THE RUSSO-TURKISH WAR

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5090, 17 July 1877, Page 2

THE RUSSO-TURKISH WAR

DAT PS VIA AMERICA TO JUNE SO.

(from our own correspondent.) San Francisco, June 20.

The following items of war news received at Auckland by the mail steamer, and telegraphed from there, were omitted from our correspondent’s communication in yesterday’s issue;— OPERATIONS AT THE DOBRUDSCHA. The Turkish Danube flotilla and land batteries are active. There was an artillery encounter at Brahilov between two Turkish monitors, supported by the shore batteries opposite Brahilov, and the Russian batteries erected at the latter place. The engagement lasted for three hours, after which the monitors went up the stream. All the shells went into the Russian batteries, not one striking the town, as was the case on previous occasions. All through the night there was a great stir in the Russian camp, and the next morning the Russian guns opened fire on the Turkish batteries opposite Bashilov. This was probably with the view to support a detachment sent across during the night, which had been merely done with a view to reconnoitre the position on the Matchin side. It made its way to the guard-houses on the river bank, and drove back the Turkish outposts, but could not penetrate further. The opinion on the spot seems to be that this reconnoitring expedition is the precursor of a serious attempt to cross in force and capture Matchin. Another engagement is reported to have been fought lower down the river, at Isaktsha, where a Turkish monitor engaged the Russian shore battery, erected at the monastery of Theraponte, south of the village of Satanov, founded by Russians in commemoration of their passage of the Danube near that place in 1828. The village lies at some distance from the river on a more elevated point, and from it there runs down to the river, between the lakes of Kugur and Kartal, a narrow strip of land on which the monastery of Theraponte is built. The result of the evacuation was that the monastery was destroyed, and the Russian guns dismounted. HIGHER UP THE RIVER the Turkish craft are cruising about reconnoitring different places, and laying hands on any ships they can find there. They went to the mouth of the Schyl, and took away several vessels laden with grain ; and did the same at Turnu at the mouth of the river Aluta, where, according to news from Trieste, they forced three Austrian ships laden with Indian corn to cross to Nicopolis, on the Turkish side. The owners already have put in claims through the Austrian authorities. The Turkish flotilla has hitherto been able to maintain its supremacy in the Danube against the Russian shore batteries and torpedoes in artillery encounters. ON THE LOWER DANUBE, especially at Ibraila and Isaktsha, the Russians have heavy guns in position. AN ARTILLERY DUEL took place between Widdin and Kalafat, where firing was resumed on the Bth, with more effect than on the day before. In Kalafat the barricades of the Custom house were destroyed, and the church which forms a prominent object on a bluff was badly injured, while the Roumanian shells set fire to seme wooden houses in Widin. The Russians made attempted crossings at various places with small bodies of troops, intended as feints to deceive the Turks and de /elop their defence of the Danube near Rustchuk. By a series of alarms of this kind, the Turks will he forced to keep a large number of troops distributed along the river, which they cannot concentrate on the real point of crossing. THE POLES FOR THE TURKS. The Constantinople committee of Polish immigrants have issued a stirring address to their fellow countrymen calling them to arms. The address says —“The foes of our land for centuries, who have dismembered it, and wasted it with fire and sword —who deprived ns of onr property," nationality, freedom, religion, and even our mother tongue—presume, under the hypocritical mask of the champion of the Christians, to unfold their war standard and send their savage hordes against Turkey, onr ally in the time of onr independence, and oar magnanimous protector in the time of onr exile—against Turkey who, alone of all the Powers, refused to the present day to recognise the partition of Poland, Let us rend the chains which fetter our white eagle. The wild hordes of Tsardom will not stand before our united force, and we shall erect our colors at the mouths of the Vistula and Memel, and at the mouths of the Dnieper and the Dniester. Europe will recover its equilibrium, lost a hundred years ago, and will owe it to ns. To arms then, brothers, and again, to arms.” THE FIGHTING IN MONTENEGRO was very severe. After making his despositions with great care, and seizing several important positions in front of Kryslaz, and at the immediate entrance of the Dnga Pass, Sulieman Pasha advanced with several battalions and mountain artillery to force the defile held by the Montenegrins. There being only one available road, and that leading directly through the Duga passage, the Turks sought by dint of sheer fighting, to seize the bends of the road, so as to place their guns in position to support the advance of the head of their column. The ground was favorable for this plan of operations. For the first two days the Montenegrins slowly retired before the well deployed Turkish line until the narrowing of the ground and the increasing difficulties of the road forced the Turks to reduce their front, and then the concentrated fire of the Montenegrins from every rock and gully of the rugged mountain slopes began to tell with frightful effect upon the Turks. Amid a perfect hail storm of bullets the brave Turkish infantry struggled onward, encumbering the road with their dead and wounded at every step. The guns posted before shelled the defile in advance, but with little effect, as the Montenegrins were well covered, and suffered only when the Turks desperately charged on them amid the rocks and brushwood. The fighting on every day was almost hand to hand, the combatants firing in each other’s faces at only a few yards distance ; but although the Turks gained ground slowly, it was at a terrible cost in men. Their superior numbers enabled them to push up their supports to take the place of the slain, and it seemed as if the head of the Turkish column of attack was melting away as it before a furnace. Notwithstanding the stubborn bravery of Sulieman Pasha’s troops, the fourth day’s fighting found them no nearer the key of the pass, and they had already lost

