Burning of Smyrna explained

Partof:the Greco-Turkish War (1919–1922) and the Greek and Armenian genocides[1] [2]
Event Name:Burning of Smyrna
Aka:Great Fire of Smyrna
Perpetrator:See Responsibility for the burning of Smyrna
Location:Smyrna, Greek Zone of Smyrna (today İzmir, Turkey)
Date:13–22 September 1922
Deaths:Estimated at 10,000–125,000
Result:80,000–400,000 refugees
Destruction of the Greek and Armenian quarters
Also Known As:Great Fire of Smyrna
Smyrna Catastrophe
Type:Arson, Mass murder

The burning of Smyrna[3] [4] (Greek, Modern (1453-);: Καταστροφή της Σμύρνης, "Smyrna Catastrophe"; Turkish: 1922 İzmir Yangını, "1922 İzmir Fire"; Armenian: Զմիւռնիոյ Մեծ Հրդեհ, Zmyuṙnio Mets Hrdeh) destroyed much of the port city of Smyrna (modern İzmir, Turkey) in September 1922. Eyewitness reports state that the fire began on 13 September 1922[5] and lasted until it was largely extinguished on 22 September. It began four days after the Turkish military captured the city on 9 September, effectively ending the Greco-Turkish War, more than three years after the Greek landing of troops at Smyrna. Estimated Greek and Armenian deaths resulting from the fire range from 10,000 to 125,000.[6] [7]

Approximately 80,000 to 400,000 Greek and Armenian refugees crammed the waterfront to escape from the fire. They were forced to remain there under harsh conditions for nearly two weeks. Turkish troops and irregulars had started committing massacres and atrocities against the Greek and Armenian population in the city before the outbreak of the fire. Many women were raped.[8] [9] Tens of thousands of Greek and Armenian men were subsequently deported into the interior of Anatolia, where most of them died in harsh conditions.

The fire completely destroyed the Greek and Armenian quarters of the city; the Muslim and Jewish quarters escaped damage.[10] There are different accounts and eyewitness reports about who was responsible for the fire; most contemporary sources and modern scholars attribute it to Turkish soldiers setting fire to Greek and Armenian homes and businesses to eradicate the last traces of Christian presence in Anatolia,[11] while a few, Turkish or pro-Turkish,[12] sources hold that the Greeks and/or Armenians started the fire either to tarnish the Turks' reputation or deny them access to their former homes and businesses. Testimonies from Western eyewitnesses[13] were printed in many Western newspapers.[14] [15]

The event is considered one of the most catastrophic urban fires in history and it is widely regarded as an act of genocide and a war crime; the event is still a source of tension between Greece and Turkey. Winston Churchill called it an "infernal orgy" and stated that: "For a deliberately planned and methodically executed atrocity, Smyrna must...find few parallels in the history of human crime".[16]

Background

The ratio of the Christian population to the Muslim population remains a matter of dispute, but the city was both a multicultural and cosmopolitan center until September 1922.[17] Different sources claim either Greeks or Turks as constituting the majority in the city. According to Katherine Elizabeth Flemming, in 1919–1922 the Greeks in Smyrna numbered 150,000, forming just under half of the population, outnumbering the Turks by a ratio of two to one.[18] Alongside Turks and Greeks, there were sizeable Armenian, Jewish, and Levantine communities in the city. According to Trudy Ring, before World War I the Greeks alone numbered 130,000 out of a population of 250,000, excluding Armenians and other Christians.[19]

According to the Ottoman census of 1906/7, there were 341,436 Muslims, 193,280 Greek Orthodox Christians, 12,273 Armenian Gregorian Christians, 24,633 Jews, 55,952 Foreigners totalling to 630,124 people in İzmir Sanjak (13 Kazas including the central Kaza);[20] the updated figures for 1914 gave 100,356 Muslims, 73.676 Greek Orthodox Christians, 10,061 Armenian Gregorians, 813 Armenian Catholics, 24,069 Jews for the central kaza of İzmir.[21] [22]

According to the U.S. Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire at the time, Henry Morgenthau, more than half of Smyrna's population was Greek.[23] The American Consul General in Smyrna at the time, George Horton, wrote that before the fire there were 400,000 people living in the city of Smyrna, of whom 165,000 were Turks, 150,000 were Greeks, 25,000 were Jews, 25,000 were Armenians, and 20,000 were foreigners—10,000 Italians, 3,000 French, 2,000 British, and 300 Americans.[24] Most of the Greeks and Armenians were Christians.[25]

