The destruction of the Russian land. Heroic defense of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery
1608-1610 "Protection of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra by monks from the Poles.".Original drawing by Mikhail Petrovich Klodt (Klodt von Jurgensburg) (1835-1914), engraver Baranovsky. From the collection of illustrations of the Niva magazine.
On September 23, 1608, the Polish detachments of Sapieha and Lisovsky appeared at the walls of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. On September 29, they sent a letter to the Lavra demanding the surrender of the stronghold. However, the monks, archers and peasants from the devastated villages had already managed to prepare for defense. No one even thought about surrendering the Orthodox shrine, although there were exactly ten times fewer defenders - two and a half thousand. The Russians replied to the Polish ultimatum: “Know, proud chiefs Sapieha and Lisovsky, that even a ten-year-old boy will laugh at you, for it is not useful for a person to love darkness more than light, to exchange truth for a lie, freedom for slavery.”
The garrison of the monastery consisted of monks and a detachment of archers sent by Vasily Shuisky to help. There were 3,000 defenders in total. The defense was led by siege governors - Prince Dolgoruky and the boyar Golokhvostov.
Nine Polish batteries smashed the fortress for 6 weeks without noticeable success. Unsuccessful assaults alternated with attacks by the besieged. Sapieha's engineers began to dig a mine gallery. Having learned from the defector that the Poles were going to equip the tunnel with a mine, Dolgoruky ordered to open the old secret passage, protected by three doors, and made a sortie. The Russians broke into the mine gallery, where the charges had already been laid, and blew them up. Since the Poles did not have time to fill (clog) the gallery by this time, the explosion caused destruction on the Polish side.
Shelling and attacks succeeded each other, the number of defenders was dwindling. Food was running out, there was a lack of water, people were suffering from injuries and cold, as the wood stocks were coming to an end. The situation was becoming hopeless.
Every day, the besieged prayed to the Holy Trinity, Archangel Michael, the Mother of God and the founder of the Lavra, Sergius of Radonezh. The Monk Sergius himself repeatedly appeared to the defenders, went around the monastery and sprinkled it with holy water, and with God's help, the defenders of the stronghold of Orthodoxy more and more often succeeded in daring sorties, after which the Lavra was replenished with cattle, firewood, water, flour, and also ... captive Poles. From time to time, small Russian detachments made their way through the Polish blockade to the aid of the besieged. But all the same, the situation remained formidable: the winter of 1609-1610 claimed the lives of many defenders. People died in battle on the fortress walls, died from wounds and diseases. As a formidable harbinger of even greater troubles, scurvy began in the fortress-laurel. But the forces of the Poles were running out.
In January 1610, the Poles retreated after a fruitless fifteen-month siege.
Here is the full chronology of events:
September 22 - the battle near the village of Rakhmantsy and the defeat of the detachment of I.I. Shuisky, sent in pursuit of Sapieha, to prevent him from reaching the Trinity-Sergius Monastery.
September 23, the conception of the prophet John the Baptist - the arrival of the troops of Hetman Peter Sapieha and Alexander Lisovsky to the Trinity Monastery along the Moscow road.
September 29 - Sapieha sent a letter to the Trinity Monastery demanding to surrender.
September 30 - a decisive refusal of the defenders of the monastery.
October 3 - the beginning of the shelling of the monastery from guns.
October 6 - the enemies began to dig an approach moat to the Red Gates of the monastery.
October 12 - the enemies began to dig under the Pyatnitskaya tower.
October 13 - a new shelling of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery and the 1st great attack on the walls of the monastery on the night of October 13-14.
October 19 - battle with the Lithuanians in the cabbage garden and near the Lithuanian tours.
October 23 - the appearance of St. Sergius to the sexton Irinarkh with a warning about the imminent attack of enemies on the beer yard and an unsuccessful attack of enemies on the beer yard on the night from Sunday to Monday.
On October 26, in memory of St. Demetrius of Thessalonica, Archimandrite Joasaph led a procession along the walls of the monastery, the flight of Lithuanian people from the walls of the monastery to their camps.
The end of October - a sortie from the monastery and the capture of captain Brushevsky, who reported on the digging under the monastery fortress.
November 1, in memory of Cosmas and Damian, is an unsuccessful sortie by the defenders of the monastery. According to Tyumentsev, this event took place on November 10.
November 2 - attack on the walls of the monastery on the night of November 3.
Appearance of St. Sergius to Archimandrite Joasaph.
November, on the night from Saturday to Sunday, the appearance of St. Sergius and Nikon besieging the monastery.
It is likely that St. Sergius appeared to both Archimandrite Joasaph and the enemies on the same night, or this phenomenon occurred on October 23.
November 4 - the capture of a prisoner, who showed the direction of the dig and the date of undermining the Pyatnitskaya tower.
November 8, the feast of the Cathedral of the Archangel Michael, - the hit of two cores in the Trinity Cathedral: one pierced the image of the Archangel Michael, the other - the image of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker. Appearance of Archangel Michael to Archimandrite Ioasaph. Destruction of the Lithuanian squeal "Treshcher".
November 9, Wednesday, in memory of the holy martyrs Onesiphorus and Porfiry - a sortie from the Trinity Monastery and the capture of several enemy guns. According to Avraamy Palitsyn, on that day they destroyed the tunnel under the Pyatnitskaya Tower.
November 11 - sortie and destruction of the Lithuanian mine by Shilov and Slota.
November 17 - the beginning of scurvy in the monastery. According to Kostomarov, on this day there was an unsuccessful sortie for firewood and the enemies, pursuing the Trinity people, almost captured the Kalichi Gates.
