Mahmud Shevket Pasha

For the other Ottoman general Shevket Turgut Pasha, see Shevket Turgut Pasha.

In this Ottoman Turkish style name, the given name is Mahmud Shevket, the title is Pasha, and there is no family name.

Mahmud Shevket Pasha (Ottoman Turkish: محمود شوكت پاشا, 1856 – 11 June 1913)^[1] was an Ottoman generalissimo^[2] and statesman, who was an important political figure during the Second Constitutional Era. During the 31 March Incident, Shevket Pasha and the Committee of Union and Progress overthrew Abdul Hamid II after an anti-Constitutionalist uprising in Constantinople. He played the role of a power broker after the crisis, balancing the various factions of the Young Turks and the army. As War Minister he played a leading role in military reform and the establishment of Air Divisions. Shevket Pasha became Grand Vizier during the First Balkan War in the aftermath of the 1913 coup d'état, from 23 January 1913 until his death by assassination.

Mahmud Shevket Pasha
Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire
In office 23 January 1913 – 11 June 1913
Monarch	Mehmed V
Preceded by	Kâmil Pasha
Succeeded by	Said Halim Pasha
Minister of War
In office 23 January 1913 – 11 June 1913
Monarch	Mehmed V
Grand Vizier	Himself
Preceded by	Nazım Pasha
Succeeded by	Ahmet İzzet Pasha
In office 12 January 1910 – 9 July 1912
Monarch	Mehmed V
Grand Vizier	İbrahim Hakkı Pasha Mehmed Said Pasha
Preceded by	Salih Hulusi Pasha
Succeeded by	Hurşid Pasha
Personal details
Born	1856 Baghdad, Baghdad Eyalet, Ottoman Empire
Died	11 June 1913 (aged 56 or 57) Istanbul, Ottoman Empire
Manner of death	Assassination
Resting place	Monument of Liberty, Istanbul
Relations	Khaled Sulayman Faiq Hikmet Sulayman
Alma mater	Mekteb-i Harbiye
Military service
Allegiance	Ottoman Empire
Branch/service	Ottoman Army
Rank	Field Marshal
Commands	Third Army Action Army
Battles/wars	Macedonian Struggle 31 March Incident Albanian Revolt of 1910 Yemeni Revolt First Balkan War

Early life and career

Mahmud Shevket was born in Baghdad in 1856. His grandfather, Hacı Talib Ağa had moved from Tbilisi to Baghdad.^[3] His father was Basra governor Kethüdazade Süleyman Faik Bey. He had four brothers, Numan, Murad, Khaled, and the much younger Hikmat, the latter two would become important statesmen of post Ottoman rule Iraq. Raised as an Ottoman, most sources claim that he had Georgian,^[4] Chechen,^[5][6][7][8] or Iraqi Arab^[9] ancestry. However, according to Celal Bayar and Rıza Tevfik Bölükbaşı, the relatives of the pasha told them that they were of Georgian origin.^[10][11] In addition to Turkish and Arabic, he spoke French and German.

He finished his primary and secondary education in Baghdad before going to Alliance Israélite Universelle of Constantinople (now Istanbul).^[12][13][14] After completing his education in the Mekteb-i Harbiye in 1882 he served in Crete as a lieutenant before returning as a faculty member the next year.^[15] Shevket rose through the ranks, eventually serving on the general staff and achieving the rank of Miralay (Colonel) in 1891. He joined an arms purchasing commission sent to Germany to supervise the manufacture of war matériel for the Ottoman army, during which he worked as an assistant to Colmar Freiherr von der Goltz. There he wrote extensively on the Mauser rifle as it entered into operation in the Ottoman Army. Upon his return in 1899, he was promoted to brigadier general and appointed deputy chairman of the Tophane-i Amire's Inspection Commission. In 1901, he was promoted to Ferik (Lieutenant General) and was soon assigned to the Hejaz railway to oversee construction of the Mecca–Medina telegraph line. He perceived this assignment as an exile, which likely tainted his opinion of Sultan Abdul Hamid II's regime. During this period he also spent some time in France studying military technology.^[16]

In 1905 Mahmud Shevket Pasha was appointed governor of the Kosovo Vilayet during the height of the Macedonian Conflict, where he gained respect from the army for his effectiveness. He made contact with the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) and turned a blind eye to their anti-regime activism. Thus began his complex and tenuous relationship with the "Sacred Committee". When the CUP prevailed in the 1908 Young Turk Revolution, which forced Sultan Abdul Hamid to reinstate the Ottoman constitution and call for elections, Shevket was placed in command of the Selanik (Thessaloniki) based Third Army.