Moreover, according to various scholars, prior to the war, the city was a center of more Greeks than the ones who lived in Athens, the capital of Greece.[26] [27] The Ottomans of that era referred to the city as Infidel Smyrna (Gavur İzmir) due to the numerous Greeks and the large non-Muslim population.[28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34]

Events

Entry of the Turkish Army

Greek troops evacuated Smyrna on the evening of Friday 8 September. The first elements of Mustafa Kemal's forces, a Turkish cavalry squadron, made its way into the city from the northern tip of the quay the following morning, establishing their headquarters at the main government building called Konak.[35] [36] The Hellenic Army was in disarray and could not evacuate the city in an orderly manner, and fighting continued to the next day. According to the General of the 5th Cavalry Sidearmy Fahrettin Altay, on the 10th of September, Turkish forces belonging to the 2nd and the 3rd Cavalry regiments captured around 3,000 Greek soldiers, 50 Greek Officers, including a Brigadier Commander in the south of the city center who were retreating from Aydın.[37] Lieutenant Ali Rıza Akıncı, the first Turkish officer to hoist the Turkish flag in the Liberation of İzmir on the 9th of September, mentions in his memoirs that his unit of 13 cavalrymen was ambushed by a volley of fire from 30-40 rifles from the Tuzakoğlu factory after being saluted and congratulated by a French Marine platoon in the Halkapınar bridge. This volley fire killed 3 cavalrymen instantly and fatally wounded another. They were relieved by Captain Şerafettin and his 2 units which encircled the factory. Moreover, Captain Şerafettin, alongside Lieutenant Ali Rıza Akıncı were wounded by a grenade thrown by a Greek soldier in front of the Pasaport building. The Lieutenant was wounded lightly from his nose and his leg, and his horse from its belly.[38] The grenade thrower was also mentioned by George Horton as "some fool threw a bomb", and that the commander of this unit "received bloody cuts about the head".[39] A monument was later erected on the spot these cavalrymen had fallen. Military command was first assumed by Mürsel Pasha, and then Nureddin Pasha, General of the Turkish First Army.

At the outset, the Turkish occupation of the city was orderly. Though the Armenian and Greek inhabitants viewed their entry with trepidation, they reasoned that the presence of the Allied fleet would discourage any violence against the Christian community. On the morning of 9 September, no fewer than twenty-one Allied warships lay at anchor in Smyrna's harbor, including the British flagship, the battleships HMS Iron Duke and King George V, along with their escort of cruisers and destroyers under the command of Admiral Osmond Brock; the American destroyers USS Litchfield, Simpson, and Lawrence (later joined by the Edsall); three French cruisers and two destroyers under the command of Admiral Dumesnil; and an Italian cruiser and destroyer.[40] [41] As a precaution, sailors and marines from the Allied fleet were landed ashore to guard their respective diplomatic compounds and institutions with strict orders of maintaining neutrality in the event that violence would break out between the Turks and the Christians.[42]

On 9 September, order and discipline began to break down among the Turkish troops, who began systematically targeting the Armenian population, pillaging their shops, looting their homes, separating the men from the women and carrying away and sexually assaulting the latter.[43] [44] The Greek Orthodox Metropolitan bishop, Chrysostomos, was tortured and hacked to death by a Turkish mob in full view of French soldiers, who were prevented from intervening by their commanding officer, and much to Admiral Dumesnil's approval.[45] Refuge was sought wherever possible, including Paradise, where the American quarter was located, and the European quarters. Some were able to take shelter at the American Collegiate Institute and other institutions, despite strenuous efforts to turn away those seeking help by the Americans and Europeans, who were anxious not to antagonize or harm their relations with the leaders of the Turkish National movement. An officer of the Dutch steamer Siantar which was at the city's port during that period reported an incident that he has heard, according to him after the Turkish troops had entered the city a large hotel which had Greek guests was set on fire, the Turks had placed a machine gun at the opposite of the hotel's entrance and opened fire when people were trying to exit the burning building. In addition, he said that the crew were not allowed to go offshore after dusk because thugs were roaming the city's streets and it was dangerous.[46]