December 28 - the defenders of the monastery recaptured the cattle and hay from the Poles.
December 21, 25, 28 - according to the secretaries of Jan Sapieha, in the battles on these days, the defenders of the monastery lost 325 people killed and captured.
Tsar Vasily Shuisky granted land to the Trinity-Sergius Monastery on the outskirts of Moscow, outside Zemlyanoy Gorod, along the banks of the Neglinnaya River (later Troitskaya Sloboda and Troitskoye Sukharevskoye Compound).
January 13 - the defeat of the outposts of Pan Suma by the defenders of the monastery.
January 31 - the defeat of the Tushino people at their watering place.
February 15 - A detachment of ataman Ostankov made his way to the monastery of 66 Cossacks and 20 monastery servants with a supply of gunpowder, sent by Tsar Vasily Shuisky to help the Trinity inmates at the insistence of Avraamy Palitsyn.
March is a letter from nun Olga (Xenia Godunova) from a besieged monastery.
May 9 - Archimandrite Joasaph consecrates the chapel in the name of St. Nicholas in the Assumption Cathedral. Relief of scurvy.
May 27 - the 2nd great attack on the walls of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery.
June 28 - the 3rd great attack on the walls of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery. According to Abraham Palitsyn - July 31.
July 31 - night attack on the walls of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery.
August 12 - the departure of the main forces of Sapieha and Lisovsky from the Trinity - Sergius Monastery towards the troops of Skopin-Shuisky.
August 15, on the feast of the Assumption Holy Mother of God, - theft of cattle from the camp of the Sapezhins to the monastery.
September 3 - the return of Sapieha and Lisovsky under the Trinity - Sergius Monastery.
End of September-beginning of October - liberation from the Tushins of Pereslavl by the army of Semyon Golovin and Grigory Valuev.
October 18 - the liberation of Alexandrova Sloboda.
October 19 - arrival at the monastery from Pereslavl by order of Mikhail Skopin-Shuisky detachment of David Zherebtsov of 600 people.
October 28 - the battle for Aleksandrov Sloboda between the troops of Skopin-Shuisky and Sapieha.
The defeat of Sapieha and his flight to the camp near the Trinity Monastery.
January 4 - the arrival of Grigory Valuev's detachment of 500 people from Alexandrova Sloboda to the monastery.
January 5 - the battle of the defenders of the monastery with Sapega and Lisovsky.
January 12 - the flight of Sapieha and Lisovsky from the Trinity - Sergius Monastery, the end of the siege.
“Historical illustration”
Runiverse.
On September 23, 1608, the Polish detachments of Sapieha and Lisovsky appeared at the walls of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. On September 29, they sent a letter to the Lavra demanding the surrender of the stronghold. However, the monks, archers and peasants from the devastated villages had already managed to prepare for defense. No one even thought about surrendering the Orthodox shrine to the filthy.
On September 23, 1608, the Polish detachments of Sapieha and Lisovsky appeared at the walls of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. On September 29, they sent a letter to the Lavra demanding the surrender of the stronghold. However, the monks, archers and peasants from the devastated villages had already managed to prepare for defense. No one even thought about surrendering the Orthodox shrine to the filthy, although there were exactly ten times fewer defenders - two and a half thousand. The Russians replied to the Polish ultimatum: “Know, proud chiefs Sapieha and Lisovsky, that even a ten-year-old boy will laugh at you, for it is not useful for a person to love darkness more than light, to exchange truth for a lie, freedom for slavery.”
The garrison of the Lavra consisted of monks and a detachment of archers sent by Vasily Shuisky to help. There were 3,000 defenders in total. The defense was led by siege governors - Prince Dolgoruky and the boyar Golokhvostov.
Nine Polish batteries smashed the fortress for 6 weeks without noticeable success. Unsuccessful assaults alternated with attacks by the besieged. Sapieha's engineers began to dig a mine gallery. Having learned from the defector that the Poles were going to equip the tunnel with a mine, Dolgoruky ordered to open the old secret passage, protected by three doors, and made a sortie. The Russians broke into the mine gallery, where charges had already been laid, and blew them up. Since the Poles did not have time to fill (clog) the gallery by this time, the explosion caused destruction on the Polish side.
Shelling and attacks succeeded each other, the number of defenders was dwindling. Food was running out, there was a lack of water, people were suffering from injuries and cold, as the wood stocks were coming to an end. The situation was becoming hopeless. But the cauldrons of boiling tar were still ready, the cannons looked sternly in the direction of the invaders, and the peasants, archers and the monks themselves firmly held their weapons. Every day, the besieged prayed to the Holy Trinity, Archangel Michael, the Mother of God and the founder of the Lavra, Sergius of Radonezh. The Monk Sergius himself repeatedly appeared to the defenders, went around the monastery and sprinkled it with holy water, and with God's help, the defenders of the stronghold of Orthodoxy more and more often succeeded in daring sorties, after which the Lavra was replenished with cattle, firewood, water, flour, and also ... captive Poles. From time to time, small Russian detachments made their way through the Polish blockade to the aid of the besieged. But all the same, the situation remained formidable: the winter of 1609-1610 claimed the lives of many defenders. People died in battle on the fortress walls, died from wounds and diseases. As a formidable harbinger of even greater troubles, scurvy began in the fortress-laurel. But the forces of the Poles were running out. The Polish arrogance gradually gave way to concern, fear and, finally, despair, and these few but stubborn Russians did not give up.
In January 1610, the Poles, after a fruitless fifteen-month siege, unable to withstand Russian resistance, fled.
