Saliha Sultan (daughter of Mahmud II)


Saliha Sultan was an Ottoman princess, the daughter of Sultan Mahmud II and Aşubcan Kadın. She was the half-sister of Sultans Abdulmejid I and Abdulaziz.

Early life

Saliha Sultan was born 16 June 1811 in the Topkapı Palace. Her father was Sultan Mahmud II, and her mother was Aşubcan Kadın.

Marriage

In 1834, when Saliha was twenty three years old, her father arranged her marriage to Damat Gürcü Halil Rifat Pasha. The marriage took place on Saturday, 24 May 1834 in the Beşiktaş Waterfront Palace. The bridal procession of Saliha Sultan left this palace on Thursday, conveying the bride to Fındıklı Palace. The ladies of the marriage procession rode in carriages and coaches decorated with stars. Julia Pardoe, who observed the marriage from a caique on the Bosphorus noted the illumination of the waterfront palace of Esma Sultan. She writes that, "there must have been many hundred caiques wedged together in front of her terrace, and less than fifty of them contained musicians."
The wedding ceremony was covered in the first official Ottoman newspaper Takvim-i Vekayi. Saliha Sultan's beachfront palace and Tophane and Beşiktaş palace were flooded by rafts and boats, various descriptions were put on the rafts, and small ships, fish paintings, small cars and castles were built.
The couple owned the Neşatabad Palace located in Ortaköy Defterdarburnu and the Fındıklı Palace.
The two together had one son named Sultanzade Abdul Hamid Bey, born on 22 March 1835, who died young in 1837.

Death

Saliha Sultan died on 6 February 1843 in the Fındıklı Palace, and was buried in the mausoleum of her father in Divanyolu, Istanbul.
After her death, Gürcü married Ismet Hanım. The two together had one son, Damat Mahmud Celaleddin Pasha, who married her niece Seniha Sultan, daughter of Sultan Abdulmejid I, and the granddaughter of Mahmud II.

Issue

Together with Damat Gürcü Halil Rifat, Saliha had one son: