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Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878)

Russo-Turkish War
Part of the Great Eastern Crisis and the Russo-Turkish wars

Clockwise from top left: The Action off Măcin, The Battle of Shipka Pass, The Siege of Plevna, The Battle of Aladzha, The Battle of Gorni Dubnik
Date24 April 1877 – 3 March 1878
(10 months and 1 week)
Location
Result Russian coalition victory, see aftermath
Territorial
changes
Belligerents
Romania
Serbia
Montenegro
 Kingdom of Greece
Serbian rebels
Greek rebels

Imamate rebels
Abkhazian rebels
Commanders and leaders
Strength
  • Russia:
    Initial: 185,000 in the Army of the Danube, 75,000 in the Caucasian Army[3]
    Total: 260,000 in four corps[4][5]
 Ottoman Empire:
Initial: 70,000 in the Caucasus
Total: 281,000[6]
Spring of 1877
Olender: 490,000–530,000
Barry: 378,000
Casualties and losses
Total: 96,733–111,166[7][8]
Total: 90,000–120,000[11]
500,000–1.5 million Turkish, Albanian and Jewish civilians displaced[13][14]

The Russo-Turkish War (Turkish: 93 Harbi, lit.'War of ’93', named for the year 1293 in the Islamic calendar; Russian: Русско-турецкая война, romanizedRussko-turetskaya voyna, "Russian–Turkish war") was a conflict between the Ottoman Empire and a coalition led by the Russian Empire which included Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro.[15] Fought in the Balkans and in the Caucasus, it originated in emerging 19th-century Balkan nationalism. Additional factors included the Russian goals of recovering territorial losses endured during the Crimean War of 1853–56, re-establishing itself in the Black Sea and supporting the political movement attempting to free Balkan nations from the Ottoman Empire.

The Russian-led coalition won the war, pushing the Ottomans back all the way to the gates of Constantinople, leading to the intervention of the western European great powers. As a result, Russia succeeded in claiming provinces in the Caucasus, namely Kars and Batum, and also annexed the Budjak region. The principalities of Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro, each of which had had de facto sovereignty for some years, formally proclaimed independence from the Ottoman Empire. After almost five centuries of Ottoman domination (1396–1878), Bulgaria emerged as an autonomous state with support and military intervention from Russia.

Conflict pre-history edit

Treatment of Christians in the Ottoman Empire edit

Article 9 of the 1856 Paris Peace Treaty, concluded at the end of the Crimean War, obliged the Ottoman Empire to grant Christians equal rights with Muslims. Before the treaty was signed, the Ottoman government issued an edict, the Edict of Gülhane, which proclaimed the principle of the equality of Muslims and non-Muslims,[16] and produced some specific reforms to this end. For example, the jizya tax was abolished and non-Muslims were allowed to join the army.[17]

Crisis in Lebanon, 1860 edit

In 1858, stirred by their clergy, the Maronite peasants of northern Lebanon revolted against their predominantly Druze feudal overlords and established a peasant republic. In southern Beirut vilayet, where both Maronite and Druze peasants worked under Druze overlords, Druze peasants sided with their co-religious and against the Maronites, transforming the conflict into a civil war. Although both sides suffered, about 10,000 Maronites were massacred at the hands of the Druze.[18][19]

Fearing European intervention, the Ottoman foreign minister Mehmed Fuad Pasha was dispatched to Syria and immediately set about trying to resolve the conflict as swiftly as possible. Mehmed sought out and executed the agitators on all sides, including the governor and other officials. Order was soon restored, and preparations made to give Lebanon new autonomy. These efforts were ultimately not enough to prevent European intervention, however, with France deploying a fleet in September 1860. Fearing that a unilateral intervention would increase French influence in the region at their expense, the British joined the French expedition.[20] Faced with further European pressure, the Sultan agreed to appoint a Christian governor in Lebanon, whose candidacy was to be submitted by the Sultan and approved by the European powers.[18]

The revolt in Crete, 1866–1869 edit

 
The Moni Arkadiou monastery

The Cretan Revolt, which began in 1866, resulted from the failure of the Ottoman Empire to apply reforms for improving the life of the population and the Cretans' desire for enosis – union with Greece.[21] The insurgents gained control over the whole island, except for five fortified cities where the Muslims took refuge. The Greek press claimed[citation needed] that Muslims had massacred Greeks and the word was spread throughout Europe. Thousands of Greek volunteers were mobilized and sent to the island.

The siege of Arkadi Monastery became particularly well known. In November 1866, about 250 Cretan Greek combatants and around 600 women and children were besieged by about 23,000 mainly Cretan Muslims aided by Ottoman troops, and this became widely known in Europe. After a bloody battle with a large number of casualties on both sides, the Cretan Greeks finally surrendered when their ammunition ran out but were killed upon surrender.[22]

By early 1869, the insurrection was suppressed, but the Porte offered some concessions, introducing island self-rule and increasing Christian rights on the island. Although the Cretan crisis ended better for the Ottomans than almost any other diplomatic confrontation of the century, the insurrection, and especially the brutality with which it was suppressed, led to greater public attention in Europe to the oppression of Christians in the Ottoman Empire.

Small as the amount of attention is which can be given by the people of England to the affairs of Turkey ... enough was transpiring from time to time to produce a vague but a settled and general impression that the Sultans were not fulfilling the "solemn promises" they had made to Europe; that the vices of the Turkish government were ineradicable; and that whenever another crisis might arise affecting the "independence" of the Ottoman Empire, it would be wholly impossible to afford to it again the support we had afforded in the Crimean war.[23]

Changing balance of power in Europe edit

 
Ottoman Empire in 1862

Although on the winning side in the Crimean War, the Ottoman Empire continued to decline in power and prestige. The financial strain on the treasury forced the Ottoman government to take a series of foreign loans at such steep interest rates that, despite all the fiscal reforms that followed, pushed it into unpayable debts and economic difficulties. This was further aggravated by the need to accommodate more than 600,000 Muslim Circassians, expelled by the Russians from the Caucasus, to the Black Sea ports of north Anatolia and the Balkan ports of Constanța and Varna, which cost a great deal in money and in civil disorder to the Ottoman authorities.[24]

The New European Concert edit

The Concert of Europe established in 1814 was shaken in 1859 when France and Austria fought over Italy. It came apart completely as a result of the wars of German Unification, when the Kingdom of Prussia, led by Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, defeated Austria in 1866 and France in 1870, replacing Austria as the dominant power in Central Europe. Britain, diverted by the Irish question and averse to warfare, chose not to intervene again to restore the European balance. Bismarck did not wish the breakup of the Ottoman Empire to create rivalries that might lead to war, so he took up Tsar Alexander II of Russia's earlier suggestion that arrangements be made in case the Ottoman Empire fell apart, creating the Three Emperors' League with Austria-Hungary and Russia to keep France isolated on the continent.

France responded by supporting self-determination movements, particularly if they concerned the three emperors and the Sultan. Thus revolts in Poland against Russia and national aspirations in the Balkans were encouraged by France. Russia worked to regain its right to maintain a fleet on the Black Sea and vied with the French in gaining influence in the Balkans by using the new Pan-Slavic idea that all Slavs should be united under Russian leadership. This could be done only by destroying the two empires where most non-Russian Slavs lived, the Habsburg and the Ottoman Empires. The ambitions and the rivalries of the Russians and French in the Balkans surfaced in Serbia, which was experiencing its own national revival and had ambitions that partly conflicted with those of the great powers.[25]

Russia after the Crimean War edit

Russia ended the Crimean War with minimal territorial losses, but was forced to destroy its Black Sea Fleet and Sevastopol fortifications. Russian international prestige was damaged, and for many years revenge for the Crimean War became the main goal of Russian foreign policy. This was not easy though – the Paris peace treaty included guarantees of Ottoman territorial integrity by Great Britain, France and Austria; only Prussia remained friendly to Russia.

The newly appointed Russian chancellor, Alexander Gorchakov depended upon alliance with Prussia and its chancellor Bismarck. Russia consistently supported Prussia in her wars with Denmark (1864), Austria (1866) and France (1870). In March 1871, using the crushing French defeat and the support of a grateful Germany, Russia achieved international recognition of its earlier denouncement of Article 11 of the Paris Peace Treaty, thus enabling it to revive the Black Sea Fleet.

Other clauses of the Paris Peace Treaty, however, remained in force, specifically Article 8 with guarantees of Ottoman territorial integrity by Great Britain, France and Austria. Therefore, Russia was extremely cautious in its relations with the Ottoman Empire, coordinating all its actions with other European powers. A Russian war with Turkey would require at least the tacit support of all other Great Powers, and Russian diplomacy was waiting for a convenient moment.

Balkan crisis of 1875–1876 edit

 
Europe before the Balkan crisis

In 1875, a series of Balkan events brought Europe to the brink of war. The state of Ottoman administration in the Balkans continued to deteriorate throughout the 19th century, with the central government occasionally losing control over whole provinces. Reforms imposed by European powers did little to improve the conditions of the Christian population, while managing to dissatisfy a sizable portion of the Muslim population. Bosnia and Herzegovina suffered at least two waves of rebellion by the local Muslim population, the most recent ending in 1862.

Austria-Hungary consolidated after the turmoil of the first half of the century and sought to reinvigorate its centuries long policy of expansion at the expense of the Ottoman Empire. Meanwhile, the nominally autonomous, de facto independent principalities of Serbia and Montenegro also sought to expand into regions inhabited by their compatriots. Nationalist and irredentist sentiments were strong and were encouraged by Russia and her agents. At the same time, a severe drought in Anatolia in 1873 and flooding in 1874 caused famine and widespread discontent in the heart of the Empire. The agricultural shortages precluded the collection of necessary taxes, which forced the Ottoman government to declare bankruptcy in October 1875 and increase taxes on outlying provinces including the Balkans.

Balkan uprisings edit

Albanian revolts edit

István Deák states that the Albanian highlanders resented new taxes and conscription, and fought against the Ottomans in the war.[26]

Herzegovina Uprising edit

 
Herzegovinian insurgents in 1875

An uprising against Ottoman rule began in Herzegovina in July 1875. By August almost all of Herzegovina had been seized and the revolt had spread into Bosnia. Supported by nationalist volunteers from Serbia and Montenegro, the uprising continued as the Ottomans committed more and more troops to suppress it.

Bulgarian Uprising edit

The revolt of Bosnia and Herzegovina spurred Bucharest-based Bulgarian revolutionaries into action. In 1875, a Bulgarian uprising was hastily prepared to take advantage of Ottoman preoccupation, but it fizzled before it started. In the spring of 1876, another uprising erupted in the south-central Bulgarian lands despite the fact that there were numerous regular Turkish troops in those areas.

A special Turkish military committee was established to quell the uprising. Regular troops (Nizam) and irregulars (Redif or Bashi-bazouk) were directed to fight the Bulgarians (11 May – 9 June 1876). The irregulars were mostly drawn from the Muslim inhabitants of the Bulgarian region. Many were Circassians from the Caucasus or Crimean Tatars who were expelled during the Crimean War; some were Islamized Bulgarians. The Ottoman army suppressed the revolt, massacring up to 30,000[27][28] people in the process.[29][30] Five thousand out of the seven thousand villagers of Batak were put to death.[31] Both Batak and Perushtitsa, where the majority of the population was also massacred, participated in the rebellion.[28] Many of the perpetrators of those massacres were later decorated by the Ottoman high command.[28] Modern historians have estimated the number of murdered Bulgarians at between 30,000 and 100,000.[32]

International reaction to atrocities in Bulgaria edit

 
The Avenger: An Allegorical War Map for 1877 by Fred. W. Rose, 1877: This map reflects the "Great Eastern Crisis" and the subsequent Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78.

Word of the bashi-bazouks' atrocities filtered to the outside world by way of the American-run Robert College located in Constantinople. The majority of the students were Bulgarian, and many received news of the events from their families back home. Soon the Western diplomatic community in Constantinople was abuzz with rumours, which eventually found their way into newspapers in the West. While in Constantinople in 1879, Protestant missionary George Warren Wood reported Turkish authorities in Amasia brutally persecuting Christian Armenian refugees from Soukoum Kaleh. He was able to coordinate with British diplomat Edward Malet to bring the matter to the attention of the Sublime Porte, and then to the British Foreign Secretary Robert Gascoyne-Cecil (the Marquess of Salisbury).[33] In Britain, where Disraeli's government was committed to supporting the Ottomans in the ongoing Balkan crisis, the Liberal opposition newspaper The Daily News hired American journalist Januarius A. MacGahan to report on the massacre stories first-hand.

MacGahan toured the stricken regions of the Bulgarian uprising, and his report, splashed across The Daily News's front pages, galvanized British public opinion against Disraeli's pro-Ottoman policy.[34] In September, opposition leader William Ewart Gladstone published his Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East[35] calling upon Britain to withdraw its support for Turkey and proposing that Europe demand independence for Bulgaria and Bosnia and Herzegovina.[36] As the details became known across Europe, many dignitaries, including Charles Darwin, Oscar Wilde, Victor Hugo and Giuseppe Garibaldi, publicly condemned the Ottoman abuses in Bulgaria.[37]

The strongest reaction came from Russia. Widespread sympathy for the Bulgarian cause led to a nationwide surge in patriotism on a scale comparable with the one during the Patriotic War of 1812. From autumn 1875, the movement to support the Bulgarian uprising involved all classes of Russian society. This was accompanied by sharp public discussions about Russian goals in this conflict: Slavophiles, including Fyodor Dostoevsky, saw in the impending war the chance to unite all Orthodox nations under Russia's helm, thus fulfilling what they believed was the historic mission of Russia, while their opponents, westernizers, inspired by Ivan Turgenev, denied the importance of religion and believed that Russian goals should not be defense of Orthodoxy but liberation of Bulgaria.[38]

Serbo-Turkish War and diplomatic maneuvering edit

 
Russia preparing to release the Balkan dogs of war, while Britain warns him to take care. Punch cartoon from 17 June 1876

On 30 June 1876, Serbia, followed by Montenegro, declared war on the Ottoman Empire. In July and August, the ill-prepared and poorly equipped Serbian army helped by Russian volunteers failed to achieve offensive objectives but did manage to repulse the Ottoman offensive into Serbia. Meanwhile, Alexander II of Russia and Prince Gorchakov met Austria-Hungary's Franz Joseph I and Count Andrássy in the Reichstadt castle in Bohemia. No written agreement was made, but during the discussions, Russia agreed to support Austrian occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Austria-Hungary, in exchange, agreed to support the return of Southern Bessarabia – lost by Russia during the Crimean War – and Russian annexation of the port of Batum on the east coast of the Black Sea. Bulgaria was to become autonomous (independent, according to the Russian records).[39]

As the fighting in Bosnia and Herzegovina continued, Serbia suffered a string of setbacks and asked the European powers to mediate an end to the war. A joint ultimatum by the European powers forced the Porte to give Serbia a one-month truce and start peace negotiations. Turkish peace conditions however were refused by European powers as too harsh. In early October, after the truce expired, the Turkish army resumed its offensive and the Serbian position quickly became desperate. On 31 October, Russia issued an ultimatum requiring the Ottoman Empire to stop the hostilities and sign a new truce with Serbia within 48 hours. This was supported by the partial mobilization of the Imperial Russian Army (up to 20 divisions). Sultan Abdul Hamid II accepted the conditions of the ultimatum.

To resolve the crisis, on 11 December 1876, the Constantinople Conference of the Great Powers was opened in Constantinople (to which Ottoman representatives were not invited). A compromise solution was negotiated, granting autonomy to Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina under the joint control of European powers. The Ottomans, however, refused to sacrifice their independence by allowing international representatives to oversee the institution of reforms and sought to discredit the conference by announcing on 23 December, the day the conference was closed, that a constitution was adopted that declared equal rights for religious minorities within the Empire. The Ottomans attempted to use this manoeuver to get their objections and amendments to the agreement heard. When they were rejected by the Great Powers, the Ottoman Empire announced its decision to disregard the results of the conference.

On 15 January 1877, Russia and Austria-Hungary signed a written agreement confirming the results of the earlier Reichstadt Agreement of July 1876. This assured Russia of the benevolent neutrality of Austria-Hungary in the impending war. These terms meant that in case of war Russia would do the fighting and Austria-Hungary would derive most of the advantage. Russia therefore made a final effort for a peaceful settlement. After reaching an agreement with its main Balkan rival and with anti-Ottoman sympathies running high throughout Europe due to the Bulgarian atrocities and the rejection of the Constantinople agreements, Russia finally felt free to declare war.