Thus, the promise of the Queen of Heaven to St. Sergius was justified: “I will not depart from this place and will cover it.”
As a reminder of those glorious days - a hole from the Polish core on one of the doors of the Trinity Church.
Here is the full chronology of events:
September 22nd- the battle near the village of Rakhmantsy and the defeat of the detachment of I.I. Shuisky, sent in pursuit of Sapieha, to prevent him from reaching the Trinity-Sergius Monastery.
23 September, the conception of the prophet John the Baptist, the arrival of the troops of hetman Peter Sapieha and Alexander Lisovsky to the Trinity Monastery along the Moscow road.
October 13- a new shelling of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery and the 1st great attack on the walls of the monastery on the night of October 13-14.
October 23- the appearance of St. Sergius to the sexton Irinarkh with a warning about the imminent attack of enemies on the beer yard and an unsuccessful attack of enemies on the beer yard on the night from Sunday to Monday.
October 26, in memory of St. Demetrius of Thessalonica, - Archimandrite Joasaph led a procession along the walls of the monastery, the flight of Lithuanian people from the walls of the monastery to their camps.
The end of October- a sortie from the monastery and the capture of captain Brushevsky, who reported on the digging under the monastery fortress.
Nov. 1, in memory of Cosmas and Damian - an unsuccessful sortie of the defenders of the monastery. According to Tyumentsev, this event took place on November 10.
Appearance of St. Sergius to Archimandrite Joasaph.
November, on the night from Saturday to Sunday, the appearance of St. Sergius and Nikon besieging the monastery.
It is likely that St. Sergius appeared to both Archimandrite Joasaph and the enemies on the same night, or this phenomenon occurred on October 23.
November 4- the capture of a prisoner, who showed the direction of the dig and the date of undermining the Pyatnitskaya tower.
November 8, the feast of the Cathedral of the Archangel Michael, - the hit of two cores in the Trinity Cathedral: one pierced the image of the Archangel Michael, the other - the image of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker. Appearance of Archangel Michael to Archimandrite Ioasaph. Destruction of the Lithuanian squeal "Treshcher".
November 9, Wednesday, in memory of the holy martyrs Onesiphorus and Porfiry, - a sortie from the Trinity Monastery and the capture of several enemy guns. According to Avraamy Palitsyn, on that day they destroyed the tunnel under the Pyatnitskaya Tower.
November 17- the beginning of scurvy in the monastery. According to Kostomarov, on this day there was an unsuccessful sortie for firewood and the enemies, pursuing the Trinity people, almost captured the Kalichi Gates.
December 21, 25, 28- according to the secretaries of Jan Sapieha, in the battles on these days, the defenders of the monastery lost 325 people killed and captured.
1609
Tsar Vasily Shuisky granted land to the Trinity-Sergius Monastery on the outskirts of Moscow, outside Zemlyanoy Gorod, along the banks of the Neglinnaya River (later Troitskaya Sloboda and Troitskoye Sukharevskoye Compound).
February, 15- A detachment of Ataman Ostankov made his way to the monastery of 66 Cossacks and 20 monastery servants with a supply of gunpowder, sent by Tsar Vasily Shuisky to help the Trinity inmates at the insistence of Avraamy Palitsyn.
March- a letter from nun Olga (Xenia Godunova) from the besieged monastery.
May 9- Consecration by Archimandrite Joasaph of the chapel in the name of St. Nicholas in the Assumption Cathedral. Relief of scurvy.
June 28- 3rd great attack on the walls of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery. According to Abraham Palitsyn - July 31.
12th of August- the departure of the main forces of Sapieha and Lisovsky from under the Trinity-Sergius Monastery towards the troops of Skopin-Shuisky.
August 15, on the feast of the Assumption of the Most Holy Theotokos, - the theft of cattle from the Sapezhin camp to the monastery.
End of September – beginning of October- liberation from the Tushins of Pereslavl by the army of Semyon Golovin and Grigory Valuev.
October 19- arrival to the monastery from Pereslavl by order of Mikhail Skopin-Shuisky detachment of David Zherebtsov of 600 people.
28 of October- the battle for Aleksandrov Sloboda between the troops of Skopin-Shuisky and Sapieha. The defeat of Sapieha and his flight to the camp near the Trinity Monastery.
1610
4 January- the arrival of a detachment of Grigory Valuev of 500 people from Alexandrova Sloboda to the monastery.
January 12- the flight of Sapieha and Lisovsky from the Trinity-Sergius Monastery, the end of the siege.
Russian Civilization
Original taken from slovenorus14 on 01/12/1610 (01/25). - End of the siege of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra by the Poles (1608-1610)
Defense of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra
In the Time of Troubles at the beginning of the 17th century, our famous spiritual stronghold of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery was also an example of due resistance to heretic enemies. The monastery of St. Sergius - the main stronghold of Orthodoxy and the center of all paths to the north - was built in the name of the Life-Giving Trinity, 64 miles from Moscow. Since the time of Ivan the Terrible, the Lavra has been surrounded by stone walls four sazhens high and three sazhens thick, with towers, forts and a deep moat.
On September 23, 1608, the commander of the Polish troops, Jan-Peter Sapieha, began the siege of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, this "chicken coop", as the Poles called it with contempt. At first, Sapieha, along with Lisovsky, had up to 30,000 people (Poles and troops of the "thief" - False Dmitry II), but since the siege dragged on and Sapega was forced to send detachments in different directions, sometimes he had no more than 10,000 people.
