Ustym Yakymovych Karmаliuk (March 10, 1787 – October 22, 1835) was a Ukrainian peasant outlaw who became a folk hero

Folk hero

A folk hero is a type of hero, real, fictional, or mythological. The single salient characteristic which makes a character a folk hero is the imprinting of the name, personality and deeds of the character in the popular consciousness. This presence in the popular consciousness is evidenced by...

. He is often referred to as the "Ukrainian Robin Hood

Robin Hood

Robin Hood was a heroic outlaw in English folklore. A highly skilled archer and swordsman, he is known for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor", assisted by a group of fellow outlaws known as his "Merry Men". Traditionally, Robin Hood and his men are depicted wearing Lincoln green clothes....

" and "the last Haydamak".

Early Age

Karmalyuk was born a serf in the settlement of Holovchyntsi in Lityn uyezd of Podolie Governorate. There is little known about his early life except that he possessed some literacy and was fluent in Russian, Polish and Yiddish, besides his native Ukrainian language, as attested by the police documents of the time. He was taken by his owner at the age of 17 to work as a servant in the manor, but was notoriously insolent. As a result his owner decided to forcibly send him into Russian military service, in order to remove him from others whom he was inciting to rebellion.

Established Revolutionary

Revolutionary

A revolutionary is a person who either actively participates in, or advocates revolution. Also, when used as an adjective, the term revolutionary refers to something that has a major, sudden impact on society or on some aspect of human endeavor.-Definition:...

Karmaliuk was enlisted to serve in the Imperial Russian Army in Kamianets-Podilskyi. He was forcibly inducted into the Russian Imperial Army, and served in the Napoleonic Wars of 1812 in an Uhlan

Uhlan

Uhlans were Polish light cavalry armed with lances, sabres and pistols. The title was later used by lancer regiments in the Russian, Prussian, and Austrian armies....

 regiment, but eventually escaped and organized rebel bands who attacked merchants and landowners, while distributing the booty between the poor. He was captured in 1814, and was sentenced in Kamianets-Podilskyi

Kamianets-Podilskyi

Kamyanets-Podilsky or Kamienets-Podolsky is a city located on the Smotrych River in western Ukraine, to the north-east of Chernivtsi...

 to run a gauntlet of 500 "spitzruten" blows, a typical military punishment. He was then sent to serve out the 25-year term of service in a military unit in the Crimea

Crimea

Crimea , or the Autonomous Republic of Crimea , is a sub-national unit, an autonomous republic, of Ukraine. It is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name...

, but he fled again, returning to northern Podilia. Once again he organized rebel bands in Proskuriv, Letychiv

Letychiv

Letychiv is a town in the eastern part of Khmelnytskyi Oblast of western Ukraine. 51 km from Khmelnytskyi and 33 km from the railway station Derazhnya. Administrative center since Tsarist times, formerly in Podolia Province. Population: 11,081 inhabitants . There are brickworks, dairy,...

, and Lityn regions, attracting a wide support base among the serfs, Jews and even Poles. The rebellions intensified over the years, and then had spread not only to other parts of Podilia, but also to the neighboring provinces of Volynia, Kyivshchyna

Kiev

Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....

, and Bessarabia

Bessarabia

Bessarabia is a historical term for the geographic region in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the east and the Prut River on the west....

. Karmaliuk escaped from the castle where he was held captive, but was captured yet again in 1817-18. The second time, he was sentenced to 25 blows with the knout

Knout

A knout is a heavy scourge-like multiple whip, usually made of a bunch of rawhide thongs attached to a long handle, sometimes with metal wire or hooks incorporated....

 in front of the town hall and sent to far-away Siberia

Siberia

Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...

. In 1822, Karmaliuk was arrested yet again and jailed for the third time in the castle's Pope's Tower. On the night of March 12-13, 1823, Ustym Karmaliuk organized an escape with his fellow inmates, during which he was injured and captured just two weeks later. In April 1823, Karmaliuk was sentenced to 101 hits with the knout in front of the town hall. Karmaliuk's mishaps and numerous arrests have caused 20,000 Podolians to be oppressed. By the early 1830s Karmaliuk's guerrilla army was approximately 20,000 strong, with over 1,000 raids on the estates of the Polish and Russian landowners over a 20-year period. The response of the Tsar

Tsar

Tsar is a title used to designate certain European Slavic monarchs or supreme rulers. As a system of government in the Tsardom of Russia and Russian Empire, it is known as Tsarist autocracy, or Tsarism...

 was to station military units in those regions hardest hit by Karmaliuk. Karmaliuk was caught four times and sentenced to hard labor in Siberia, but escaped each time, returning to Lityn and Letychiv

Letychiv

Letychiv is a town in the eastern part of Khmelnytskyi Oblast of western Ukraine. 51 km from Khmelnytskyi and 33 km from the railway station Derazhnya. Administrative center since Tsarist times, formerly in Podolia Province. Population: 11,081 inhabitants . There are brickworks, dairy,...

