The Sun.
London, England, 1848-12-26 00:00:00

INTERVENTION OF THE RUSSIAN
AND TURKISH ARMIES IN THE DANUBIAN
PRINCIPALITIES.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE MORNING HERALD.
Sir,—On the 11th of Juae last the Wallachians made
a revolution—or rather, they modified their fundamental
laws, for the revolution was effected entirely by pacific
means. The reigning Prince accepted the new constitu-
tion, and then abdicated. Shortly after, the Turkish
plenipotentiary, Soleyman Pacha, recognised, in the
name of the Sultan, the new Government; and his ex-
ample was followed by the representatives of the different
European powers residing at Bucharest. Soleyman
Pacha likewise recognised the new constitution which
the Wallachians had just established, after having sug-
gested some trifling modifications in it. Subsequently, at
a moment when all the functions of the Wallachian Go-
vernment were being exercised with the greatest regu-
larity, and when the country was enjoying a state of per-
fect tranquillity, a Turkish army presented itself before
the gates of Bucharest, professing to be actuated by an
amicable spirit and to have been sent thither merely to
deprive Russia of every pretext for an intervention, and
to prevent her from marching troops into Wallachia.
Confiding in the word of the Turks, 100,000 of the in-
habitants went out on the 25th of September, unarmed,
in festive garments and with the clergy at their head, to
meet and welcome this army. Fund Effendi, the com-
mander of this army, then invited the Wallachians to
send a deputation to his camp to receive his instructions.
No sooner did the deputation, acting in accordance with
this older, present themselves before him, than they
were made prisoners (the most eminent among them
were afterwards, during a whole month, dragged from
prison to prison by order of the Russian commissary,
General Duhamel, and have only lately effected their
escape), and at the same time Fund Effendi's army
precipitated itself in a forced march upon Bucharest,
trampling down under the hoofs of the cavalry the
peaceful inhabitants who had gone out to meet the
Turks as friends, tearing down their banners, destroying
their crosses, bombarding a military barrack it encoun-
tered on its passage, as well as a whole quarter of the
town, shooting down with grape-shat the few Walla-
chian soldiers who occupied the barracks, having first
induced them to capitulate and to lay down their arms,
putting to death the sick, and having reached the town,
giving itself up to pillage, massacres, and other horrible
deeds, the equal of which might be sought for in vain in
the darkest pages of the annals of history. It is true
the inhabitants of Bucharest might perhaps easily have
Irouted the 16,000 Turks who committed these outrages,
for a single company of the Wallachian fire-brigade
(pornpiers), which was advancing towards the barracks,
finding itself suddenly surrounded by the Turks, and
fired upon with grape-shot, without having pre-
viously been called upon to surrender, defended
itself heroically, slew 400 Turks, and captured two
pieces of cannon. But in the first lace the Wallaehians
thought that the Turks were their friends, and in the
second they abstained from all resistance in order to
deprive Russia of every pretext for an intervention..
They were unfortunately doubly mistaken. W
have just seen what were the proceedings of the
Turks, whose movements were, it must be con-
fessed, directed by the Russian commissary, General
Duhamel, who was present in the Turkish camp, while
on the morrow of the entry of the Turks into the city
of Bucharest, a proclamation of General Luders an-
nounced the violation of the Wallachian territory by the
Russian troops. The latter rivalled the Turks in bar-
barism; they respected nothing along their passage ;
everywhere they arrested the public functionaries, and
dragged them after the army bare-footed and loaded
with chains; they devastated the fields, carried off whole
herds of cattle, took possession of all provisions and
other moveables which they found on their way, and then,
as if they had been in a conquered country, they sold
their booty at public auction in the market places. When
they arrived at the principal towns of the departments,
they laid hands on the money contained in the Govern-
ment coffers, in order, they said, to defray the expenses
of the army ; but the superior officers pocketed the
money, and then levied contributions in kind from the
inhabitants. The resources of the country having by
these means been entirely exhausted within the space of
a few days, the Turkish Government observed to the
Russian that the principalities were entirely exhausted;
that they were menaced with a general famine, and that
the Emperor Nicholas ought to follow the example of
the Sultan, and himself defray the expenses of his troops.
Hereupon the Czar, in order to have a new hold
upon the principalities, immediately opened a credit for
them on the Imperial Treasury at St. Petersburgh, and
forced them to draw from thence the money required for
the support of a foreign and inimical army, which was
held in readiness in the country to march upon Ger-
many, Italy, or Constantinople, as circumstances should
require. The Russian and urkish commissaries, to-
gether with Constantino Cantacuzene (a man who had
been gained by Russia, and who, as a matter of form,
was nominated lieutenant of the Prince) were installed
in the place of the Government; a pacha was nominated
military commandant of the city of Bucharest; all honest
men were disarmed or proscribed as persons of suspicious
character; an iron yoke was laid on the shoulders of the
Wallachians; all their liberties were taken from them,
and terror spread its deadening influence throughout the
country. Ono man alone—General Maguero—the com-
mander of the irregular troops, who had withdrawn to
the foot of the mountains with a force of about 20,000
men, was still in arms, and protested against these mon-
strous proceedings. But he also, by the persuasions of
the British Consul-General, who represented to him that
the presence of his army paralysed the action of diplo-
macy, which would soon see his country righted, has
now been induced to dissolve his army, and withdraw
beyond the Carpathian Mountains.
