Campaign plan of 1739
Austria gradually leaned towards peace with Turkey. In December 1738, a peace agreement was signed between France and Austria - the war for the Polish succession received its official end. France recognized Augustus III as king, and Stanislav Leshchinsky was given possession of Lorraine, which, after his death, was to go to the French crown. The Duke of Lorraine, Franz Stephen, son-in-law of the Austrian emperor Charles VI, in return for his hereditary possession received Parma, Piacenza and in the future (after the death of the last duke) - Tuscany. Naples and Sicily, Charles VI lost to the Spanish prince Carlos. Unable to put Leszczynski on the Polish throne, France was preparing for a new stage in the struggle for influence in Europe. And one of its first tasks was to destroy the union of Russia and Austria.
On March 1, 1739, A. P. Volynsky, Prince A. M. Cherkassky, A. I. Osterman, B. K. Minich submitted to the Empress a plan for a future military campaign. “When drawing up a plan for a future campaign, special attention should be paid to the demands of the Austrian court and to the entire course of our relations with it. The affairs of this court are now in such a weak state that it cannot offer proper resistance to the Turks, which makes it more and more difficult to conclude peace … Therefore, we think that with the main army it is necessary to go straight through Poland to Khotin and act according to the enemy movements: for it is dangerous for one corps to go through Poland, but the Poles will be afraid of a strong army and refrain from confederation; with another army, for sabotage, to act against the Crimea and the Kuban. It was believed that the loss of Khotin, becoming a heavy loss for the Port, would alleviate the situation for Austria.
A serious threat was also seen in Sweden, in which the anti-Russian party again prevailed. If Russia is left alone against the Ottoman Empire, the dignitaries reasoned, then it is very likely that “France … instead of preventing Sweden from getting closer to Porto, it will help her both the Swedes and the Poles against us out of old malice for Polish affairs ….
Anna Ioannovna agreed with the project, and Minikh immediately went to Little Russia to prepare for the campaign. Shortly before this, the Crimean Tatars made another raid, but were repulsed. At this time F. Orlik tried to lure the Cossacks to the side of the Port. However, the overwhelming majority of the Cossacks treated his agitation with complete indifference. On the Dnieper, the disastrous times of Doroshenko have not yet been forgotten and the Cossacks did not want to be ruled by the Sultan.
For the campaign on Khotin, Minikh planned to collect an army of 90 thousand people and give it 227 field guns. However, he managed to concentrate in the Kiev region only 60 thousand people, 174 siege and field guns. Not counting on permanent supply bases, the commander decided to carry all the supplies in one wagon train, giving him strong cover.
Hike
The Russian army crossed the Dnieper in the Kiev region (main forces) and near the town of Tripolye (Rumyantsev's column). On May 25, the troops approached the city of Vasilkov, located on the border with Poland, and for two days they waited for the transports and lagging units to pull up. On May 28, the Russian army crossed the border and headed for the Dniester. On June 3, in a camp on the Kamenka River, Munnich received a rescript from the empress, demanding "an early march and every possible haste with the production of sensible actions to the enemy." However, the "haste" was very much hampered by the large carts, as well as the previous campaigns.
The army was divided into four divisions, which followed different roads, but maintained constant contact with each other. On June 27, Russian troops crossed the Bug in two places: at Konstantinov and at Mezhibozh. Taking advantage of the fact that the Turks pulled all their forces to Khotin, Minikh sent Cossack detachments to Soroki and Mogilev on the Dniester. Both towns were captured and burned, and the Cossacks returned to the army with a lot of booty.
While the Russian troops were moving forward, the Turks managed to gather serious forces from Khotin. To mislead the Ottomans, the commander divided the army into two parts. The first, under the command of A. I. Rumyantsev, was to demonstratively advance towards Khotin, and the second, led by Minikh himself, was to make a roundabout maneuver and reach the city from the south. On July 18, a month later than previously planned, the army reached the Dniester, and the next day crossed it, in full view of the enemy. Having crossed the river, the Russian troops camped in front of the village of Sinkovtsi for a short respite. On July 22, the Russians were attacked by large enemy forces, but successfully repelled the onslaught. According to Minich, "our people showed an indescribable desire for battle." In the battle, 39 soldiers and officers were killed, and 112 were wounded.
Battle of Stauchany
From Sinkovitsy, the Russian army went to Chernivtsi and further to the Khotinskiy mountains. To complete the task, the troops had to walk along the so-called "Perekop Uzins" - a defile in the southern part of the Khotinskiy mountains. On the march, the Russian regiments were repeatedly attacked by the Tatar cavalry, but repelled all attacks. Before entering the "Uzins", Field Marshal Minich left the entire wagon train, leaving 20 thousand soldiers to defend it. frame.