nearly 3000 men. Still they endeavored tomaintain possession of the ground gained at such a fearful cost ; but the effort was hopeless. The hardy Montenegrins repulsed every attempt to advance, and it became now only a question of covering the retreat of the exhausted column. This was commenced by a furious onslaught on the Montenegrins by tho troops furthest in advance, but which was quickly repulsed by a murderous fire. The retreat now became general, and the victorious mountaineers speedily followed the retiring Turks, killing an immense number and reoccupying their former position. In the prolonged and bloody combat, lasting over five days, the Turks lost over 4000 men and a quantity of arms left on the field. The victorious Montenegrins lost 700 men, and the disproportion in casualties was due wholly to the natural strength of their position and the necessary exposure of the Turks during the attack and retreat. Hhe Montenegrins afterwards abandoned the Duga Pass, and Isetsni was re-victualled. Several severe engagements between the Sultan troops and the Montenegrins, with heavy loss on both sides, are reported. A despatch to the London Times says the Christian doctor who deserted from Trebinje gives a gloomy account of the condition of the army. Two thousand four hundred men have died at Trebinje since the campaign the city being the hospital depot of the army now concentrated at Gatschko, which consists of 86 battalions of 200 to 400 men each. Of these at least half were suffering, chiefly from scurvy ; there is also much dysentery. The physicians and surgeons are subject to the fanatical outbreaks of the Mussulmans, and are continually menaced and assaulted, and never paid. Three thousand men are sick at Mostar, and deserters from Podgoritza report the same condition of affairs as prevailing there. The troops are underfed, having nothing beyond the barest means of sustaining life ; they are compelled to work continually on earthworks. The health of the Montenegrin force is excellent, and the h spitals are quite empty.

HOBART PASHA, with the Turkish squadron, consisting of two monitors, three ironclads, and several smaller vessels, is cruising off Eupatoria and Sebastopol, where the famous General Todleben, of Crimean fame, is in command. At Odessa there is great panic. It is reported that the fleet will not rest satisfied with bombarding the places on the coast, but also means to excite an insurrectionary movement in the Crimea. The Tartars have been quiet hitherto, but the spirit that is beginning to show itself in that population is not one calculated to inspire much confidence. The Russian element has wholly left the districts inhabited by the Tartars, and the south coast is now almost entirely occupied by Mahommedans, upon whom the events in the Caucasus might have a very bad effect. More than 50,000 inhabitants of Odessa have migrated, and are suffering the greatest hardships in the neighboring inland districts.