THE SECOND BATTLE OF PLEVNA (JULY 30).
Talks with my Patients--A Candid Kurd--Grim Confessions--How he
killed his Enemy--Dr. Robert's Cave of Refuge--He loses his
Dinner--The Spy's Death--Canards in the Town--The Second Battle
of Plevna--I take a Hand--Turkish Women as Water-carriers--A
Woman shot in Action--My Veiled Patient--Osman Pasha's Bay
Cob--A Sign of Hot Fighting--The Attack on the Village of
Grivitza--Czetwertinski and his Cigarette--Retreat of the
Russian Infantry--A Cavalry Pursuit--Mustapha Bey waves his
Sword--I join in the Charge--An Exultant Ride--The Retreat
sounded--We retire--A _sauve qui peut_--Horrible Fears--The Ride
through the Maize-field--Our Infantry Panic-struck--Osman
Pasha's Method of rallying Men--A Timely Reinforcement--The Day
is ours--Tremendous Russian Losses--Russian Physique compared
with Turkish--Wounded Horses on the Battle-field--Back in the
Hospital--Many Operations--Osman Pasha decorated--The Muchir
makes a Speech--I shift my Quarters again--Bulgarian
Hospitality--A Youthful Friend--A Terrific Rainstorm--The
Tutchenitza runs a Banker--A Ghastly Find in a Gooseberry Bush.
Although I could speak Turkish sufficiently to make myself understood
for ordinary purposes, I found myself in difficulties when my patients
began to talk to me about their private affairs, or to go into long
accounts of their adventures on the battle-field. Sometimes, however, I
was able to gather a few startling illustrations of the ferocity with
which the engagement had been fought.
One of my patients was the colonel of a Kurdish regiment, a magnificent
specimen of a man, who had been shot in the thigh by a rifle-bullet. The
ball had entered the left thigh on the outside, passed clean through it,
and also through the right thigh, making four distinct wounds, which had
occasioned a great deal of hæmorrhage with inflammatory conditions and
high temperature. I refrain from giving this patient's name as he may be
still alive, and he probably would not desire to remember the incident
which he related to me.
He told me that he received his wound in the height of the action, and
became for a while unconscious. When he came to himself, he commenced to
crawl on his hands and knees towards the Turkish lines, and on his way
he came to a Russian officer lying wounded on the ground. I give the
story now in his own words. "I saw him lying there before me," whispered
my patient to me as I dressed his wounds, "and the impulse to kill him
came into my mind. I suppose he read my purpose in my face, for he
pointed to his wound, and then he held up his hands to me as if to ask
for quarter. As I crawled over on my hands and knees, I knelt over him
and pointed to my own wounds in reply. Then I drew my revolver and shot
him through the head. My servant, who had come to look for me, was close
behind me. He was a Kurd, and he took his long Kurdish knife and cut off
the Russian's head before he was dead. The air made a gurgling, bubbling
sound as the knife went through the windpipe. The Russian officer had a
long fair beard. He was a fine man, and I shall never forget his face.
You are horrified. Well, it was war. I was not a man then, I was a wild
beast. I killed him as he lay there because he was in my power. If I had
been in the same position, he would have killed me. It was destiny."
Each of the members of the medical staff had a similar hospital to
attend to, and all were managed on much the same lines. As a rule I
finished my work in the forenoon, and had the rest of the day more or
less to myself, except when it was my turn to attend at the main
hospital, where once a week I had to be in attendance all night on
emergency duty.
I was on friendly terms with the colonels of most of the regiments, and
especially with Tewfik Bey, who used to keep me supplied with the latest
news until he went to Lovtcha, and then I was thrown back on my own
resources; but I found plenty of entertainment in watching the progress
of the fortifications, trenches, and redoubts, which the troops were
constructing with ceaseless activity under the direction of Tewfik Bey,
who laid out the works before he went to Lovtcha.
