April Uprising - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The April Uprising was an insurrection organised by the Bulgarians

Bulgarians

The Bulgarians are a South Slavic nation and ethnic group native to Bulgaria and neighbouring regions. Emigration has resulted in immigrant communities in a number of other countries.-History and ethnogenesis:...

in the Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

from April to May 1876, which indirectly resulted in the re-establishment of Bulgaria as an autonomous nation in 1878. Тhe regular Ottoman Army and irregular bashi-bazouk

Bashi-bazouk

A bashi-bazouk or bashibazouk was an irregular soldier of the Ottoman army...

units brutally suppressed the rebels, leading to a public outcry in Europe and the United States, with many famous intellectuals condemning the Ottoman atrocities and supporting the oppressed Bulgarian population.

The 1876 uprising involved only those parts of the Ottoman territories populated predominantly by Bulgarians. The emergence of Bulgarian national sentiments was closely related to the re-establishment of the independent Bulgarian church

Bulgarian Orthodox Church

The Bulgarian Orthodox Church - Bulgarian Patriarchate is an autocephalous Eastern Orthodox Church with some 6.5 million members in the Republic of Bulgaria and between 1.5 and 2.0 million members in a number of European countries, the Americas and Australia...

in 1870. Together with notions of romantic nationalism the rise of national awareness became known as the Bulgarian National Revival

Bulgarian National Revival

The Bulgarian National Revival , sometimes called the Bulgarian Renaissance, was a period of socio-economic development and national integration among Bulgarian people under Ottoman rule...

Background

In Europe, in the eighteenth century, the classic non-national states were the multi-ethnic empires such as the Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

, ruled by a Sultan

Sultan

Sultan is a title with several historical meanings. Originally, it was an Arabic language abstract noun meaning "strength", "authority", "rulership", and "dictatorship", derived from the masdar سلطة , meaning "authority" or "power". Later, it came to be used as the title of certain rulers who...

and the population belonged to many ethnic groups, which spoke many languages. The idea of nation state was an increasing emphasis during the 19th century, on the ethnic and racial origins of the nations. The most noticeable characteristic was the degree to which nation states use the state as an instrument of national unity, in economic, social and cultural life. By the 19th century, the Ottomans had fallen well behind the rest of Europe in science, technology, and industry. However, the Bulgarian population was also suppressed socially and politically under Ottoman

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

rule. Additionally, more immediate causes for the greater mobilisation compared to earlier revolts were the severe internal and external problems which the Ottoman Empire experienced in the middle of the 1870s. In 1875, taxes levied on non-Muslims were raised for fear of a state bankruptcy, which, in turn, caused additional tension between Muslims and Christians and facilitated the breakout of the Herzegovinian rebellion

Herzegovinian rebellion

The Herzegovina Uprising of 1875-1878 was an uprising led by Christians, firstly in Herzegovina and then in Bosnia. It is the most significant of the rebellions against Ottoman rule in Herzegovina...

and the Stara Zagora revolt in Bulgaria. The failure of the Ottomans to handle the Herzegovinian uprising successfully showed the weakness of the Ottoman state while the brutalities which ensued, discredited additionally the empire to the outside world. In the late 19th century European ideas of nationalism

Nationalism

Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...

were adopted by the Bulgarian elite.

Preparation

In November 1875, activists of the Bulgarian Revolutionary Central Committee

Bulgarian Revolutionary Central Committee

The Bulgarian Revolutionary Central Committee or BRCK was a Bulgarian revolutionary organisation founded in 1869 among the Bulgarian emigrant circles in Romania. The decisive influence for the establishment of the committee was exerted by the Svoboda newspaper which Lyuben Karavelov began to...

met in the Romanian town of Giurgiu

Giurgiu

Giurgiu is the capital city of Giurgiu County, Romania, in the Greater Wallachia. It is situated amid mud-flats and marshes on the left bank of the Danube facing the Bulgarian city of Rousse on the opposite bank. Three small islands face the city, and a larger one shelters its port, Smarda...

and decided that the political situation was suitable for a general uprising. The uprising was scheduled for April or May 1876. The territory of the country was divided into five revolutionary districts with centers in Vratsa

Vratsa

Vratsa is a city in northwestern Bulgaria, at the foothills of the Balkan Mountains. It is the administrative centre of the homonymous Vratsa Province. As of February 2011, the town has a population of 60,482 inhabitants....

