Potocki and Kalinowski. They realized that the entire country would
soon be up in arms and that their plan of cutting off the Zaporozhe
from the north had completely failed. Yet they disagreed on everything
else. Kalinowski wanted to press on to Fort Kodak, Potocki wanted to
stay where they were, and the lesser officers called for a retreat.
This was finally decided upon and as they moved north, Potocki
commenced to set fire to the villages and burned the city of Korsun
for terroristic purposes. The result was not what he had expected. He
merely aroused the anger of the population, who joined the Kozaks. In
the meanwhile the Tatars attacked the army in front and Khmelnitsky
sent to the rear a detachment of the Korsun regiment of Kozaks under
the command of a Scotch adventurer, known by the name of Maksym
Krivonos (Crooked-nose). Everything went like clockwork for the Kozaks.
The Poles fell into the ambuscade and lost all semblance of discipline.
One detachment under Prince Koretsky succeeded with heavy loss in
cutting its way to safety, but the two hetmans, Potocki and Kalinowski,
and over one thousand men were captured. The rest were killed. The
prisoners were turned over to the Tatars and the leaders were sent to
the Crimea until they should pay 20,000 gold coins each.
This overwhelming defeat was the signal for a general uprising of the
oppressed Ukrainian peasantry. The fire of revolt spread rapidly
through the province of Kiev and throughout eastern Ukraine. Everywhere
manor houses were burned, the nobles and their families were killed and
the country was caught up in a savage civil war which threatened Polish
control of the entire region. It was not only a struggle of the Kozaks
but of the entire Orthodox Ukrainian population which was now seeking
redress for all the cruelty and oppression which it had suffered.
To add to the confusion, King Wladyslaw died on the same day as the
battle of Korsun and under the loose Polish constitution, months were
required before a new King could be elected. Never before had such a
storm been unleashed.
It would have been a simple matter for Khmelnitsky to have marched
across Poland and menaced or taken Warsaw, but he had no desire to be
at the head of a peasant uprising. The same dualism that had existed
between the Kozaks and the peasantry, and the pride of the Kozak
officers who felt that they were on a par with the Poles prevented him
from taking this solution. Instead, he sent a letter a few weeks later
to the Polish King as if he were still alive and set forth the main
Kozak demands. They were, as can be well imagined, the restoration of
the Orthodox Church, the doubling of the number of registered Kozaks,
and the restoration of the old Kozak rights which had been abolished
in 1638. The Polish government seemed inclined to accept them and in
addition steps were taken whereby the marriage of Helen to Czaplinski
was annulled and she married Bohdan in accordance with the Orthodox
rites.
Just at this moment, when it seemed as if Khmelnitsky and the Kozaks
would effect some solution of their problem with the Poles, Prince
Jarema Wisniowiecki sprang into action. One of the great landowners
on the left bank of the Dnyeper, he was a descendant of that Prince
Dmytro who had been one of the founders of the Sich a century earlier.
Now as a convert to the Roman Catholic Church, he set himself to wipe
out the Kozak movement with fire and sword. By far the ablest and
the most warlike of the Polish magnates, he assumed the lead of the
Polish opposition to Khmelnitsky and marched through the Ukrainian
regions, giving no quarter and devastating ruthlessly all the Ukrainian
villages. The result might have been foreseen.
He forced Bohdan, after futile appeals to the government, to take the
field again. The two armies met at Pylyava on September 13, 1648 and
again the Poles were decisively defeated. The Ukrainians were then
joined by the army of the Crimean Tatars, who insisted on continuing
the war in order to secure booty. For this purpose the combined forces
moved on Lviv which finally paid a large ransom. Just at this moment,
Jan Kazimierz was elected King of Poland and Bohdan, trusting to his
good intentions, repeated his demands on a somewhat broader scale,
for now he demanded the recognition of the Orthodox Church and the
abolition of the Union.