Although not very particular as to what I ate, I got very tired of the
incessant pilaf and scrambled eggs which my Circassian cooked for me,
and both Weinberger and I always looked forward with lively pleasure to
an invitation to dine with Dr. Robert, who was certainly very liberal in
his hospitality. On these occasions we had European food admirably
cooked by the Viennese housekeeper, and Robert always produced his best
Bulgarian wine. I think I can see him now, dressed in his dirty yellow
suit of Bulgarian frieze, with his long, sinuous fingers flying over the
keys of his piano as he yelled out song after song in half the languages
of Europe until far into the early hours of the morning. Peace to his
ashes! He used to give us capital dinners; but I never could find out
what happened to him eventually.
One little incident connected with him is perhaps worth recording here,
though it occurred at a later period in the campaign. When the shells
were falling fast in Plevna, Robert dug a large hole in his garden, and
was accustomed to bury himself in it like a mole whenever the firing
became particularly hot. One day, when I was watching outside his
garden, I saw the housekeeper bring in his midday meal, steaming hot and
very appetizing. Just as Robert sat down to it a shell exploded on the
top of the house, and Robert was off to his hole in the ground like a
fox with a pack of hounds at its heels. As he lay there quaking, it
seemed a pity that the dinner should be allowed to get cold, so I
vaulted the fence and ate it myself. The cutlets were simply delicious.
Of course Robert had nothing to do with the wounded men. He was simply a
Bulgarian doctor, and was, moreover, strongly suspected of Russophile
proclivities. Long afterwards I heard a rumour that he was shot as a spy
before Plevna fell.
In those days of comparative quiet which preceded the second battle we
only gleaned stray pieces of news from the outside world. The telegraph
wire was closed to all private despatches, and the information which
filtered into the town was consequently of the vaguest. The soldiers who
came up from Sofia certainly brought us news as to the progress of the
campaign in other parts of the Turkish Empire; and we learnt that while
the army of the Lom was doing fairly well, Suleiman Pasha's forces had
sustained a serious disaster at the Shipka Pass. The untrustworthy
nature of the news, however, may be understood from the fact that for
some days a persistent rumour was current that Great Britain had
declared war against Russia, and that twenty thousand British troops
were even then at Sofia.
In order to get a clear idea of the significance of the second battle of
Plevna it is necessary to comprehend the position from the point of view
of the Russian commanders, who realized that if they did not blot out
their crushing defeat of June 20 by a great victory they would be
compelled to abandon the initiative and fall back upon a tedious
defensive policy with all its attendant disadvantages. It was clear that
the most natural course to attempt was to crush Osman Pasha's army, for
Plevna was much more accessible than either Rasgrad or Eski-Zagra; it
was easier to concentrate a force there, and there was no immediate
danger in any other quarter. To attack the Turkish army of the east
would probably necessitate protracted siege operations; while if Osman
Pasha were defeated, it would be easy to reinforce General Gourko, and
afterwards advance against Suleiman Pasha's army. Thus it was that the
Russian general staff, who were sixty miles away at Tirnova, resolved to
attack Plevna, and entrusted the task to Prince Schahoffskoi and General
Krüdener. Let us see with what result.
On the 27th and 28th of July our scouts reported the proximity of large
bodies of Russians coming from Nicopolis and Poradim, and we all
recognized that an attack was imminent. The 29th was quiet; but on the
morning of the 30th, as I was at breakfast, I heard the boom of the
heavy guns once more, and recognized that the Russian artillery
preparation for the attack had commenced, and that the Turkish batteries
were replying. The early morning had been damp and foggy; but when the
fog lifted the sun came out strongly, and it became blazing hot. I had
received no special instructions from Hassib Bey, my superior officer,
and I resolved to see as much of the fighting as possible. So, when I
had finished my work at the hospital, I saddled my horse, and galloped
off as a free-lance with my pocket-case of surgical instruments and two
large bags, one containing tiftig, or lint, and the other bandages. For
weapons I carried a sword and a revolver, but no carbine. No field
ambulance had been organized, and it occurred to me that I might be of
some service to the wounded. So I headed in a south-easterly direction,
where the firing seemed particularly heavy; and about a mile from the
town I rode up the slope of a small colline, below the crest of which a
regiment of Turkish infantry were lying under cover. The day was very
hot, and the men had had nothing to drink since they took up their
position five or six hours before. When I got there it was about ten
o'clock, and the first thing I saw was a long procession of Turkish
women of the poorer class, who were carrying earthen pitchers of water
from a small stream at the foot of the hill to the thirsty troops lying
in position. Some were ascending with full pitchers, and others were
descending again with the empty vessels to replenish them at the stream.
