Roumania Past and Present, James Samuelson [best novels to read to improve english .txt] 📗

had been put upon her by the Treaty of Paris, had succeeded in obtaining a modification of that treaty, which gave her once more the right of entrance into the Black Sea; how, resuming her favourite rôle of protectress of the Christian inhabitants of Turkey, she intervened in the affairs of those nations who stood between her and Constantinople; how the Servians and Montenegrins, incited by her, rose in revolt, and the Bulgarians followed suit; how the European Powers, sympathising with Turkey on the one hand, in consequence of the renewed machinations and transparent designs of her powerful northern enemy, and on the other despairing of her on account of the barbarities with which she endeavoured to quell the rising in her vassal provinces, the inherent weakness of her rule, and the bankrupt condition of her finances, they were compelled at length to leave her at the mercy of her foe. To repeat the narrative of these would be telling an oft-told tale. But when, after the final break-up of the Conference of Constantinople in January 1877, the Cross and the Crescent were once more opposed to each other, and when the Russian forces were massed on the eastern bank of the Pruth, then came the moment at which it behoved the newly-liberated nation, which had so often been the victim of the 'holy' strife, to decide on which side it would array itself. Indeed, Roumania had little choice in the matter; the critics who have censured her policy, and have charged her with breach of faith towards her suzerain the Porte (and we know there are many such in this country), cannot have carefully considered her past history; nor have reflected upon the position in which she was placed.[173] As a matter of preference, the young nation which was about being dragged into this ruthless strife could have none, and might with justice have exclaimed, 'A plague on both your houses!' What cared they, on the one hand (and this was the popular sentiment), for the hypocritical crusade undertaken for purposes of aggrandisement; or, on the other, what sympathy could they have with the moribund State which had ever been to them as the daughters of the horseleech, and whose atrocities were identical with those that were perpetrated in the days when Huns and Vandals devastated their own fair plains? If Roumania in her then condition (now it would be different) had opposed the passage of the Russian forces, they would have entered her territory as enemies, the war would have been carried on once more within her borders, and, beggared and prostrate, she might at best have reckoned upon retaining her political independence through the intervention of the European Powers; though, looking at the fact that these had recognised Russia as their executioner in Turkey, it is very questionable whether they would have interfered for the protection of Roumania, and whether she would not have fallen to Russia along with Bessarabia. On the other hand, if she had actively sided with either Power, her national independence and the happiness of her people would have been staked upon the result. She chose the wise, and indeed the only course, namely, that of allowing her powerful neighbour to pass through her dominions, stipulating that, so far as Russia could help it, she should be spared the desolation and horrors of war within her frontiers. But what course did the Porte adopt? Not recognising the force majeure which had driven Roumania to this decision, she was suicidal enough to declare her an enemy, and to threaten to depose the Prince, thus giving to her bitterest foe an ally who, at a critical period, in self-defence, turned the scale against her, and caused her to lose some of her fairest provinces. For the Roumanians well knew, after the declared enmity of the Porte, that the defeat of the Russians and their withdrawal into their own territories would at once have been followed by all the incidents of Turkish rule, of which for centuries they had had such a bitter experience.

Amongst the valuable services which Prince Charles had rendered to his adopted country before the outbreak of the Russo-Turkish war was the organisation of a national army on the German model. Under Prince Couza the whole standing army of the two Principalities was at first 8,400 men, but he raised it to 25,000 strong, and officered it on the French system. When Prince Charles received the investiture at the hands of the Sultan in 1867, the army was limited to 30,000 men of all ranks; but he substituted German for French officers, and sent young Roumanians to Germany to study military tactics. In 1874 the standing army numbered 18,542 men of all arms, and the territorial forces 43,744, making a total of 62,286 men and 14,353 horses; these were armed with 52 steel Krupp guns, besides about 200 of an inferior description; 25,000 Peabody rifles, and 20,000 Prussian needle-guns, raised in 1875 to 100,000 rifles of the best description.[174] The sanitary services and the military hospitals had been organised by General Dr. Davila, a French physician, of whom we have frequently spoken elsewhere, and who still occupies the post of Director of Hospitals, &c., and of the Medical School at Bucarest.[175]

[Footnote 173: The critics of her conduct during and immediately after the close of the war were more bitter than at the present day, charging her with perfidy of the worst kind, and predicting that she would become a vassal state of Russia. See, amongst others, Ollier, History of Russo-Turkish War , vol. i. p. 537.]

[Footnote 174: These details are from Von Wittinghausen's work on Roumania, from a military point of view (Vienna: Carl Gerold's Sohn).]

