Clash of Empires in the Balkans
Ottoman-Russia-Austria War of 1736-1739
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In the 1730s, the allied Russian and Austrian Empires looked upon a weakening Ottoman Empire and saw an opportunity to expand into the Balkans and along the Black Sea coast. The Russian commander-in-chief boldly outlined his ambitions to Empress Anna: “In 1739, the banners and standards of Her Majesty shall be raised in Constantinople.”
The Austrians were less eager for war. Their army still needed time to recover and rebuild, yet they could not allow Russia to dominate the Balkans unchecked. Confident in Ottoman weakness, some Austrian leaders believed they would “only need to march without fighting.” They were badly mistaken. The Ottomans proved far more resilient than expected. Russian armies paid dearly for every mile gained in Ukraine, while Ottoman forces defeated the Austrians in Bosnia and Serbia. When the war ended, Russia had secured only modest gains, and Austria had lost its foothold in Serbia, including the key fortress city of Belgrade. Today, this war is largely forgotten. Yet hundreds of thousands of men fought in it, and many died—more from disease than from enemy action. Few memorials remain to mark their struggle. Soldiers of fortune arrived from across Europe to serve in all three armies. Germans and Jacobites commanded Russian and Austrian forces, French advisers assisted the Ottomans, and even a Scottish earl appeared in both Russian and Austrian service before suffering a fatal wound on the banks of the Danube. This book tells the story of that momentous conflict: the leaders, soldiers, battles, and sieges that shaped the great clash of empires in the eighteenth-century Balkans. Publication Date: 6 July 2026. 161 pages. 6" x 9" ISBN: 978-1-9193086-2-3 UK only. If you are outside the UK, please buy from your local bookshop or Amazon. There is a Kindle version as well. 
Clash of Empires in the Balkans
£9.90
In the 1730s, the allied Russian and Austrian Empires looked upon a weakening Ottoman Empire and saw an opportunity to expand into the Balkans and along the Black Sea coast. The Ottomans proved far more resilient than expected. Russian armies paid dearly for every mile gained in Ukraine, while Ottoman forces defeated the Austrians in Bosnia and Serbia. When the war ended, Russia had secured only modest gains, and Austria had lost its foothold in Serbia, including the key fortress city of Belgrade. This book tells the story of that momentous conflict: the leaders, soldiers, battles, and sieges that shaped the great clash of empires in the eighteenth-century Balkans. |
The Earl of Crawford. One of many foreign soldiers to fight in this conflict.
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Prologue
John Lindsay, 20th Earl of Crawford, steadied his horse at the entrance to a gully, alongside Austrian cuirassiers and dragoons. Cuirassiers, with their steel breastplates, were the last hurrah of the armoured cavalry that had been fighting the Ottomans in the Balkans for centuries. It was 22 July 1739, and the Austrian commander, Marshal Wallis, had intelligence that the Ottoman field army was camped in the village of Grocka (on the Danube, near Belgrade, Serbia) at the end of the gully.
After taking part in a reconnaissance with the hussars, Lindsay joined the Pálffy Cuirassier Regiment, which would lead the main advance. In a 1753 biography, English writer Richard Rolt described the action that followed:
‘It was here that the Earl of Crawford conspicuously signalised his courage, which carried him into the thickest scene of danger. This regiment behaved with the utmost gallantry they were animated with the presence of their principal commander, and every soldier was exasperated at the insolence of the Turkish Sipahis, one of whom galloped up to the Earl of Crawford whose eye was directed another way; but a German officer alarmed his lordship with the danger, who instantly fired his pistol, and shot the Turkish desperado dead.’
Having lost one horse from under him, he was then wounded in the thigh; his servants thought he would die. He had surgery in Belgrade and then a painful journey home.
