Under the Red Crescent / Adventures of an English Surgeon with the Turkish Army at Plevna and Erzeroum 1877-1878

by Charles S. Ryan; John Sandes

I stopped at the field-ambulance depot attending to the wounded men until about six o'clock in the evening, when we all cleared off and went back to Plevna. This was the battle of Pelischat, otherwise named Sgalevitcha. We had about one thousand three hundred men killed and wounded, and we had gained absolutely nothing. I never could understand the exact object of this sortie from Plevna, since even if we had succeeded in capturing the Pelischat-Sgalevitcha position we could never have held it.

Early on the morning of September 4 an orderly came to my quarters before I was up, and said to me, "At eleven o'clock you will see some troops advancing by the Lovtcha road, and you will follow them."

I asked him where they were going, and he said that he did not know. I inquired how long we were likely to be away, and he said that he had no idea, adding that I had better take my instruments with me because I should probably want them.

After I had done my work at the hospital, I went up to the headquarters camp, and found that Osman Pasha and a number of officers, Hassan Labri Pasha, Emin Bey, Tahir Pasha, Tewfik Bey, Osman Bey, and Yalaat Bey, with sixteen battalions and three batteries, were marching out along the Lovtcha road, and I joined them at once. About a mile from Plevna on this road were some large vineyards laden with clusters of ripe grapes, which had attracted the attention of our troops some days before this. In fact, the Turkish soldiers, in their desire to get the ripe fruit, had been in the habit of stealing out by night past our vedettes into the vineyards, and several of them had been shot by the Russian outposts; strict orders had accordingly been given to the troops to refrain from indulging their appetite for grapes under the circumstances, and the Turkish sentries had been instructed to shoot any men who attempted to pass them during the night for the purpose of getting into the vineyards.

When, however, we were marching out towards Lovtcha in the daytime, it was impossible to keep the troops out of the vineyards; and many of the men who had not been too plentifully supplied with rations for some time past gorged themselves with fruit to such an extent that they became ill with dysentery, and I had to attend to them. On the outskirts of Plevna also I noticed many Turkish professional beggars who pestered the troops for money; and as it was considered lucky to give something in charity before going into action, the soldiers were very liberal, and the beggars reaped a rich harvest of piastres.

Almost as soon as we were well clear of Plevna and out into the open country, we fell in with some Russian cavalry vedettes, and began a period of intermittent fighting which continued all that day. When the vedettes saw that we were in strong force, they fell back upon a field where the corn had been cut and stood piled up at intervals in stooks. It was quite interesting to watch them dodging for cover from one stook to another, while our men tried to pick them off with their rifles. A good many of the Cossacks fell in the wheat-field, and the remainder were driven back without difficulty. Hardly had we got rid of those, however, when three or four Russian infantry regiments put in an appearance with a couple of batteries of artillery, and opened fire on us. We were drawn up in very open order, and Osman Pasha sent a couple of batteries up to the crest of some rising ground, and we started to shell the enemy, still continuing to push forward with the main body. There was a small creek to cross, and we had a hard task to get the guns over the bridge under a heavy fire from the Russians. It was very exciting work; and as Tewfik Bey was directing the passage of the bridge, his horse was killed under him by a shell. At last, however, we got safely over, just as it was growing dusk, and sending out skirmishers in front we continued to advance. The firing went on for some hours, sudden sheets of flame appearing on both sides in the twilight as the opposing troops discharged volley after volley; but our casualties were very few, and at last there was a cessation of hostilities.

We camped in a wheat-field which had just been reaped, and Weinberger and I sat all night in one of the stooks, holding our horses. We had no rations with us; but I had had a good feed of grapes in the morning, and with some cobs of maize that I had put in my pocket before starting we managed to satisfy our hunger. As we squatted in the stook together, Weinberger and I discussed the situation seriously, and came to the conclusion that it was by no means reassuring. In point of fact we made up our minds that our last hour was all but come, for we made sure that before morning the Russians would bring up their troops and we should have to be struck by a flank attack. Our communication with Plevna would no doubt be cut off during the night, and we apprehended that when the morning came our force would probably be annihilated. When day broke, however, we looked out of our stook, and found to our intense relief that there was not a Russian in sight anywhere. It was the most beautiful morning that I remember to have ever seen; and after the bare hills round Plevna and the narrow streets of the town, the well timbered, undulating country was a delightful sight.

The march was resumed soon after daybreak, and it must have been midday before we halted in the doghole Bulgarian village of Kakrinka, a little distance eastward of Lovtcha. A number of pigs belonging to the fugitive villagers were roaming about among the empty cottages, and the Circassians, who, like all good Mussulmen, regard the pig as a filthy and abominable creature, showed their religious zeal by shooting several of them. On the outskirts of the village we met a Bulgarian woman with two children, and from her we learnt the fatal news that Lovtcha had fallen two days before. Our march from Plevna had been with the object of relieving Rifaat Pasha, who commanded the garrison at Lovtcha; but we had arrived too late, for he had been attacked by an overwhelming Russian force, and the Turkish troops in Lovtcha had been cut to pieces.

What had happened was this. Skobeleff had advanced upon Lovtcha on September 1, with about twenty-one thousand men and eighty-four guns, exclusive of the Cossacks and their batteries. Aware that he was vastly outnumbered, Rifaat Pasha had sent an urgent request to Osman Pasha in Plevna for immediate assistance; but the commander-in-chief apparently considered that the Lovtcha position could hold out for a few days, and delayed to send reinforcements at once.