The dissertation examines the formation, organizational structure and functioning of the Russian fortresses system in the lands of the Lower Dnieper Zaporozhian Host during the Pidpil'nenska (New) Sich period, everyday
relations between the Zaporozhian Cossacks and the Russian garrisons as well as the latter's perception of Zaporizhia territories.
The main focus is the period between the Russo-Turkish wars of 1735–1739 and 1768–1774. The Zaporozhian Host and Russian government attempts to stabilize the Russian-Turkish border (with military presence in Zaporizhia lands being one of the instruments to do so) during this period are studied in the context of Danube-Black Sea section of the European Steppe Frontier closure. The study is based on microhistorical approach.
Russian fortresses in Zaporozhian lands were built primarily to solve current tactical tasks of the Russo-Turkish war of 1735–1739 and urgent logistical issues. The important role was also played by retrenchments on the
banks of the Dnieper that became primary bases for the Dnieper flotilla. However, all these fortifications were built as objects of temporary field fortification, what later led to their rapid destruction and loss of proper defensive condition. As a systemic phenomenon, Russian military presence in Zaporozhia dates back to 1736.
The system of Russian fortresses in Zaporozhia underwent changes: two reductions in size, one due to liquidation of the Dnieper flotilla in the early 1740s and one in the late 1740s due to the diminishing military threat, as well as the reform of 1755. In 1755 Russia introduced new levers of influence in the region – the Novosichens'kyi retrenchment was transferred into the command of Kyiv garrison officer, local Russian administrator who worked together with the Kosh Ataman and was directly subordinated to Kyiv Governor.
In terms of staffing and supply, these Russian garrisons were a separate unit of the Ukrainian Land Militia Corps that carried out patrol services in Zaporozhia on a shift basis.
Considerable attention in this study is paid also to the internal organization of Russian garrisons in Zaporozhia, recruitment and rotation of manpower, supply system. The total number of Russian troops stationed in Zaporozhia from the mid-1750s to 1768 did not exceed four hundred soldiers. The rank-and-file personnel rotations in the Lower Dnieper Command took place in «manual mode», by the order of the Commander of the Ukrainian Land Militia Corps, who, if needed, could also move soldiers between the fortifications under his command.
The influence of the Russian military presence in the lands of Lower Dnieper Zaporozhian Host is analyzed, its components such as the control of Zaporozhia and attempts to colonize the Zaporozhian territories are singled out. The task to control the Zaporozhian Sich was added to local Russian forces already in the autumn of 1736 – from that point the Commandant of the Novosichens'kyi retrenchment had to supervise the mood of local
Cossacks. Later this official was treated as a representative of the Kyiv Governor-General at Kosh Ataman and a local Russian administrator, who informed the governor of all events in Zaporozhia and the Russian-Crimean
borderlands.
The state (centralized) and private vectors of the Russian colonization in the lands of Zaporozhia are distinguished in this research. Both relied on the Russian military presence and both were defeated as a result of Zaporozhian Host policy aimed at active colonization of its own territory. In 1740, the Commander of the Lower Dnieper Command supervised settlements that spontaneously appeared near the Russian fortresses, but within three or four years most of them ceased to exist due to population migration to Zaporozhian villages and towns. Private settlements, founded by Russian officers in the Host lands, eventually became subjects of Zaporozhia as well.
Despite the conflicts, the relations were not fundamentally hostile. Thanks to the Frontier realities and the flexibility of Zaporozhian society as a frontier community, there were cases of mutually beneficial cooperation too.
In the Russian commanders' worldview – outside of the official discourse – the territory of Zaporozhia did not belong to the proper Russian lands, and after 1775 it was perceived as recently annexed. In the interwar period,
the Russian administration clearly understood Zaporozhia as a part of the Ukrainian world.
Consequently, Russian strategies on the Frontier aimed at the elimination of the Zaporozhian Cossackdom.
The specificity of the Lower Dnieper Zaporozhian Host – an autochthonous frontier community and an organic component of the Ukrainian world that resisted against the imperial pressure at the local level – only emphasizes the transition of Zaporozhian lands from free frontier to state-building trajectory during the interwar period.
