Siege of Kars

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Siege of Kars

Date	June - November 1855
Location	Kars
Result	Russian victory

Belligerents

Ottoman Empire

Russian Empire

Commanders

William Fenwick Williams
Omar Pasha

Nikolay Muravyov

Strength

30,000 strong garrison

40,000 soldiers

Crimean War

Sinop – Kurekdere – Petropavlovsk – Alma – Sevastopol – Balaclava – Inkerman – Eupatoria – Taganrog – Chernaya River – Kars – Malakhoff – Kinburn

The Siege of Kars was the last major operation of the Crimean War. On June 1855, in an attempt to alleviate pressure on the troops at Sevastopol, Emperor Alexander II ordered General Nikolay Muravyov to lead his troops against areas of Turkish interest in Asia Minor. Uniting disparate contingents under his command into a strong corps of 40,000 soldiers, Muravyov decided to attack Kars, the most important fortress of Eastern Turkey.

The first attack was repulsed by the 30,000-strong Turkish garrison under British general William Fenwick Williams. Russians began setting up siege lines and started a siege that would last until November. Upon hearing news of the attack, the Turkish Commander Omar Pasha asked for Turkish troops to be moved from the line at the Siege of Sevastopol and redeployed to Asia Minor mainly with the idea of relieving Kars. On September 6, Omar Pasha left the Crimea for Sukhumi with 45,000 soldiers.

Omar Pasha's arrival to Sukhumi induced Muravyov to begin a third assault, which was repulsed by the now nearly starved Turkish forces at Kars. Of 13,000 Russians who took part in the 29 September attack, about half were killed. However, Omar Pasha, instead of relieving the garrison, plunged into prolonged warfare in Mingrelia and took Sukhumi in the aftermath. In the meantime, the Turkish reserves in Kars were running out and the supply lines had been thinned.

The heavy snowfall in late October made the arrival of Turkish reinforcements to Kars quite impracticable. Selim Pasha, Omar's son, landed another army at the ancient city of Trebizond and began marching south to Erzerum in order to prevent Russian retreat further into Turkey. The Russians sent a small force from the Kars lines to attack Pasha and stop his advance. They were defeated at the River Ingur on November 6.

The garrison of Kars declined to face further hardships of the winter siege and on November 26, 1855 surrendered to General Muravyov, who on the occasion was authorized by the tsar to change his name to "Muravyov-Karssky", in order to commemorate his part in the taking of the Turkish fortress.

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