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Lost Like Bekovich

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Lost Like Bekovich

05.10.2017

Dmitrii Klimov

The Russian expression “lost like Bekovich” once meant that someone had encountered a terrible misfortune, but it has long fallen out of common use. Nonetheless, the story of its emergence is quite revealing. Three hundred years ago, in 1717, Alexander Bekovich-Cherkassky led the first Russian army expedition to Khiva. Neither Bekovich nor the rest of his detachment were to return from this campaign.

The Russian State and the East


For a long time Khiva attracted Europeans with stories of its incredible riches. But an even more important factor was the fact that Khiva lay along the path to India, and legends of the fantastic riches of this fabled land dazzled the imagination. Whoever conquered Khiva could control the overland route to this faraway country.


Soldier, seargent, and officer of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, 1695-1700.
Drawing by Adolf Charlemagne. Photo: vdvgazeta.ru

The khans of Bukhara and Khiva sought ties with distant Muscovy and sent their envoys to the court of Ivan the Terrible in 1557 with lavish gifts to ask him to allow their subjects to conduct trade in Rus. A century later, Rus had not lost interest in these lands—quite the opposite, it was fueled by the stories of foreign merchants, who enjoyed protection in the Russian lands and were guaranteed “the most favorable treatment in trade.”

In the 1660s, the khan of Khiva sent his envoys to Moscow to ask that he be accepted as an honorary subject while preserving his authority as khan. The internal politics of Khiva were not in the best shape for the ruler, and he was counting on preserving his rule by requesting the protection of Muscovy, but he was nonetheless overthrown by more successful political opponents.

In 1700 the Khivan ruler Xah Niyaz Khan made an appeal to the Russian tsar, once again asking to be accepted as an honorary subject. There exists evidence of later appeals by Khiva as well. In 1714, the Khivan ambassador Ashur-bek was received in Saint Petersburg, which had recently been built on the originally Russian land of Izhora (newly re-conquered from the Swedes). The ambassador attested that gold had been found at the mouth of the Amu Darya River, within Khivan territory. This was more or less true, though the size of this find left much to be desired, but the truth of the assertion didn’t matter here. Prior intelligence about the incredible riches of the East and the opportunity to open a caravan route to India had already decided the issue of launching an expedition.

According to the rumors of merchants who went there, the Khivans had built an enormous dam and changed the course of the Amu Darya. As a result, the river now ran to the Aral Sea instead of the Caspian, and the land that it had previously supplied with water had become an arid, impassable desert along the banks of the Caspian Sea. Such assertions were already held in doubt at the time, but Peter the Great was his usual decisive and uncompromising self and ordered his subjects to go on a campaign to Khiva.

At that time, Russia was waging war with Sweden to gain access to the Baltic Sea. After the crushing defeat of Karl XII’s forces outside Poltava in 1709, this issue was basically settled, but it was still necessary to join the existing paths in Europe with the trade routes into Asia. This would be a variation on the well-known medieval trade route “from the Varangians to the Greeks,” just with a somewhat altered direction and the possibility of reaching faraway India. Especially since this land was already known in the writings of the renowned Russian traveler and merchant Afanasy Nikitin, who actually undertook that dangerous voyage almost at a whim in the late 15th century.

Russia intended to greatly expand its trade with Europe. But the traditional offerings of Russian goods remained hemp, flax, honey, and furs as before. They needed something that would be more rare and in-demand on the European market. Such goods—specifically, those spices and seasonings that become incredibly popular in Europe—could be found in the East.


Alexander Bekovich-Cherkassky

There was very good reason to choose Captain Alexander Bekovich-Cherkassky as leader for this expedition. In those times, ambassadors were appointed from among “worldly and knowledgeable people,” and moreover, from among those who held respectable ranks and titles. One should not read too much into the rank of captain, modest though it is by today’s standards. At that time, the rank of captain was greatly respected. What’s more, he was not just any captain but a captain of the guard.


