The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II

by William James Stillman

Two changes in the position now took place in favor of the Cretan non-combatants. The influence of Russia at Alexandria induced the viceroy to withdraw his troops in spite of the opposition of Omar, and after the disastrous end of that campaign the remainder were embarked for Egypt, 10,000 surviving out of the 24,000 who had landed under Schahin Pasha. The other change was the removal of Derché, whose uselessness even to his own government had finally become evident. His successor—Tricou, a quick-witted Parisian, of a character entirely opposed to the Turcophile Derché—asked permission to follow the army in the next movement, which was intended to be for the subjugation of the central provinces, and Omar bluntly refused. As Tricou had orders from his own government to accompany the army, this impolitic refusal threw him at once into the opposition with us.

Omar marched by Retimo towards Candia, watched by Coroneos, and, when the army reached the valley of Margaritas, it was surrounded and furiously attacked by Coroneos and all the bands of the immediately surrounding country, and completely bottled up. One of the European officers with Omar assured me that they had given up all hope of rescue. The fire of the Cretans penetrated to their tents, and that of Omar was several times pierced. Omar had, before setting out, sent orders to Reschid Effendi, who commanded at Candia, to come and meet him, and Reschid, a more competent commander, with a strong body of irregulars, fighting day and night, succeeded in effecting a junction and opening the way. In this affair, again, the jealousy of the Greeks lost a most brilliant opportunity for a victory which would have undoubtedly finished the war. Petropoulaki, a Mainote palikari of the great insurrection of 1827-30, sent over from Greece to direct affairs about Ida, was called on by Coroneos to reinforce the resistance to the passage of Rescind, but refused to move or even send Coroneos a much-needed supply of ammunition, so that the latter was obliged to retire. On this march there was a repetition of the incident of the great insurrection, in the stifling of all the families who had taken refuge in one of the caves which abound in Crete, by making a huge fire in the entrance. My informant was an Italian colonel under Omar, who was an eye-witness of the event.

Omar next announced a comprehensive movement which was to sweep the insurgents from east to west, and surround them in Sphakia, when he would finish with them. He began by an attack on the position of Lasithe, where were gathered about 5000 insurgents,—sufficient if they had had one commander; having many, they were, after temporary successes, scattered and dispersed east and west, Omar following those who went westward. I ran down to Candia, in the Kestrel, to get the earliest news. Harried, and with several partial defeats, the army was finally concentrated at Dibaki, on the south coast; but, instead of sweeping the country as Omar had proposed doing, it was embarked on the fleet and transported to the eastern foothills of Sphakia, and debarked at Franco Castelli, the scene of the debarkation of Mustapha in his Askyphó campaign. With much hard fighting, but greatly aided by the want of coöperation amongst the insurgents and their allies, one division penetrated to Askyphó, but was unable to get further, and, being cut off from all communication with its base of supplies, was obliged to retreat to Vrysis, Omar always remaining on his ironclad, while Reschid, who was by far the most competent soldier in the Turkish army in Crete, was obliged to retreat towards Candia, followed by Coroneos, and, reaching that place mortally wounded in a parting fight with the Greek chief near Melambos, died at Candia a few weeks later. While at Candia I received most of my information from the son of Reschid Pasha.

Omar, having ravaged and murdered along the southern coast, was obliged to take ship and sail round with the entire army to the point from which he had started. He landed at Canea, having lost, mostly by disease, from 20,000 to 25,000 men in a three months' campaign, and effected nothing except the destruction of six hundred villages and the murder of hundreds of Cretans. The reports of Tricou had made it necessary for the French government to recognize the real condition of affairs, for he had set his agents in the island to collecting the authentic cases of Turkish barbarity, a ghastly roll. His irritation against the sirdar, on account of the discourteous manner of refusal of the permission to accompany the army, was intensified by an insulting remark which Omar made to Captain Murray, concerning Tricou, and which Murray repeated to me and I to Tricou; and the war was thereafter to the knife. Tricou crushed the Croat in the end, and the Russian and French governments came to an accord for the transportation of the non-combatants to Greece. In consequence, four French ships, three Russian, two Italian, and, not to be left alone, three Austrian and one Prussian, rapidly carried to Greece all who wished to escape from the island. It was unnecessary, as there was no longer any danger from the Turkish army; but it was, I suppose, in pursuance of some political scheme which had brought France and Russia together. The Turkish army was nowhere in force or spirit to penetrate into the interior, and the demoralization was such that soldiers deserted from battalions ordered for Crete. The military hospitals in Crete were full, and the troops so mutinous that operations had become impracticable beyond holding and keeping up communication with the blockhouses and posts within easy reach.

Omar Pasha having failed to make any impression, A'ali Pasha, the grand vizier, came out in October, 1867, to try conciliation. He offered all that the Cretans could desire, short of annexation to Greece,—an assembly of their own, freedom from taxation for a term of years, a prince of their own election without reserve, and the half of the customs receipts. I waited on him, as I had on the former envoys of the Sultan, as a matter of etiquette, and was surprised by the just and reasonable tone and substance of his propositions. They seemed even better for the Cretans than annexation to Greece, and I so represented them to Mr. Morris. But I received from him the orders of General Ignatieff to urge the Cretans to reject them, as the certain alternative was their independence and annexation to Greece. I obeyed my orders without concealing my own sentiments in favor of the acceptance of the offers of the grand vizier.

