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# Officer's helmet with the badge "For Philippopolis, 3rd, 4th and 5th January 1878"
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/kaska-ofitserskaia-so-znakom-za-filippopol-3-go-4-go-i-5-go-ianvaria-1878-g/
- Published: 2025-03-02T06:37:49.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T05:30:58.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: The East, Museums

**The Battle of Philippopolis (Plovdiv) took place on 2–7 January 1878** during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878.

The Russian forces of the Western Detachment under Lieutenant-General I. V. Gurko, numbering 71,000 men and 318 guns, defeated the forces of the Turkish Western Army under Suleiman Pasha, numbering 40,000 men and 122 guns.

On 2 January the Russian troops set out from Pazardzhik, and in the evening Gurko's vanguard crossed the Maritsa in the dark. On 3 January the rest of the 2nd Guards Division crossed the river by the same route. The Russians who had got across spent the whole day in an indecisive engagement, awaiting the deployment of the main forces. Suleiman Pasha, noticing the danger, ordered an immediate retreat, but it was already far too late.

On 4 January the Russian troops took Philippopolis, and in the evening the Life Guards Lithuanian Regiment, bursting into the midst of the retreating Turkish army, destroyed an infantry brigade in a sudden night attack and captured 23 guns.

On 5 January the Turkish army turned due south, and two of its straggling divisions were destroyed. The Russian cavalry pursued the retreating Turks and on the morning of 7 January captured the remnants of the Turkish artillery

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