Amasyalıdır. Bekir Beyzâde Hacı Osmân Bey'in oğludur. 1178 şa'bânının on dördüncü günü Amasya mutasarrıfı ve Bender muhâfızı olup Rahtuvân Paşazâde Hacı Ahmed Bey mütesellim oldu. Baş a'yânın riyâseti altında toplanan bütün a'yân ve hâcıyân harb i'ânesi cem'i ve harbe me'mûr olanların firâr etmeyecekleri tekâfül-i umûmî altına alındı.
Şevvâl evâ'ilinde Sivâs vâlîsi Çapan Ahmed Paşa pek zâlimâne harekâtından dolayı i'dâm edildikde Amasyalı Sarıbeyzâde vezîr Mehmed Paşa Sivâs vâlîsi ve zilka'de ibtidâsında mutasarrıfın yeğeni Abdullâh Bey bin Abdî Bey bin Hacı Osmân Bey Amasya mütesellimi [110] oldu. Bu yıl a'yândan Hacı Zeynel Ağa ve Rûmeli pâyeli İçil mutasarrıfı Şâhinoğlu Hacı Osmân Paşa vefât etdi.
1179 muharreminde Rahtuvân Paşazâde Hacı Ahmed Bey baş a'yân, Hacı Efendioğlu Hacı Ahmed Ağa hacıbaşı, Selâm Beyzâde Abdullâh Bey de alaybeyi oldu. Rebî'ulevvelde alaybeyi, yeniçeri serdârlarından Dayıoğlu Süleymân, Kara Hüseyinoğlu Abdî, Akhasanoğlu Halîl, Kallâşoğlu Genç Ahmed ve kethüdâ Deli Hüseyin Ağalar da za'îmler, sipâhîler, yeniçerilerle harbe gitdi. Edilen muhârebede mutasarrıf olan Bender muhâfızı Ebûbekir Paşa bozulup Ruslar'a esîr oldu.
In Modern English
He was a native of Amasya. He was the son of Bekir Beyzade Hacı Osman Bey. On the fourteenth day of Şaban 1178 [1765] he became mutasarrıf of Amasya and guardian of Bender; Rahtuvan Paşazade Hacı Ahmed Bey also became mütesellim. All the notables and hacıs, gathering under the chairmanship of the chief notable, undertook to collect the war aid and collectively stood surety that those sent to the war would not flee.
At the beginning of Şevval, when the governor of Sivas, Çapan Ahmed Pasha, was executed because of his very cruel conduct, the vizier Sarıbeyzade Mehmed Pasha of Amasya became governor of Sivas. At the beginning of Zilkade the mutasarrıf's nephew Abdullah Bey son of Abdi Bey son of Hacı Osman Bey became mütesellim of Amasya. This year Hacı Zeynel Ağa, one of the notables, and Şahinoğlu Hacı Osman Pasha, mutasarrıf of İçel with the rank of beylerbeyi of Rumelia, died.
In Muharrem 1179 [1765] Rahtuvan Paşazade Hacı Ahmed Bey became chief notable, Hacı Efendioğlu Hacı Ahmed Ağa hacıbaşı, and Selam Beyzade Abdullah Bey alaybeyi. In Rebiülevvel the alaybeyi and the janissary serdars Dayıoğlu Süleyman, Kara Hüseyinoğlu Abdi, Akhasanoğlu Halil, Kallâşoğlu Genç Ahmed and the kethüda Deli Hüseyin Ağas went to the war together with the zaims, sipahis and janissaries. In the battle that took place, Ebubekir Pasha, the mutasarrıf and guardian of Bender, was defeated and fell captive to the Russians.
Notes and Research
Old Words in the Text
- muhâfız: the commander in charge of guarding a fortress and its surroundings
- hâcıyân: the hacıs; the notables of the city bearing the title hacı
- harb i'ânesi: aid collected from the people for war
- cem': collecting
- tekâfül-i umûmî: standing surety collectively
- evâ'il: the first days of a month
- i'dâm: execution
- birâderzâde, yeğen: brother's child
- serdâr: head of the janissaries in the provinces
- esîr olmak: to fall captive
Ebubekir Pasha's Second Mutasarrıflık
Ebubekir Pasha is the son of Bekir Beyzade Hacı Osman Bey, founder of the Bekir Pasha Madrasa, whom we met as mutasarrıf of Amasya in entry 49. The Pasha's tie with Bender is older than this entry: Hüsameddin, recounting the events of 1169-1170 [1756-57], also writes "The mutasarrıf Ebûbekir Pasha was guardian of Bender". As Yılmaz Karadeniz notes, from the seventeenth century on Amasya had begun to be given as an arpalık to persons bearing the title pasha. When the pasha who held the sanjak was assigned elsewhere, the city was administered in his name by mütesellims. In Ebubekir Pasha's time, the mütesellimlik's being given first to Rahtuvan Paşazade Hacı Ahmed Bey and then to the Pasha's nephew Abdullah Bey is an example of this arrangement.
The meeting recounted in the first paragraph of the entry is interesting. The notables and hacıs of Amasya collectively undertook the aid to be collected from the people for the war and that the soldiers to go to the war would not flee. Such collective surety shows an order in which the notables of the city took joint responsibility toward the state. How great a problem deserters were will be clearly seen in the war a few years later: Cengiz Fedakar states that the basic reason for the loss of the battles in Rumelia in the 1768-1774 war was desertion by soldiers, and records that the soldiers guarding Bender fled en masse.
