Stenka Razin's Cossack Uprising

Stenka Razin (or Stepan Timofeyevich) was a Don Cossack hetman who carried out a series of successful raids on Persian and Russian settlements 1667-69. Having acquired great fame and wealth, Razin launched a new campaign in 1670 against the czar's fortress cities on the Volga. With a force of about 7,000 Cossacks, he seized Tsaritsyn and Astrakhan. In both towns Razin and his men engaged in drunken orgies and perpetrated savage atrocities against the nobles and military officers - he also replaced the local governments with Cossack institutions of self-rule. Razin continued his advance up the Volga, and along the way he incited the serfs and urban lower classes to join his rebellion. He captured Saratov and proceeded to Simbirsk, while his insurrection spread throughout the Volga region and even into some of the central Russian provinces. Alarmed at Razin's success, Czar Alexis sent an army to relieve Simbirsk. The force inflicted a decisive defeat on Razin's undisciplined and badly equipped troops. Razin fled to the Don, but on April 24, 1671, he was captured by loyalist Cossacks and turned over to the tsarist authorities. Brought to Moscow and tortured, Razin was executed by quartering in Red Square.