The Battle of Dervenakia ( el, Μάχη των Δερβενακίων) was the
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
victory over the
Ottoman forces on
6-
8 August 1822
Events
January–March
* January 1 – The Greek Constitution of 1822 is adopted by the First National Assembly at Epidaurus.
*January 3 - The famous French explorer, Aimé Bonpland, is made prisoner in Paraguay accused of being a spy. ...
, an important event in the
Greek War of Independence
The Greek War of Independence, also known as the Greek Revolution or the Greek Revolution of 1821, was a successful war of independence by Greek revolutionaries against the Ottoman Empire between 1821 and 1829. The Greeks were later assisted by ...
.
It resulted in the defeat of a major expedition by
Mahmud Dramali Pasha
Dramalı Mahmud Pasha, ( Turkish: ''Dramalı Mahmut Paşa''; c. 1770 in Istanbul – 26 October 1822, in Corinth) was an Ottoman
Albanian statesman and military leader, and a pasha, and served as governor (''wali'') of Larissa, Drama, and the M ...
, intended to quell the ongoing Greek rebellion which had begun in 1821.
The destruction of Dramali Pasha's forces saved the heartland of the rebellion, the
Morea
The Morea ( el, Μορέας or ) was the name of the Peloponnese peninsula in southern Greece during the Middle Ages and the early modern period. The name was used for the Byzantine province known as the Despotate of the Morea, by the Ottoman ...
, and secured it for the Greeks until the arrival of
Ibrahim Pasha in 1825.
Background
After the Greek victory at the
Battle of Vasilika
The Battle of Vasilika was fought between Greek revolutionaries and the Ottoman Empire during the Greek War of Independence.
Battle
After the battle of Alamana, the route to Eastern Central Greece and Morea was clear for the Ottoman armies. Du ...
in 1821, the Ottoman army was prevented from entering
Attica
Attica ( el, Αττική, Ancient Greek ''Attikḗ'' or , or ), or the Attic Peninsula, is a historical region that encompasses the city of Athens, the capital of Greece and its countryside. It is a peninsula projecting into the Aegean Se ...
and the
Peloponnese
The Peloponnese (), Peloponnesus (; el, Πελοπόννησος, Pelopónnēsos,(), or Morea is a peninsula and geographic regions of Greece, geographic region in southern Greece. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmu ...
, and by the summer of 1822 the Ottomans were prepared for another attempt to move southwards and crush the Greek uprising.
The Ottomans had assembled an army of some 20,000 men and 8,000 cavalry with ample supplies and transportation at
Larissa
Larissa (; el, Λάρισα, , ) is the capital and largest city of the Thessaly region in Greece. It is the fifth-most populous city in Greece with a population of 144,651 according to the 2011 census. It is also capital of the Larissa regiona ...
,
which was eventually entrusted to Dramali Pasha of
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been ...
, the army was the largest seen in Greece since the last Ottoman-Venetian war.
Dramali was expected to crush the Greek rebellion by advancing to Corinth, relieve the besieged garrison of
Nafplion
Nafplio ( ell, Ναύπλιο) is a coastal city located in the Peloponnese in Greece and it is the capital of the regional unit of Argolis and an important touristic destination. Founded in antiquity, the city became an important seaport in the ...
and recapture the capital of the Morea,
Tripoli
Tripoli or Tripolis may refer to:
Cities and other geographic units Greece
*Tripoli, Greece, the capital of Arcadia, Greece
* Tripolis (region of Arcadia), a district in ancient Arcadia, Greece
* Tripolis (Larisaia), an ancient Greek city in ...
. While the Ottomans were now in a better position than a year earlier, the same could not be said for the Greeks who had been weakened by infighting and disagreement between their leaders, who failed to cooperate and make adequate preparations for Dramali's advance.
