The Conquest of Azov
Many of the rank and file Cossacks headed to the Sich and “Down Under” to hunt, fish and Secretlyprepare Black Sea expeditions under the watchful eyes of Potockis men who were stationed on the Dnipro nearby.
Others answered the Don Cossacks’ call and headed to the lower Don to join their comrades with whom they had an agreement of mutual support: “the Za- porozhian Cossacks are to help us in the Don River region, and we Don Cossacks are to help the Zaporozhian Cherkasians (Ukrainians).” During the 1637 uprising in Ukraine some 4,000 Zaporozhians had gone to join the 5,000 Don Cossack army to attack the formidable Ottoman stronghold of Azov which guarded and controlled the entrance to the mouth of the Don River, where it empties into the Azov Sea. The fort consisted of three-walled fortifications, one within the other, and eleven corner bastions armed with artillery. The walls were 25 feet (7.8 meters) high, 14 feet (4.3 meters) thick, and surrounded by a 25 foot deep trench. The entire defense system was garrisoned by 4,000 Janissaries and 200 pieces of artillery.Arriving before the walls in April 1637 the joint Cossack army tried to storm the walls with scaling ladders and siege towers (“huliay horody”) but were beaten back with heavy losses and decided to settle down to a siege. An attempt by Tatars to lift the siege was beaten back, and a Cossack call for reinforcements was answered by the arrival of a strong force from the Don, including 1,000 Zaporozhians to replace the casualties suffered in the fighting. The walls seemed to be impregnable, but nine weeks into the siege a large shipment of gunpowder arrived from Moscow. Tunnels had been dug under a section of the walls in anticipation of the shipment, and on 18 June a large charge of gunpowder was set off in a great blast, which brought down a part of the outer wall. Before the Janissaries knew what hit them the Don Cossacks were charging through the breach, while on the other end the Zaporozhians threw up their ladders against the walls covered by sharpshooters.
The Janissaries fell back to the next defensive walls, but in three days of fighting the last inner citadel fell to the Cossacks. Most of the Janissaries perished, and thousands of Cossacks lost their lives but the great fortress was in their hands. The Don and Za- porozhian Cossacks had performed a feat which the entire Tsar’s army had failed to achieve.Azov was soon rebuilt and in Cossack hands began to flourish again as a major trading center. The Ottoman reaction was slow in coming since Sultan Murad IV died in 1640 and was succeeded by Ibrahim I, but in early June 1641 an Ottoman fleet of 70 galleys and almost 100 smaller ships set out for the reconquest of Azov. Since each vessel probably carried about 50 Janissary soldiers the whole fleet could not have brought more than 10,000 troops. Once on shore they were joined by the Nogay Tatars and Moldavians, who once again had become the Sultans vassals. Their main hope, however, lay in the 129 heavy siege guns which could fire cannonballs weighing half a hundred weight. The Turks’ offer of surrender was refused and several frontal assaults were beaten back, but once in place the big guns opened up on the great walls. This time it was the Cossacks who found themselves on the defensive.
The walls were soon shattered by the bombardment but the Cossacks retreated, dug trenches behind the walls and repelled all attacks. They also dug tunnels under the enemy positions and set off large charges. Running low on gunpowder and ammunition they made nightly sorties to harass the enemy and raid their ammunition dumps. Casualties amongst the defenders mounted and with only 3,000 able-bodied men and most of those wounded, 800 Don Cossack women began to fight alongside the men. Worn out and running low on food and ammunition, after a month-long siege a decision was made to stage a break-out which would enable at least some defenders to survive. But as the day drew near Cossack sentries reported that the Ottoman forces were pulling back and retreating to their boats.