The defenders of the Lavra were only about one and a half thousand people, including nobles, boyar children, Cossacks and various people - 1300 people and up to 200 monks capable of carrying weapons, many of whom were formerly warriors and now put on military armor over their cassocks. In addition, many old people, women and children from the surrounding villages and the settlements burned around the monastery gathered in the monastery, so that the cramped conditions in it were great. Then the former Queen of Livonia Maria Vladimirovna, in monasticism Martha, and nun Olga - Princess Ksenia Borisovna Godunova in the world were also here. The archimandrite of the monastery was the valiant elder Iosaf, and the governors were the okolnichi prince Grigory Borisovich Roscha-Dolgoruky and the nobleman Alexei Golokhvastov.
The monastery was supplied with food and ammunition quite plentifully, but there was little firewood prepared.
Archimandrite Iosaph took the voivode and all military men to an oath at the tomb of St. Sergius that they would fight hard and "without treason" against the enemies of Orthodoxy and the Fatherland, and then commanded to unceasingly perform divine services and sing the prayers of St. Sergius. The defenders of his monastery were preparing with all their might to repulse the enemy. One half of them was always on the walls and towers, armed with cannons and squeakers, while the other was intended to replace the dead and sick and to make sorties; Brave monks were often at the head of these sorties.
At the same time, the monks actively sent letters to the enemy camp to the Cossacks and Russian "thieves", urging them to repent and secede from the enemies of our faith.
All initial attempts to take possession of the monastery were beaten off by an attack. Soon, the Poles indignantly began to write to the "thief" in Tushino about the monks of the Sergius Lavra, that these "black crows .., nested in a stone coffin, and as far as gray-haired, dirty tricks on us everywhere ...".
To the offer of the Poles to surrender, with the threat of otherwise taking the monastery and putting its defenders to death, Josaf replied: “Let your dark state know that you are in vain deceiving the flock of Christ, Orthodox Christians. What is the use of a person to love the darkness more than the light and transfer the lie to the truth: how can we leave our eternal holy true Orthodox Christian faith of the Greek law and submit to the heretical laws that are cursed by the four ecumenical Patriarchs? Or what acquisition should we leave our Orthodox sovereign Tsar and submit to a false enemy, and to you a foreign Latin, to become like the Jews or be even worse than them?
Convinced that he would have to spend the winter under the walls of the monastery, Sapieha began to fortify himself and from October 3 for six weeks he fired from 63 cannons in order to destroy the wall. However, most of the cores flew past buildings and fell into wastelands or monastery ponds.
Seeing in the unsuccessful actions of enemy cannons a clear proof of God's mercy to the monastery of St. Sergius, everyone was strengthened in spirit in anticipation of an attack, confessed and partook of the Holy Mysteries; many took monastic vows in order to die in the monastic order. Despite the enemy fire, religious processions with holy icons were made daily along the walls of the monastery...
Neither shelling, nor attacks, nor undermining, nor scouts helped the Poles to take possession of the Lavra during its 16-month siege. The courageous defenders of the monastery, enduring hunger, cold and illness, sometimes remaining up to 200 people, survived and on January 12, 1610, they joyfully met the troops of the liberator prince M.V. Skopin-Shuisky.
And more than once, the strong-willed Lavra helped the Russian people overcome the time of troubles. This happened at the turning point in the battles for the liberation of Moscow from the Poles, when the Cossacks who volunteered to help “not only did not help, but also boasted of ruining the noble regiments,” writes I.E. Zabelin. - Hearing this, Archmandrite Dionysius and the cellar Abraham ... promised the Cossacks to give the entire Sergius treasury if they stand, and the Lord will help them ... For this, the Cossacks gladly promised to stand for the faith of Christ and lay down their heads ... ".
When the Poles were defeated, then “Archimandrite Dionysius with the cathedral elders of the Trinity Lavra, in fulfillment of the promise given to the Cossacks, sent them as a pledge of a thousand rubles the treasures of St. Sergius - church vestments, stole in salaries and church utensils. When the Cossacks saw this package, their Orthodox hearts trembled. They hurried to return her to the monastery and sent a letter to him, promising to endure everything, but not to leave Moscow.
Trinity siege - the siege of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery by the troops of False Dmitry II, lasted almost sixteen months - from October 3 (September 23, old style), 1608 to January 22 (12.01, old style), 1610.At the beginning of 1608, False Dmitry II and his followers, having won a number of important victories over government troops, approached Moscow and tried to organize a blockade of the capital. A special role in this regard belonged to the Trinity-Sergius Monastery, which by the beginning of the Time of Troubles had become an influential religious and economic center - according to the medieval Polish merchant Stanislav Nemoevsky, which is confirmed by later Russian sources, the annual income of the Trinity monks was 10 thousand zlotys or 1500 rubles, huge money at the time! Only in the Zamoskovye Territory, the Troitsk brethren owned about 196,000 acres of land (not counting the overgrown with forests), over 7,000 peasant households.
The center of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery was a powerful stone fortress, erected in 1540-1550 on an elevated place, bordered by deep ravines. The occupation of the monastery and subsequent control over it provided a complete blockade of Moscow from the east and control over the northeastern regions of Russia, and the seizure of the treasures of the monastery made it possible to strengthen the financial position of False Dmitry II.
To solve this problem, the united Polish-Lithuanian army of Hetman Jan Sapieha was sent to the monastery, reinforced by detachments of their Russian allies-Tushins and Cossacks under the command of Colonel Alexander Lisovsky. Data on the number of these troops differ (according to some sources - about 15 thousand people, according to other sources - up to 30 thousand people). The historian I. Tyumentsev gives the following data on the enemy troops: the Polish-Lithuanian regiments and mercenaries amounted to 4.5 thousand people, the Tushins - 5-6 thousand. The army consisted of 6770 cavalry and 3350 infantry, the total number of troops was a little over 10 thousand people, which by the standards of that time was a significant fighting force. There were 17 guns, but they were all field guns, almost useless for conducting a siege.
