Jetisu

Jetisu (Kazakh: Жетісу, romanized: Jetısu [ʒʲetɘˈsuˑ])[1][2] or Semirechye (Russian: Семиречье, IPA: [sʲɪmʲɪˈrʲetɕje]) is a historical region in Central Asia corresponding to the southeastern part of modern Kazakhstan.

Another mountain complex of much lower elevation runs north-westwards from the Trans-Ili Ala-tau towards the southern extremity of Lake Balkhash.

In the north, where the province bordered Semipalatinsk, it included the western parts of the Tarbagatai range, the summits of which (3,000 m or 10,000 ft) do not reach the limit of perpetual snow.

The remainder of the province consisted of a fertile steppe in the north-east (Sergiopol), and vast uninhabitable sand-steppes on the south of Lake Balkhash.

When Dzungar Khanate was conquered by the Qing dynasty in 1755, the area formed part of the Qing dynasty and was under the direct rule of the general of Ili (Chinese: 伊犁將軍, Yīlí jiāngjūn [zh]), headquartered at the fort of Huiyuan (then more often known as Ili or New Kuldja)[16] about 30 km (19 mi) west of Ghulja (Yining).

Most of Jetisu was annexed by the Russian Empire from Qing China in 1854,[17] before the outbreak of the Crimean War, which delayed the southern advance.

The province was divided into six districts, the chief towns of which were Verny (the capital), Jarkent, Kopal, Pishpek, Przhevalsk and Sergiopol.

Livestock breeding was very extensively carried on by the Kazakhs, namely, horses, cattle, sheep, camels, goats and pigs.

From 1905, after the Russian-Japanese war and the construction of the Trans-Aral Railway, the settlement of Russian people in the area increased greatly under the guidance of the new Migration Department in St. Petersburg (Переселенческое Управление).

Approximately 2,500 Russian settlers are thought to have been killed by the Kazakhs in the violence that followed in Jetisu, and this was followed by equally bloody reprisals against the nomadic population, led by the (all-Russian) workers' & soldiers' Soviets in Tashkent and Verny.

Bolshevik control was reimposed in 1918-21 in a series of campaigns led by Mikhail Frunze, after whom the town of Pishpek in Jetisu was renamed.