Abdul Hamid II
Abdülhamid II or Abdul Hamid II was the 34th sultan of the Ottoman Empire, from 1876 to 1909, and the last sultan to exert effective control over the fracturing state. He oversaw a period of decline with rebellions, and presided over an unsuccessful war with the Russian Empire, the loss of Egypt, Cyprus, Bulgaria, Serbia, Montenegro, Tunisia, and Thessaly from Ottoman control, followed by a successful war against Greece in 1897, though Ottoman gains were tempered by subsequent Western European intervention.
Elevated to power in the wake of Young Ottoman coups, he promulgated the Ottoman Empire's first constitution, a sign of the progressive thinking that marked his early rule. But his enthronement came in the context of the Great Eastern Crisis, which began with the Empire's default on its loans, uprisings by Christian Balkan minorities, and a war with the Russian Empire. At the end of the crisis, Ottoman rule in the Balkans and its international prestige were severely diminished, and the Empire lost its economic sovereignty as its finances came under the control of the Great Powers through the Ottoman Public Debt Administration.
In 1878, Abdul Hamid consolidated his rule by suspending both the constitution and the parliament,, and curtailing the power of the Sublime Porte. He ruled as an autocrat for three decades. Ideologically an Islamist, the sultan asserted his title of Caliph to Muslims around the world. His paranoia about being overthrown, like his uncle and half-brother, led to the creation of secret police organizations, such as the Yıldız Intelligence Agency and the Umur-u Hafiye, and a censorship regime. The Ottoman Empire's modernization and centralization continued during his reign, including reform of the bureaucracy, extension of the Rumelia Railway and the Anatolia Railway, and construction of the Baghdad Railway and the Hejaz Railway with German assistance. Systems for population registration, sedentarization of tribal groups, and control over the press were part of a unique imperialist system in fringe provinces known as borrowed colonialism. The farthest-reaching reforms were in education through the establishment of many professional schools and a network of primary, secondary, and military schools throughout the Empire.
Ironically, the same educational institutions that the Sultan sponsored proved to be his downfall. Large sections of the Ottoman intelligentsia were discontent with his repressive policies, which coalesced into the Young Turks movement. Ethnic minorities started organizing their own national liberation movements, resulting in insurgencies in Macedonia and Eastern Anatolia. Armenians especially suffered from massacres and pogroms at the hands of the Hamidiye regiments. Of the many assassination attempts during Abdul Hamid's reign, one of the most famous is the Armenian Revolutionary Federation's Yıldız assassination attempt of 1905. In 1908, the Committee of Union and Progress forced him to recall parliament and reinstate the constitution in the Young Turk Revolution. Abdul Hamid II attempted to reassert his absolutism a year later, resulting in his deposition by pro-constitutionalist forces in the 31 March incident, though the role he played in these events is disputed.
Abdul Hamid has been long vilified as a reactionary "Red Sultan" for his tyrannical leadership and condoning of atrocities. It was initial consensus that his personal rule created an era of stagnation which held the Ottoman Empire back from the otherwise dynamic Belle Époque. Recent assessments have highlighted his promotion of education and public works projects, his reign a culmination and advancement of the Tanzimat reforms. Since the AKP's rise to power, scholars have attributed a resurgence in his personality cult an attempt to check Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's established image as the founder of modern Turkey.
Early life
Hamid Efendi was born on 21 September 1842 either in Çırağan Palace, Ortaköy, or at Topkapı Palace, both in Constantinople. He was the son of Sultan Abdulmejid I and Tirimüjgan Kadın, originally named Virjinia. Following his mother's death, he became the adoptive son of his father's legal wife, Perestu Kadın. Perestu was also the adoptive mother of Abdul Hamid's half-sister Cemile Sultan, whose mother Düzdidil Kadın had died in 1845, leaving her motherless at the age of two. The two were brought up in the same household, where they spent their childhood together.Unlike many other Ottoman sultans, Abdul Hamid II visited distant countries. In the summer of 1867, nine years before he ascended the throne, he accompanied his uncle Sultan Abdul Aziz on a visit to Paris, London, Vienna, and capitals or cities of a number of other European countries.