At this time the roar of the guns was terrific, and the Russian shells
were screaming over our heads, some of them exploding in the air and
others striking the ground behind us. The women, who were all dressed in
white, with their yashmaks over their faces, and only their eyes
showing, went steadily on with their self-appointed task, carrying their
pitchers of water up to the men and back to the stream without a falter.
When I was about two hundred yards from the crest where the troops were
lying, a shell burst within a few yards of me, and a fragment of it
struck one of the women in the arm. She screamed out as the artery
spirted up over the white dress, and I made her my first patient in the
battle.
As soon as the other women saw that she was wounded, they made a great
fuss, chattering away like magpies. They placed her under a tree, and at
first refused to let me attend to her, for a Giaour must not touch a
Turkish woman under any circumstances; but when they could not stop the
bleeding themselves, they became alarmed, and offered no objections when
I approached with my bags of lint and bandages. I slit up the sleeve of
her dress with a pair of scissors and stanched the bleeding; but the
injury was only a flesh wound, and not serious. Osman Pasha got to hear
of the women being there somehow, and presently an aide-de-camp came
galloping up and cleared the whole lot of them off. They went back into
the town, and I saw no more of them.
When I reached the crest of the hill and looked round, I saw an immense
panorama of country thickly sprinkled with hills, and from every
individual summit a battery of field-guns seemed to be roaring. No
Russian infantry were visible, and it was impossible to say which were
the Russian guns and which the Turkish. The noise was terrific, and
everywhere I saw clouds of dust, with here and there a Russian battery
with six horses going at full gallop, as the guns came into action at a
new position. Over towards Grivitza and over by Radishevo and on the
crest of every hill we had men placed, and our batteries were answering
the Russian fire. I attended a few wounded men who had been struck by
fragments of shells, and then I rode off due east towards the village of
Grivitza, which was the objective of both the attacking columns.
On the way I met Osman Pasha and his staff, and saluted them. Osman
looked careworn and very anxious. He was riding a little bay cob, which
he always used when any specially dangerous operations were in progress,
preferring not to run the risk of getting either of his two other
valuable chargers killed. That little bay cob was a capital barometer by
which to gauge the warmth of the fighting; and whenever he made his
appearance on the battle-field, it was safe to assume that affairs were
pretty critical. Just as I passed Osman Pasha, I heard the whistle of
rifle-bullets for the first time in the engagement.