True, it was not so easy to capture the monastery: the monastery fortifications consisted of 12 towers connected by walls with a total length of 1250 meters, a height of 8-14 meters, and a thickness of one meter. 110 cannons were placed on the walls and towers, there were numerous throwing devices, boilers for boiling water and resin, devices for overturning them on the enemy. The approaches to the fortress were blocked by slingshots and gouges. Temples, monastic cells, numerous office premises were located inside the fortress, in which significant supplies of equipment and food were stored. Around the citadel there were the village of Klemyatevo and settlements, which were actually a settlement at the monastery fortress.
Tsar Vasily Shuisky and his entourage were well aware of the strategic importance of the Trinity Fortress. They promptly sent a voivode here: Prince Grigory Dolgoruky-Roshcha, a Moscow nobleman, Alexei Golokhvastov, a Moscow nobleman, Boris Zubov, Yuri and Afanasy Redrikovs from Pereyaslavl, Marina Sila from Kashiryan, Ivan Khodyrev from Alexin, Ivan Bolkhovsky from Vladimir, Ivan Esipov from Tulyan, Ivan Vnukov from Yuryev with eight "hundreds" of nobles, Nikolai Volzhinsky with 110 archers and Cossacks.
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I must say that with all the understanding of the importance of the Trinity Fortress and the heroic siege, the gratitude of the sovereigns was not long and was not disinterested. Boris Godunov, False Dmitry and Vasily Shuisky took a total of 65655 rubles from the Trinity treasury [The Tale of Avraamy Palitsyn. S. 203]. But after the lifting of the siege, V. Shuisky sent the clerk S. Samsonov to seize material resources in the monastery in favor of the state. “ Archimandrite Iasaph took away the guilt of his coming and was horrified by his brother
". He writes to the cellarer in Moscow, who addresses the tsar, “ lays before him a letter of writing, the writing of Archimaritan Iasaph
”[Ibid. S. 204], but the king ignored this petition.
__________________
In turn, Archimandrite Joasaph and the cathedral elders mobilized all the military forces of the monastery: monks who had military experience in the past (there were approximately 260-270 elders in the Trinity), 130-150 servants, gunners and peasants from the monastery estates. Many artisans and peasants of nearby settlements and villages, as well as pilgrims who arrived to celebrate the memory of Sergius of Radonezh, also took up arms and joined the ranks of the Trinity soldiers. An important role in the defense of the Trinity was played by the servants of the "great people".
Thus, according to Russian and Polish data, the total number of defenders of the monastery in the autumn of 1608 was 2-2.5 thousand soldiers and about a thousand old men, women and children.
Beginning of the siege
The leaders of the Polish-Lithuanian army did not expect a stubborn defense of the monastery, based on the mass rejection by the population of Russia of the reign of Vasily Shuisky and the paralysis of Russian state power. Therefore, the refusal of the Russian garrison to surrender the Trinity-Sergius Monastery without resistance put them in a difficult position. First of all, the besiegers had to hastily build their own fortified camps and prepare for the difficulties of the assault, while at the same time trying to enter into negotiations with the besieged. However, in the last question, Sapieha was expected to fail - the archimandrite of the monastery Ioasaph, in a response message to him, put at the forefront not the fulfillment of the oath to Tsar Vasily Shuisky, but the defense of Orthodoxy and the duty " faithfully serve the sovereign, who will be in Moscow ". Copies of this message in the form of letters were widely distributed throughout Russia, playing a significant role in the growth of the national self-consciousness of the Russian people. Thus, from the very beginning, the defense of the monastery acquired, in the eyes of the besieged themselves and in the eyes of the Russian society of that time, a nationwide, deeply state character, multiplied by the importance of the armed defense of one of the main Orthodox shrines.
From October 1608, small skirmishes began: the besiegers fought Russian scouts, the besieged tried to cut off and destroy small groups of besiegers at construction work and forage. The construction of tunnels under the towers of the monastery began. On the night of November 1, 1608, the first assault attempt was made with a simultaneous attack from three sides. The besiegers set fire to one of the foremost Russian wooden fortifications. The flames of the fire illuminated the orders of the advancing troops. With aimed fire from numerous Russian artillery, the attackers were stopped and put to flight. In the course of the subsequent sortie, scattered groups of Tushians, who were hiding in the ditches, were destroyed. The first assault ended in complete failure with significant damage to the besiegers.
The besieged undertook frequent sorties: the defenders of the monastery tried to cut off and destroy small groups of besiegers at construction work and fodder.
According to the monastery inventory of sorties, which has come down to our days, from October 3, 1608 to the end of January 1609, 31 sorties were made by the besieged. During one of the sorties, having discovered a dig under the towers of the monastery, two peasants from the village of Klementyevskoye blew themselves up in it, violating the insidious plans of the enemy. During another, Alexander Lisovsky himself was seriously wounded.
Events of 1609. Scurvy
From January 1609, the situation of the besieged worsened - due to the lack of food supplies, scurvy began. Already in February, the death rate reached 15 people per day. Also, a few stocks of gunpowder began to be depleted. Having received information about this, hetman Jan Sapieha began preparations for a new assault, planning to undermine the fortress gates with prepared powerful firecrackers. In turn, the governor Vasily Shuisky tried to support the besieged by sending a wagon train with a load of 20 pounds of gunpowder, accompanied by 70 Cossacks and 20 monastery servants, to the monastery. The Poles managed to capture the messengers, whom the head of this convoy sent to the monastery to coordinate the plan of action. Under torture, the messengers revealed the information they knew. As a result, on the night of February 26, 1609, the convoy fell into one of the ambushes, the Cossacks guarding the convoy entered into an unequal battle. Hearing the noise of the battle, the governor Dolgoruky-Grove undertook a sortie. As a result, the ambush was dispersed, a valuable convoy broke into the monastery.
