Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

Like numerous Russian peasant rebellions, Bulavin's uprising emerged in the Cossack areas along the Don River. While the Russian government sought to limit the power and independence of the Cossacks, at the same time it sought to control the border region to prevent serfs from escaping beyond the Don. In the early 1700s, the Russian government was under political pressure from Russian landowners to capture more than 60,000 serfs who fled their masters to the Don River. In response to calls for action by landowners, Peter the Great signed a decree on July 6, 1707 calling for a census in Cossack settlements as a pretext to track down all runaway serfs and return them to their lords. Peter the Great appointed Duke Dolgorukiy to lead the military expedition that initially captured about 3,000 fugitive serfs. But Cossacks saw Dolgo-rukiy's mission as a threat to their own rights and freedom. In response to the Russian military infiltration, Cossack chief or ataman Kondratiy Bulavin formed a rebel army to repel the Russian forces. On the night of October 8, 1707, Kondratiy Bulavin staged an attack and killed Dolgorukiy and his entire forces. Not all of the Cossacks supported Bulavin's effort. Some atamans remained loyal to the tsar and sought to capture Bulavin and his insurgents, who had already escaped to Zaporozhye, a town on the western Donetsk River Basin, to regroup before staging ... log in or subscribe to read full text