Looking over towards Radishevo, I could make out a strong Russian force
in the village. They were sending their guns on in front, and the
infantry were advancing, also following the guns, which were going at a
furious gallop. I could see Osman Pasha and his staff riding over
towards the Bulgareni road, which lay at the foot of the Janik Bair,
with the Grivitza brook running alongside it. As I followed them I met
several wounded men dragging themselves slowly and painfully from the
front to the hospital at Plevna, and I was able to reduce their
sufferings a little, though of course I could not attempt any operations
even of the simplest kind. Gradually I became aware of the general
disposition of the opposing forces, and found that the Turks, roughly
speaking, occupied the arc of a circle south and south-east of Plevna,
while the Russian troops were advancing in converging lines upon them
with the village of Grivitza evidently as the main object of their
attack. From the top of the hill where I stood I could make out the
advancing lines of the Russians, while our troops by this time were
below me, standing in hastily constructed trenches which they had dug
for protection against the increasingly heavy fire. Some idea of the
infernal tumult which was going on may be gathered from the fact that
over one hundred and fifty heavy guns were firing incessantly, while the
infantry fusillade extended in an unbroken line from one end of the arc
of defence to the other. From where I stood I could see the attack on
the village of Grivitza quite plainly. The Russians attacked in column
of front half a mile wide, while our men waited grimly breast high in
the trenches in front of the village. The whole place was so thickly
covered with smoke, and the area of the battle-field was so extended,
that sometimes I scarcely knew who were Turks and who were Russians. I
rode back a little way from the crest of the hill to get cover, and
presently my friend Czetwertinski galloped up with eighty troopers, who
formed the bodyguard of Osman Pasha. We had a talk together, and
presently, as we could not see much from where we were, we agreed to go
up and inspect our first line of defence. Just below the crown of the
hill we found four thousand Turkish troops entrenched and blazing away
at the Russians who were developing the attack on the position.
Czetwertinski and I rode together to the extreme end of our line of
infantry, and I could hear the bullets whistling like hornets all round
us. Czetwertinski, as he sat there on his horse, leisurely rolled a
cigarette for himself, and then looked round for a light. Seeing that
the soldier in the trenches nearest to us was puffing calmly at a
cigarette himself in the intervals of business, Czetwertinski sang out
to him, "Verbana a-tish," meaning, "Give me a light." The man clambered
out of the trench, saluted, and handed his lighted cigarette to Prince
Czetwertinski. As he stood there in the act of saluting a rifle-bullet
went through his head, and the man threw up his arms and fell dead.
Czetwertinski remarked to me that it was not good enough to stop there
any longer; so we retired to the other side of the hill again, and
rejoined the cavalry, who were waiting there under cover.
Just at this juncture the Russians, who were advancing in two lines of
company columns, a formation totally unfitted for modern warfare, began
to falter under the terrific fire from our trenches. The faltering grew
more decided, and in a few moments the advance was changed to a retreat.
This was our opportunity. The bugles sounded for the Turkish cavalry to
advance; and almost before I could realize what was happening, I saw old
Mustapha Bey, the colonel of the regiment, and the eighty troopers, with
Czetwertinski among them, going off at full gallop straight towards the
retreating Russian infantry, who had already begun to run. For a moment
I hesitated what to do. Then old Mustapha Bey waved his sword, and sang
out to me to come along with them; so I forgot that I was a simple
medical officer. I drove the spurs into my horse, and in half a minute I
was riding alongside Czetwertinski in a wild charge against the flying
Russians. We climbed the hill at a gallop, rode through our own men at
the top, and charged down the slope towards Schahoffskoi's fugitives.
There was a large field of ripe maize on our right as we went down the
hill, and I could see the Russians running through it as hard as their
legs could carry them, believing of course that a strong body of cavalry
was swooping down to cut off their retreat. Next to the field of
standing maize was a field of barley, which had been reaped and piled in
stooks. I could see the Russians dodging in and out among the stooks as
we rode towards them, our troopers yelling and cheering as they emptied
their carbines and revolvers into the mass of the fugitives. The Russian
officers were trying to rally their men, and parties of them began to
make a stand under some trees and to reply to our fire. In a moment
more, when the most venturesome of the troopers had got within forty or
fifty yards of the fugitives, the Russians suddenly faced round, and,
recognizing that they were attacked by a mere handful of men, took up a
formation and poured their fire into us in earnest. Hassan Labri Pasha,
who was watching the whole thing, foresaw that our retreat was likely to
be cut off, and he sounded the retreat. We wheeled our horses just in
time, drove the spurs in, and galloped back for our lives.
