ПИТАЊЕ РЕФОРМИ И УСТАНКА У ТУРСКОЈ С ПОСЕБНИМ ОСВРТОМ НА ДЕЛАТНОСТ СРПСКО-БОСАНСКОГ ОДБОРА И РУСКИХ СЛОВЕНОФИЛА (1860–1861)
ISSUE OF REFORMS AND UPRISING IN TURKEY WITH A SPECIAL REVIEW ON THE ACTIVITIES OF THE SERBIAN-BOSNIAN BOARD AND RUSSIAN SLAVOPHILES (1860–1861)

Summary/Abstract: The Serbian-Bosnian Board was founded in Belgrade, in August 1860, with the knowledge of the Serbian Government and the Prince. The foundation of the Board was supported by the Russian diplomacy through Slavophiles. The sponsor of the Board was the Serbian Metropolitan Mihailo, to whom Prince Miloš assigned the task to maintain relations with the refugees from Turkey. Immediately before the foundation of the Board, the secretary of the Moscow Charity Committee Ivan Sergeevič Aksakov stayed in Belgrade. He brought to Serbia (in July 1860) the well-known Epistle from Moscow to the Serbs, which represented the basis of the Slavophile beliefs about the position of Serbia and Orthodox Christianity in the Balkans. Upon his return to Moscow, Aksakov ensured the amount of 3000 ducats, which was enough to finance the work of the Board during several months. The paper determines the notion of Old Serbia according to the standpoints of that time, and investigates the role of certain persons who were engaged in the preparation of the uprising or represented a link with the Serbs from Old Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. The largest number of collaborators of the Serbian-Bosnian Board were refugees from Bosnia, which explains its name. The six-member Main Board included Zarija Kurtić, from the Vranje region, as a representative of Old Serbia. The Board maintained links with Russia through the consulate in Belgrade, Russian embassy in Vienna and protopresbyter Mihailo F. Rajevski, a priest of the Russian church at the same embassy. In a detailed plan about the preparation of the uprising, it was designed that in the vicinity of Kosovska Mitrovica an auxiliary corpus should be organized, which would prevent the penetration of the Turkish army from the direction of Rumelia. The organizers also counted on the cooperation with the Miriditis. The total rebellious force comprised 32000 Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina, 8000 from Old Serbia, 3000 Montenegrians and 20000 Miriditis. Significant attention is devoted to the reforms in Turkey, which the Porte, despite passing the reformatory law and obligations adopted at the Paris Peace Treaty (1856), carried out very slowly and negligently. After the war in Italy (1859) and weakening of the Austrian influence in the Balkans, Russia increased the pressure on Turkey. Russian diplomacy criticised unsuccessful measures undertaken by the Grand Vizier Kibrisli Mehmed Pasha during his tour of some parts of Old Serbia and Bulgaria (1860). Upon the completion of the Grand Vizier’s trip (in October 1860), the Serbian-Bosnian Board sent Zarija Kurtić with a courier to Old Serbia and Macedonia. At that time, new complaints were filed by the Serbs from Old Serbia, which confirmed the standpoint of the Russian diplomacy that Kibrisli Pasha did not do anything significant in improving the position of the Christian population. The paper also investigates the relation of Serbia with Montenegro, both when it comes to the Herzegovina uprising and to the possibility of a general uprising in the Balkans and the war of the two countries with Turkey. Standpoints of the president of the Board, Matija Ban, about the uprising and the arrangement of the Balkan region after the liberation from Turkey, differed to a great degree from the standpoints of other members of the Board. Preparations for the uprising in 1860–1861 were closely related to the occurrences in Italy and the indications about the disembarkation of the Italian, Hungarian and Polish legionaries in the Balkans. The Serbian-Bosnian Board represented one stage between the propaganda organization from the end of the 1840s and the beginning of the 1850s, and the preparations for the uprising which were undertaken after Ilija Garašanin became the head of Government, in December 1861.

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