In 1902 he published Ottoman Organization and Military Uniforms from the Establishment of the Ottoman State to the Present (Turkish: Devlet-i Osmâniyye’nin Bidâyet-i Tesisinden Şimdiye Kadar Osmanlı Teşkilât ve Kıyâfet-i Askeriyesi) which is considered to be one of the most comprehensive studies written on the history of the Ottoman army and its uniforms.^[17]

31 March Incident

Main article: 31 March Incident

A year later saw the 31 March Incident, when counter-revolutionary reactionaries rose up in support of Abdulhamid's absolutist rule and the Constitution was once again repealed. The CUP appealed to Shevket Pasha to restore the status quo, and he organized the Action Army, an ad hoc formation made up of his Third Army and elements of the First and Second Armies to suppress the uprising.^[18][19] His chief of staff during the crisis was the first president of the Republic of Turkey, captain Mustafa Kemal (Atatürk). The Action Army entered Constantinople on 24 April, and after a series of negotiations, Abdulhamid II was deposed, Mehmed V Reshad ascended to the throne, the Constitution was reinstated for the third and last time, and the CUP was allowed to form a government.

War Minister

 

Mahmud Shevket Pasha

After the incident, he became an important power holder in Ottoman politics: Shevket Pasha was made martial law Commander of Constantinople, inspector of the First, Second, and Third Armies, and Minister of War. Though Hüseyin Hilmi Pasha came back to form a government, his premiership was widely seen as being under Shevket Pasha's control. His tenourship as War Minister saw the suppression of the 1910 Albanian Revolt. He also used troops from Tripolitania to suppress Yahya Muhammad Hamid ed-Din's revolt in Yemen, which exposed Tripolitania to foreign invasion from Italy in 1911. Hilmi's resignation saw Ibrahim Hakki elevated to the Grand Vezierate, and Shevket Pasha was also included in cabinet as War Minister.

Shevket Pasha is credited for the creation of Ottoman Air Divisions in 1911. Shevket Pasha gave much importance to a military aviation program and as a result the Ottoman Empire held some of the pioneering aviation institutions in the world.^[20][21]

Shevket Pasha pushed for Christians to make up 25% of the Ottoman army, and for good relations with the United States.^[22]

Though he saved the CUP in the 31 March Incident, Shevket Pasha also played a pivotal role in the 1912 coup which caused the fall of the CUP government. His resignation as War Minister was an effective endorsement to the Savior Officers, who were able to maneuver around the Unionist parliament and shuttered it, driving them underground.^[23] Thereafter he served as a senator.

Premiership and assassination

See also: Shevket Pasha cabinet

 

Mahmud Shevket Pasha, 1900 portrait

During the First Balkan War, the Ottoman Empire lost all of its Balkan possessions except the outskirts of Constantinople. The CUP overthrew Kâmil Pasha's Savior Officer backed government in January 1913 in a coup known as the Raid on the Sublime Porte, because he entered negotiations with the Balkan League. Shevket Pasha was made Grand Vizier, War Minister, Foreign Minister and Field Marshal in a national unity government that included the CUP, and resumed fighting in the war. However the change in government did not change the reality that the war and most of Rumelia was lost. The Treaty of London ended the First Balkan War, though Shevket Pasha's government never signed the treaty.^[24] The Ottoman Empire would recover Eastern Thrace and Edirne in the Second Balkan War, but by then Shevket Pasha would be dead.

