Battle of Kirk Kilisse

The Battle of Kirk Kilisse or Battle of Kirklareli[3] or Battle of Lozengrad was part of the First Balkan War between the armies of Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire. It took place on 24 October 1912, when the Bulgarian army defeated an Ottoman army in Eastern Thrace and occupied Kırklareli.

Map of the battle
Battle of Kirk Kilise
Part of the First Balkan War
Date22-24 October 1912
Location
Kırk Kilise District, Adrianople Vilayet, Ottoman Empire
(now Kırklareli, Turkey)
41°44′05″N 27°13′31″E
Result Bulgarian victory
Belligerents
Bulgaria Bulgaria  Ottoman Empire
Commanders and leaders
Bulgaria Radko Dimitriev
Bulgaria Ivan Fichev		 Mahmud Muhtar Pasha (WIA)
Abdullah Pasha
Strength
153,745 men[1] 98,326 men[1]
Casualties and losses
887 killed, 4,034 wounded and 824 missing[2] 1,500 killed and wounded,[2]
2,000–3,000 prisoners[2]
58 artillery captured

The initial clashes were around several villages to the north of the town. The Bulgarian attacks were irresistible and the Ottoman forces were forced to retreat. On 10 October the Ottoman army threatened to split 1st and 3rd Bulgarian armies but it was quickly stopped by a charge by 1st Sofian and 2nd Preslav brigades. After bloody fighting along the whole town front the Ottomans began to pull back and on the next morning Kırk Kilise (Lozengrad) was in Bulgarian hands. The Muslim Turkish population of the town was expelled and fled eastwards towards Constantinople.

After the victory, the French minister of war Alexandre Millerand stated that the Bulgarian Army was the best in Europe and that he would prefer 100,000 Bulgarians for allies than any other European army.[4]

References
  1. Министерство на войната (1928), p. 204
  2. Necdet Hayta, Togay S. Birbudak, Balkan Savaşları'nda Edirne, Genelkurmay Basımevi, Ankara, 2010, page 23.
  3. Edward J. Erickson, Defeat in detail: the Ottoman Army in the Balkans, 1912–1913 , Greenwood Publishing Group, 2003, ISBN 978-0-275-97888-4, p. 86, 181.
  4. В. Мир, № 3684, 15. X. 1912.

Sources
  • Министерство на войната, Щаб на войската (1928). Войната между България и Турция, vol. II. Държавна печатница, София.


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