The Turkish Empire, its Growth and Decay

Two events now occurred which materially affected the position of Turkey, and deprived Mahmoud of the fruits of his ably devised policy. The one was the death of Alexander, the Emperor of Russia, the other the decision of the British Government to intervene on behalf of Greece. Alexander for some years past had been on the horns of a dilemma. He had a deep sympathy for the subjects of the Ottoman Empire who were members of the Greek Church, and a great aversion to Turkish rule. But he also hated and feared revolution. He believed in the divine right of rulers, however bad, and would take no step to support the revolt of their subjects, however oppressive their government. He feared that a dangerous precedent might be extended to his own Empire. This conflict of views paralysed his action. He gave no assistance to the Greek insurgents. So long as he lived there was little hope that Greece would recover its independence. He died late in 1825, and was succeeded by his brother, Nicholas, a much younger and more vigorous man, and a truer exponent of Russian ideals. The new Czar had no objection to insurrection if it was not directed against his own government. He hated the Turks and wished to drive them out of Europe much more than he sympathized with the Greeks. He had many other grounds of complaint against the Porte. It has also been suggested that he wished to come to conclusions with it before time had been given for perfecting his new army.

As regards Great Britain, its Government had not originally sympathized with the Greek revolution, but the reverse. But public opinion, outraged by the barbarities which had been committed, had produced an influence on it, and Mr. Canning, the Foreign Secretary, was personally very favourable to the cause of Greece. The Government as a whole held the view that the continuance of disorder in Greece was a menace to the peace of Europe. They had no wish for the extension of Russia at the expense of Turkey. They thought that if Greece were not pacified Russia would intervene, and would not confine its claim to the settlement of the Greek claims, but would aim at other conquests. They decided, therefore, to make an effort to settle the Greek question on the basis of autonomy, subject to the suzerainty of the Sultan. In this view the Cabinet sent the Duke of Wellington to St. Petersburg in 1826 to negotiate with the Czar. He effected an arrangement which was later embodied in the treaty of London of July 6, 1827, between the three Powers, Great Britain, Russia, and France, for the pacification of Greece. Under the terms of this treaty it was agreed, with a view to bringing about a reconciliation between the Ottoman Porte and the Greeks, to offer mediation, and to demand an immediate armistice as a preliminary to the opening of a negotiation.

Under the arrangement to be proposed to the Ottoman Porte, Greece was to be granted complete autonomy, under the suzerainty of the Sultan, and was to pay a fixed annual tribute. It was to be governed by authorities whom its people were to nominate. In order to bring about a complete separation between the individuals of the two nations and to prevent the collisions resulting from a long struggle, the Greeks were to enter upon possession of all Turkish property, either on the continent or in the isles of Greece, on condition of indemnifying the former proprietors by the payment of an annual sum to be added to the tribute. By an additional secret article it was provided that “if, within one month, the Ottoman Porte did not agree to accept the mediation of the three Powers and consent to an armistice, the signatories of the treaty would find the necessity for an approximation with the Greeks by entering into relations with them, and would employ all their means for the accomplishment of the objects of the treaty without, however, taking any part in the hostilities between the two contending parties.”

In accordance with this treaty, a demand was made on the Porte, by the ambassadors of the three Powers, for an armistice, and for a pacification of Greece on the basis above described. The Porte indignantly refused to entertain the proposed mediation. It denied the right of the Powers to intervene as regards its Greek subjects. In a manifesto to its own people, the Porte justified its refusal to mediate on the proposed basis. It denied that the Greeks had any cause for complaint against the Ottoman rule. “It is notorious,” it said, “that these Greeks have been treated like Mussulmans in every respect and as to everything which regards their property, their personal security, and the defence of their homes, and that they have been loaded with benefits by the present Sultan.”

The negotiations between the Porte and the ambassadors were protracted by the former, in order that an Egyptian fleet, bringing large reinforcements to Ibrahim in Greece, might arrive at Navarino before the conclusion of them. After the final rejection of the proposals of the ambassadors, instructions were given to the combined fleet of the three Powers to effect a blockade of the Greek ports, and to prevent the entrance or departure of any Turkish or Egyptian vessels of war.