A'ali made on me an impression of honesty and justice such as I had never seen in any Turkish official. He dissembled none of his difficulties, and discussed the questions arising out of the position without reserve. For the first time since the affair began I felt my sympathies drawn to the Turkish aspect of the political question involved. I had long seen that Crete could not be governed from Athens without a course of such preparation as the Ionian Islands had had; they would never submit to prefects from continental Greece; they felt themselves, as they really are, a superior race, superior in intelligence and in courage; but the men from Athens had persuaded them that the only alternative to submission to the Sultan was annexation, and, meanwhile, the ships of Europe were carrying their families to Greece, where they were to remain practically as hostages for the fulfillment of the Greek plans. The Russian influence was now strengthened by the service rendered in the deportation of the women and children, and the Greek influence by the maintenance of them in Greece.

The offers of A'ali Pasha were rejected without being weighed. A'ali used no arts; he offered bribes to no one; he showed what the Sultan was ready to offer and guarantee, and listened patiently to all that the consuls or the friends of the Cretans said, but it was too late. Meanwhile fighting had ceased, for the Turks dared not go into the interior, and the Christians, having neither artillery nor organization, could not attack the fortified posts or the walled cities. The fighting men in the mountains were provided with food from Greece, and had lost the habits of industry which would have made peace profitable. Dissensions arose amongst the chiefs, and the best of them went back to Greece to urge the carrying of the war into the continental provinces of Turkey. The conclusion of the war by the proffered autonomy of Crete was utterly ignored by all who had any influence in bringing about a solution.

The Russian government now concluded to take the direction of matters. Its minister at Athens required Comoundouros to fall in with a plan for a general movement in all the Balkan provinces under Russian direction, Russia beginning to fear a pan-Hellenic rising. To this Comoundouros gave a peremptory refusal; it was a Greek movement and should remain under Greek direction. The king of Greece had married a Russian princess, and during his stay at St. Petersburg had given himself up to the influence of the court. He was a weak, incapable young man, and the absolutist atmosphere suited his temperament perfectly, and the independence of Comoundouros did not. Under the requisition of the Russian minister, the king dismissed the ministry of Comoundouros. The Chamber refused its confidence to the new ministry, and the Russian minister then made the formal proposal to Comoundouros that if he would accept the programme of St. Petersburg he should come back to power. This proposal was also rejected, and the Chamber was dissolved, and in the new elections, by the most outrageous exercise of all the expedients that could be applied, Comoundouros and all his principal adherents were excluded, and a subservient Chamber elected, under the shadow of a ministry of affairs composed of men of no party and no capacity. The popular feeling ran so high that an insurrection was imminent, and was averted only by the formal promises of the ministry to carry on the war in Crete with renewed energy; but, at the same time, the means were withdrawn from the Cretan committee, who were the most capable and honest, as well as patriotic, people to be found in Athens. Never had the condition of affairs been so favorable for the realization of a thorough Greek policy. The Greeks on the Continent were ready and all the Turkish empire was in a ferment. Joseph Karam, prince of the Lebanon, was waiting at Athens on the plans of the Greek government to give the word for a rising in his country. The election having given the ministry the majority it desired, it gave place to Bulgaris, the Russian partisan, and colleagues nominated by the Russian minister for the distinct purpose of suppressing the Cretan insurrection.

Omar Pasha went home in disgrace in November, and left in charge Hussein Avni, who had a plan of paralyzing the insurrection by building lines of blockhouses across the island and isolating the bands. With much pain and expense a number of blockhouses were built and roads made in the western provinces; but, with the exception of another fruitless attack on Zurba, nothing really serious was attempted on either side in the island. The Turkish hospitals were full of fever and dysentery patients, and the insurgents harried all the country round about with perfect impunity. Most of the houses around us at Kalepa were occupied as hospitals, and the very air seemed infected by the number of sick; there were 3000 in and around Canea.

In this condition the year 1867 went out and the third year of the insurrection began. The Greek government sent supplies enough to keep the men under arms from starving, and the Turkish could send no more troops, so that there were only, after garrisoning the fortresses, about 5000 troops available for any operations. One of the European officers told me that the total force remaining out of eighty-two battalions, of which most had come to Crete full, was 17,000 men effective. A party of the consuls and officers of the men-of-war in the port made a picnic at Meskla in August, and witnessed a fight between the Cretans and Zurba and the Turks at Lakus, in the course of watching which I had a shot fired at me from the Turkish trenches, which came so near that the lead of the bullet striking a rock at my side spattered me from head to foot, and as we returned to Canea we were surrounded by the insurgents at Theriso, having lost our road in the dark, and most of the party taken prisoners. I and my veteran cavass, Hadji Houssein, broke through with a guest,—Colonel Borthwick, an English officer in the Turkish service,—escaping down a breakneck hillside in the dark to save him and his two orderlies from capture by the insurgents, a trifling thing for us who were known as the friends of the Cretans, but a serious matter possibly for Turkish soldiers in fez and uniform. We made a reckless race down the mountain, leaving our horses and my photographic apparatus under the care of Dickson, and just succeeded in reaching the Turkish outpost in advance of a party of Cretans who followed the road down to cut us off. The post which we reached was under the command of a major, and Borthwick, who outranked him, ordered out a relieving party to go up the road and rescue the consuls, but the frightened major went up the road, out of sight, and waited there till we were gone, and then came back. He complained to Borthwick on receiving the order, "But you know that is dangerous,"—a fair expression of the feeling of the army as to their service at that time. They were too demoralized to make any impression on the insurgents.