[Footnote 175: The army organization has progressed rapidly since the war of complete liberation, and it is estimated that in 1884 the total forces of Roumania, regular militia, and Landsturm, will exceed 215,000 men. Full information will be found in Von Wittinghausen, Obedenare and in the Gotha Almanack , 1881, p. 903, where the present state of the forces is given in detail.]


III.

With an army thus constituted and disciplined, Prince Charles went into the Russo-Turkish war as an ally of the Russians, although, at first, not as an active one; and as the success of that terrible war relieved Roumania from the last vestiges of her dependence upon Turkey, we will endeavour to collect within as narrow limits as possible a few of the leading events wherein she participated, and which affected her claim to European attention.

That the Roumanians rendered valuable services to the Russians before they co-operated actively in arms is well known, and also that the latter had pressing need for such assistance. In May 1877 every facility was given for the passage of troops over the Roumanian railways, hospital equipments taking the precedence, and the Roumanian civil and military hospitals opened their doors to receive the Russian sick; in fact, disastrous as were the Russian reverses throughout the war, they would have entailed far greater misery upon their wounded soldiers if it had not been for the systematic aid which they received from the Roumanians. Then, in preparing for the defence of their own bank of the Danube, the latter were diverting the attention of the Turks, whose gunboats amused themselves in making harmless excursions up and down the river, pretty much as our fleet did between Besika Bay and the Dardanelles, and they were making a line of defence for the Russians in case they should have been obliged to recross tho Danube. Here it is that we first make the acquaintance of Prince Charles, who travelled from post to post on the river inspecting the defences. 'Born a Hohenzollern, and reared an officer in the Prussian army,' says a writer who accompanied him on this tour, 'it is little wonder that Prince Charles of Roumania is above all things a soldier. Since his election to the headship of the Principalities he has sedulously devoted a large share of his energies to the improvement, or rather, in the first instance, to the creation of a Roumanian army, and that his labour has not been lost is apparent to any man having any conversance with military matters, who has spent the last few weeks in the territory over which Prince Charles holds sway.'[176] The prince had at his disposal two army corps, each numbering 28,000 men, fully equipped, whilst the militia, whose strength was about 100,000, was ready for mobilisation at the shortest notice. As to the fighting qualities of these troops writers differ, and we shall refer presently to the changes that took place in the estimation in which they were held as the war progressed; but even at the commencement there were those who lauded their coolness, and said that they did not exhibit any of that tremor under fire which is not wholly unnatural in young soldiers.

Before these men were called into action, however, their powerful allies had suffered terrible defeats at the hands of the enemy. Dealing only with that division of the Russian army which was engaged in Bulgaria, we have to note the following events. On June 27, 1877, the main body of Russians, or the 'army of operations,' as it was called, which was under the command of the Grand Duke Nicholas, crossed the Danube in floating ferries from Simnitza to Sistova, feints having been made to concentrate and pass over in other places at the same time, so as to mislead the Turks as to the intended point of crossing. Although some efforts were made by the latter to prevent the landing on the Bulgarian shore, which resulted in many being killed and wounded on either side, the Russians effected the passage in safety and occupied Sistova, where they found all the houses of the inhabitants sacked and plundered by the Turks, who had beaten a retreat. The Emperor and the Grand Duke Nicholas were either on the spot or in the immediate vicinity at the time of the crossing, the headquarters being then at Ploiesti, on the Bucarest and Orsova, railway, and from that time forward they sustained a series of terrible reverses.[177]

As soon as a sufficient force was landed, they divided the army into three sections, one of which, under General Ghourko, pressed on to the famous Shipka Pass in the Balkans, where he encountered the brave enemy; he occupied the pass on July 19. Another section under the Grand Duke himself--part of the 9th Army Corps--marched onwards to the equally well-known position of Plevna, where Osman Pasha was in command of the Turkish forces, and where the Russians met with their first check. General Krüdener, who commanded the attacking force, was not only repulsed, but, being assailed in his turn by the Turks, he was badly beaten. Two days afterwards, having been reinforced, he, in conjunction with General Schahofskoy, commanding a force of 32,000 men, made a second assault on Plevna, but they were again defeated with terrible loss. On July 31 Ghourko met with a still more serious defeat. He had penetrated with a Russo-Bulgarian force as far as Eski-Zagra (or Zara), where he met the Turks under Suleiman Pasha, and, after a sanguinary encounter, he was not only repulsed, but compelled to withdraw to the Shipka Pass. Suleiman Pasha followed him and succeeded in occupying the village of Shipka, but his attempts to drive the Russians from the pass were unsuccessful, and on August 27 he discontinued his operations and telegraphed for reinforcements, the Russians having in the meantime also received theirs. Suleiman Pasha did not renew the attempt until September 17; and, although at one time he had so far discounted his success as to telegraph a victory to Constantinople, he was finally repulsed.[178]

Added to these and other reverses in Europe, there came tale