We have only very cursorily recapitulated the melan-
choly and terrible events of which Wallachia has been
and is still the theatre, for the pen refuses to dwell in
detail upon the cowardly barbarism of the Turks, and
the still more infamous deeds of the Russians, who
pushed on the former to commit the excesses perpe-
trated by them, and afterwards surpassed them in every
act of cruelty and injustice. Turkey is already sinking.
under the weight of her crime ; her sentence was pro-
nounced on the very day when she presented to the
world that hideous spectacle of a barbarism unworthy
even of the darkest ages ; from that day forward civili-'
zation must hold the Turks in abhorrence, must repulse
them from her domains. Were the Porte to call to an ac-
count Fuad Effendi, who, whether from cowardice
or from treasonable motives, allowed himself to':
be the instrument of all these cruelties—to award
a full and entire amnesty to the Wallachiana who.,
have been proscribed because they have been will-,
ing to sacrifice their fortunes, and even their
Him, in order to establish more firmly the Ottoman
empire, and who had been promised impunity—to
exempt the principalities for some years from the pay-‘
ment of the annual tribute, in order to leave the country
time to recover from the deep wounds inflicted upon it--
to recognise and to respect their right of national sove-
reignty and self-government, and protect them effica-
ciously against the designs of. Russia—even all these
tardy. but just measures of reparation would not now,
perhaps, suffice to wash out the crimes of the Turkish
Government, and to reconquer for it the affection of the
two principalities and the esteem of Europe. As for
Russia, the hour of justice for her is also nigh at hand,
for crime never remains unpunished.
But let us now disengage the question from these me-
lancholy and sudden changes of fortune, and merely
turn our attention to the fact of the intervention of the
Turkish and Russian armies in the Danubian principa-
lities, which is in itself so monstrous, so flagrant a viola-
tion of the law of nations, as no treaties recognise the
right of these powers to take such a step. This inter-
vention is the more inexplicable, as nothing had oc-
curred to give the least colouring of a pretext for it.
The Wallachians, in modifying their constitution,
simply availed themselves of the right of autonomy,
which they have repeatedly, on former occasions,
exercised in their national assemblies, and which has
been ensured to them by their capitulations with the
Turks; capitulations recognised, and constantly in-
voked, by Russia herself. Besides the revolution had
been consummated more than three months previous to
the intervention ' • perfect tranquillity reigned in the
principalities, and the new Government had already been
recognised by Turkey and the other European powers.
But we need not discuss the question of right, for the
Russians were fully aware, when they crossed the fron-
tiers of Moldavia and Wallachia, that they were violat-
ing a neutral territory, and, as a proof of this, we will
only mention their previous endeavours to prevail upon
the Bayards to call them in, so that they might obtain a
pretext for their invasion.
This attempt having failed, they at first timidly crossed
the Pruth, then retired again, themselves
during resigning
during three months to allow the Wallachian revolution
volution
to pursue its pacific course, and it is only very lately
that they have ventured to recommence their endeavours
to crush it. Russia did not venture boldly upon this Ste,
before she observed, on the one aide, that her mani-
festoes, her threats, her pressure upon the Divan, not
only did not encounter any opposition from the ther
Cabinets of Europe; but that the foreign ambassadors
at Constantinople remained deaf to the cries of the
Wallaehians and to the representations of the Porte.
She then conceived, and unfortunately with too much
reason, that everything would be permitted to her, and
that she would not be called to an account for our acts
of aggression. As for the Turks they have foolishly
fallen into the snare which they knew was spread for
them, and which they regret not having been able to
avoid. They confess that they only intervened in the
hope of preventing Russian intervention; they are even
willing to withdraw from the principalities, but the
Russians oppose this, as it would force them to do the
same. The Divan even openly avows that it would
publicly protest against the entry of the Russians into
Muldo-Wallachia were it but sure of the support of one
only of the great Powers.
The aggression of Russia, however revolting, is not
surprising to those who are acquainted with the Russian
policy; we should, on the contrary, be more surprised
had she, from any scruples as to legality, abstained
from taking possession of so important a stategetical
position as that afforded by the Danubiau principalities.
It is the attitude of Great Britain which astonishes us.
For is it not astonishing that, in the face of circumstances
of such gravity and such importance, she should have
shown so little sympathy for the oppressed, and that, on
the other hand, she should have carried her deference
for the oppressors to such lengths as to be suspected in
the East of being the accomplice of Russia; that, in a
question of so much importance, and in which she could
be sure in advance of having almost the whole of Europe
on her side, she should not have taken the first step; in
a word, that she should not h:iv. taken op that petition
at Constantinople wlneh even the Porte invited her t,,
adopt, and which all the other puwers were forced t,
aloindon on account of the revolutions and ~...t.ntkr-rt% 0-
lutions which succeeded each other every fortnight in
their dominions?

A WALLACMAN.