Start of the campaign and retaking of Corinth
In early July, Dramali set out from Zitouni (today
Lamia
LaMia Corporation S.R.L., operating as LaMia (short for ''Línea Aérea Mérida Internacional de Aviación''), was a Bolivian charter airline headquartered in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, as an EcoJet subsidiary. It had its origins from the failed ...
) and found initial success. The Greeks, who were unprepared, left Dramali's army largely unassailed, and by the 17th of July Dramali had retaken Corinth, which had been abandoned by its defenders.
However, Dramali decided against retaking Athens, which had fallen earlier to the Greeks on 21 June.
At Corinth, Dramali held a military council to decide on future actions. Emboldened by the rapid progress and disintegration of the Greeks at the beginning of his campaign, Dramali proposed to march his entire army to Nafplio. This was met with disagreement from Yussaf Pasha and Ali Pasha, who instead proposed to strengthen their position at Corinth and to build up a strong naval force in the Saronic Gulf. Dramali rejected this plan and decided to carry out his march towards Nafplion.
Siege of Nafplion
Dramali passed through the narrow
defile known as the
Dervenaki (Tretos) and on 24 July reached
Argos
Argos most often refers to:
* Argos, Peloponnese, a city in Argolis, Greece
** Ancient Argos, the ancient city
* Argos (retailer), a catalogue retailer operating in the United Kingdom and Ireland
Argos or ARGOS may also refer to:
Businesses
...
, whence the Greek government had fled.
[Brewer, David ''The Greek War of Independence'', London: Overlook Duckworth, 2011 page 175.] The flight of the Greek government from Argos without a shot being fired inflicted a blow to its prestige that it never recovered from as many Greeks damned their government as one of cowards.
Earlier that year, the Ottomans had committed the
Chios Massacre
The Chios massacre (in el, Η σφαγή της Χίου, ) was a catastrophe that resulted to the death, enslavement, and refuging of about four-fifths of the total population of Greeks on the island of Chios by Ottoman troops, during the G ...
, and refugees from Chios had brought vivid tales of the murder, rape and enslavement committed on Chios to the mainland; the news of Dramali Pasha’s advance created panic all over the Morea.
The Maniots, who were supposed to stop the Ottomans instead robbed the refugees, leading Colonel Thomas Gordon to caustically comment that the Maniots “would have reputed it a disgrace to have gone back to their mountains as poor as they left them”.
Dramali Pasha left no guards behind him in the Dervenaki and he posted no forces where other defiles exposed his flanks.
[Brewer, David ''The Greek War of Independence'', London: Overlook Duckworth, 2011 page 177.] He sent cavalry forward to join the Ottoman garrison at
Nafplion
Nafplio ( ell, Ναύπλιο) is a coastal city located in the Peloponnese in Greece and it is the capital of the regional unit of Argolis and an important touristic destination. Founded in antiquity, the city became an important seaport in the ...
, which at that time was on the point of capitulation. As it was, Dramali was able to seize the Greek hostages which the garrison was held there as a pledge for the safety of Muslim hostages held by the Greeks.
Trapped in the Argolis
![Nikitaras by Hess](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Nikitaras_by_Hess.jpg)
On arriving in Argos, he found that its citadel,
Larisa (Argos), was manned, and that the Ottoman fleet, with which he had planned to rendezvous with at Nafplion, was actually at
Patras
)
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, ...
. What he should have done was to have fallen back immediately to Corinth, from where he could have drawn supplies from Patras. Instead, he launched an attack on the citadel. The Greeks, under
Demetrios Ypsilantis
Demetrios Ypsilantis (alternatively spelled Demetrius Ypsilanti; el, Δημήτριος Υψηλάντης, ; ro, Dumitru Ipsilanti; 1793August 16, 1832) was a Greek army officer who served in both the Hellenic Army and the Imperial Russian Ar ...
, held out for twelve days, waging a resolute defense before lack of water forced them to sneak out past the Ottoman lines in the middle of the night.
