1658: Prince György Rákóczi II defeated the Ottoman army

The Transylvanian prince’s campaign against Poland resulted in a retributive military action by the Sublime Porte.
At first, they declared the dethronement of Rákóczi and assigned Rhédey Ferenc in his place. (Note, I am using the Eastern name order for Hungarian names where the family names come first.) Yet, Rákóczi took back his throne in January 1658 which act was naturally not accepted by the Sultan. The Ottomans began to demand Rhédey cede the Castle of Borosjenő to them and this request was combined with a punitive war against Rákóczi.

The warriors in (Boros)Jenő Castle were supporting Rákóczi as it was he who guaranteed the defense of the castle. They received the news in May that the Pasha of Buda, Kenán Gurdzsi was getting ready to set out against Jenő Castle. This triggered the hostility between the Turks and the Hungarians along the Borderland between the Ottoman Occupied Lands of Hungary and Transylvania, mainly between the warriors of Jenő Castle and the Turk warriors of Gyula Castle. The soldiers of Várad Castle soon joined in.

At the end of May, the Pasha of Buda was near Lippa Castle and he was joined there by the Begler-Bey of Temesvár and by the Bey of Esztergom with 1,000 horsemen. Rákóczi’s reaction was to go to Bihar County to recruit more soldiers. In the meantime, the warriors of Jenő Castle ambushed the vanguard of the Turk army. There was a famous warrior among the Hungarians called Kádár István who was said to have slain three Turks at the same time; his deeds were even recorded in a historic song. During the fight, they also took several high-ranking Ottoman officers and executed them.

Prince Rákóczi heard the news of the enemy’s coming against Jenő Castle so he and his army set out towards Jenő Castle at the end of June from his camp of Jánosd. Finding no enemy at Jenő, he reinforced his army with the garrison of the castle and marched on towards Arad Castle to reach the enemy before soon. He wanted to divert the attention of the Pasha from Jenő Castle, too.
Having arrived at Arad Castle, he had the wooden palisade set on fire. Seeing the smoke, Pasha Kenán came out of Lippa Castle.

The two armies clashed near Lippa Castle, in the Pass of Pálülés.

Prince Rákóczi deployed 7,000 cavalrymen, 2,000 infantrymen, and 8 cannons in a wedge-shaped formation. The right wing was led by Captain Gyulai Ferenc of Várad Castle: he deployed the recruited infantrymen in the first line, commanded by Barkóczy István.

The Hajdú soldiers of Captain Szuhay Mátyás of Kálló Castle stood on the left wing. The artillery was led by a Scottish officer called András (Andrew) Gaudi. You can read more about Gaudi here:

https://www.hungarianottomanwars.com/essays/andrew-gaudi-the-scot-hero-of-varad/
The very edge of the right- and the left wing were manned by the mercenaries of Ebeni István and Bakos Gáspár, to fend off any attacks that might come from the sides.

The Ottoman cavalry was commanded by the Sanjak Bey of Esztergom and by the Pasha of Eger Castle. The middle was led by Pasha Kenán of Buda Castle, supported by the Janissaries and the artillery, along with 800 cavalrymen. Their primary goal was to hit Jenő Castle.
The troops of Kenán were situated in a bushy area, sheltered by some trenches and a ruined stone wall.

The fight broke out at 10 A.M. when the Ottoman vanguard launched an attack. It was beaten back by the Hungarian left-wing which launched a strong counter-attack that made the Turk right-wing flee. The same thing took place on the Hungarians’ right wing.
Yet, the fleeing Ottomans were stopped in the Pass of Pálülés where the Ottoman middle-ward was deployed. The runners turned back and a bloody fight developed.

It was the time when Ebeni István took over the main command and with the help of Gyulai, they tried to withdraw a bit of the Transylvanian army to make an order. The Janissaries saw this as a great opportunity to attack and under the cover of their cannons, they threw themselves at the Hungarians.
They were not aware of Gaudi’s cannons which were well-hidden in the forest, though. The cannons of the Scottish officer made a terrible carnage among the Janissaries.

The Hungarian troops ran down from the higher ground and surrounded them, then slaughtering the elite troops of the Pasha. Several thousand of them perished in a few hours. The Ottoman troops were all fleeing at about 4 P.M. towards Lippa Castle, led by Pasha Kenán.

The road between Pálülés and Lippa was covered by the corpses of 3,000 Ottoman soldiers but many of them died in the Maros river, too. The Pasha of Eger lost his life, likewise the Bey of Esztergom. Two hundred Turks were captured, and Pasha Haszán, the Tihaja of Buda was among them.
The Hungarians took three cannons and many wagons of food.