On 11 June 1913 Mahmud Shevket Pasha was assassinated in his car in Beyazit Square in a revenge attack by a relative of the assassinated War Minister Nazım Pasha, who was killed during the 1913 coup.^[1] He was buried in the Monument of Liberty, dedicated to soldiers of the Action Army who were killed in the 31 March Incident. The car he was in, the uniform he was wearing, the clothes of his murdered aides, and the weapons used in the assassination are on display at the Istanbul Military Museum.

On the day of his assassination, a deputy of the Freedom and Accord Party, Lütfi Fikri stated "In the full sense of the word, Mahmud Şevket Pasha has committed suicide, and this was decided on the day he accepted the grand vezierate over the corpse of Nâzım Pasha. I am sure that this man did not like, for instance, Talaat Bey and his friends. How could it be that he became, to such a degree, a toy in their hands and died for this reason?"^[25]

Legacy

 

Mahmut Shavket Pasha's grave in the Monument of Liberty

Mahmud Shevket Pasha represented the last independent personality in the Empire's politics; the successor of the premiership, Said Halim Pasha, would be a puppet of the CUP's radical faction, headed by the triumvirate of Talat, Enver, and Cemal, all of whom would finally enter the cabinet following his death. Enver took Shevket Pasha's old post of Minister of War by 1914, and Talat in addition to returning to the interior ministry after his assassination, himself became Grand Vizier in 1917. Shevket Pasha's assassination allowed the CUP, primarily Talat Pasha, to establish a radical nationalist dictatorship that would last until the Ottoman Empire's defeat in World War I in 1918. This dictatorship would see the empire retake Edirne in the Second Balkan War, but also join and lose World War I while committing genocide against its Christian minorities.

Shevket Pasha was the last Ottoman Grand Vizier to die in office.

A town in Beykoz, Istanbul is named after him. The name of the town Tirilye was changed to Mahmutşevketpaşa in his memory after his assassination, but would rename itself to Zeytinbağı in 1963.^[26]

Shevket Pasha's speech to the Action Army

In a 2012 interview with Habertürk, Murat Bardakçı publicized what he claimed was the first ever sound recording made in the Ottoman Empire, which was Mahmud Shevket Pasha's rallying speech to the troops of the Action Army, urging them to march on Istanbul and overthrow the sultan.^[27] While a YouTube video recording of the speech has gone viral, its veracity has been controversial. A study by the historian Derya Tulga concluded that it is impossible for an original audio recording of Shevket Pasha's 1909 speech to exist, and even assuming it is Mahmud Shevket Pasha's voice, the recording was ultimately a reenactment produced two years after the 31 March Incident, which he would have done for propaganda purposes. She goes further to state that the voice in the recording is most likely not even Shevket Pasha's but instead the Turkish representative of Favorite Platten Record Company Ahmet Şükrü Bey. Mehmet Çalışkan came to a similar conclusion, adding that the words of the speech itself can't be verified to be Shevket Pasha's, and points out that Ahmet Şükrü promoted the voice recording on a 15 August 1911 issue of the CUP mouthpiece Tanin.^[28]

Works

Shevket Pasha wrote several books in addition to his memoirs. He also translated Alphonse Karr's Sous les Tilleuls.

• Logaritma Cedâvili Risalesi (from Jean Dupuis, H. 1301)
• Fenn-i Esliha (H. 1301)
• Usûl-i Hendese I-II (H. 1302-1304)
• Asâkir-i Şahanenin Piyade Sınıfına Mahsus 87 Modeli Mükerrer Ateşli Mavzer üzer Tüfeği (H. 1303)
• Mükerrer Ateşli Tüfekler (H.1308)
• Küçük Çaplı Mavzer Tüfekleri Risâlesi (H. 1311)
• Küçük Çaplı Mavzer Tüfeklerine Mahsus Atlas  (H.1311)
• Devlet-i Osmâniyye’nin Bidâyet-i Tesisinden Şimdiye Kadar Osmanlı Teşkilât ve Kıyâfet-i Askeriyesi (I-III, H. 1320)

Gallery

 

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Mahmud Shevket Pasha.

