| Padoor Rebellion | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|||||||
| Combatants | |||||||
| Kingdom of Soigá | Rebels (Protestant and Firrobatist insurgents, Republicans and various others) | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| King Hálámír General Jertö Níjávazöm General Muntik Verdyjae General Hevard Cozedodíl | Mensílúfes Bádör Hemíljez Oger |
||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| King's Army (at peak): 150,000 Various Catholic loyalist militias: 25,000 to 40,000 | At peak: 160,000 to 240,000 (the latter including various other semi autonomous rebellious groups) | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 46,000 deaths | 53,000 deaths | ||||||
| Roughly 30,000 civilian deaths, for a total death toll of about 130,000 deaths. | |||||||
Peasants forming a militia in Hertúmóper.
The Padoor Rebellion (Olfkin: Ropelí Bádörai), also known as the Padoor War, was a rebellion, or a civil war according to some historians, that occured in Soigá between May 1891 and April 1893 (thus for nearly 2 full years). It was a bloody war fought between forces of King Hálámír and a combination of anti monarchist, Protestant, Firrobatist and other rebellious forces. It is the most lethal war that ever occured on Soigan ground, with around 130,000 deaths (or around 6% of the Soigan population at the time), plus many (permanently) wounded. The war is named after the leader of the rebels, Mensílúfes Bádör, although this has been a propaganda name made by the King's side, as they tried to portray Bádör as someone who was power hungry who wanted the throne, instead as some freedom fighter fighting for a bigger cause than himself alone.
Background[]
After the end of Spanish rule (1809-1842), the Soigan king was back in power over Soigá. However, whereas Soigá had entered a golden age in the first era of the Kingdom (1733 to 1809), the second era was plagued by various crisisses, famines & crop failures, loss of colonial territory and a drain of wealth. The ineptness of the Kings to deal with these issues together with various revolutions in other countries in Europe (for example in 1848) and manifestos (like Karl Marx's Das Kapital) caused a severe distrust and resentment towards the Kings. Although there had been a few serious uprisings, no real change could be brought to how the country was administrated. With the death of King Verdídölax in 1877 came a new king: King Hálámír. King Hálámír was an extremely conservative and zealous king: he believed minorities like Protestants, Firrobatists (which he argued to be the worst), Jews, Muslims and more had to be "destroyed". Although Hálámír's programs to diminish poverty and unemployement, and create better health sanitations proved to be succesful, his aggresive and sometimes violent and deathly way of making Soigá a "strong Catholic" country made him very unpopular with the minorities, and only fueled the republicans' and anti-monarchist's ambitions to get rid of the King and get a more democratic country.
Start of conflict[]
Although the exact date of the start of the rebellion is unclear, most historians note the start date somewhere in May 1891. The rebellion is generally seen as a result of a serie of violence towards the Government in the Gyvál municipality that started around 1891. When Protestant villagers had lynched a Catholic taxman who had to collect a special "religious" tax (a severe tax introduced by King Hálámír: religious minorities had to pay nearly double the tax as Catholics had to), this had a domino effect on other villages in the regio: Government related figures were hunted away, attacked or even murdered. The army was quickly sent to the area with the extreme measure to kill any villager opposing Government rule, but the villagers quickly started arming themselves. To top on that, a part of the army located near the regio that was to be sent there, refused to go there to kill refusing villagers. The General of the army saw this as mutiny, and declared that the refusing soldiers were to be sacked of all positions, and disarmed of any weapon. This the first time Mensílúfes Bádör come into the picture. Mensílúfes Bádör was a protestant soldier who had climbed to the role of colonel. He refused to lay down the weapons and have the villagers be killed. Instead, he immediately called for soldiers to refuse the order. The first gunfighting occured when soldiers of army massacred a revolting village. This would escalate the conflict, and quickly more soldiers deserted. The conflict started to get bigger and bigger after the revolt army of Bádör could defeat the army pelotons. Bádör became the head figure after he proclaimed the conflict would be a conflict for more democracy.
Bádör knew he had to be smart to defeat the King, as the King still had a far larger army and the conflict was still relatively small. Bádör had men go to every village to recruit people, and weapons were produced in every local smith. Bádör started attacking weapon depots, to acquire weapons for the growing revolt army. His successes of defeating various army units were to be used in a propaganda machine. Various hidden cells were to post posters in the cities with calls for support for the conflict and showing the atrocities of the King (the murdered villagers were photographed). As the propaganda machine ensued, more and more street protests appeared on the streets, calling for more democracy and less persecution. Various previously hidden groups started taking up arms, and joined the fight. At the time Hálámír still viewed the conflict as petty.