Alexander Bekovich-Cherkassky. Drawing by F.A. Vasilev, 1710.
Photo: ru.wikipedia.org


Bekovich-Cherkassky was born as Devlet-Girei-Murza and descended from a noble family, being the great-grandson of the Prince of Greater Kabardia Kaza Psheapshokov. The correct date of birth for Bekovich-Cherkassky remains unknown to this day. It is known that he was fated to end up in Russia at a young age. A very wealthy widow, a member of the Golitsyn family, felt compassion for the boy and declared him her heir. Once he was baptized, the boy took the name Alexander and was raised in the home of the Prince Boris Golitsin, on equal terms with the prince’s own sons. Boris Alexeevich Golitsin had also educated Peter the Great in his a youth. According to the extant archival documents, in 1699 the Princess Anna Vasilevna, nee Nagaia, bequeathed to Bekovich-Cherkassky a substantial fortune consisting of patrimonial lands in the Romanov district.

The young prince traveled to Holland in 1707-1709 in order to study navigation alongside the other scions of noble boyar families. Later, he would serve in the elite Preobrazhensky regiment. Then, in 1711, he was entrusted with the sensitive mission of persuading Kabardia to accept the status of subject within the Russian Empire. The Circassian princes accepted him graciously. Bekovich reported to the tsar that Karbardia would happily accept Russia’s protection. Buoyed by this success, he offered to conduct negotiations with other the mountain peoples of the Caucasus.

But he was commissioned to undertake an important expedition across the Caspian Sea. In 1715, the Russians became the first Europeans to traverse the whole eastern shore of the Caspian Sea, compiling quite accurate maps while doing so. This success earned the prince the title of captain. He received the high calling of ambassador to the Khan of Khiva and unprecedented control over the preparations for the campaign.


The Journey to Khiva

Peter the Great wrote to Bekovich-Cherkassky in his own hand with detailed instructions for conducting the campaign. The main points of his instructions were: 1) it was necessary to build towns on the Amu Darya River and, if possible, to dismantle the dam and return the Amu Darya to its original course (i.e., direct it to the Caspian Sea); 2) make the Khivan Khan a Russian subject; 3) if possible, make the Khan of Bukhara a Russian subject as well; 4) request vessels from the local authorities for merchants to use to reach India along the Amu Darya; 5) to send Lieutenant Korzhin (the tsar mentioned this name specifically in his orders) and five navigators to explore a trade route to India, and also to give him “two good men from the merchant class, who are not old” in order to find out about spices (which were valued highly in Europe at the time) and other goods; 6) to send two men down the Syr Darya River to Erketi (now Xinjiang in the Chinese Autonomous Region) to search for gold. They were ordered to treat the locals “kindly and without burdening them.”

Alexander Bekovich-Cherkassky included in his detachment five squadrons from the Penza regiment and one squadron from the Astrakhan infantry regiments, 1900 Cossacks, and 550 “non-Russians.” Thus, the overall size of expedition was somewhere in the range of 3.5-4 thousand men.

In May 1717, the detachment made camp near the city Guryev, where arms and provisions for the coming expedition had been brought for nearly a year. During this time, the Karakalpks had time to attack the camp, taking five Cossacks captive and stole a drove of horses. The infantry Bekovich sent after them managed to win back the Cossacks and horses. All the same, they started to receive troubling news to the effect that Khivans were collapsing wells on the path that the detachment might follow. Nonetheless, in June 1717, after some delay, the detachment embarked on a difficult expedition through the desert. Under the burning sun, many men fell victim to sunstroke, and they were all tormented by terrible thirst. Their food mainly consisted of hard tack and dried meats, but sometimes they were able to catch desert rodents. Another significant source of trouble was the nomadic tribes who would disturb the ranks from time to time with raids.

What’s more, there was discord in the detachment between Bekovich and Lieutenant Kozhin, who had earlier demanded exceptional powers from the monarch and was himself ready to lead the detachment or undertake a separate expedition. But Peter the Great wisely decided not to divide his forces, nor did he change his decision about the leadership for the operation. The only thing that Kozhin managed to get was personal recognition in the tsar’s orders. Both Bekovich and Kozhin sent denunciations to Petersburg, each detailing the blunders and shortcomings of his rival.

Knowing the local customs, Bekovich decided on a clever course of action and sent the nobleman Kiritov to Khiva with some Cossacks as an advance detachment in order to learn more about the situation there. Khiva accepted Kiritov’s gifts, but they wouldn’t let him into the city, instead giving him so-called “fodder money” and keeping him outside the gates. This meant that they were not yet received as friends, but it would be possible to hold peaceful negotiations. The Khan even sent his own emissary in response, bringing Bekovich a caftan, a horse, and Eastern sweets as gifts. Everything indicated that it would be possible to establish amiable relations, if not an outright friendship.


