The eastern question in the parliament of the United Kingdom in 1876

Abstract

This article scrutinizes the attitude of the British political elites towards the Eastern question, in the year of the beginning of the Serbian liberation and unification wars of 1876-1878. It is based on diverse sources, Hansard?s Parliamentary Debates being the most important one. The Eastern question, as geopolitical problem of the future of the Balkan and Levantine lands from which the Ottoman Empire was gradually retreating, has been considered through the confrontation of Great Britain and Russia on the wider Eurasian stage, especially in relation to their conflict in the Central Asia. The article is mainly devoted to the different interpretations, debates and conflicts in the British Parliament and public opinion, provoked by the Serbian uprising in Herzegovina and Bosnia, atrocities in Bulgaria, and the beginning of the Serbian-Turkish Wars. The divisions went mainly through the party lines. Behind almost all events in the East, the Conservatives perceived the hand of Russia and League of the Three Emperors (Dreikaisebund). These ?foreign influences? were attributed mainly to Russia and Serbia, as the alleged Russia?s tool in the Balkans. Thus, according to the Conservatives, the Serbs and Russians were to blame for the sufferings of Bulgarians in the hands of the Turks. Additionally, they were repeating that Turkish crimes were committed in self-defence, and that the numbers of victims were hugely exaggerated by the Russian, Serbian and Bulgarian propaganda and the British liberal press. The Conservatives had similar attitudes towards the atrocities committed by the Turks in the Eastern Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Liberals, on the other hand, were insisting that the main causes of these uprisings and wars were national feelings, economical problems, and the misrule of the Turks. They were directing their moral indignation not only to the Turks, but to the British government as well. According to the Liberals, by despatching of the British fleet in the vicinity of the Ottoman capital, the British government encouraged the Turks and made Great Britain co-responsible for the atrocities committed in Bulgaria, Serbia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.