Facing external and internal threats to their authority and the empire’s territorial integrity, the Ottoman political elite in Istanbul launched an unprecedented agenda of institutional reform, centralization, and military mobilization in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. In 1826, Sultan Mahmud II (r. 1808-39) destroyed the Janissary Corps, a potential threat to these policies, and ordered the creation of a disciplined, European-style army. To this end, the Ottoman state conscripted an unprecedented number of Muslim recruits from the lower classes of urban and rural populations in the following decades. By the end of the Crimean War (1853-56), perhaps as many as 500,000 men in total had been pressed into the regular and reserve formations. In official papers, Ottoman decision-makers and ideologues, who demanded loyalty and sacrifice from their conscripts, repeatedly framed the era’s armed conflicts as ones waged between the rightful Islamic state and “foreign infidels,” “enemies of Islam,” and “heretics.” But what did the actual conscripts think about their military service? How did they respond to their new, dangerous lives as the sultan’s soldiers? To what extent were the widespread historical and contemporary assumptions about “Islamic fanaticism” or “born-soldier” qualities of the Ottoman/Turkish troops correct? What were the stories of those who no longer wanted to serve, and those who simply escaped from the ranks to become civilians again by their own means and choosing? Compared to its Western counterparts, history of the Ottoman military in the nineteenth century remains unexplored. Furthermore, Ottoman/Middle East historians have shown very little interest in the experiences of the ordinary Ottoman soldier and junior officers in this era. By utilizing primary sources produced from the Ottoman military tribunals (including statements by the soldiers), civilian bureaucracy, and domestic surveillance reports, this paper will address the questions posed above and attempt to suggest some answers.