Status of combatants edit

The Ottoman Army edit

The Ottoman army at this time solely conscripted Muslims with non-Muslims paying a poll tax in lieu of service, the army itself was divided into four categories: the Nizam (standing army), who served for four years (five for cavalry and engineers); the Ithiat, or first reserve, where a further two years were served (one year for the cavalry and artillery); the Redif, which took veterans of the Nizam and Ithiat categories and men who did not serve; and the Moustafiz, where all men who had completed their service in the Redif (approximately 300,000 troops) served for a further six years.[40]

The Redif itself was divided into four categories: the first category consisted of veterans of the Nizam category, who served in the first Redif subcategory for four years before entering the second Redif sub-category; men who were not conscripted served in the third sub-category of the Redif for four years before entering the fourth subcategory. The Redif itself was grouped into battalions and classes, with whole battalions taken out to serve as new units. The annual draft conscripted 37,500 men; following mobilisation of the Nizam and Ithiat, these two portions of the army totaled approximately 210,000 men. An additional 20,000 men of the Gendarme were included in the Nizam. The Redif was theoretically capable of providing 190,000–200,000 troops. [41]

Sultan Abdulaziz had reorganised the military school during his reign to educate officers. However, the turnout of this academy was poor and only 1,600 of the 20,000 regular officers of the army were academy trained, though the artillery saw the highest concentration of academy trained officers at 20% of the total. For the entire Ottoman army, only 132 academy-trained generals were available.[40]

The Ottoman army was organised at the battalion level with a battalion nominally holding 800 men subdivided into companies of 100 men, for formations above the battalion level these were to be assembled ad-hoc this results in difficulty at estimating Ottoman troop strength throughout the war as many units were below strength before entering the war due to the many rebellions affecting the empire. However, the Ottoman army was well prepared for war, as it had increasingly called up its reserves up to the third subcategory of the Redif when Russian forces began gathering in Bessarabia.[42] Olender gives the Ottoman battalion (tabor) of infantry at 774 men on paper and 650 in practice, the cavalry squadron containing 143 men on paper and 100 in practice, with the artillery being organised into six gun batteries.[41]

The Ottoman army was also well equipped; 75% of its troops were equipped with Peabody-Martini rifles (accurate to 1,800 yards), with 300,000 of these guns having been purchased prior to the war. The remainder of the regular troops used Snider rifles; the irregulars used Winchester repeating rifles, and the Egyptians used Remington rifles.[43] The Ottoman support services were, however, less impressive, with the army often forced to resort to foraging. On the other hand, Ottoman forces were equipped with entrenching tools (which they used extensively at Plevna) and had sufficient ammunition for their repeating rifles. The Ottoman artillery were armed with Krupp guns of the 8cm and 9cm types for field usage, with 12 cm and 15cm guns also being used (but less commonly) and various older guns found primarily in fortresses.[44][41]

At the outbreak of war, the Ottoman army was divided into several groups. The largest was the 168,000-man contingent under the command of Abdülkerim Nadir Pasha, based out of Shumla. 140,000 were assigned to the general task of fighting threats in the European provinces of the Empire, with 45,000 in various garrisons in Anatolia, Europe, and Crete. With the Caucasus army containing 70,000 men, the total of number of troops amounted to 378,000.[45]

Olender gives a breakdown of Ottoman troops in the spring of 1877 as containing 571 infantry battalions (181 of which were Nizam), 147 cavalry squadrons and 143 artillery batteries not including the fortress and garrison companies or irregulars. On paper this would amount to 441,954 infantry (140,094 being nizam troops), 21,021 cavalry and 858 guns. However, due to other conflicts and the ongoing process of mobilisation of the Redif units at this process the Regular Ottoman army amounted to 400,000 troops with an additional 90,000 irregular troops and Egyptian troops.[41]

Disposition of Ottoman forces at the outbreak of war[46][41]
Location Commander Formations Personnel

(Paper Olender)

Vidin Osman Pasha 50 battalions

10 squadrons 15 batteries

30,000

(40,130 men, 90 guns)

Rushchuk

Sistova

Kaisserli AhmedPasha 15 battalions

4 squadrons 5 batteries

15,000

(12,182, 30 guns)

Silistra Sulami Pasha 12 battalions

3 squadrons 3 batteries

9,000

(9,717, 18 guns)

ShumlaTargovishte Ahmed Eyub

Pasha

65 battalions

30 squadrons (mostly irregular) 15 batteries

55,000

(54,600, 90 guns)

Varna Reshid Pasha 12 battalions

2 squadrons 2 batteries

8,000

(9,288, 12 guns)

Sofia, Tirnovo,

Adrianople Constantinople

45 battalions

12 squadrons 8 batteries

25,000

(36,546, 48 guns)

Bosnia Suleiman Pasha 15,000
Albania 20,000
Novi Pazar 10,000
Crete and European

Ottoman lands

45,000

The Russian Army edit

The Russian army in the decade prior to the war underwent major modernisation spearheaded by the Minister of War Dmitry Milyutin, this programme of reform gave Russia a large army that was capable of fighting a war against the Ottomans. All Russian men were to serve 6 years in the active army and 9 years in the reserves though through exemption the effective intake of conscription was considerably less (in 1874 of 724,648 eligible men only 150,000 were enlisted this having risen to 218,000 by 1877) in peacetime, though this was still sufficient to meet the Russian need for manpower. The Active portion of the army was subdivided into 2 portions, the local troops, who were garrison soldiers in Europe, regular soldiers in Asia, stationary forces and gendarmes, the other portion was the Field Army. In addition to these forces there was the militia (opolcheniye), which contained all men exempted from conscripted and men under 40 who had completed their terms of service.[47][48]

The Field Army was organised into 48 infantry divisions (3 of which were guard and 4 Grenadier). There were also 8 rifle brigades, 19 cavalry divisions, 35 horse gun batteries, 19 engineer battalions, 49 field gun brigades. The Russian divisions were organised into corps of 2 to 3 divisions, a corps excluding support and command staff would consist of 20,160 infantry, 2,048 cavalry, 96 field guns and 12 horse drawn guns (this is for a 2 division corps).[47]

The Russian army in 1874 contained 754,265 men and by January 1, 1878, this had risen to over 1.5 million men. The Russian army used 2 rifles, the Krnka rifle, which they possessed 800,000 of at the minimum and was accurate to only 600 yards (to the Turkish Peabody's 1,800), and the Berdan rifle, which equipped the Line, Grenadier, Rifle and Guard formations and was accurate to 1,500 yards. However, the Russian army, despite possessing breechloading rifles, was still holding to the maxims of Suvorov, which called for the usage of the bayonet as the principal weapon, Russian soldiers also lacked entrenching equipment to an adequate level. Russian artillery, despite being breechloaded, were nearing obsolescence[49]

History edit

 
Nizhegorodsky Dragoons pursuing the Turks near Kars, 1877, painting by Aleksey Kivshenko

Course of the war edit

Opening manoeuvres edit

On 12 April 1877, Romania gave permission to the Russian troops to pass through its territory to attack the Turks.

On 24 April 1877 Russia declared war on the Ottomans, and its troops entered Romania through the newly built Eiffel Bridge near Ungheni, on the Prut river, resulting in Turkish bombardments of Romanian towns on the Danube.

On 10 May 1877, the Principality of Romania, which was under nominal Turkish suzerainty, declared its independence.[50]

 
Russian crossing of the Danube, June 1877, painting by Nikolai Dmitriev-Orenburgsky, 1883

At the beginning of the war, the outcome was far from obvious. The Russians could send a larger army into the Balkans: about 300,000 troops were within reach. The Ottomans had about 200,000 troops on the Balkan peninsula, of which about 100,000 were assigned to fortified garrisons, leaving about 100,000 for the army of operation. The Ottomans had the advantage of being fortified, complete command of the Black Sea, and patrol boats along the Danube river.[51] They also possessed superior arms, including new British and American-made rifles and German-made artillery.

In the event, however, the Ottomans usually resorted to passive defense, leaving the strategic initiative to the Russians, who, after making some mistakes, found a winning strategy for the war. The Ottoman military command in Constantinople made poor assumptions about Russian intentions. They decided that Russians would be too lazy to march along the Danube and cross it away from the delta, and would prefer the short way along the Black Sea coast. This would be ignoring the fact that the coast had the strongest, best supplied and garrisoned Turkish fortresses. There was only one well manned fortress along the inner part of the River Danube, Vidin. It was garrisoned only because the troops, led by Osman Nuri Pasha, had just taken part in defeating the Serbs in their recent war against the Ottoman Empire.

The Russian campaign was better planned, but it relied heavily on Turkish passivity. A crucial Russian mistake was sending too few troops initially; an expeditionary force of about 185,000 crossed the Danube in June, slightly fewer than the combined Turkish forces in the Balkans (about 200,000). After setbacks in July (at Pleven and Stara Zagora), the Russian military command realized it did not have the reserves to keep the offensive going and switched to a defensive posture. The Russians did not even have enough forces to blockade Pleven properly until late August, which effectively delayed the whole campaign for about two months.

Balkan theatre edit

 
Map of the Balkan Theater

At the start of the war, Russia and Romania destroyed all vessels along the Danube and mined the river, thus ensuring that Russian forces could cross the Danube at any point without resistance from the Ottoman Navy. The Ottoman command did not appreciate the significance of the Russians' actions. In June, a small Russian unit crossed the Danube close to the delta, at Galați, and marched towards Ruschuk (today Ruse). This made the Ottomans even more confident that the big Russian force would come right through the middle of the Ottoman stronghold.

 
Soldiers of Finnish Guard sharpshooter battalion during Battle of Gorni Dubnik

In the first month of the war, the Ottomans suffered a pair of significant naval losses on the Danube. The turret ship Lütf-ü Celil was destroyed by a Russian artillery battery on 11 May.[52] And on the night of 25–26 May, a Romanian torpedo boat with a mixed Romanian-Russian crew attacked and sank the Ottoman monitor Seyfî on the Danube. Under the direct command of Major-General Mikhail Ivanovich Dragomirov, on the night of 27/28 June 1877 (NS) the Russians constructed a pontoon bridge across the Danube at Svishtov. After a short battle in which the Russians suffered 812 killed and wounded,[53] the Russians secured the opposing bank and drove off the Ottoman infantry brigade defending Svishtov. At this point the Russian force was divided into three parts: the Eastern Detachment under the command of Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich, the future Tsar Alexander III of Russia, assigned to capture the fortress of Ruschuk and cover the army's eastern flank; the Western Detachment, to capture the fortress of Nikopol, Bulgaria and cover the army's western flank; and the Advance Detachment under Count Joseph Vladimirovich Gourko, which was assigned to quickly move via Veliko Tarnovo and penetrate the Balkan Mountains, the most significant barrier between the Danube and Constantinople.

 
Fighting near Ivanovo-Chiflik

Responding to the Russian crossing of the Danube, the Ottoman high command in Constantinople ordered Osman Nuri Pasha to advance east from Vidin and occupy the fortress of Nikopol, just west of the Russian crossing. On his way to Nikopol, Osman Pasha learned that the Russians had already captured the fortress and so moved to the crossroads town of Plevna (now known as Pleven), which he occupied with a force of approximately 15,000 on 19 July (NS).[54] The Russians, approximately 9,000 under the command of General Schilder-Schuldner, reached Plevna early in the morning. Thus began the Siege of Plevna, lasting for 145 days until 10 December.

Osman Pasha organized a defense and repelled two Russian attacks with colossal casualties on the Russian side. At that point, the sides were almost equal in numbers and the Russian army was very discouraged.[55] A counter-attack might have allowed the Ottomans to control and destroy the Russians' bridge, but Osman Pasha did not leave the fortress because he had orders to stay fortified in Plevna.

Russia had no more troops to throw against Plevna, so the Russians besieged it, and subsequently asked[56] the Romanians to cross the Danube and help them. On 9 August, Suleiman Pasha made an attempt to help Osman Pasha with 30,000 troops, but he was stopped by Bulgarians at the Battle of Shipka Pass. After three days of fighting, the volunteers were relieved by a Russian force led by General Fyodor Radetsky, and the Turkish forces withdrew. Soon afterwards, Romanian forces crossed the Danube and joined the siege. On 16 August, at Gorni-Studen, the armies around Plevna were placed under the command of the Romanian Prince Carol I, aided by the Russian general Pavel Dmitrievich Zotov and the Romanian general Alexandru Cernat.

The Turks maintained several fortresses around Pleven which the Russian and Romanian forces gradually reduced.[57][58] The Romanian 4th Division led by General Gheorghe Manu took the Grivitsa redoubt after four bloody assaults and managed to keep it until the very end of the siege. The Siege of Plevna (July–December 1877) turned to victory only after Russian and Romanian forces cut off all supply routes to the fortified Ottomans. With supplies running low, Osman Pasha made an attempt to break the Russian siege in the direction of Opanets. On 9 December, in the middle of the night the Ottomans threw bridges over the Vit river and crossed it, attacked on a 2-mile (3.2 km) front and broke through the first line of Russian trenches. Here they fought hand to hand and bayonet to bayonet, with little advantage to either side. Outnumbering the Ottomans almost 5 to 1, the Russians drove the Ottomans back across the Vit. Osman Pasha was wounded in the leg by a stray bullet, which killed his horse beneath him. Making a brief stand, the Ottomans eventually found themselves driven back into the city, losing 5,000 men to the Russians' 2,000. The next day, Osman surrendered the city, the garrison, and his sword to the Romanian colonel, Mihail Cerchez. He was treated honorably, but his troops perished in the snow by the thousands as they straggled off into captivity.

At this point, Serbia, having finally secured monetary aid from Russia, declared war on the Ottoman Empire again. This time there were far fewer Russian officers in the Serbian army but this was more than offset by the experience gained from the 1876–77 war. Under nominal command of Prince Milan Obrenović (effective command was in hands of general Kosta Protić, the army chief of staff), the Serbian Army went on offensive in what is now eastern south Serbia. A planned offensive into the Ottoman Sanjak of Novi Pazar was called off due to strong diplomatic pressure from Austria-Hungary, which wanted to prevent Serbia and Montenegro from coming into contact, and which had designs to spread Austria-Hungary's influence through the area. The Ottomans, outnumbered unlike two years before, mostly confined themselves to passive defence of fortified positions. By the end of hostilities the Serbs had captured Ak-Palanka (today Bela Palanka), Pirot, Niš and Vranje.

Russians under Field Marshal Gourko succeeded in capturing the passes at the Stara Planina mountain, which were crucial for maneuvering. Next, both sides fought a series of battles for Shipka Pass. Gourko made several attacks on the Pass and eventually secured it. Ottoman troops spent much effort to recapture this important route, to use it to reinforce Osman Pasha in Pleven, but failed. Eventually Gourko led a final offensive that crushed the Ottomans around Shipka Pass. The Ottoman offensive against Shipka Pass is considered one of the major mistakes of the war, as other passes were virtually unguarded. At this time a huge number of Ottoman troops stayed fortified along the Black Sea coast and engaged in very few operations.

A Russian army crossed the Stara Planina by a high snowy pass in winter, guided and helped by local Bulgarians, not expected by the Ottoman army, and defeated the Turks at the Battle of Tashkessen and took Sofia. The way was now open for a quick advance through Plovdiv and Adrianople to Constantinople.

Besides the Romanian Army (which mobilized 130,000 men, losing 10,000 of them to this war), more than 12,000 volunteer Bulgarian troops (Opalchenie) from the local Bulgarian population as well as many hajduk detachments fought in the war on the side of the Russians.

Caucasian theatre edit

 
The Russo-Turkish War in Caucasia, 1877

The Russian 1st Caucasus Army Corps was stationed in Georgia and Armenia, composed of approximately 50,000 men and 202 guns under the overall command of Grand Duke Michael Nikolaevich, Governor General of the Caucasus.[59] The Russian force stood opposed by an Ottoman Army of 100,000 men led by General Ahmed Muhtar Pasha. While the Russian army was better prepared for the fighting in the region, it lagged behind technologically in certain areas such as heavy artillery and was outgunned, for example, by the superior long-range Krupp artillery that Germany had supplied to the Ottomans.[60]

The Caucasus Corps was led by a quartet of Armenian commanders: Generals Mikhail Loris-Melikov, Arshak Ter-Gukasov (Ter-Ghukasov/Ter-Ghukasyan), Ivan Lazarev and Beybut Shelkovnikov.[61] Forces under Lieutenant-General Ter-Gukasov, stationed near Yerevan, commenced the first assault into Ottoman territory by capturing the town of Bayazid on 27 April 1877.[62] Capitalizing on Ter-Gukasov's victory there, Russian forces advanced, taking the region of Ardahan on 17 May; Russian units also besieged the city of Kars in the final week of May, although Ottoman reinforcements lifted the siege and drove them back. Bolstered by reinforcements, in November 1877 General Lazarev launched a new attack on Kars, suppressing the southern forts leading to the city and capturing Kars itself on 18 November.[63] On 19 February 1878, the strategic fortress town of Erzurum was taken by the Russians after a lengthy siege. Although they relinquished control of Erzurum to the Ottomans at the end the war, the Russians acquired the regions of Batum, Ardahan, Kars, Olti, and Sarikamish and reconstituted them into the Kars Oblast.[64]

Greek involvement edit

During the course of the war, the majority of Greeks wanted to enter the war on Russia's side, however the Greek government decided reluctantly to not intervene, due to British neutrality.[65] The Brits guaranteed that after the end of the war they would intervene themselves and assure equal rights for the Greek subjects of the Ottoman Empire, as long as Greece didn't join the war.[65] Nevertheless, several Greek revolts broke out in Crete, Epirus, Macedonia and Thessaly demanding union with Greece. The Greek Army invaded Thessaly in January 1878, but didn't officially declare war on the Ottomans; along with Greek irregular revolutionaries, the Greek Army won the Battle of Mouzaki.[66] However, the Great Powers asked for the Greece to recall its army, in return, they ensured that issues regarding the Greek communities would be raised in the post-war Peace Conference. The Greek government accepted and, as a result, the rebellions were left unsupported and were crushed by the Ottomans.[67] Three years later, with the Convention of Constantinople, most of Thessaly (excluding Elassona) as well as Arta were ceded to Greece.[68]

Kurdish uprising edit

 
Plevna Chapel near the walls of Kitay-gorod

As the Russo-Turkish war came to a close, a Kurdish uprising began. It was led by two brothers, Husein and Osman Pasha. The rebellion held most of the region of Bohtan for 9 months. It was ended only through duplicity, after force of arms had failed.[69] In Kars, Kurdish notables like Abdürrezzak Bedir Khan and a son of Sheikh Ubeydullah were supporters of the Russians.[70]

Civilian government in Bulgaria during the war edit

After Bulgarian territories were liberated by the Russian Army during the war, they were governed initially by a provisional Russian administration, which was established in April 1877. The Treaty of Berlin (1878) provided for the termination of this provisional Russian administration in May 1879, when the Principality of Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia were established.[71] The main objectives of the temporary Russian administration were to secure peace and order and to prepare for a revival of the Bulgarian state.