Khmelnitsky returned to Kiev during the Christmas holidays in 1648
in triumph. He was received with overwhelming acclaim by the entire
population and all classes vied in doing him honor. Perhaps it was
only then that his thoughts and his aspirations expanded, for he found
waiting for him representatives of Turkey, Transylvania, Moldavia, and
Wallachia and they were soon joined by an ambassador from Moscow. He
could not fail to be impressed by the difference between his position
at the moment and that of a year before when he was regarded as only a
Kozak officer striving to avenge his personal wrongs and to win for the
Kozaks some vestige of their ancient liberties.
At the same time Patriarch Paisius of Jerusalem, who was present
in Kiev on his way to Moscow for the collection of alms and for
conferences on Muscovite Orthodoxy with the Patriarch Nikon, is said
to have addressed Bohdan dan as King of Rus’ and to have encouraged
him to undertake a grand alliance of all the Orthodox States which
were represented at Kiev. The successful campaigns of 1648 certainly
opened up visions of a future to Bohdan Khmelnitsky and inspired him to
undertake extensive diplomatic negotiations among all the neighboring
powers. They made him consider himself a real head of an independent
people and he felt more confident than ever that he could tackle the
problem of relations with Poland on a grand scale.
As a result there is no reason to doubt the reports of the Polish
commissioners whom he met in February, 1649. According to these he
demanded that the Polish administration definitely quit Ukraine, that
the Orthodox Metropolitan of Kiev be given a seat in the Polish senate,
that the Union be abolished, and that the Kozak Host be responsible
only to the King. All this meant that Ukraine would become a third
member of the Polish state along with Poland and Lithuania.
Yet to do this, it was necessary to have a more permanent political
organization. The old Kozak system was well devised to win military
victories but it had never taken up the problems of administration
in any area. The Kozak officers had come to feel that they were the
appointed mouthpieces of Kozakdom and compared themselves to the
Polish magnates. The ordinary Kozaks, equally proud of their position,
resented these claims of their officers and clamored for the old rights
of frequent election. At the same time they looked down upon the
non-Kozak elements of the population, even though the latter had taken
an important part in the campaigns of 1648.
The very success of the Kozak movement had created a new embarrassment.
The pressing task before Bohdan and his associates was to build a
state, to establish in it the rights of the townspeople and the
burghers, the intellectuals and the peasants. They had to draw a line
between the completely autocratic rule of Moscow and the aristocratic
republic of Poland, to secure unity and obedience, democracy and
authority. This was a colossal task and it is perhaps doubtful if even
Khmelnitsky realized the many ramifications of the political problems.
The best that he could do was to expand the Kozak authority and system,
to make the regimental commanders the local authorities, and to hand
over to them all the necessary functions of administration. In the long
run this could not prevail in time of peace. It was little better as a
permanent basis in war, when the commanders would be busy in the field.
Thus the ruling groups of the Kozaks failed to set up a true government
in the territory which they had with such relative ease acquired.
It seemed far more tempting and agreeable to seek for foreign support
and Khmelnitsky spent his time in endeavoring to secure foreign allies
who would assist him against his main enemy. For this the Crimean
Tatars seemed easily the most suitable and he bent his efforts to
securing their aid in the future.
When hostilities finally broke out in 1649, the Kozaks again speedily
obtained the advantage and after a few minor defeats in the north,
they entrapped the armies of their main enemy, Wisniowiecki, in the
town of Zbarazh. It was only the daring and skill of Wisniowiecki that
saved the day until the armies of the new King could arrive. Even that
was no salvation, for Khmelnitsky and his men speedily defeated the
reinforcements at Zboriv and besieged the King and the remains of his
army in a fortified camp there. At the darkest hour for the Poles, they
succeeded in bribing the Tatar Khan to abandon his Kozak allies. He
was the more willing to do this, since he also had no desire to see a
strong Ukraine.