[Brewer, David ''The Greek War of Independence'', London: Overlook Duckworth, 2011 pages 176-177.] Gordon recounted when faced with the demand for surrender: “Prince Demetrius received the bearers of this proposal with apparent indifference, regaled them out of the small stock of luxuries reserved for his own table and declared his resolution to hold out for six months.”
On the night of 3 August 1822, faced with no water, Ypsilantis led his men out of the Argos citadel.
By this point, Dramali’s army had no more cattle, the burned grain fields supplied no subsistence, and the summer of 1822 was an especially hot summer (making water a scarce commodity).
The plain south of Argos was a land of ditches, interconnected water lanes and vineyards, which hindered the Ottoman cavalry, but was the perfect terrain for Greek snipers, who soon started to take a regular toll on the Ottoman forces.
However, while Dramali was preoccupied with Larissa, the Greeks rallied their forces.
Already the Peloponnesian Senate had stepped into the place vacated by the central government. Military leaders like
Theodoros Kolokotronis
Theodoros Kolokotronis ( el, Θεόδωρος Κολοκοτρώνης; 3 April 1770 – 4 February 1843) was a Greek general and the pre-eminent leader of the Greek War of Independence (1821–1829) against the Ottoman Empire. Kolokotronis's g ...
and
Petrobey Mavromichalis
Petros Mavromichalis (; 1765–1848), also known as Petrobey ( ), was a Greek general, politician and the leader of the Maniot people during the first half of the 19th century. His family had a long history of revolts against the Ottoman Emp ...
called for volunteers, who came flocking in, along with the ''kapetanei'' and the primates. Five thousand troops assembled at the fortified
Mills of Lerna; others assembled at points on the marshy banks of the river Erasinos; and daily, the Greeks skirmished with the Ottomans as they attempted to find water and fodder for their horses and baggage animals.
Other Greek bands infiltrated the mountains which overlook the plains of Argos. On the hills extending from Lerna to the Dervenaki, Kolokotronis, who had been appointed ''archistratigos'' (commander-in-chief), concentrated no less than 8,000 men. Around Agionori there were 2,000 troops under Ypsilantis,
Nikitaras
Nikitaras ( el, Νικηταράς) was the nom de guerre of Nikitas Stamatelopoulos ( el, Νικήτας Σταματελόπουλος) (c. 17841849), a Greek revolutionary in the Greek War of Independence. Due to his fighting prowess, he was ...
and
Papaflessas
Grigorios Dimitrios Dikaios-Flessas (; 1788 – 25 May 1825), popularly known as Papaflessas () was a Greek priest and government official who became one of the most influential figures during the Greek War of Independence. The prefix () in th ...
. Towards Nafplion, large forces were assembled under Nikolaos Stamatelopoulos, the brother of Nikitaras, and these were joined by
Arvanites
Arvanites (; Arvanitika: , or , ; Greek: , ) are a bilingual population group in Greece of Albanian origin. They traditionally speak Arvanitika, an Albanian language variety, along with Greek. Their ancestors were first recorded as settlers ...
from
Kranidi
Kranidi ( el, , Katharevousa: ) is a town and a former municipality in Argolis, Peloponnese, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality Ermionida, of which it is the seat and a municipal unit. The municipal u ...
,
Poros
Poros ( el, Πόρος) is a small Greece, Greek island-pair in the southern part of the Saronic Gulf, about south from the port of Piraeus and separated from the Peloponnese by a wide sea channel, with the town of Galatas, Troizina, Galatas on ...
and
Kastri.
Kolokotronis pursued a
scorched earth
A scorched-earth policy is a military strategy that aims to destroy anything that might be useful to the enemy. Any assets that could be used by the enemy may be targeted, which usually includes obvious weapons, transport vehicles, communi ...
policy, aiming at starving the Ottomans out. The Greeks looted the villages, burned the grain and foodstuff they could not move, and damaged the wells and springs. Dramali's army was trapped in the sweltering Argolic plain. However, Kolokotronis was not in a position to coordinate all the Greek forces, for many operated under their own leaders, refusing to follow his orders. If Kolokotronis had in fact commanded the Greek armies, and thus been able draw up a general military plan, Dramali's forces might have been completely annihilated and Nafplion would have been captured with little difficulty.
