The Civil War OR and 19th Century American newspapers are full of examples of the revulsion by many with the idea of arming slaves and creating servant armies. The history of this goes back to Europe and the 16th-17th Century wars with the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman-Turks had several elite fighting force made up of slaves. One of these called the Janissaries-- These elite slave troops had been the Christian children of European captives. They were converted into the Muslim faith and trained as strict warriors dedicated to their masters. By 1826 their numbers had swelled to 135,000. The Turkish sultan saw a threat and decided he no longer needed them, and incited a revolt amongst them. This led to the near complete extermination of the Janissaries by the Turks, who killed nearly all of them after their capture.