Then the Russian army forced the defile and on August 9 entered the plain. Here the Russian troops lined up in three squares. The Turks and Tatars did not interfere with the movement of the Russians through the Khotin mountains. The Turkish command planned to surround the Russians and destroy them with superior forces, on favorable terms for themselves. Following the infantry and cavalry, the Uzins also passed the train. On August 16, Minich's army approached the village of Stavuchany, which was located about 13 versts south-west of Khotin. By this time, under the command of the field marshal there were about 58 thousand people and 150 guns.
The Russians were opposed by a powerful enemy army. In Stavuchany there were 80 thousand people. an army of Turks and Tatars under the command of the serasker Veli Pasha. The Turkish commander distributed his forces as follows. About 20 thousand soldiers (mainly infantry) occupied a fortified camp on the heights between the villages of Nedoboevtsy and Stavuchany, blocking the road to Khotin. The camp was surrounded by a triple retrenchment with numerous batteries containing about 70 cannons. Detachments of Turkish cavalry under the command of Kolchak-Pasha and Genj-Ali-Pasha (10 thousand people) were to attack the flanks of the Russian army, and the 50-thousand army of the Tatars, led by Islam-Giray, were ordered to go to the rear of the Russian army. As a result, the Turkish commander planned to embrace the Russian army from the flanks and rear, and destroy or force it to surrender in the face of superior forces.
Minich planned to deflect the enemy's attention with a demonstrative attack on the right flank, and strike the main blow on the left, less fortified flank and break through to Khotin. On the morning of August 17 (28), 9 thous. the detachment under the command of G. Biron with 50 guns undertook a demonstrative attack. Having crossed the Shulanets River, the Russian troops went to the main forces of the Ottomans, and then turned back, and began to cross the river again. The retreat of Biron's detachment was regarded by the Ottomans as the flight of the entire Russian army. Veli Pasha even sent news to Khotin about the defeat of the “despicable giaurs” and transferred a significant part of his forces from the left flank to the right in order to build on the success and “destroy” the Russian army.
Meanwhile, Minich moved forward the main forces, which crossed Shulanets on 27 bridges. Following the main forces, Biron's detachment again crossed to the left bank of the river. Since the crossing took a long time (about 4 hours), the Turks managed to pull their forces back to the camp and dig additional trenches. By 5 o'clock in the evening, the Russians lined up in battle formation and moved to the left wing of the Turkish army. Attempts by the Turkish artillerymen, who occupied the commanding heights, to stop the Russian troops with fire were unsuccessful. The Turkish artillerymen did not shine with accuracy. Then the Turkish commander threw the cavalry of Gench-Ali-Pasha into the offensive. The Russian infantry stopped, put out their slingshots and repelled the onslaught of the enemy cavalry. This failure finally undermined the fighting spirit of the Ottomans. Turkish troops in disarray retreated to Bendery, to the Prut River and beyond the Danube.
Russian soldiers captured the camp. The entire enemy convoy and a lot of artillery became Russian trophies. About 1,000 Turkish soldiers were killed in the battle. The losses of the Russian army were insignificant and amounted to 13 killed and 53 wounded. Count Munnich explained such small losses "by the bravery of Russian soldiers and how much artillery and trench fire they were trained for."
Munnich wrote to Anna Ioannovna: “The Almighty Lord, who by his mercy was our leader, protected us with his supreme right hand, that we through the enemy's continuous fire and in such a strong battle killed and wounded less than 100 people; all the privates of the Victoria received until midnight rejoiced and shouted "Vivat, great empress!" And the aforementioned Victoria gives us hope for great success (that is, success), the army is still in good condition and has extraordinary courage."
On August 18, the Russian army approached Khotin. The Turkish garrison fled to Bendery. The next day, the city was occupied without firing a shot. From Khotin, Minich's troops went to the Prut River. On August 28-29, the Russians crossed the river and entered Moldavia. The local population enthusiastically greeted the Russians, seeing them as liberators from the Ottoman yoke. On September 1, the Russian vanguard occupied Iasi, where the commander received an official deputation of Moldovans, who asked to accept the country under the "high hand" of Empress Anna Ioannovna.
In one of his dispatches to St. Petersburg, Minich wrote: “The local Moldavian land is very splendid and no worse than Livonia, and the people of this land, seeing their liberation from barbaric hands, accepted the highest patronage with tearful joy, therefore it is very necessary to keep this land in your hands. Majesties; I will strengthen it from all sides so that the enemy will not be able to survive us from it; in the spring of the future, we can easily capture Bendery, drive the enemy out of the country between the Dniester and the Danube and occupy Wallachia. However, these far-reaching plans remained on paper. Minich's dreams were able to come true only during the times of Catherine the Great, Potemkin, Rumyantsev, Suvorov and Ushakov.