For the second time the Cossacks had prevailed in the battle for Azov.Lacking resources and manpower to rebuild and man Azov, the Don Cossacks sent their Ataman Vasiliev to Moscow at the head of a delegation with an offer of a prize. Tsar Mikhail Romanov could have Azov as a gift from the Don Cossacks who had conquered it “with our blood,” and rebuild it as his own stronghold. But the Tsar it seems was wary of the gift. After sending his men to examine the ruins and convening an assembly of boyars to debate the question, the Tsar decided that it would require 10,000 of his troops to garrison the town, and a great deal of money to rebuild the fortification. The Sultan also considered Azov as a part of his domain, and sending Muscovite troops would mean war with the powerful Ottoman Empire, a conflict which Moscow wished to avoid. The Don Cossacks were told to return to their settlements and “usual places,” and Ataman Vasiliev and his delegation were held as hostages until the Tsar’s wishes were carried out. Seeing no choice, the Cossacks destroyed whatever had been left standing of the once great fortification and pulled out in the summer of 1642. Sultan Ibrahim I was informed that the Cossacks had abandoned Azov, which was promptly occupied by his men and rebuilt to its former strength. Moscow’s cunning politics had paid off. In one stroke it had used the Cossacks as a proxy to strike at the powerful Ottoman Empire, to discourage the Sultan from any further expansion in the region which he seems to have been entertaining, and remembering Bolotnikov the tsar and wealthy boyars weren’t taking any chances with the Don Cossacks, who were once again reinforced by the Zaporozhians.
The Tsar, however, had no control over the Ukrainian Cossacks from both sides of the Dnipro, who now numbered in the thousands. Following the surrender in the Starets Valley many Cossacks, joined by peasants-turned-Cossacks but now experienced fighters, had headed “Down Under” to escape serfdom.
Other peasants, however, turned east to settle in lands controlled by Muscovy, to establish “slobodas” or free settlements where there were no taxes or serfdom.59 Following the fall of Azovthousands of Ukrainian Cossacks headed to the Don and Volga region to join their surviving comrades, who together with the Don Cossacks had played such a prominent role in the defense of the stronghold. The Sea of Azov is an inland body of water which is joined to the Black Sea by the narrow Strait of Kerch, which was now blocked by the Turkish fleet. This did not prevent joint Zaporozhian and Don Cossackboats from attacking the Ottoman men-of-war and venturing into the Black Sea, to conduct their usual raids on Muslim territory. The raids continued even after 1642 when Azovwas handed back to the Turks, as reported in the Don Chronicles:In October 1644 about 30 boats of Cherkasians arrived from the sea and began to approach Azov. They killed many people of Azov and did much damage. And they informed the Don (Cossack) army to help them. And the Don Atamans and Cossacks went with the Cherkasians to Azov. They attacked Azov with them, causing much damage near the town. With cannon they knocked down about 12 fathoms (yards) of town walls, and some Cherkasians were even inside the town.60
When the order had come from Tsar Mikhail Romanov to abandon Azov and cease attacking the Turks and the Nogay Tatars not all Cossacks complied, particularly the Zaporozhians, which led the Tsar to advise the Don Cossacks not to heed the aCherkasians or any other thieves.” Another joint raid, however, occurred in the summer of 1645 when 50 boats led by Colonel Sulyma and Ataman Alexei Starov again attacked Azov. Retaliation was not long in coming, however, when during the winter of 1645-46 a great Tatar invasion of Muscovy occurred, during which many (if not most) of the Don Cossack “stanitsas” (settlements) were destroyed, causing large casualties. The Tsar sent help of both men and supplies and the surviving Don Cossacks allied themselves with Moscow, creating a rift with the Ukrainian “Cherkasians” and leading to fighting among the Cossacks.
Unlike the Ukrainian Cossacks who made their own gunpowder and most weapons the Cossacks of the Don depended on Moscow for much of their ammunition and other supplies. We have a letter from the Don Cossack atamans who had become loyal to the Tsar.Great thievery is being practiced by them (the Ukrainian Cossacks) on the Don and Donets rivers. Quite a few people have arrived from Lithuania (sic) more than 700 men. Theyhave been overwhelming and killing patrols of Don Cossacks and all kinds of people. Theyhave established themselves on the Don River, and there are many of them on the Donets River.”61
The voivoda (governor) of Voronezh reported that a band of 300 or more “Cherkasians” attacked the fortified Don Cossack town ofReshetova and razed it to the ground. Reports also state that people from the “border towns” (Ukraine) had established permanent settlements on the Don following the Tatar destruction of Don Cossack “stanitsas,” including Cherkask (“Place of Cherkasians”) which became the new capital of the Don, replacing the capital OfRazdorskaya also destroyed by the Tatars. By 1646 the Don Cossacks were reduced to 1,000 men supplied with grain and ammunition by the Tsar, and from that year a contingent of Tsarist troops were stationed on the Don Cossacklands.