THE
SIEGE OF KARS.
Nothing has more contributed
to the spread of the belief in a thirst for
conquest on the part of Russia, than her constant
maintenance of a military establishment greatly
exceeding the internal requirements of the
Empire. Anxiety on this score may, however, be in
some degree relieved by the consideration of the
incontrovertible fact, that it is a mere scenic
effect which is produced, rather than a practical
reality. Numbers are there, it is true, but an
organization capable of giving them any very
formidable power is absolutely wanting. The whole
administration of regiments is concentrated in
the hands of their commanding officers and their
medical Staff, who are in direct communication
with the contractors furnishing the requisite
supplies. Rations suppressed in the lines, and
remedies withheld in the ambulances, are paid for
by the Government, to fill the pockets of
colonels and surgeons. The control of generals
and inspectors is bought off.
The Turkish army is far from
being immaculate in this respect, but it has
occasionally the advantage of being commanded by
Europeans incapable of conniving at corruption.
Omar Pasha was one of these, and nothing of the
kind was ever heard of where he could prevent it;
and success seemed to attend the troops under his
orders, not only on that account, but also as a
result obtained by his military ability. It was
so in the campaign of the Danube; and the case was similar
with the defense of Kars, under the orders of
another upright officer, General Williams,
until the place was starved into capitulation. In
both these campaigns the Turks proved themselves
to be good soldiers, and were respected
accordingly ; in the Crimea alone were they
treated otherwise. It was neither just nor
generous on the part of the allied armies; for
the services rendered by them were not such as
they were expected to perform, and they were
fulfilled without a murmur and with perfect
goodwill. After acting as beasts of burden for
the conveyance of stores and ammunition from the
ports to the camps, they would receive with
thanks a few biscuits tossed to them as a reward;
and I have even seen a requisition sent in for so
many ' mules or Turkish soldiers to carry loads.'
The
two armies, Russian and Turkish, had a trial of
strength at Kars without foreign
interference, beyond the presence of General
Williams and his Staff. An invasion, of the
Ottoman territory by an army of 40,000 Russians
under the command of General
Mouravieff, for the purpose of laying siege
to the strongly fortified town of Kars, was met
by 15,000 Turks, who were led by Vassif Pasha. Receiving no support
from Selim Pasha, who held Erzurum with 16,000
men, and did nothing to reinforce or victual the
beleaguered garrison, the general in command
of it made an urgent appeal for assistance from Constantinople.
The French and English Commanders-in-Chief were
applied to by the Porte. The saving of Karswas not
regarded as an essentially French interest,
and it was finally left to Lord Stratford to
decide what should be done, on the plea that England
alone had reasons for defending the road from Russia
to India. None of the British troops before
Sebastopol could be spared for this purpose, but it was agreed that the
Turkish contingent attached to the English army
might be sent from Kertch to raise the siege of Kars.
General Vivian, commanding that force, did not
consider it to be sufficiently provided with the
means of land transport to undertake a march from
the eastern shore of the Black Sea to Kars, and, as there
seemed to be no time to make the necessary
arrangements for enabling it to move, Omar Pasha
was sent with 40,000 Turkish troops to create a
diversion, at least, in favor of the besieged
army, if he could not succeed in reaching Kars
in time to attack General Mouravieff's army of
investment on one side, while it might be
assailed on the other side by a simultaneous
sortie of the garrison. Colonel Simmons, of the
Royal Engineers, acted as Queen's Commissioner
with Omar Pasha's army, and could always give him
advice if any strategic blunder seemed likely to
be committed by him, and it is therefore safe to
assume that there was not any mistake made. Yet
the expedition proved unsuccessful. Struggling
against the rigors of an inclement autumn, the
army contrived to march on as far as Kutais,
fought a desperate and not inglorious battle at
the passage of the river Ingur against a Russian
force sent to impede its progress, and, finding
it impossible to proceed farther, retired on its
base of operations, without having been able to
accomplish anything in favor of the Turkish
garrison of Kars.
