Samoilovich Ivan Samoilovich - hetman of the Zaporizhzhya army in Left-Bank Ukraine. He headed it from 1672 to 1687. He was the successor of the Demian the Sinful. This article will describe a brief biography of the hetman.
Military career
Ivan Samoilovich Samoilovich was born in Khodorkov (Ukraine, Zhytomyr region). The exact date of birth is unknown, around the 1630s. After the war, Bogdan Khmelnitsky, the whole Samoilovich family moved to Krasny Kolyadin (Chernihiv region). Ivan's brothers became priests, but such a prospect did not appeal to him. The young man decided to realize himself in another area. Once in the Cossack army, he made a rather rapid career, receiving in a short time the rank of convoy colonel.
In 1665, Ivan went to serve in the Chernigov army, led by Demyan Mnogogreshny. In 1669, the Cossack Council elected him hetman. Samoylovich, as his faithful companion, Demian appointed the general judge. Ivan also went to Moscow to sign the Glukhovsky articles. On the whole, the Sinful led an independent policy, which officials from the capital did not like very much. Soon he was removed from his post. In March 1672, Demyan was arrested by a Cossack foreman. At first, the Many-Sinned was sent to Moscow, and from there to Siberia.
Hetman title
One of the main organizers of the dismissal of Demyan from his post was Samoilovich Ivan Samoilovich. Prior to the next vote, a special parliament formed from elders conspirators ruled. In 1672, near the Konotop, new elections of the hetman of the Left-Bank Ukraine took place . It was Samoylovich who became him, although he did not really want to. He confirmed his allegiance to Moscow and promised to execute anyone who encroached on this alliance.
Expansion of Territories
Having become a hetman, Ivan Samoilovich Samoilovich decided to unite the Ukrainian lands. In 1674, together with Romodanovsky (Belgorod colonel), he spoke on the Right Bank against Doroshenko. At the same time, one of the hetmans of Right-Bank Ukraine renounced his authority in favor of Samoilovich. Other petty officers, dissatisfied with the leadership of Doroshenko, also acted. The latter surrendered in 1676. Thus, Ivan united the Ukrainian lands and became the hetman of the two banks of the Dnieper.
New battles
In 1677–1681 during the Russo-Turkish war, Samoilovich was engaged in the defense of the hetman's capital. As a result, Chigirin was completely destroyed. Ivan was forced to retreat to the Left Bank. And on the Right, under the Turkish protectorate, hetman was proclaimed Yuri Khmelnitsky. At this time, Samoilovich realized that it was necessary to fight not for land, but for people. In 1679, he ordered the Cossacks to forcibly resettle peasants from the Right Bank to the Left. Now in the power of Khmelnitsky remained only burnt and devastated cities and villages. After this act of Ivan Samoilovich, the whole simple population hated and constantly cursed him.
"Eternal World" and the Crimean campaign
In 1683, Poland defeated the Turks near Vienna. Thus, she regained her own control over Right-Bank Ukraine. The Poles proposed an alliance for Samoilovich, but the hetman refused it. On the other hand, they were negotiating with Russia about a joint protest against the Ottoman Empire. Ivan was sure of the failure of such an alliance. He dissuaded Russian diplomats, assuring them that the Poles did not keep their word and there was no point in negotiating with them. Samoilovich’s arguments were not accepted, and in 1686 they signed the Eternal Peace with Poland. He secured the division of Ukraine along the Dnieper and assumed the Crimean campaign. The latter ended in failure. Even before the start of the fighting, due to the arson of the steppe and other adverse circumstances, the Russian-Ukrainian army lost almost half of its personnel. Samoilovich Ivan Samoilovich insisted on the retreat and return to his homeland. The assembled parliament supported the decision of the hetman.
Dissatisfaction with Ivan Samoilovich grew gradually: Cossacks and foremen did not like him for corruption and the introduction of exorbitant taxes. Russian governors "laid eyes" on the huge state of the hetman, "earned" by him during the reign. In addition, officials did not like Ivan's independent policies. It was also necessary to blame someone for the failure of the Crimean campaign.
Arrest and death
In June 1687, Cossack foremen wrote a 23-point denunciation on Samoilovich. It is believed that the ideological inspiration of this document was Ivan Mazepa. Among the points were the above-mentioned accusations. But most of all, Moscow officials did not like one thesis. According to him, Samoilovich Ivan Samoilovich planned to create his own specific principality and get rid of the capital’s protectorate. In July 1687, Russian troops arrested the hetman. After the trial, he was exiled to the city of Tobolsk (Siberia), where he died in 1690.
Personal emblem
Since the 17th century, the Samoilovich family had a Polish coat of arms “Shalava”, which was a blue shield. On his field there was a golden ring, on the inner circle of which three cavalry crosses were evenly placed. In kleinode there was a hand with a sword. The brush is blue, lined with gold. Well, Ivan Samoilovich himself had a slightly different coat of arms. The hetman received it in the last years of his reign: three black cavalry crosses were located on the red field of the shield. Three ostrich feathers could be observed in the claynode.
Samoilovich Ivan Samoilovich: memory
Even now, several centuries after the death of the hetman, none of the Ukrainians forgot his deeds. Samoilovich Ivan Samoilovich, whose biography is presented above, went down in history as one of the largest corrupt officials. He taxed the people with many obscure and overwhelming taxes. By the end of his life, Ivan had accumulated such a huge fortune that even high-ranking Russian officials wanted to profit from them.
In 2000, a stamp was published in Ukraine dedicated to the hero of this article.
It is worth noting that many people confuse the hetman with a man named Kunda Ivan Samoilovich. It is not entirely clear where this error came from. It is reliably known that Kunda Ivan Samoilovich is a participant in the Second World War, who had the rank of sergeant. Born in 1925, he began his service in 1942. For his services he was awarded the Order of the Patriotic War of the 2nd degree. And he has nothing to do with the hetman (except for the same name and patronymic), who lived three centuries before him.