Battle of Ivankovac

The Battle of Ivankovac (Serbian: Бој на Иванковцу/Boj na Ivankovcu) was the first full-scale confrontation between Serbian revolutionaries and the regular forces of the Ottoman Empire during the First Serbian Uprising.

Battle of Ivankovac
Part of the First Serbian uprising
Map of the battlefield
Date 18 August [O.S. 7 August] 1805 Location Ivankovac, Sanjak of Smederevo, Ottoman Empire (today Serbia) Result Serbian victory
Belligerents
Revolutionary Serbia	Ottoman Empire
Commanders and leaders
Karađorđe Petrović Milenko Stojković	Hafiz Mustafa Pasha †
Strength
initially 2,500 men, later reinforced with 5,000 more	20,000 men
Casualties and losses
1,000 killed	10,000 killed

In the Summer of 1805, Hafiz the Ottoman pasha of Niš, gathered an army to crush the Serbian rebels led by Milenko Stojković near the village of Ivankovac. The battle ended with a Serbian victory and the death of the pasha, prompting Ottoman Sultan Selim III to declare jihad (holy war) against the Serbs.

Background

In the 1790s, the Ottoman Sultan Selim III granted the Serbs in the Sanjak of Smederevo (central Serbia) the right to run their own affairs in exchange for their cooperation with the governor of Belgrade, Hadži Mustafa Pasha. Following the Slaughter of the Knezes in February 1804, a revolt led by Karađorđe Petrović erupted against the Ottoman janissary junta (the "Dahije") in Serbia. The Serbs initially received the support of Selim and managed to defeat the corrupt janissaries by the end of the year. In the negotiations that followed the Serbs demanded the restoration of their autonomy while making contact with other Serbs in other parts of the Ottoman Empire. Alarmed by the Serbs demands and actions, Selim appointed the Ottoman governor of Niš, Hafiz Pasha, as the new governor of Belgrade and ordered him to destroy the Serbian insurgents. For the first time a regular Ottoman force was sent to crush the rebels.

Battle

During the Summer the Ottoman force arriving from Niš and led by Hafiz Pasha was ambushed by a much smaller Serbian force commanded by Milenko Stojković at the village of Ivankovac near Ćuprija. On 18 August [O.S. 7 August] 1805. Stojković designed fortifications consisting of three earth and palisade fortresses and two redoubts. Serbian leader Karađorđe arrived with guns and reinforcements defeating and driving the Turks back to Niš, where Hafiz Pasha, seriously wounded during the battle, died as a result.

Aftermath

The battle was a major victory for the Serbian rebels. It marked the first time that a regular Ottoman Turkish unit was defeated by Serbian revolutionaries during the First Serbian Uprising. The victory meant that the Serbian forces had taken full control of the Belgrade Pashaluk. Smederevo was captured in November and became the first capital of the Serbian revolutionary government, while Belgrade was taken the following year. Defeat in the battle prompted Selim to declare jihad (holy war) against the Serbian revolutionaries fighting to expel the Turks from Serbia.

Gallery

• 
  Monument in Ivankovac.
• 
  Remains of sconces of the battle of Ivankovac.
• 
  Remains of redoubt of the battle of Ivankovac

See also

• List of Serbian Revolutionaries

References

• Axelrod, Alan (2003). Profiles in Leadership. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall Press. ISBN 978-0-73520-256-6.
• Columbus, Frank H. (1999). Kosovo–Serbia: A Just War?. Hauppauge, New York: Nova Science Publishers. ISBN 978-1-56072-724-8.
• Cox, John K. (2002). The History of Serbia. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. ISBN 978-0-313-31290-8.
• Jelavich, Charles; Jelavich, Barbara (2000). The Establishment of the Balkan National States, 1804–1920. Vol. 8 (4 ed.). Seattle: University of Washington Press. ISBN 0-295-96413-8.
• Judah, Tim (2000). The Serbs: History, Myth and the Destruction of Yugoslavia (2nd ed.). New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-08507-5.
• Merry, Robert W. (2005). Sands of Empire: Missionary Zeal, American Foreign Policy, and the Hazards of Global Ambition. New York: Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-7438-5.
• Morrison, Walter Angus (1942). The Revolt of the Serbs Against the Turks: 1804–1813. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-67606-0.
• Radosavljević, Nedeljko V. (2010). "The Serbian Revolution and the Creation of the Modern State: The Beginning of Geopolitical Changes in the Balkan Peninsula in the 19th Century". Empires and Peninsulas: Southeastern Europe between Karlowitz and the Peace of Adrianople, 1699–1829. Berlin: LIT Verlag. pp. 171–178. ISBN 9783643106117.

• Protić, A. (1892). A history from the time of the Serbian leader Karađorđe. Spomenik (in Serbian).