Khiva. Photo: aa.fb.uz

There was just one problem. A Kalmyk named Baksha, who was serving as a guide for the detachment, unexpectedly snuck away from camp along with several others placed in Bekovich’s service by Ayuka Khan and went to Khiva, where he was quickly able to get an audience with the Khan. Baksha convinced the Khan that Bekovich wanted to take the Khivan throne for himself. The Russian Cossacks and Kiritov were quickly seized and imprisoned, and an army numbering over 24,000 men advanced on Bekovich.

Meanwhile, the Russian detachment was approaching Khiva at an accelerated march. They were at a distance of around 150 kilometers and had made a fortified camp near the natural boundary Karagach. The Khivan cavalry attacked some Cossacks catching fish in the lake, taking around 60 men captive, though some managed to get away and warn the detachment of the coming threat.

The camp quickly prepared to defend itself. The first attack was beaten off with massive losses to the Khivans, who then attempted a siege, but they still couldn’t take the camp. Over this entire period of time, Bekovich lost no more than ten men, while the bodies of his enemies filled all the space around the Russian positions. The dead alone numbered over one thousand. The precision grapeshot fired from the Russian cannons did its job.

Bekovich’s detachment had more than enough provisions of food and gunpowder to last a month or more. There was a whole lake nearby, which assured they would have valuable water. And so the Khivans faced the prospect of a long and thoroughly planned siege, which they were not prepared to do.

On the advice of his treasurer, the Khivan Khan sent emissaries to the Russian camp, who made assurances that everything that had happened was only an irritating misunderstanding. Bekovich’s council offered the opinion that the Khan couldn’t be trusted. Spies reported military preparations. No news came from Kiritov’s detachment, which had been sent to Khiva. All of this should have made them wary.


Bekovich Dies

But Bekovich rashly decided in favor of talks. A preliminary peace treaty was signed. The Khan swore on the Koran to uphold his agreed-upon obligations and invited the Russians into his camp. Bekovich visited the Khan with an honorary accompaniment of cavalry and Cossack and made arrangements to hand over gifts from the tsar, which were to be brought on twenty camels.

The Khivans’ plan consisted of luring Bekovich out of his camp and splitting up the Russian detachment. They told Bekovich that it would be impossible to properly receive such a large number of troops in Khiva and offered to divide them into five parts, each of which would spend the night separately from the others.

Five times the acting commander at camp, the German Frankenberg, refused to act on Bekovich’s written orders to leave the camp, divide into smaller detachments, and follow the guides to a new site. Surrounded by enemies, such a decision was downright suicidal, but Bekovich trusted the Khan and paved the way for a dramatic outcome.

Threatened with immediate hanging for disregarding a direct order, Frankenberg agreed to split up the detachment. Bekovich still couldn’t sense the danger hanging over him. The Russian detachment had hardly divided up and left the camp when Khivans attacked Bekovich’s convoy from all angles. Bekovich was stabbed with a dagger in his tent, and his body was then chopped up with sabers. Bekovich-Cherkassky was decapitated, and his head was sent to the Khan of Bukhara as a sign of victory. Incidentally, the Khan of Bukhara sent this “gift” back, inquiring whether the Khivan leader was a cannibal.


V.V. Vereshchagin. Triumph, 1872. Photo: muzei-mira.com

They attacked the divided parts of the Russian division soon after they left the camp, killing some, and taking others captive. Gallows were built on the main square. Bekovich’s decapitated body—its skin sliced up and insides stuffed with straw—hung from one of them. A number of the captives were enslaved.

It is thought that Bekovich conducted himself so incautiously and trustingly toward the Khan on account of personal circumstances. Specifically, at the very beginning of the campaign, in Astrakhan, the boat carrying Bekovich’s wife and two daughters capsized right before his eyes. They all drowned. This was a bad sign. Bekovich-Cherkassky would never fully recover from the shock for the rest of his life. During the campaign, he drank heavily, which affected his decisions.

In 1740 the Persian army conquered Khiva. Nader Shah freed the few Russian captives who remained alive.

Russia would not conduct further campaigns in Khiva for over a century. In 1873, Russian forces commanded by Adjutant General Konstantin von Kaufman took Khiva, and the Khivan khanate became a vassal state of the Russian Empire.

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