The 13th Belozersk celebrated its anniversary on 6 December, the feast day of Saint Nicholas, although it was actually formed on Beshankovichy as Prince Repnin's Grenadier Regiment on 10 March 1708. The regiment was formed from the grenadier companies of the Shlisselburg, Butyr, Yaroslavl, Nizhny Novgorod, Belgorod, Neva, Yamburg, and Tver Regiments. Late that year, it was renamed Teyler's Grenadier Regiment, and in 1709 the future Belozersk Regiment became Lacy's Grenadier Regiment, after Peter Lacy. The regiment fought in the Great Northern War with Sweden, and on 27 June 1709 participated in the Battle of Poltava, where Peter the Great decisively defeated Charles XII of Sweden's army. In 1711 it fought in the Pruth River Campaign against the Ottoman Empire, the first of many campaigns against that empire that the regiment participated in.