Though Serbs fought side by side with Russians until 1812, it happened
that no important battles took place on Serbian territory. During these
years Serbia not only had self-government, but she somewhat increased
her boundaries by lands taken from neighboring Pashiliks. Yet she had
her disappointments. Turkey, when Russia's war with Napoleon began,
disregarded the few concessions made to Serbia by the Peace of
Bucharest. At last, the Grand Vizier led his army against Serbia, and
although her men fought bravely, they had to draw back from the
frontier. Then a strange thing happened! With no obvious reason,
Karageorges went back to Belgrade with the army reserves. Without
staying there even for a day, he and part of his officers practically
deserted the army. Crossing the Danube into Austria, they forsook their
country in her day of trial. With them went the Russian consul and the
Metropolitan and many leading Serbians with their families.
The downfall of Karageorges was due to no fault of his. No one ever
doubted his courage, and could he have had his own way, when he saw the
impossibility of pushing back the enemy, he would have gone again to his
stronghold in the Sumadia, there to fight to the last. But there was a
frontier to be defended, and Serbs owning property along the rivers
begged for protection. The army was not large enough to accomplish all
that was demanded of it. The Turks were victorious and with their
victory there began again a series of acts of unspeakable cruelty.
Among the Serbs who remained in Serbia when Karageorges and his friends
crossed over into Austria was Milosh Obrenovitch. He had not only served
with Karageorges in the Austrian armies, but he had worked for him as a
keeper of swine on his Sumadia estate. During the recent revolution he
had helped his great leader by watching the Balkan passes for unfriendly
Bosnians and Albanians.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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