Frustrated by the failure, Colonel Lisovsky ordered the next morning to take out under the walls of the monastery and brutally execute the captured messengers and four prisoners taken in the night battle. In response, Dolgoruky-Grove ordered all the prisoners in the monastery to be brought to the walls and hacked to death - 61 people, most of them Tush Cossacks and mercenaries. The result was a revolt of the Tushino detachments among the besiegers, who accused Lisovsky of the death of their comrades. Since that time, discord in the camp of the besiegers began to intensify.
Discord arose in the garrison of the monastery between archers and monks. There were facts of people fleeing to the enemy.
On the ninth of May, on the feast of St. Nicholas, Archimandrite Joasaph consecrated the chapel of the Miracle Worker of Mirliki in the northern nave of the Assumption Cathedral, after which everything followed “ relief” [The Tale of Avraamy Palitsyn. S. 177; Church-historical Month of the Holy Trinity St. Sergius Lavra. M., 1850. S. 47]. On the twenty-seventh of May, a fierce night attack of the enemy followed, during which Archimandrite Joasaph with the cathedral elders performed a prayer service in the Trinity Cathedral " for help on enemies
” [The Tale of Avraamy Palitsyn. S. 178.]. After repulsing the assault, in the ensuing sortie they took “pans and Russian traitors 30 people. And commanded them to play with the millstone; and so it works for the brethren and for the entire Trinity army” [Ibid. S. 179.].
(A prayer service in the Trinity Cathedral during the siege, led by Archimandrite Joasaph. Lithograph of the 19th century)
Sapega, who knew about the difficulties of the besieged, undertook preparations for a new assault, and to guarantee success, he sent a Pole defector Martyash to the monastery with the task of gaining confidence in the Russian governor, and at the decisive moment to disable part of the fortress artillery. Participating in sorties and firing cannons at the Tushins, Martyash really gained confidence in the governor Dolgoruky. But on the eve of the assault, scheduled for July 8, an Orthodox Litvin ran into the monastery, reporting on a scout. Martyash was captured and under torture told everything he knew about the upcoming assault. Although by that time the forces of the garrison had decreased by more than three times since the beginning of the siege, their correct placement in the places of enemy strikes made it possible this time to defend the monastery. The attackers were repulsed in a night battle, during the subsequent sortie, more than 30 people were captured. But the number of soldiers among the besieged decreased to 200 people.
Therefore, Sapieha immediately began to prepare a third assault. By joining the Tushino detachments operating in the vicinity, he brought the number of his troops to 12,000 people. This time the attack had to be carried out from all four sides in order to achieve the complete fragmentation of the insignificant forces of the garrison. The signal for the attack was a cannon shot, from which a fire would start in the fortress, if the fire did not occur, then the second shot, and if the fire did not occur then, then the third shot, regardless of the results. The assault was scheduled for August 7, 1609. The voivode Dolgoruky-Grove, who saw the preparations for it, armed all the peasants and monks, ordered all the gunpowder to be brought to the walls, but there was practically no chance of success in the battle.
Only a miracle could save the besieged, and it happened. The intricate system of signals for the assault played its fatal role: some detachments rushed to the assault after the first shot, others after the next. In the darkness, the orders of the attackers mixed up. In one place, the German mercenaries heard the cries of the Russian Tushians behind their backs and, deciding that they were the besieged, who had come out on a sortie, entered into battle with them. In another place, during flashes of shots, the Polish column saw a detachment of Tushino troops approaching it from the flank and also opened fire on it. The artillery of the besieged opened fire on the battlefield, adding to the confusion and panic that ensued. The battle between the besiegers turned into a bloody massacre of each other. The number of killed by each other amounted to hundreds of people.
Hunger
From that moment on, Sapieha abandoned attempts to take the monastery by storm and decided to starve the defenders of the fortress to death. Historian Yevgeny Golubinsky wrote: Teasing the appetite of the hungry Trinity inmates, they grazed cattle along the dam side - behind the ponds, on the southern side of the monastery, along Red Mountain and on Klementevsky field. With the bait of cattle, the Poles hoped to call the besieged on a sortie, in the hope of beating them. The besieged did indeed make a sortie, but only it ended with the fact that they completely healthy, that is, without any loss in people, got a part of the cattle. On the very day of the Assumption of the Mother of God, August 15, the besieged sent several horsemen to the herd, which was grazing on Red Mountain; the deportees, passing secretly by the Blagoveshchensk enemy, unexpectedly attacked the guards of the herd and beat them, and the herd was driven to the monastery ».
But by autumn, a real famine broke out in the monastery - grain supplies ran out, people ate all the birds and cats.
End of the siege
In the autumn of 1609, the Russian troops of Prince Mikhail Skopin-Shuisky inflicted a number of defeats on the Tushino and Poles, after which they launched an offensive towards Moscow. Moving from Kalyazin, the Russian regiments liberated Pereslavl-Zalessky and Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda. In the former royal residence, a camp was set up to reinforce the troops with detachments flocked from all over the country. Feeling threatened, Sapega decided to deliver a preemptive strike to Skopin-Shuisky. Leaving part of his army to besiege the Trinity-Sergius Monastery, he moved to the Alexander Sloboda, but was defeated in the battle on the Karinsky field.
