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Back to the Balkans (1877 - 1878) While Schuver was in Egypt, the Russo-Turkish War broke out on 24 April 1877, after the Turkish government had instituted the reforms so greatly desired by the three Great Powers.18 At the beginning of May, Schuver started his return journey from Assiut, making all haste towards the Balkans, where in July we find him in Edirne (Adrianopolis). [19] In August he made his way to Plevna (Bulgaria). On reaching the outermost fortifications, he came under Russian cannon fire, but escaped without a scratch. Between July and September the beleaguered Turks repulsed three Russian assaults, leaving the Russians with the sole alternative of starving the Turks out. Realising that this process could last a long time, Schuver followed Mehmet Ali's army, which opened an unsuccessful offensive aimed at relieving Plevna. Schuver witnessed the fighting around Sofia, which would fall into Russian hands before the year's end.
Perhaps because Schuver did not expect any more large-scale hostilities, he left the front line at the beginning of January 1878, to embark on a 'journey into exile' (in his own enigmatic expression). Did he mean that he was going to the ends of the civilized world, as happened to the Roman poet Ovid after Caesar Augustus exiled him to Tomis, close to the present-day Constanza on the Black Sea? Or was his statement merely the result of a temporary melancholy mood? Whatever the truth of the matter, Schuver's journey had a bad start since at Edirne Bulgarians robbed him of all his luggage and his Bosnian horse. To cap the disaster, the Russians took him prisoner on suspicion of espionage. After his release, he remained in the vicinity of Istanbul from March to July, learning the Turkish language, purchasing weapons, and making preparations for a journey to the Caucasus. | |