The Execution of Çapanoğlu Ahmed Pasha
The end of Çapan Ahmed Pasha, whom Hüsameddin writes was executed "because of his very cruel conduct", is recounted in detail in İsmail Hakkı Uzunçarşılı's study based on archival documents. Ahmed Pasha, who in 1174 [1760] became governor of Sivas while mütesellim of Bozok and voivode of Yeni İl, was later transferred to the sanjak of Niğde and in 1177 [1763] defeated a bandit named Kadızade in the vicinity of Niğde and sent the heads of his men to Istanbul; for this service he had been rewarded by the sultan with a robe of honor. But later, on the grounds that he secretly protected bandits and masterless levends, that complaints were made of his tyranny and that he did not heed the advice given him, a decree for his killing was secretly sent to Zaralızade Feyzullah Pasha, who had become governor of Sivas for the second time. According to Uzunçarşılı, in this decision what Abaza Mehmed Ağa, then in the Rişvan ağalık, had long been writing against the Pasha also had an effect; Abaza Mehmed Ağa was assigned to the killing too. Although Ahmed Pasha tried to flee, he was caught and killed and his head sent to Istanbul. Uzunçarşılı gives its date as the end of Şevval 1178, that is April 1765; this almost completely coincides with Hüsameddin's record "early Şevval". Uzunçarşılı adds that Ahmed Pasha was harsh and merciless in his administration, and that he was the first to found the town of Yozgat and had a madrasa built there.
Hamit Karasu shows that this Abaza Mehmed is the one nicknamed "Silahşor" of the two Abaza Mehmed Pashas, often confused, who lived in the same years. According to Karasu, the enmity between Silahşor Abaza Mehmed and Çapanoğlu Ahmed Pasha goes back to Ahmed Pasha's having some persons of the Rişvan tribe beaten at Bozok in 1757; shortly after the execution the sanjak of Bozok was given to Abaza Mehmed. "Halebli Abaza Mehmed Pasha", who will appear to us as mutasarrıf of Amasya in the next entry, is the other namesake, whom Karasu calls "of Goniye".
The Record of the Sivas Governorship
Hüsameddin writes that after Ahmed Pasha's execution the vizier Sarıbeyzade Mehmed Pasha became governor of Sivas. The list of the governors of Sivas that Ahmet Önal compiled from the appointment registers does not confirm this record. According to the list, from 6 Cemaziyelahir 1177 [12 December 1763] Zaralızade Feyzullah Pasha was in the governorship of Sivas and was left in office on 1 November 1764 and 21 September 1765. Uzunçarşılı too says that the execution decree of Çapan Ahmed Pasha was sent to Feyzullah Pasha, "who had become governor of Sivas for the second time". Sarızade Mehmed Pasha, on the other hand, administered Sivas twice, in June-December 1763 and April-October 1768, with the rank of beylerbeyi. Hüsameddin's record may have been confused with one of these two appointments.
The Question of Falling Captive to the Russians
The last sentence of the entry is the place where the reader most needs to attend to chronology. Hüsameddin writes that the forces of Amasya went to the war in Rebiülevvel 1179 [August-September 1765] and that Ebubekir Pasha, guardian of Bender, fell captive to the Russians. Yet in 1765 there was no war between the Ottoman state and Russia. The Ottoman-Russian War of 1768-1774 began when the Ottoman state declared war on Russia in the autumn of 1768. Bender Castle was the scene of one of the bloodiest sieges of this war. According to Semavi Eyice, the Russians took Bender in 1770 after a siege of two months; the event passed as a bloody tragedy, and the Turks in the fortress were forced to kill their family members with their own hands so that they would not fall into enemy hands. According to Fedakar, the fortress, which had been left under siege after the Kartal rout, was seized by General Panin on 16 September 1770. In some sources the loss of the defenders is given as seven thousand dead and five thousand three hundred prisoners.
One detail concerning this siege may shed light on Hüsameddin's record. According to a document Hamit Karasu relays, when Goniyeli Abaza Mehmed Pasha, guardian of Bender, died in the fortress, the janissaries, cebecis, gun-carriage drivers and officers came together and wrote a letter announcing the Pasha's death and informing that "another vizier in the city, Ebu Bekir Pasha" had been chosen by them as guardian of the fortress in his place. That an Ebubekir Pasha had been chosen guardian in the fortress shortly before Bender's fall in 1770 suggests that the capture by the Russians of Ebubekir Pasha of Amasya may in fact belong to the events of 1770. However, that the Ebubekir Pasha in the document is our Pasha has not been definitely confirmed. Hüsameddin's writing in the next entry that the Pasha escaped captivity and returned to Amasya in 1180 [1766] makes the matter more complicated still. The dates of the events of the Russian war in this section appear to be affected by a shift in the local records Hüsameddin used or by a later dating error.
No information was found in other sources on Şahinoğlu Hacı Osman Pasha, Selam Beyzade Abdullah Bey and the janissary serdars named in the entry.
Bibliography
Primary sources
Academic studies
- İsmail Hakkı Uzunçarşılı, "Çapanoğulları", Belleten, 38/150, 1974, https://doi.org/10.37879/belleten.1974.150-215
- Hamit Karasu, "XVIII. Yüzyılda İki Abaza Mehmed Paşa", Genel Türk Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi, 7/13, 2025, p. 51-68, https://doi.org/10.53718/gttad.1598862
- Ahmet Önal, "Sivas Eyaleti Valileri ve Beylerbeyileri (1753-1792)", Tarihin Peşinde, 21, 2019, http://www.tarihinpesinde.com/dergimiz/sayi21/M21_02.pdf
- Semavi Eyice, "Bender Kalesi", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/bender-kalesi
Books
Other sources