Samson Makintsev

Samson Yakovlevich Makintsev
Самсо́н Я́ковлевич Маки́нцев
سامسون‌خان (Samson Khan)
Born 1780
Caucasian line
Russian Empire
Died 1849 (aged 68-69)
Persian Empire
Allegiance  Russian Empire
Persian Empire
Rank Sergeant (Wachtmeister)
General
Unit Infantry, Cavalry
Commands held Bogatyr battalion
Russian battalion of the Persian army
Battles/wars

Samson Yakovlevich Makintsev (Russian: Самсо́н Я́ковлевич Маки́нцев), otherwise and better known as Samson Khan (Persian: سامسون‌خان‎‎); (1849 – 1776), was a general in Qajar Persia of Russian origin. Having deserted from the Imperial Russian Army, a sergeant of the Nizhny Novgorod Dragoon Regiment, he was one of the many defectors that changed sides in the era of the Russo-Persian Wars.

Biography

From at least the beginning of the 19th century, and probably earlier, a steady stream of deserters from the Imperial Russian armies in the Caucasus had fled to Iranian territory, sometimes surrendering to Iranian forces and themselves entering Iranian service.[1] Iran's then commander-in-chief, crown-prince Abbas Mirza, was eager to acquire and retain the services of as many Russian deserters as possible, because their military training was a useful asset to his new regular army.[1] At first, he merely utilised individual deserters to train his new regiments.[1] As their numbers grew, he incorporated them into the Nizam regiments, then finally made them into a separate unit of their own.[1]

One of the more notable deserters that enlisted in the Iranian service was Samson Yakovlevich Makintsev, a staff-trumpeter sergeant, who had deserted from the Nizhni-Novgorod Dragoon Regiment in 1802, just before the start of the first Russo-Persian War of the 19th century (1804–1813).[1] He was born in 1780 in the Caucasian Line of Ukrainian origin and was of the soldiers' children.[2] He joined the Dragoon regiment in 1799, then 19 years old.[3] According to the service record of Lieutenant General V.V. Grushenko’s Nizhni-Novgorod Dragoon Regiment for 1 January 1800, the following is written about him; "Samson Makantsov, Yakov's son. 19 years of age, height 2 arshins, 4 1/2 vershoks (162 cm). White face, light blond hair, grey eyes. Can read and write Russian. Unmarried. Taken into Major O.A. Kulikovskii’s squadron as a dragoon on 14 September 1799, from the soldiers’ children with the regiment who had attained adulthood."[4][3] Him being from the "soldier's children" (soldatskie deti) meant that he was in fact part of a juridically defined social category as was stipulated in the Imperial Russian Petrine ranking system.[3] According the ranking system, the soldies' children belonged to the military domain (voennoe vedomstvo) and were therefore destined for life to the military service.[3] The most probable assumption regarding him being literate – something very uncommon amongst the lower Russian ranks – was that he received his education at the special military schools, which he was allowed to enter as he was from the soldatskie deti.[3]

In Persia

Historian Stephanie Cronin states that the reason for his desertion is not definitely known, but the men of his regiment apparently believed that he had stolen the mouthpieces from the regiment's silver trumpets.[1] After fleeing the regiment in 1802, then 22 years old,[3] he gave himself up to the Iranians, entered Abbas Mirza's service, and was appointed a lieutenant in one of the new Nezam-e-Jadid (lit. "New Army") regiments, the fawj-i-Erivan (the Erivan regiment), named after one of Iran's threatened Caucasian provinces.[5]

Through his efforts, which included the enlisting of other fugitives into the ranks, Makintsev earned promotion to major.[6] Thanks to these successes, soon one half of the Erivan regiment was made up deserters.[6] Seemingly having noticed Abbas Mirza's approval, it gave the Russians the confidence to express their dissatisfaction with the regiment's Iranian commander and to ask that he be replaced by Makintsev.[6] Abbas Mirza, who was unwilling to place a mixed unit including Muslim Iranians under direct Russian rule, instead formed the deserters into a separate unit, giving its command and the rank of colonel, and later general, to Makintsev, who took the name Samson Khan.[6]

Makintsev quickly gained the complete confidence of Abbas Mirza, who gave the Russians the name Bahadoran (heroes) and used them to constitute his palace guard.[6] The most reliable element in the Nezam-e-Jadid, they were better and more regularly paid than the native troops and the king (Fath Ali Shah Qajar) and Abbas Mirza particularly relied on them to suppress domestic rebellions in general. With regard to that, they were especially used in any issue related to "discontent with a religious flavour".[6]

At first, Makintsev recruited amongst the Russians whom he found in Tabriz: deserters, prisoners of war, but also even runaway peasants.[6] As Cronin notes, as his regiment suffered severe losses in the 1804–1813 Russo-Persian War, Makintsev started an active approach.[6] Not waiting for deserters to arrive in Tabriz of their own accord, he made every effort to encourage the flight of soldiers in the Russian army then occupying the Iranian territory which is modern-day Azerbaijan.[6] He employed a range of methods, including "enticements, money and cunning" and her organized efforts in order to seduce troops from their Russian unites. Persuasion was tried first, and then Makintsev's men would ply the Russians "with wine and seize them."[6]