Probably no man except one who has been in a similar position can even
faintly guess at the rapid change of feeling which comes over one at
such a crisis. A few moments before, while we were galloping forward
against the fugitives, I felt as brave as a lion; but when once I had
turned my back to them and heard their bullets whistling round me, a
mortal dread came over me, and if I had had a hundred millions in the
bank I would have given it all to be a furlong farther from the muzzles
of those Russian rifles. It was every man for himself of course, and we
did not attempt to preserve any sort of formation. The instinct of a
hunted animal flying for cover made me turn towards the maize-field, and
I galloped into the friendly shelter of the tall stems, bending my head
low over my horse's neck and urging him forward with voice and spur. The
maize was tall enough to conceal a horse and man completely, so that the
Russians could not take aim at any individual mark; but they poured
incessant volleys into the field, and many a bullet fired at random
found its billet. As these hundreds of bullets cut the maize stalks in
all directions round me, I must confess that my previous recklessness
had given place to a ghastly, overmastering terror. Wherever I turned,
danger was by my side, and I could only press blindly forward and hope
for the best. A trooper close by me suddenly threw up his arms, and
seemed to spring several feet up from the saddle before he fell with a
thud among the blood-soaked maize stalks. It occurred to me then that he
must have been shot through the heart.
By this time the entire Russian force which had been attacking our
position on the hill was in full pursuit; and as I came out on the other
side of the maize-field with the other survivors of that mistaken
charge, I saw with dismay that our retreat had affected our own
infantrymen with a panic. They had held their ground stubbornly while
the Russians were developing the original attack; but when they saw us
galloping back pell-mell with the returning Russians behind us, the
moral influence of our retreat was too much for them, and they started
to run from the position. It was a critical moment; but the threatened
retreat was stopped as quickly as it began; for Osman Pasha, who had
been watching the affair with his staff from the top of the hill, took
prompt steps to rally the men. The slope of the hill, from the crest
down to where the men were entrenched, was extraordinarily steep; but
when we rode up it, and the men in the trenches began to follow us,
Osman Pasha and his staff came down it at full gallop, with shouts and
direful threats, emptying their revolvers at the advancing body of their
own men. This drastic remedy had the desired effect, and the men
rallied, took their places again in the trenches, and opened fire upon
the Russians.
By this time it was beginning to get dusk; and as the firing showed no
signs of diminution, I made my way back to Plevna as fast as I could go,
in the full conviction that it was all up with us, and that the Russians
would be in the town soon after me. What actually happened was this. The
Russians took our first line of trenches, when Osman Pasha, seeing that
the northern attack had died out, ordered down two fresh regiments along
the Nicopolis road to reinforce the position. The men were quite fresh,
and they "doubled" the whole way, covering the intervening two miles in
about twelve minutes, and arriving just in time to bar the farther
advance of the Russians, who fell back after some desperate hand-to-hand
fighting.
When I reached the town, the bullets were falling pretty thickly in the
streets, showing that the Russians had penetrated unpleasantly close. I
saw a Bulgarian coming out of a house with a bucket to fill it with
water from a small fountain in the middle of the street; but before he
reached the fountain he fell dead drilled by a rifle-ball.
Coming to the hospital, I was soon up to my neck in work. Gradually the
firing died away, and all night long the wounded kept coming in, some
walking and others in arabas. We had thirty-seven medical men on the
staff at this time, and there was plenty for all to do. No one knew
exactly what had happened; and I remember telling several of the wounded
men, who inquired how the day had gone, that we had been beaten. Later
on, however, I found that we had won a great victory, and that the
Russians had been decisively beaten all along the line; Krüdener's and
Schahoffskoi's columns having suffered terrible loss, while Skobeleff
who had been fighting on the Green Hills, had retired his force in good
order, and with lighter loss. The Russian total loss was given as one
hundred and sixty-nine officers, and seven thousand one hundred and
thirty-six men, or about one-fourth of the total force. Even this
figure, however, is believed to be largely under-estimated. The Turkish
loss was about eight hundred killed and nine hundred wounded.
