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After bringing his column of 11,000 men through the pass, Gurko drove off four Turkish battalions sent against him from the Shipka Pass and Kazanlik. Next he sent out bands of Cossacks to spread terror southwards, and delude the Turks into the belief that he meant to strike at the important towns, Jeni Zagra and Eski Zagra, on the road to Adrianople.
Though this quick change in the supreme command necessarily was for discipline, it augured well in all other respects for a reconstruction of the Russian armies. The new supreme commander was known to be an efficient general, a keen fighter, and a sincere adherent of the Allied cause. His own command at the southeastern front was assumed by General Gurko.
It used to be in the Saratov The doorman rushed, and was so fine; But now all drive me in the neck, Give for a split, oh brother mine." "Gentlemen!" suddenly exclaimed Roly-Poly with pathos, cutting short his singing and smiting himself on the chest. "Here I behold you, and know that you are the future generals Skobelev and Gurko; but I, too, in a certain respect, am a military hound.
In point of fact their light troops had already seized one of its more difficult passes an exploit that will always recall the name of that dashing leader, General Gurko. The plan now to be described was his conception; it was approved by the Grand Duke Nicholas. The liberators there received an overwhelming ovation, and gained many recruits for the "Bulgarian Legion."
Generals Gurko and Brussilov also sent in their resignations, and a few days later Minister of War and Marine Gutchkov, wishing to precipitate the impending crisis, also resigned. Complete anarchy now threatened, for the council still insisted on its right to guard the interests of democracy in the army as well as among the civil population.
Above that place towered the mighty wall of the Balkans, lessened somewhat at the pass itself, but presenting even there a seemingly impregnable position. Gurko, however, relied on the discouragement of the Turkish garrison after the defeats of their comrades, and at seeing their positions turned on the south while they were also threatened on the north.
In the early part of the month the Council of Workingmen's and Soldiers' became more and more radical in its demands, both as to the share it was to have in the control of the army and as to the disciplinary measures under which soldiers were to live. So serious became the crisis that Minister of War General Gutchkov, as well as Generals Kornilov, Brussilov, and Gurko resigned their commands.
From Armenia came the tidings that Mukhtar Pasha, after a skilful retreat and concentration of force, had turned on the Russians and driven them back in utter confusion. From beyond the Balkans Gurko sent news that Suleiman's army was working round by way of Adrianople, and threatened to pin him to the mountain chain.
The truth was, ere long, found out by outposts of the north Russian forces; Skobeleff and his men were soon at the summit, and there Gurko's vanguard speedily joined them with shouts of joy. Thus, within twenty-three days from the crossing of the Danube Gurko seized two passes of the Balkans, besides capturing 800 prisoners and 13 guns.
In the beginning of 1883, the governor-general of Odessa, Gurko, took occasion in his report to the Tzar to comment on the excessive growth of the number of Jewish pupils in the gymnazia and on their "injurious effect" upon their Christian fellow-pupils.
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