people. As a side effect of victories, the main forces of the Crimean Tatars of the Third Girey arrive in Ukraine, without fights they seize a huge amount of yasir (esir – prisoner of war), other booty, and triumphantly return to the Crimea.
In the same year, a battle will take place near Pilyavtsi. The forces of the troops of the Sich and Tatars – 80 thousand, Polish-Lithuanian noblemen and jolners (cadre infantrymen), as well as the German reytars – about 50 thousand (not counting 30 thousand of various kinds of servants). At night, the Cossacks and Tatars attack the Polish camp; there is confusion, the Poles come into battle with scattered detachments, the leadership is retired, panic flares up. The result of the battle: the loss of Cossacks and Tatars 2—3 thousand, the Crown troops – about 50 thousand, killed and captured, as well as 90 guns (equated to regimental banners) and 100 thousand supply carts. Most of the production, however, goes to more pragmatic Tatars, which causes discontent in the camp of Khmelnitsky. To, as they say, «to repel money losses», Cossacks are taken for the robbery of the local population.
The next destination is Lviv. Khmelnytsky receives solid payoffs and besieges the Polish fortress Zamosc (song «Zamoscie»), which prevents direct movement to Warsaw. Meanwhile, the fighting spirit of the army, which has already tasted a rich booty, falls. The hetman conducts sluggish negotiations with the new Polish king and, without waiting for their end, actually dissolves his irregular army. He expects a triumphant reception in Kiev, ode and salute, as well as the returned saber wife, Elena (now) Chaplinskaya.
With some indecision, Bohdan Khmelnitsky takes the official letter of hetmanship from the King of Poland. Actually, Bogdan «on horseback», he is the winner, the possible founder of the dynasty of the South Russian principality, what else? But, apparently, the hetman feels that centrifugal forces are still very strong in his people, aspiration for anarchy and «patchiness», there is no well-functioning administration apparatus, or even at least a clear self-government.
In July 1649 the army of Khmelnitsky – militiamen from all parts of Ukraine and Cossacks, with a total of 130 thousand, are speaking to Poland. They unite with the Crimean Tatars and storm for several months, the fortress Zbarazh, defended by the 15 thousandth Polish garrison. King Jan Kazimir with a 20,000-strong army approaches the besieged, and suffers a catastrophic defeat. Bogdan stops the battle when he notices that Crimean Tatars, Muslims, can get, even hostile, but still, a Christian monarch.
The Poles are negotiating with representatives of the Crimean Khan, to which Bogdan Khmelnitsky is not invited. The so-called Zboriv peace treaty is signed. Tatars receive how many hundreds of thousands of golden thalers, vast tracts of steppe for nomadic, and Cossacks – the autonomy of the three regions and an expanded to 40 thousand register. In fact, yesterday, even proud militiamen with weapons, are again disenfranchised serfs, under the control of all the same gentry. Poles with the troops of the servants, not paying attention to some restrictive lines, are scouring all over Ukraine, searching for their now unarmed, yesterday’s offenders, and severely punishing them. Khmelnytsky, on the other hand, does not hinder anything to the gentry, on the contrary, wishing to observe the concluded agreement on points, severely punishes peasants who dared to defend themselves.
At the end of the summer of 1650, the crown hetman Nikolai Pototsky («Bear’s Paw») returned from Tatar captivity, and immediately announced mobilization throughout Poland. In response, Khmelnitsky, whose popularity among the people has catastrophically decreased, again sends a request to the Crimean Khan. Tatars, already fed up with prey, do not want to fight yet. Bogdan acts through the Turkish sultan as a vassal of his empire, and he, weighing the «pro» and «contra», gives the troops of the khan an order to join the Cossacks. The Tatars are reluctant to obey. Forces parties: Cossacks, along with the militia, the ratio of one to one – 100 thousand, the Tatar cavalry 20 thousand. Poland: 100 thousand Poles, Lithuanians, 12 thousand German, 8 thousand Romanian mercenaries, and about 40 thousand servants, «servants for everything». June 20, 1651 between the armies are fastened skirmishes. Shot by the Polish artillery the Crimean-Tatar army (under Islam-Gireem the horse is killed) unexpectedly is removed from a place, strips a flank and goes unknown where. In an effort to understand the meaning of what is happening, Bogdan with a small retinue catches up with the Tatars. Instead of explanations, the Crimean Khan takes Khmelnitsky and his secretary Vygovsky with him.
