Ottoman ironclad Asar-i Şevket

Russian painting of the attack on Asar-i Şevket, depicting her supposed sinking

The Ottoman fleet began mobilizing in September 1876 to prepare for a conflict with Russia, as tensions with the country had been growing for several years, an insurrection had begun in Ottoman Bosnia in mid-1875, and Serbia had declared war on the Ottoman Empire in July 1876. The Russo-Turkish War began on 24 April 1877 with a Russian declaration of war.[7] By this time, Asar-i Şevket had been transferred to the I Division in the Mediterranean Fleet, but she was quickly transferred to the Black Sea squadron, with the bulk of the Ottoman ironclad fleet.[8][9] The Ottoman fleet, commanded by Hobart Pasha, was vastly superior to the Russian Black Sea Fleet; the only ironclads the Russians possessed there were Vitse-admiral Popov and Novgorod, circular vessels that had proved to be useless in service. The presence of the fleet did force the Russians to keep two corps in reserve for coastal defense, but the Ottoman high command failed to make use of its naval superiority in a more meaningful way, particularly to hinder the Russian advance into the Balkans. Hobart Pasha took the fleet to the eastern Black Sea, where he was able to make a more aggressive use of it to support the Ottoman forces battling the Russians in the Caucasus. The fleet bombarded Poti and assisted in the defense of Batumi.[10]

In May, Asar-i Şevket, the steam frigate Mubir-i Sürur, and several transport ships steamed to Batumi. Over the course of the war, Russian torpedo boats made several attacks on the vessels stationed in Batumi, but Asar-i Şevket was not damaged in any of them.[11] By the end of June, Asar-i Şevket was transferred to the port of Sulina at the mouth of the Danube, along with the ironclads Muin-i Zafer and Hifz-ur Rahman. The ships were tasked with defending the seaward approach to the port, supporting three coastal fortifications.[12] By August, the ship had been transferred to Sukhumi. There, on the night of 24 August, four Russian torpedo boats launched an attack on the ships in the harbor. One of the boats succeeded in detonating its spar torpedo under Asar-i Şevket's hull and claimed to sink her, but the ironclad was undamaged in the attack.[13]

After the end of the war in 1878, Asar-i Şevket was laid up in Constantinople.[2] This was in part due to chronically low budgets, and in part due to the fact that the Sultan, Abdul Hamid II, who had come to power after a coup deposed Murad V that involved senior members of the Navy, distrusted the Navy.[1] The annual summer cruises to the Bosporus ended. By the mid-1880s, the Ottoman ironclad fleet was in poor condition, and Asar-i Şevket was unable to go to sea. Many of the ships' engines were unusable, having seized up from rust, and their hulls were badly fouled. The British naval attache to the Ottoman Empire at the time estimated that the Imperial Arsenal would take six months to get just five of the ironclads ready to go to sea. Throughout this period, the ship's crew was limited to about one-third the normal figure. During a period of tension with Greece in 1886, the fleet was brought to full crews and the ships were prepared to go to sea, but none actually left the Golden Horn, and they were quickly laid up again. By that time, most of the ships were capable of little more than 4 to 6 knots (7.4 to 11.1 km/h; 4.6 to 6.9 mph).[14] In 1890, the ship was taken to the Imperial Arsenal for refitting, and new boilers were installed. The ship also received a battery of light guns, including two 87 mm (3.4 in) Krupp guns, two 63.5 mm (2.50 in) Krupp guns, two 37 mm (1.5 in) Hotchkiss revolver cannon, and one 25.4 mm (1 in) Nordenfelt gun. The ship returned to service on 12 February 1892.[2]

At the start of the Greco-Turkish War in February 1897, the Ottomans inspected the fleet and found that almost all of the vessels, including Asar-i Şevket, to be completely unfit for combat against the Greek Navy. Many of the ships had rotted hulls and their crews are poorly trained. Through April and May, elements the Ottoman fleet made several sorties into the Aegean Sea in an attempt to raise morale among the ships' crews, though the Ottomans had no intention of attacking Greek forces. During these operations, Asar-i Şevket and the rest of the ironclad fleet ventured no further than Naga, the narrowest point of the Dardanelles. The condition of the Ottoman fleet could not be concealed from foreign observers, which proved to be an embarrassment for the government and finally forced Abdul Hamid II to authorize a modernization program, which recommended that the ironclads be modernized in foreign shipyards. German firms, including Krupp, Schichau-Werke, and AG Vulcan, were to rebuild the ships, but after having surveyed the ships, withdrew from the project in December 1897 owing to the impracticality of modernizing the ships and the inability of the Ottoman government to pay for the work. By 1900, the contracts were finally awarded, and Asar-i Şevket was not included in the program. Instead, the ship was decommissioned in 1903 and was ultimately sold to ship breakers on 31 July 1909.[15]