Russian conquest of Circassia
Circassia was a small independent nation on the northeastern shore of the Black Sea . For no reason other than ethnic hatred, over the course of hundreds of raids the Russians drove the Circassians from their homeland and deported them to the Ottoman Empire . At least 600,000 people lost their lives to massacre, starvation, and the elements while hundreds of thousands more were forced to leave their homeland. By 1864, three-fourths of the population was annihilated, and the Circassians had become one of the first stateless peoples in modern history. Between the late 18th and early-to-mid-19th centuries, the Adyghe people lost their independence as they were slowly conquered by Russia in a series of wars and campaigns. During this period, the Adyghe plight achieved a certain celebrity status in the West; but pledges of assistance were never fulfilled. After the Crimean War , Russia turned her attention to the Caucasus in earnest, starti...