In the middle of the summer of 1822, the High Gate would make a serious communication error. He would formally inform the foreign diplomats in Constantinople that the Greek Revolution was almost completely crushed. After the destruction of Chios and Naoussa, the Ottoman army (presumably) subjugated Rumeli and Moria.

The official announcement was made on 13 August, at least to Austrian diplomats, perhaps to all Europeans. But 18 days before that (July 26), a powerful Ottoman army was defeated in Dervenakia by the Greeks, led by Theodore Kolokotronis. The message had not yet reached Constantinople. Why did the Ottomans rush to report by giving incorrect information? What were their sources?

The source of the Exalted Gate was absolutely reliable and, moreover, official, Hursit Pasha himself, the infamous commander of the Ottoman troops in the Greek region, having sunk the Serbian revolution in 1809 and recently crushed the apostate Ali Pasha.

However, Hursit did not want to risk his reputation by trying to invade the Morea, although he may have had other reasons to avoid a long and risky campaign. Therefore, he entrusted the leadership to Mahmut Dramali Pasha. It seems that the reports of Dramalis of Argos Hursit in Larissa were too optimistic.

So Hursit made a big mistake. He hastened to send two equally overly optimistic reports to the Sultan. The first arrived on August 11, and the second on August 13 in Istanbul. I hope that references to Khursita will be found in the Ottoman archives by the good Osmanologist brothers, if they have not already done so. The gate didn’t seem to process the information much, as it immediately informed the diplomats unconditionally. On the basis of these over-optimistic, but already tragically outdated reports by Dramalis at Khursit and Khursit at Gates, the latter informed foreign diplomats about this.

According to information provided by the Austrian Observer (Der Oesterreichische Beobachter), controlled by Chancellor Metternich, on September 4: “Almost the entire Peloponnese is conquered and controlled by the Ottoman army. The Greeks surrendered Tripolitsa without a fight, and the Ottomans declared an amnesty for those who surrendered and followed her, he did not open his nose in the city. Outside Nafplio, the Ottoman cavalry drowned the rebels in their blood. Despite the famine, the heroic Turks defended the city for half a year, suffering heavy losses. Their heroic resistance to the siege will go down in history. But reinforcements would have been delayed a little longer, and they would not have been enough.

Having captured two cities, the Ottomans sent small detachments of 2-3 thousand people to subjugate various regions. Corinth fell easily. As soon as the Greeks saw the Turks on the isthmus, they disappeared, leaving the city. Members of the Greek government emptied the treasury and fled to Livadia with the intention of boarding a ship to the Ionian Islands.

The commanders Ypsilantis, Kolokotronis and Petrobeis, as soon as they realized this, pursued them, arrested them and sent them to Hydra on charges of treason. The military then hid in the mountains of Mani with money from the state treasury. The Parliament, based in Argos, burned down the city. For now, the uprising is limited to Crete and the three small islands of Hydra, Spetses and Psara. But the inhabitants of the three small islands are ready to submit to Ottoman rule. But they ask for clear guarantees for their lives and property. If they do not receive them, then they are determined to resist to the end. If they are forced to leave their place, they plan to go somewhere far away, such as a city. in America. The Turks will not be able to stop them. Especially on Hydra, they feverishly organize defenses and prepare firepower to inflict great damage on the Turkish fleet, as they did on Chios.

The publication (and update) contains both the events that took place (the indiscriminate flight from the isthmus and abandonment of Corinth by the Greeks, the heroic defense of Nafplio against the Ottomans, the significant dissolution of the revolutionary government) and references to problems that they could not solve. come from the information of the Ottomans, but rather from the reports of the Austrian armada, as well as from the fabricated lies (fake news) of the Austrian services and Austrian journalists.

However, the publication of the Austrian Observer in mid-to-late September was reproduced by many European newspapers, especially conservative and fearful of the Greek revolutionaries. In fact, the conservative French newspaper Gazette de France commented ironically on the news in its September 13 issue: “This is the end of the famous Hellenic Republic!”

In less than a month, the liberal newspapers will take turns celebrating when the news about Dervenakia arrives, news that is much closer to reality, although with the usual exaggerations. On October 10, 1822, the liberal French newspaper “Constitution” (the largest newspaper in terms of circulation on the planet in the 1820s) will be published with a description of the battle of Dervenakia on the front page. The article ends with Kolokotronis warning the besieged Turks in Corinth to surrender unconditionally.

[όλες οι ημερομηνίες μετατράπηκαν στο παλαιό ημερολόγιο]

*Aristidis Hatzis is Professor of Philosophy of Law and Theory of Institutions at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. His book The Glorious Struggle: The Greek Revolution of 1821 is published by Papadopoulos and includes numerous excerpts from the European press of the time about the Greek Revolution, which are published for the first time.