In spite of this splendid victory, the great chance of the campaign was
missed owing to the want of cavalry. If we had had a strong body of
cavalry, scarcely a Russian would have reached the Danube alive; and
even as it was the panic among the Russians at Sistova was so great
that a rush was made upon the bridge, and many waggons were actually
pushed over into the river by the crowding fugitives.
As for my little troop of cavalry with whom I made that desperate charge
and still more desperate retreat, it had been absolutely decimated,
though Mustapha Bey the colonel, Czetwertinski the captain, and the
Turkish lieutenant, all escaped as fortunately as myself.
In the town of Plevna we had plenty of accommodation for the wounded,
and all the arrangements for attending to them were in far better order
than on the occasion of the first battle. When the main hospital was
full, we sent the men off to the smaller hospitals, and many of the less
serious cases lay out in the open air all night. It was a repetition in
many respects of our experience after the first battle; for we had
forty-eight hours of almost continuous work, and then the great bulk of
the men were put into carts and sent away to Sofia. On the first night
after the artillery firing had ceased, all was quiet, and the only
sounds to be heard in the town were the cries and moans of the wounded
and the loud creaking of the great wooden-wheeled waggons as they rolled
over the cobble-stones outside.
As I have said, we were much better prepared for the reception of the
wounded than after the first battle; for we had plenty of instruments,
chloroform, antiseptic solutions, and bandages, and, moreover, we had
trained a number of the soldiers to act as an ambulance corps. These
assistants were able to help us very materially, and had become quite
expert dressers. In the majority of cases the wounds were very severe,
as the men had fought principally in the trenches, and when hit they
were generally shot either through the head or right through the chest.
On August 1 I got away from the hospital at about five o'clock in the
afternoon, and rode out to have a look at the battle-field. Near the
spot where the Grivitza redoubt was afterwards built the Russian dead
lay thickest, and within a space of about two acres on this rising slope
I counted fifteen hundred bodies. The spectacle was a horrifying one.
Turkish burial parties had already been out burying our dead; but the
Russians were left where they fell. Nearly all of them were absolutely
naked, for the Bashi-Bazouks had been there already, and had stripped
them of arms and clothing completely. I could not help noticing the
difference in physique between the Russian soldiers and the Turks. The
Russians were far less robust, and many of them seemed to be mere lads,
hardly equal to the task of carrying the heavy Berdan or Krenke rifle.
Broken gun carriages lay on every side, and the ground was scarred and
torn in all directions.
A number of wounded horses, lying on the ground unable to rise, were
neighing pitifully, and farther off two or three more with broken legs
and entrails hanging out were dragging themselves slowly and painfully
to a pool of water that had collected in a hollow at the foot of a hill.
I shot four of the unfortunate creatures with my revolver, and put them
out of their misery.
Some of the wounded men were in very strange attitudes. One man was
kneeling as if in prayer; another was on his hands and knees; another
was lying in his own brains. All three had been stripped by the
Bashi-Bazouks. The Russian line of retreat could be easily
distinguished, for it was marked out by a track of dead bodies laid as
plainly as the track of a paper-chase. Here and there I could see where
groups of them had tried to make a little stand, and had been shot down
thirty or forty or fifty at a time. I saw one dead man in a most
extraordinary position. He was stuck in the fork of a tree about fifteen
feet from the ground, having evidently climbed it for safety, and then
been shot by a stray bullet.
Returning from my visit to the dead, I devoted myself again to the
wounded in the hospitals, and performed a number of amputations together
with Osman Effendi, who worked splendidly with me. In the intervals of
work next day I rode out again to the battle-field, which was beginning
to smell terribly, so that we had to send out more burial parties to
bury them in large trenches containing eighty or a hundred bodies each.
So terrible had been the slaughter that some Russian regiments had
literally ceased to exist.