 Districts. A tower in the Kamianets-Podilskyi Castle

Kamianets-Podilskyi Castle

Kamianets-Podilskyi Castle is a former Ruthenian-Lithuanian castle located in the historic city of Kamianets-Podilskyi, Khmelnytskyi Oblast , in the historic region of Podolia in western Ukraine...

 bears the name of its famous prisoner.

Unlike the Haidamaks of the previous century Karmaluk bore no ill will towards the poor of all ethnic groups and minorities in Ukraine, Jews in particular, and as a result they supported him en masse. His close companions were the Poles Jan and Alex Glembovski, Feliks Jankovski and Alexander Wytwycki and Jews Avrum El Itzkovych, Abrashko Duvydovych Sokolnytsky and Aron Viniar. Many Jews were prosecuted for participating in Karmalyuk's raids and aiding and abetting him. In general, Karmalyuk inspired unprecedented loyalty in all his supporters.

Karmalyuk's death

On October 22, 1835, a Tsarist posse closed in on the Karmaliuk gang at the house of a Ukrainian peasant by the name of E. Protskova, in the hamlet of Shlyakhovi-Korychyntsi near Derazhnia

Derazhnia

Derazhnia is a city and railway station in the Khmelnytskyi Oblast of western Ukraine. Derazhnia is situated along the banks of the Vovk River , 42 km east from the regional center Khmelnytskyi. An important railway junction on the line Lviv-Khmelnytskyi-Zhmerynka. Derazhnia has 10,500...

. There, they successfully ambushed the gang. Karmaliuk was shot and killed, at the age of 48. His body was brought to Letychiv

Letychiv

Letychiv is a town in the eastern part of Khmelnytskyi Oblast of western Ukraine. 51 km from Khmelnytskyi and 33 km from the railway station Derazhnya. Administrative center since Tsarist times, formerly in Podolia Province. Population: 11,081 inhabitants . There are brickworks, dairy,...

 where he was buried. A monument in his honor has been erected there in the 20th century. The man who killed Karmaliuk, Polish nobleman

Szlachta

The szlachta was a legally privileged noble class with origins in the Kingdom of Poland. It gained considerable institutional privileges during the 1333-1370 reign of Casimir the Great. In 1413, following a series of tentative personal unions between the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of...

 F. Rutkovsky, was given a medal by the Tsar

Tsar

Tsar is a title used to designate certain European Slavic monarchs or supreme rulers. As a system of government in the Tsardom of Russia and Russian Empire, it is known as Tsarist autocracy, or Tsarism...

 himself and was granted a pension for life. According to the legend, Karmalyuk was impervious to bullets, and was killed by the only thing that could get him, a lead garment button.

Karmalyuk in Art and Literature

Karmalyuk is a subject of many art- and folk-songs. He is sometimes referred to as "the Houdini of Podilia", as no prison was able to hold him for very long. Affectionately, he is known as the last Haidamak of Ukraine

Ukraine

Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...

.

Karmaliuk was the subject of three portraits by Russian painter Vasily Tropinin. There are a few different versions of Karmaliuk's acquaintance with the artist. According to one version Tropinin was introduced to Karmaliuk by his friend physician Prokopy Danylevsky, who had given medical help to Karmaliuk people. According to another version, Tropinin painted Karmaliuk inside prison. Three portraits of Karmaliuk by Tropinin survive. One is kept in the Nizhny Tagil

Nizhny Tagil

Nizhny Tagil is a city in Sverdlovsk Oblast, Russia, situated east of the virtual border between Europe and Asia. Population: -History:...

 art museum, another is kept in the Tretyakov Gallery

Tretyakov Gallery

The State Tretyakov Gallery is an art gallery in Moscow, Russia, the foremost depository of Russian fine art in the world.The gallery's history starts in 1856 when the Moscow merchant Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov acquired works by Russian artists of his day with the aim of creating a collection,...

 and the third is in the Russian Museum

Russian Museum

The State Russian Museum is the largest depository of Russian fine art in St Petersburg....

.http://nearyou.ru/tropinin/20karm.html

Karmalyuk was the subject of a number of poems by the songwriter Tomasz Padura

Tomasz Padura

Tomasz Padura - An influential Ukrainian-Polish Romantic poet of the so-called Ukrainian school , musician-torbanist, and composer-songwriter....

, some of which became folk songs.

Footnotes

a. In honor of Karmaliuk

Ustym Karmaliuk

Ustym Yakymovych Karmаliuk was a Ukrainian peasant outlaw who became a folk hero. He is often referred to as the "Ukrainian Robin Hood" and "the last Haydamak".-Early Age:...

, the Pope's Tower where he was frequently held captive in is also referred to as "Karmaliuk's Tower."