, Veliko Tarnovo

Veliko Tarnovo

Veliko Tarnovo is a city in north central Bulgaria and the administrative centre of Veliko Tarnovo Province. Often referred to as the "City of the Tsars", Veliko Tarnovo is located on the Yantra River and is famous as the historical capital of the Second Bulgarian Empire, attracting many tourists...

, Sliven

Sliven

Sliven is the eighth-largest city in Bulgaria and the administrative and industrial centre of Sliven Province and municipality. It is a relatively large town with 89,848 inhabitants, as of February 2011....

, Plovdiv

Plovdiv

Plovdiv is the second-largest city in Bulgaria after Sofia with a population of 338,153 inhabitants according to Census 2011. Plovdiv's history spans some 6,000 years, with traces of a Neolithic settlement dating to roughly 4000 BC; it is one of the oldest cities in Europe...

and Sofia

Sofia

Sofia is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria and the 12th largest city in the European Union with a population of 1.27 million people. It is located in western Bulgaria, at the foot of Mount Vitosha and approximately at the centre of the Balkan Peninsula.Prehistoric settlements were excavated...

.

The rebels had been hoarding arms and ammunition for some time and even constructed make-shift cannon out of cherry-wood

Cherry gun

The Cherry Gun is a famous weapon that was created in Macedonia for use against the Turks in the April Uprising. It was a wooden cannon that was used to arm the under equipped Bulgarian rebels against the Turkish army. It has now become a common symbol throughout Bulgaria despite the fact that it...

.

In the progress of the preparation of the uprising, the organisers gave up the idea of a fifth revolutionary district in Sofia

Sofia

due to the deplorable situation of the local revolutionary committees and moved the centre of the fourth revolutionary district from Plovdiv

Plovdiv

to Panagyurishte

Panagyurishte

Panagyurishte is a town in Pazardzhik Province, Southern Bulgaria, situated in a small valley in the Sredna Gora mountains. It is 91 km east of Sofia, 43 km north of Pazardzhik, and 37 km south of Zlatitsa. The town is the administrative centre of the homonymous Panagyurishte...

. On 14 April 1876, a general meeting of the committees from the fourth revolutionary district was held in the Oborishte locality near Panagyurishte

Panagyurishte

to discuss the proclamation of the insurrection. One of the delegates, however, disclosed the plot to the Ottoman authorities. On , Ottoman police made an attempt to arrest the leader of the local revolutionary committee in Koprivshtitsa

Koprivshtitsa

Koprivshtitsa is a historic town in Sofia Province, central Bulgaria, lying on the Topolnitsa River among the Sredna Gora mountains. It was one of the centres of the April Uprising in 1876 and is known for its authentic Bulgarian architecture and for its folk music festivals, making it a very...

, Todor Kableshkov

Todor Kableshkov

Todor Kableshkov was a 19th-century Bulgarian revolutionary and one of the leaders of the April Uprising....

Outbreak and suppression

In conformity with the decisions taken at Oborishte, the local committee attacked the headquarters of the Ottoman police in the town and proclaimed the insurrection two weeks in advance. Within several days, the rebellion spread to the whole Sredna Gora

Sredna Gora

Sredna Gora is a mountain range in central Bulgaria, situated south of and parallel to Balkan mountain range and extending from the river Iskar to the west and the elbow of Tundzha north of Yambol to the east. Sredna Gora is 285 km long, reaching 50 km at its greatest width...

and to a number of towns and villages in the northwestern Rhodopes. The insurrection broke out in the other revolutionary districts, as well, though on a much smaller scale. The areas of Gabrovo

Gabrovo

Gabrovo is a city in central northern Bulgaria, the administrative centre of Gabrovo Province. It is situated at the foot of the central Balkan Mountains, in the valley of the Yantra River, and is known as an international capital of humour and satire , as well as noted for its Bulgarian National...

