Battle of Čegar The Battle of Čegar ( April 15 , 1809 – May 31 , 1809 ) was a military engagement that occurred of the First Serbian Revolutionary War near Fortress of Niš against the Ottoman Empire . Battle . Serbian offensive . On April 15 , 1809 , the Serbian Revolutionary Army with its 10 , 000 soldiers approached the villages of Kamenica , Gornji and Donji Matejevac , near the Fortress of Niš with Miloje Petrović as Commander - in - chief . The Serbian soldiers made six trenches . The first and the biggest one was on Čegar Hill in charge of Duke Stevan Sinđelić . The second one was in the village Gornji Matejevac with Petar Dobrnjac as the commander . The third trench was North - east to Kamenica with Duke Ilija Barjaktarević . The fourth trench was in Kamenica with Miloje Petrović as the chief commander . The fifth trench was in the mountain above Kamenica and under the control of Duke Pauljo Matejić while the sixth one was in Donji Matejevac . The Ottoman commander of the fortress was Hursid Pasha who had 8 , 000 troops in fort and the surrounding area . The Serbs then launched several attacks against the Niš Fortress , but they could not take the fort due to lack of heavy artillery . In such circumstances , their strategy was to force with the long siege to surrender Hursid Pasha . But Hurshid was have different tactics , after every Serbian attack , he was offered negotiations buying on such way time while his arrives aid in the fresh troops . Ottoman counterattack . Meanwhile , on 20 May the Ottoman army was reinforced with 20 , 000 soldiers from Rumelia . One Ottoman unit then tried to encircle the Serbian troops , 30 kilometres east of the town . Veljko Petrovic and his 2 , 000 soldiers then left their position , and moved to prevent the Ottoman attack from their rear approach . This manoeuvre further weakened revolutionary positions on the main front line . The Ottoman troops attacked on the trench of Petar Dobrnjac on 30 May . The following day , on May 31 , 1809 , the most prominent trench at Čegar Hill , under the command of Stevan Sinđelić , was under attack . The battle lasted for the whole day . Stevan and his Brigade became separated from the remainder of the Serb guerrilla positions and he and his men resisted fiercely . With hundreds of Ottoman soldiers pouring into the trench , Stevan saw that his Brigade had little hope of staving off the Ottoman offensive . Hand - to - hand combat ensued in the trenches . Stevan decided to fire his flintlock pistol into a pile of gunpowder kegs . When the Ottomans swarmed the trench from all sides and headed for him , Sinđelić squeezed the trigger . As Milovan Kukić witnessed : Aftermath . The fall of Sinđelić ' s trench forced the other Brigades of the Serbian Revolutionary Army to retreat back to the town of Deligrad , where they entrenched themselves in a new , fortified front line . When Hursid Pasha of Niš realized that , even though the post at Chegar hill had been taken , he ordered that the heads of the Serb victims be collected , skinned , and that the skulls be built into the Tower . This Tower was built along the road to Constantinople , as a warning to anyone rising against the Ottoman Empire . Defeat of the Serbian Revolutionary Army in this battle was meaning the lost initiative in the war , which lasted until 1813 . Thousands Serbian revolutionaries and Ottoman troops were killed on Čegar Hill . In 1815 was started Second Serbian Revolutionary War under the leadership of Miloš Obrenović .