Russia Takes Tashkent

June 17, 1865

A Russian detachment under Chernyayev, acting beyond his orders, stormed Tashkent and added the largest city of Central Asia to the tsar's empire. The Great Game between Britain and Russia now had a new front. Over the next fifteen years the khanates of Khiva, Bukhara, and Khokand would fall to Russian bayonets.