Battle of the Town

In the summer of 1655, Russian-Cossack troops began to develop an offensive in the southern theater of operations. In the Lviv area, the troops of the Great Crown Hetman Stanislav Pototsky gathered.

September 18 (28), the troops of the Hetman Bogdan Khmelnitsky and the governor Vasily Buturlin went to Lviv. Hetman Potocki, when approaching the enemy, retreated 3 miles from the city and stood in prepared positions near the Salt City . Khmelnitsky and Buturlin, besieging Lviv, sent a detachment against the forces of Potocki under the command of the steward Prince Grigory Romodanovsky and Mirgorod colonel Grigory Lesnitsky.

Getman Pototsky, who was waiting for the enemy’s approach, took the most advantageous position. A fortified camp was built near Gorodok, located west of the Gorodok-Drozdovichi pond in the fields of the village of Drozdovichi. From the south, the camp was protected by swamps of the Vereshchitsy River . The only way by which one could approach the camp lay through the dam between the pond and the Vereshchitsa river. The guard posts of the Great Hetman were rowing and in Gorodok. Getman Pototsky was confident in the impregnability of his position and “thought that the pond, which washes the place, and many sources of water widely spilled ... are sufficient to protect the troops, and overlaid only rowing” ^[2] .

On the night of September 20 (30), Russian-Cossack troops attacked the positions of the army of the Great Hetman. The Cossacks made dams on the canals, crossed over them, entered the battle with the guards and overturned the detachment sent to prevent the crossing. At the same time, Prince Romodanovsky attacked Polish positions in Gorodok, in which a fire broke out. Polish troops stubbornly resisted. Hetman Pototsky managed to squeeze the enemy, but soon the front straightened, and both flanks of the Russian-Cossack army attacked the hetman's camp. At this time, Polish troops saw the approach of a new army. It was a detachment of the Przmyshelsky Commonwealth ruin, marching in conjunction with the hetman. In the turmoil of the battle, the Poles decided that this was the army of Khmelnitsky and Buturlin. A panic broke out in the troops of the hetman, soldiers fled from the battlefield. Prince Romodanovsky got the Bunchuk of the Crown Hetman, banners, timpani, artillery, the entire convoy and many prisoners. The retreating soldiers of the Great Hetman were pursued in three directions, reaching even Yaroslav . The nephew of the Great Hetman, the Bratslav governor Jan Potocki and the winemaker elder Gulevich, were captured.

The victory near Gorodok ensured freedom of action for the troops of Khmelnitsky and Buturlin. The army of the Commonwealth in the southern theater of operations no longer existed.

• Maltsev A.N. Russia and Belarus in the middle of the XVII century., M., 1974.
• History of cities and villages of the Ukrainian SSR. Lviv region, K., 1978
• Karol Marcinkowski, Cień złotego cielca nad walczącą Rzeczpospolitą 1655 r. 1957 Google Print p.51