Within a very few days after the battle we had sent away the greater
number of the wounded, and only the cases for operation remained. All of
these were removed to the main hospital, and Osman Effendi and myself
resumed our work upon this new supply of patients. All our operations
were done out of doors in the same place under the willow tree near the
bank of the Tutchenitza. A great number of cases ended fatally which in
a civil hospital would probably have resulted differently; but we did
not attempt any intricate operations, and we were also hampered by the
fact that the patients frequently preferred to die rather than undergo
the amputation of a limb. If a man had a bullet in his knee, for
instance, such a thing as excising the knee or laying it open was never
thought of, and we simply took the leg off. This is a legitimate course
for a surgeon to adopt in time of war, because the skilled attention
necessary to the after treatment of a delicate operation was not
available, and it was often better surgery to take a man's leg off and
preserve his life than to perform an intricate operation in order to
save the leg with the probability of the patient succumbing for want of
careful nursing afterwards. As in the case of the wounded in the first
battle, there were a large number of men whose fingers we had to
amputate.
Trade revived quite briskly as soon as things began to settle down again
in the town, and the bazaars were all in full swing. Many Spanish Jews,
scenting large profits from afar, put in an appearance, and bought
Russian coin and arms from the Circassians who had secured the plunder.
A Russian rouble was to be had for twopence, and an officer's sword
could be had for a franc. I myself bought two beautifully mounted
Russian revolvers, which I still possess.
Osman Pasha was overwhelmed with congratulations upon his brilliant
victory from all quarters of Europe, and I was a witness of an
impressive scene when he was the recipient of the highest military
honour that the Sultan can bestow. It was a few days after the battle,
and I was standing close to the headquarters camp, behind which all the
reserves were stationed, when I heard the bugles sounding the "fall in."
Everything had been perfectly quiet, and there was no sign of the
proximity of the Russians, so that I was at a loss to understand the
meaning of the order; but it was carried out with astonishing celerity.
Within five minutes several thousand men were on parade under arms, and
I was looking round to see what was the matter, when I saw a Turkish
officer in gorgeous uniform galloping up to the headquarters camp
accompanied by a troop of cavalry. It proved to be an aide-de-camp of
the Sultan, who had come up from Constantinople with an escort bearing
despatches for Osman Pasha. Soon all the camp was in motion, and as the
bugles repeated the call troops came pouring down to the parade-ground
from the different redoubts and the earthworks on the Janik Bair and at
Grivitza, and formed up into square. All the field officers were
present, including Adil Pasha, the second in command. The Sultan's
aide-de-camp and some of the officers went into the tent of Osman Pasha,
who presently appeared with the first order of the Osmanli, the highest
Turkish military decoration, pinned upon his breast, with the cordon.
The aide-de-camp read out a special despatch from the Sultan,
congratulating Osman Pasha upon his recent brilliant victory. He then
presented him with a splendid sword, the hilt of which was set in
diamonds, and he presented Adil Pasha with a brace of magnificently
mounted pistols as a token of the Sultan's appreciation of his soldierly
qualities. All the officers came forward with the standard-bearers, and
Osman Pasha then delivered a stirring address to the troops. He said
that his Imperial Majesty the Sultan had done him the honour of
decorating him with the order which he then wore, and had presented him
with that magnificent sword in token of his pleasure at the decisive
defeat which had been inflicted upon the Russians. Though the Sultan had
decorated him personally, yet the credit of the victory did not belong
so much to him as to his brave officers and troops, who, he felt
certain, were still eager and ready to try conclusions again with the
enemy. He added that the battle which they had just fought was not to
end the campaign. They were fighting for hearths and homes, for wives
and children; and though the fighting still in store for them would
probably be even more severe than that which they had already gone
through, still he placed the fullest confidence in their bravery and
their patriotism. The troops all cheered their leader lustily, and the
ceremony came to an end with a great, united shout of "La ilaha illallah
Mohammed Rasul Allah."
