Onufriy Stepanov
Encyclopedia
Onufriy Stepanov (died June 30, 1658) was a Siberian Cossack
Siberian Cossacks
Siberian Cossacks were Cossacks who settled in the Siberian region of Russia from the end of the 16th century, following the Yermak Timofeyevich's conquest of Siberia. In early Siberia practically the whole Russian population, especially the serving-men were called Cossacks, but only in the loose...

 and explorer of the Amur River. For background see Russian–Manchu border conflicts.

1653: After Yerofey Khabarov
Yerofey Khabarov
Yerofey Pavlovich Khabarov or Svyatitsky Erofej Pavlovič Chabarov , was a Russian entrepreneur and adventurer, best known for his exploring the Amur river region and his attempts to colonize the area for Russia...

’s arrest and departure to Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 in the fall of 1653, Onufriy Stepanov was appointed his deputy in the region of Dauria (upper reaches of the Amur River) and put in charge of the 320 men who remained there. Stepanov and his men suffered privations without enough grain
GRAIN
GRAIN is a small international non-profit organisation that works to support small farmers and social movements in their struggles for community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems. Our support takes the form of independent research and analysis, networking at local, regional and...

 and timber
Timber
Timber may refer to:* Timber, a term common in the United Kingdom and Australia for wood materials * Timber, Oregon, an unincorporated community in the U.S...

, so they decided to sail down the Amur River beyond the Sungari River to the Ducher country in order to procure food and building materials. Stepanov succeeded in his mission, but not without skirmishes with the Duchers, exacting a considerable yasak
Yasak
Yasak or yasaq, sometimes iasak, is a Turkic word for "tribute" that was used in Imperial Russia to designate fur tribute exacted from the indigenous peoples of Siberia.- Origin :...

 from them. Here he built winter quarters.

1654: In the summer of 1654, Stepanov sailed back to the Sungari River to find grain and was joined by another band of 50 cossacks. After sailing up the Sungari for three days he met a Manchu
Manchu
The Manchu people or Man are an ethnic minority of China who originated in Manchuria . During their rise in the 17th century, with the help of the Ming dynasty rebels , they came to power in China and founded the Qing Dynasty, which ruled China until the Xinhai Revolution of 1911, which...

 army under the command of Mingandali. (according to Stepanov, it consisted of 3,000 Chinese
Chinese people
The term Chinese people may refer to any of the following:*People with Han Chinese ethnicity ....

 and Manchus, not including the Duchers and Daurs). A river battle ensued, and Stepanov and his men came off victorious, but the remaining Manchu forces went ashore and entrenched themselves. The Cossacks made an attempt to besiege the trenches, but sustained losses and had to retreat downriver where they were joined by 30 men under sotnik Beketov. He retreated up the Amur, past the Zeya to the mouth of the Kamora River, and wintered at the half-ruined Kamora fortress (Каморский острог).

1655: Fearing attack, Stepanov began rebuilding the desolate settlement and its fortifications. These precautions paid off, when a Manchurian army of 10,000 soldiers led by Mingandali besieged the Kamora fortress
Huma County
Huma County is a county in the far north of the Heilongjiang province, People's Republic of China. The county seat is located on the right bank of the Amur River, a few kilometers upstream from the fall of the Huma River into the Amur.It is under the administration of the Da Hinggan Ling...

 on March 13, 1655. The outnumbered defenders repulsed several assaults, but the Manchus ran short of food and lifted the siege the on April 3, 1655 after destroying the Russian boats.

1655-58: After this incident Stepanov ordered a few of his men to travel to Moscow and deliver the yasak, collected during his stay in the Amur region. Meanwhile, fifty Tomsk
Tomsk
Tomsk is a city and the administrative center of Tomsk Oblast, Russia, located on the Tom River. One of the oldest towns in Siberia, Tomsk celebrated its 400th anniversary in 2004...

 Cossacks led by a boyar
Boyar
A boyar, or bolyar , was a member of the highest rank of the feudal Moscovian, Kievan Rus'ian, Bulgarian, Wallachian, and Moldavian aristocracies, second only to the ruling princes , from the 10th century through the 17th century....

 son Fyodor Pushchin (who had been fighting the Tungus at the mouth of the Argun River
Argun River
Argun River may refer to*Argun River , in Georgia and Russia*Argun River , part of the Russia–China border...

