1822 was marked by an uncontrollable chaotic war on land and sea. Political internal strife between factions and the growing incompetence of the first administration led to a society in severe chaos. The strife and incompetence surged and took with it the populace and the real blame for the ordered disorder that was life in 1822.
The sorrowful and destructive event that took place in Greece was the Revolution of 1821. Although it was initially successful, it took a dramatic turn for the worse. Sultan Mahmud II sent an army to Greece to put down the revolution and restore order.
One of the wealthiest cities in Macedonia, Naoussa, experienced a holocaust on February 22. Zehir Pasha, the commander of Thessaloniki, invaded the city and mercilessly killed the men, women, and children there. The city was left in complete ruin, with the narrow streets and homes echoing the last screams of the doomed and the quiet darkness of death that follows any massacre. It is a shadowy blot in the history of Greece—February 22, Naoussa: A Holocaust.
A couple of months later, on May 26, Chios underwent a comparable catastrophe. Ottoman soldiers disembarked on the island, commencing their execution of the inhabitants. In a little over a week, they had killed and taken captive over 70,000 Chians. The island was left desolate.
The Ottoman barbarity also descended upon Samos. On July 18, Karatasos, the commander of Smyrna, came ashore with his troops and began the land operation that would lead to the conquest of Samos. Over the course of several days, while the defenders of Samos held out, Karatasos’s men committed what amounted to a concentration of killings and tortures at the execution ground that had been set up on the beach. When it was all over, it was figured that about 4,000 Samians had been killed and another 3,000 had been captured to be carried across the Aegean Sea to Smyrna, where they were to be held as slaves.
Chios’s massacre and Samos’s destruction caused an international uproar. Philhellenic organizations throughout Europe labored to render assistance to the Greeks, while the change in public sentiment exerted pressure on the European powers to take action.
Even though the Greeks suffered greatly, they pressed on with their fight for freedom. Their semi-legendary stature in the popular imagination across the West is due not just to the fact that they rose against impossible odds and won but also to the vivid images of the ceremony at which they unfurled the national flag on 25 March 1821.
The debilitating internal conflicts
While the Revolution was in full swing in 1822, the internal political disputes of the groups led by Ypsilantis and Mavrokordatos became sharper. Ypsilantis withdrew from all political activities, and the direction of his faction was taken over by Kolokotronis.
On the other hand, Mavrokordatos had secured the support of the islanders, especially Hydra. He had ambitions that reached beyond the Peloponnese, which he had limited to Kolokotronis. Mavrokordatos also had support that went beyond the island precursors.
In contrast to Ypsilantis, Kolokotronis possessed the quality of not being meek and was certainly not appeasing. He felt he had been wronged by the first administration that had avoided honouring him for what he had done and had achieved. Personal grievances juiced up his rivalry with the faction that had appeared to be rivaling him.
Quarrels within the movements were almost overcome all reason and were now just weakening the common struggle. Without coordination and unity, the revolutionary forces seemed in danger of collapse.
The incompetence and inertia of the first administration
The first Administration of the Revolution that took over in July 1822 was totally incompetent and ineffective. It was constituted by the Parliamentary Committee and the Executive, which ruled very weakly.
The Peloponnese experienced an invasion in July, when Dramalis arrived with forces from the north. Once again, the government fled, retreating onto ships. For an entire month, the administration maintained itself on this flotilla and, when it could do so no longer, moved; it went aimlessly from one safe harbor to another without taking effective action. What it could manage to do during this time was to issue an inflated series of proclamations that lauded itself and a handful of other fighters. Yet this administration also found time to do the significant work of finding fault with Kolokotronis, which it did, faultfinding that served to make several already prominent figures even more prominent. By its combination of faultfinding and issuing self-laudatory proclamations, the administration well earned its own dislike.
The first administration’s internal conflicts and mismanagement severely weakened the fights of 1822, creating uncontrollable chaos that nearly brought the Revolution to an end.
Bibliography
Hionidis, G.H. (1968). The events in the Naoussa-Veroya region during the Revolution of 1822: (problems in their chronology). Retrieved from ejournals.epublishing.ekt.gr
Siorokas, G.A. (1975). Hionidis, The campaign and the revolution in Olympon during the years 1821-1822: (After unpublished documents and new data on the Lazaians). Retrieved from ejournals.epublishing.ekt.gr