The result was the Treaty of Zboriv which granted on paper practically
all of the Kozak demands. It conferred upon them complete control
of the three provinces of Kiev, Braslav, and Chernihiv, placed the
Orthodox Metropolitan in the Polish Senate and made the number of
registered Kozaks 40,000. This was considerably less than Khmelnitsky
had demanded the winter before and it aroused annoyance in both the
Ukrainian and Polish camps. The Catholic prelates in the Senate
declined to admit the Orthodox Metropolitan to their number and he
obligingly returned from Warsaw to Kiev. It displeased most of the
magnates, even those more moderate than Wisniowiecki, because it
recognized the Kozak leaders as their equals. On the other hand it
promised little for the bulk of the Ukrainian population, who had
joined Khmelnitsky’s army, since in many sections it compelled them
to return, even with an amnesty, to the harsh rule of their former
lords. Many of the more independent went across the border of Moscow to
the so-called Slobidshchina or Free Land which was still practically
a lordless domain. Their departure of course weakened the Host and
deprived it of many men who had done it good service.
Yet the years after the Treaty of Zboriv marked the height of the
influence of Bohdan. It was the time when he could have carried
through far reaching reforms and strengthened the country internally.
However he spent his energies in trying to marry his son Timosh to
the daughter of Vasyl Lupul, the ruler of Moldavia, and in carrying
on negotiations with the Sultan of Turkey and the Khan of the Crimea.
As a result he gave the Poles the opportunity of recovering their
strength and, under the driving force of Wisniowiecki, the work went
forward rapidly, with the result that the Kozaks were badly defeated
at the battle of Berestechko in the summer of 1651, again due to the
treachery and fear of their Tatar allies. The Treaty of Bila Tserkva of
that autumn reduced the Kozak power but it still left Bohdan strong.
It increased discontent against him among the Ukrainians and drove him
to still more far reaching diplomatic schemes. His mood was made worse
by the discovery that his beloved Helen was intriguing against him and
when proof was forthcoming, he had her and her friend executed. The
final certainty that Helen had played him false wrecked his general
shrewdness and embittered him in every way.
Then came his most disastrous move. He appealed for assistance to
Moscow, and offered to place the Kozak Host under the protection of the
Tsar on condition that its privileges be respected. He had undoubtedly
many reasons for this, but when the matter was put before the general
body of the Kozaks, the argument that convinced them was religious.
Moscow was also Orthodox and this appealed to all those classes of
people who resented the Roman Catholicism of the Poles. It was not
so favorably received by the Kozak officers who realized that the
Muscovite regime did not and could not recognize any inherent rights
in any class of the population. The Kievan Academy and many of the
Orthodox hierarchy welcomed the move, however, for already many of
their distinguished members were being invited by the Patriarch Nikon
to Moscow and they felt that the act of Bohdan would place them in a
better position there.
After prolonged negotiations, the Muscovite envoys met Bohdan at
Pereyaslav on January 18, 1654. In a last gesture Bohdan asked the
Tsar’s envoy Buturlin to swear in his Sovereign’s name to respect the
treaty. Buturlin refused on the ground that the Tsar could not swear to
any subject. Popular sentiment had been so stirred up that Bohdan could
not retract and the oath placing the Kozak Host under the Tsar was duly
administered.
Shortly after the Tsar confirmed various Kozak privileges. He
granted the maintenance of the traditions of the Host, the right of
maintaining Kozak courts, the raising of the quota of registered Kozaks
to 60,000, the preservation of the privileges of the Ukrainian gentry,
and the free right of election of the hetman, the payment of a large
sum of money to the hetman, the officers and all registered Kozaks and
the right of the hetman to receive foreign envoys (except that the Tsar
insisted upon knowing and authorizing all negotiations with the King of
Poland and the Sultan of Turkey).
All this seemed very good and the Kozaks at first believed that they
had profited by the agreement. The leaders were not long in discovering
their mistake. There was no more peace than there had been before.
It is true that the Kozaks in their wars with the Poles could depend
upon some support from the Muscovites but the territories which they
conquered from Poland passed directly under the control of the Tsar
and did not add to the prestige or power of the Kozak Host. The Poles
continued to invade their territory. Now they usually had the open
support of the Tatars and the uncontrolled and encouraged devastations
of these nomads often caused the Kozaks greater exertions than in the
old days. Besides that, it was not long before it became evident that
the Muscovite troops intended to settle down as garrisons in Kiev and
in other Ukrainian cities, as an ostensible protection against the
Poles, but in reality as an occupying force.