) joined Onufriy Stepanov. Once again, Stepanov headed towards the grain-rich region of the Sungari River. After having refreshed his supplies, Stepanov and his men made their way to the Gilyak
Nivkhs
The Nivkh are an indigenous ethnic group inhabiting the northern half of Sakhalin Island and the region of the Amur River estuary in Russia's Khabarovsk Krai. Nivkh were mainly fishermen, hunters, and dog breeders...

 country on the lower Amur. There, the Cossacks built a fort and collected a yasak consisting of sable
Sable
The sable is a species of marten which inhabits forest environments, primarily in Russia from the Ural Mountains throughout Siberia, in northern Mongolia and China and on Hokkaidō in Japan. Its range in the wild originally extended through European Russia to Poland and Scandinavia...

, red
Red Fox
The red fox is the largest of the true foxes, as well as being the most geographically spread member of the Carnivora, being distributed across the entire northern hemisphere from the Arctic Circle to North Africa, Central America, and the steppes of Asia...

 and silver fox
Silver fox (animal)
The Silver Fox is a melanistic form of red fox. Silver foxes display a great deal of pelt variation: some are completely black, save for the white tail tip, while others are bluish-grey, and others may have a cinereous colour on the sides...

 fur. Meanwhile, the living conditions along the Amur River grew worse from year to year because most of the native population had been impoverished by the Cossacks’ exactions and had left the area. Also, Stepanov found out that the Daurs and Duchers had been resettled by the order of their Shunzhi Emperor
Shunzhi Emperor
The Shunzhi Emperor was the third emperor of the Manchu-led Qing dynasty, and the first Qing emperor to rule over China, which he did from 1644 to 1661. "Shunzhi" was the name of his reign period...

 from the Amur River to the Kurga River. Thus, the Amur region became almost completely deserted, the shores of the Sungari River in particular. An increasing number of outlaws in the area would prey on both the natives and the legal Cossacks. Stepanov and his men would often encounter uluses, sacked and burnt down by robbers. The Cossacks found themselves in a critical situation, especially considering the fact that they lacked manpower to fight their way to more fertile lands. To avoid death from starvation, Stepanov’s men had to plough and scatter the fields with seeds themselves. It was pointless to remain in this region any longer, so Onufriy Stepanov waited for an opportunity to leave. On July 22, 1656, he dispatched a group of fifty Cossacks to Moscow to deliver a new yasak, providing them with a letter asking the tsar
Tsar
Tsar is a title used to designate certain European Slavic monarchs or supreme rulers. As a system of government in the Tsardom of Russia and Russian Empire, it is known as Tsarist autocracy, or Tsarism...

 not to send his men back to him due to the lack of food in the Amur region. In his reply, Alexei Mikhailovich thanked Stepanov and his subordinates for their great service and instructed them to "conduct themselves bravely". Soon enough, the Cossacks grew completely desperate and began to run away from their leader. Negotiations between Moscow and the Manchus stalled, help was nowhere in sight, and natives’ animosity towards the Cossacks grew stronger every day.

1658: Stepanov began preparations for an advance towards a region with a more favorable and friendly environment. On June 30, 1658, below the mouth of the Sungari, Stepanov's 11-boat fleet with 500 Cossacks aboard was surrounded by 40 (or 45, or 45-47) boats of the Qing
Qing Dynasty
The Qing Dynasty was the last dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917. It was preceded by the Ming Dynasty and followed by the Republic of China....

 general Sarhuda
Sarhuda
Šarhūda, known also under the Chinese transcription of his name, Shaerhuda , was a Manchu military commander during the early Qing Dynasty, active both before and after the Manchus' seizing control of the entire China....

, with some 1400 Manchu and Korean soldiers aboard, armed with cannon
Cannon
A cannon is any piece of artillery that uses gunpowder or other usually explosive-based propellents to launch a projectile. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees,...

s and harquebuses.
Exhausted and demoralized, Onufriy Stepanov and his Cossacks could not offer any serious resistance and were defeated by the larger enemy force. Stepanov was either killed during the fight or drowned while trying to cross the Amur River. The Manchus captured the Russian's yasak and released over a hundred Ducher women kept by the Cossacks on their boats. 270 Russians were lost and 222 escaped, of whom 180 formed themselves into outlaw bands that lived by raiding the natives in the Zeya area until they were largely wiped out by the Manchus in 1660.

Such a tragic finale of the Stepanov party discouraged the Russian leaders from collecting yasak from the natives of the Amur region and made them abandon its official conquest for the next 15 or so years. A number of cossacks continued to live and raid in the area unofficially.
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