Monday, November 14, 2011

Today in History - November 14, 1914 - Ottoman Empire Declares a Holy War

Today in History - November 14, 1914 - Ottoman Empire Declared a Holy War  and
Moby Dick Published in 1851


On November 14, 1914, in Constantinople, capital of the Ottoman Empire, the religious leader Sheikh-ul-Islam declares an Islamic holy war on behalf of the Ottoman government, urging his Muslim followers to take up arms against Britain, France, Russia, Serbia and Montenegro in World War I.
By the time the Great War broke out in the summer of 1914, the Ottoman Empire was faltering, having lost much of its once considerable territory in Europe with its defeat in the First Balkan War two years earlier. Seeking to ally themselves with one of the great European powers to help safeguard them against future loss, the ambitious Ottoman leaders--members of the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), known collectively as the Young Turks--responded favorably to overtures made by Germany in August 1914. Though Germany and Turkey secretly concluded a military alliance on August 2, the Turks did not officially take part in World War I until several months later. On October 29, the Ottoman navy--including two German ships, Goeben and Breslau, which famously eluded the British navy in the first week of the war to reach Constantinople--attacked Russian ports in the Black Sea, marking the beginning of Turkey's participation in the war.
Read more at:   www.history.com/this-day-in-history/ottoman-empire-declares-a-holy-war
Also in 1851, the novel, ˆMoby Dick' was published. 

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