The combined fleet, under command of the British admiral, Sir Edward Codrington, thereupon took up a position outside the bay of Navarino. The admiral then entered into negotiations with the Turkish admiral and concluded an armistice on behalf of the Greeks. In spite of this, the Egyptian troops, under Ibrahim Pasha, continued to ravage the Morea in the most cruel manner, devastating property, murdering the men, and carrying off the young women for sale as slaves in Egypt. As the winter was approaching, the British admiral thought it would be difficult to maintain his position outside the bay. He determined, therefore, to enter the bay with his fleet. The combined fleet consisted of ten vessels of the line, ten frigates and smaller vessels, with about twelve hundred guns. The Turko-Egyptian fleet consisted of five ships of the line, fifteen frigates, and sixty-two smaller vessels, armed with two thousand guns. It was anchored in a crescent facing the entrance of the bay. There were also batteries on shore commanding the entrance of the bay. The allied fleet entered the bay without opposition from these batteries and anchored in a line alongside of the Turkish and Egyptian vessels.

It was obvious that the position was a most critical one, almost certain to lead to an armed conflict. The Turks fired the first gun and broke the armistice, whether intentionally, or not, is not quite clear. The challenge was taken up. There followed a fierce battle between the two fleets. In a few hours of this 20th of October, 1827, the Turko-Egyptian fleet was completely destroyed. With the exception of some of the smaller craft, all the vessels were sunk or burnt. Their crews had fought valiantly, but they were no match for those of the allied fleet. But their guns caused much loss of life and did much damage, and the British battleships, after the battle, were compelled to return to England for repairs. The batteries on shore did not begin to fire until the allied fleet had taken position. They might have effected much more damage if they had fired on the fleet when entering the bay. A more complete destruction of a fleet had never occurred.

This great victory gave no satisfaction to the British Government. The spirit of Canning no longer inspired it. He had died since the initiation of the policy which inevitably led to this naval battle. On the meeting of the British Parliament, early in 1828, the Speech from the Throne referred to the battle in the following terms: “His Majesty deeply laments that this conflict should have occurred with the naval force of our ancient ally. He still entertains a confident hope that this untoward event will not be followed by further hostilities.” The Duke of Wellington, who was now Prime Minister, when challenged in the House of Lords as to the expression ‘untoward event,’ said: —

The Ottoman Empire was an essential part of the balance of power in Europe. Its preservation had been for many years an object to the whole of Europe. While he acquitted the British admiral of all blame, he pointed out that, under the treaty of London, one of the stipulations was that the operation was not to lead to hostilities. When, therefore, the operation under the treaty did lead to hostilities, it certainly was an untoward event.

It is difficult, however, to conceive how the Duke, who had negotiated the treaty with the Czar of Russia, could have supposed that, in the event of the Sultan not agreeing to the terms of mediation, the use of force against him could be avoided.

However that might have been, the destruction of the Ottoman fleet at Navarino was of momentous importance. It cut off the communication between Ibrahim Pasha and Egypt. It restored to Greece command of the sea in the archipelago. It assured the supremacy of the Russian fleet in the Black Sea. This last was of enormous value to the Russians in the war which soon broke out with Turkey. It facilitated the capture of Varna, and enabled the Russian army to advance across the Balkans and to threaten Constantinople.

Ibrahim Pasha, finding his position in the Morea untenable, entered into a convention with the British admiral under which he was permitted to withdraw the Egyptian army from Greece and embark it for Alexandria without molestation from the allied fleet. There remained in the Morea only the Turkish troops. They held most of the fortresses there. Later, a French army, under General Maison, was, by agreement with the allies, sent to the Morea. It soon cleared the whole country of the Turkish troops.

