On May 1, Shein, the generalissimo, boarded his commander's galley and raised on its stern a great embroidered banner bearing the Tsar's arms. Two days later, the first ships weighed anchor and the long procession of galleys and barges began the voyage down the Don. Peter, starting later with a battle squadron of eight fast galleys, overtook the main fleet on May 26. By the end of the month, the entire fleet of barges and galleys had reached the Russian-held watchtower forts above Azov.
Fighting began immediately. On May 28, the leader of the Don Cossacks, who had gone ahead with 250 men to reconnoiter the mouth of the river, sent back word that two large Turkish ships were anchored there. Peter decided to attack. Nine galleys were selected, and one of Gordon's best regiments embarked in them. They were accompanied down the river by forty Cossack boats, each carrying twenty men. In unfamiliar waters and with unfavorable winds, the galleys began to go aground and were ordered to turn back. Peter transferred into one of the lighter Cossack boats and continued down the river, but at its mouth he found not two but thirty Turkish craft, including warships, barges and lighters. This force he judged too strong for his small boats, and he returned upstream to the Russian camp; the Cossacks, however, remained in the vicinity of the Turkish ships. The following night, while the Turks were still moving supplies from the sea-going ships to the shore, the Cossack raiders attacked and captured ten of the smaller Turkish boats. The remainder of the Turkish force fled back to the main anchorage, where the Turkish captains became so alarmed that, although their unloading was still incomplete, the entire Turkish fleet weighed anchor and sailed the open sea. This was the last succor the city of Azov was to receive.
A few days later, Peter returned to the mouth of the river, bringing his entire force of twenty-nine galleys safely past the fortress of Azov. The city was now isolated, and any help sent by the Sultan would have to fight its way upriver through Peter's flotilla. To strengthen his grip, Peter landed troops at the mouth of the river and constructed two small forts containing artillery. When these were finished, he wrote to Romodanovsky, "We are now completely out of danger of the Turkish fleet." On June 14, a number of ships appeared and attempted to land troops to attack the Russian forts, but the approach of Peter's galleys quickly frightened them away. Two weeks later, the Turks tried again, but again the arrival of the Russian galleys forced them to withdraw.
Meanwhile, with the sea secure and the city isolated, Peter's generals and engineers could proceed with the siege. Fortunately for them, the Turkish garrison of Azov, not expecting the Russians to return after their previous failure, had done little to improve its situation. The Turks had not bothered to level the Russian earth siege works or fill in the Russian trenches of the previous summer, and Peter's returning soldiers reoccupied them quickly with a minimum of fresh digging. With twice its former numbers, the Russian army was now able to spread its siege lines completely around the land side of the city.
Once his artillery was in place, Peter called on the Turkish Pasha in Azov to surrender. On June 26, when the Tsar's demand was refused, the Russian cannon opened fire. Through the days that followed, Peter lived primarily on his galley anchored at the mouth of the Don, coming upstream at times to watch the bombardment. When news of his activities reached Moscow, his sister Natalya, alarmed by reports that he was exposing himself to enemy fire, wrote and begged him not to go near enemy cannonballs and bullets. Lightheartedly, Peter replied, "It is not I who go near to cannonballs and bullets, but they come near to me. Send orders for them to stop it."
As all hope of reinforcement from the sea was gone, Peter repeated his offer of good surrender terms to the garrison. A Russian archer fired an arrow over the walls bearing a written offer of honorable terms, granting the garrison the right to depart the fortress with all its arms and baggage if it surrendered before the coming assault. The answer was a billowing line of smoke from the walls as all the Turkish cannon fired back in unison.
Meanwhile, the siege works progressed. Under Gordon's direction, 15,000 Russians toiled with shovels, filling baskets of earth and piling up dirt higher and higher, and nearer and nearer the Turkish walls, until at last a vast earth platform had been built from which it was possible to see and fire directly down into the streets of the town. By mid-July, the Austrian siege engineers sent by the Emperor Leopold arrived. They had been four months en route, having understood that the campaign would not begin until late summer. When Peter discovered that their ignorance was due to the unwillingness of Ukraintsev at the Foreign Ministry in Moscow to reveal the army's plan to Austria for fear it would leak to the Turks, he wrote in fury to Vinius, the culprit's brother-in-law: "Has he any healthy good sense? Entrusted with state matters, yet he conceals what everybody knows. Just tell him that what he does not write on paper I shall write on his back!"
The Austrian engineers were impressed by the magnitude of the Russian earth mound, but suggested a more scientific approach, using mines, trenches and well-placed siege cannon. Nevertheless, it was the earth mound that resulted in the taking of the town. A number of Cossacks, disgusted by the endless work with shovels and baskets and finding carrying earth a poor substitute for fighting, determined to attack the town on their own. On July 27, without orders from their generals, 2,000 Cossacks stormed down from the earth mound onto the walls and into the streets of the town. Had they been supported by regular soldiers or Streltsy, they would have been successful. As it was, a desperate Turkish counterattack forced them back, but they managed to keep control of one of the comer towers of the wall, where they were finally reinforced by soldiers sent by Golovin. The following day, to exploit the breakthrough, Shein ordered a general assault, but before it could begin, the Turks signaled by lowering and waving their banners that they were ready to surrender. The Pasha, seeing his wall breached, had decided to accept the Russian offer of surrender under honorable conditions.
The terms allowed the Turks to withdraw with all their arms and baggage, along with their wives and children, but Peter insisted that" the Dutch traitor Jensen be delivered. The Pasha hesitated as Jensen screamed at him, "Cut off my head, but don't give me up to Moscow!" But the Tsar insisted, and Jensen was brought, tied hand and foot, into the Russian camp.
The following day, with banners flying, the Turkish garrison marched out of Azov and through the Russian lines to board the Turkish ships which had been permitted to approach. Shein, the victorious commander, waited on horseback by the embarkation point. The Pasha thanked him for keeping his word, lowered his banner in respect, boarded his ship and sailed away. Ten Russian regiments marched into the empty city, which was found heavily damaged by the bombardment. The Cossacks could not be restrained and looted the empty houses while the Russian commanders sat down to a victory banquet which spared "neither drink nor powder."