After that, the detachments of Skopin-Shuisky blocked the retreating hetman in his own camp. Regular communication was restored between the besieged and coming to the aid of the troops.
It was done on time. By that time, the besieged monastery was a terrible sight: a depopulated ghost fortress, which was defended by the living dead, barely standing on their feet. The Poles, approaching the fortress walls, shuddered with horror at the sight of these skeletons covered with leather, and that icy stubbornness that again and again understood them to fight.
On October 29, 1609 and January 14, 1610, the defenders received reinforcements: detachments of archers, governor Davyd Zherebtsov (900 people) and Grigory Valuev (500 people), broke into the monastery. The reinforced garrison began active hostilities. In one of the sorties, the archers set fire to the wooden fortifications of the Sapieha camp. The numerical superiority of the enemy did not allow them to break into the camp, but the outcome of the struggle was already clear. Knowing about the imminent approach of the main army of Skopin-Shuisky, Sapega ordered to hastily lift the siege. On January 22, 1610, the Polish-Lithuanian detachments retreated from the monastery towards Dmitrov. There they were overtaken and defeated by the Russian detachment of governor Ivan Kurakin. As a result, Sapieha brought a little more than 1,000 people back to False Dmitry II.
In the besieged monastery, by the end of the siege, no more than 1000 people remained from those who were there at the beginning of the siege, of which the number of the garrison was less than 200 people.
The successful end of the siege had a significant impact on the mood of the population, raised the morale of the troops, which for the first time during the Time of Troubles gave such a decisive rebuff to foreign invaders.
After the lifting of the siege, Archimandrite Joasaph, with the blessing of Patriarch Hermogenes, retired to the place of his tonsure - the Pafnutiev-Borovsky Monastery, which soon experienced an enemy attack. I. O. Tyumentsev believes that the archimandrite “ Joasaph, as before in the Trinity-Sergius Monastery, convinced the brethren, nobles and archers to sit down under siege and repulse the enemy ” [Tyumentsev I. O. Time of Troubles in Russia ... S. 545.]. But unlike the Trinity Monastery, the Borovskaya Monastery was taken by the invaders due to the betrayal of the governor on July 5, 1610. “ Well, Lithuanian people entered the church and began to chalice the hegumen and brothers<…>and beat all sorts of people in the monastery "[PSRL. T. 14. S. 98–99. See also: Ancient Russian vivliophy. Ed. 2. M., 1789. Part 11. S. 419–422.]. At the same time, the courageous Archimandrite Joasaph also died. So the hero of Troitsky ended his life as a martyr " seats”.
The Monk Martyr Joasaph of Borovsky is commemorated on January 12/25 and July 5/18.
Our Venerable Father Sergius and Venerable Martyr Joasapha, pray to God for us!
The Trinity-Sergius Lavra, in church literature usually the Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra, is the largest Orthodox male stauropegial monastery in Russia (ROC), located in the center of the city of Sergiev Posad, Moscow Region, on the Konchura River. Founded in 1337 by St. Sergius of Radonezh.
In the Middle Ages, at certain points in history, played a prominent role in political life North-Eastern Russia; was the backbone of the Moscow rulers. According to accepted church historiography, he took part in the struggle against the Tatar-Mongol yoke; opposed the supporters of the government of False Dmitry II in the Time of Troubles.
The siege of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery by the troops of False Dmitry II lasted almost sixteen months - from September 23, 1608 to January 12, 1610, when it was removed by the troops of Mikhail Vasilyevich Skopin-Shuisky and Jacob Delagardie.
By the Time of Troubles, the Trinity-Sergius Monastery was already an influential religious center, the owner of the richest treasury and a first-class military fortress.
The monastery was surrounded by 12 towers, connected by a fortress wall 1250 meters long, 8 to 14 meters high, 1 meter thick. 110 cannons were placed on the walls and towers, there were numerous throwing devices, boilers for boiling water and resin, devices for overturning them on the enemy. Having strengthened near Moscow, False Dmitry II and the Polish forces supporting him made an attempt to organize its complete blockade. The occupation of the monastery and subsequent control over it provided a complete blockade of Moscow from the east and control over the northeastern regions of Russia, the seizure of the treasures of the monastery made it possible to strengthen the financial position, and attracting influential monastic brethren to their side promised the final collapse of the authority of Tsar Vasily Shuisky and the subsequent wedding to the kingdom False Dmitry II.
To solve this problem, the united Polish-Lithuanian army of Hetman Jan Sapieha was sent to the monastery, reinforced by detachments of their Russian allies-Tushins and Cossacks under the command of Colonel Alexander Lisovsky. Data on the number of these troops differ (according to some sources - about 15 thousand people, according to other sources - up to 30 thousand people).
The government of Vasily Shuisky sent in advance to the monastery archery and Cossack detachments of the governor Grigory Dolgorukov-Grove and the Moscow nobleman Alexei Golokhvastov. By the beginning of the siege, the defenders numbered up to 2,300 military men and about 1,000 thousand peasants of neighboring villages, pilgrims, monks, servants and workers of the monastery, who took an active part in its defense.