Meanwhile, the Sultan at Constantinople, in spite of the destruction of his fleet at Navarino, still maintained an obstinate refusal to accede to the terms of the treaty of London. The ambassadors of England and France thereupon left the city. Differences then began to arise between the three allied Powers. The Emperor of Russia proposed to employ coercive measures against Turkey, and for this purpose to occupy Moldavia and Wallachia. England and France rejected the proposal. They wished to preserve the Ottoman Empire as well as to secure the independence of Greece. But the Greek question was only one of the complaints of Russia against Turkey. It had also grave reasons to complain that the treaty of Bucharest and the later treaty of Akermann of 1826, confirming and extending it, were disregarded by the Porte, which still occupied Moldavia, Wallachia, and Serbia by its armies. The Sultan, in a manifesto to his own people, had publicly announced that he had entered into the treaty of Akermann with the full intention of not being bound by its terms, and that he regarded Russia as his hereditary foe.

On April 26, 1828, Russia declared war against Turkey. England and France found themselves in a position when they could not object, for the Porte still refused their demands as regards Greece. They had joined with Russia in destroying the Turkish fleet. They were now compelled to stand by while the Russians invaded Turkey. The position, and still more the results of the war, showed what a grave error Mahmoud committed when he refused to agree to the scheme of the allied Powers for granting autonomy to Greece under the suzerainty of Turkey. If he had accepted, his fleet would have been intact. England and France would have been in a position to object to Russia’s schemes. As it was, Greece secured an absolute independence, and Wallachia, Moldavia, and Serbia were soon, by the victories of Russia, to secure the status of complete autonomy which the Sultan had refused to Greece.

The Emperor Nicholas, in nominal command of his army, crossed the Pruth on May 7, 1828. His force consisted of not more than sixty-five thousand men, a surprisingly small number for the greatest military Power in Europe to put into the field. It was necessary, however, to keep a large army in Poland, where an outbreak was expected. Another army was stationed in the Ukraine to watch Austria, who regarded the Russian attack on Turkey with suspicion and malevolence; and a fourth army of thirty thousand men, under General Paskiewich, invaded Asia Minor from the Caucasus. With the main army it was hoped to cross the Balkans and to menace Constantinople. The Turks offered no resistance in Moldavia and Wallachia. But it was not till June 8th that the Russians were able to effect a crossing over the Danube. The Sultan, on his part, commenced the campaign under great disadvantages. His old army of Janissaries had recently been destroyed. The new army, equipped and drilled in the fashion of European armies, was very raw and ill-trained. It consisted of very young men, who were recruited with difficulty, often by compulsion, for the new service was very unpopular, and the older men could not be induced to join. It did not count more than forty-five thousand men, exclusive of the artillery. It was supplemented by irregulars from Asia, and the total force under arms was estimated at one hundred and eighty thousand men, of whom, after providing for the defence of Constantinople and the Dardanelles, for a reserve at Adrianople and for other demands on the Empire in Europe and Asia, there remained only fifty thousand men to oppose the Russians in Bulgaria, and to provide garrisons for the fortresses on the Danube and for Schumla and Varna. These garrisons, however, were supported by the armed Turkish inhabitants of the towns, who could be relied on for a vigorous resistance. The Turks were under the further disadvantage that the greater part of their fleet had been destroyed at Navarino. The Russians were, in consequence, completely masters in the Black Sea. They were able to send to the Ægean archipelago another fleet, which blockaded the Dardanelles.

In spite of these difficulties, the Turks made an unexpectedly vigorous defence against the Russian invasion in Europe. The campaign of 1828 was mainly one of sieges, where the Turkish soldiers, supported by Moslems of the fortified towns, fought to the best advantage behind walls and earthworks. They could make but a poor stand in the open against their better trained enemy.

The Russians, after crossing the Danube, laid siege to Ibrail, the most important fortress on the lower stretch of the river, and which it was essentially necessary to capture before making an advance to Schumla. The garrison and inhabitants made a gallant resistance, and it was only after five weeks that it was compelled to surrender, on June 17th. The Russian army was then divided into three parts – the one to attack Silistria, the capture of which was almost as necessary as that of Ibrail; the second to besiege Varna; the third and most important, under the Emperor, to march to Schumla. The attack on Silistria failed, and after some weeks the force employed against it marched in the direction of Schumla to support the Czar’s army. Even with this addition it was found impossible to invest the fortified camp of the Turks behind Schumla, and, after a demonstration, it was compelled to hold a defensive position, in front of Schumla, while the Czar and a part of the army marched in support of the division before Varna.