Aftermath edit

Intervention by the Great Powers edit

 
Europe after the Congress of Berlin in 1878 and the territorial and political rearrangement of the Balkan Peninsula.

Under pressure from the British, Russia accepted the truce offered by the Ottoman Empire on 31 January 1878, but continued to move towards Constantinople.

The British sent a fleet of battleships to intimidate Russia from entering the city, and Russian forces stopped at San Stefano. Eventually Russia entered into a settlement under the Treaty of San Stefano on 3 March, by which the Ottoman Empire would recognize the independence of Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro, and the autonomy of Bulgaria.

Alarmed by the extension of Russian power into the Balkans, the Great Powers later forced modifications of the treaty in the Congress of Berlin. The main change here was that Bulgaria would be split, according to earlier agreements among the Great Powers that precluded the creation of a large new Slavic state: the northern and eastern parts to become principalities as before (Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia), though with different governors; and the Macedonian region, originally part of Bulgaria under San Stefano, would return to direct Ottoman administration.[72]

The 1879 Treaty of Constantinople [ru] was a further continuation of negotiations between Russia and the Ottoman Empire. While reaffirming provisions of the Treaty of San Stefano which had not been modified by the Berlin Treaty, it set compensation terms owed by Ottoman Empire to Russia for losses sustained during the war. It contained terms to release prisoners of war and to grant amnesty to Ottoman subjects,[73][74] as well as providing terms for the inhabitants nationality after the annexations. Article VII allowed subjects to opt within six months of the signing of the treaty to retain Ottoman subjecthood or become Russian subjects.[74][75]

A surprising consequence came in Hungary (part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire). Despite memories of the terrible defeat at Mohács in 1526, elite Hungarian attitudes were becoming strongly anti-Russian. This led to active support for the Turks in the media, but only in a peaceful way, since the foreign policy of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy remained neutral.[76]

Effects on Bulgaria's Jewish population edit

The Bulletins de l'Alliance Israélite Universelle reported that thousands of Bulgarian Jews found refuge at Constantinople and reported that many Jewish communities had fled in their entirety with the retreating Turks as their protectors.[77]

However, this is directly contradicted by census figures, which, instead of a decrease, indicate a substantial increase in Bulgaria's Jewish population before and after the war. While there were only 4,595 males or 9,190 male and female Jews in the five vilayets to form the future Principality of Bulgaria – Rusçuk, Vidin, Sofia, Tirnova, and Varna – according to the pre-war Ottoman salname of 1875 (0.4% of the population), the 1880 Bulgarian census indicated a total of 14,342 Jews, who accounted for 0.7% of the post-war Bulgarian population.[78][79][80] Moreover, an increase by 5,152 people, or 56%, in less than five years, cannot be explained by natural increase alone and would rather indicate substantial net immigration rather than emigration of Jews from the principality. Obviously, any such immigration or return of refugees would happen only after the postwar situation stabilized, offering necessary personal and economic security.

Internationalization of the Armenian Question edit

 
Emigration of Armenians into Georgia during the Russo-Turkish war

The conclusion of the Russo-Turkish war also led to the internationalization of the Armenian Question. Many Armenians in the eastern provinces (Turkish Armenia) of the Ottoman Empire greeted the advancing Russians as liberators. Violence and instability directed at Armenians during the war by Kurd and Circassian bands had left many Armenians looking toward the invading Russians as the ultimate guarantors of their security. Influential pro-Russian Armenian thinker Grigor Artsruni encouraged Armenians to migrate to Russia in order to form a more concentrated block.[81] In January 1878, Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople Nerses II Varzhapetian approached the Russian leadership with the view of receiving assurances that the Russians would introduce provisions in the prospective peace treaty for self-administration in the Armenian provinces. Though not as explicit, Article 16 of the Treaty of San Stefano read:

As the evacuation of the Russian troops of the territory they occupy in Armenia, and which is to be restored to Turkey, might give rise to conflicts and complications detrimental to the maintenance of good relations between the two countries, the Sublime Porte engaged to carry into effect, without further delay, the improvements and reforms demanded by local requirements in the provinces inhabited by Armenians and to guarantee their security from Kurds and Circassians.[82]

The Armenian Patriarch discouraged Armenian migration to Russia and encouraged Armenians to “remain faithful to the Sultan”. The Patriarch held the belief that Armenian-inhabited areas could remain under Ottoman rule, but under Christian control, and that Muslims who were dissatisfied with how the Ottomans had been governing the provinces would tolerate life under Christian leadership. In attempting to persuade the British to drive a hard bargain with the Ottoman Empire, he asserted to British Ambassador Austen Henry Layard that the “only thing … that could induce the Armenians to refrain from listening to the advice of Russia to emigrate, and to be content to remain under the rule of the Sultan, would be the appointment of an Armenian as Vali of Armenia”.[81] Great Britain, however, took objection to Russia holding on to so much Ottoman territory and forced it to enter into new negotiations by convening the Congress of Berlin in June 1878. An Armenian delegation led by prelate Mkrtich Khrimian traveled to Berlin to present the case of the Armenians but, much to its chagrin, was left out of the negotiations. Article 16 was modified and watered down, and all mention of the Russian forces remaining in the provinces was removed. In the final text of the Treaty of Berlin, it was transformed into Article 61, which read:

The Sublime Porte undertakes to carry out, without further delay, the improvements and reforms demanded by local requirements in the provinces inhabited by Armenians, and to guarantee their security against the Circassians and Kurds. It will periodically make known the steps taken to this effect to the powers, who will superintend their application.[83]

As it turned out, the reforms were not forthcoming. Khrimian returned to Constantinople and delivered a famous speech in which he likened the peace conference to a "'big cauldron of Liberty Stew' into which the big nations dipped their 'iron ladles' for real results, while the Armenian delegation had only a 'Paper Ladle'. 'Ah dear Armenian people,' Khrimian said, 'could I have dipped my Paper Ladle in the cauldron it would sog and remain there! Where guns talk and sabers shine, what significance do appeals and petitions have?'"[84] Given the absence of tangible improvements in the plight of the Armenian community, a number of Armenian intellectuals living in Europe and Russia in the 1880s and 1890s formed political parties and revolutionary societies to secure better conditions for their compatriots in Ottoman Armenia and other parts of the Ottoman Empire.[85]

Civilian casualties edit

Atrocities and ethnic cleansing edit

Both sides carried out massacres and an ethnic cleansing policy during the war.[86][87]

Against Turks edit

 
Turkish refugees fleeing from Tarnovo towards Shumen
 
The execution of the Bashi-bazouks in Bulgaria, 1878.

In January 1878, advancing coalition forces started committing atrocities against Muslim populations in the region. British reports from that time have detailed information about atrocities and massacres. According to those reports, in the village of İssova Bâlâ, the school and 96 of the 170 houses were burned to the ground.[88] The inhabitants of Yukarı Sofular were slaughtered and 12 of the 130 houses in village, a mosque, and a school were burned.[89][90] In Kozluca, 18 Turks were killed.[91] Massacres of Muslim inhabitants occurred in Kazanlak too.[92] In the village of Muflis, 127 Muslim inhabitants were kidnapped by a group of Russian and Bulgarian troops. 20 managed to escape. The rest were killed.[93] 400 people from Muflis were killed according to Ottoman sources.[94] 11 inhabitants were killed in Keçidere.[93] According to John Joseph the Russian troops frequently killed Muslim peasants to prevent them from disrupting their supply and troop movements. During the Battle of Harmanli accompanying this retaliation on Muslim non-combatants, it was reported that a huge group of Muslim townspeople were attacked by the Russian army. Thousands died and their goods were confiscated.[95][96][97] The correspondent of The Daily News describes as an eyewitness the burning of four or five Turkish villages by the Russian troops in response to the Turks firing at the Russians from the villages, instead of behind rocks or trees,[98] which must have appeared to the Russian soldiers as guerrilla attempts by the local Muslim populace upon the Russian contingencies operating against the Ottoman forces embedded in the area. During the conflict a number of Muslim buildings and cultural centres were also destroyed. A large library of old Turkish books was destroyed when a mosque in Turnovo was burned in 1877.[99] Most mosques in Sofia were destroyed, seven of them in one night in December 1878 when "a thunderstorm masked the noise of the explosions arranged by Russian military engineers."[100]

Many villages in the Kars region were pillaged by Russian army during the war.[94] The war in Caucasus caused many Muslims to migrate to remaining Ottoman lands, mostly in poverty and with poor conditions.[101] Between 1878 and 1881, 82,000 Muslims migrated to the Ottoman Empire from lands ceded to Russia in Caucasus.[102]

Muslim war refugees according to census data and Ottoman official documents edit

According to Ottoman official records, the total number of refugees from the lands ceded in 1878 to the Principality of Bulgaria, Eastern Rumelia, Serbia, Romania and Austria-Hungary (from Bosnia) from 1876 to 1879 stands at 571,152 people: 276,389 in 1876, 198,000 in 1877, 76,000 in 1878 and 20,763 in 1879.[103] However, it is unclear if the numbers include refugees who emigrated after the suspension of hostilities.

According to the pre-war Ottoman salname of 1875, the total male Muslim population of the five vilayets to form the future Principality of Bulgaria – Rusçuk, Vidin, Sofia, Tirnova, and Varna – stood at 405,450 (total population of 810,900), however, inclusive of Circassian Muhacir and Muslim Romani.[78] The Danube vilayet census of 1874, which covered all sanjaks in the vilayet except Niš counted a total of 963,596 Muslims.[104] The total Muslim population of the Danube Vilayet for the same year, Niš included, stood at 1,055,650.[104] This number included not only Ottoman Turks, but also Crimean Tatars, Circassians, Pomaks, Romani as well as a substantial number of Albanians.

At the same time, the 1876 Ottoman population records for the Sanjaks of Filibe and İslimye, which were detached from the Adrianople Vilayet to form Eastern Rumelia in 1878, indicated 171,777 male Turks and 16,353 male Muslim Romani, or total Muslim population of 376,260.[105] This figure however included the Rhodopian kazas of Ahi Çelebi and Sultanyeri (male Muslim population of 8,197 and 13,336, respectively, or total Muslim population for both of 43,066), which remained part of in the Ottoman Empire.[105] Without Ahi Çelebi and Sultanyeri, the Muslim population of Eastern Rumelia was 333,194.[105]

Thus, according to the Ottoman Empire's own population records, the total number of Muslims in the territories ceded by the Empire to the Principality of Bulgaria, Eastern Rumelia, Serbia and Romania, did not exceed 1,388,844 people (1,055,650 for the Danube Vilayet and 333,194 for the Filibe and İslimye Sanjaks), a figure that is lower than the approx. 1.5 million Turks who had reportedly perished or been forced to migrate according to both Karpat and İpek – whose estimates would also necessarily mean that no Muslims whatsoever remained in either the Principality of Bulgaria, Eastern Rumelia, Serbia or Romanian Dobruja.

At the same time, the 1880 population census of the Principality of Bulgaria gave 578,060 Muslims; the 1880 population census of Eastern Rumelia indicated 174,749 Turks and 19,254 Romani (total Muslim population of 194,003); the 1880 population census of Romanian North Dobruja showed 18,624 Turks and 29,476 Crimean Tatars (total of 48,100 Muslims), while the 1880 population census of Serbia stated only 6,567 Muslims in the Niš area.[79][106][107][80][108][109]

Thus, as of 1880, the total number of Muslims who lived in the territories ceded by the Ottoman Empire stood at 827,000 people, down from 1,388,844 Muslims counted by the pre-war Ottoman statistics, signifying a net loss of 561,844 Muslims (40.4%). While shockingly high, this figure falls short by more than 200,000 people of Dennis P. Hupchick and Justin McCarthy's estimates of some 260,000 Muslims missing/dead and 500,000 forced to emigrate and is way more off compared to the figure of more than 750,000 Muslim casualties and victims of ethnic cleansing from the Bulgarian lands alone quoted by Douglas Arthur Howard.

The Principality of Bulgaria, Eastern Rumelia and Romania accounted for a negative net balance of 472,792 Muslims (or a net loss of 36.5%).

By comparison, Serbia, the only country in the region, which did indeed engage in ethnic cleansing and forced expulsion of its Muslim population, effectively reduced its Muslim population between 1877 and 1880 from 95,619 to 6,567 people (cf. Expulsion of the Albanians, 1877–1878), i.e., a net loss of 89,052 Muslims, or 93%.[109]

Historians' estimates about Muslim population losses edit

20th century historians have made different guesses about the total Muslim losses during the Russo-Turkish war. Dennis P. Hupchick and Justin McCarthy says that 260,000 people went missing and 500,000 became refugees.[110][111] Turkish historian Kemal Karpat claims that 250–300,000 people, about 17% of the former Muslim population of Bulgaria, died as a consequence of famine, disease, and massacres,[112] and 1 to 1.5 million people were forced to migrate.[113] Turkish author Nedim İpek gives the same numbers as Karpat.[114] Another source claims 400,000 Turks were massacred and 1,000,000 Turks had to migrate during the war.[115] The perpetrators of those massacres are also disputed, with Justin McCarthy claiming that they were carried out by Russian soldiers, Cossacks as well as Bulgarian volunteers and villagers, though there were few civilian casualties in battle.[116] while James J. Reid claims that Circassians were significantly responsible for the refugee flow, that there were civilian casualties from battle and even that the Ottoman army was responsible for casualties among the Muslim population.[117] The number of Muslim refugees is estimated by R.J. Crampton to be 130,000.[118] Richard C. Frucht estimates that only half (700,000) of the prewar Muslim population remained after the war, 216,000 had died and the rest emigrated.[119] Douglas Arthur Howard estimates that half the 1.5 million Muslims, for the most part Turks, in prewar Bulgaria had disappeared by 1879. 200,000 had died, the rest became permanently refugees in Ottoman territories.[120]

In this connection, it is important to note that Justin McCarthy, who is the author of the estimates above and has been requoted by both Hupchik and Howard, is an Armenian Genocide denialist who has been criticised severely by many of his colleagues for whitewashing Ottoman history.[121][122][123][124] Moreover, McCarthy is a member of, and has received grants from, the Institute of Turkish Studies.[125] Throughout his career, he has been accused, among other things, of being "an apologist for the Turkish state", of having "an indefensible bias toward the Turkish official position", of selectively using sources and of always ascribing intent to non-Ottoman troops while making excuses for Ottoman ones for similar events.[126][127][128]

Against Albanians edit

Against Bulgarians edit

 
Bones of massacred Bulgarians at Stara Zagora (ethnic cleansing by the Ottoman Empire)

The most notable massacre of Bulgarian civilians during the Russo-Turkish War took place during the Battle of Stara Zagora in July 1877, when Gurko's forces had to retreat back to the Shipka pass. In the aftermath of the battle, Suleiman Pasha's forces burned down and plundered the city of Stara Zagora and subjected its population to indiscriminate slaughter.[129][130]

At the time, Stara Zagora was not only one of the biggest Bulgarian cities, but it also accommodated some 20,000 refugees from nearby villages, seeking shelter from Ottoman reprisals. The number of massacred Christian civilians in the course of the battle is estimated at between 14,000 and 14,500, which would make it the biggest war crime in modern-era Bulgaria. In addition to the massacre carried out by the Suleiman's regular forces, Circassian bashi-bazouks engaged in numerous acts of looting, plunder and killing, among other things, The Terror in Karlovo, the Kalofer massacre, the Kavarna uprising etc. etc.[131][132][133]

Moreover, Suleiman Pasha's forces also established an entire system of police and judicial terror across the entire valley of the Maritsa, where any Bulgarian who had ever in any way assisted the Russians was hanged. However, even villages that had not assisted the Russians were destroyed and their inhabitants massacred.[134] As a result, as many as 100,000 civilian Bulgarians fled north to the Russian occupied territories.[135] Later on in the campaign, the Ottoman forces planned to burn the town of Sofia after Gurko had managed to overcome their resistance in the passes of Western part of the Balkan Mountains.

Only the refusal of the Italian Consul Vito Positano, the French Vice Consul Leandre le Gay and the Austro–Hungarian Vice Consul to leave Sofia prevented that from happening. After the Ottoman retreat, Positano even organized armed detachments to protect the population from marauders (regular Ottoman Army deserters and bashi-bazouks).[136] Circassians in the Ottoman forces also raped and murdered Bulgarians during the 1877 Russo-Turkish war.[137][138][139][140][141][142][143]

According to Bulgarian historians, 30,000 Bulgarian civilians were killed during the war, with two-thirds of the killings being committed in the Stara Zagora area.[144]

Against Circassians edit

Russians raped Circassian girls during the 1877 Russo-Turkish war from the Circassian refugees who were settled in the Ottoman Balkans.[145] After the signing of the Treaty of San Stefano, the 10,000-strong Circassian minority in Dobruja was expelled.[146]

Lasting effects edit

International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement edit

 
The Red Cross and the Red Crescent emblems

This war caused a division in the emblems of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement which continues to this day. Both Russia and the Ottoman Empire had signed the First Geneva Convention (1864), which made the Red Cross, a colour reversal of the flag of neutral Switzerland, the sole emblem of protection for military medical personnel and facilities. However, during this war the cross instead reminded the Ottomans of the Crusades; so they elected to replace the cross with the Red Crescent instead. This ultimately became the symbol of the Movement's national societies in most Muslim countries, and was ratified as an emblem of protection by later Geneva Conventions in 1929 and again in 1949 (the current version).

