Fall of Okzhakov
In August 1788, Potemkin began the siege of Okzhakov, but the fortress could not be conquered until December. Finally, he was defeated and called for help from General Svarovsky. With Svarovsky's arrival, the siege intensified. The final assault took place on December 16. Four thousand Russians were crushed by the barrage of Turkish guns, but Svarovsky kept sending fresh troops forward. In the end, the overwhelming numbers of the Russians prevailed and they entered the fortress. Even after reaching inside, the Turks fought them with amazing courage, but they could not stop the increasing flood of Russian troops for long. After capturing the city, the Russians began a massacre and continued this bloody game with unspeakable ferocity for three days. The old, children and women were all brutally slaughtered. Out of a population of forty thousand, only a few hundred people, most of whom were children and women, survived the bloodthirsty Russians. Even this small number, who were able to escape safely from the sword, were able to escape through the personal efforts of some Russian officers.
At the siege of Okzhakov, Etienne was with Prince Potemkin. He had seen scenes of the bravery and luxury of the Turks before, but on this occasion he was amazed to observe their patience and independence. He writes:
The Turkish women and children (four hundred in number) were taken out of the city after the victory of Okzhakov and brought to the camp of the Russian army, and on the first night they were all put up in one tent. Under the existing conditions, no better arrangement could have been made for their accommodation, although it was snowing heavily that night and these poor people were suffering greatly from the cold and lack of clothing. Many of them were also suffering from severe wounds. Since I spoke Turkish, I was entrusted with their protection and surveillance. I saw that there was complete silence over them all, not a single woman cried or groaned, although perhaps every one of them Every one of them, whether their father or child or husband had been killed, these women spoke in a tone of calm and independence and answered the questions I asked them without any anxiety. I was amazed and could not decide whether this state of theirs was the result of indifference or the fact that they had seen and heard great ups and downs of fate or whether the reason for all this was the teaching of submission and contentment that their religion gives them and even today I am still unable to find out the reason for this. One of these women was sitting silently but unusually sad. I wanted to console her, so I said to her, why don't you act courageously and bear the suffering like a Muslim, as your fellow women are bearing it. She answered me in these effective words, I have seen my father, my husband and my children killed, now I have only one child left. I quickly asked where that child is. She replied calmly that this is it and another. Pointing to the child who was lying next to her and who had just died, I and those who were with me wept helplessly, but she did not cry at all. That night I took these suffering women and children, who were dying of wounds and cold, into my warm basement room and accommodated as many people as it could accommodate. They stayed with me for twelve days, but during this entire period not one of them complained or showed any of their intense inner pain. Rather, each woman, whether old or young, told me her story as if she were telling the story of an unrelated person, without crying, without gasping for breath, and without tears.
Reference: Ottoman Empire
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