Victims of the massacres committed by the Turkish army and irregulars were also foreign citizens. On 9 September, Dutch merchant Oscar de Jongh and his wife were murdered by Turkish cavalrymen,[47] while in another incident a retired British doctor was beaten to death in his home, while trying to prevent the rape of a servant girl.[48] [49]

Burning

The first fire broke out in the late afternoon of 13 September, four days after Turkish nationalist forces had entered the city.[50] The blaze began in the Armenian quarter of the city (now the Basmane borough), and spread quickly due to the windy weather and the fact that no effort was made to put it out.[51] Author Giles Milton writes:

Others, such as Claflin Davis of the American Red Cross and Monsieur Joubert, director of the Credit Foncier Bank of Smyrna, also witnessed the Turks putting buildings to the torch. When the latter asked the soldiers what they were doing, "They replied impassively that they were under orders to blow up and burn all the houses of the area."[52] The city's fire brigade did its best to combat the fires but by Wednesday 13 September so many were being set that it was unable to keep up. Two firemen from the brigade, a Sgt. Tchorbadjis and Emmanuel Katsaros, would later testify in court witnessing Turkish soldiers setting fire to the buildings. When Katsaros complained, one of them commented, "You have your orders...and we have ours. This is Armenian property. Our orders are to set fire to it."[53] The spreading fire caused a stampede of people to flee toward the quay, which stretched from the western end of the city to its northern tip, known as the Point. Captain Arthur Japy Hepburn, chief of Staff of the American naval squadron, described the panic on the quay:

The heat from the fire was so intense that Hepburn was worried that the refugees would die as a result of it. The refugees' situation on the pier on the morning of 14 September was described by the British Lieutenant A. S. Merrill, who believed that the Turks had set the fire to keep the Greeks in a state of terror so as to facilitate their departure:

Turkish troops cordoned off the Quay to box the Armenians and Greeks within the fire zone and prevent them from fleeing.[54] Eyewitness reports describe panic-stricken refugees diving into the water to escape the flames and that their terrified screaming could be heard miles away. By 15 September the fire had somewhat died down, but sporadic violence by the Turks against the Greek and Armenian refugees kept the pressure on the Western and Greek navies to remove the refugees as quickly as possible.[55] The fire was completely extinguished by 22 September,[6] and on 24 September the first Greek ships – part of a flotilla organized and commandeered by the American humanitarian Asa Jennings – entered the harbor to take passengers away, following Captain Hepburn's initiative and his having obtained permission and cooperation from the Turkish authorities and the British admiral in command of the destroyers in the harbor.[56]

Aftermath

The entire city suffered substantial damage to its infrastructure. The core of the city had to be rebuilt. Today, 40 hectares of the former fire area is a vast park named Kültürpark serving as Turkey's largest open air exhibition center, including the İzmir International Fair, among others.

According to the first census in Turkey after the war, the total population of the city in 1927 was 184,254, of whom 162,144 (88%) were Muslims, the remainder numbering 22,110.[57] The evacuation was difficult despite the efforts of British and American sailors to maintain order, as tens of thousands of refugees pushed and shoved towards the shore. Attempts to organize relief were made by the American officials from the YMCA and YWCA, who were reportedly robbed and later shot at by Turkish soldiers.[58] On the quay, Turkish soldiers and irregulars periodically robbed Greek refugees, beating some and arresting others who resisted. Though there were several reports of well-behaved Turkish troops helping old women and trying to maintain order among the refugees, these are heavily outnumbered by those describing gratuitous cruelty, incessant robbery and violence.

American and British attempts to protect the Greeks from the Turks did little good, with the fire having taken a terrible toll. Some frustrated and terrified Greeks took their own lives, plunging into the water with packs at their back, children were stampeded, and many of the elderly fainted and died. The city's Armenians also suffered grievously, and according to Captain Hepburn, "every able-bodied Armenian man was hunted down and killed wherever found, with even boys aged 12 to 15 taking part in the hunt."

The fire completely destroyed the Greek, Armenian, and Levantine quarters of the city, with only the Turkish and Jewish quarters surviving. The thriving port of Smyrna, one of the most commercially active in the region, was burned to the ground. Some 150,000–200,000 Greek refugees were evacuated, while approximately 30,000 able-bodied Greek and Armenian men were deported to the interior, many of them dying under the harsh conditions or executed along the way. The 3,000-year Greek presence on Anatolia's Aegean shore was brought to an abrupt end, along with the Megali Idea.[59] The Greek writer Dimitris Pentzopoulos wrote, "It is no exaggeration to call the year '1922' the most calamitous in modern Hellenic history."