Iran, which neighbored both the Russian Empire and Ottoman Empire, considered them to be rivals, and probably considered the Red Crescent in particular to be an Ottoman symbol; except for the Red Crescent being centred and without a star, it is a colour reversal of the Ottoman flag (and the modern Turkish flag). This appears to have led to their national society in the Movement being initially known as the Red Lion and Sun Society, using a red version of the Lion and Sun, a traditional Iranian symbol. After the Iranian Revolution of 1979, Iran switched to the Red Crescent, but the Geneva Conventions continue to recognize the Red Lion and Sun as an emblem of protection.

In popular culture edit

The novella Jalaleddin, published in 1878 by the novelist Raffi describes the Kurdish massacres of Armenians in the eastern Ottoman Empire at the time of the Russo-Turkish war. The novella follows the journey of a young man through the mountains of Anatolia. The historical descriptions in the novella correspond with information from British sources at the time.[147]

The novel The Doll (Polish title: Lalka), written in 1887–1889 by Bolesław Prus, describes consequences of the Russo-Turkish war for merchants living in Russia and partitioned Poland. The main protagonist helped his Russian friend, a multi-millionaire, and made a fortune supplying the Russian Army in 1877–1878. The novel describes trading during political instability, and its ambiguous results for Russian and Polish societies.

The 1912 silent film Independența României depicted the war in Romania.

Russian writer Boris Akunin uses the war as the setting for the novel The Turkish Gambit (1998).

See also edit

References edit

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  2. ^ Daur, Soner. Plevne'de Çerkesler
  3. ^ Timothy C. Dowling. Russia at War: From the Mongol Conquest to Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Beyond. 2 Volumes. ABC-CLIO, 2014. p. 748
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Bibliography edit

  • Allen, William E. D.; Muratoff, Paul (1953). Caucasian Battlefields. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press..
  • Argyll, George Douglas Campbell (1879). The Eastern question from the Treaty of Paris 1856 to the Treaty of Berlin 1878 and to the Second Afghan War. Vol. 2. London: Strahan.
  • Crampton, R. J. (2006) [1997]. A Concise History of Bulgaria. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-85085-1.
  • Gladstone, William Ewart (1876). Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East. London: William Clowes & Sons. OL 7083313M.
  • Greene, F. V. (1879). The Russian Army and its Campaigns in Turkey. New York: D.Appleton and Company. Retrieved 19 July 2018 – via Internet Archive.
  • von Herbert, Frederick William (1895). The Defence of Plevna 1877. London: Longmans, Green & Co. Retrieved 26 July 2018 – via Internet Archive.
  • Hupchick, D. P. (2002). The Balkans: From Constantinople to Communism. Palgrave. ISBN 1-4039-6417-3.
  • Jonassohn, Kurt (1999). Genocide and gross human rights violations: in comparative perspective. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 9781412824453.
  • Kofos, Evangelos (1977). "Από το τέλος της Κρητικής Επαναστάσεως ως την προσάρτηση της Θεσσαλίας" [From the End of the Cretan Revolution to the Annexation of Thessaly]. In Christopoulos, Georgios A. & Bastias, Ioannis K. (eds.). Ιστορία του Ελληνικού Έθνους, Τόμος ΙΓ΄: Νεώτερος Ελληνισμός από το 1833 έως το 1881 [History of the Greek Nation, Volume XIII: Modern Hellenism from 1833 to 1881] (in Greek). Athens: Ekdotiki Athinon. pp. 289–365. ISBN 978-960-213-109-1.
  • Langensiepen, Bernd & Güleryüz, Ahmet (1995). The Ottoman Steam Navy 1828–1923. London: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 978-0-85177-610-1.
  • Maurice, Major F. (1905). The Russo-Turkish War 1877; A Strategical Sketch. London: Swan Sonneschein. Retrieved 8 August 2018 – via Internet Archive.
  • McCarthy, Justin (1995). Death and Exile: The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims, 1821-1922. Darwin Press. ISBN 9780878500949.
  • Reid, James J. (2000). Crisis of the Ottoman Empire: Prelude to Collapse 1839–1878. Quellen und Studien zur Geschichte des östlichen Europa. Vol. 57 (illustrated ed.). Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag. ISBN 9783515076876. ISSN 0170-3595.
  • Shaw, Stanford J.; Shaw, Ezel Kural (1977). History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. Vol. 2, Reform, Revolution, and Republic: The Rise of Modern Turkey 1808–1975. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521291637.
  • Stavrianos, L. S. (1958). The Balkans Since 1453. NYU Press. pp. 393–412. ISBN 9780814797662.
  • The War Correspondence of the "Daily News" 1877 with a Connecting Narrative Forming a Continuous History of the War Between Russia and Turkey to the Fall of Kars Including the Letters of Mr. Archibald Forbes, Mr. J. A. MacGahan and Many Other Special Correspondents in Europe and Asia. London: Macmillan and Co. 1878. Retrieved 26 July 2018 – via Internet Archive.
  • The War Correspondence of the "Daily News" 1877–1878 continued from the Fall of Kars to the Signature of the Preliminaries of Peace. London: Macmillan and Co. 1878. Retrieved 26 July 2018 – via Internet Archive.

Further reading edit

  • Acar, Keziban (March 2004). "An examination of Russian Imperialism: Russian Military and intellectual descriptions of the Caucasians during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878". Nationalities Papers. 32 (1): 7–21. doi:10.1080/0090599042000186151. S2CID 153769239.
  • Baleva, Martina. "The Empire Strikes Back. Image Battles and Image Frontlines during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878." Ethnologia Balkanica 16 (2012): 273–294. online[dead link]
  • Dennis, Brad. "Patterns of Conflict and Violence in Eastern Anatolia Leading Up to the Russo-Turkish War and the Treaty of Berlin." War and Diplomacy: The Russo-Turkish War of 1878 (1877): 273–301.
  • Drury, Ian. The Russo-Turkish War 1877 (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2012).
  • Glenny, Misha (2012), The Balkans: Nationalism, War, and the Great Powers, 1804–2011, New York: Penguin.
  • Isci, Onur. "Russian and Ottoman Newspapers in the War of 1877–1878." Russian History 41.2 (2014): 181–196. online
  • Murray, Nicholas. The Rocky Road to the Great War: The Evolution of Trench Warfare to 1914. Potomac Books Inc. (an imprint of the University of Nebraska Press), 2013.
  • Neuburger, Mary. "The Russo‐Turkish war and the ‘Eastern Jewish question’: Encounters between victims and victors in Ottoman Bulgaria, 1877–8." East European Jewish Affairs 26.2 (1996): 53–66.
  • Stone, James. "Reports from the Theatre of War. Major Viktor von Lignitz and the Russo-Turkish War, 1877–78." Militärgeschichtliche Zeitschrift 71.2 (2012): 287–307. online contains primary sources
  • Todorov, Nikolai. "The Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878 and the Liberation of Bulgaria: An Interpretative Essay." East European Quarterly 14.1 (1980): 9+ online
  • Yavuz, M. Hakan, and Peter Sluglett, eds. War and diplomacy: the Russo-Turkish war of 1877–1878 and the treaty of Berlin (U of Utah Press, 2011)
  • Yildiz, Gültekin. "Russo-Ottoman War, 1877–1878." in Richard C. Hall, ed., War in the Balkans (2014): 256–258 online[dead link].
  • Глазков, В. В.; Копытов, С. Ю.; Литвин, А. А.; Митев, П.; Георгиева, Т.; Колев, В. (2018). Освобождение Болгарии – Лики Войны и Памяти. К 140-летию окончания Русско-турецкой войны 1877–1878 гг. [альбом] (1000 экз ed.). М.: Фонд «Русские Витязи». Сост. и науч. ред.: Олег Леонов, д.и.н Румяна Михнева. Сост.: профессор Пламен Митев, доцент Тина Георгиева, доцент Валери Колев. ISBN 978-5-6040157-4-2.

External links edit

  • Seegel, Steven J, Virtual War, Virtual Journalism?: Russian Media Responses to 'Balkan' Entanglements in Historical Perspective, 1877–2001 (PDF), Rhode Island: Brown University.
  • Military History: Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878), Digital book index.
  • Sowards, Steven W, , MSU, archived from the original on 15 October 2007.
  • "Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878 and the Exploits of Liberators", Grand war (in Russian), Kulichki.
  • The Romanian Army of the Russo-Turkish War 1877–1878, AOL.
  • (image gallery) (in Bulgarian), 8M, archived from the original on 13 October 2006
  • Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878). Historical photos. 14 October 2018 at the Wayback Machine

Video links edit

130 years Liberation of Pleven (Plevna)

  • Zelenogorsky, Najden (3 March 2007), (speech), archived from the original (video) on 25 October 2007, retrieved 30 April 2007.
  • Stanishev, Sergej (3 March 2007), (speech), archived from the original (video) on 25 October 2007, retrieved 30 April 2007.
  • Potapov (3 March 2007), (speech), archived from the original (video) on 24 October 2007, retrieved 30 April 2007.