The leaders of the Polish-Lithuanian army did not expect a stubborn defense of the monastery, based on the mass rejection by the population of Russia of the reign of Vasily Shuisky and the paralysis of Russian state power. Therefore, the refusal of the Russian garrison to surrender the Trinity-Sergius Monastery without resistance put them in a difficult position. First of all, the besiegers had to hastily build their own fortified camps and prepare for the difficulties of the assault, while at the same time trying to enter into negotiations with the besieged. However, in the last question, Sapieha was expected to fail - the archimandrite of the monastery Joasaph, in a response message to him, put at the forefront not the fulfillment of the oath to Tsar Vasily Shuisky, but the defense of Orthodoxy and the duty "to faithfully serve the sovereign who will be in Moscow." Copies of this message in the form of letters were widely distributed throughout Russia, playing a significant role in the growth of the national self-consciousness of the Russian people. Thus, from the very beginning, the defense of the monastery acquired, in the eyes of the besieged themselves and in the eyes of the Russian society of that time, a nationwide, deeply state character, multiplied by the importance of the armed defense of one of the main Orthodox shrines.
On the night of November 1, 1608, the first assault attempt was made with a simultaneous attack from three sides. With aimed fire from numerous Russian artillery, the attackers were stopped and put to flight. In the course of the subsequent sortie, scattered groups of Tushians, who were hiding in the ditches, were destroyed. The first assault ended in complete failure with significant damage to the besiegers.
From January 1609, the situation of the besieged worsened - due to the lack of food supplies, scurvy began. Already in February, the death rate reached up to 15 people per day. Also, a few stocks of gunpowder began to be depleted. Having received information about this, hetman Jan Sapieha began preparations for a new assault, planning to undermine the fortress gates with prepared powerful firecrackers. Although by that time the forces of the garrison had decreased by more than three times since the beginning of the siege, their correct placement in the places of enemy strikes made it possible this time to defend the monastery. The attackers were repulsed in a night battle, during the subsequent sortie, more than 30 people were captured. But the number of soldiers among the besieged decreased to 200 people. Therefore, Sapieha immediately began to prepare a third assault. By joining the Tushino detachments operating in the vicinity, he brought the number of his troops to 12,000 people. This time the attack had to be carried out from all four sides in order to achieve the complete fragmentation of the insignificant forces of the garrison.
As the ranks of the defenders thinned out, despondency began to take hold of the weakest, and voices even began to be heard that it was better to surrender to the enemy voluntarily, because it was no longer possible to send to Moscow for help that would have arrived in time for the spring, for the resumption of hostilities.
According to legend, the Monk Sergius, in order to maintain courage and encourage the faint-hearted, appeared to the sexton Irinarkh and said to him:
- Tell the brethren and all the soldiers: why grieve that it is impossible to send a message to Moscow? Today, at three o'clock in the morning, I sent from myself to Moscow, to the house of the Most Pure Mother of God and to all the Moscow miracle workers, three of my disciples: Micah, Bartholomew and Naum. Enemies saw sent, ask why they did not seize them?
Irinarch told about this vision. Everyone began to ask the guards - did anyone see those sent from the monastery? It turned out that the enemy guards really saw the three elders and began to pursue them, hoping to quickly overtake them, since the horses under the elders were very bad. But the persecutors were deceived: the horses under the elders rushed, as if winged. The enemies were unable to overtake them.
At that time, there was one sick elder in the Monastery. Hearing about the miracle, he began to think about what kind of horses the elders sent by Sergius were on and did all this really happen? Then the Monk appeared to him and said that he sent the elders on three blind horses, which, due to lack of food, were released outside the monastery fence. After that, he healed the old man from the disease and at the same time from unbelief.
According to legend, on that very day in Moscow they saw a riding old man, followed by twelve wagons filled with baked bread. Moscow was then also besieged by enemies and was in need of bread. The elder with wagons and companions was heading to the Epiphany Monastery, where there was then a Lavra farmstead. Those who saw this marveled and wondered:
– Who is this Elder and his companions, and how did they get through the enemy army?
The old man replied kindly:
– Everything from the house of the Most Holy and Life-Giving Trinity.
When asked what was happening in the Monastery of St. Sergius, the elder answered:
- The Lord will not betray his name to reproach, only you yourself, brethren, do not be embarrassed and do not give in to despair.
Meanwhile, a rumor began to spread around Moscow about those who had arrived from the Monastery of Sergius. Tsar Basil himself asked why they had not been brought to him? Many people began to flock to the Epiphany Monastery, but no one saw the arrivals there. When suddenly there was a great abundance of bread in this monastery, then they realized that it was the appearance of St. Sergius.
Thus, the spiritual help of the Reverend was refracted in the people's consciousness.
Source Banner of St. Sergius of Radonezh. Yarovskaya N. (Roerich E.I.)
Historical studies show that the intricate system of signals for the assault played a fatal role for the besiegers - some detachments rushed to the assault after the first shot, others after the subsequent ones. In the darkness, the orders of the attackers mixed up. The artillery of the besieged opened fire on the battlefield, adding to the confusion and panic that ensued. The battle between the besiegers turned into a bloody massacre of each other. The number of killed by each other amounted to hundreds of people. There was a split in the besieging army. The besieged, on the contrary, were sure that the miraculous salvation of the monastery was the result of divine intercession and that the end of the siege was near.
Knowing about the movement from Novgorod to the monastery of the troops of Mikhail Skopin-Shuisky, Sapega ordered the siege to be hastily lifted. On January 12, 1610, the Polish-Lithuanian detachments retreated from the monastery towards Dmitrov. There they were overtaken and defeated by the Russian detachment of governor Ivan Kurakin. As a result, Sapieha brought a little more than 1,000 people back to False Dmitry II.
In the besieged monastery, by the end of the siege, no more than 1000 people remained from those who were there at the beginning of the siege, of which the number of the garrison was less than 200 people.
The successful end of the siege had a significant impact on the mood of the population, raised the morale of the troops, which for the first time during the Time of Troubles gave such a decisive rebuff to foreign invaders.