by Benny Morris
supplied during the entire journey, which went slowly thanks to the limited
rail infrastructure: the lone track carried many trains travelling in both direc-
tions, so cars were forced to sidetrack for hours at a time. Many died in the
cars. Escape was virtually impossible, as “all along the railway line from Konia
to Karaman, Eregli and Bozanti . . . hundreds of thousands of Armenians were
pursued by the gendarmes.” 6 When the surviving exiles fi nally disembarked,
usually in the town of Pozantı, they still had to march hundreds of miles
through arid countryside to reach the deserts of Syria and Iraq.
Edirne
Located in the far northwest, on the Eu ro pean side of the empire, the vilayet
of Edirne had no significant “Armenian prob lem” at the start of the Great War.
The Armenian population was small, just 20,000. Attempts by the Balkan
The Western River, and Downstream
states to recruit them in 1912–1913 had gotten nowhere. The few Armenians
suspected of disloyalty had been expelled to Bulgaria.7 Local authorities were
more worried about the larger and more threatening Greek and Bulgarian
communities.8 Almost 30,000 Greeks had crossed the border to join the Greek
army during the Balkan wars. Many of these volunteers also fought against
the Ottomans during the world war.9
Thus when Britain and France began bombarding Gallipoli in late Feb-
ruary 1915, General Liman ordered the deportation of the region’s Greek
inhabitants. Greeks were gradually driven from their homes, transferred to
Edirne city, and then nudged across the border into neighboring countries.10
Whereas Armenians were routinely prevented from leaving the empire, forced
to stay and be killed, Greeks were encouraged to go. The government fur-
nished travel documents with alacrity, and in short order some 40,000
Greeks emigrated. Their properties were seized, in most cases turned over to
muhacirs.11
Edirne’s governors received the Armenian deportation order in May, but
they at first believed, or were given to understand, that they were not ex-
pected to comply. Edirne was regarded as marginal, as indicated by its ab-
sence from Talât’s pedantic deportation summaries of 1917.12 Adil Bey, the
vali in the first half of 1915, welcomed the government’s indifference. Ac-
cording to Dashnak sources, he was far from keen on deportations. He did,
on orders from the Interior Ministry, have some leading Armenians arrested
in late April. But he refrained from torture, trials, and executions.13 However,
later in 1915 he was replaced by Zekeriya Zihni Bey, a CUP stalwart.14
On the night of October 27, most of Edirne city’s Armenian community
was rounded up, and the deportation began. The authorities put on a show
of civility. Each of the 500 or so families was provided a carriage; gendarmes
helped load the vehicles and direct traffic. But “a few kilo meters in[to] the
interior,” the American consular agent in Edirne, Charles Allen, reported,
“the people are compelled to descend from the carriages and proceed on
foot, the carriages returning to the city.”15 Many were murdered or died during
the initial journey. The rest were put on boats, two of which sank under
mysterious circumstances near Tekirdağ (Rodosto), in the Sea of Marmara.16
The other boats anchored in Izmit, where the deportees disembarked and
continued on foot toward the Syrian Desert. In the postwar trials, Edirne’s
The Young Turk s
CUP representative, Abdülgani, “whose power matched that of the vali,” was
convicted of having planned the murders.17
In the wake of the deportation and killings, Austro- Hungarian Consul
Arthur Nadamlenzki lamented that “all city life has ceased” in Edirne.
“The shops are closed at 3 in the after noon. Armenians and Greeks do not
dare to leave their houses: the entire Christian population is passing an-
guished hours and living in constant fear.”18 Houses were confiscated and
looted. The authorities invited muhacirs and locals, presumably Muslims,
to rent them.19
Halil Bey, the Ottoman foreign minister, told Morgenthau that the Edirne
deportation was a mistake, the personal initiative of Zihni Bey, the zealous new
vali. By the middle of November, Talât had ordered Zihni to halt the depor-
tation.20 But in early March 1916, the rest of Edirne’s Armenians were de-
ported, including the chief cleric, Archimandrite Arsen, who was dragged
The Western River of Armenian Deportation and Murder
Black Sea
Edirne
10-11/1915
N
3/1916
Tekirdağ
Istanbul
Sinop
Kastamonu
Adapazari
Izmit
Merzifon
8-9/1915
8-9/1915
Samsun
Gallipoli
6/1915
Bursa
Amasya
8/1915
8/1915
Aegean
Bahçecik
Tokat
8-9/1915
Ankara
8/1915
Sea
8-9/1915
Eskişehir
Yozgat
Sivas
7/1915
Kutahya
Afyonkarahisar
Izmir
Kayseri and Talas
8/1915
Aydın
Malatya
Konya
Zeytun
8/1915–3/1916
3-4/1915
Kahramanmaras
Gaziantep
Adana
Osmaniye 9-10/1915
Mersin
Fethiye
Iskenderun
7/1915
Adana, Dortyol,
Musadağ
7-9/1915
Al Bab
Mersin, Iskanderun
Mediterranean Sea
1909
Antakya
Aleppo
8/1915
2/1916
Maskanah
0
100
200
300
Deportation
Mass kill zone
Organized resistance
KM
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through the streets and beaten. “Only conversion to Islam can save the un-
fortunate victims,” Nadamlenzki reported. “Forty families have already sub-
mitted requests for conversion.”21 Permission was granted, but a few days later
several converts were caught trying to cross the border to Bulgaria. The au-
thorities then revoked the entire group’s conversion, declaring, “They have
not become Muslims in their hearts.”22
Izmit
Since the sixteenth century, Izmit, the city and mutasarriflik (a kind of sanjak), had been major Armenian centers. The absence of major Muslim religious
sites meant that more ardent believers tended to spend their time elsewhere,
making Izmit a relatively welcoming place for Christians. And Armenians
there took advantage of proximity to Constantinople and the ports of the
Marmara to develop a thriving silk industry.
