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Sheikh Mansur (born Ushurma or Uchermak, – 13 April 1794) was a Chechens military commander and leader who led a resistance movement against Russian expansion into the Caucasus from 1785 until his capture in 1791. Sheikh Mansur is considered the first leader of the resistance in the North Caucasus against Russian imperialism. He remains a hero of the Chechen and North Caucasian peoples in general, and their struggle for independence.
When Ushurma was 26 years old or older, he renounced ordinary life, divorced his wife, and secluded himself. He saw a vision of two mounted messengers from the prophet Muhammad who tasked him with preaching Islam to the Chechens and nearby peoples. He apparently believed that he was the Mahdi, a savior-like figure in Islamic eschatology who was supposed to appear in the thirteenth century of the Islamic calendar. Or, he may have presented himself as a Mujaddid, a "renewer" of Islam supposed to appear at the end of every century. He claimed that his direct contact with the Prophet granted him the ability to see into the future and protect his followers from being struck in battle. Like earlier leaders who claimed supernatural powers, he often covered his face in front of his disciples. Some Russian sources incorrectly claim that he called himself a prophet. In 1784, he adopted the name Mansur (meaning "victorious" in Arabic) and began to style himself as the sheikh and imam of the mountain peoples. He called on them to adhere closely to the Sharia and to reject what he considered non-Islamic practices, such as customary law (Adat), consumption of wine, and smoking tobacco. This was not easy in Chechnya, where Islamic tradition was not as entrenched as it was in Dagestan. The egalitarian implications of his message made it gain popularity among indigent peasants and other marginalized groups. Russian expansion had disrupted the pre-existing social order of various peoples of the North Caucasus, and inequality was rising between the lower classes and the nobility, who often collaborated with the Russians.
In March 1785, two earthquakes occurred which may have been seen as omens by local people. After this, Mansur rallied the Chechens to attack Kabarda in order to force them to adhere to the Sharia. It is not certain whether he was already advocating a holy war against the Russians. Despite this, Sheikh Mansur's actions came to the attention of the Russian military authorities, who sent a force under Colonel Pieri to capture the Chechen leader. The Russian force assaulted and destroyed Mansur's native village of Aldi, forcing its population to flee to the mountains. Sheikh Mansur and his disciples evaded capture and conducted a surprise attack on the Russians while they marched back. 600 Russian soldiers and officers, including Colonel Pieri, were killed. This success was seen as proof of that Mansur had the support of God. Nobles from Kabarda and Dagestan who had previously hesitated to join Mansur now brought their well-armed forces to his side. In the summer of 1785, Mansur's army, reportedly 10,000 strong, attacked the Russian town of Kizlyar and besieged it, but they had to abandon the siege because of the Russian cannons. They also failed to take the smaller fort of Grigoriopolis. Despite these setbacks, Mansur attacked Kizlyar again in August 1785. This failed attempt left many of his men dead and caused others to desert. Nevertheless, several influential Kabardian leaders and numerous Chechens, Kumyks and Dagestanis remained at his side. It was the subsequent defeat of Mansur's army in November 1785 by a Russian contingent commanded by Colonel Nagel that caused Mansur's noble allies to abandon him.
Mansur continued to attack Russian fortresses from the mountains of Chechnya. Losing many of his followers, he tried to achieve a truce with the Russians, but they would accept nothing less than his unconditional surrender. He sought followers in the Western Caucasus, inhabited by the Circassians. This may have also been motivated by the greater attention he was receiving from the Ottoman Empire, which had previously dismissed him as a "rabble-rouser". With another war between the Russian and Ottoman empires approaching, the Ottoman command in the Black Sea forts of Anapa and Soğucak saw an opportunity to unite the Circassian tribes through Sheikh Mansur and use them for military purposes. Mansur conducted several successful raids across the Kuban just before the beginning of the Russo-Turkish War. He took hundreds of prisoners and more livestock. However, a Russian expedition sent at the beginning of the war, in August 1787, inflicted several defeats on Mansur. He fought his last battle on the Urup River on 20 September 1787, against a Russian force commanded by General Peter Tekeli. After this, Mansur fled to Anapa. When Anapa fell to the Russians, he was captured and transported to Saint Petersburg, where Catherine the Great inspected him. He was initially held at the Peter and Paul Fortress. After he stabbed a guard to death during his interrogation, he was moved to the fortress of Shlisselburg, east of Saint Petersburg, where he died on 13 April 1794.
Academic and popular sources were often confused about Sheikh Mansur's religious ideology, frequently characterizing him as a "false prophet", "charlatan" or "impostor". According to Knysh, this confusion derived from Russian authorities' lack of understanding of Islamic doctrines, reinforced by exaggerations by Sheikh Mansur's mostly illiterate followers. In the 18th century, a hoax appeared in a Florentine newspaper which alleged that Mansur was actually a former Dominican monk named Giovanni Battista Boetti; these claims were taken seriously by some 19th-century authors. Sheikh Mansur was the subject of two Romantic novels in the mid-19th century: one in Russian by V. I. Savinov ( Shikh Mansur, 1853) and one in English by E. Spencer ( The Prophet of the Caucasus, 1840).
Sheikh Mansur became a central nationalist symbol during the Chechen struggle for independence from Russia in the 1990s. In 1990, in one of the last acts of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR, Grozny's airport was named after Sheikh Mansur; the name has since been changed. Under the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, the main square of Grozny, now called Akhmat Kadyrov Square, was named after Sheikh Mansur. Streets and squares in different parts of Chechnya were also named in Mansur's honor, although these have been renamed under Ramzan Kadyrov leadership. Sheikh Mansur remains a popular figure in Chechnya. According to journalist Maaz Bilalov, books and articles about Mansur are popular, songs and poems are written about him, and his (fictional) portrait can be found in many houses. The Sheikh Mansur Battalion, a Chechen unit fighting on the Ukrainian side in the Russo-Ukrainian War, is named after him.
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