Ottoman Troops - Recruitment
The men for the regular army were, by the decree of 1869, recruited from the Mussulman population by conscription. Their first drawing commences when they are twenty years of age ; if they draw a blank they again come up the following year, and so on until twenty-six years of age, at which time, if they have drawn six blanks, they pass at once into the reserve. This plan has great inconveniences, as it obliges men to travel sometimes long distances every year for their "drawing," and keeps them in an unsettled state as to their future. Moreover, it passes men into the reserve who have not had a military training.
The Mussulman population, from which the recruits for the army were drawn, may be put at about 16,000,000, and since 35,000 conscripts are supposed to be drawn every year, it would give about 1 in 450 of the Mussulman population as drawn for the army annually. But as the recruiting for each corps is confined to the military districts, some of which are populated by a large majority of Christians, the drain on the Mussulman population in many cases becomes very severe. Considering the extent of the Turkish Empire, the source of supply for men is evidently extremely small, and unless use is made of the Christian population, it would be next to impossible for Turkey to compete against a first-rate European power in a lengthened campaign.
In Turkey the system of raising men was simple in the extreme. The authorities look out for a few villages where young and able men are to be found. These villages are surrounded in the night by troops, and a raid made at daylight next morning upon all the houses; much in the same manner that a nest of hornets, or the favorite haunt of some well-known wild beast, would he attacked. The women, children, and old men are allowed to go free; but the young and able-bodied men are retained, made prisoners of, and marched away to serve for five years in some faroff army corps, never in that which is stationed round their own homes. The whole process is so simple, and reminds one so strongly of what used to take place in England when men were wanted for the Royal Navy, that with a change of names and circumstances one might almost be reading a bygone, but not very old, history of the days when the press-gang and its merry men did their work so effectually. Whether any other people in the world - except, perhaps, in parts of Russia - would submit to be thus kidnapped, sent away from home, and made to soldier for five years in parts of the country which are as distant from their homes as Naples is from the North of Scotland, must be more or less a matter of conjecture.
The probabilities were that if a soldier died, or was killed, far away from home, his friends and relations would never hear a word more on the subject, one way or another. The records in the Turkish War-office were kept a good deal by the rule of thumb. Moreover, if a man was alive, he was pretty sure to turn up again, at some time or other; if he was dead, he would never trouble anyone again; and so what was the use of bothering at all about the matter? Fatalism, if carried out to its full extent, in practice as in theory, must save a vast deal of worry, no end of returns, a host of clerks, and a large number of staff officers.
The exemptions are, members of the legal profession and priests, and the only sons of families. Exemption, and also discharge, can be purchased, according to present arrangements, for from £40 to £50 Turkish, equal to about £36 to £45 sterling. The price before 1869 was £73 sterling; and the Government received rather a startling example of the dislike to military service, when the reduction in the price of discharge was made. In the 3rd Army Corps no less than 4,000 men applied for their discharge in 1869, while the average number in previous years before the reduction of cost of discharge was only 400!
The production of such a large sum of money represented by the discharge of 4,000 men, £200,000 in one district, was so unexpected that inquiries were set on foot to discover how the money had been produced, and it was found that it had been obtained by the sale of landed property, in most cases to Christians. Much bribery is practiced in the purchase of exemptions. One of the officers sent to the Monastir district was discovered to have pocketed as much as £6,000 for letting off 1,600 recruits.
By law, the annual contingent of recruits was fixed at 37,500, but the real number does not exceed 25,000 men. Kecruiting is divided into districts corresponding with the head-quarters of the corps d'armee. In each district the levy of recruits is made by a commission nominated by the general of the corps d'armee, and composed of one superior officer, one doctor, one mollah, one secretary, and the members of the Medjlis or civil court.
Officers did not all pass through that course. Some are raised from the ranks, and others appointed by favor, and so little pains is taken to teach them their duties after they enter the service, that those from the military colleges forget what they have learned, and the knowledge of the others is infinitesimal.
The Brigade of Cossacks was the only corps in which Christians were admitted into the rank and file. It is recruited from volunteers. At first the Christians predominated, but now the reverse is the case.
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