But no region was immune to the crackdown. At the beginning of the war,
the authorities carried out systematic searches and discovered guns and bo
mb
caches in Armenian homes in towns and villages around Izmit, including
Bahçecik (Bardizag), Arslanbey, Döngel, and Yuvacık. The German consul-
general in Constantinople later claimed that most of the bombs were antiques,
made, ironically, by Armenians collaborating with the Young Turks against
Abdülhamid’s regime years before.23 Around the same time, a number of Izmit
inhabitants were arrested on suspicion of contacting a French spy ring. Then,
in April 1915, many local leaders were arrested. Abuse and torture seem to
have been minimal, and most were released. In May police began patrolling
Izmit’s Armenian quarters, looking for deserters. In one incident, shots were
fired and a deserter wounded. Emboldened by what they had found, police
then undertook more searches and arrests.24
On July 20 official notices went up around town, instructing the Armenians
to prepare to leave. People packed suitcases and sold belongings, but the de-
portation was delayed, perhaps at foreign insistence. Morgenthau had, after
all, secured from Enver a promise that these deportations “would be done with
moderation and decency.”25 But Talât was insistent. On August 9 he cabled
Izmit’s mutesarrif to ask why the deportation was being delayed.26 At this
point, Morgenthau wrote, the government’s “decision was definitely rendered.”
The Young Turk s
Supposedly the authorities “had found 100 bombs at Adabazar [Adapazarı]
and were afraid that the Rus sians might come . . . and the Armenians in that
region might assist them!” Morgenthau was incredulous, given the distance
to the Rus sian front.27
A few days after Talât’s cable, thousands of families and soldiers were de-
ported from Izmit and surrounding towns and villages. Armenian properties
were looted. A range of officials took part, from the mayors of Bahçecik and
Derbend to the local prison warden and the CUP secretaries for Adapazarı
and Izmit mutesarriflik. The Armenians either were dispatched southeastward
or scattered among larger neighboring Turkish villages, in line with the
5 percent rule.28
While the women, children, el derly, and infirm traveled by train, some men
were sent out on foot. Dr. William Dodd of the American hospital in Konya
encountered Izmit deportees as they entered the town’s train station:
They came by hundreds on train after train. They had been compelled
to pay the railway fare, 180 piasters for each person, and then were
packed into box- cars forty to forty- five in the car, men women and
children, sick and well, for the journey that took four or five days. There
were deaths on the cars, there were babies born in the midst of this crowd,
there were those who threw themselves into the lake on the way. Of the
beatings and treatment received before starting I have heard much.29
The deportees were led to believe that Konya would be their destination,
where they would be re united with the men sent on foot. But, for many, the
stay in Konya proved as temporary as it was hazardous. For months, while
the rails were devoted to military usage, deportees were stuck in the city.
Those who could afford to rented rooms; others camped in the open or in
makeshift tents near the station.30 Eventually many of the deportees were put
on trains to Pozantı, from which they continued to the desert on foot, still
without their husbands and fathers.31 At one point that summer, a group of
Izmit Armenian Protestants and state employees whose expertise was
thought indispensable received special permission to return with their fami-
lies. They made their way home, only to have their permits torn up by the
vali. They were sent back to Konya.32
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Some Izmit- area Armenians, mainly from Bahçecik, were massacred as
they left town.33 This seems to be what an Austrian diplomat had in mind
when he reported to his foreign office, “A specialist for the slaughter of
Armenians whom I personally know, ex- vali of Adana Emin Buad, . . . was
sent to Ismid on a secret mission to or ga nize a small, condensed version of
his work in Adana.”34 The diplomat was referring to the killing of thou-
sands in that city in 1909, amid an attempted coup against the new CUP-
led government.