Accession to the Ottoman throne
Abdul Hamid ascended the throne after his brother Murad was deposed on 31 August 1876. At his accession, some commentators were impressed that he rode practically unattended to the Eyüp Sultan Mosque, where he was presented with the Sword of Osman. Most people expected Abdul Hamid II to support liberal movements, but he acceded to the throne at a critical time. Economic and political turmoil, local wars in the Balkans, and the Russo-Turkish War threatened the Empire's very existence.First Constitutional Era, 1876–1878
Abdul Hamid worked with the Young Ottomans to realize some form of constitutional arrangement. This new form could help bring about a liberal transition with an Islamic provenance. The Young Ottomans believed that the modern parliamentary system was a restatement of the practice of consultation, or shura, that had existed in early Islam.In December 1876, due to the 1875 insurrection in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the ongoing war with Serbia and Montenegro, and the feeling aroused throughout Europe by the cruelty used in stamping out the 1876 Bulgarian rebellion, Abdul Hamid promulgated a constitution and a parliament. Midhat Pasha headed the commission to establish a new constitution, and the cabinet passed the constitution on 6 December 1876, allowing for a bicameral legislature with senatorial appointments made by the sultan. The first ever election in the Ottoman Empire was held in 1877. Crucially, the constitution gave Abdul Hamid the right to exile anyone he deemed a threat to the state.
The delegates to the Constantinople Conference were surprised by the promulgation of a constitution, but European powers at the conference rejected the constitution as a too-radical change; they preferred the 1856 constitution '' or the 1839 Gülhane edict, and questioned whether a parliament was necessary to act as an official voice of the people.
In any event, like many other would-be reforms of the Ottoman Empire, it proved nearly impossible. Russia continued to mobilize for war, and early in 1877 the Ottoman Empire went to war with the Russian Empire.
War with Russia
Abdul Hamid's biggest fear, near dissolution, was realized with the Russian declaration of war on 24 April 1877. In that conflict, the Ottoman Empire fought without help from European allies. Russian chancellor Prince Gorchakov had by that time effectively purchased Austrian neutrality with the Reichstadt Agreement. The British Empire, though still fearing the Russian threat to the British presence in India, did not involve itself in the conflict because of public opinion against the Ottomans, following reports of Ottoman brutality in putting down the Bulgarian uprising. Russia's victory was quick; the conflict ended in February 1878. The Treaty of San Stefano, signed at the end of the war, imposed harsh terms: the Ottoman Empire gave independence to Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro; it granted autonomy to Bulgaria; instituted reforms in Bosnia and Herzegovina; and ceded parts of Dobrudzha to Romania and parts of Armenia to Russia, which was also paid an enormous indemnity. After the war, Abdul Hamid suspended the constitution in February 1878 and dismissed the parliament, after its only meeting, in March 1877. For the next three decades, Abdul Hamid ruled the Ottoman Empire from Yıldız Palace.As Russia could dominate the newly independent states, the Treaty of San Stefano greatly increased its influence in Southeastern Europe. At the Great Powers' insistence, the treaty was revised at the Congress of Berlin so as to reduce the great advantages Russia gained. In exchange for these favors, Cyprus was ceded to Britain in 1878. There were troubles in Egypt, where a discredited khedive had to be deposed. Abdul Hamid mishandled relations with Urabi Pasha, and as a result, Britain gained de facto control over Egypt and Sudan by sending its troops in 1882 to establish control over the two provinces. Cyprus, Egypt, and Sudan ostensibly remained Ottoman provinces until 1914, when Britain officially annexed them in response to the Ottoman participation in World War I on the side of the Central Powers.
Reign
Disintegration
Abdul Hamid's distrust of the reformist admirals of the Ottoman Navy and his subsequent decision to lock the Ottoman fleet inside the Golden Horn indirectly caused the loss of Ottoman overseas territories and islands in North Africa, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Aegean Sea during and after his reign.Financial difficulties forced him to consent to foreign control over the Ottoman national debt. In a decree issued in December 1881, a large portion of the empire's revenues were handed over to the Public Debt Administration for the benefit of bondholders.
The 1885 union of Bulgaria with Eastern Rumelia was another blow to the Empire. The creation of an independent and powerful Bulgaria was viewed as a serious threat to the Empire. For many years Abdul Hamid had to deal with Bulgaria in a way that did not antagonize the Russians or the Germans. There were also key problems regarding the Albanian question resulting from the Albanian League of Prizren and with the Greek and Montenegrin frontiers, where the European powers were determined that the Berlin Congress's decisions be carried out.
Crete was granted "extended privileges", but these did not satisfy the population, which sought unification with Greece. In early 1897 a Greek expedition sailed to Crete to overthrow Ottoman rule on the island. This act was followed by the Greco-Turkish War, in which the Ottoman Empire defeated Greece, but as a result of the Treaty of Constantinople, Crete was taken over en depot by the United Kingdom, France, and Russia. Prince George of Greece was appointed ruler and Crete was effectively lost to the Ottoman Empire. The ʿAmmiyya, a revolt in 1889–90 among Druze and other Syrians against excesses of the local sheikhs, similarly led to capitulation to the rebels' demands, as well as concessions to Belgian and French companies to provide a railroad between Beirut and Damascus.