On August 18th the Czar arrived there with a reinforcement of nine thousand men, and the siege then commenced, while the Russian Black Sea fleet of eight ships of the line and three frigates, under command of Admiral Greig, joined in the attack from the sea. The Turks again made a desperate and prolonged defence, which might have been successful if it had not been that Jussuf Pasha, in command of the garrison, with five thousand of his men, traitorously deserted the city, on October 14th, and threw themselves on the mercy of the Czar. The remainder of the garrison, under the Capitan Pasha, refused to be a party to the surrender. It was said that the cause of this extraordinary act of treachery was that the Sultan, in pursuance of his policy of concentrating all power and authority in himself, had been persuaded by an intrigue to confiscate the property of Jussuf, who was one of the few large landowners in Turkey, while the owner was gallantly fighting the enemy at Varna. However that may be, the remaining garrison was soon compelled to capitulate, and this most important stronghold fell into the hands of the Russians. Without it no advance could possibly have been made across the Balkans.

The campaign of 1828 came to an end with the surrender of Varna. Though the Russians had been able to capture two of the four fortresses which barred their way to the Balkans, the campaign had not been without success to the Turks. They had shown unexpected powers of resistance, and had prevented for a year the achievement of the main object of the Russians – their advance to Constantinople. The losses of the Russians had been very great, not only in the sieges, but by disease, which dogged their armies as usual.

Baron von Moltke, the German general, who, at the invitation of the Sultan, was with the Turkish headquarters during this war, writes of the Russian and Turkish troops in his remarkable history of it: —

The faults of the Russian Staff were atoned for by the innate excellence of the Russian troops. The self-sacrificing obedience of the commanders, the steadiness of the common soldiers, their power of endurance and unshaken bravery in times of danger, were the qualities that enabled them to avert the dangers of their position before Schumla and to hold the Turks in check, and to make up for all deficiencies and overcome all resistance at Varna.32

Of the Turks he adds: —

We cannot say much for the skill of the Turkish commanders, but the conduct of the Turks, from the highest officers to the last soldier at the storming of Ibrail, their courage and steadiness in the mines and trenches before Varna, were far above all praise.

In Asia the Turks had not done so well. General Paskiewich was able to defeat the army in front of him and to capture the important stronghold of Kars and its adjoining district.

The campaign of 1829 began late. It was not till the middle of May that the Russian army again took the field, not on this occasion under the Czar, but under General Diebitsch, who proved to be a most able general and diplomatist. The army was again most inadequate for the campaign which was in contemplation – namely, the crossing of the Balkans and an advance to Constantinople. It consisted of no more than sixty-eight thousand men, a force which, in these days, eighty-eight years later, would count for little or nothing. It was thought necessary, as a condition precedent to any advance, to capture Silistria. The siege was commenced on May 17, 1829. The Russian force detailed for this was not more than fourteen thousand men. The Turks who defended it were twenty-one thousand in number, including eight thousand armed inhabitants. In spite of this disparity of numbers, the town was captured after a siege of forty-four days, on July 26th, at a loss to the Russians of two thousand five hundred men.

In the meantime Diebitsch had advanced with the main army in the direction of Schumla. Reschid Pasha, who had replaced Hussein Pasha as Grand Vizier and Seraskier, issued from Schumla with forty thousand men, and on June 18th a great battle took place at Kulewtska. The Turks were utterly defeated by a very inferior force of Russians. They had begun the battle with an impetuous charge, but they could not sustain it against the serried ranks of the Russian veterans. Some ammunition wagons exploded and, as often happened with the Turks, a wild panic ensued. They fled from the field of battle and dispersed in all directions. All their artillery fell into the hands of the Russians. Reschid escaped at the head of six hundred men and found his way to Schumla, where there were ten thousand Turks, and where a large number of fugitives from the battle eventually found refuge. This victory at Kulewtska had far-reaching effects. It was the first great battle in which the new troops of Mahmoud were tested. It showed that the Russian soldiers had an overwhelming superiority.