russo, turkish, 1877, 1878, russo, turkish, warpart, great, eastern, crisis, russo, turkish, warsclockwise, from, left, action, măcin, battle, shipka, pass, siege, plevna, battle, aladzha, battle, gorni, dubnikdate24, april, 1877, march, 1878, months, week, lo. Russo Turkish WarPart of the Great Eastern Crisis and the Russo Turkish warsClockwise from top left The Action off Măcin The Battle of Shipka Pass The Siege of Plevna The Battle of Aladzha The Battle of Gorni DubnikDate24 April 1877 3 March 1878 10 months and 1 week LocationBalkans CaucasusResultRussian coalition victory see aftermathTerritorialchangesEstablishment of the Principality of Bulgaria Independence of Romania Serbia and Montenegro from the Ottoman Empire Kars and Batum Oblasts become part of the Russian Empire Britain occupies Cyprus Austria Hungary occupies Bosnia Russian annexation of Southern Bessarabia from Romania Romanian annexation of Northern Dobruja Greek annexation of Thessaly and ArtaBelligerentsRussian Empire Guard of Finland 1 Bulgarian Legion Romania Serbia Montenegro Kingdom of GreeceSerbian rebelsGreek rebels Ottoman Empire Egypt Polish Legion Kurdish volunteers Albanian volunteers Circassian volunteers 2 Imamate rebelsAbkhazian rebelsCommanders and leadersAlexander IIGD NikolaiGD MikhailDmitry MilyutinIosif GurkoMikhail Loris MelikovGrigol DadianiPrince AlexanderPyotr VannovskyMikhail DragomirovMikhail SkobelevIvan LazarevEduard TotlebenNikolai StoletovCarol IMilan IKosta ProticNikola IKosmas DoumpiotisAbdul Hamid IIIbrahim Edhem PashaAhmed Hamdi PashaKurt Ismail PashaAhmed PashaOsman Pasha WIA Mehmed Sakir PashaSuleiman PashaHasan Husnu PashaHuseyin PashaHobart PashaMehmed Pasha AbdulKerim PashaAhmed Eyub PashaDeli Fuad PashaMehmed Riza PashaSaid PashaGiranduk BeySheikh UbeydullahStrengthRussia Initial 185 000 in the Army of the Danube 75 000 in the Caucasian Army 3 Total 260 000 in four corps 4 5 Ottoman Empire Initial 70 000 in the CaucasusTotal 281 000 6 Spring of 1877Olender 490 000 530 000 Barry 378 000Casualties and lossesTotal 96 733 111 166 7 8 Russia 15 567 30 000 killed 7 8 81 166 died of disease 56 652 wounded 1 713 died from wounds 7 Romania 4 302 killed and missing 3 316 wounded 19 904 sick 9 Bulgarian Legion 2 456 killed and wounded 10 Several thousand total military deaths mostly disease Serbia and Montenegro 2 400 dead and wounded 10 Total 90 000 120 000 11 Ottoman Empire 30 000 killed 11 60 000 90 000 11 died from wounds and diseases 110 000 captured 12 500 000 1 5 million Turkish Albanian and Jewish civilians displaced 13 14 The Russo Turkish War Turkish 93 Harbi lit War of 93 named for the year 1293 in the Islamic calendar Russian Russko tureckaya vojna romanized Russko turetskaya voyna Russian Turkish war was a conflict between the Ottoman Empire and a coalition led by the Russian Empire which included Bulgaria Romania Serbia and Montenegro 15 Fought in the Balkans and in the Caucasus it originated in emerging 19th century Balkan nationalism Additional factors included the Russian goals of recovering territorial losses endured during the Crimean War of 1853 56 re establishing itself in the Black Sea and supporting the political movement attempting to free Balkan nations from the Ottoman Empire The Russian led coalition won the war pushing the Ottomans back all the way to the gates of Constantinople leading to the intervention of the western European great powers As a result Russia succeeded in claiming provinces in the Caucasus namely Kars and Batum and also annexed the Budjak region The principalities of Romania Serbia and Montenegro each of which had had de facto sovereignty for some years formally proclaimed independence from the Ottoman Empire After almost five centuries of Ottoman domination 1396 1878 Bulgaria emerged as an autonomous state with support and military intervention from Russia Contents 1 Conflict pre history 1 1 Treatment of Christians in the Ottoman Empire 1 1 1 Crisis in Lebanon 1860 1 1 2 The revolt in Crete 1866 1869 1 2 Changing balance of power in Europe 1 2 1 The New European Concert 1 2 2 Russia after the Crimean War 2 Balkan crisis of 1875 1876 2 1 Balkan uprisings 2 1 1 Albanian revolts 2 1 2 Herzegovina Uprising 2 1 3 Bulgarian Uprising 2 2 International reaction to atrocities in Bulgaria 2 3 Serbo Turkish War and diplomatic maneuvering 3 Status of combatants 3 1 The Ottoman Army 3 2 The Russian Army 4 History 4 1 Course of the war 4 1 1 Opening manoeuvres 4 1 2 Balkan theatre 4 1 3 Caucasian theatre 4 1 4 Greek involvement 4 1 5 Kurdish uprising 4 1 6 Civilian government in Bulgaria during the war 5 Aftermath 5 1 Intervention by the Great Powers 5 2 Effects on Bulgaria s Jewish population 5 3 Internationalization of the Armenian Question 6 Civilian casualties 6 1 Atrocities and ethnic cleansing 6 1 1 Against Turks 6 1 1 1 Muslim war refugees according to census data and Ottoman official documents 6 1 1 2 Historians estimates about Muslim population losses 6 1 2 Against Albanians 6 1 3 Against Bulgarians 6 1 4 Against Circassians 7 Lasting effects 7 1 International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement 8 In popular culture 9 See also 10 References 11 Bibliography 12 Further reading 13 External links 13 1 Video linksConflict pre history editTreatment of Christians in the Ottoman Empire edit Article 9 of the 1856 Paris Peace Treaty concluded at the end of the Crimean War obliged the Ottoman Empire to grant Christians equal rights with Muslims Before the treaty was signed the Ottoman government issued an edict the Edict of Gulhane which proclaimed the principle of the equality of Muslims and non Muslims 16 and produced some specific reforms to this end For example the jizya tax was abolished and non Muslims were allowed to join the army 17 Crisis in Lebanon 1860 edit Main article 1860 Mount Lebanon civil war In 1858 stirred by their clergy the Maronite peasants of northern Lebanon revolted against their predominantly Druze feudal overlords and established a peasant republic In southern Beirut vilayet where both Maronite and Druze peasants worked under Druze overlords Druze peasants sided with their co religious and against the Maronites transforming the conflict into a civil war Although both sides suffered about 10 000 Maronites were massacred at the hands of the Druze 18 19 Fearing European intervention the Ottoman foreign minister Mehmed Fuad Pasha was dispatched to Syria and immediately set about trying to resolve the conflict as swiftly as possible Mehmed sought out and executed the agitators on all sides including the governor and other officials Order was soon restored and preparations made to give Lebanon new autonomy These efforts were ultimately not enough to prevent European intervention however with France deploying a fleet in September 1860 Fearing that a unilateral intervention would increase French influence in the region at their expense the British joined the French expedition 20 Faced with further European pressure the Sultan agreed to appoint a Christian governor in Lebanon whose candidacy was to be submitted by the Sultan and approved by the European powers 18 The revolt in Crete 1866 1869 edit nbsp The Moni Arkadiou monasteryThe Cretan Revolt which began in 1866 resulted from the failure of the Ottoman Empire to apply reforms for improving the life of the population and the Cretans desire for enosis union with Greece 21 The insurgents gained control over the whole island except for five fortified cities where the Muslims took refuge The Greek press claimed citation needed that Muslims had massacred Greeks and the word was spread throughout Europe Thousands of Greek volunteers were mobilized and sent to the island The siege of Arkadi Monastery became particularly well known In November 1866 about 250 Cretan Greek combatants and around 600 women and children were besieged by about 23 000 mainly Cretan Muslims aided by Ottoman troops and this became widely known in Europe After a bloody battle with a large number of casualties on both sides the Cretan Greeks finally surrendered when their ammunition ran out but were killed upon surrender 22 By early 1869 the insurrection was suppressed but the Porte offered some concessions introducing island self rule and increasing Christian rights on the island Although the Cretan crisis ended better for the Ottomans than almost any other diplomatic confrontation of the century the insurrection and especially the brutality with which it was suppressed led to greater public attention in Europe to the oppression of Christians in the Ottoman Empire Small as the amount of attention is which can be given by the people of England to the affairs of Turkey enough was transpiring from time to time to produce a vague but a settled and general impression that the Sultans were not fulfilling the solemn promises they had made to Europe that the vices of the Turkish government were ineradicable and that whenever another crisis might arise affecting the independence of the Ottoman Empire it would be wholly impossible to afford to it again the support we had afforded in the Crimean war 23 Changing balance of power in Europe edit nbsp Ottoman Empire in 1862Although on the winning side in the Crimean War the Ottoman Empire continued to decline in power and prestige The financial strain on the treasury forced the Ottoman government to take a series of foreign loans at such steep interest rates that despite all the fiscal reforms that followed pushed it into unpayable debts and economic difficulties This was further aggravated by the need to accommodate more than 600 000 Muslim Circassians expelled by the Russians from the Caucasus to the Black Sea ports of north Anatolia and the Balkan ports of Constanța and Varna which cost a great deal in money and in civil disorder to the Ottoman authorities 24 The New European Concert edit The Concert of Europe established in 1814 was shaken in 1859 when France and Austria fought over Italy It came apart completely as a result of the wars of German Unification when the Kingdom of Prussia led by Chancellor Otto von Bismarck defeated Austria in 1866 and France in 1870 replacing Austria as the dominant power in Central Europe Britain diverted by the Irish question and averse to warfare chose not to intervene again to restore the European balance Bismarck did not wish the breakup of the Ottoman Empire to create rivalries that might lead to war so he took up Tsar Alexander II of Russia s earlier suggestion that arrangements be made in case the Ottoman Empire fell apart creating the Three Emperors League with Austria Hungary and Russia to keep France isolated on the continent France responded by supporting self determination movements particularly if they concerned the three emperors and the Sultan Thus revolts in Poland against Russia and national aspirations in the Balkans were encouraged by France Russia worked to regain its right to maintain a fleet on the Black Sea and vied with the French in gaining influence in the Balkans by using the new Pan Slavic idea that all Slavs should be united under Russian leadership This could be done only by destroying the two empires where most non Russian Slavs lived the Habsburg and the Ottoman Empires The ambitions and the rivalries of the Russians and French in the Balkans surfaced in Serbia which was experiencing its own national revival and had ambitions that partly conflicted with those of the great powers 25 Russia after the Crimean War edit Russia ended the Crimean War with minimal territorial losses but was forced to destroy its Black Sea Fleet and Sevastopol fortifications Russian international prestige was damaged and for many years revenge for the Crimean War became the main goal of Russian foreign policy This was not easy though the Paris peace treaty included guarantees of Ottoman territorial integrity by Great Britain France and Austria only Prussia remained friendly to Russia The newly appointed Russian chancellor Alexander Gorchakov depended upon alliance with Prussia and its chancellor Bismarck Russia consistently supported Prussia in her wars with Denmark 1864 Austria 1866 and France 1870 In March 1871 using the crushing French defeat and the support of a grateful Germany Russia achieved international recognition of its earlier denouncement of Article 11 of the Paris Peace Treaty thus enabling it to revive the Black Sea Fleet Other clauses of the Paris Peace Treaty however remained in force specifically Article 8 with guarantees of Ottoman territorial integrity by Great Britain France and Austria Therefore Russia was extremely cautious in its relations with the Ottoman Empire coordinating all its actions with other European powers A Russian war with Turkey would require at least the tacit support of all other Great Powers and Russian diplomacy was waiting for a convenient moment Balkan crisis of 1875 1876 edit nbsp Europe before the Balkan crisisIn 1875 a series of Balkan events brought Europe to the brink of war The state of Ottoman administration in the Balkans continued to deteriorate throughout the 19th century with the central government occasionally losing control over whole provinces Reforms imposed by European powers did little to improve the conditions of the Christian population while managing to dissatisfy a sizable portion of the Muslim population Bosnia and Herzegovina suffered at least two waves of rebellion by the local Muslim population the most recent ending in 1862 Austria Hungary consolidated after the turmoil of the first half of the century and sought to reinvigorate its centuries long policy of expansion at the expense of the Ottoman Empire Meanwhile the nominally autonomous de facto independent principalities of Serbia and Montenegro also sought to expand into regions inhabited by their compatriots Nationalist and irredentist sentiments were strong and were encouraged by Russia and her agents At the same time a severe drought in Anatolia in 1873 and flooding in 1874 caused famine and widespread discontent in the heart of the Empire The agricultural shortages precluded the collection of necessary taxes which forced the Ottoman government to declare bankruptcy in October 1875 and increase taxes on outlying provinces including the Balkans Balkan uprisings edit Albanian revolts edit Istvan Deak states that the Albanian highlanders resented new taxes and conscription and fought against the Ottomans in the war 26 Herzegovina Uprising edit nbsp Herzegovinian insurgents in 1875Main article Herzegovina Uprising 1875 78 An uprising against Ottoman rule began in Herzegovina in July 1875 By August almost all of Herzegovina had been seized and the revolt had spread into Bosnia Supported by nationalist volunteers from Serbia and Montenegro the uprising continued as the Ottomans committed more and more troops to suppress it Bulgarian Uprising edit Main article April Uprising The revolt of Bosnia and Herzegovina spurred Bucharest based Bulgarian revolutionaries into action In 1875 a Bulgarian uprising was hastily prepared to take advantage of Ottoman preoccupation but it fizzled before it started In the spring of 1876 another uprising erupted in the south central Bulgarian lands despite the fact that there were numerous regular Turkish troops in those areas A special Turkish military committee was established to quell the uprising Regular troops Nizam and irregulars Redif or Bashi bazouk were directed to fight the Bulgarians 11 May 9 June 1876 The irregulars were mostly drawn from the Muslim inhabitants of the Bulgarian region Many were Circassians from the Caucasus or Crimean Tatars who were expelled during the Crimean War some were Islamized Bulgarians The Ottoman army suppressed the revolt massacring up to 30 000 27 28 people in the process 29 30 Five thousand out of the seven thousand villagers of Batak were put to death 31 Both Batak and Perushtitsa where the majority of the population was also massacred participated in the rebellion 28 Many of the perpetrators of those massacres were later decorated by the Ottoman high command 28 Modern historians have estimated the number of murdered Bulgarians at between 30 000 and 100 000 32 nbsp Konstantin Makovsky The Bulgarian Martyresses a painting depicting the atrocities of bashibazouks in Bulgaria nbsp Two Hawks by Vasily Vereshchagin showing two Bashibazouks held captive by the Bulgarian and Russian army nbsp Bashi bazouks returning with the spoils from the Romanian shore of the Danube 1877 engraving nbsp Bashi bazouks atrocities in Bulgaria International reaction to atrocities in Bulgaria edit nbsp The Avenger An Allegorical War Map for 1877 by Fred W Rose 1877 This map reflects the Great Eastern Crisis and the subsequent Russo Turkish War of 1877 78 Word of the bashi bazouks atrocities filtered to the outside world by way of the American run Robert College located in Constantinople The majority of the students were Bulgarian and many received news of the events from their families back home Soon the Western diplomatic community in Constantinople was abuzz with rumours which eventually found their way into newspapers in the West While in Constantinople in 1879 Protestant missionary George Warren Wood reported Turkish authorities in Amasia brutally persecuting Christian Armenian refugees from Soukoum Kaleh He was able to coordinate with British diplomat Edward Malet to bring the matter to the attention of the Sublime Porte and then to the British Foreign Secretary Robert Gascoyne Cecil the Marquess of Salisbury 33 In Britain where Disraeli s government was committed to supporting the Ottomans in the ongoing Balkan crisis the Liberal opposition newspaper The Daily News hired American journalist Januarius A MacGahan to report on the massacre stories first hand MacGahan toured the stricken regions of the Bulgarian uprising and his report splashed across The Daily News s front pages galvanized British public opinion against Disraeli s pro Ottoman policy 34 In September opposition leader William Ewart Gladstone published his Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East 35 calling upon Britain to withdraw its support for Turkey and proposing that Europe demand independence for Bulgaria and Bosnia and Herzegovina 36 As the details became known across Europe many dignitaries including Charles Darwin Oscar Wilde Victor Hugo and Giuseppe Garibaldi publicly condemned the Ottoman abuses in Bulgaria 37 The strongest reaction came from Russia Widespread sympathy for the Bulgarian cause led to a nationwide surge in patriotism on a scale comparable with the one during the Patriotic War of 1812 From autumn 1875 the movement to support the Bulgarian uprising involved all classes of Russian society This was accompanied by sharp public discussions about Russian goals in this conflict Slavophiles including Fyodor Dostoevsky saw in the impending war the chance to unite all Orthodox nations under Russia s helm thus fulfilling what they believed was the historic mission of Russia while their opponents westernizers inspired by Ivan Turgenev denied the importance of religion and believed that Russian goals should not be defense of Orthodoxy but liberation of Bulgaria 38 Serbo Turkish War and diplomatic maneuvering edit Main articles Serbo Turkish War 1876 78 Montenegrin Ottoman War 1876 1878 Constantinople Conference Expulsion of the Albanians 1877 1878 and Attacks on Serbs during the Serbian Ottoman War 1876 1878 nbsp Russia preparing to release the Balkan dogs of war while Britain warns him to take care Punch cartoon from 17 June 1876On 30 June 1876 Serbia followed by Montenegro declared war on the Ottoman Empire In July and August the ill prepared and poorly equipped Serbian army helped by Russian volunteers failed to achieve offensive objectives but did manage to repulse the Ottoman offensive into Serbia Meanwhile Alexander II of Russia and Prince Gorchakov met Austria Hungary s Franz Joseph I and Count Andrassy in the Reichstadt castle in Bohemia No written agreement was made but during the discussions Russia agreed to support Austrian occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Austria Hungary in exchange agreed to support the return of Southern Bessarabia lost by Russia during the Crimean War and Russian annexation of the port of Batum on the east coast of the Black Sea Bulgaria was to become autonomous independent according to the Russian records 39 As the fighting in Bosnia and Herzegovina continued Serbia suffered a string of setbacks and asked the European powers to mediate an end to the war A joint ultimatum by the European powers forced the Porte to give Serbia a one month truce and start peace negotiations Turkish peace conditions however were refused by European powers as too harsh In early October after the truce expired the Turkish army resumed its offensive and the Serbian position quickly became desperate On 31 October Russia issued an ultimatum requiring the Ottoman Empire to stop the hostilities and sign a new truce with Serbia within 48 hours This was supported by the partial mobilization of the Imperial Russian Army up to 20 divisions Sultan Abdul Hamid II accepted the conditions of the ultimatum To resolve the crisis on 11 December 1876 the Constantinople Conference of the Great Powers was opened in Constantinople to which Ottoman representatives were not invited A compromise solution was negotiated granting autonomy to Bulgaria Bosnia and Herzegovina under the joint control of European powers The Ottomans however refused to sacrifice their independence by allowing international representatives to oversee the institution of reforms and sought to discredit the conference by announcing on 23 December the day the conference was closed that a constitution was adopted that declared equal rights for religious minorities within the Empire