Today, in the mass consciousness, the inhabitants of Chukotka are associated mainly with the heroes of jokes - simple-minded and good-natured guys. And few people remember that the Chukchi are a very warlike people, with whom the Russians had a lot of problems in the development of the Far East …
Mysterious gave
The first contact between the Russians and the Chukchi was recorded in 1641, and it was a battle. The Russians were represented by the Cossack ataman Semyon Dezhnev, the famous explorer-pioneer. His detachment collected yasak from the tribes - a tribute in skins. The pickers went in a small detachment of fifteen people and were attacked by a group of several dozen Chukchi. The explorers saved Yasak and left safely. The next meeting was also not blissful. In general, the Russians were pushed east by quite practical considerations. With luck, the one who picked the jackpot and returned with furs or some other valuable goods became a wealthy person, but from those who failed, not even bones remained. In short, in this sense, the Cossacks were not particularly different from the conquistadors, Vikings and all other adventurers who went to the edge and beyond the edge of the known world.
In 1646, Isai Ignatiev went east to the Chaunskaya Bay (northern coast of the East Siberian Sea) and brought to Nizhnekolymsk a walrus bone, obtained under unknown circumstances from the aborigines.
The merchants were interested in Ignatiev's success, so it was decided to organize a new, larger campaign. The specific goal was to find the Anadyr River as a possible route of communications and a source of wealth. The leader of the campaign was Fedot Popov (often referred to by his father as Alekseev), a clerk of a Moscow merchant. Dezhnev also entered the team in two forms at once. First, he was an experienced officer who served extensively in Eastern Siberia. Secondly, he had to look after the interests of the state and monitor payments to the treasury in case of success.
The first attempt to go out to sea failed: in June 1647, the sea after the mouth of the Kolyma was filled with ice. However, the next year, a new, more numerous expedition nevertheless escaped into open water.
In total, the expedition left the mouth of the Kolyma on seven kochi. The leaders of the campaign were Popov, Dezhnev and another Cossack ataman, Gerasim Ankudinov. Dezhnev and Ankudinov frankly disliked each other, competing for leadership, and this circumstance later played a role.
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In the summer of 1648, the Kochi with the pioneers left the mouth of the Kolyma and went north. The expedition was fraught with monstrous risks: in those parts it is cold even in summer, and the pioneers were not familiar with either water or land. For the 17th century and in general for the era of the Great Geographical Discoveries, the mass death of participants in such expeditions was typical. The trip to Chukotka was no exception. Two kochas crashed on the rocks during a storm, some of the crews managed to get ashore, but the comrades could not help them because of the storm. Two more ships disappeared and, apparently, also became the prey of the ocean. The travelers rounded the Big Stone Nose. Here they soon found a place to disembark when another koch crashed - belonging to Ankudinov (he himself escaped and boarded Popov's ship).
The Cossacks went to the camp of the local leader Ermachin. At first, everything went excellently: the Cossacks presented the natives with mirrors, beads, cauldrons and vodka, and received walrus bones and sables in exchange. The contact was a success, but the case was spoiled by Ankudinov's greed. Soon after the first meeting, the Kochi moved on, while Ankudinov returned and plundered the camp, taking away everything that could not be bargained for. A few days later, the surviving kochi again fell into a storm. Dezhnev and Popov were forced to go ashore, the enraged Ermachin was waiting for their notes, just waiting for an opportunity to get even. As a result, the Cossacks were forced to retreat back to the ships after a heavy battle with the Chukchi, in which Popov was wounded. Dezhnev never saw either Popov or Ankudinov anymore: the storm separated them. Dezhnev was left on the only nomad, who eventually also crashed on the coastal rocks.
Semyon had to walk with the remaining people (twenty-five travelers in total) to Anadyr. The march lasted ten weeks. The supplies ran out on the sixth. The path ran through the mountains, in frosty weather, in a completely wild and unknown area. Only twelve people managed to get to the coveted mouth, where they overwintered. Along Anadyr, they climbed on boats made with their own hands to the Yukaghir settlements and founded a winter quarters, from which the Anadyr prison later grew. Thus ended an astonishing expedition in which the Russians really encountered the Chukchi as trade partners and military adversaries. And here the most important stronghold of the Russians in the region arose: the Anadyr prison.
Since that time, there is a history of constant clashes between Russians and Chukchi. One of the main features of this struggle was the extremely small number of detachments participating in it. The Russians tried to explain the natives, while the Chukchi, for their part, considered it useful to rob both the Russian merchants, who were becoming more and more in these parts, and the exaggerated Yukaghirs who were supposed to be protected. The Russians quickly realized that they were facing an unexpectedly powerful enemy. Unlike, for example, the Crimean Tatars, no truce could be concluded here: the Chukchi obeyed a huge number of leaders, and an agreement with one meant nothing to the other. Reciprocal campaigns beat into emptiness: the death of a dozen yarangas for the Chukchi was not something serious. An attempt to act through the hostages failed miserably: the Chukchi did not value life so much,for this "peace enforcement" to work.