Casualties and refugees

The number of casualties from the fire is not precisely known, with estimates of up to 125,000 Greeks and Armenians killed.[6] [7] [60] American historian Norman Naimark gives a figure of 10,000–15,000 dead, while historian Richard Clogg gives a figure of 30,000. Larger estimates include that of John Freely at 50,000 and Rudolf Rummel at 100,000.[60]

Help to the city's population by ships of the Hellenic Navy was limited, as the 11 September 1922 Revolution had broken out, and most of the Greek army was concentrated at the islands of Chios and Lesbos, planning to overthrow the royalist government of Athens.

Although there were numerous ships from various Allied powers in the harbor of Smyrna, the vast majority of them cited neutrality and did not pick up Greeks and Armenians who were forced to flee from the fire and the Turkish troops retaking the city after the Greek army's defeat.[61] Military bands played loud music to drown out the screams of those who were drowning in the harbor and who were forcefully prevented from boarding Allied ships.[62] A Japanese freighter dumped all of its cargo and took on as many refugees as possible, taking them to the Greek port of Piraeus.[63] [64]

Many refugees were rescued via an impromptu relief flotilla organized by American missionary Asa Jennings.[65] Other scholars give a different account of the events; they argue that the Turks first forbade foreign ships in the harbor to pick up the survivors, but, under pressure especially from Britain, France, and the United States, they allowed the rescue of all the Christians except males 17 to 45 years old. They intended to deport the latter into the interior, which "was regarded as a short life sentence to slavery under brutal masters, ended by mysterious death".[66]

The number of refugees changes according to the source. Some contemporary newspapers claim that there were 400,000 Greek and Armenian refugees from Smyrna and the surrounding area who received Red Cross aid immediately after the destruction of the city.[67] Stewart Matthew states that there were 250,000 refugees who were all non-Turks. Naimark gives a figure of 150,000–200,000 Greek refugees evacuated. Edward Hale Bierstadt and Helen Davidson Creighton say that there were at least 50,000 Greek and Armenian refugees.[68] Some contemporary accounts also suggest the same number.[69]

The number of Greek and Armenian men deported to the interior of Anatolia and the number of consequent deaths varies across sources. Naimark writes that 30,000 Greek and Armenian men were deported there, where most of them died under brutal conditions. Dimitrije Đorđević puts the number of deportees at 25,000 and the number of deaths at labour battalions at 10,000.[70] David Abulafia states that at least 100,000 Greeks were forcibly sent to the interior of Anatolia, where most of them died.[71]

Aristotle Onassis, who was born in Smyrna and who later became one of the richest men in the world, was one of the Greek survivors. The various biographies of his life document aspects of his experiences during the Smyrna catastrophe. His life experiences were featured in the TV movie called Onassis, The Richest Man in the World.[72]

During the Smyrna catastrophe, the Onassis family lost substantial property holdings, which were either taken or given to Turks as bribes to secure their safety and freedom. They became refugees, fleeing to Greece after the fire. However, Aristotle Onassis stayed behind to save his father, who had been placed in a Turkish concentration camp.[73] [74] He was successful in saving his father's life. During this period three of his uncles died. He also lost an aunt, her husband Chrysostomos Konialidis, and their daughter, who were burned to death when Turkish soldiers set fire to a church in Thyatira, where 500 Christians had found shelter to avoid Turkish soldiers and the burning of Smyrna.

Responsibility

See main article: Responsibility for the burning of Smyrna. The question of who was responsible for starting the burning of Smyrna continues to be debated, with Turkish sources mostly attributing responsibility to Greeks or Armenians, and vice versa.[75] [76] Other sources, on the other hand, suggest that at the very least, Turkish inactivity played a significant part on the event.

