War and Revolution in Asiatic Russia
turist. He does not see at once when he is outmastered: but when he does, then the untrained Oriental comes out strong in him; he throws everything away and bolts in a general sauve qui peut. In this case he just ran till he reached Erzerum. The Russians reached Kupri Keui on the 18th, and the next day were in Hassan Kaleh, thus getting into their hands the whole of the east Passan plain and the basin of the Araxes right up to the outer forts of Erzerum. On January 19th the last Turkish column was seen disappearing behind the rolling banks of the Deve-Boyun. The Cossacks pursued right up to the outer chain of forts under cover of darkness, and cut off 1,000 prisoners. Next day field artillery shelled the outer forts, and so after thirty-nine years Erzerum saw a Russian shell again within its precincts.
Up to this time it was not really part of the Russian plan to attack Erzerum. The original plan was to break the Turkish line on the Passan plain, and to put such pressure on the Turks along the whole line from the Chorokh to Bitlis, that the pressure on the English at Bagdad would be relieved. The extraordinary success of the advance in the second week of January took no one more by surprise than the Russians themselves. The Grand Duke Nicolas would not believe the news, when he heard that Hassan Kaleh and Kupri Keui had fallen. Indeed, it was not until January 23rd that General Eudenitch informed him that he thought it possible to take Erzerum, and asked for permission to work out a plan. This was done in the next few days by himself, General Tomiloff, one of his Staff officers, and General Prejvalsky, the commander of the 2nd Turkestans, who for many years had been Russian military attaché at
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