Deportation

After the devastation of Aukh (the Chechen region in the north-east) in summer 1841 the empire resettled the Aukh families loyal to it away from their land. The imperial historian Yurov recorded: "By 21 June 180 families had gathered in the villages of Aktash and Yurt-Aukh; as a pledge of submission they delivered their most honoured men as amanats and sent their herds to pasture in Salatau" (amanat - a person whom the empire took from a community as a hostage)^[1]. When the troops withdrew in September the families were led away from their native land: historian N. I. Pokrovsky - "the Aukhovites loyal to tsarism were settled in Kumyk auls, where they quickly fell under the heavy hand of the Kumyk princes"^[2]. The pressure on the families was two-sided: according to Yurov, the Aukhovites who had gone over to the empire were threatened with reprisal by the Imamate, "one thing remained to them - to hold fast to the Russians"^[1] - a choice between two threats that ended in the loss of their home and subjection to alien lords. The creation of the Sunzha Line went through the expulsion of the people living on it. Historians Ya. Z. Akhmadov and E. Kh. Khasmagomadov write: after the decision to create the line of Cossack stanitsas "the systematic expulsion of the Chechens began. In the end the largest community of Lesser Chechnya - Karabulak - was deprived of its lands entirely" (the Karabulaks - a Vainakh community between Chechnya and Ingushetia)^[3]. The sweep of December 1846 squeezed the inhabitants off the plain physically: the imperial officer Poltoratsky, a participant of the expedition, recorded - "the country around the Aldy hamlets kept emptying: the auls were burned, and their inhabitants were pushed further into the forests"^[4].