Yemelyan Pugachev Yemelyan Ivanovich Pugachev ( ) ( c . 1742 – ) was a pretender to the Russia n throne who led a great Cossack insurrection during the reign of Catherine II . Alexander Pushkin wrote a notable history of the rebellion , " The History of Pugachev " , and he recounted some of the events in his novel " The Captain ' s Daughter " ( 1836 ) . Early life . Pugachev , the son of a small Don Cossack landowner , was the youngest son of four children . Born in the stanitsa Zimoveyskaya , he signed on to military service at the age of 17 . One year later , he married a Cossack girl , Sofya Nedyuzheva , with whom he had a total of five children , two of whom died in infancy . Shortly after his marriage , he joined the Russian Second Army in Prussia during the Seven Years ' War under the command of Count Zakhar Chernyshov . He returned home in 1762 , and for the next seven years would divide his time between his home village and several service assignments . During this period , he was recognized for his military skill and achieved the Cossack rank of khorunzhiy , which would be roughly equivalent to the post of company commander . It was also during this period , in 1770 at the siege of Bender , that he first displayed a flair for impersonation , boasting to his fellow comrades that his sword was given to him by his " godfather " , Peter I . Life as a fugitive . In 1770 , Pugachev requested leave to return home to recover from a severe illness , later seeking permanent discharge . Despite urging from military commanders , Pugachev refused to be treated in a military infirmary or return to the front . Convinced by his brother - in - law , Simon Pavlov , he joined a dissatisfied Cossack group who were fleeing eastward for an independent Cossack community on the Terek River . After they were safely across the Don River , he returned home to Zimoveyskaya . The fleeing Cossacks were caught soon after by the authorities , and Pavlov implicated Pugachev in the desertion , causing his arrest . He was held for 48 hours before he managed to escape , beginning his fugitive career . Fleeing for the Cossack community on the Terek River , he arrived in early January 1772 . During his six weeks in the area , he joined a protest group and was elected their official representative . On his way to St . Petersburg to make an official complaint , his fugitive status was discovered in Mozdok , and he was again arrested . He escaped on 13 February and returned home , only to be arrested once again . Dispatched to Cherkassk for investigation , he met Lukyan Ivanovich Khudiakov , whom he tricked into releasing him , after which he fled to Vetka , a Polish border settlement , with the help of many raskol ' niki . He returned to Russia in the autumn of 1772 by pretending to be an Old Believer wishing to return home . He received a visa to settle in the Malykovka district ( present day Vol ' sk ) , where he most likely first heard of the Yaik Cossacks rebellion . Insurrection 1773 – 1774 . The idea of impersonating the late Emperor Peter III occurred to Pugachev early on , even before he reached the Yaik Cossacks . It is of no surprise , given another recent peasant impersonator , Fedot Bogmolov , and Russia ' s history of impersonators . Pugachev , posing as a wealthy merchant , reportedly tested the feelings of the Cossacks at the Yaitsk by suggesting that he lead a mass exodus into Turkey . When the majority seemed to agree to his plan , he deemed it the right time to begin his rebellion . Though he was arrested shortly after once again , and this time held for five months at Kazan , he escaped once more and returned to the Yaitsk to start his revolt . By promising to return several privileges to the Cossacks and to restore the Old Belief , he was able to gain the support he needed to promote his identity as Peter III . The story of Pugachev ' s strong resemblance to the tsar Peter III , who in 1762 was overthrown and murdered by his wife , the future empress Catherine II , comes from a later legend . Pugachev told the story that he and his principal adherents had escaped from the clutches of Catherine . Having amassed an army through propaganda , recruitment and promise of reform , Pugachev and his generals were able to overrun much of the region stretching between the Volga River and the Urals . Pugachev ' s greatest victory of the insurgency was the taking of Kazan . As well as amassing large numbers of Cossacks and peasants , Pugachev also acquired artillery and arms and was able to supply his force better than the Russian army would have predicted . In response , General Peter Panin set out against the rebels with a large army , but difficulty of transport , lack of discipline , and the gross insubordination of his ill - paid soldiers paralyzed all his efforts for months , while Pugachev ' s innumerable and ubiquitous bands gained victories in nearly every engagement . Not until August 1774 did General Michelsohn inflict a crushing defeat upon the rebels near Tsaritsyn , when they lost ten thousand killed or taken prisoner . Panin ' s savage reprisals , after the capture of Penza , completed their discomfiture . On 14 September 1774 , Pugachev ' s own Cossacks delivered him to Yaitsk . Alexander Suvorov had him placed in a metal cage and sent first to Simbirsk and then to Moscow for a public execution , which took place on . In Bolotnaya Square in the center of Moscow , he was decapitated and then drawn and quartered in public . Legacy of Pugachev . The Pugachev rebellion had a long lasting effect on Russia for years to come . While Catherine II tried to reform the provincial administration , the horrors of the revolt caused her to drop other reforms , particularly attempts to emancipate the peasant serfs of Russia . The Russian writer Alexander Radishchev , in his " Journey from St . Petersburg to Moscow " , attacked the Russian government , in particular the institution of serfdom . In the book , he refers to Pugachev and the rebellion as a warning . The term " Pugachevs of the University " was frequently used to describe the generation of the Russian Nihilist movement . The town in which Pugachev was born was later named in his honor by the Soviet government . The central square in the Kazakh town of Uralsk is named Pugachev Square .