During those days after the second battle the work of fortification
proceeded with ceaseless activity under the direction of Tewfik Pasha,
who was rapidly rearing a chain of redoubts connected by trenches and
subterranean passages to bar the passage of the Russian troops into
Turkish territory. These earthworks were marvels of intricate
construction, and at this period the greater number of our troops lived
underground like moles, tunnelling communications between the different
redoubts, the largest of which was the famous one at Grivitza, which
contained four thousand men.
When we had finished our work with the wounded and sent them all away, I
had practically nothing to do, and used to spend my time riding about
the hills either on Dr. Robert's trotting pony or my own charger. I got
tired of my quarters in the Bulgarian house, and decided to flit to some
place more convenient to the hospital. I found the place I was looking
for in another Bulgarian house, situated in the extreme north-west of
the town on the bank of the Tutchenitza, and within a couple of minutes'
walk of the hospital. It was a remarkable house, for it had no front
door and no staircase inside, although it was a two-story edifice. There
was a large yard at the back, and in one corner of it was the shed,
which did duty for a stable. I saw that there was a fine garden attached
to the house, and that it was separated from the Tutchenitza by a fence.
The ground floor was inhabited by a forbidding-looking Bulgarian and his
family, and I took possession of the upper rooms, which were reached by
a flight of stone steps from the outside. There I installed myself in
the best bedroom as comfortably as possible under the circumstances, and
Ahmet, my Circassian servant, occupied an adjoining apartment. He had no
trouble about arranging the furniture in my room, because there wasn't
any, with the exception of a wide divan running round the wall.
Cordial hospitality was not at that time the strong point of the average
Bulgarian, and my host downstairs was an unusually surly person. I was a
tenant at will--that is to say, at my own will, not at my
landlord's--but the heads of the household took no more notice of me
than if I had been dead--probably indeed not so much. There was one
little chap, though, a yellow-haired, blue-eyed Bulgarian boy of about
thirteen, who used occasionally to visit me; and he endeavoured without
success to explain to me his views upon the position. I encouraged his
confidences with an eye to subsequent advantages, and reaped the reward
in milk, which the little chap used to bring me from his father's dairy
cow. With the addition of the milk to my daily fare, I was enabled to
boil my rice in a new way and to improve my _menu_ considerably.
In the beautiful garden which surrounded the house were some of the most
magnificent specimens of china asters, zinnias, and balsams that I have
ever seen. I sent some of the seed home to Australia, and can still,
even after long years, pluck flowers which are the lineal descendants of
those that bloomed for the first time in the blood-stained soil of
Plevna. But sometimes that garden produced another and a ghastlier
crop. About ten days after the battle we had a terrific downfall of
rain. It poured for about twenty-four hours in torrents, and the
Tutchenitza was soon running a banker. Presently the flood-waters
encroached, and poured across the low-lying flats, through the fence,
and over our beautiful garden. When the rain stopped and the water
receded, I walked in the garden one morning, and found _débris_ of all
sorts, which had been brought down by the stream, still sticking in my
favourite gooseberry bushes. Among the flotsam and jetsam gathered there
was a grisly relic from the battle-field a mile or two away. It was a
human head, with most of the flesh worn off the skull by the action of
the water, and the teeth set fast in a horrid grin. It was impossible to
say whether it was the head of a Turk or a Russian, and I buried it
under the gooseberry bush where I found it.
A day or two after this great rainstorm I rode out again over the hills
and visited the battle-field. Far down on the lower ground, where the
main Russian attack upon Grivitza was delivered, I came upon a gully,
down which the recent rains had poured a miniature mountain torrent. The
water had scooped away the earth that was thinly laid over the Russian
dead, and had robbed the shallow graves of the corpses, carrying the
bones away to the lowest lying ground, and depositing them there to
whiten in the sun. Hundreds of skulls which had been separated from the
bodies were lying there. I thought of the Kurdish colonel, and of the
fate which his Circassian servant meted out to the wounded Russian
officer, and I guessed the shocking reason. These were the heads of
wounded men whom the Circassians had decapitated.