The first Turks Siege of Vienna took place in the year 1529.
It was on the 29th August 1526 when Hungarian King "Ludwig II" died in the battle of Mohacs. His death was the end of the 400 years old Hungarian nation. The way to Vienna was now free for the Turkish army of the Ottoman Empire.
Only three years later the whole Turkish crowd with Sultan Süleyman II was standing infront of the gates of Vienna. Duke Niklas Salm was the hero who organized the fortress and some soldiers to keep the Turks out of Vienna.
300.000 Turkish soldiers left in May 1529 Konstantinobel and reached in July Beograd. On the 11th of September the Hungarian town "Ofen" was taken by the Turks. The churchman Ferdinand I. in Vienna started to cry desperate for help, but his brother, the Emperor Karl V., did not care much, because he had other interests in Western Europe.
In fact of that it was no wonder that the citizens of Vienna started to panic and tried to leave the city if they could. But only very rich people with a lot of money, were able to pay the journey and get far away from Vienna. The mayor of Vienna was Wolfgang Treu. He stayed with some few poor citizens to defend the city. But they knew that it would be impossible to hold their home, because the fences and trenches were a bad joke. So they started to burn down the suburbs of Vienna, and concentrated themselfes only to defend the old town of Vienna. In only three days 800 houses were destroyed that way.
Turks were coming closer and closer. There was enough of food and ammounition in the city, but the people were not so excited to go to war. Only 1.000 people were willing to defend their homes.
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Sultan Suleyman's 300.000 soldiers were not able to beat 1.000 Austrians |
On the 21th September the first Turkish soldiers showed up in Schwechat and Simmering, and first fights occured. In only 5 days Schwechat and Simmering were taken by the Turks, and Vienna was locked.
The battle of Vienna lasted three weeks. Turks were trying to get into Vienna, and they even started to burrow underground tunnels to get inside. But those brave men inside of Vienna also started to burrow underground tunnels to meet and beat the Turks subterranean. And they did. But on the 14th October the Turkish army leader Süleyman was blowing for the main attack. A huge explosion destroyed 80 meters of the city wall and a bloody fight started between those two armies. About 300.000 Turkish soldiers were not able to beat 1.000 Austrians inside of Vienna. In the afternoon of the same day, Süleyman canceled the attack. The siege was broken off. Süleyman did not want to continue his siege, because he was afraid of the winter. Vienna was rescued!
But the Austrian victory was disastrous. Everything was destroyed outside of Vienna. The vineyards, the main source of income of the city, were all annihilated. The economical damage was enormous.