, Tryavna

Tryavna

Tryavna is a town in central Bulgaria, situated in the north slopes of the Balkan range, on the Tryavna river valley, near Gabrovo. It is famous for its textile industry and typical National Revival architecture, featuring 140 cultural monuments, museums and expositions...

, and Pavlikeni

Pavlikeni

Pavlikeni is a town in Veliko Tarnovo Province, Northern Bulgaria, about 41 kilometers away from the city of Veliko Tarnovo. It is the administrative centre of the homonymous Pavlikeni Municipality...

also revolted in force, as well as several villages north and south of Sliven

Sliven

and near Berovo

Berovo

Berovo is a small town near the Maleševo Mountains, from Skopje, from Strumica and from Kočani, in the Republic of Macedonia. It is the seat of Berovo Municipality.-Demographics:There are 7,002 residents in the town of Berovo.-Features:...

(in the present-day Republic of Macedonia

Republic of Macedonia

Macedonia , officially the Republic of Macedonia , is a country located in the central Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. It is one of the successor states of the former Yugoslavia, from which it declared independence in 1991...

). While according to a temporary British report the Muslim civilian population was not significantly affected, American historian Justin McCarthy, who is widely considered to have pro-Turkish views, claims that during the revolts over a 1,000 Muslims were slaughtered and many more expelled. Detachments of regular and irregular

Irregular military

Irregular military refers to any non-standard military. Being defined by exclusion, there is significant variance in what comes under the term. It can refer to the type of military organization, or to the type of tactics used....

Ottoman troops (bashi-bazouk
Bashi-bazouk
A bashi-bazouk or bashibazouk was an irregular soldier of the Ottoman army...

s) were mobilised and attacked the first insurgent towns as early as 25 April. Massacre

Massacre

A massacre is an event with a heavy death toll.Massacre may also refer to:-Entertainment:*Massacre , a DC Comics villain*Massacre , a 1932 drama film starring Richard Barthelmess*Massacre, a 1956 Western starring Dane Clark...

s of civilian populations were committed, the principal places being Panagurishte, Perushtitza, Bratzigovo and Batak

Batak, Bulgaria

Batak is a town in Pazardzhik Province, Southern Bulgaria, not far from the town of Peshtera. It is the administrative centre of the homonymous Batak Municipality. As of December 2009, the town has a population of 3,498 inhabitants.- Geography :...

. By the middle of May, the insurrection was completely suppressed; one of the last sparks of resistance was poet Hristo Botev

Hristo Botev

Hristo Botev , born Hristo Botyov Petkov , was a Bulgarian poet and national revolutionary. Botev is widely considered by Bulgarians to be a symbolic historical figure and national hero.-Early years:...

's attempt to come to the rebels' rescue with a detachment of Bulgarian political emigrees resident in Romania, ending with the unit's rout and Botev's death.

The most detailed contemporaneous account was that of Schuyler. After visiting some of the sites, Eugene Schuyler

Eugene Schuyler

Eugene Schuyler was a nineteenth-century American scholar, writer, explorer and diplomat. Schuyler was of the first three Americans to earn a Ph.D. from an American university; and the first American translator of Ivan Turgenev and Lev Tolstoi...

published a report detailing the atrocities. He reported that fifty-eight villages had been destroyed, five monasteries demolished, and fifteen thousand rebels killed.
The American historian Richard Milliman states that Eugene Schuyler

Eugene Schuyler

visited personally only 11 of the villages he reported on. Millman also claims that the accepted reality of the massacres is largely a myth.

Reaction in Europe and the United States

News of massacres of Bulgarians reached Istanbul in May and June 1876 through Bulgarian students at Robert College

Robert College

Robert College of Istanbul , is one of the most selective independent private high schools in Turkey. Robert College is a co-educational, boarding school with a wooded campus on the European side of Istanbul between the two bridges on the Bosphorus, with the Arnavutköy district to the east, and...

, the American college in the city. Faculty members at Robert College wrote to the British Ambassador and to the Istanbul correspondents of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

and the London Daily News.