Khmelnitsky, completely disillusioned, began to look for other allies.
Sweden seemed the most promising, for it was then at the height of its
power. It was invading Poland and was on such terms of friendship with
Moscow that no open criticism could be made of the negotiations. His
relations with Moldavia became entangled with the hopes of Lupul to
capture Wallachia and these only led to the death of his son Timosh
during the siege of Sochava, shortly before his submission to the Tsar.
His plans for a great union of the Orthodox countries were definitely
disrupted and it was not long before Sweden too proved a broken reed.
In the spring of 1657, he was taken ill. To please him, his son Yury,
a boy of fourteen who had shown no signs of having a strong character,
was elected hetman over Ivan Vyhovsky, who had been secretary to Bohdan
and was familiar with all of his plans and negotiations. Then the
father died on July 27, 1657, was buried at his birthplace of Subotiv.
It is difficult to evaluate correctly the work of Bohdan Khmelnitsky.
There can be no question that he was an able and sincere patriot. He
towered in ability, in military skill and in political vision high
above all the hetmans who preceded and followed him. He became in a
real sense the outstanding diplomatic figure of Eastern Europe during
the years when he was at the height of his power.
He definitely moved the Ukrainian, or more accurately, the Kozak
question from one of purely internal Polish politics to the
international arena where it deserved to be placed. In this connection
he was the first of the hetmans who revived the Ukrainian claim to be
a complete and sovereign state, able to negotiate as an equal with
the various countries which were taking part in the game of Eastern
European politics.
Yet the defect and the tragedy of Khmelnitsky, and with him of the
Ukrainian people, lay in the fact that he did not realize soon enough
the essential problem which required an immediate solution. That was
the relationship of the Kozak Host to all the other classes of the
Ukrainian population. For Ukraine to rally all of its strength and
resources, it was necessary to call upon all classes of the population.
This was no easy task in the seventeenth century, when political
thought concentrated upon the rights of the nobility, even more than
upon the well being of the peasantry and the towns. The Polonization
of the gentry had deprived the Ukrainians of exactly that class of
their population which would have been most able to steer the course
of the ship of state. The Kozaks and especially the Kozak officers
felt themselves called upon to assume the role of a new nobility. At
the same time they had so long conceived of themselves as a military
group that they hesitated to make the transformation into a permanent
administrative organization.
Hence arose the insoluble conflict between the Kozaks and non-Kozaks
in the growing Ukrainian organization. Perhaps had Khmelnitsky lived
longer and had the time to think through the reforms that he was
introducing, he might have changed his policies or in a period of
peace he might have cemented his power and accustomed the people to
accept it. He had neither time nor peace. It was necessary to organize,
fight, and build all at the same moment and the result became a bitter
circle in which he could see his way only through a complicated scheme
of diplomatic intrigue. He did not have the power to carry to success
any of his plans and as a result, Ukraine and the Kozak Host were left
at the mercy of either Poland or Moscow or both, depending upon the
general state of their relations at any given moment.
Despite this fact, his work was not lost, for he had created an
attitude, even if only in theory, that would assure to thinking
Ukrainians a permanency and a place in the world. Even those later
thinkers who condemned his submission to Moscow recognized that it
was not a mere act of union, a mere desire to change masters for
the Kozaks, but that it involved a deep political philosophy which
circumstances destroyed.
Khmelnitsky was the real founder of the Ukrainian national movement and
he came nearer to making it successful than any one between the fall of
Kiev and the modern Ukrainian Republic. That was a major achievement
to carry out in less than nine years of uninterrupted turmoil. In one
sense he was too late. Had he played his role a half century earlier,
it is very possible that he might have accomplished more. Had he been
able to hand the state over to some successor with the same breadth of
vision, that man might have been able to continue and stabilize his
work. As it was, he became the incarnation of the Ukrainian struggle
for liberty and independence, and the inspiration of many of his
followers. It was an unkind fate that preserved to the world only a
knowledge of his submission to the Tsar and a distorted idea, zealously
fostered by the Russians, that this was his ultimate goal.