A number of studies have been published on the Smyrna fire. Professor of literature Marjorie Housepian Dobkin's 1971 study Smyrna 1922 concluded that the Turkish army systematically burned the city and killed Christian Greek and Armenian inhabitants. Her work is based on extensive eyewitness testimony from survivors, Allied troops sent to Smyrna during the evacuation, foreign diplomats, relief workers, and Turkish eyewitnesses. A study by historian Niall Ferguson comes to the same conclusion. Historian Richard Clogg categorically states that the fire was started by the Turks following their capture of the city.[43] In his book Paradise Lost: Smyrna 1922, Giles Milton addresses the issue of the Smyrna Fire through original material (interviews, unpublished letters, and diaries) from the Levantine families of Smyrna, who were mainly of British origin.[77] The conclusion of the author is that it was Turkish soldiers and officers who set the fire, most probably acting under direct orders. British scholar Michael Llewellyn-Smith, writing on the Greek administration in Asia Minor, also concluded that the fire was "probably lit" by the Turks as indicated by what he called "what evidence there is."[78]

Stanford historian Norman Naimark has evaluated the evidence regarding the responsibility of the fire. He agrees with the view of American Lieutenant Merrill that it was in Turkish interests to terrorize Greeks into leaving Smyrna with the fire, and points out to the "odd" fact that the Turkish quarter was spared from the fire as a factor suggesting Turkish responsibility. He also points out that arguments can be made that burning the city was against Turkish interests and was unnecessary and that responsibility may lie with Greeks and/or Armenians as they "had own their good reasons", pointing out to the "Greek history of retreating" and "Armenian attack in the first day of the occupation".[79] However, the Greek army departed from Smyrna on 9 September 1922,[80] when Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his army entered the city, while the fire began four days later, on 13 September 1922.[81] Nevertheless, Naimark concludes that "the fire almost assuredly was purposely set by the Turkish troops".[82]

Horton and Housepian are criticized by Heath W. Lowry and Justin McCarthy, who argue that Horton was highly prejudiced and Housepian makes an extremely selective use of sources.[83] Lowry and McCarthy were both members of the now defunct Institute of Turkish Studies and have in turn been strongly criticized by other scholars for their denial of the Armenian Genocide[84] [85] [86] [87] and McCarthy has been described by Michael Mann as being on "the Turkish side of the debate."[88]

Turkish author and journalist Falih Rıfkı Atay, who was in Smyrna at the time, and the Turkish professor Biray Kolluoğlu Kırlı agreed that Turkish nationalist forces were responsible for the destruction of Smyrna in 1922. More recently, a number of non-contemporary scholars, historians, and politicians have added to the history of the events by revisiting contemporary communications and histories. Leyla Neyzi, in her work on the oral history regarding the fire, makes a distinction between Turkish nationalist discourse and local narratives. In the local narratives, she points to the Turkish forces being held responsible for at least not attempting to extinguish the fire effectively, or, at times, being held responsible for the fire itself.[89]

