Antoni Aleksander Iliński
| Iskender Pasha | |
|---|---|
Antoni Aleksander Ilinski (Iskender Pasha) as Brigadier General in the Ottoman Army
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| Native name | Mehmet İskender Paşa |
| Birth name | Antoni Aleksander Iliński |
| Born | 1814 Žilina, Hungary |
| Died | 1861 (aged 46–47) Constantinople, Ottoman Empire |
| Allegiance |
 Ottoman Empire
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| Service/branch |
 Ottoman Army
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| Years of service | 1844–1861 |
| Rank | Mirliva |
| Battles/wars | |
Antoni Aleksander Iliński, also known as Iskender Pasha (Turkish: Mehmet İskender Paşa; 1814–1861), was a Polish-Ottoman military officer and general. A Polish independence activist and insurgent, he took part in the independence struggles of Poles and Hungarians against the Austrian-Russian alliance. He converted to Islam in 1844 and subsequently served in various commanding posts in the Ottoman Army during the reign of Abdülmecid I (1839–1861) in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Danube, Crimea, Transcaucasia, and Baghdad. He was promoted to the rank of Pasha (General) during the Crimean War in 1855.
Antoni Aleksander Iliński was born in the town of Žilina (Ilina), in Hungary. In 1830, he took part in the November Uprising as a young officer of the Lithuanian Legion. He was an active member of the movement of Polish exiles led by Prince Adam Jerzy Czartoryski from Paris. Iliński worked under the leadership of Józef Bem in his abortive Portuguese Legion attempt (1833), and in further struggles to form Polish legions in Spain, France and elsewhere.
In 1844 he was arrested in Constantinople upon Russian request, for allegedly working to organise Ukrainian Cossack legions under Michał Czajkowski's "Eastern Agency". The Ottoman authorities were indifferent, but Russia pressured for his handover for trial. To escape this trap, he consented to an offer to convert to Islam and assumed Ottoman nationality under the new name of Mehmed Iskender. He was immediately accepted as a Lieutenant Colonel in the Ottoman Army as "Iskender Beg". In the years 1848–49, during the time of Spring of Nations, he was again Bem's aide in Hungary.
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