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  The pistols carried by Mahmud Shevket Pasha's assassins.
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  The first automobile in Constantinople.
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  Mahmud Shevket Pasha just before his murder, Istanbul Military Museum.
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  Shevket Pasha's funeral
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  Sketch of events of Shevket Pasha's assassination in the report written by the police chief of Istanbul
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  Mahmud Shevket Pasha in a car, 1911
•  
  Mahmud Shevket Pasha and Enver Pasha

References

1. David Kenneth Fieldhouse: Western imperialism in the Middle East 1914-1958. Oxford University Press, 2006 p.17
2. Urazov, Fatikh. Generalissimusy mira XVI-XX vekov [Istoricheskiye portrety]. p. 58. ISBN 5-295-01270-0.
3. Finkel, Caroline. (2007). Osman's dream : the history of the ottoman empire. New York: Basic Books. p. 57. ISBN 978-0-465-00850-6. OCLC 756484323.
4. • Şakir, Ziya (1944). Mahmut Şevket paşa. F. Gücüyener Anadolu Türk Kitap Deposu. pp. 11–12. Retrieved 17 May 2022. Resmi sicillere nazaran bu aileyi kuran zat, aslen (Gürcü) olup (Bağdat kölemenleri)ndendir. [According to the official records, the person who founded this family was originally Georgian and was one of the Baghdad slaves.]
   • Amca, Hasan (1958). Dogmayan hürriyet. M. Sıralar Matbaası. p. 77. Retrieved 17 May 2022.
   • Seyrek, Ahmet Murat (2002). ATATÜRK SÖZLÜĞÜ. Yediveren Yayinlari. p. 159. ISBN 9786052692387. Retrieved 17 May 2022.
   • Yöntem, Ali Canib (2005). Prof. Ali Cânip Yöntem'in yeni Türk edebiyatı üzerine makaleleri. Tablet. p. 166. ISBN 9789756346143. Retrieved 17 May 2022. Mahmut Şevket Paşa'nın soyu Gürcü'dür. [Mahmut Şevket Pasha's ancestry is Georgian.]
   • Publications de la Société d'histoire turque: VIII. sér. Türk Tarih Kurumu. 1952. p. 323. Retrieved 17 May 2022.
   • Bayur, Yusuf Hikmet (1983). Türk inkılâbı tarihi, 2. cilt,4. sayı. Türk Tarih Kurumu. p. 323. ISBN 9789756346143. Retrieved 17 May 2022. Kendisi aslen Gürcü idi , ancak ailesi çoktandır Irak'a yerleşmişti ve Araplaşmıştı [He was originally Georgian, but his family had long since settled in Iraq and was Arabized.]
   • Belleten, 8. cilt. Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi. 1944. p. 92. Retrieved 17 May 2022. Süleyman Bey Bağdad'daki kölmenlere mensub ve Aslen Gürcü olup merhum Sadr-ı âzam ve Harbiye Nazırı Mahmud Şevket Paşanın babasıdır. [Süleyman Bey, a member of the slaves in Baghdad and originally Georgian, is the father of the late grand vizier and Minister of War Mahmud Şevket Pasha.]
   • "The New York Times, May 17, 1909" (PDF). The New York Times. 17 May 1909.
   • Hasan Kayali (1997). Arabs and Young Turks: Ottomanism, Arabism, and Islamism in the Ottoman Empire. Los Angeles: University of California Press. p. 20.
   • Hasan Kayali (1962). Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, 1798-1939. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press Press. p. 282.
5. Nâzım Tektaş, Sadrazamlar: Osmanlı'da ikinci adam saltanatı, Çatı Kitapları, 2002, p. .
6. İsmail Hâmi Danişmend, Osmanlı Devlet Erkânı, Türkiye Yayınevi, İstanbul, 1971, p. 101. (in Turkish)
7. Finkel, Caroline. (2007). Osman's dream : the history of the ottoman empire. New York: Basic Books. p. 57. ISBN 978-0-465-00850-6. OCLC 756484323.