Moreover, the Russians could not arrange really massive campaigns. Russian power in an area the size of a large European state could be based on a fortification with a couple of dozen Cossacks and soldiers inside. Any oversight could cost life.
In conditions of a huge shortage of people, the Russians most often organized a punitive expedition of several dozen Russians proper and several hundred Koryaks or Yukaghirs to create extras. The Russians acted as the main striking force with rifles and sometimes cannons, the Yukaghirs and Koryaks did not allow extermination of the allies bursting with fire.
An example of such a campaign was the expedition of the Cossack commander Alexei Chudinov. The event took place in 1702. Chudinov set out from Anadyrsk to protect the Yasak Yukaghirs, at the head of a detachment of 24 Russians (servicemen and in general everyone who wanted to join) and 110 protected Yukaghirs and Koryaks. On the Anadyr Nose, the allies captured the Chukchi taken by surprise. What happened next * impressed even the harsh Cossacks. The captive women killed themselves and their children. Soon a militia of about three hundred Chukchi gathered against the Cossacks and friendly natives. Considering the general weak connection of the Chukchi camps and the small number of colonists, this can be called a general battle. But the northern soldiers found it difficult to resist the rifle fire: as the participants in the campaign claimed, they managed to destroy about two hundred enemies.
The next day, the Russians and Yukaghirs were attacked by an alleged 3,000 Chukchi. It is unlikely that the announced number corresponds to reality, but, apparently, the formidable reindeer herders really appeared on the battlefield as a huge army for those places. The Russians had to retreat.
Peace enforcement
I must say, the Chukchi were pretty impressed by the "fiery enemies", as they called the Russians armed with guns. In the Chukchi legend, the Russians are described as follows: “They have mustache sticking out, like those of walruses, spears up to the elbow so wide that they obscure the sun; iron eyes, round, all iron clothes. They dig the ground with the end of their spear and challenge them to battle.
Meanwhile, already in the new capital - St. Petersburg - there have been radical changes in ideas about how the Far East should live. Until now, the Polar Western went "by itself": campaigns and battles were more a local initiative than a part of government policy. However, what was becoming the norm in the Russian kingdom could not be tolerated by the Russian Empire. In St. Petersburg, they looked without enthusiasm at the frontier, where the masses of tribes and peoples somehow submitted to the tsarist power, and literally tens of thousands of almost primitive inhabitants of the circumpolar regions are trying to challenge the power of the state.
In 1725, the Cabinet of Ministers in St. Petersburg received a "report" from Afanasy Shestakov, the Yakut Cossack head. Shestakov called on the authorities to pay attention to the outskirts of the state and organize an expedition in order to bring the "non-peaceful" to submission. The reason is that the movement of the Russians and internal processes made Siberia close. This may sound strange, but one should not forget that with the primitive economy that the peoples of the northeast led, huge areas were required to feed even a small number of people. Therefore, the Chukchi gradually crowded out their less brutal neighbors. The Russians, of course, were not happy with this situation.
The authorities' reaction to Shestakov's signals was quite unambiguous. The Senate expressed its opinion in a document, the very first paragraph of which sounded like this: "Traitors-foreigners and which peoples are found and adhered to the Siberian side, and not under whose authority, to conquer those under Russian possession and enter into a yasak payment."
Soon the outline of the future operation was outlined. The number of the expedition has been established: four hundred people, an area of operations (Chukotka, Kamchatka) has been designated and commanders have been determined. Shestakov himself became the head of the expedition, and the captain of the Tobolsk regiment, Dmitry Pavlutsky, was put in command of the military unit. The formation was named the Anadyr Party.
The Senate viewed the establishment of the Russian government in Chukotka not only as an enterprise, important in itself, but also as creating a springboard for future contacts with Japan, Korea, China and America. In short, in St. Petersburg they were already seriously thinking about a full-fledged penetration into the Pacific Ocean. The tribe, muddying the waters in the Far East, of course, interfered with these plans.
The leaders of the Anadyr party immediately fell out. Pavlutsky, as an officer of the regular army, categorically did not want to obey the Cossack Shestakov. In the end, both bosses did the worst thing they could think of: split up and began acting alone. Detachment Shestakov (twenty-three Russian Cossacks, about a hundred friendly natives) in the summer of 1729 moved to Okhotsk, and from there - to the non-peaceful Koryaks. Dear Shestakov forced the natives to pay yasak and mercilessly burned the houses of those who refused. Already on the way, Shestakov learned that the Chukchi had launched another raid on the Yasak Koryaks, and went to catch them. At the Penzhinskaya Bay on the Ergach River on March 14, 1730, Shestakov overtook the enemy.
