In 1827, the Greeks were at the end. Six years and your rebellion against the Sultan lasted already. But had gained a powerful ally. Ironically, Mehmed Ali Pasha, his renegade Governor of Egypt, had set for the offer, also in the Peloponnese, his range, his army and fleet in March. Unlike the Ottoman troops the army of in fact self-employed, Egyptian Vice-king was trained in a modern and armed. In spite of all the emotional and material support flowed to the Greeks from the European Public, it seemed their defeat was only a matter of time.
An almost chance encounter turned the tide. 20. October, 1827, sailed a combined English-French-Russian squadron in the Bay of Navarino in the southwest Peloponnese. To him, the Egyptian-Turkish fleet was in Position. What was intended as a demonstration of power, was through a couple of rifle shots to a bloody battle. Within a few hours, the ships Mehmed were destroyed Ali. The Greek Revolution had triumphed.
That it came about, was due, not least, of Ibrahim Pasha, the second son of Mehmed Ali, the approximately 25,000 man Egyptian expeditionary force comma. As he sat fully on the strategy of scorched earth. The news of the atrocities committed by the Muslim troops found in the European Public sphere resonance, which, in turn, the governments of the Holy Alliance under pressure.
basically, was the rebellion that had erupted in 1821 in Greece, a collapse of the principles which it had decreed in the Congress of Vienna after the defeat of Napoleon in 1815: The backup of the restored legitimate Regime in Europe had done Austria, Russia, Prussia, and later France. England had remained aloof, saw itself as the leading naval power, but inevitably in the conflict, the Revolution ignited in the Western Levant.
The international was dominated by the front position between the Tsar and the withered Ottoman Empire, the Maritime powers of England and France beisprangen, they saw the Russian pursuit of the Bosporus and Dardanelles, but with suspicion. For the Austrian state Chancellor Metternich and the European System, but on the test bench, which he had built as a bulwark against the Revolution.
for this reason, the bourgeois Public sphere in Europe, saw in the revolt of the Greeks a blow against the restoration of the Holy Alliance. In the neuhumanist spirit of the International of the Phil Hellenes intoxicated on the alleged rebirth of the ancient Hellenes and löckte against censorship and the authorities. However, the princes were not immune to such emotions. Ludwig I. of Bavaria had sent a military mission to support the Greeks. It was fashionable to be involved in the Phil-Hellenic Clubs. Even aristocrats did not want to be considered as barbarians.
In this sense, had reached England, France and Russia at the beginning of July, 1827, in London, on a ceasefire, which provided for an Autonomous Greece under the suzerainty of the Sultan. Edward Codrington, commander-in-chief of the Mediterranean fleet of the Royal Navy, was commissioned, in cooperation with the French ships to enforce, which is also a Russian Detachment joined. Sultan Mahmud II instructed but the suggestion of, and Ibrahim meant the middle to victory – to destroy the last pockets of resistance.
The Egyptians promptly went to work. “Flying columns through Messinia, and Arcadia moved; the previously spared villages went up in flames, 60.000 Fig, 25.000 olive trees were hewn down, and the maintenance of future generations destroyed in the ward in advance,” wrote the German historian Karl Mendelssohn Bartholdy in his “history of Greece”. Prompts the allies to put an end to it, eluded Ibrahim, he claimed to be absent.
Then, Codrington and his fleet ordered on the 20. To enter October, a demonstration of power in the Bay of Navarino, the ancient Pylos,. The allies had 26 vessels, including ten ships of the line and twelve frigates, with a total of 1270 cannons. Ibrahim’s fleet consisted of 82 units, with about 2000 guns, but the ships were smaller, the guns are out of date, the teams and untrained.
About Codringtons instructions to the admirals and captains has been repeatedly argued. To put it the Brit to a fight, or he wanted to impress the opponent only? “The allied fleet is to do it before the Signal is given, no cannon shot. A steam vehicle should allow a shot, so it should be fired and immediately be destroyed … it Comes to the General battle …, remember the words of the Lord Nelson (the proposed 1805 at Trafalgar of Napoleon I. fleet; d. Red.): No captain can be better at his Post, as if his ship one of the enemy ships.“
The sound, at least to a healthy Dose of lust for battle. As against 14.30 a British boat called a Turkish Brander, to go the distance, shots rang out. Several Englishmen died. Immediately, the allies struck back. In a confined space a salvo of modern artillery, enough, often, to put an enemy ship out of action. After two and a half hours Ibrahim had lost a ship of the line, twelve frigates, 22 corvettes, and 25 other ships. Prisoners had not been made. The allies were 172 killed and 470 Wounded, Egyptians, and Turks lost about 6000 men, including all recruits of the new Egyptian military schools.
Nevertheless, it looked at first like a Pyrrhic victory. Because the Egyptian-Turkish army remained intact and struck back brutally, while Codringtons ships and forced them to retreat to repair and refresh the supplies to their bases. But the Destruction hit back now to Ibrahim, he was barely able to supply his troops for the Winter, especially since his fleet was destroyed.
The Rest of the armies of the Tsar worried. Declared in 1828 the Sultan of the war, the embattled army against the Russian troops have no Chance. Only English and French pressure will triple, it was the Ottomans that Nicholas stopped I. the March on Istanbul and the peace of Edirne, graduated. In it, the Sultan had to agree to the Treaty of London of 1827, however, that Greece – the Peloponnese, the mainland, up to the amount of Volos–Arta, and some of the Aegean Islands – should not be Autonomous, but sovereign.
Since Codrington was celebrated in the Public as a Hero, decided by the government in London forced him with the Grand cross of the Bathordens to stand out and not condemn because of the Düpierung of a strategic ally against the Tsar. The biggest loser was sitting in Vienna. Metternich had to realize that his Holy Alliance and its principles had been pounded about a conflict on the southeastern edge of Europe.
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