Legacy and remembrance

See also

Further reading

Personal accounts

History of Smyrna and the Fire

Humanitarianism

Memory and remembering

See also

External links

Notes and References

  1. Book: ((Shirinian, G. N.)), ((Martoyan, T.)) . 2017 . Genocide in the Ottoman Empire: Armenians, Assyrians, and Greeks, 1913–1923 . Berghahn Books . Chapter 8. The Destruction of Smyrna in 1922: An Armenian and Greek Shared Tragedy.
  2. Book: ((Morris, B.)), ((Ze’evi, D.)) . 2021 . The Thirty-Year Genocide: Turkey's Destruction of Its Christian Minorities, 1894–1924 . Harvard University Press . 434–444.
  3. Stewart, Matthew. "Catastrophe at Smyrna ." History Today, Volume: 54 Issue 7.
  4. Web site: Tsounis. Catherine. Remembering Smyrna: The Asia Minor Catastrophe. Queens Gazette. 8 September 2010. 13 May 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20110715134526/http://www.qgazette.com/news/2010-09-08/Features/Remembering_Smyrna_The_Asia_Minor_Catastrophe.html. 15 July 2011. dead.
  5. Horton, George. The Blight of Asia. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1926; repr. London: Gomidas Institute, 2003, p. 96.
  6. Book: ((Naimark, N. M.)) . 2002 . Fires of Hatred: Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth-Century Europe . Harvard University Press . 52.
  7. Book: Biondich, Mark. The Balkans: Revolution, War, and Political Violence Since 1878. Oxford University Press. 2011. 92. 978-0199299058. 28 November 2020. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141655/https://books.google.com/books?id=vC-Fk7Mxu2MC&q=Smyrna+1922+10000+Greeks+dead&pg=PA92. live.
  8. Book: Trudy Ring. Noelle Watson. Paul Schellinger. Southern Europe: International Dictionary of Historic Places. 2013. Routledge. 978-1134259588. 351. 23 February 2014. Kemal's triumphant entry into Smyrna... as Greek and Armenian inhabitants were raped, mutilated, and murdered.. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141650/https://books.google.com/books?id=Qcr9AQAAQBAJ&q=%22Kemals%27+triumphant+entry+into+Izmir%22&pg=PA351. live.
  9. Book: Abulafia, David. The Great Sea : A Human History of the Mediterranean. 2011. Oxford University Press. New York. 978-0195323344. 287. 23 February 2014. As the refugees crowded into the city, massacres, rape and looting, mainly but not exclusively by the irregulars, became the unspoken order of the day... Finally, the streets and houses of Smyrna were soaked in petrol... and on 13 September the city was set alight.. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141649/https://books.google.com/books?id=dKcQPBV0UdQC&q=smyrna+1922+september+irregulars&pg=PA587. live.
  10. Stewart . Matthew. It Was All a Pleasant Business: The Historical Context of 'On the Quai at Smyrna'. The Hemingway Review. 1 January 2003. 23. 1. 58–71. 10.1353/hem.2004.0014. 153449331.
  11. Book: Goalwin, Gregory J. . Borders of Belief: Religious Nationalism and the Formation of Identity in Ireland and Turkey . 2022 . Rutgers University Press . 978-1-9788-2648-9 . 126. Many Turks argue that it was the Greeks and Armenians themselves who started the fire, but reports from Western observers at the time lead most scholars to place the blame squarely on Turkish soldiers, who were seen igniting Christian-owned businesses in the city. . 20 November 2022 . 20 November 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20221120215755/https://books.google.com/books?id=fz-DEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA126 . live.
    • Book: Bali, Rıfat N. . The Saga of a Friendship: Asa Kent Jennings and the American Friends of Turkey . 2009 . Libra . 978-605-89308-3-4 . 55. The question of "who burned Izmir?" is still very much debated. Most, if not all, of the foreign observers claim that the Turkish Army burned it as it wanted to eradicate the last traces of Christian presence. . 29 January 2023 . 29 January 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230129173016/https://books.google.com/books?id=kUktAQAAIAAJ . live.
    • Book: Papoutsy, Christos . Ships of Mercy: The True Story of the Rescue of the Greeks : Smyrna, September 1922 . 2008 . Peter E. Randall . 978-1-931807-66-1 . 23. Some sources, mostly Turkish, have claimed that the Armenians and Greeks set these fires themselves, to keep the Turks from having Smyrna, but most eyewitness accounts (and only a relative few are relayed here) attribute this fire to the Turks. . 5 October 2022 . 7 December 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20221207120401/https://books.google.com/books?id=FGJtAAAAMAAJ&q=Mostly+Turkish+sources+smyrna+fire . live.
    • Book: Saracoglu, Cenk . Kurds of Modern Turkey: Migration, Neoliberalism and Exclusion in Turkish Society . 2011 . Bloomsbury Academic . 978-1-84885-468-0 . 74. While some Turkish-based sources have blamed the Greeks and Armenians for burning their buildings before they departed from İzmir (Kaygusuz, 1956: 225–226), most researchers outside Turkey have blamed the Turkish side for orchestrating the fire in order to eradicate the traces of non-Muslim presence in the city (Housepian, 1971). . 29 January 2023 . 29 January 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230129174421/https://books.google.com/books?id=sWMiAQAAMAAJ . live.
    • Book: Prott, Volker . The Politics of Self-Determination: Remaking Territories and National Identities in Europe, 1917–1923 . 2016 . Oxford University Press . 978-0-19-108354-9 . 181. ..few Western scholars question the overall responsibility in the subsequent systematic destruction of the European, Greek and Armenian districts of Smyrna. For such a rare, pro-Turkish view see Heath W. Lowry, "Turkish history: On Whose Sources Will it Be Based? A Case Study on the Burning of Izmir", Journal of Ottoman Studies 9 (1989): 1–29. . 23 September 2021 . 26 March 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141632/https://books.google.com/books?id=2nnADAAAQBAJ . live.
  12. Nevertheless, some Turkish sources have accepted Turkish responsibility for the fire. See, for example: Falih Rifki Atay, Çankaya: Atatürk'un Dogumundan Olumune Kadar, Istanbul, 1969, 324–325
  13. list of them here
  14. i.e. The Daily Telegraph 19 September 1922: The martyrdom of Smyrna and eastern Christendom; a file of overwhelming evidence, denouncing the misdeeds of the Turks in Asia Minor and showing their responsibility for the horrors of Smyrna Incendiaries at work – Destruction of christian quarters
  15. Daily Mail

