Protestant Participation in the April Uprising (1876)

A considerable number of Protestants took part in the prematurely erupted April Uprising. Many of them were in the immediate circle of Benkovski, Vasil Volóv, and the other revolutionary apostles. Some Protestants joined during the uprising itself. According to Dimitar Strashimirov, about sixty men from the village of Tserovo, in the Pazardzhik region, joined Benkovski’s detachment under the leadership of Tsvyatko Brŭshkov. At that time Tserovo had 120 households, fifteen of which belonged to Bulgarian Protestants. Two roster protocols were compiled – one larger list for the Orthodox, and a smaller one for the Protestants. The leaders of the Protestant group were K. Teliyski and Nikola Kochov. From the same village came Ivan Cheshírov, one of the “tens-men” (leaders of groups of ten) in the Flying Column. Collective memory has preserved the names of two well-known Protestants from Panagyurishte as active participants in the uprising: Stefan Balabanov, who organized the sewing of clothing for the rebels, and Rad Minev, one of the most experienced arms-bearers of the insurgent town.

Protestants were also involved in the activities of nearly all revolutionary districts. Particularly dramatic was the fate of the evangelist Stoil Findzhikov, the master craftsman of the “cherry-wood cannons,” who became a symbol of the uprising. As a youth, Stoil had worked in a military workshop in Constantinople, where he learned details of firearms manufacture. On the eve of the uprising and during its course, prompted by Volov and Benkovski, he crafted and refined several of these primitive cannons. He fired his last “cherry-wood cannon” at the advancing Ottoman forces beneath Mount Kamenitsa. Under the pressure of the attacking bashi-bozouk irregulars, the defenders fled one by one, and some fell in battle.

The evangelist Petar Donchev from Panagyurishte also took an active part in the April Uprising. During the height of the revolt, he served as a trusted courier between the surrounding towns and villages, employed by both Benkovski and Volov. “Petraki,” as the insurgents called him, displayed remarkable resourcefulness, courage, and self-sacrifice. After the uprising he departed for the United States, where he studied theology, later returning to Bulgaria as pastor in Chirpan. Yet he remained throughout his life a passionate patriot and tireless public figure. He declined every offer of praise or reward after the Liberation with the simple words that “whatever he had done, he had done for God and for the Fatherland.”

In the early summer days of 1876, there existed a real danger that the bloody sacrifice of the Bulgarian people would be silenced. Had this occurred, the central idea of the revolutionary movement – and the sacrifice of tens of thousands – would have faded ingloriously into obscurity. At precisely this moment, Bulgarians from Pazardzhik and Plovdiv succeeded in secretly sending the first accurate and detailed descriptions of the events in the rebellious regions to the Protestant missionaries in Constantinople. A decisive man – Father Tilev of Pazardzhik – was the first to describe the massacres, the fires, the hangings, the mass slaughter of defenseless people, and the full horror experienced by the population in the affected districts. He entrusted the packet of writings to the Croat Ilitch, director of the Austrian post in Plovdiv, asking him to forward it to a friend in Constantinople who would deliver it personally to Dr. Albert Long. The first description was soon followed by a second and a third. Reports and accounts began to appear from other sources as well. Ivan Ev. Geshov of Plovdiv also sent a letter through Andrei Tsanov to Dr. Long, writing, among other things: “Many villages in the Pazardzhik region are in flames and the people are being exterminated. Is there no help or protection for them from somewhere?”

With the help of Andrei Tsanov, Dr. Long translated the letters into English and consulted Dr. George Washburn, director of Robert College. The two agreed that Dr. Long would systematize the shocking materials arriving in Constantinople, while Dr. Washburn would bring them to the attention of influential English and American figures in the Ottoman capital. Thus, the information reached Edwin Pears, an English barrister and correspondent for the Daily News, who sent the first alarming reports. The London editorial office initially refused to believe the atrocious descriptions and demanded telegraphic confirmation from Pears himself. Only then, on 23 June 1876, did the Daily News publish the first horrifying accounts of the tragedy of the Bulgarian people.

Dr. Long and Dr. Washburn presented the matter to the British ambassador Henry Elliot and the American minister Horace Maynard. Elliot stated that the matter had to be investigated and verified before being taken “seriously.” Undeterred, the two missionaries sent a second, even more detailed report to the Daily News, insisting that Britain intervene on behalf of the suffering Christian population. Gradually, the Disraeli–Beaconsfield government was cornered, and the prime minister attempted to deflect the issue by declaring in Parliament that “all this commotion is nothing but coffeehouse gossip.” This statement, however, marked the beginning of the crisis’ most intense phase.

More and more dispatches appeared in the Daily News and in a growing number of British and European newspapers. The Daily Mail sent the well-known American journalist Januarius MacGahan – then in London – to visit the sites of the atrocities and report his findings. Disraeli, for his part, ordered an “urgent inquiry” by the British Embassy in Constantinople. The ambassador entrusted the task to the youngest member of the mission, Walter Baring, along with his father-in-law, Fr. Gauracino, a Levantine, retired British consul, and significant debtor to the Ottoman state.

To the American missionaries it was clear that this move sought to obscure the truth about the massacre of an entire people. They immediately visited Minister Maynard again, insisting that the newly arrived first secretary and U.S. consul general in Constantinople, Eugene Schuyler, depart for the burned and blood-soaked regions of Bulgaria. This was also necessary because they feared that the Ottoman government would refuse permission for Baring to carry out his mission.