What was a Scottish earl doing on a Serbian battlefield in 1739? John Lindsay inherited his father’s titles upon his father’s death in 1714. He was only 12 and went to live with a relative, the Duchess of Argyll. He studied at the University of Glasgow and the Vaudeuil Military Academy in Paris. He re-turned to Britain and was commissioned into the Foot Guards in 1726. On his return to Scotland, he commanded the Black Watch before becoming Colonel of the 2nd Troop of Horse Grenadier Guards (1740–1743) and Colonel of the 4th Troop of Horse Guards ('Scottish Horse Guards') (1743–1746). He fought at the Battle of Dettingen on 16 June 1743, and was then promoted to brigadier-general in 1744 and major-general in 1745. He fought in the Jacobite Rising of 1745 (on the government side) and at the Battle of Fontenoy on 30 April 1745. He reached the rank of lieutenant-general in 1747 and Colonel of the 2nd Dragoons (Scots Greys) before dying from a wound he received at Grocka in 1749, aged 47.
Foreign-born soldiers were not uncommon in the armies of many European countries in the 18th century. However, Lindsay was more of a battlefield tourist than a typical soldier of fortune. He met several of his fellow foreign soldiers during the wars of this period. In St Petersburg, he met Admiral Thomas Gordon, one of many British officers who helped develop the Rus-sian navy. He travelled to the front line in Ukraine in 1738, where he met the German-born army commander von Münnich, whose fellow generals in-cluded the British-born Lacy, Douglas and Keith. When he returned to the Austrian front in 1739, the commander was George Olivier, Count of Wallis, who was of Irish descent. The British officers were exiled Jacobites, which must have made for difficult dinner conversations with the staunchly union-ist Earl of Crawford.
And it wasn’t just senior commanders who were foreign-born. The Austrians recruited soldiers from across Europe, whereas such recruitment was less prevalent in Russia, although Cossacks and Kalmyk tribesmen were by no means ethnic Russians. A little-known naval captain, John Elton, joined the Russian service in the 1730s and explored on land, including the 1734 Orenburg expedition, where he helped construct the great fortress. He later mapped the salt lake on the lower Volga that still bears his name, which by the 1750s was Russia’s largest source of salt.
The Ottomans recruited soldiers from across their empire. Troops from Egypt and the Middle East found themselves on Balkan battlefields, facing conditions very different from those at home. The Ottomans also recruited foreign experts. The most famous was Claude Alexandre, Count of Bonne-val, a French officer who also served with Prince Eugene’s Imperial forces. He reformed the Ottoman artillery, aided by another exiled Jacobite, Ramsey, who was then poached by the Russians.
Religion played a diminishing role in the decisions of these latter-day football managers, although crusading rhetoric would be used on occasion, if largely cynically, to stir up revolts. Although Protestants in the largely Catholic Austrian army faced discrimination, it was less of an issue in the Orthodox Russian army. Bonneval did convert to Islam, but the Ottoman system accommodated troops of all religions. That is not to say that religion didn’t play a motivational role, with prayers before almost every battle. The Bosnian troops looking down on the Austrian invaders at Bana Luka in 1737, invoked all ‘true believers’ to conquer the ‘execrated infidel wretches.’
These were just some of the men who would take part in this clash of empires in the Balkans.
John Lindsay, 20th Earl of Crawford, steadied his horse at the entrance to a gully, alongside Austrian cuirassiers and dragoons. Cuirassiers, with their steel breastplates, were the last hurrah of the armoured cavalry that had been fighting the Ottomans in the Balkans for centuries. It was 22 July 1739, and the Austrian commander, Marshal Wallis, had intelligence that the Ottoman field army was camped in the village of Grocka (on the Danube, near Belgrade, Serbia) at the end of the gully.
After taking part in a reconnaissance with the hussars, Lindsay joined the Pálffy Cuirassier Regiment, which would lead the main advance. In a 1753 biography, English writer Richard Rolt described the action that followed:
‘It was here that the Earl of Crawford conspicuously signalised his courage, which carried him into the thickest scene of danger. This regiment behaved with the utmost gallantry they were animated with the presence of their principal commander, and every soldier was exasperated at the insolence of the Turkish Sipahis, one of whom galloped up to the Earl of Crawford whose eye was directed another way; but a German officer alarmed his lordship with the danger, who instantly fired his pistol, and shot the Turkish desperado dead.’
