Rîmnic

Rîmnic 

a river in Rumania, a tributary of the Siretul (Siret) River. A battle was fought on the Rîmnic on Sept. 11 (22), 1789, during the Russo-Turkish War of 1787–91.

After using decoy maneuvers to tie down the main forces of the Russian Army at Izmail, the Turkish commander in chief, Grand Vizier Yusuf Pasha, sent his main forces of about 100,000 men (mostly cavalry) against the Prince of Coburg’s Austrian corps of 18,000 men (Austria was Russia’s ally), which was located near Focşsani. Upon learning about the movement of the Turks, A. V. Suvorov, whose detachment was near Bîrlad, set out on the night of September 7 (18) with 7,000 men to help the allies. Covering about 100 km in 2½ days, the Russian troops arrived in Focşani before the Turks. Having established that the Turks were not expecting an attack and had taken up position in four camps between the Rîmna and Rîmnic rivers, Suvorov, who had assumed the command of the Russo-Austrian troops, decided to pass to the offensive. After a 14-km night march, the Russo-Austrian troops attacked the first Turkish camp by surprise. Repelling the counterattacks of the numerous Turkish cavalry with fire from a square formation, the Russo-Austrian troops successively overpowered the three other Turkish camps with decisive strikes. The enemy fled in panic.

The allies lost about 700 men, and the Turks lost, according to different counts, from 6,000 to 20,000 men in killed and wounded and their whole artillery and supply train. Suvorov received the title of Count Rymnikskii for the victory on the Rîmnic.