Ermak Timofeevich (Timofeev) (born about 1532 - death on August 6 (16), 1585) - Cossack chieftain in the service of the Stroganov merchants of Perm, who conquered the Siberian kingdom (khanate) for Russia, a fragment of the Golden Horde.
Origin
There are several versions of Ermak's origin. According to one version, he came from the Don Cossack village of Kachalinskaya. According to another version, he came from the banks of the Chusovaya River. There is also a version about the Pomor origin of Yermak. It is believed that his surname is Timofeev, although as a rule the Cossack chieftain is called Yermak Timofeevich, or simply Yermak.
1552 - Ermak commanded a separate Cossack detachment from the Don in the army of Tsar Ivan the Terrible during the conquest of the Kazan Khanate. Distinguished himself in the Livonian War of 1558–1583, being personally known to King Stephen Bathory.
Stanitsa chieftain
When Ermak Timofeevich returned from Livonia to the village of Kachalinskaya, the Cossacks elected him as the village chieftain. Soon after his election, he, with several hundred Cossacks, went to "libertine" on the Volga, that is, to rob on its banks. The capital of the Nogai Horde was destroyed in the steppe town of Nagaichik. It was around 1570.
Promotional video:
The tsar instructed the Kazan voivode to clear the Volga of river robbers - the head Ivan Murashkin with several streltsy regiments, put on river ships. 1577 - the tsarist voivode Murashkin cleared the Middle and Lower Volga of the robber Cossack freemen. Many large and small Cossack detachments were defeated and scattered. Several captured chieftains were executed.
A tsar's decree was sent from Moscow to the Don so that the Don army would stop the "robbery" of its Cossacks, and capture those guilty of this "theft" and send them under strong guard to the capital for trial. Messengers sent from the Don, who had with them the decision of the Army Circle, found Ermak's detachment and other surviving detachments of robber Cossacks in Yaik (Ural). Most of the Donets obeyed the order of the circle and dispersed to their "yurts", that is, to the villages.
In the service of the Stroganovs
In the detachment of Ataman Yermak, there remained those Don and Volga Cossacks who "fell into the tsar's disgrace." They gathered their "circle" to decide how to live on. The decision taken was this: to leave the Volga for the Kama and enter the "Cossack service" to the richest merchants-salt producers Stroganovs. They needed the protection of their huge possessions from the raids of Siberian foreigners.
Having overwintered on Sylva and built a sufficient number of light plows, the Cossacks (540 people) in the spring of 1759 arrived at the Stroganovs in the town of Orel. The salt-mining merchants "went out of their way", that is, they did everything for a successful campaign against the hostile Siberian kingdom and its ruler Kuchum. Ataman Ermak Timofeevich led not 540 Cossacks, but an army of 840 soldiers. The Stroganovs gave three hundred of their warriors. About a third of the Cossacks owned firearms.
Ermak - the conquest of Siberia
Taking everything they needed, the Cossacks on June 13, 1579 set out as a ship's army up the Chusovaya to the Tagil port. Further the path lay to the Serebryanka river. The drag from the mouth of the Serebryanka River to the headwaters of the Tagil (Tagil) River - to the Narovlya River stretched for almost 25 versts of complete impassability. Cossacks dragged light ships “to the other side of the Stone,” that is, the Ural Mountains.
By 1580, the squad of the ataman Ermak Timofeevich went to Tagil. In a forest tract, a camping camp was built for wintering. Cossacks all winter "fought the possession of the Pelym Khan." 1580, May - on old plows and newly built ships, the Cossacks left Tagil on the Tura River and began to "fight the surrounding uluses." Ulus Khan Yepancha was defeated in the very first battle. Ermak occupied the town of Tyumen (Chingi-Tura). A new wintering took place there.
1581, spring - going further along the Tura River, in its very lower reaches, they were able to defeat the militia of six local princelings in battle. When the Cossack flotilla along the Tura River reached the vastness of the much more full-flowing Tobol, there they met the main forces of Khan Kuchum. The Siberians occupied the Babasan (or Karaulny Yar) tract, where the river narrowed in high, steep banks. According to the chronicle, the river in this place was blocked with an iron chain.
The khan's troops were commanded by the heir of Kuchum, prince Mametkul. When the Cossack plows approached the river narrowness, arrows fell on them from the bank. Ataman Ermak accepted the battle, landing part of his squad ashore. The other part remained on the plows, firing at the enemy from the cannons. Mametkul, at the head of the Tatar cavalry, attacked the Cossacks who landed on the shore. But they met the Kuchumites with a "fiery battle".