Cossacks fall into the encirclement in the camp, bordering the swamp. The Poles are trying to destroy the gati, they meet them, at night, a two thousandth detachment of a new voivode is being put forward. Kozaki, believing that the hetman throws them, rush after them, and, with their whole mass, destroy the ferries. The Poles take advantage of the moment, attack the camp from the field side. In the end, 35,000 Cossacks manage to escape. The loss of the Poles is 15—20 thousand.
After spending a month in the Crimean Tatar captivity, Khmelnytsky returns to his thin army. In addition, he is experiencing a family drama. His son, who disliked his stepmother, and suspected her of adultery, without the order of the hetman, executed her along with the alleged lover. Nevertheless, pretty soon Khmelnitsky takes control of himself, marries again, an agitated population flocking under his banner. A full-scale guerrilla war is unfolding, during which militiamen and Cossacks show unimaginable cruelty to the captives of the gentry. The Poles nevertheless occupy Kiev burnt by its inhabitants, they arrange total terror throughout the country. They are now helped by the Crimean-Tatar Horde. There is a famine, epidemics break out. Ukraine is losing half the population. Neither side wants to come to its senses, to show the advantage of its branch of faith by the unilateral termination of a series of bloody crimes. People run north to Russia (Moscow Rus), or to Moldova, try to take refuge in sparsely populated areas of the left bank of the Dnieper.
The transition of the peasants (otherwise, pospolityh, ready to mobilize, but still sedentary Cossacks) on the Left Bank Ukraine causes overpopulation of the territories, as well as the development of such a malicious phenomenon as «renting». People are becoming increasingly dependent on the «masters» of the land, the influential Cossack sergeant and monasteries. Landlords arbitrarily increase «obedience», require new taxes and services. The villagers complain to the hetman, but, as a rule, they do not receive permission. Starting from Mazepa’s rule, 27 articles of section 9 of the Lithuanian statute are applied, prohibiting the purchase of anything without the will of the Pan. The next step – the «masters» by force keep the people off the transitions.
Since 1727 (Hetman Daniel the Apostle) time after time, the chief of the sergeant-major calls on St. Petersburg to officially forbid the transitions of its peasants. And, in 1783, by the decree of Catherine II, serfdom in Minor Russia is formalized legally.
On January 8, the Rada (Supreme Council) meets in Pereyaslavl, where the issue is being resolved; one of the four princes to receive; Khan of the Crimean, the Turkish Sultan, the King of Poland, or the Muscovite Tsar. They choose the tsar of all Russia – at that time Alexey Mikhailovich (Tishayshey). As one of the results of this decision, the Russian-Polish war starts, a series of battles, often with an uncertain outcome. A real strong world, albeit with a nasty taste of serfdom, comes only during the reign of Catherine II.
Bogdan Khmelnitsky dies in 1657 (61), in all probability, from a hemorrhage to the brain. In 1664 the Polish voivode, whose name will not tell us anything, seizes Subotov farm, orders to dig up the hetman’s ashes and throw it to scold.
7. Ivan Dmitrievich Serko (Gray, i.e., «Wolf»), the ataman of the Zaporozhye Sich, a «character» who possesses clairvoyance, insensitivity to pain, also the ability to bring back to life the recently deceased comrade, to force the enemy to see instead of stuck in land of stakes, grove, etc. Reconstruction according to Gerasimov. The image is not represented; Photo is not in the database with a license to use and change. Birth – 1610, the village of Merefa Slobozhanshchyna (present Kharkiv region). Many data about the ataman have been lost, since 1644 he may have served the French king, participated in the European Thirty Years’ War, besieged Dunkirk under the prince of the blood of de Conde.
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