    https://archive.org/stream/martyrdomofsmyrn00oecoiala#page/68/mode/2up

  16. Book: Cabanes, Bruno . The Great War and the Origins of Humanitarianism, 1918–1924 . 2014 . Cambridge University Press . 978-1-107-02062-7 . 174. 22 February 2023 . 26 March 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141646/https://books.google.com/books?id=1anoAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA174 . live.
  17. Book: Slim, Hugo. Killing civilians : method, madness, and morality in war. 2010. Columbia University Press. New York. 9780231700375. 129. 28 November 2020. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141643/https://books.google.com/books?id=Ai_1ZNxWY5YC&q=smyrna+multicultural+1922&pg=PA129. live.
  18. Fleming Katherine Elizabeth. Greece: A Jewish History. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008, p. 81. .
  19. Ring Trudy, Salkin Robert M., La Boda Sharon. International Dictionary of Historic Places: Southern Europe . Taylor & Francis, 1995., p. 351
  20. [Kemal Karpat]
  21. Salâhi R. Sonyel, Minorities and the Destruction of the Ottoman Empire, Ankara: TTK, 1993, p. 351; Gaston Gaillard, The Turks and Europe, London, 1921, p. 199.
  22. [Kemal Karpat]
  23. Morgenthau Henry. Ambassador Morgenthau's Story Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1918, p. 32.
  24. Horton, The Blight of Asia
  25. Web site: The Whispering Voices of Smyrna: The Destruction and Genocide of a Christian City Institute on the Holocaust & Genocide in Jerusalem. ihgjlm.com. 21 June 2018. 20 February 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220220123347/https://www.ihgjlm.com/the-whispering-voices-of-smyrna-the-destruction-and-genocide-of-a-christian-city/. live.
  26. Book: Panayi, Panikos. Outsiders History of European Minorities.. 1998. Continuum International Pub. Group. London. 9780826436313. 111.
  27. Book: MacMillan, Margaret. Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World. 2003. Random House. New York. 430. 9780307432964.
  28. Book: Clogg, Richard . A Concise History of Greece. registration. 2002. Cambridge University Press. 9780521004794. 94. Refugees crowded on the waterfront at Smyrna on 13 September 1922 after fire had devastated much of the Greek, Armenian and Prankish [European] quarters of the city which the Turks had called Gavur İzmir or 'Infidel İzmir', so large was its non-Muslim population..
  29. Book: Hans-Lukas Kieser. Turkey Beyond Nationalism: Towards Post-Nationalist Identities. 26 December 2006. I.B.Tauris. 978-1-84511-141-0. 49–. They called Izmir "Gavur Izmir" (infidel Izmir) because the majority of its population consisted of non- Muslims and Levantines. They could not forget the fact that while a National War of Independence was going on, the minorities living in ....
  30. Book: Mindie Lazarus-Black. Susan F. Hirsch. Contested States: Law, Hegemony and Resistance. 12 November 2012. Routledge. 978-1-136-04102-0. 273–. Not surprisingly, Smyrna was the most cosmopolitan city in the Levant in the eighteenth century. It was called gavur Izmir (infidel Izmir) because of the prominence of the Christians..
  31. Book: Vivre avec l'ennemi: La cohabitation de communautés hétérogènes du XVIe au XIXe siècle. 2008. Presses Univ Blaise Pascal. 978-2-84516-380-5. 6–. Située sur la côte anatolienne, Smyrne (ou Izmir en turc) est aux XVIIIe ... (c'est-à-dire chrétienne et juive) est majoritaire au XIXe siècle, à tel point que ses habitants musulmans la surnomment " gavur Izmir ", Smyrne l'Infidèle..
  32. Book: Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ḥusaynī Farāhānī. A Shi'ite Pilgrimage to Mecca: 1885–1886. 1990. Saqi Books. 978-0-86356-356-0. 150. Its bazaars are mostly covered and have red-tiled roofs. Most of the people of this city are Europeans, Greeks, or Jews. Because the Turks call those outside the religion of Islam "gavur," [the city] is popularly known as "Gavur Izmir.".