Minister Maynard expressed his profound sympathy for the Bulgarian people but explained that his duties in Constantinople did not include intervention in the political affairs of the empire, being limited exclusively to the promotion of “commercial relations.” In his view, only one Great Power – Britain – could exert real influence over Turkey. Dr. Washburn, exasperated, rose from his chair and firmly declared: “I am going directly to the telegraph office to inform the President of the United States that his representative in Turkey refuses to lift a finger to save an entire nation of suffering Christians. And I shall report the same to the American press.” The minister was compelled to ask Washburn to return to his office. With the assistance of Dr. Long, they devised a “skillful maneuver”: Eugene Schuyler would travel to Adrianople and the province “to identify and appoint a suitable correspondent for commercial matters.” Thus, the ground was prepared. Upon MacGahan’s arrival, the two Americans, both fluent in Russian, together with Petar Dimitrov, a graduate of Robert College and secretary of the newspaper Zornitsa, set out for the devastated regions of Bulgaria. They were later joined by the Russian consul in Adrianople, Prince Tsertelev.

Meanwhile, Dr. Jacob Clarke of Plovdiv was the first foreigner to visit Batak immediately after the massacre, accompanied by Pastor Nikola Boyadzhiev of Panagyurishte. Amid the ghastly scene and overwhelming stench, they placed in their suitcase several heads of children and women – still with their hair braided – and carried them back to Plovdiv. These were physical proofs intended to confront certain foreign skeptics, influenced by Ottoman officials, who claimed that the victims had been “rebels” whom the Turks were obliged to eliminate “to preserve order.” Dr. Clarke visited several consuls in Plovdiv and began taking out the severed heads one by one, asking: “Is this a rebel? And is this a rebel?” Britain, and soon all of Europe, recoiled in horror at the slaughter. One of the most renowned British war correspondents, Archibald Forbes, wrote:

“MacGahan accomplished brilliantly his mission of exposing the Turkish atrocities in Bulgaria in 1876. I know of nothing in journalism that surpasses, in language, pathos, and flaming indignation, writing that passed so spontaneously from heart to heart. His call stirred William Gladstone to a convulsive paroxysm of revulsion at the barbarities. It stirred England to the depths of her national soul. You could see people traveling on the railways reading those reports with burning faces and tears in their eyes.”

 Throughout this entire dramatic period Dr. Albert Long, though remaining in Constantinople, continued – literally day and night – his efforts on behalf of the Bulgarian people. Even when, at the end of 1876 and the beginning of 1877, certain forces sabotaged the work of the Constantinople Conference of the Great Powers, which had agreed on autonomy for Bulgaria across its full ethnic territory, Dr. Long did not lose composure. He continued to seek solutions by every means available. Washburn wrote of him:

“It is a fundamental fact that, although Dr. Long kept modestly in the background, he was the center of everything that was done in Constantinople for Bulgaria during the massacres and the severe trials endured by the Bulgarians in their struggle for freedom.”

Finally, in early May 1876, just days after the outbreak of the April Uprising, a Bulgarian girl in Thessaloniki – Stefana Lanskova – was rescued from abduction intended to force her conversion to Islam. She was hidden in the home of the American consul in Thessaloniki, Hadzhi Lazarov (a Bulgarian Evangelical Christian from Voden who had taken American citizenship and service). This provoked violent unrest among fanatical Turks around Robert College in Constantinople. On May 6, 1876, Muslim extremists murdered the French and German consuls in Thessaloniki (Moulin and Abbott). The American consul, who was their primary target, survived. As unrest at Robert College intensified, ambassador Maynard appealed to President Grant for assistance who did not hesitate to dispatch an American naval squadron led by the USS Trenton to the Sea of Marmara to deter both the fanatical mobs threatening Robert College and the British naval squadron positioned at the Bosporus. It was in precisely this atmosphere that the large-scale efforts of American missionaries, journalists, and diplomats unfolded during the summer of 1876.

In s similar fashion Januarius MacGahan received assignments from the London Daily News and others to report from war zones, particularly the 1876 Bulgarian Uprising against the Ottoman Empire, where his vivid reports on atrocities. With special attention to the Batak Massacre that had shocked Europe and galvanized support for Bulgarian independence, leading to his posthumous title, “Liberator of Bulgaria.” His “orders” were to report the truth, which he did fearlessly, even following Russian armies without permission. His dispatches became crucial historical records of the conflict and Ottoman brutality over Bulgarian civilian population.

Dony K. Donev, D.Min., is a prominent researcher and author specializing in Bulgarian Protestant, Evangelical, and Pentecostal history, with over three decades of study. His work, including 19th Century History of Protestantism in Bulgaria and The Unforgotten: Historical and Theological Roots of Pentecostalism in Bulgaria, documents the development of these movements, their suppression under Communism, and the subsequent post-1989 revival. Key aspects of Donev’s research on Bulgarian Protestant history include:
Origins (19th Century): Protestant work began in the 1800s, with denominations like Congregationalists (1856), Methodists (1857), and Baptists (1865) establishing missions, culminating in the first Bulgarian Protestant Church in 1871. Donev also highlights the 1871 publication of the Protestant Bulgarian Bible translation. His research, often in collaboration with the Institute of Bulgarian Protestant History, has focused on preserving, digitizing, and recovering documents, including church diaries, photographs, and, in some cases, saving records from destruction during the communist era.