First Siege of Missolonghi


The First Siege of Missolonghi was an attempt by Ottoman forces to capture the strategically located port town of Missolonghi during the early stages of the Greek War of Independence.

Siege

After the battle of Peta and the fall of Suli, the road to Missolonghi for the Ottomans was clear. An Ottoman force of 11,000 troops, leaded by Omer Vrioni and Reşid Mehmed Pasha, and a part of the Ottoman fleet leaded by Yussuf Pasha of Patras sieged the town at 25 October 1822. Inside the fortified town there were Alexandros Mavrokordatos, Markos Botsaris, Athanasios Razi-Kotsikas and six hundred or so men with fourteen guns. The food and the ammunition they had were lasting only a month. The Ottomans could easily take the city with an attack. Although they prefered making negotiations with the besieged Greeks. The Greeks took advantage of this, dragging the negotiations out until the reinforcements from the south arrive. So, at November, the Greek fleet show up and hunt down the Ottoman ships. More than 1,000 soldiers with food were debarked so the besieged Greeks were relieved and stopped the negotiations. Then the Ottomans realized their mistake, and resumed the siege in earnest.
After a month of bombardment and sorties,the main Ottoman assault was set for the night of December 24, before Christmas, calculating that the Greeks would be caught by surprise. The Greeks however were warned by Vryonis' Greek secretary, and the Greeks were ready. At the upcoming conflict the Ottomans were defeated and the siege was subsequently lifted on December 31. The Ottoman army, at his retreat pssed from the flooded Achelous River and there more than five hundred men were drouned trying to pass it.

Aftermath

Missolonghi remained under Greek control, and resisted another Ottoman attempt at its capture a year later. Its resistance achieved wider fame when Lord Byron arrived there, dying in the town of fever in April 1824. The city was besieged for a third and final time, resisting both Ottoman and Egyptian armies for almost a year, until its final fall on April 10, 1826.