An article about the massacres in the Daily News on June 23 provoked a question in Parliament about Britain's support for Turkey, and demands for an investigation. Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli promised to conduct an investigation about what had really happened.

In July, the British Embassy in Istanbul sent a second secretary, Walter Baring, to Bulgaria to investigate the stories of atrocities. Baring did not speak Bulgarian (although he did speak Turkish) and British policy was officially pro-Turkish, so the Bulgarian community in Istanbul feared he would not report the complete story. They asked the American Consul in Istanbul, Eugene Schuyler, to conduct his own investigation.

Schuyler set off for Bulgaria on July 23, four days after Baring. He was accompanied by a well-known American war correspondent, Januarius MacGahan

Januarius MacGahan

Januarius Aloysius MacGahan was an American journalist and war correspondent working for the New York Herald and the London Daily News...

, by a German correspondent, and by a Russian diplomat, Prince Aleksei Tseretelev.

Schuyler's group spent three weeks visiting Batak

Batak, Bulgaria

and other villages where massacres had taken place. Schuyler's official report, published in November 1876, said that fifty-eight villages in Bulgaria had been destroyed, five monasteries demolished, and fifteen thousand people in all massacred. The report was reprinted as a booklet and widely circulated in Europe.

Baring's report to the British government about the massacres was similar, but put the number of victims at about twelve thousand.

No other investigation of the massacres was made. A century later, one historian claimed that the number killed was exaggerated, and was closer to three thousand. But it is difficult to ignore the accounts of MacGahan, Schuyler and Baring, who visited the massacre sites three months after they occurred, and saw many of the unburied corpses. The actual number of victims will never be known.

MacGahan's vivid articles from Bulgaria moved British public opinion against Turkey. He described in particular what he had seen in the town of Batak, where five thousand of a total of seven thousand residents had been slaughtered, beheaded or burned alive by Turkish irregulars, and their bodies left in piles around the town square and the church. He described "Skulls with gray hair still attached to them, dark tresses which had once adorned the heads of maidens, the mutilated trunks of men, the rotting limbs of children..."

The political impact of the reports was immediate and dramatic. The leader of the British opposition, William Ewart Gladstone

William Ewart Gladstone

William Ewart Gladstone FRS FSS was a British Liberal statesman. In a career lasting over sixty years, he served as Prime Minister four separate times , more than any other person. Gladstone was also Britain's oldest Prime Minister, 84 years old when he resigned for the last time...

, wrote a booklet denouncing what he called "the Bulgarian Horrors", and calling upon Britain to withdraw its support for Turkey. "I entreat my countrymen", he wrote, "upon whom far more than upon any other people in Europe it depends, to require and to insist that our government, which has been working in one direction, shall work in the other, and shall apply all its vigor to concur with the states of Europe in obtaining the extinction of the Turkish executive power in Bulgaria. Let the Turks now carry away their abuses in the only possible manner, namely, by carrying off themselves...."

Prominent Europeans, including Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin

Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...

, Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...

, Victor Hugo

Victor Hugo

Victor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....

, and Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi was an Italian military and political figure. In his twenties, he joined the Carbonari Italian patriot revolutionaries, and fled Italy after a failed insurrection. Garibaldi took part in the War of the Farrapos and the Uruguayan Civil War leading the Italian Legion, and...

, spoke against the Turkish behavior in Bulgaria. When the war with Russia started in 1877, the Turkish Government asked Britain for help, but the British government refused, citing public outrage caused by the Bulgarian massacres as the reason.

The April uprising was a failure as a revolution, but due to publicity that was given to the reprisals that followed, it led directly to European demands for reform of the Ottoman Empire, and the Russo-Turkish War, which ended in Turkish defeat, and the signing of the Treaty of San Stefano

Treaty of San Stefano

The Preliminary Treaty of San Stefano was a treaty between Russia and the Ottoman Empire signed at the end of the Russo-Turkish War, 1877–78...

in March 1878, followed in July that year by the Treaty of Berlin. It thus ultimately achieved its original purpose, the liberation of Bulgaria from the Ottoman Empire.

Background

Preparation

Outbreak and suppression

Reaction in Europe and the United States

See also

Further reading