Allegedly, only 20 soldiers died from the Transylvanian army, including Lieutenant Forray János. Várallyai Lőrinc, the Protestant preacher of Rákóczi’s court held a church service after the battle whereas the entire army was eagerly singing Psalms to give thanks for the victory to God.

Then, the Hungarians intended to take advantage of the victory and appeared at Gyula Castle. Yet, they were not prepared to receive the attack of the coming main Ottoman army. So Prince Rákóczi sent the Borderland warriors back to their castles. Here you can read more about Borosjenő castle:

https://www.hungarianottomanwars.com/transylvania/borosjeno/

Unfortunately, the warriors of Jenő Castle didn’t pay heed to the Prince’s warning and there were only 350 soldiers in Jenő Castle when the Grand Vizier, Köprülü Mehmed arrived there at the end of August…

…a comment: “Thanks” to Prince Rákóczi, the Ottomans decimated Transylvania in the next three years, it was the period when the Hungarians were wiped out between Gyulafehérvár (Alba Iulia) and Arad…

13-20 September 1658 The Crimean Tartars besieged Várad

After the victory at Pálülés, Prince Rákóczi II György retreated to Várad, while the Crimean Tatar armies invading Transylvania systematically destroyed the province, especially the Hungarian-inhabited areas of the lower Mezőség region became the victims of the cruel destruction. Finally, they broke through the Meszes Mountains and the Király Pass into the Partium, between Transylvania, the Ottoman lands, and Royal Hungary.

On 13 September, Rákóczi, under the command of the Scottish officer Andrew Gaudi, left the bulk of his infantry at Várad and marched with his light cavalry to attack the Tartars. However, he was unable to catch up with the fast-moving raiders, who by this time had already ravaged the regions of the Érmellék, Székelyhíd, Somlyó and Tasnád.

Rákóczi could only follow the trail of the Tatars, who were leaving destruction in their wake, and finally reached Nagykároly, but he sent a few thousand soldiers led by Captain Szuhay Mátyás of Kálló to the Meszes region. They found the Tartar camp, but, not knowing the strength of Khan Mehmed IV Giray’s forces, they did not dare to attack.

Meanwhile, on 13 September the Tartar outposts reached Várad, and two days later the Khan himself arrived. Another Tartar army, which had been raiding the Érmellék and the Berettyó valley, joined the attack, and it was rumored that the Grand Vizier, Mehmed Köprülü, was also on his way here. Rákóczi therefore retreated even further away, to Kálló near the Tisza River.

Although the guards’ pay was stagnant, Várad was preparing to resist, Andrew Gaudi was a good enough soldier to know that it was not hopeless to engage in combat against the light-horse Tatars. Even as the enemy approached, the few cavalrymen were already breaking out of the castle and achieving considerable success. Eventually, the defenders were pushed back into the city by the overwhelming numbers, but even then Gaudi tried to keep the attackers as far away from the castle walls as possible.

Unfortunately, the defense of the town had been completely neglected in the past, the large town between the branches of the Körös River was neither defended by a rampart nor a palisade, the stone wall on the western side of the Péntekhely district was in a very dilapidated state, it was reinforced by a tower of empty barrels, where Rákóczi’s Hungarian and German bodyguards were ordered. Gaudi also blocked off the old battlements of Olaszi and the streets with barrel barricades and 100 infantrymen.

The defense was made more difficult because the houses in the town to the west of the castle prevented the castle’s guns from firing. Gaudí had two small ‘mortar-shaped’ cannon barrels converted into light field guns towed by two horses, making them easy to move and redeploy at any time.

When the clash began on 15 September, the guns were left behind, and then, as the enemy approached, the soldiers of Várad took evasive action, and the guns poured a terrible hail of cannon fire on the attackers. In the outskirts of the city, 500 houses were burnt to the ground, but amid the fighting, the defenders were able to prevent the fire from spreading.

The “siege” lasted barely five days, and on 20 September Mehmed Girai was on his way home. Rákóczi also moved his headquarters to Debrecen and called men of the city’s inhabitants and refugees to arms, who hurried to obey the order. But the poorly armed insurgents were eventually sent home.

The Tartars did not retreat towards Máramaros, but south towards Jenő, and Rákóczi missed the last chance to free the captives. The example of the people of Szentjób showed that there was hope for success, here the nobles who had fled to the castle and 200 serfs with rifles ambushed the Tartars at Sárköz one night and, freeing the prisoners, smashed the Tartars.

While Rákóczi and the people of Várad were fighting the Tatars, the Grand Vizier appointed Barcsay Ákos, Rákóczi’s former chieftain, as a prince in his camp. The deposed prince, however, refused to accept this and the fight for Transylvania and the Transylvanian territory continued for years.

(Source: Szibler Gábor, and B. Szabó János: Erdély tragédiája 1657-1662)

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