Turks at Last Under Way.

New York Times 100 years ago today, October 30, 1912:
By Marconi Transatlantic Wireless to The New York Times.
    LONDON. Wednesday, Oct. 30.— According to reports from Lieut. Wegener at the Bulgarian front and from Turkish official sources, the great battle which is to decide the fate of Turkey has now apparently begun.
    There are, however, several points in such news as has been received in the last twenty-four hours which are decidedly obscure, and even suggest that at last the Turks may have found themselves and that all is not going well with the hitherto all-conquering foe.
    In any case, it seems certain that there has been a considerable alteration in the Bulgarian plans from the outline which Lieut. Wegener was permitted to send to the Reichepost under date of Sunday evening. Of course it is possible that the Bulgarian staff, was utilizing this officer in order to supply the Turks with misinformation.
    In Vienna the absence of any news of actual happenings from the Bulgarian front is construed to mean that the Bulgarians have suffered a check, and this view is taken by the well-known military correspondent of The Times, Col. Repington, who suggests that the Bulgarians attempted to capture Adrianople by assault, and failed. Col. Repington's theory is developed as follows:
    "The first Bulgarian Army, under Gen. Ivanoff, was destined for the attack on Adrianople in the first instance. It consists of five Bulgarian divisions, and conceivably one Servian. This army deployed in two groups north and west of Adrianople on Oct. 22, and during the days immediately following drew its lines around the town on all sides except, possibly, on the southeast.
    "The Bulgarians' siege artillery, which must have been handy to the front, came up and fire was opened. Turkish sorties were, according to Bulgarian reports, repulsed, and the confident hope was entertained at Sofia that the place would promptly fall to an assault.

Importance of Adrianople.
    "There was and there is every reason for Bulgaria to desire the speedy fall of Adrianople. It is a necessity to secure the use of the railway for purposes of transport and supply. It was evident that the moral and political effect of the capture of the fortress would have been very great. The need to set free the first army for operations to the southward was obvious to everybody. The general situation in the fortress before the outbreak of war must have been well known to the Bulgarian intelligence service and advices from Sofia demonstrated that early success was confidently anticipated.
    "Days go by, and there is no direct news from Adrianople, and still more interesting is it that, so far as we know, no large detachments from the First Army have come south,
    "The inference is that an assault has been made and has failed. The sudden mobilization of the Bulgarian last reserve and the calling up of a fresh levy of young men are indications that all is not going quite well, and all the time there are Roumania, obviously uneasy, and a steady flow of Turkish reinforcements from Asia Minor to be borne in mind.
    "The need was to finish quickly with Adrianople, and though we may hear soon that its investment has been handed over to the reserves and the young levies, there probably must be left before the place several active divisions, and, on the whole, the general conclusion reached is that the Bulgarian First Army is mainly occupied with the attack on the town and has probably failed at present in the effort to assault it."
    Col. Repington further argues that Lieut. Wegener's information as to an intended Bulgarian attack on the Turkish force along the Ergene River was meant to throw the Turks off the real track, which is that the mission of the Bulgarian Second Army is to threaten Constantinople, tie down Nazim Pasha to a defensive role and cover the prosecution of the attack on Adrianople. He says:
    "It is a very bold game, if the Bulgarian First Army is unable to co-operate with it."
    Some apparent confirmation of these pro-Turkish inferences is found in a Sofia dispatch stating that large numbers of wounded continue to arrive there and that heavy fighting, in regard to which no information is available, is believed to have taken place recently near Adrianople.
    The operations in other districts continue without specially remarkable developments.
    Turkish official reports say that Tager Bey has driven the Bulgarians out of Tirnovo, but this surprising effort of imagination is not calculated to obliterate the fact that, careless of Lincoln's advice about not swapping horses when crossing a stream, the Sultan has accepted the resignation of Mukhtar Pasha's Cabinet and has appointed Kiamil Pasha Grand Vizier.