. Pushkin "History of Pugachev" (censored title - "History of the Pugachev rebellion")
• Grotto Ya.K. Materials for the history of the Pugachev rebellion (Papers by 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.

Volume 1. From the Pugachev archive. Documents, decrees, correspondence. M.-L., Gosizdat, 1926. Volume 2. From investigative materials and official correspondence. M.-L., Gosizdat, 1929 Volume 3. From the archive of Pugachev. M.-L., Sotsekgiz, 1931

• 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 Emelyan Pugachev in Chuvashia. Collection of documents. Cheboksary, 1972
• Peasant war led by Emelyan 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. The Peasant War of 1773-1775. in Russia. M., Military Publishing, 1954

Art

Pugachev uprising in fiction

• A. S. Pushkin "The Captain's Daughter"
• S. P. Zlobin. "Salavat Yulaev"
• E. Fedorov "Stone Belt" (novel). Book 2 "Heirs"
• V. Ya. Shishkov "Emelyan Pugachev (novel)"
• V. Buganov "Pugachev" (biography in the series "Life of Remarkable People")
• Mashkovtsev V. "Golden Flower - Overcome" (historical novel). - Chelyabinsk, South Ural Book Publishing House, ISBN 5-7688-0257-6.

Cinema

• Pugachev () - feature film. Director Pavel Petrov-Bytov
• Emelyan Pugachev () - historical dilogy: "Slaves of Freedom" and "Will Washed with 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 rebellion () - a historical film based on the works of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin "The Captain's Daughter" and "The Story of Pugachev"

Links

• Peasant war led by Pugachev on the site History of Orenburg
• Peasant war led by Pugachev (TSB)
• Gvozdikova I. Salavat Yulaev: historical portrait ("Belskie open spaces", 2004)
• Collection of documents on the history of the Pugachev uprising on the site Vostlit.info
• Maps: Map of the lands of the Yaik army, the Orenburg Territory and the Southern Urals, Map of the Saratov province (maps of the beginning of the 20th century)