8. Mango, Andrew. (1999). Atatürk. London: John Murray. p. 549. ISBN 0-7195-5612-0. OCLC 41547097.
9. Ali Bilgenoğlu, Osmanlı Devleti'nde Arap milliyetçi cemiyetler, Müdafaa-i Hukuk Yayınları, 2007, p. 87.]
10. Bayar, Celal (1967). Ben de yazdim. Vol. IV. Baha Matbaasi. p. 1228. Retrieved 19 December 2022. Bana, Mahmut Şevket Paşa'nın yakınları, babasının Gürcü, annesinin Arap olduğunu söylemişlerdir [Relatives of Mahmut Şevket Pasha told me that his father was Georgian and his mother was Arab.]
11. Tevfik, Rıza (2008). Biraz da ben konuşayım. İletişim. p. 179. ISBN 9789750505638. Retrieved 17 May 2022. Kendisi, umumi kanaat ve zan hilâfına, Arap değil Bağdat'ta yerleşmiş bir Gürcü ailesinin evlâdıdır. Nitekim ben Bağdat'ta iken merhumun hâlâ orada yaşayan hısım ve akrabası ile görüştüm. [Contrary to public opinion, he is the son of a Georgian family settled in Baghdad, not an Arab. As a matter of fact, while I was in Baghdad, I talked to the deceased's relatives and relatives who still live there.]
12. . inanç, kültür ve mitoloji araştırmaları dergisi. Vol. 6, no. 3. May–August 2009. Archived from the original on 17 April 2023.
13. Türkiye'nin devlet yaşamında Yahudiler. from the original on 17 April 2023. Retrieved 17 April 2023.
14. Soner Yalçın, Efendi 2 – Beyaz Müslümanların Büyük Sırrı, Doğan Kitap, 1. Baskı, Istanbul 2006, sayfa 114.
15. Finkel, Caroline, Osman's Dream, (Basic Books, 2005), 57; Istanbul was only adopted as the city's official name in 1930...
16. "Mahmud Şevket Paşa". Britannica.
17. Türkmen, Zekeriya. "Mahmud Şevket Paşa". İslâm Ansiklopedisi.
18. Gawrych 2006, p. 167.
19. Zürcher 2017, p. 202.
20. . Archived from the original on 7 October 2011. Retrieved 6 November 2011.
21. . Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 5 September 2013.
22. "The New York Times, May 17, 1909" (PDF). The New York Times. 17 May 1909.
23. Shaw & Shaw 1977, p. 291.
24. Feroz Ahmad (2014). Turkey: The Quest for Identity (second ed.). London: Oneworld. p. 44. ISBN 978-1-78074-301-1.
25. Kieser 2018, p. 140.
26. . Sabah. Türkçe. Archived from the original on 30 January 2012. Retrieved 6 October 2020.
27. Archived at Ghostarchive and the : "Mahmud Şevket Paşa'nın 31 Mart Olayı Sırasındaki Ses Kaydı". YouTube.
28. Aladağ, Alaaddin (15 December 2021). "Mahmut Şevket Paşa'ya ait olduğu iddia edilen ses kaydı". Doğruluğu Ne?.

Sources

• Gawrych, George (2006). The Crescent and the Eagle: Ottoman Rule, Islam and the Albanians, 1874–1913. London: IB Tauris. ISBN 978-1-84511-287-5.
• Kieser, Hans-Lukas (2018). Talaat Pasha: Father of Modern Turkey, Architect of Genocide. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-15762-7. (Google Books)
• Shaw, Stanford; Shaw, Ezel (27 May 1977), History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, vol. II, Cambridge University Press (published 1975), ISBN 0-521-29166-6
• Zürcher, Erik Jan (2017). "31 Mart: A Fundamentalist Uprising in Istanbul in April 1909?". In Lévy-Aksu, Noémi; Georgeon, François (eds.). The Young Turk Revolution and the Ottoman Empire: The Aftermath of 1918. I.B.Tauris. ISBN 9781786720214.

External links

• Newspaper clippings about Mahmud Shevket Pasha in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW
• Alleged recording of Mahmud Shevket Pasha's speech to the Action Army

Preceded by Kibrisli Mehmed Kamil Pasha

Grand Vizier 1913

Succeeded by Said Halim Pasha