Those who survived the journey to the desert reached their destination
more than seven months after setting out.35 At the end of the war, a British
officer, Lieutenant C. E. S. Palmer, estimated that, in total, about 120,000 Ar-
menians had been deported from Izmit mutesarriflik. About 30,000 were ac-
counted for, living in other regions of the empire; only 4,000 remained in the
mutesarriflik.36 Talât’s 1917 numbers were considerably lower, but the ratio
was similar. According to his black book, there were just over 56,000 Arme-
nians in the mutesarriflik before the deportation, of whom slightly more than
13,000 were alive afterward, mostly living elsewhere.37
Bursa
Both the governor and CUP responsible secretary in Bursa pushed for de-
portations from an early date, but higher- ups apparently held them back. De-
portation from the vilayet was fi nally announced on August 14.38 Armenians
were essential to the international silk trade centered on Bursa, but, as else-
where, their economic clout could not protect them. “All Armenians must be
deported,” the vali declared, “without regard for gender, age and health.”
During the postwar trials, a prosecutor accused the secretary, Midhat, of going
out of his way to ensure immediate removal of the sick, who were usually ex-
empted from initial deportation orders. Per local directives, Armenians’
property would be used to pay their debts to merchants and suppliers and
other wise would be sealed away. Their houses would be rented out. The de-
portees were given three days to prepare for departure. They sold what
they could; heirlooms went for a pittance. Officials told the deportees that
they would be settled in Konya, but at this point well- founded rumors held
that, from there, they would continue on foot to Deir Zor.39 The expulsions
The Young Turk s
kicked off on August 18, with about 1,800 Armenians loaded onto 500 ox
carts. More would be dispatched in the days that followed.40
At the beginning of September Dr. Wilfred Post, another American physician
working at the hospital in Konya, encountered “perhaps 5,000 exiles” from
Bursa. They camped in fields near the rail station, begged in the streets, and
waited for a train. The deportees told Post that the authorities seemed intent
on starving them to death: “Within two weeks the Government had made
two distributions of bread, neither of them sufficient for more than one day,
and had given nothing else.” The deportees met further abuse on arrival in
Konya, according to Post. “I myself saw police beating the people with
whips and sticks when a few of them in a perfectly orderly way attempted to
talk to some of their fellow- exiles on the train, and they were in general treated as though they were criminals.” At Çay, sixty miles northwest of Konya, Post
observed “perhaps a couple of thousand�
� en route. “ Here the men and women
were together, and the Turks had not succeeded in carry ing off more than two
girls. By keeping constant guard the Armenians, although unarmed, had been
able to frighten the assailants away.” Still, there was “ great suffering, followed by sickness and some deaths, especially among the children. A good many of
the people had gone insane.” 41
After the deportations, Bursa’s authorities, like similarly thorough officials
elsewhere, discovered that they had exiled most of their region’s skilled me-
chanics, artisans, and bankers. In September the officials pleaded with the cen-
tral government to permit some Armenians to return.42 A few were allowed
back, but their homecoming was fraught. In October, perhaps in order to jus-
tify persecution of the returnees, the vali informed Talȃt that “Armenian
gangs” had resurfaced and renewed sabotage operations in the area.43 Sev-
eral alleged saboteurs were eventually caught, tried, and sentenced to death.44
The evidence supporting the allegations was questionable at best. During the
postwar tribunals, Turkish prosecutors argued there were no such gangs.45
According to Talât’s summaries, 66,413 people were deported from Bursa
vilayet during the war, and fewer than 3,000 Armenians remained afterward.
Only about 10,000 of the deportees were alive in 1917.46
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Ankara
Hasan Mazhar Bey, the vali of Ankara, was one of several in western Anatolia
who opposed the CUP’s campaign. The party suspected as much. Consid-
ered a sentimental relic of the ancien regime, Mazhar was kept out of Con-
stantinople’s decision- making. He had his first inkling of the deportation
plan on April 25, 1915, when he was informed that 180 alleged Armenian
komitecis— members of revolutionary committees— would be passing through
and that another hundred had been sent to the nearby town of Çankiri. He
was ordered to provide men to assist the guard detail.47
Mazhar stalled. “I pretended not to understand,” he testified several years
later. “As you know, other provinces were done with the deportations before
I had even started.” 48 Rather than begin deportations, he deci ded to investi-
gate the government’s allegation that Ankara’s Armenians were engaged in
mass treason. Finding no evidence, he asked Muslim notables to sign a peti-