Disaster in the ravines
As it was, Dramali was given the opportunity to carry out his belated decision to retreat. On 6 August he dispatched an advance guard consisting of 1,000 Muslim Albanians to occupy the passes.
[Brewer, David ''The Greek War of Independence'', London: Overlook Duckworth, 2011 page 178.] These troops, who were either mistaken by the Greeks for cobelligerents or deliberately allowed to pass, got through entirely unharmed, losing only three men.
The Albanians kept to the mountains, avoiding the trails, making them difficult to ambush.
After the Albanians marched through,
Nikitaras
Nikitaras ( el, Νικηταράς) was the nom de guerre of Nikitas Stamatelopoulos ( el, Νικήτας Σταματελόπουλος) (c. 17841849), a Greek revolutionary in the Greek War of Independence. Due to his fighting prowess, he was ...
and Ypsilantis had brought down trees and piled up stones to slow down the Ottomans.
But a body of Dramali's cavalry which was following up to occupy the Dervenaki was intercepted by
Nikitaras
Nikitaras ( el, Νικηταράς) was the nom de guerre of Nikitas Stamatelopoulos ( el, Νικήτας Σταματελόπουλος) (c. 17841849), a Greek revolutionary in the Greek War of Independence. Due to his fighting prowess, he was ...
at the village of
Agios Vasilis and was routed, a victory which gained for Nikitaras the name of 'Turk-eater' (''Turkofagos''). The Greeks brought down devastating fire and then charged, slaying the Ottomans in vicious hand-to-hand fighting.
Very few of the
Ottoman ''delhis'' (light cavalry) managed to escape; most of them had lost their horses and, as they tried to make their way on foot up the ravines of the mountains, were almost all intercepted by small Greek bands or shot down by individual marksmen from concealed positions.
During the encounter the Greeks took an enormous amount of booty - hundreds of horses and baggage animals and a considerable quantity of treasure, arms and stores.
Two days later (8 August), Dramali attempted to evacuate his main forces by way of the route through Agionori.
Here he came up against the Greeks under Papaflessas who was holding the main defile (Klisoura). Unable to proceed, he soon found himself assailed by Nikitaras and Ypsilantis who made a forced march from their positions at the village of Agios Vasilis and at Agios Sostis, where the Greeks again annihilated the Ottomans by ambushing them in a narrow defile.
Although Dramali himself with the main troop of delhis managed to force his way through and finally reach Korinthos, the Greeks captured all the baggage and the military chest; and they annihilated almost completely the unmounted personnel of Dramali's army.
[Brewer, David ''The Greek War of Independence'', London: Overlook Duckworth, 2011 pages 178-179.] Had Iatrakos followed orders by attacking from the rear, all of Dramali’s army might have been destroyed, which led Koloktronis to write in his memoirs: “So much for Iatrakos.”
Dramali himself lost his sword and turban in his haste to run away and save his own life.
The Greeks had captured all of the Ottoman valuables and baggage plus 1,300 mules, 400 horses, and 700 camels.
No sooner had they achieved victory than they dispersed. The Moreots hastened to return to their villages taking with them such animals and other booty on which they had been able to lay their hands. Had they been less intent on booty, they might have totally annihilated Dramali's army. As it was, many of the delhis lived to fight another day, but Dramali himself died, a broken man, the following December at Korinthos. His campaign had resulted in a disaster of great magnitude: Out of the army of more than 23,000 with which he entered the Morea, barely 6,000 had survived. The extent of the Ottoman defeat became proverbial in Greece, where a great defeat is still referred to as a "καταστροφή του Δράμαλη", i.e. "Dramali's disaster".