General Williams, of the
Royal Artillery, an officer who had been employed
as Instructor of the Turkish Artillery, and
subsequently as English member of the Mixed
Commission for the Topography of the
Turco-Persian Frontier, had finally been
appointed Queen's Commissioner with the Turkish
army at Kars. He
had rendered very valuable assistance to the
pasha commanding it, chiefly by suggesting timely
and effective measures for provisioning the
garrison and the town. The pasha of Erzurum
alleged as a pretext for not sending supplies
that there were no beasts of burden to be found
except donkeys, and that it would be a
disgrace to the Turkish troops to have their food
conveyed by them. A complaint was forwarded by
the Queen's Commissioner to Lord Stratford on
this subject for communication to the Porte. No
reply was returned. Other dispatches of his
remained unanswered. He could not expect,
however, that every one of his reports should
have an acknowledgment of receipt, and it was
surely enough that the requests contained in them
should receive prompt attention. The want of
boots in the Turkish ranks, for instance,
furnished matter for a lengthy correspondence
with the Ambassador, who did not fail to send a
dragoman to the Porte to press unofficially the
transmission of boots to Kara ; but he had too
man}' important questions to write about at that
time to admit of his answering verbose effusions
about boots. I recollect one of those reports
which was exceedingly diffuse on the subject of a
thunderstorm.
' Donner
und Blitzen /' exclaimed Lord Stratford,
putting it into my hand, as he used to do when he
wished me to draft an answer to a dispatch.
I
asked him what reply he thought of sending.
'
Tell General Williams,' he said,' that an
Ambassador is not called upon to enter into
meteorological discussions on the phenomena
observed by Queen's Commissioners at the
headquarters of foreign armies. But no, we
may let him alone in the enjoyment of his cacoethes
scribendi, and we need not make him read
answers, when he seems to have so little leisure,
if Dr. Johnson was right in his apology for
writing a long letter to a friend, because he had
not time to write a short one.'
The
defenses of Kars consisted chiefly of earthworks,
which were raised by Colonel Lake and Major
Teesdale, two officers on the staff of General
Williams. Vassif Pasha had the good sense to be
guided by the advice of European officers.
Besides General Williams and his staff, there was
a distinguished Hungarian general of the name of
Kmety, who had entered the Turkish army under the
name of Ismail Pasha. For some time there was no
engagement fought between the besiegers and the
besieged, beyond occasional skirmishes of the
outposts ; but at last an attempt was made by the
Russians to enter the most advanced outwork, from
whose artillery fire they suffered so severely
that they soon retreated.
A
Russian colonel of cavalry then deserted to the
Turks with forty of his men, being Muslims
of Dagestan, and loath to fight against
Islam. He became a Brigadier-General, and did
good service in the Turkish army.
Dr.
Humphrey Sand with was on the Staff of General
Williams, and distinguished himself by organizing
the hospitals. Four wounded Russianofficers fell
into the hands of the Turks, and he took such
care of them in his medical capacity, that
a flag of truce was hoisted by General
Mouravieff, in order that he might personally
offer his thanks to Dr. Sand with, such amenities
of war being sanctioned by precedents between
enemies in the field.
The garrison had from time to
time found it possible to procure supplies of
provisions from without, but the town was at last
completely invested, and no further communication
could be held with the surrounding country. There
was an unbroken cordon of Cossacks round the
town, which no one could pass, even during the
night. All letters were of course intercepted by General
Mouravieff, but he always sent them into Ears
with a flag of truce after perusal. Intelligence
reached the garrison of Omar Pasha's expedition
in the hope of raising the siege, but those
bright expectations were doomed to disappointment
when news arrived of his having returned to the
coast after the battle of the Ingur. The final
determination of the defender of Kars was to hold out
as long as possible, and capitulate only when
absolute starvation should commence. As yet,
matters had not reached that extremity.
With Lord Stratford in the
Crimean War, Author, James Henry Skene,
Publisher, R. Bentley, 1883