Plan of the Stavuchansk battle
End of the war. Belgrade Peace
Russia was let down by an ally - Austria. If the Russian army during the campaign of 1739 successfully advanced and achieved serious successes, then for the Austrians this year became black. 40 thous. The Austrian army under the command of Count Georg von Wallis suffered a heavy defeat near the village of Grotsky in a battle with 80 thousand. Turkish army. In this battle, the Austrians, who were striving to regain Orsova, grossly underestimated the enemy. After an unsuccessful maneuver in a mountain defile, they were thrown back with heavy losses and took refuge in Belgrade. The Turkish army laid siege to Belgrade. Although the capital of Serbia was considered a very strong fortress, the Austrians were completely discouraged.
Vienna has decided to ask for peace. General Neiperg was sent to the Turkish camp near Belgrade, who was ordered by Emperor Charles VI to immediately begin negotiations on a separate peace. Arriving at the Ottoman camp, Neuperg immediately showed that Austria was ready to make some territorial concessions. The Turkish side demanded that Belgrade be handed over to them. The Austrian envoy agreed to this, but on the condition that the fortifications of the city would be demolished. However, the Ottomans were already proud of the victory and, seeing the weakness of the Austrians, announced their intention to get Belgrade with its entire defensive system.
This behavior of the Ottomans alarmed the French, who wanted to keep the peace with Austria and destroy the alliance of Russians and Austrians. Villeneuve immediately went to the camp near Belgrade. He made it in time: the Turks were already preparing for the assault on Belgrade. The French envoy proposed a compromise solution: let the Austrians destroy the fortifications that they themselves built, and leave the old, Turkish walls intact. So they decided. In addition to Belgrade, Porta received back everything that she lost in Serbia, Bosnia and Wallachia under the terms of the Firefighter Treaty. The border between Serbia and Turkey again ran along the Danube, Sava and the mountainous province of Temesvar. In fact, Austria lost what it received as a result of the war of 1716-1718.
When the representative of the Russian Empire to the Austrian army, Colonel Brown, asked Neiperg if there were any articles in the treaty reflecting the interests of St. Petersburg, he replied rather sharply that Austria had already done too much, having entered the war for the sake of the Russians. "The usual evasion of the ministry of the Austrian court", - remarked on this occasion Munnich.
For Russia, this world was a shock. Munnich called the treaty "shameful and highly reprehensible." With undisguised bitterness, he wrote to Anna Ioannovna: “God is the judge of the Roman Caesar court for such an accidental and evil deed committed to the side of Your Majesty and for the shame that will follow from all Christian weapons, and I am now in such sorrow that I am not I can understand how a close ally could have done this. " The field marshal urged the empress to continue the war. Minich spoke with confidence about future victories and that the "local" peoples were ready to provide support to the army.
However, in St. Petersburg they thought differently. The war was very costly for the empire. Huge human losses (primarily from illness, exhaustion and desertion), the expenditure of funds were no longer a matter of serious concern for the Russian government. Little Russia suffered especially severe ruin. Thousands of people were sent to construction work, many died. Tens of thousands of horses were requisitioned from residents, food was constantly confiscated. Desertions from the field army grew steadily. The majority fled to Poland. Once almost a whole infantry regiment fled to Poland: 1,394 people. New campaigns in the steppe seemed to the exhausted soldiers to be certain death, and they preferred to risk their lives, starting "on the run", rather than go to war.
In Russia itself, the war led to an increase in social problems. The country was plagued by epidemics, vagrancy and crime, generated by desertion and mass poverty. To fight the robbers, it was necessary to allocate entire military teams. Official papers of that time are replete with reports of "thieves' people" who repaired "great ruin and mortal killings." It was so close to the big turmoil. In particular, at the beginning of January 1738 in the village of Yaroslavets, near Kiev, a certain man appeared who declared himself Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich (the son of Peter I). The impostor called on the soldiers to "stand up" for him, and said: "… I know your need, there will be joy soon: I will conclude eternal peace with the Turks, and in May I will send all the regiments and Cossacks to Poland and order all the lands to be burned with fire and cut with a sword. ". Such agitation caused the most grateful response among the soldiers. They even defended the "tsarevich" when the authorities sent the Cossacks to seize him. Later he was nevertheless seized and impaled. Some of the soldiers were beheaded, others were quartered.
The outskirts rioted. Back in 1735, a major uprising of the Bashkirs broke out, caused by mistakes and abuses of local authorities. Punitive expeditions brought down the fire of the uprising, but in 1737 the Bashkirs continued to fight, albeit on a smaller scale. In 1738 they turned to the Kyrgyz khan Abul-Khair for help. He agreed to help and ruined those Bashkirs in the vicinity of Orenburg who were loyal to the Russian government. The Kyrgyz Khan promised to take Orenburg.