The Ottomans attempted to use this manoeuver to get their objections and amendments to the agreement heard When they were rejected by the Great Powers the Ottoman Empire announced its decision to disregard the results of the conference On 15 January 1877 Russia and Austria Hungary signed a written agreement confirming the results of the earlier Reichstadt Agreement of July 1876 This assured Russia of the benevolent neutrality of Austria Hungary in the impending war These terms meant that in case of war Russia would do the fighting and Austria Hungary would derive most of the advantage Russia therefore made a final effort for a peaceful settlement After reaching an agreement with its main Balkan rival and with anti Ottoman sympathies running high throughout Europe due to the Bulgarian atrocities and the rejection of the Constantinople agreements Russia finally felt free to declare war Status of combatants editThe Ottoman Army edit Main article Ottoman Army 1861 1922 The Ottoman army at this time solely conscripted Muslims with non Muslims paying a poll tax in lieu of service the army itself was divided into four categories the Nizam standing army who served for four years five for cavalry and engineers the Ithiat or first reserve where a further two years were served one year for the cavalry and artillery the Redif which took veterans of the Nizam and Ithiat categories and men who did not serve and the Moustafiz where all men who had completed their service in the Redif approximately 300 000 troops served for a further six years 40 The Redif itself was divided into four categories the first category consisted of veterans of the Nizam category who served in the first Redif subcategory for four years before entering the second Redif sub category men who were not conscripted served in the third sub category of the Redif for four years before entering the fourth subcategory The Redif itself was grouped into battalions and classes with whole battalions taken out to serve as new units The annual draft conscripted 37 500 men following mobilisation of the Nizam and Ithiat these two portions of the army totaled approximately 210 000 men An additional 20 000 men of the Gendarme were included in the Nizam The Redif was theoretically capable of providing 190 000 200 000 troops 41 Sultan Abdulaziz had reorganised the military school during his reign to educate officers However the turnout of this academy was poor and only 1 600 of the 20 000 regular officers of the army were academy trained though the artillery saw the highest concentration of academy trained officers at 20 of the total For the entire Ottoman army only 132 academy trained generals were available 40 The Ottoman army was organised at the battalion level with a battalion nominally holding 800 men subdivided into companies of 100 men for formations above the battalion level these were to be assembled ad hoc this results in difficulty at estimating Ottoman troop strength throughout the war as many units were below strength before entering the war due to the many rebellions affecting the empire However the Ottoman army was well prepared for war as it had increasingly called up its reserves up to the third subcategory of the Redif when Russian forces began gathering in Bessarabia 42 Olender gives the Ottoman battalion tabor of infantry at 774 men on paper and 650 in practice the cavalry squadron containing 143 men on paper and 100 in practice with the artillery being organised into six gun batteries 41 The Ottoman army was also well equipped 75 of its troops were equipped with Peabody Martini rifles accurate to 1 800 yards with 300 000 of these guns having been purchased prior to the war The remainder of the regular troops used Snider rifles the irregulars used Winchester repeating rifles and the Egyptians used Remington rifles 43 The Ottoman support services were however less impressive with the army often forced to resort to foraging On the other hand Ottoman forces were equipped with entrenching tools which they used extensively at Plevna and had sufficient ammunition for their repeating rifles The Ottoman artillery were armed with Krupp guns of the 8cm and 9cm types for field usage with 12 cm and 15cm guns also being used but less commonly and various older guns found primarily in fortresses 44 41 At the outbreak of war the Ottoman army was divided into several groups The largest was the 168 000 man contingent under the command of Abdulkerim Nadir Pasha based out of Shumla 140 000 were assigned to the general task of fighting threats in the European provinces of the Empire with 45 000 in various garrisons in Anatolia Europe and Crete With the Caucasus army containing 70 000 men the total of number of troops amounted to 378 000 45 Olender gives a breakdown of Ottoman troops in the spring of 1877 as containing 571 infantry battalions 181 of which were Nizam 147 cavalry squadrons and 143 artillery batteries not including the fortress and garrison companies or irregulars On paper this would amount to 441 954 infantry 140 094 being nizam troops 21 021 cavalry and 858 guns However due to other conflicts and the ongoing process of mobilisation of the Redif units at this process the Regular Ottoman army amounted to 400 000 troops with an additional 90 000 irregular troops and Egyptian troops 41 Disposition of Ottoman forces at the outbreak of war 46 41 Location Commander Formations Personnel Paper Olender Vidin Osman Pasha 50 battalions 10 squadrons 15 batteries 30 000 40 130 men 90 guns Rushchuk Sistova Kaisserli AhmedPasha 15 battalions 4 squadrons 5 batteries 15 000 12 182 30 guns Silistra Sulami Pasha 12 battalions 3 squadrons 3 batteries 9 000 9 717 18 guns ShumlaTargovishte Ahmed Eyub Pasha 65 battalions 30 squadrons mostly irregular 15 batteries 55 000 54 600 90 guns Varna Reshid Pasha 12 battalions 2 squadrons 2 batteries 8 000 9 288 12 guns Sofia Tirnovo Adrianople Constantinople 45 battalions 12 squadrons 8 batteries 25 000 36 546 48 guns Bosnia Suleiman Pasha 15 000Albania 20 000Novi Pazar 10 000Crete and European Ottoman lands 45 000The Russian Army edit Main article Imperial Russian Army The Russian army in the decade prior to the war underwent major modernisation spearheaded by the Minister of War Dmitry Milyutin this programme of reform gave Russia a large army that was capable of fighting a war against the Ottomans All Russian men were to serve 6 years in the active army and 9 years in the reserves though through exemption the effective intake of conscription was considerably less in 1874 of 724 648 eligible men only 150 000 were enlisted this having risen to 218 000 by 1877 in peacetime though this was still sufficient to meet the Russian need for manpower The Active portion of the army was subdivided into 2 portions the local troops who were garrison soldiers in Europe regular soldiers in Asia stationary forces and gendarmes the other portion was the Field Army In addition to these forces there was the militia opolcheniye which contained all men exempted from conscripted and men under 40 who had completed their terms of service 47 48 The Field Army was organised into 48 infantry divisions 3 of which were guard and 4 Grenadier There were also 8 rifle brigades 19 cavalry divisions 35 horse gun batteries 19 engineer battalions 49 field gun brigades The Russian divisions were organised into corps of 2 to 3 divisions a corps excluding support and command staff would consist of 20 160 infantry 2 048 cavalry 96 field guns and 12 horse drawn guns this is for a 2 division corps 47 The Russian army in 1874 contained 754 265 men and by January 1 1878 this had risen to over 1 5 million men The Russian army used 2 rifles the Krnka rifle which they possessed 800 000 of at the minimum and was accurate to only 600 yards to the Turkish Peabody s 1 800 and the Berdan rifle which equipped the Line Grenadier Rifle and Guard formations and was accurate to 1 500 yards However the Russian army despite possessing breechloading rifles was still holding to the maxims of Suvorov which called for the usage of the bayonet as the principal weapon Russian soldiers also lacked entrenching equipment to an adequate level Russian artillery despite being breechloaded were nearing obsolescence 49 History edit nbsp Nizhegorodsky Dragoons pursuing the Turks near Kars 1877 painting by Aleksey KivshenkoCourse of the war edit See also Romanian War of Independence Opening manoeuvres edit On 12 April 1877 Romania gave permission to the Russian troops to pass through its territory to attack the Turks On 24 April 1877 Russia declared war on the Ottomans and its troops entered Romania through the newly built Eiffel Bridge near Ungheni on the Prut river resulting in Turkish bombardments of Romanian towns on the Danube On 10 May 1877 the Principality of Romania which was under nominal Turkish suzerainty declared its independence 50 nbsp Russian crossing of the Danube June 1877 painting by Nikolai Dmitriev Orenburgsky 1883At the beginning of the war the outcome was far from obvious The Russians could send a larger army into the Balkans about 300 000 troops were within reach The Ottomans had about 200 000 troops on the Balkan peninsula of which about 100 000 were assigned to fortified garrisons leaving about 100 000 for the army of operation The Ottomans had the advantage of being fortified complete command of the Black Sea and patrol boats along the Danube river 51 They also possessed superior arms including new British and American made rifles and German made artillery In the event however the Ottomans usually resorted to passive defense leaving the strategic initiative to the Russians who after making some mistakes found a winning strategy for the war The Ottoman military command in Constantinople made poor assumptions about Russian intentions They decided that Russians would be too lazy to march along the Danube and cross it away from the delta and would prefer the short way along the Black Sea coast This would be ignoring the fact that the coast had the strongest best supplied and garrisoned Turkish fortresses There was only one well manned fortress along the inner part of the River Danube Vidin It was garrisoned only because the troops led by Osman Nuri Pasha had just taken part in defeating the Serbs in their recent war against the Ottoman Empire The Russian campaign was better planned but it relied heavily on Turkish passivity A crucial Russian mistake was sending too few troops initially an expeditionary force of about 185 000 crossed the Danube in June slightly fewer than the combined Turkish forces in the Balkans about 200 000 After setbacks in July at Pleven and Stara Zagora the Russian military command realized it did not have the reserves to keep the offensive going and switched to a defensive posture The Russians did not even have enough forces to blockade Pleven properly until late August which effectively delayed the whole campaign for about two months Balkan theatre edit nbsp Map of the Balkan TheaterAt the start of the war Russia and Romania destroyed all vessels along the Danube and mined the river thus ensuring that Russian forces could cross the Danube at any point without resistance from the Ottoman Navy The Ottoman command did not appreciate the significance of the Russians actions In June a small Russian unit crossed the Danube close to the delta at Galați and marched towards Ruschuk today Ruse This made the Ottomans even more confident that the big Russian force would come right through the middle of the Ottoman stronghold nbsp Soldiers of Finnish Guard sharpshooter battalion during Battle of Gorni DubnikIn the first month of the war the Ottomans suffered a pair of significant naval losses on the Danube The turret ship Lutf u Celil was destroyed by a Russian artillery battery on 11 May 52 And on the night of 25 26 May a Romanian torpedo boat with a mixed Romanian Russian crew attacked and sank the Ottoman monitor Seyfi on the Danube Under the direct command of Major General Mikhail Ivanovich Dragomirov on the night of 27 28 June 1877 NS the Russians constructed a pontoon bridge across the Danube at Svishtov After a short battle in which the Russians suffered 812 killed and wounded 53 the Russians secured the opposing bank and drove off the Ottoman infantry brigade defending Svishtov At this point the Russian force was divided into three parts the Eastern Detachment under the command of Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich the future Tsar Alexander III of Russia assigned to capture the fortress of Ruschuk and cover the army s eastern flank the Western Detachment to capture the fortress of Nikopol Bulgaria and cover the army s western flank and the Advance Detachment under Count Joseph Vladimirovich Gourko which was assigned to quickly move via Veliko Tarnovo and penetrate the Balkan Mountains the most significant barrier between the Danube and Constantinople nbsp Fighting near Ivanovo ChiflikResponding to the Russian crossing of the Danube the Ottoman high command in Constantinople ordered Osman Nuri Pasha to advance east from Vidin and occupy the fortress of Nikopol just west of the Russian crossing On his way to Nikopol Osman Pasha learned that the Russians had already captured the fortress and so moved to the crossroads town of Plevna now known as Pleven which he occupied with a force of approximately 15 000 on 19 July NS 54 The Russians approximately 9 000 under the command of General Schilder Schuldner reached Plevna early in the morning Thus began the Siege of Plevna lasting for 145 days until 10 December Osman Pasha organized a defense and repelled two Russian attacks with colossal casualties on the Russian side At that point the sides were almost equal in numbers and the Russian army was very discouraged 55 A counter attack might have allowed the Ottomans to control and destroy the Russians bridge but Osman Pasha did not leave the fortress because he had orders to stay fortified in Plevna Russia had no more troops to throw against Plevna so the Russians besieged it and subsequently asked 56 the Romanians to cross the Danube and help them On 9 August Suleiman Pasha made an attempt to help Osman Pasha with 30 000 troops but he was stopped by Bulgarians at the Battle of Shipka Pass After three days of fighting the volunteers were relieved by a Russian force led by General Fyodor Radetsky and the Turkish forces withdrew Soon afterwards Romanian forces crossed the Danube and joined the siege On 16 August at Gorni Studen the armies around Plevna were placed under the command of the Romanian Prince Carol I aided by the Russian general Pavel Dmitrievich Zotov and the Romanian general Alexandru Cernat The Turks maintained several fortresses around Pleven which the Russian and Romanian forces gradually reduced 57 58 The Romanian 4th Division led by General Gheorghe Manu took the Grivitsa redoubt after four bloody assaults and managed to keep it until the very end of the siege The Siege of Plevna July December 1877 turned to victory only after Russian and Romanian forces cut off all supply routes to the fortified Ottomans With supplies running low Osman Pasha made an attempt to break the Russian siege in the direction of Opanets On 9 December in the middle of the night the Ottomans threw bridges over the Vit river and crossed it attacked on a 2 mile 3 2 km front and broke through the first line of Russian trenches Here they fought hand to hand and bayonet to bayonet with little advantage to either side Outnumbering the Ottomans almost 5 to 1 the Russians drove the Ottomans back across the Vit Osman Pasha was wounded in the leg by a stray bullet which killed his horse beneath him Making a brief stand the Ottomans eventually found themselves driven back into the city losing 5 000 men to the Russians 2 000 The next day Osman surrendered the city the garrison and his sword to the Romanian colonel Mihail Cerchez He was treated honorably but his troops perished in the snow by the thousands as they straggled off into captivity At this point Serbia having finally secured monetary aid from Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire again This time there were far fewer Russian officers in the Serbian army but this was more than offset by the experience gained from the 1876 77 war Under nominal command of Prince Milan Obrenovic effective command was in hands of general Kosta Protic the army chief of staff the Serbian Army went on offensive in what is now eastern south Serbia A planned offensive into the Ottoman Sanjak of Novi Pazar was called off due to strong diplomatic pressure from Austria Hungary which wanted to prevent Serbia and Montenegro from coming into contact and which had designs to spread Austria Hungary s influence through the area The Ottomans outnumbered unlike two years before mostly confined themselves to passive defence of fortified positions By the end of hostilities the Serbs had captured Ak Palanka today Bela Palanka Pirot Nis and Vranje Russians under Field Marshal Gourko succeeded in capturing the passes at the Stara Planina mountain which were crucial for maneuvering Next both sides fought a series of battles for Shipka Pass Gourko made several attacks on the Pass and eventually secured it Ottoman troops spent much effort to recapture this important route to use it to reinforce Osman Pasha in Pleven but failed Eventually Gourko led a final offensive that crushed the Ottomans around Shipka Pass The Ottoman offensive against Shipka Pass is considered one of the major mistakes of the war as other passes were virtually unguarded At this time a huge number of Ottoman troops stayed fortified along the Black Sea coast and engaged in very few operations A Russian army crossed the Stara Planina by a high snowy pass in winter guided and helped by local Bulgarians not expected by the Ottoman army and defeated the Turks at the Battle of Tashkessen and took Sofia The way was now open for a quick advance through Plovdiv and Adrianople to Constantinople Besides the Romanian Army which mobilized 130 000 men losing 10 000 of them to this war more than 12 000 volunteer Bulgarian troops Opalchenie from the local Bulgarian population as well as many hajduk detachments fought in the war on the side of the Russians Caucasian theatre edit nbsp The Russo Turkish War in Caucasia 1877The Russian 1st Caucasus Army Corps was stationed in Georgia and Armenia composed of approximately 50 000 men and 202 guns under the overall command of Grand Duke Michael Nikolaevich Governor General of the Caucasus 59 The Russian force stood opposed by an Ottoman Army of 100 000 men led by General Ahmed Muhtar Pasha While the Russian army was better prepared for the fighting in the region it lagged behind technologically in certain areas such as heavy artillery and was outgunned for example by the superior long range Krupp artillery that Germany had supplied to the Ottomans 60 The Caucasus Corps was led by a quartet of Armenian commanders Generals Mikhail Loris Melikov Arshak Ter Gukasov Ter Ghukasov Ter Ghukasyan Ivan Lazarev and Beybut Shelkovnikov 61 Forces under Lieutenant General Ter Gukasov stationed near Yerevan commenced the first assault into Ottoman territory by capturing the town of Bayazid on 27 April 1877 62 Capitalizing on Ter Gukasov s victory there Russian forces advanced taking the region of Ardahan on 17 May Russian units also besieged the city of Kars in the final week of May although Ottoman reinforcements lifted the siege and drove them back Bolstered by reinforcements in November 1877 General Lazarev launched a new attack on Kars suppressing the southern forts leading to the city and capturing Kars itself on 18 November 63 On 19 February 1878 the strategic fortress town of Erzurum was taken by the Russians after a lengthy siege Although they relinquished control of Erzurum to the Ottomans at the end the war the Russians acquired the regions of Batum Ardahan Kars Olti and Sarikamish and reconstituted them into the Kars Oblast 64 Greek involvement edit Further information Epirus Revolt of 1878 1878 Macedonian rebellion and Cretan revolt 1878 During the course of the war the majority of Greeks wanted to enter the war on Russia s side however the Greek government decided reluctantly to not intervene due to British neutrality 65 The Brits guaranteed that after the end of the war they would intervene themselves and assure equal rights for the Greek subjects of the Ottoman Empire as long as Greece didn t join the war 65 Nevertheless several Greek revolts broke out in Crete Epirus Macedonia and Thessaly demanding union with Greece The Greek Army invaded Thessaly in January 1878 but didn t officially declare war on the Ottomans along with Greek irregular revolutionaries the Greek Army won the Battle of Mouzaki 66 However the Great Powers asked for the Greece to recall its army in return they ensured that issues regarding the Greek communities would be raised in the post war Peace Conference The Greek government accepted and as a result the rebellions were left unsupported and were crushed by the Ottomans 67 Three years later with the Convention of Constantinople most of Thessaly excluding Elassona as well as Arta were ceded to Greece 68 Kurdish uprising edit nbsp Plevna Chapel near the walls of Kitay gorodMain article Uprising of Sheikh Ubeydullah As the Russo Turkish war came to a close a Kurdish uprising began It was led by two brothers Husein and Osman Pasha The rebellion held most of the region of Bohtan for 9 months It was ended only through duplicity after force of arms had failed 69 In Kars Kurdish notables like Abdurrezzak Bedir Khan and a son of Sheikh Ubeydullah were supporters of the Russians 70 Civilian government in Bulgaria during the war edit Main article Provisional Russian Administration in Bulgaria After Bulgarian territories