Having lost one horse from under him, he was then wounded in the thigh; his servants thought he would die. He had surgery in Belgrade and then a painful journey home.
What was a Scottish earl doing on a Serbian battlefield in 1739? John Lindsay inherited his father’s titles upon his father’s death in 1714. He was only 12 and went to live with a relative, the Duchess of Argyll. He studied at the University of Glasgow and the Vaudeuil Military Academy in Paris. He re-turned to Britain and was commissioned into the Foot Guards in 1726. On his return to Scotland, he commanded the Black Watch before becoming Colonel of the 2nd Troop of Horse Grenadier Guards (1740–1743) and Colonel of the 4th Troop of Horse Guards ('Scottish Horse Guards') (1743–1746). He fought at the Battle of Dettingen on 16 June 1743, and was then promoted to brigadier-general in 1744 and major-general in 1745. He fought in the Jacobite Rising of 1745 (on the government side) and at the Battle of Fontenoy on 30 April 1745. He reached the rank of lieutenant-general in 1747 and Colonel of the 2nd Dragoons (Scots Greys) before dying from a wound he received at Grocka in 1749, aged 47.
Foreign-born soldiers were not uncommon in the armies of many European countries in the 18th century. However, Lindsay was more of a battlefield tourist than a typical soldier of fortune. He met several of his fellow foreign soldiers during the wars of this period. In St Petersburg, he met Admiral Thomas Gordon, one of many British officers who helped develop the Rus-sian navy. He travelled to the front line in Ukraine in 1738, where he met the German-born army commander von Münnich, whose fellow generals in-cluded the British-born Lacy, Douglas and Keith. When he returned to the Austrian front in 1739, the commander was George Olivier, Count of Wallis, who was of Irish descent. The British officers were exiled Jacobites, which must have made for difficult dinner conversations with the staunchly union-ist Earl of Crawford.
And it wasn’t just senior commanders who were foreign-born. The Austrians recruited soldiers from across Europe, whereas such recruitment was less prevalent in Russia, although Cossacks and Kalmyk tribesmen were by no means ethnic Russians. A little-known naval captain, John Elton, joined the Russian service in the 1730s and explored on land, including the 1734 Orenburg expedition, where he helped construct the great fortress. He later mapped the salt lake on the lower Volga that still bears his name, which by the 1750s was Russia’s largest source of salt.
The Ottomans recruited soldiers from across their empire. Troops from Egypt and the Middle East found themselves on Balkan battlefields, facing conditions very different from those at home. The Ottomans also recruited foreign experts. The most famous was Claude Alexandre, Count of Bonne-val, a French officer who also served with Prince Eugene’s Imperial forces. He reformed the Ottoman artillery, aided by another exiled Jacobite, Ramsey, who was then poached by the Russians.
Religion played a diminishing role in the decisions of these latter-day football managers, although crusading rhetoric would be used on occasion, if largely cynically, to stir up revolts. Although Protestants in the largely Catholic Austrian army faced discrimination, it was less of an issue in the Orthodox Russian army. Bonneval did convert to Islam, but the Ottoman system accommodated troops of all religions. That is not to say that religion didn’t play a motivational role, with prayers before almost every battle. The Bosnian troops looking down on the Austrian invaders at Bana Luka in 1737, invoked all ‘true believers’ to conquer the ‘execrated infidel wretches.’
These were just some of the men who would take part in this clash of empires in the Balkans.
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Perekop walls defending the Crimea.
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Wargaming
There is an annex to the book with suggestions for wargaming this conflict. The Russo-Ottoman Wars offer a wide range of options. There were major battles in the Balkans and Crimea, a war of outposts for skirmish games, and a few naval actions. There were a variety of troop types, from Russian and Austrian regulars and Janissaries to irregulars such as Grenzer, Tatars, and Cossacks. There are three introductory scenarios in the book: The Battle of Banja Luka 1737 The Battle of Grocka 1739 Feeding the army - a skirmish on the Eastern Front. We will publish further ones here. |
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