Disturbing news came from Sweden, where there was a hope of taking revenge for previous defeats. Throughout the war of 1735-1739. in the Swedish elite, two parties fought bitterly. One, which advocated the war with the Russian Empire, was called the "party of hats", the other, more peaceful, - the "party of nightcaps." Swedish socialites were actively involved in the confrontation. Countesses De la Gardie and Lieven were in favor of the war party, and Countess Bondé was a supporter of the peace party. Almost every ball ended with duels between young nobles from among the admirers of these politicized beauties. Snuffboxes and pincases in the form of hats and caps even came into vogue.
In June 1738, the Russian resident in Sweden, MP Bestuzhev-Ryumin, was forced to inform Osterman about the undoubted success of the "military" party. Stockholm decided to send Porte, on account of the debts of King Charles XII, a 72-gun ship of the line (though it sank along the way) and 30 thousand muskets. A Swedish agent, Major Sinclair, left for the Ottoman Empire, under whom there were dispatches to the Grand Vizier with a proposal to start negotiations on a military alliance. The situation for Russia was extremely dangerous. Bestuzhev in his message recommended that Sinclair be "annelated" and "then spread the rumor that he was attacked by the Haidamaks or someone else."
And so they did. In June 1739, two Russian officers, Captain Kutler and Colonel Levitsky, intercepted Sinclair in Silesia, on his way back from Turkey, killed him and took all the papers. The murder sparked an obvious outcry in Sweden. The 10-thousandth Swedish corps was urgently transferred to Finland, the fleet was being prepared in Karlskrona. Petersburg was already expecting a Swedish strike. Only Minich's victory at Stavuchany cooled the hot heads in Stockholm somewhat. However, the threat of war with the Swedes became one of the most important reasons why Russian diplomats were in a hurry to sign peace with Turkey.
As a result, Petersburg did not dare to continue the war with the Turks alone. The negotiations were held with the mediation of France. On September 18 (29), 1739, in Belgrade, Russia and the Ottoman Empire signed a peace treaty. According to its terms, Russia returned Azov, without the right to keep a garrison in it and build fortifications. At the same time, Russia was allowed to build a fortress on the Don, on the Cherkasy island, and Porte in the Kuban. Russia also could not keep a fleet in the Black and Azov Seas. Moldavia and Khotin remained with the Turks, while Small and Big Kabarda in the North Caucasus were declared independent and neutral, turning into a kind of buffer between the two powers. Trade between Russia and Turkey could only be carried out on Turkish ships. Russian pilgrims were given guarantees of free visits to holy places in Jerusalem.
Results of the 1737 campaign and the war
Russian troops managed to defeat the Turks on the Dniester and develop an offensive in Moldova, with the prospect of annexing this area to Russia. But the defeat of the Austrian army near Belgrade and the separate Austro-Turkish negotiations, which ended with the conclusion of a peace treaty in which the Russian side was forced to participate, as well as the threat of war with Sweden, prevented the development of success.
Thus, the results looked very modest. They boiled down to the acquisition of Azov (without the right to strengthen it) and to the expansion of the borders by several versts in the steppe. The problem of the Crimean Khanate was not resolved. Russia had the ability to create a fleet in the Azov and Black Seas. Failed to gain a foothold in the Danube. That is, the problem of military-strategic security in the southern and southwestern directions has not been resolved.
Militarily, the results of the 1736-1739 campaign. had positive and negative sides. On the one hand, 1735-1739. smoothed the heavy impression of the failure of the Prut campaign and showed that the Turks and Tatars can be defeated on their territory. The Russian army successfully smashed the Crimean Khanate, took strategic fortresses (Perekop, Kinburn, Azov, Ochakov), pressed the Turkish-Tatar troops, taking up in open battles. On the other hand, the war brought out very clearly the main problems of the war in the south. Difficulties were in the huge distances, unusual natural conditions and the clumsy Russian bureaucracy, including the officer corps. The Russian army suffered huge losses in the war: from 100 to 120 thousand people. At the same time, only an insignificant part (8-9%) of the dead were killed in battle. The main damage to the Russian army was caused by long and tedious transitions, thirst, epidemics, lack of supplies, and the underdevelopment of medicine. A certain role in the problems of the army was played by inertia, abuse, lordly inclinations (striving for luxury even in wartime) and corruption among the bureaucracy and officers. However, the lessons of the campaign of 1735-1739. useful for the Russian army in future victorious battles with the Ottoman Empire. In the not too distant future, Russia was to win such wars, conquering the steppe and vast expanses, challenging the generally accepted rules of war, without being intimidated by the numerically superior forces of the enemy.