Bádör showed to be a competent leader after many succeses. This gave courage to many people who were doubting to fight. With cunning skill, Bádör could make an army unit in a fort surrendering with much less men. Now Bádör had access to a whole fort, and many weapons including heavy artillery. Everyday hundreds of people were joining the revolt. The revolt became serious for the King Hálámír. Bádör also stated making his revolt army to be much more structured: weapons and logistics were handled now much more centrally, and commanders who were loyal to the revolt's ideals were assigned to various groups of soldiers, and structured in a hierarchy.
Siege of Koifólopé[]
The first real big succes was when the revolt army, which was first unstructured and divided in various areas, could be (unexpectedly for the King's forces) united quickly by Bádör to assault Koifólopé, a city in the north of the modern regio of Gazimirgá, where the propaganda tactics where very succesful for the rebels and a majority of the city wanted reforms and less persecution, in late May 1891. There were just 1,500 soldiers guarding the city, many of them placed in the city after the revolt started. They were overwhelmed by the artillery fire, and the guard house caught fire, killing dozens of soldiers. They surrendered, and now the rebel forces had a whole city of around 10,000 citizens.
This came as a shock for King Hálámír, as previously the revolt seemed not to be able to actually conquer territory. Hálámír personally ordered to retake the city as quickly as possible, as he knew this loss was an embarrassment for the army, but worse encouraged opponents of the King to take up arms and reduced the faith loyalists had to the King in being able to stop the rebels.
A massive force of 23,000 soldiers was sent over to the city, although there were only roughly 8,000 rebels in the city. However, the rebels had hided themselves in the houses, on the roofs, and even in the sewer. Plus they had around 1,000 soldier captives, which they could use as leverage or shield. However, as King Hálámír had ordered to retake the city as quickly as possible, the soldiers brought their artillery and started firing at the city. Some historians note that there is evidence that King Hálámír ordered to attack everything in the city because the city was mainly Protestant. The artillery fire caused a massive fire, causing the rebels to flee the city. But they were met with gun fire. The artillery fire killed thousands upon thousands of civilians. Only 2,000 rebels could flee, including Bádör.
The King's army had several advantages over the Rebel army, for example having modern guns.
This was the first in many of incidents caused by religion, and shows the harsh nature Catholics and Protestants viewed each other. Instead of demoralizing the enemy, as King Hálámír hoped, the bombing caused major revolts in many Protestant cities, and the propaganda machine of the rebels was quick to show that also many civilian deaths occured. It only fueled the hate towards the King, and another few thousand soldiers deserted in the first two weeks after the bombing.
Religious conflict started and counterpropaganda[]
After the bombing, Protestants started forming militias, and whole Protestant villages went to Catholic ones, resulting in fights that killed thousands of people. King Hálámír knew the propaganda of the rebels was effective, and even though he had ordered full night shifts of units patrolling the streets looking for propagandists posting posters, he knew he had to come up with counter propaganda. The incidents of Protestants attacking Catholics were a perfect opportunity to have the support of most Catholics (Catholics formed a majority), by having in the propaganda said that Bádör wanted Protestants in power in the country and that the rebels were killing innocent Catholics, showing their "true nature". Furthermore, Bádör was shown as a powerhungry opportunist who wanted the power himself, who manipulated the people into thinking otherwise.
Conservative Catholics were now also arming themselves, and various clashes occured between Protestant and Catholic civilians in the streets of the big cities. The King's army got a steady number of new recruitments of conservative Catholics wanting to fight the "Protestant monsters". The King tried to turn the narrative of the rebels about why they fought into the narrative that they fought because of religious reasons.
The King's army pushed the rebels to the North after the Bombing of Koifólopé, and incidents occured where the army massacred whole Protestant villages. Nearly 4,000 Protestants had united themselves near the small town of Vicódé, and they could stop the army in August 1891. Bádör used this time gained to unite the various units in the area to fight the army and push them back.
Battle near Vicódé[]
Bádör now had some time to improve his army. Rocket fighting proved to be effective (mainly in scaring the enemy, the accuracy itself wasn't high), and rockets were easy and cheap to produce. Nearly 300 artillery pieces had been captured from the enemy, including mortars which could shoot with a steep angle. However, the main army was still lacking in resources. Bádör had gathered around 19,000 men, including the 4,000 Protestant insurgents. However, only 11,000 had guns, of whom only half had modern guns. Bádör had already ordered the many smiths to produce a weapon that was easy to produce but could be used against the units of Hálámír equiped with modern rifles. Most of Bádör's army were peasants, who used nothing more than pitchforks, rakes, or bayonets to fight the enemy. Thus, Bádör used a technique:
With artillery and rockets, the enemy army would be lured out of its defense, to attack Bádör's army. The people with guns would dig themselves in, to fire on the enemy and have a chance against the many more people with guns in the King's army. In the mean time, the cavalery of Bádör would attack at one flank, which would cause the army of the King to sent reinforcements to that flank. Meanwhile, the peasants with melee weapons would attack the weakened flank at the other side and so overrun the enemy.