In any case, Makintsev, now having the rank of general, his reputation as a trusted soldier of crown prince and commander-in-chief Abbas Mirza, and the welcome awaiting for those who deserted were by this time well known among the Russian troops stationed locally and were generally attractive to them; the stream of deserters was constant.[6] After the conclusion of the Russo-Persian War of 1826-1828 and the order for the Russian regiments stationed in Iran sparked the signal for a wave of desertions, reducing the senior officers to despair.[6] As well as through an active policy of sedition, Makintsev replenished the regiment from other sources.[6] After the conclusion of the 1826–1828 war with Russia, several hundred Russian prisoners of war were enlisted into the regiment.[6] Cronin notes that as time passed, the sons of those deserter-troops who had married in Iran were, in a continuation of the Russian practise, also enlisted into the regiment.[6]

The strength of the regiment fluctuated. In 1822, they were estimated to number 800–1,000, but after the second Russo-Iranian War (1826–1828) it was reported that there were as many as 3,000.[6] In 1833 alone, 400 new deserters arrived from Russia.[6] Compared to the native Nizam troops this was a comparatively substantial number, who, though also fluctuating and uncertain, probably amounted to around 12,000 around the early 1830s, according to Cronin.[6] Some decided to permanently settle in Iran, integrating into local society, their habitual drunkenness apparently presenting no impediment so social acceptance.[7] Some on the contrary yearned to return home.[8] However, many married and established families; Makintsev himself married and had children, and those who married were given land and apparently lived well.[8] Makintsev himself inhabited a large house in the Tabriz arg (citadel), having made an extremely advantageous marriage to the daughter of Prince Aleksandre of Georgia, the ex-vali (governor) of Georgia, the latter who was living himself in Iran proper as well.[8]

The regiment of Makintsev was the fighting core of the Nizam-i-jadid, and appears to have possessed a considerable military capacity.[8] During the Russo-Iranian War of 1804-1813, Makintsev's regiment accompanied other nizam to the decisive Battle of Aslanduz in October 1812.[8] Though overall a disaster for the Iranians, the deserters under Makintsev appear to have engaged the troops under General Pyotr Kotlyarevsky with some success, reportedly nearly annihilating them.[8] Kotlyarevsky on the other hand acted quickly to take revenge, for the deserters amongst the prisoners were hanged and bayoneted.[8] By the time of the 1826–1828 war, the deserters had developed qualms, and Makintsev tried to avoid a direct confrontation in the fighting, declaring that the "Russians had sworn on the Holy Gospel that they would not fire on fellow Christians".[8] Abbas Mirza however was determined to use his expertise and made him his military adviser, and the regiment subsequently went on campaign on the conditions that it would be kept in reserve, though inevitably it eventually was involved in military operations.[8] After the campaign, Makintsev retired from active service. He then appointed his new son-in-law, Yevstafii Vasilievich Skryplev, a non-commissioned officer recently deserted from the Nasheburg infantry regiment, the new colonel and regimental commander.[8]

Though Russia had been making extensive efforts and appeasement policies for years towards the deserters to repatriate them, with eventually relatively high successes.[9] Makintsev himself, having declined the offer, apparently out of fear that he would be treated differently to the other deserters, tried separately and punished, died in 1849 and was buried under the altar of an Orthodox church that he himself had built.[9]

By the early 1850s the deserter regiment which Makintsev was once part of had vanished, its remnants in Iran absorbed into the native Nizam units.[10]

Issue

Samson Khan married three times;[11]

1. an Armenian from the village Kizyldzha near Salmas of the Khoy Khanate, Samson killed her later for infidelity.
2. Yelizaveta - the illegitimate daughter of Prince Aleksandre of Georgia.
3. unknown - died childless.

Children;

From the 1st marriage, he had three daughters. From the 2nd, a son - Jebrail, and a daughter - Anna. His son Jebrail later served as an aide-de-camp to the shah Naser al-Din, known by the name of Jebrail Khan.[12]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Cronin 2013, p. 148.
  2. ↑ Berge, Adolf Самсон-хан Макинцев и русские беглецы в Персии 1806-1853 гг (in Russian) edition; Русская старина. publisher; Тип. В. С. Балашева, 1876. Vol. 15 page 772
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Cronin 2013, p. 153.
  4. ↑ RGVIA, f. 489, op. 1, d. 2476, l. 1506-116.
  5. ↑ Cronin 2013, pp. 148-149.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Cronin 2013, p. 149.
  7. ↑ Cronin 2013, pp. 149-150.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Cronin 2013, p. 150.
  9. 1 2 Cronin 1980, p. 151.
  10. ↑ Cronin 2013, p. 160.
  11. ↑ Муромов  И. А. (1999). "Самсон Яковлевич Макинцев (in Russian)". 100 великих авантюристов. 100 великих. М.: Вече. ISBN 5-7838-0437-1.
  12. ↑ Lepyokhin 2000, p. 49.

Sources

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