It is interesting that the Russians, despite the era, went into battle in kuyaks and helmets. And it was a logical decision: after all, the Chukchi are not Swedes for you, and they bombarded the enemy with a cloud of arrows. The number of the Chukchi is unknown, but they planned to launch a major raid, so it can be assumed that an army of several hundred people had gathered. Shestakov stood in the center with the Russians and Yakuts, and covered the flanks with the Koryaks and Tungus. Behind him, he made a "prison" of the sleigh.
The Chukchi demonstrated their best fighting qualities: after exchanging volleys, they went around the flank, fell on the unstable Koryaks from several sides and crushed them. Seeing this, the Tungus fled. Shestakov jumped out from behind his sleigh and was wounded by an arrow in the throat. As a result, more than half of the Russians managed to break out of the encirclement: in the end, 31 people were killed, including Shestakov and ten of his compatriots, the rest of the fallen were Yakuts, Koryaks and Tungus. In addition, the Chukchi got fifteen guns.
Carrot and stick
By the standards of the region, this was a serious blow. Pavlutsky, who arrived at the theater of action, had to take urgent measures to restore the reputation of the central government. As such a measure, in his understanding, the scorched earth tactics were most suitable. Dmitry Pavlutsky has earned himself a kind of fame as an antihero of local folklore. And he really proceeded from the fact that with the locals you can afford any measures to achieve your goals. Pavlutsky at first tried to act as he was used to serving in regular troops: in dense formations. Soon, however, he himself became convinced that the infantry "boxes" were meaningless against huge crowds of Chukchi, and began, on the advice of the veterans of the Far Eastern campaigns, to use the loose formation.
Pavlutsky's marches gave a seemingly furious effect: in ten months, from eight hundred to one and a half thousand Chukchi were killed (considering that there were 12-13 thousand of them, for them it was monstrous losses), one and a half hundred were taken prisoner, most of the trophies were taken away taken from the late Shestakov, two Russians and forty-two Koryaks were freed from slavery, forty thousand reindeer were taken back.
And in 1747 something unexpected happens. In March, the Chukchi attack the Koryaks near Anadyrsk and take away deer, including the garrison ones, and at the same time steal eight Koryaks. Pavlutsky, having almost a hundred fighters, chases them on dog sleds and deer and overtakes the kidnappers. But those suddenly turn out to be about half a thousand people. Pavlutsky attacked the Chukchi head-on, however, contrary to custom, they did not waste time shooting from bows. Immediately after the first volley, the entire crowd rushed to the Russians hand-to-hand. A desperate battle began with spears and guns. The Cossacks themselves were very good at fencing with the usual spears in these parts, but the numerical superiority was not on their side. Pavlutsky brushed aside the barrel of his gun and chopped everything around him with a saber, which he held in his other hand. When his entire small squad began to retreat, he was still fighting. Chained in iron, rushing into the attack like a berserker, they could not kill him for a long time. The Chukchi fired at Pavlutsky with bows, stabbed him with spears and finally managed to knock him down, only confusing them with lassos. Some of the Chukchi warriors pierced his throat with a spear.
The beginning of a new stage in relations between Russians and their allies with the Chukchi can be attributed to 1755, when an order came from St. Petersburg to change the style of relations with proud aborigines. They made it clear from the capital that they were in the mood for a broad amnesty and, with the consent of the Chukchi, to move to civilized relations, would not continue to clean up the tundra. Later, in 1756, the Russians managed to lure one of the respectable leaders into negotiations and agree with him on peaceful coexistence. The noble Chukchi swore allegiance to the empire.
In 1763, a new commandant, Lieutenant Colonel Friedrich Plenisner, arrived at the fortress. After familiarizing himself with the situation and making simple calculations, he proposed to completely liquidate the Anadyr party due to the high cost of its content and the complete senselessness of its existence. Economically, the Anadyr prison absorbed huge funds, politically - the problem of protecting the population from the Chukchi raids was not resolved, and in terms of ties with America and East Asia, the Russians had already firmly nestled in Kamchatka, so that in this aspect, penetration into the depths of Chukotka was no longer really need to. By that time, the governor of Eastern Siberia had already expressed similar thoughts.
All these considerations made an impression on St. Petersburg. In 1764, something extremely rare for the 18th century happened: the Russian Empire retreated. And she retreated in front of a small, extremely desperate tribe. The Anadyr prison was abandoned. The church was dismantled. Her bells and utensils went to Gizhiginsk and Srednekolymsk. Soon, a significant part of the garrison of Nizhnekolymsk was recalled.
What was not achieved with guns was done by traders and diplomats. In 1776, Catherine the Great ordered to organize the peaceful acceptance of the Chukchi aborigines into the citizenship of the empire. The Russians began to negotiate vigorously with the tribal leaders. This work was extremely painstaking: it was necessary to get around really all the ugly and negotiate with each separately. However, we managed to cope with this task. At this stage, the fair became the main instrument of Russian expansion. On the Anyue River in a small prison, an exchange took place annually. On the Chukchi side, beavers, fox skins, martens, walrus bones were traded, in response the Russians offered tobacco and metal products, and later tea was added to the list of basic goods.