Yermak's shipmen moved further down the Tobol. Soon there was a 5-day clash with the army of Tsarevich Mametkul. And again the victory of the Cossacks was convincing. According to legend, they were inspired to fight by the vision of Nicholas the saint. The Khan's army in all its multitude occupied a high cliff on the right bank of the Tobol, which was called Dolgiy Yar. The flow of the river was blocked with felled trees. When the Cossack flotilla approached the obstacle, from the shore it was greeted with clouds of arrows.
The conquest of Siberia
Ermak Timofeevich took the planes back and for 3 days prepared for the upcoming battle. He went for a military trick: some of the warriors with stuffed animals made of brushwood and dressed in a Cossack dress remained on the plows, clearly visible from the river. Most of the detachment went ashore to attack the enemy, if possible, from the rear.
The ship's caravan, on which only 200 people remained, moved again along the river, firing at the enemy on the bank from the "fiery battle". And at this time, the main part of the Cossack squad went into the rear of the khan's army at night, unexpectedly fell on him and put him to flight. Soon, on August 1, the army of Khan Kharachi was defeated at Lake Tara.
Now Isker was on the way of the Cossacks. Khan Kuchum gathered all the available military forces to defend his capital Isker. He skillfully chose the Irtysh bend, the so-called Chuvash Cape, as a place for the battle. The approaches to it were covered with marks. The khan's army had two cannons brought from Bukhara.
The battle on October 23 began with the fact that the Tatar cavalry detachment approached the parking lot of the Cossack squad and fired at it with bows. The Cossacks defeated the enemy and, pursuing him, faced the main forces of the khan's army, commanded by Tsarevich Mametkul. On the victorious battlefield, 107 of Ermak's comrades fell, noticeably belittling his already small Cossack army.
Khan Kuchum fled from Isker on the night of October 26, 1581. On October 26, the Cossacks occupied it, calling the town Siberia. He became the main headquarters of Ataman Yermak. Ostyak, Vogul and other princes voluntarily arrived in Siberia and there they were accepted into the citizenship of the Russian tsar.
From Siberia (Isker) Ermak informed the Stroganov merchants about his victories. At the same time, preparations began for an embassy ("stanitsa") to Moscow, headed by the ataman Ivan Koltso - "to beat the king with the Siberian kingdom with his forehead." 50 "best" Cossacks were sent with him. That is, it was a question of joining the Russian state with one more (after Kazan and Astrakhan) "fragment" of the Golden Horde.
Ermak's campaign map
Siberian prince
Tsar Ivan the Terrible said to the conquerors of Siberia his words of thanks: "Ermak and his comrades and all the Cossacks" were forgiven all their previous guilt. The chieftain was granted a fur coat from the king's shoulder, battle armor, including two shells, and a letter in which the autocrat bestowed the title of Siberian prince on Ermak.
1852 - the Cossacks were able to establish the power of the Moscow sovereign "from Pelym to the Tobol River", that is, in all regions along the course of these two large rivers of Western Siberia (in the modern Tyumen region).
But soon the death of two Cossack detachments gave the fugitive Khan Kuchum new strength. Khan Karacha became the head of the rebellion. He and his troops approached the wooden walls of Siberia. From March 12, 1854, the Cossacks were able to withstand a real enemy siege for a whole month. But the chieftain found the right way out of a really dangerous situation.
On the night of May 9, on the eve of the patron saint of the Cossacks, Nicholas the saint, Ataman Matvey Meshcheryak with a detachment of Cossacks was able to sneak through the enemy's guard unnoticed and attacked the camp of Khan Karachi. The attack was distinguished by both suddenness and audacity. Khan's camp was defeated.
Death of Ermak
Then Khan Kuchum went to the trick, which he completely succeeded. He sent loyal people to Yermak, who informed the chieftain that a merchant caravan was moving up the Vagai River from Bukhara, and Khan Kuchum was holding them back. Ermak Timofeevich with a small detachment of only 50 Cossacks swam up the Vagai. On the night of August 6, 1585, the detachment stopped to rest at the confluence of the Vagai with the Irtysh. Tired of the hard work at the oars, the Cossacks did not send out sentries. Or, more likely, they simply fell asleep on a bad night.
In the middle of the night, the khan's horse detachment crossed over to the island. Kuchum's warriors crept up to them unnoticed. The attack on the sleeping ones was unexpected: few people managed to grab their weapons and engage in an unequal battle. Of the entire Cossack detachment of 50 people, only two survived in that massacre. The first was a Cossack who managed to get to Siberia and tell the sad news of the death of his comrades and the chieftain.
The second was Yermak Timofeevich himself.
Wounded, dressed in a heavy chain mail donated by the tsar (or a carapace?), He covered the retreat of a few Cossacks to the plows. Unable to climb onto a plow (apparently, he was already alive only one), Ermak Timofeevich drowned in the Vagai River. According to another version, Ermak died at the very edge of the coast, when he fought off the attackers. But those did not get his body, carried away into the night by a strong river current.
A. Shishov