Silistria fell on July 13th. The Russians who had been engaged in the siege then joined Diebitsch before Schumla. The general thereupon decided on the bold and even perilous course of crossing the Balkans, without previously capturing Schumla and its army. Leaving ten thousand men to mask that fortress, where a much greater force of Turks was now assembled, consisting largely of men demoralized by the recent defeat, Diebitsch commenced his march with such secrecy that for some days the Turks were not aware of it. Reschid Pasha, expecting an attack on Schumla, and thinking his force insufficient for its defence, had called in the various corps who were posted for the defence of the mountain passes. Diebitsch therefore met with no opposition. He crossed the mountains in nine days of forced marches fraught with great hardship to his troops. When south of the mountain range, he deflected his route to the Black Sea and got into communication with the Russian fleet, under Admiral Greig, which assisted in the capture of Bourgas and other ports along the coast, and afforded supplies to Diebitsch’s army.

Three battles were fought south of the mountains, at Aidos, Karnabad and Slivno, where small divisions of Turks were defeated and dispersed. After three weeks from crossing the Balkans, Diebitsch arrived in front of Adrianople, a city of eighty thousand inhabitants, with a garrison of ten thousand men. His army was by this time reduced to less than twenty thousand men. Its appearance before Adrianople caused wild panic. Never before had a hostile army crossed the southern range of the Balkans. It was thought to be impossible. It was confidently believed that the Russian army numbered over one hundred thousand men. The city and its garrison surrendered without making a show of fight. Everywhere on its route through Bulgaria the Christian raya population had received the invaders with acclamation and the Turks had thrown away their arms and fled. The campaign of 1829 in Asia had been almost equally disastrous to the Turks. Paskiewich had defeated them in a pitched battle and had captured Erzerum. He was now approaching Trebizond, after dispersing an army on the way.

When news reached Constantinople of the crossing of the Balkans and the capture of Adrianople, there was consternation and dismay among Turks of all classes. The Sultan almost alone maintained his presence of mind. He issued a proclamation calling on all the Turks in the city to join in its defence. He announced his intention to take command in person. The sacred banner of the Prophet was unfurled. But when, at the first review of the forces, the Sultan appeared in a carriage and not on horseback, this “unheard of and indecorous innovation” chilled the enthusiasm of the volunteers, and undid the good which was expected from his action.

There was no great zeal for the defence of the capital. The chief ministers of the Porte were unanimous in advising the Sultan to sue for terms of peace. They were quite ignorant of the weakness of the Russian army. They believed the stories that more than a hundred thousand men were advancing on the capital. There were no troops at Constantinople, they said, able to meet this army. The ambassadors of England and France, who had recently returned to Constantinople, at the invitation of the Sultan, backed up the ministers, and urgently advised him to come to terms with the enemy. We now know that all this advice and these alarms were founded on false information and that there was no real justification for them. In fact, the real position of the Russian army was one of extreme danger. It had suffered great losses on the battlefields and from the hardships of the forced marches, and was also being decimated by disease. There was no possibility of its being reinforced. Retreat across the Balkans was almost impossible. The Turkish army at Schumla was now reinforced. On its flank there was an army of twenty thousand Albanians, under the rebellious Pasha of Scotra, who had refused aid to the Porte in the earlier part of the campaign, but who, now that the existence of the Empire was threatened, might confidently be expected to come to its aid. Advance to Constantinople might also be dangerous, if not impossible. It was distant one hundred and forty miles. Its garrison of thirty thousand men, supplemented by fresh volunteers, might be relied on to meet the Russians, now reduced to much less than twenty thousand. These difficulties of the Russian army, however, were not known to the Porte.