He died too soon, for he had not healed the breaches that were apparent
in the Kozak organization, he had not solved definitely the entire
Kozak problem from a Ukrainian standpoint and it was left for lesser
men to corrupt his ideas and to lead Ukraine to a new and more complete
ruin, with only his example to serve as a beacon light of what Ukraine
might be.
CHAPTER SEVEN
_THE REVOLT OF MAZEPA_
The seventeenth century, which saw the settlement of the English in
America, witnessed a shift in the balance of power in Eastern Europe
and no one had contributed more to this than had Khmelnitsky and the
successful revolt of the Kozak Host. The sudden awakening of the
Ukrainians politically to a sense of their importance was an event of
more than usual significance, and they undoubtedly hoped to play the
role of a neutral state between Poland and Moscow. To both contestants
they presented an entirely new situation.
The Poland of the beginning of the century was mortally wounded by
the Kozak revolt. At the beginning of the century, the King of Poland
had dared to dream of establishing himself in the Kremlin, and while
he failed, the results were not disastrous. The lack of success in
the Polish Kozak policy was disastrous, for the great revolt had not
only torn away from Poland a large part of its eastern lands but had
encouraged the Swedish wars which wrecked the country still further.
The damage was done at Pereyaslav, for an honest acceptance of the
demands of Khmelnitsky up to that moment might easily have permitted
the restoration of the Republic under a different form and have allowed
it to continue strong and powerful.
The magnates and the Polish Catholic authorities would not hear of any
settlement. They were neither ready nor able to support the thoroughly
militant ideas of Wisniowiecki which would have laid upon them a heavy
and continuous burden, perhaps beyond the power of the state, but
which would have provided a consistent policy, the success or failure
of which might be calculated in advance. They would not accept a policy
of compromise, even when Khmelnitsky offered it, lest it injure their
dignity. Thus again Polish wavering promised nothing but ill to the
state as it had when the Kozak question was still a purely internal
problem.
Moscow welcomed the control over the Host. The defeat of the Golden
Horde in the sixteenth century had in a way freed the hands of the
Tsars. The submission of Khmelnitsky advanced their boundaries to the
Dnyeper. Yet there was a definite fly in the ointment. The Kozaks were
liberty-loving people, they were accustomed to personal rights, and
they formed a serious menace to the monolithic structure in which the
Tsar and the Tsar alone possessed absolute rights. If Moscow was to
triumph over its old enemy to the west, it was necessary to hold the
Kozak Host and if it was to continue its policy, it was necessary to
break its influence.
Thus Moscow could not rest satisfied with the conditions produced at
Pereyaslav. Almost at once it commenced to infringe upon the rights
of the Kozaks and to seek to turn them into typical Russian serfs. It
knew that its acceptance of the Host would speedily involve it in war
with Poland and that there would be a clash in which the loyalty of the
Kozaks would be the decisive factor.
This left the Host and the Ukrainians in a relatively advantageous
position. Besides that, there was still the Sultan of Turkey who could
play a hand in the game, for we must never forget that at this moment
the Turkish tide was still running strongly. It was still twenty years
before it would reach its height outside the walls of Vienna and all of
Europe would be terrorized at the thought that a victorious Islam might
push its way further into the heart of the continent.
Everything depended upon the successor of Khmelnitsky. Would he be able
to continue the task of welding the Host and the Ukrainian population
into a strong whole which would be able to speak unhesitatingly and
firmly to both friend and foe? Would he be able to heal the rifts that
were already evident in the organization, which had been evident for a
century and which awaited only a strong and continued effort to mend,
or would he allow them to increase and destroy what had been already
accomplished?
Unfortunately disorder and blind passion were destined to be the
guiding forces of the next half century. None of the successors of
Khmelnitsky possessed his political acumen or the ability to control
the unruly bands of Kozaks and to continue his work of turning a purely
military order of fighters into a modern state. All the disruptive
tendencies which had existed from the beginning appeared again with
renewed force now that the Kozak question was pitched on international
lines and formed a part of the European struggle for power.