Fedor Soimonov

Fyodor Ivanovich Soimonov, Knight of the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky, was a nautical surveyor of the Imperial Russian Navy, hydrographer and pioneering explorer of the Caspian Sea who charted the until then little-known body of water. Soimonov was an important contributor to the improvement of navigation along the Russian coasts. As a cartographer he also mapped new territories in Siberia and contributed to the development of farming in that region. As a military man, he served in the Russian campaigns against Sweden and against the Safavid Empire and the Ottoman Turks