[3] In 1834, when Saliha was twenty three years old, her father arranged her marriage to Damat Gürcü Halil Rifat Pasha.
[4] Julia Pardoe, who observed the marriage from a caique on the Bosphorus noted the illumination of the waterfront palace of Esma Sultan.
[8][9][10] According to Julia Pardoe, Saliha was a haughty person and had a turbulent relationship with her father Mahmud II.
In her memoir of her journey on Istanbul, The Sultan and Domestic Manners of the Turks (1837), she relates two episodes in particular.
In the first, Saliha would be harshly reprimanded by Mahmud II for ordering to beat a group of Ulema who had not bowed to her passing by in the carriage.