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Ochakov

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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a fortified town and port of Russia, in the government of Kherson, 41 m. E. of Odessa, on a cape of the Black Sea, at the entrance to the estuary of the Dnieper, and opposite to Kinburn. Pop. (1897), 10,784. Strong fortifications have been built at Ochakov and on the Kinburn promontory, to protect the entrance to the Dnieper. Ochakov stands close to the site of the old Miletan (Greek) colony of Olvia and the Greek colony of Alektor. The fortress of Kara-kerman or Ozu-kaleh was built on this spot by the khan of the Crimea, Mengli Girai, in 1492. At a later date it became the centre of a Turkish province which included Khaji-dereh (Ovidiopol), Khaji-bey (Odessa), and Dubossary, as well as some 150 villages. Russia, regarding it as the main obstacle to the possession of the Black Sea littoral, besieged it in 1737, when it was captured by Marshal Miinnich, but in the following year it was abandoned, and in 1739 restored to Turkey. The second siege by Russia was begun in 1788, and lasted six months, until the fortress was stormed and taken, after a terrible loss of life. By the peace of 1791 it became Russian. In 1855 it was bombarded by the Anglo-French fleet, and after that the Russians demolished the fortifications.