were liberated by the Russian Army during the war they were governed initially by a provisional Russian administration which was established in April 1877 The Treaty of Berlin 1878 provided for the termination of this provisional Russian administration in May 1879 when the Principality of Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia were established 71 The main objectives of the temporary Russian administration were to secure peace and order and to prepare for a revival of the Bulgarian state Aftermath editIntervention by the Great Powers edit Main articles Treaty of San Stefano and Congress of Berlin nbsp Europe after the Congress of Berlin in 1878 and the territorial and political rearrangement of the Balkan Peninsula Under pressure from the British Russia accepted the truce offered by the Ottoman Empire on 31 January 1878 but continued to move towards Constantinople The British sent a fleet of battleships to intimidate Russia from entering the city and Russian forces stopped at San Stefano Eventually Russia entered into a settlement under the Treaty of San Stefano on 3 March by which the Ottoman Empire would recognize the independence of Romania Serbia and Montenegro and the autonomy of Bulgaria Alarmed by the extension of Russian power into the Balkans the Great Powers later forced modifications of the treaty in the Congress of Berlin The main change here was that Bulgaria would be split according to earlier agreements among the Great Powers that precluded the creation of a large new Slavic state the northern and eastern parts to become principalities as before Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia though with different governors and the Macedonian region originally part of Bulgaria under San Stefano would return to direct Ottoman administration 72 The 1879 Treaty of Constantinople ru was a further continuation of negotiations between Russia and the Ottoman Empire While reaffirming provisions of the Treaty of San Stefano which had not been modified by the Berlin Treaty it set compensation terms owed by Ottoman Empire to Russia for losses sustained during the war It contained terms to release prisoners of war and to grant amnesty to Ottoman subjects 73 74 as well as providing terms for the inhabitants nationality after the annexations Article VII allowed subjects to opt within six months of the signing of the treaty to retain Ottoman subjecthood or become Russian subjects 74 75 A surprising consequence came in Hungary part of the Austro Hungarian Empire Despite memories of the terrible defeat at Mohacs in 1526 elite Hungarian attitudes were becoming strongly anti Russian This led to active support for the Turks in the media but only in a peaceful way since the foreign policy of the Austro Hungarian monarchy remained neutral 76 Effects on Bulgaria s Jewish population edit The Bulletins de l Alliance Israelite Universelle reported that thousands of Bulgarian Jews found refuge at Constantinople and reported that many Jewish communities had fled in their entirety with the retreating Turks as their protectors 77 However this is directly contradicted by census figures which instead of a decrease indicate a substantial increase in Bulgaria s Jewish population before and after the war While there were only 4 595 males or 9 190 male and female Jews in the five vilayets to form the future Principality of Bulgaria Ruscuk Vidin Sofia Tirnova and Varna according to the pre war Ottoman salname of 1875 0 4 of the population the 1880 Bulgarian census indicated a total of 14 342 Jews who accounted for 0 7 of the post war Bulgarian population 78 79 80 Moreover an increase by 5 152 people or 56 in less than five years cannot be explained by natural increase alone and would rather indicate substantial net immigration rather than emigration of Jews from the principality Obviously any such immigration or return of refugees would happen only after the postwar situation stabilized offering necessary personal and economic security Internationalization of the Armenian Question edit nbsp Emigration of Armenians into Georgia during the Russo Turkish warThe conclusion of the Russo Turkish war also led to the internationalization of the Armenian Question Many Armenians in the eastern provinces Turkish Armenia of the Ottoman Empire greeted the advancing Russians as liberators Violence and instability directed at Armenians during the war by Kurd and Circassian bands had left many Armenians looking toward the invading Russians as the ultimate guarantors of their security Influential pro Russian Armenian thinker Grigor Artsruni encouraged Armenians to migrate to Russia in order to form a more concentrated block 81 In January 1878 Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople Nerses II Varzhapetian approached the Russian leadership with the view of receiving assurances that the Russians would introduce provisions in the prospective peace treaty for self administration in the Armenian provinces Though not as explicit Article 16 of the Treaty of San Stefano read As the evacuation of the Russian troops of the territory they occupy in Armenia and which is to be restored to Turkey might give rise to conflicts and complications detrimental to the maintenance of good relations between the two countries the Sublime Porte engaged to carry into effect without further delay the improvements and reforms demanded by local requirements in the provinces inhabited by Armenians and to guarantee their security from Kurds and Circassians 82 The Armenian Patriarch discouraged Armenian migration to Russia and encouraged Armenians to remain faithful to the Sultan The Patriarch held the belief that Armenian inhabited areas could remain under Ottoman rule but under Christian control and that Muslims who were dissatisfied with how the Ottomans had been governing the provinces would tolerate life under Christian leadership In attempting to persuade the British to drive a hard bargain with the Ottoman Empire he asserted to British Ambassador Austen Henry Layard that the only thing that could induce the Armenians to refrain from listening to the advice of Russia to emigrate and to be content to remain under the rule of the Sultan would be the appointment of an Armenian as Vali of Armenia 81 Great Britain however took objection to Russia holding on to so much Ottoman territory and forced it to enter into new negotiations by convening the Congress of Berlin in June 1878 An Armenian delegation led by prelate Mkrtich Khrimian traveled to Berlin to present the case of the Armenians but much to its chagrin was left out of the negotiations Article 16 was modified and watered down and all mention of the Russian forces remaining in the provinces was removed In the final text of the Treaty of Berlin it was transformed into Article 61 which read The Sublime Porte undertakes to carry out without further delay the improvements and reforms demanded by local requirements in the provinces inhabited by Armenians and to guarantee their security against the Circassians and Kurds It will periodically make known the steps taken to this effect to the powers who will superintend their application 83 As it turned out the reforms were not forthcoming Khrimian returned to Constantinople and delivered a famous speech in which he likened the peace conference to a big cauldron of Liberty Stew into which the big nations dipped their iron ladles for real results while the Armenian delegation had only a Paper Ladle Ah dear Armenian people Khrimian said could I have dipped my Paper Ladle in the cauldron it would sog and remain there Where guns talk and sabers shine what significance do appeals and petitions have 84 Given the absence of tangible improvements in the plight of the Armenian community a number of Armenian intellectuals living in Europe and Russia in the 1880s and 1890s formed political parties and revolutionary societies to secure better conditions for their compatriots in Ottoman Armenia and other parts of the Ottoman Empire 85 Civilian casualties editAtrocities and ethnic cleansing edit Both sides carried out massacres and an ethnic cleansing policy during the war 86 87 Against Turks edit nbsp Turkish refugees fleeing from Tarnovo towards Shumen nbsp The execution of the Bashi bazouks in Bulgaria 1878 In January 1878 advancing coalition forces started committing atrocities against Muslim populations in the region British reports from that time have detailed information about atrocities and massacres According to those reports in the village of Issova Bala the school and 96 of the 170 houses were burned to the ground 88 The inhabitants of Yukari Sofular were slaughtered and 12 of the 130 houses in village a mosque and a school were burned 89 90 In Kozluca 18 Turks were killed 91 Massacres of Muslim inhabitants occurred in Kazanlak too 92 In the village of Muflis 127 Muslim inhabitants were kidnapped by a group of Russian and Bulgarian troops 20 managed to escape The rest were killed 93 400 people from Muflis were killed according to Ottoman sources 94 11 inhabitants were killed in Kecidere 93 According to John Joseph the Russian troops frequently killed Muslim peasants to prevent them from disrupting their supply and troop movements During the Battle of Harmanli accompanying this retaliation on Muslim non combatants it was reported that a huge group of Muslim townspeople were attacked by the Russian army Thousands died and their goods were confiscated 95 96 97 The correspondent of The Daily News describes as an eyewitness the burning of four or five Turkish villages by the Russian troops in response to the Turks firing at the Russians from the villages instead of behind rocks or trees 98 which must have appeared to the Russian soldiers as guerrilla attempts by the local Muslim populace upon the Russian contingencies operating against the Ottoman forces embedded in the area During the conflict a number of Muslim buildings and cultural centres were also destroyed A large library of old Turkish books was destroyed when a mosque in Turnovo was burned in 1877 99 Most mosques in Sofia were destroyed seven of them in one night in December 1878 when a thunderstorm masked the noise of the explosions arranged by Russian military engineers 100 Many villages in the Kars region were pillaged by Russian army during the war 94 The war in Caucasus caused many Muslims to migrate to remaining Ottoman lands mostly in poverty and with poor conditions 101 Between 1878 and 1881 82 000 Muslims migrated to the Ottoman Empire from lands ceded to Russia in Caucasus 102 Muslim war refugees according to census data and Ottoman official documents edit According to Ottoman official records the total number of refugees from the lands ceded in 1878 to the Principality of Bulgaria Eastern Rumelia Serbia Romania and Austria Hungary from Bosnia from 1876 to 1879 stands at 571 152 people 276 389 in 1876 198 000 in 1877 76 000 in 1878 and 20 763 in 1879 103 However it is unclear if the numbers include refugees who emigrated after the suspension of hostilities According to the pre war Ottoman salname of 1875 the total male Muslim population of the five vilayets to form the future Principality of Bulgaria Ruscuk Vidin Sofia Tirnova and Varna stood at 405 450 total population of 810 900 however inclusive of Circassian Muhacir and Muslim Romani 78 The Danube vilayet census of 1874 which covered all sanjaks in the vilayet except Nis counted a total of 963 596 Muslims 104 The total Muslim population of the Danube Vilayet for the same year Nis included stood at 1 055 650 104 This number included not only Ottoman Turks but also Crimean Tatars Circassians Pomaks Romani as well as a substantial number of Albanians At the same time the 1876 Ottoman population records for the Sanjaks of Filibe and Islimye which were detached from the Adrianople Vilayet to form Eastern Rumelia in 1878 indicated 171 777 male Turks and 16 353 male Muslim Romani or total Muslim population of 376 260 105 This figure however included the Rhodopian kazas of Ahi Celebi and Sultanyeri male Muslim population of 8 197 and 13 336 respectively or total Muslim population for both of 43 066 which remained part of in the Ottoman Empire 105 Without Ahi Celebi and Sultanyeri the Muslim population of Eastern Rumelia was 333 194 105 Thus according to the Ottoman Empire s own population records the total number of Muslims in the territories ceded by the Empire to the Principality of Bulgaria Eastern Rumelia Serbia and Romania did not exceed 1 388 844 people 1 055 650 for the Danube Vilayet and 333 194 for the Filibe and Islimye Sanjaks a figure that is lower than the approx 1 5 million Turks who had reportedly perished or been forced to migrate according to both Karpat and Ipek whose estimates would also necessarily mean that no Muslims whatsoever remained in either the Principality of Bulgaria Eastern Rumelia Serbia or Romanian Dobruja At the same time the 1880 population census of the Principality of Bulgaria gave 578 060 Muslims the 1880 population census of Eastern Rumelia indicated 174 749 Turks and 19 254 Romani total Muslim population of 194 003 the 1880 population census of Romanian North Dobruja showed 18 624 Turks and 29 476 Crimean Tatars total of 48 100 Muslims while the 1880 population census of Serbia stated only 6 567 Muslims in the Nis area 79 106 107 80 108 109 Thus as of 1880 the total number of Muslims who lived in the territories ceded by the Ottoman Empire stood at 827 000 people down from 1 388 844 Muslims counted by the pre war Ottoman statistics signifying a net loss of 561 844 Muslims 40 4 While shockingly high this figure falls short by more than 200 000 people of Dennis P Hupchick and Justin McCarthy s estimates of some 260 000 Muslims missing dead and 500 000 forced to emigrate and is way more off compared to the figure of more than 750 000 Muslim casualties and victims of ethnic cleansing from the Bulgarian lands alone quoted by Douglas Arthur Howard The Principality of Bulgaria Eastern Rumelia and Romania accounted for a negative net balance of 472 792 Muslims or a net loss of 36 5 By comparison Serbia the only country in the region which did indeed engage in ethnic cleansing and forced expulsion of its Muslim population effectively reduced its Muslim population between 1877 and 1880 from 95 619 to 6 567 people cf Expulsion of the Albanians 1877 1878 i e a net loss of 89 052 Muslims or 93 109 Historians estimates about Muslim population losses edit 20th century historians have made different guesses about the total Muslim losses during the Russo Turkish war Dennis P Hupchick and Justin McCarthy says that 260 000 people went missing and 500 000 became refugees 110 111 Turkish historian Kemal Karpat claims that 250 300 000 people about 17 of the former Muslim population of Bulgaria died as a consequence of famine disease and massacres 112 and 1 to 1 5 million people were forced to migrate 113 Turkish author Nedim Ipek gives the same numbers as Karpat 114 Another source claims 400 000 Turks were massacred and 1 000 000 Turks had to migrate during the war 115 The perpetrators of those massacres are also disputed with Justin McCarthy claiming that they were carried out by Russian soldiers Cossacks as well as Bulgarian volunteers and villagers though there were few civilian casualties in battle 116 while James J Reid claims that Circassians were significantly responsible for the refugee flow that there were civilian casualties from battle and even that the Ottoman army was responsible for casualties among the Muslim population 117 The number of Muslim refugees is estimated by R J Crampton to be 130 000 118 Richard C Frucht estimates that only half 700 000 of the prewar Muslim population remained after the war 216 000 had died and the rest emigrated 119 Douglas Arthur Howard estimates that half the 1 5 million Muslims for the most part Turks in prewar Bulgaria had disappeared by 1879 200 000 had died the rest became permanently refugees in Ottoman territories 120 In this connection it is important to note that Justin McCarthy who is the author of the estimates above and has been requoted by both Hupchik and Howard is an Armenian Genocide denialist who has been criticised severely by many of his colleagues for whitewashing Ottoman history 121 122 123 124 Moreover McCarthy is a member of and has received grants from the Institute of Turkish Studies 125 Throughout his career he has been accused among other things of being an apologist for the Turkish state of having an indefensible bias toward the Turkish official position of selectively using sources and of always ascribing intent to non Ottoman troops while making excuses for Ottoman ones for similar events 126 127 128 Against Albanians edit Main article Expulsion of the Albanians 1877 1878 Against Bulgarians edit nbsp Bones of massacred Bulgarians at Stara Zagora ethnic cleansing by the Ottoman Empire The most notable massacre of Bulgarian civilians during the Russo Turkish War took place during the Battle of Stara Zagora in July 1877 when Gurko s forces had to retreat back to the Shipka pass In the aftermath of the battle Suleiman Pasha s forces burned down and plundered the city of Stara Zagora and subjected its population to indiscriminate slaughter 129 130 At the time Stara Zagora was not only one of the biggest Bulgarian cities but it also accommodated some 20 000 refugees from nearby villages seeking shelter from Ottoman reprisals The number of massacred Christian civilians in the course of the battle is estimated at between 14 000 and 14 500 which would make it the biggest war crime in modern era Bulgaria In addition to the massacre carried out by the Suleiman s regular forces Circassian bashi bazouks engaged in numerous acts of looting plunder and killing among other things The Terror in Karlovo the Kalofer massacre the Kavarna uprising etc etc 131 132 133 Moreover Suleiman Pasha s forces also established an entire system of police and judicial terror across the entire valley of the Maritsa where any Bulgarian who had ever in any way assisted the Russians was hanged However even villages that had not assisted the Russians were destroyed and their inhabitants massacred 134 As a result as many as 100 000 civilian Bulgarians fled north to the Russian occupied territories 135 Later on in the campaign the Ottoman forces planned to burn the town of Sofia after Gurko had managed to overcome their resistance in the passes of Western part of the Balkan Mountains Only the refusal of the Italian Consul Vito Positano the French Vice Consul Leandre le Gay and the Austro Hungarian Vice Consul to leave Sofia prevented that from happening After the Ottoman retreat Positano even organized armed detachments to protect the population from marauders regular Ottoman Army deserters and bashi bazouks 136 Circassians in the Ottoman forces also raped and murdered Bulgarians during the 1877 Russo Turkish war 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 According to Bulgarian historians 30 000 Bulgarian civilians were killed during the war with two thirds of the killings being committed in the Stara Zagora area 144 Against Circassians edit Russians raped Circassian girls during the 1877 Russo Turkish war from the Circassian refugees who were settled in the Ottoman Balkans 145 After the signing of the Treaty of San Stefano the 10 000 strong Circassian minority in Dobruja was expelled 146 Lasting effects editInternational Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement edit nbsp The Red Cross and the Red Crescent emblemsThis war caused a division in the emblems of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement which continues to this day Both Russia and the Ottoman Empire had signed the First Geneva Convention 1864 which made the Red Cross a colour reversal of the flag of neutral Switzerland the sole emblem of protection for military medical personnel and facilities However during this war the cross instead reminded the Ottomans of the Crusades so they elected to replace the cross with the Red Crescent instead This ultimately became the symbol of the Movement s national societies in most Muslim countries and was ratified as an emblem of protection by later Geneva Conventions in 1929 and again in 1949 the current version Iran which neighbored both the Russian Empire and Ottoman Empire considered them to be rivals and probably considered the Red Crescent in particular to be an Ottoman symbol except for the Red Crescent being centred and without a star it is a colour reversal of the Ottoman flag and the modern Turkish flag This appears to have led to their national society in the Movement being initially known as the Red Lion and Sun Society using a red version of the Lion and Sun a traditional Iranian symbol After the Iranian Revolution of 1979 Iran switched to the Red Crescent but the Geneva Conventions continue to recognize the Red Lion and Sun as an emblem of protection In popular culture editThe novella Jalaleddin published in 1878 by the novelist Raffi describes the Kurdish massacres of Armenians in the eastern Ottoman Empire at the time of the Russo Turkish war The novella follows the journey of a young man through the mountains of Anatolia The historical descriptions in the novella correspond with information from British sources at the time 147 The novel The Doll Polish title Lalka written in 1887 1889 by Boleslaw Prus describes consequences of the Russo Turkish war for merchants living in Russia and partitioned Poland The main protagonist helped his Russian friend a multi millionaire and made a fortune supplying the Russian Army in 1877 1878 The novel describes trading during political instability and its ambiguous results for Russian and Polish societies The 1912 silent film Independența Romaniei depicted the war in