A part of the destroyed Dramali's army (c. 3,000) decided to move towards Patras to be saved. Near
Vostizza,
Andreas Londos
Andreas S. Londos ( el, Ανδρέας Λόντος, 1786–1846) was a Greek military leader and politician. Born in Vostitsa in 1786, he was initiated into the Filiki Eteria in 1818, and was one of the first military leaders to raise the banner ...
with his men attacked them and only a few were lucky to escape.
Aftermath
With the destruction of the main Ottoman force present in Greece at the time, the revolution survived its first great test, and was firmly now established. In December 1822, Nafplion finally surrendered to the Greeks, who made it their provisional capital. The Greek cause would however quickly unravel, with factional conflict breaking out in 1823. Gordon wrote that the victory at Dervenakia made Kolokotronis's reputation as "his name became a sort of talisman, the people everywhere sung ballads in his honor, his political adversaries humbled themselves before him and for some months he was absolute in the Morea".
[Brewer, David ''The Greek War of Independence'', London: Overlook Duckworth, 2011 page 180.] Inevitably, Kolokotronis' popularity made him a target for his political enemies, who now united against the most popular man in Greece. Kolokotronis himself, arguably the Greeks' ablest military leader, was imprisoned by his enemies in
Palamidi
Palamidi ( el, Παλαμήδι) is a fortress to the east of the Acronauplia in the town of Nafplio in the Peloponnese region of southern Greece. Nestled on the crest of a high hill, the fortress was built by the Venetians during their seco ...
, at a time when the Sultan, acknowledging his inability to deal with the "Greek problem", turned to
Muhammad Ali of Egypt
Muhammad Ali Pasha al-Mas'ud ibn Agha, also known as Muhammad Ali of Egypt and the Sudan ( sq, Mehmet Ali Pasha, ar, محمد علي باشا, ; ota, محمد علی پاشا المسعود بن آغا; ; 4 March 1769 – 2 August 1849), was ...
and his Western-trained armies for help.
Bibliography
*
Dakin, Douglasbr>
''The Greek Struggle for Independence, 1821-1833''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973.* Kokkinos, D. ''The Greek Revolution''. Athens: Melissa Press, 1957.
* Gallant, Thomas W. ''
The Edinburgh History of the Greeks ''The Edinburgh History of the Greeks'' is a book series published by Edinburgh University Press and edited by Thomas Gallant. The series is planned to feature 10 volumes, "covering the history of Greece and the Greeks over the last 3,500 years, fr ...
'', 1768–1913. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2015, pages 81–2.
* Brewer, David The Greek War of Independence, London: Overlook Duckworth, 2011
References
{{Use dmy dates, date=June 2017
Dervenakia
Dervenakia ( el, Δερβενάκια) is a small village in Corinthia, in northeastern Peloponnese (southern Greece). It is situated on the old national highway from Nafplio to Corinth. Dervenakia is part of the community of Archaia Nemea. The ...
Dervenakia
Dervenakia ( el, Δερβενάκια) is a small village in Corinthia, in northeastern Peloponnese (southern Greece). It is situated on the old national highway from Nafplio to Corinth. Dervenakia is part of the community of Archaia Nemea. The ...
Dervenakia
Dervenakia ( el, Δερβενάκια) is a small village in Corinthia, in northeastern Peloponnese (southern Greece). It is situated on the old national highway from Nafplio to Corinth. Dervenakia is part of the community of Archaia Nemea. The ...
Dervenakia
Dervenakia ( el, Δερβενάκια) is a small village in Corinthia, in northeastern Peloponnese (southern Greece). It is situated on the old national highway from Nafplio to Corinth. Dervenakia is part of the community of Archaia Nemea. The ...
1822 in Greece
History of Corinthia
July 1822 events
Peloponnese in the Greek War of Independence