When the battle started, Bádör made sure his artillery had a range benefit over the enemy's artillery, by placing the artillery in the town. This caused the enemy's cavalery to attack the artilley in the town. However, many peasants were in the town to quickly transport the canons into the alleys of the city, which made it difficult for the cavalery to charge, but it also made them split up. Then, peasants came out of the alleys with spears, and surrounded isolated cavalerists. When the King's cavalery retreated, it had already lost a significant part of its size. Now, the cannons were back in their positions, were they could fire at the enemy. The rebels with guns hided in the houses. The King's army was bombed with shells after shells after shells, plus many rockets made big explosions demoralizing the enemy. The King's army quickly went to the town, however they were met with many alley fighting. In the mean time the Cavalery of the rebels had hided from plain sight, and had waited for the right moment to attack from behind the canons and other artillery of the King. The artillerists were easily defeated, and it caused as well a significant part of the King's army to go back to the artillery to defend it. Now, peasants with melee weapon could surround the town easily, as they had before the battle investigated which alleys were to be taken to surround the enemy efficiently.
The King's army that was trapped had, after a few hours fighting, surrendered, seeing that it was hopeless to fight the enemy further. The cavalery of the rebels had secured the enemy's artillery, after defending it from the part of the King's army that was sent back to the artillery. The King's soldiers that could retreat, retreated, and the battle was clearly won by Bádör. However, both sides had an equal amount of casualties (around 6,000 each), but Bádör now had nearly 10,000 prisoners (which he ordered to be used as leverage), 320 captured pieces of artillery, 13,000 captured modern rifles and a few thousand captured horses.
Power balances shifting and King's army rearming[]
The Battle near Vicódé was a major hit to the morale of the King's army. It now seemed not unlikely that the rebellion would actually succeed. Other European countries started to show interest, especially countries with still an absolutive king. Whereas when the rebellion had started, it seemed like the revolt would stay relatively small and not be able to succeed in its goals, as the King's army was far larger, at the end of 1891, things had shown to be a lot different. The Rebel army had driven away the King's army away from the East, and the regio of Gázimirgá (just North of the capital of Makán) was being conquered quickly. The river of Sutífeln (the traditional border between Protestant North and East of Catholic South) was being neared. The King's army had suffered severe losses in several battles. and was both broken in morale as in structure. The rebels had captured a large number of cannons and other weapons from forts and weapon stocks. New volunteers to join the rebel army were enough to replenish the losses.
King Hálámír declared that a "Total War" happened on the "Holfan Catholics". Hálámír used his special Catholic units (who were absolutely loyal to him and hated Protestants) to loot any Protestant village they could, and Protestant homes in King controlled areas were often invaded for wealth material. Catholics had to start a higher tax, for "homeland". Catholics were ordered en masse to get in the army. Firrobatists were practically enslaved to work in the agriculture and factories (to replace the new Catholic recruits). With the extra money, Hálámír purchased more weapons, including a new ship. This ship was armed with two heavy cannons of high caliber (220 mm) and had a range of around 25 km. With this new rearming, the conflict started increasing rapidly in casualties. Many innocent victims fell after the many raidings of the King's army. The King also started increasing orders of capturing anyone who "might" be a complicant of the rebels or who might be able to go fight for the rebels. Many public executions happened, and often the captured citizens were bluntly killed or put in the prison.
Bombing of Haireken[]
At the time of February 1892, the Rebels had large areas in the East in control. The areas under control of the King were the South and the North. In the East, rebels had recently conquered the city of Haireken, a large port city. The city was important as it had large factories and a large port. The rebels had begun transforming the city so that weapons and other material could be quicker and more produced. Trading with other nations occured, and shipbuilding as well. Whereas only around 2,000 rifles could be obtained by the Rebels before February 1892 every week, in February 1892 this had been 8,000. Large cannons could be made, and the resourceful areas in the North (primarily in Hárýpé) had given acces to large amounts of iron and other resources. Now the Rebels had the opportunity to significantly bolster their campaigns, and they already had the winning hand.
King Hálámír therefore ordered his Navy to relentlesly bomb Haireken, so the city could not be used by the rebels. He still had naval superiority, even though the rebels had started making ships. The rebels had as well installed canons on the docks, and made makeshift walls to protect against a bombing, which they knew would happen. However, King Hálámír's ships were equipped with canons that had a massive range. The bombing of the city started on 12th of February, and for 8 days, the city was being bombed. This caused the deaths of roughly 9,000 people, including 7,000 citizens. After 1,739 heavy shells, all factories were destroyed, the port being unusable, and most rebels had fled the city out of fear of the bombs. The situation was made worse by the disease pandemics and food shortages that occured after the bombing. Roughly 4,000 more citizens died because of the food shortages or disease pandemics. Haireken had been one of the most important cities in Soigá before the war, but after the war not anymore. With most of the factories (and thus jobs) being destroyed the many surviving people left the city. The city was plundered of its stone, iron and other building material during the many decades after the war.