Romania Russian writer Boris Akunin uses the war as the setting for the novel The Turkish Gambit 1998 See also editBattles of the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Ottoman fleet organisation during the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Batak massacre Romanian War of Independence Harmanli massacre History of the Balkans Provisional Russian Administration in Bulgaria Monument to the Tsar Liberator The Turkish Gambit Serbo Russian MarchReferences edit Torsten Ekman 2006 Suomen kaarti 1812 1905 in Finnish Helsinki Schildts ISBN 951 50 1534 0 Daur Soner Plevne de Cerkesler Timothy C Dowling Russia at War From the Mongol Conquest to Afghanistan Chechnya and Beyond 2 Volumes ABC CLIO 2014 p 748 Menning B W Bayonets before Bullets the Imperial Russian Army 1861 1914 Indiana University Press 2000 P 55 ISBN 0 253 21380 0 Olender P Russo Turkish Naval War 1877 1878 2017 Stratus p 88 ISBN 978 83 65281 36 4 Mernikov AG 2005 Spektor A A Vsemirnaya istoriya vojn in Russian Minsk p 376 a href Template Citation html title Template Citation citation a CS1 maint location missing publisher link a b c Urlanis Boris C 1960 Vojny v period domonopolisticheskogo kapitalizma Ch 2 Vojny i narodonaselenie Evropy Lyudskie poteri vooruzhennyh sil evropejskih stran v vojnah XVII XX vv Istoriko statisticheskoe issledovanie Wars and the population of Europe Human losses of the armed forces of European countries in the wars of the 17th 20th centuries Historical and statistical research in Russian M Socekgiz ru pp 104 105 129 4 a b Buyuk Larousse cilt VII s 3282 3283 Milliyet Yayinlari 1986 Scafes Cornel et al Armata Romania in Razvoiul de Independenta 1877 1878 The Romanian Army in the War of Independence 1877 1878 Bucuresti Editura Sigma 2002 p 149 Romence a b Urlanis Boris C Vojny i narodonaselenie Evropy Chast II Glava II a b c Mernikov A G Spektor A A 2005 Vsemirnaya istoriya vojn Mn Harvest ISBN 985 13 2607 0 Turkish prisoners of war 1877 1878 accommodation keeping relationships with the population of the Russian provinces Archived from the original on 14 April 2021 Retrieved 13 December 2020 The Middle East Abstracts and Index Northumberland Press 1999 p 493 Karpat Kemal Ottoman Population pp 72 75 Crowe John Henry Verinder 1911 Russo Turkish Wars In Chisholm Hugh ed Encyclopaedia Britannica Vol 23 11th ed Cambridge University Press pp 931 936 931 para five The War of 1877 78 Hatt i Humayun full text Turkey Anayasa Vatikiotis PJ 1997 The Middle East London Routledge p 217 ISBN 0 415 15849 4 a b Lebanon Country Studies US Library of Congress 1994 Churchill C 1862 The Druzes and the Maronites under the Turkish rule from 1840 to 1860 London B Quaritch p 219 Shaw amp Shaw 1977 pp 142 143 Robson Maureen M 1960 Lord Clarendon and the Cretan Question 1868 9 The Historical Journal 3 1 38 55 doi 10 1017 S0018246X00023001 S2CID 159657337 Stillman William James 15 March 2004 The Autobiography of a Journalist ebook vol II The Project Gutenberg eBook 11594 Argyll 1879 p 122 Finkel Caroline 2005 The History of the Ottoman Empire New York Basic Books p 467 Shaw amp Shaw 1977 p 146 Deak Istvan Reforms cost money and the Kosovars resented new taxes and conscription In the Russo Turkish war of 1875 1878 Albanian and other Muslims fought against the Ottomans PDF Retrieved 9 April 2020 Hupchick 2002 p 264 a b c Jonassohn 1999 pp 209 210 Eversley Baron George Shaw Lefevre 1924 The Turkish empire from 1288 to 1914 p 319 Jonassohn 1999 p 210 Editorial staff 4 December 1915 Massacre New Statesman 6 139 201 202 202 Jelavich Charles Jelavich Barbara 1977 The Establishment of the Balkan National States 1804 1920 Seattle University of Washington Press p 139 ISBN 9780295803609 Parliamentary Papers House of Commons and Command Volume 80 Constantinople Great Britain Parliament House of Commons 1880 pp 70 72 Retrieved 3 January 2017 MacGahan Januarius A 1876 Turkish Atrocities in Bulgaria Letters of the Special Commissioner of the Daily News J A MacGahan Esq with An Introduction amp Mr Schuyler s Preliminary Report London Bradbury Agnew and Co Retrieved 26 January 2016 Gladstone 1876 Gladstone 1876 p 64 The liberation of Bulgaria History of Bulgaria US Bulgarian embassy archived from the original on 11 October 2010 Hevrolina VM Rossiya i Bolgariya Vopros Slavyanskij Russkij Vopros in Russian RU Lib FL archived from the original on 28 October 2007 Potemkin VP History of world diplomacy 15th century BC 1940 AD RU Diphis a b Barry Quintin 2012 War in the East a military history of the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Solihull West Midlands Helion p 164 ISBN 978 1 907677 11 3 OCLC 751804914 a b c d e Olender Piotr 2017 Russo Turkish Naval War 1877 1878 Place of publication not identified pp 38 42 ISBN 978 83 65281 66 1 OCLC 992804901 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Barry Quintin 2012 War in the East a military history of the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Solihull West Midlands Helion p 167 ISBN 978 1 907677 11 3 OCLC 751804914 Maurice Frederick 1905 The Russo Turkish war 1877 A strategical sketch Swan Sonnenshcein and Co pp 16 17 Barry Quintin 2012 War in the East a military history of the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Solihull West Midlands Helion pp 167 170 ISBN 978 1 907677 11 3 OCLC 751804914 Barry Quintin 2012 War in the East a military history of the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Solihull West Midlands Helion p 178 ISBN 978 1 907677 11 3 OCLC 751804914 Drury Ian 1994 The Russo turkish war 1877 Osprey military Men at arms series London Osprey pp 5 6 ISBN 978 1 85532 371 1 a b Barry Quintin 2012 War in the East a military history of the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Solihull West Midlands Helion p 144 ISBN 978 1 907677 11 3 OCLC 751804914 Olender Piotr 2017 Russo Turkish Naval War 1877 1878 Place of publication not identified pp 28 35 ISBN 978 83 65281 66 1 OCLC 992804901 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Barry Quintin 2012 War in the East a military history of the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Solihull West Midlands Helion pp 144 146 ISBN 978 1 907677 11 3 OCLC 751804914 Chronology of events from 1856 to 1997 period relating to the Romanian monarchy Ohio Kent State University archived from the original on 30 December 2007 Schem Alexander Jacob 1878 The War in the East An illustrated history of the Conflict between Russia and Turkey with a Review of the Eastern Question Langensiepen amp Guleryuz p 6 Menning Bruce 2000 Bayonets before Bullets The Imperial Russian Army 1861 1914 Indiana 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3 July 2019 Armenians and the Cleansing of Muslims 1878 1915 Influences from the Balkans Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 39 3 411 431 doi 10 1080 13602004 2019 1654186 ISSN 1360 2004 S2CID 202282745 Hertslet Edward 1891 The Map of Europe by Treaty vol 4 London Butterworths p 2686 Hurewitz Jacob C 1956 Diplomacy in the Near and Middle East A Documentary Record 1535 1956 vol I Princeton NJ Van Nostrand p 190 Balkian Peter The Burning Tigris The Armenian Genocide and America s Response New York HarperCollins 2003 p 44 Hovannisian Richard G 1997 The Armenian Question in the Ottoman Empire 1876 1914 in Hovannisian Richard G ed The Armenian People From Ancient to Modern Times vol II Foreign Dominion to Statehood The Fifteenth Century to the Twentieth Century New York St Martin s Press pp 206 212 ISBN 0 312 10168 6 93 Harbi Sonrasi Muhacir Iskani D D Pasaoglu 2013 calameo com Balkan tarihi Archived 6 January 2010 at the Wayback Machine Ingilizce David Gillard Kenneth Bourne Donald Cameron Watt Great Britain Foreign Office British documents on foreign affairs reports and papers from the Foreign Office confidential print 1984 University Publications of America sf 150 David Gillard Kenneth Bourne Donald Cameron Watt Great Britain Foreign Office British documents on foreign affairs reports and papers from the Foreign Office confidential print 1984 University Publications of America sf 197 British documents on foreign affairs reports and papers from the Foreign Office confidential print sf 152 British documents on foreign affairs reports and papers from the Foreign Office confidential print sf 163 British documents on foreign affairs reports and papers from the Foreign Office confidential print sf 176 a b British documents on foreign affairs reports and papers from the Foreign Office confidential print sf 268 a b Russian Atrocities in Asia and Europe 1877 Istanbul No 51 Medlicott William Norton The Congress of Berlin and after p 157 Joseph John 1983 Muslim Christian Relations and Inter Christian Rivalries in the Middle East p 84 Medlicott William Norton 2013 Congress of Berlin and After Routledge p 157 ISBN 9781136243172 Reid 2000 p 324 Crampton 2006 p 111 Crampton 2006 p 114 Incorporated Facts On File 2009 Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Africa and the Middle East Infobase Publishing p 244 ISBN 9781438126760 Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary Kars oblast St Petersburg Russia 1890 1907 Osmani Mead 19 June 2018 Arsiv belgelerine gore Nis Sancagi 1839 1878 The Sanjak of Nish According to the Archive PDF in Turkish Bursa Uludag University p 136 a b Koyuncu Askin January 2014 Population and Demography of the Danube Vilayet 1864 1877 Tuna Vilayeti nde Nufus Ve Demografi 1864 1877 Turkish Studies International Periodical for the Languages Literature and History of Turkish or Turkic in Turkish 9 4 676 doi 10 7827 TurkishStudies 7023 a b c Koyuncu Askin 1 December 2013 1877 1878 Osmanli Rus Harbi Oncesinde Sarki Rumeli Nufusu The Population of Eastern Rumelia Before the 1877 1878 Russo Turkish War in Turkish p 191 Bŭlgarii a 1300 institut s ii i dŭrzhavna tradit s ii a dokladi na tretii a Kongres na Bŭlgarskoto istorichesko druzhestvo 3 5 oktomvri 1981 p 326 Balev Ivan 2017 NEPRIZNATITE PREBROYaVANIYa V ISTORIYaTA NA BLGARSKATA STATISTIKA Unrecognised censuses in Bulgarian Statistics in Bulgarian pp 10 11 G Dănescu Dobrogea La Dobroudja Etude de Geographie physique et ethnographique a b Popek Krzysztof 2017 To get rid of Turks The South Slavic states and Muslim Remigration in the Turn of the 1870s and 1880s PDF Crossroads of the Old Continent Central and Southeastern Europe in the 19th and 20th Century 80 Hupchick 2002 p 265 McCarthy 1995 pp 90 91 Karpat Kemal Ouoman Population pp 72 75 Karpat Kemal H Studies on Ottoman social and political history selected articles and essays Brill 2004 ISBN 9789004121010 p 764 Ipek Nedim 1994 Turkish Migration from the Balkans to Anatolia sf 40 41 Library Information and Research Service The Middle East abstracts and index Part 1 1999 Northumberland Press sf 493 During that war nearly 400000 Rumelian Turks were massacred About a million of them who fled before the invading Russian armies took refuge in the Thrace Istanbul and Western Anatolia McCarthy J 2001 The Ottoman Peoples and the end of Empire Oxford University Press p 48 Reid 2000 pp 42 43 Crampton RJ 1997 A Concise History of Bulgaria Cambridge University Press p 426 ISBN 0 521 56719 X Frucht Richard C 2005 Eastern Europe p 641 Howard Douglas Arthur 2001 The history of Turkey p 67 Auron Yair The Banality of Denial Israel and the Armenian Genocide New Brunswick N J Transaction Publishers 2003 p 248 Charny Israel W Encyclopedia of Genocide Vol 2 Santa Barbara California ABC CLIO 1999 p 163 Dadrian Vahakn N Ottoman Archives and the Armenian Genocide in The Armenian Genocide History Politics Ethics Richard G Hovannisian ed New York Palgrave MacMillan 1992 p 284 Hovannisian Richard G Denial of the Armenian Genocide in Comparison with Holocaust Denial in Remembrance and Denial The Case of the Armenian Genocide Richard G Hovannisian ed Detroit Wayne State University Press 1999 p 210 Edward Tabor Linenthal 2001 Preserving Memory The Struggle to Create America s Holocaust Museum New York Viking 1995 Hickok Michael Robert 1996 Death and Exile The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims 1821 1922 by Justin Mccarthy 368 pages maps tables notes appendix bibliography index Princeton NJ Darwin Press 1996 Review of Middle East Studies 30 2 214 doi 10 1017 S0026318400034337 ISBN 0 87850 094 4 ISSN 0026 3184 S2CID 164893463 Al Rustom Hakem 2015 Rethinking the Post Ottoman In Altorki Soraya ed A Companion to the Anthropology of the Middle East Hoboken NJ John Wiley amp Sons Inc p 387 doi 10 1002 9781118475683 ISBN 978 1 118 47568 3 Kieser Hans Lukas Oktem Kerem Reinkowski Maurus 2015 Introduction World War I and the End of the Ottomans From the Balkan Wars to the Armenian Genocide Bloomsbury Publishing ISBN 978 0 85772 744 2 Jirecek Konstantin 1899 Knyazhestvo Blgariya Chast I Blgarskata drzhava The Principality of Bulgaria Part I The Bulgarian State Plovdiv p 382 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Seton Watson Robert William 1971 Disraeli Gladstone and the Eastern Question A Study in Diplomacy and Party Politics Psychology Press p 283 ISBN 9780714615134 Ivanova Kameliya 6 January 2015 Strashnoto v Karlovo The Terror in Karlovo Vasil Levski dokumenti istoriya i nastoyashe Dimitrov Georgi 1900 Knyazhestvo Blgariya v istorichesko geografichesko i etnografichesko otnoshenie Prodlzhenie ot chast II Po rusko turskata vojna prez 1877 78 g Historical Geographic and Ethnographic Data on the Principality of Bulgaria Continued from Part II On the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 in Bulgarian Plovdiv a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Aghanyan Grigor Bazeyan Karine 2015 Dominik Gutmeyr ed National Minorities of Armenia during the Russo Ottoman War Balkanistic Forum 3 115 116 ISSN 1310 3970 Argyll 1879 p 49 Greene Francis Vinton 1879 Report on the Russian Army and its Campaigns in Turkey in 1877 1878 D Appleton amp Co p 204 Ivanov Dmitri 8 November 2005 Pozitano Dushi v okovi in Bulgarian Sega Archived from the original on 19 July 2011 Retrieved 30 April 2009 Reid 2000 p 148 Thompson Ewa Majewska 2000 Imperial Knowledge Russian Literature and Colonialism illustrated ed Greenwood Press p 68 ISBN 0313313113 ISSN 0738 9345 Still Judith 2012 Derrida and Hospitality reprint ed Edinburgh University Press p 211 ISBN 978 0748687275 Gibson Sarah 2016 Molz Jennie Germann ed Mobilizing Hospitality The Ethics of Social Relations in a Mobile World reprint ed Routledge ISBN 978 1317094951 Culbertson Ely 1940 The Strange Lives of One Man An Autobiography Winston p 55 Magnusson Eirikr 1891 National Life and Thought of the Various Nations Throughout the World A Series of Addresses T F Unwin p 8 The New Review Volume 1 Longmans Green and Company 1889 p 309 Dimitrov Bozhidar 2002 Russian Turkish war 1877 1878 in Bulgarian p 75 Richmond Walter 2013 The Circassian Genocide Genocide Political Violence Human Rights Rutgers University Press p 107 ISBN 978 0813560694 Tița Diana 16 September 2018 Povestea dramatică a cerchezilor din Dobrogea Historia in Romanian Jalaleddin and the Russo Turkish War of 1877 1878 Archived from the original on 24 July 2020 Retrieved 17 January 2019 Bibliography editAllen William E D Muratoff Paul 1953 Caucasian Battlefields Cambridge Cambridge University Press Argyll George Douglas Campbell 1879 The Eastern question from the Treaty of Paris 1856 to the Treaty of Berlin 1878 and to the Second Afghan War Vol 2 London Strahan Crampton R J 2006 1997 A Concise History of Bulgaria Cambridge Cambridge University Press ISBN 0 521 85085 1 Gladstone William Ewart 1876 Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East London William Clowes amp Sons OL 7083313M Greene F V 1879 The Russian Army and its Campaigns in Turkey New York D Appleton and Company Retrieved 19 July 2018 via Internet Archive von Herbert Frederick William 1895 The Defence of Plevna 1877 London Longmans Green amp Co Retrieved 26 July 2018 via Internet Archive Hupchick D P 2002 The Balkans From Constantinople to Communism Palgrave ISBN 1 4039 6417 3 Jonassohn Kurt 1999 Genocide and gross human rights violations in comparative perspective Transaction Publishers ISBN 9781412824453 Kofos Evangelos 1977 Apo to telos ths Krhtikhs Epanastasews ws thn prosarthsh ths 8essalias From the End of the Cretan Revolution to the Annexation of Thessaly In Christopoulos Georgios A amp Bastias Ioannis K eds Istoria toy Ellhnikoy E8noys Tomos IG Newteros Ellhnismos apo to 1833 ews to 1881 History of the Greek Nation Volume XIII Modern Hellenism from 1833 to 1881 in Greek Athens Ekdotiki Athinon pp 289 365 ISBN 978 960 213 109 1 Langensiepen Bernd amp Guleryuz Ahmet 1995 The Ottoman Steam Navy 1828 1923 London Conway Maritime Press ISBN 978 0 85177 610 1 Maurice Major F 1905 The Russo Turkish War 1877 A Strategical Sketch London Swan Sonneschein Retrieved 8 August 2018 via Internet Archive McCarthy Justin 1995 Death and Exile The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims 1821 1922 Darwin Press ISBN 9780878500949 Reid James J 2000 Crisis of the Ottoman Empire Prelude to Collapse 1839 1878 Quellen und Studien zur Geschichte des ostlichen Europa Vol 57 illustrated ed Stuttgart Franz Steiner Verlag ISBN 9783515076876 ISSN 0170 3595 Shaw Stanford J Shaw Ezel Kural 1977 History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey Vol 2 Reform Revolution and Republic The Rise of Modern Turkey 1808 1975 Cambridge Cambridge University Press ISBN 9780521291637 Stavrianos L S 1958 The Balkans Since 1453 NYU Press pp 393 412 ISBN 9780814797662 The War Correspondence of the Daily News 1877 with a Connecting Narrative Forming a Continuous History of the War Between Russia and Turkey to the Fall of Kars Including the Letters of Mr Archibald Forbes Mr J A MacGahan and Many Other Special Correspondents in Europe and Asia London Macmillan and Co 1878 Retrieved 26 July 2018 via Internet Archive The War Correspondence of the Daily News 1877 1878 continued from the Fall of Kars to the Signature of the Preliminaries of Peace London Macmillan and Co 1878 Retrieved 26 July 2018 via Internet Archive Further reading editAcar Keziban March 2004 An examination of Russian Imperialism Russian Military and intellectual descriptions of the Caucasians during the Russo Turkish War of 1877 1878 Nationalities Papers 32 1 7 21 doi 10 1080 0090599042000186151 S2CID 153769239 Baleva Martina The Empire Strikes Back Image Battles and Image Frontlines during the Russo Turkish War of 1877 1878 Ethnologia Balkanica 16 2012 273 294 online dead link Dennis Brad Patterns of Conflict and Violence in Eastern Anatolia Leading Up to the Russo Turkish War and the Treaty of Berlin War and Diplomacy The Russo Turkish War of 1878 1877 273 301 Drury Ian The Russo Turkish War 1877 Bloomsbury Publishing 2012 Glenny Misha 2012 The Balkans Nationalism War and the Great Powers 1804 2011 New York Penguin Isci Onur Russian and Ottoman Newspapers in the War of 1877 1878 Russian History 41 2 2014 181 196 online Murray Nicholas The Rocky Road to the Great War The Evolution of Trench Warfare to 1914 Potomac Books Inc an imprint of the University of Nebraska Press 2013 Neuburger Mary The Russo Turkish war and the Eastern Jewish question Encounters between victims and victors in Ottoman Bulgaria 1877 8 East European Jewish Affairs 26 2 1996 53 66 Stone James Reports from the Theatre of War Major Viktor von Lignitz and the Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Militargeschichtliche Zeitschrift 71 2 2012 287 307 online contains primary sources Todorov Nikolai The Russo Turkish War of 1877 1878 and the Liberation of Bulgaria An Interpretative Essay East European Quarterly 14 1 1980 9 online Yavuz M Hakan and Peter Sluglett eds War and diplomacy the Russo Turkish war of 1877 1878 and the treaty of Berlin U of Utah Press 2011 Yildiz Gultekin Russo Ottoman War 1877 1878 in Richard C Hall ed War in the Balkans 2014 256 258 online dead link Glazkov V V Kopytov S Yu Litvin A A Mitev P Georgieva T Kolev V 2018 Osvobozhdenie Bolgarii Liki Vojny i Pamyati K 140 letiyu okonchaniya Russko tureckoj vojny 1877 1878 gg albom 1000 ekz ed M Fond Russkie Vityazi Sost i nauch red Oleg Leonov d i n Rumyana Mihneva Sost professor Plamen Mitev docent Tina Georgieva docent Valeri Kolev ISBN 978 5 6040157 4 2 External links edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to Russo Turkish War 1877 1878 nbsp Wikisource has the text of a 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica article about Russo Turkish War 1877 78 Seegel Steven J Virtual War Virtual Journalism Russian Media Responses to Balkan Entanglements in Historical Perspective 1877 2001 PDF Rhode Island Brown University Military History Russo Turkish War 1877 1878 Digital book index Sowards Steven W Twenty Five Lectures on Modern Balkan History MSU archived from the original on 15 October 2007 Russo Turkish War of 1877 1878 and the Exploits of Liberators Grand war in Russian Kulichki The Romanian Army of the Russo Turkish War 1877 1878 AOL Erastimes image gallery in Bulgarian 8M archived from the original on 13 October 2006 Russo Turkish War 1877 1878 Historical photos Archived 14 October 2018 at the Wayback MachineVideo links edit 130 years Liberation of Pleven Plevna Zelenogorsky Najden 3 March 2007 Mayor of Pleven speech archived from the original video on 25 October 2007 retrieved 30 April 2007 Stanishev Sergej 3 March 2007 Bulgarian Prime Minister speech archived from the original video on 25 October 2007 retrieved 30 April 2007 Potapov 3 March 2007 Ambassador of Russia in Bulgaria speech archived from the original video on 24 October 2007 retrieved 30 April 2007 Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Russo Turkish War 1877 1878 amp oldid 1195246823, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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