  33. Book: C. M. Hann. When History Accelerates: Essays on Rapid Social Change, Complexity, and Creativity. 1994. Athlone Press. 978-0-485-11464-5. 219. Izmir was the most cosmopolitan city in the Levant in the eighteenth century and was called gavur Izmir (infidel Izmir) because of the prominence of the non-Muslims..
  34. Book: M. Th. Houtsma. E. J. Brill's First Encyclopaedia of Islam, 1913–1936. 1993. BRILL. 978-90-04-09790-2. 569–.
  35. Book: Clogg, Richard . A Concise History of Greece . 1992 . Cambridge . Cambridge University Press . 97, 257.
  36. [Marjorie Housepian Dobkin|Dobkin, Marjorie Housepian]
  37. Book: Altay, Fahrettin . Görüb Geçirdiklerim-10 YIL SAVAŞ 1912-1922 VE, SONRASI . İnsel Yayınları . 1970 . Istanbul, Turkey . 363–364 . tr. Bu güzel hayal alemi betti kumandanlıktan acele olarak çağırmaları ile son buldu gittiğimde Mustafa Kemal ile Cephe Kumandanı İsmet Paşa oturuyorlardı bana şu emri verdiler : «— Aydın cihetinden çekilen bir düşman kuvveti Izmire yaklaşarak Kadifekalesine top ateşi açtı. Hazır olan kuvvetleri oraya gönderdik. Diğer kuvvetleri de al oraya git bu DÜŞMANI TEPELE...» Vakit geçirmeden emrin tatbikine geçtim, kurmaylarımı alarak Eşrefpaşa mahallesinin üstüne çıktım. Buradan birliklerime lâzım gelen emirleri gönderdim. 2. Süvari Tümeni KIZILÇULLU zeytinlikleri içinde bu düşmanla çarpışıyordu, getirdiğim kuvvetleri ileri sürdüm düşman bozuldu, bunların karşısından gelen DENİZLİ ÇOLAK İBRAHİM BEY kumandasındaki 3. Süvari Tümenimizle de irtibat hasıl ettikten sonra yaptığımız şiddetli saldırışa karşı dayanamayan düşman teslim bayrağını çekmek zorunda kaldı. Atlara binip ÇEŞME ye doğru kaçanların dışında BİR TUGAY KOMUTANI ile ELLİYE YAKIN SUBAY ve ÜÇ BİN KADAR ASKER esir edildi dört top ile bazı eşya ele geçirildi. Bunlar İzmir e doğru yola çıkarılırken topların başında yazdiğım raporu da gönderdim..
  38. Book: Aksoy, Yaşar . İstiklal Süvarisi - İzmir'in Kurtuluşu: Teğmen Ali Riza Akıncı'nın Hatıratı . Kırmızı Kedi Yayınevi . 2021 . 9786052988022 . Istanbul, Turkey . 103–109 . tr.
  39. Book: Horton, George . The Blight of Asia, An Account of the Systematic Extermination of Christian Populations by Mohammedans and of the Culpability of Certain Great Powers; with the True Story of the Burning of Smyrna . Bobbs-Merrill . 1926 . Indianapolis, United States of America . 127.
  40. Dobkin. Smyrna 1922, p. 101.
  41. Milton. Paradise Lost, pp. 4–5.
  42. See Dobkin, Smyrna 1922, passim.
  43. Clogg, A Concise History of Greece, p. 98.
  44. Dobkin. Smyrna 1922, pp. 120–167.
  45. Dobkin. Smyrna 1922, pp. 133–134.
  46. News: Terrible Turk Greek Massacres Tales of Smyrna . Evening News . 17606 . New South Wales, Australia . 22 November 1923 . 16 February 2021 . 11 . National Library of Australia . 7 September 2021 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210907184016/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/119184295 . live.
  47. Book: Schaller Dominik J., Zimmerer Jürgen. Late Ottoman Genocides – Schaller: The Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire and Young Turkish Population and Extermination Policies. 13 September 2013. Routledge. 46. 9781317990451. 8 June 2014. Member of the De Jongh family, merchant Oscar de Jongh and his wife were killed by Turkish cavaly on September 9, 1922. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141651/https://books.google.com/books?id=_Q3cAAAAQBAJ&q=%22de+Jongh%22+1922&pg=PA46. live.
  48. Book: Murat. John. The infamy of a great betrayal. 1997. Internat. Press. 9780960035670. 139. [Repr.].. 8 June 2014. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141659/https://books.google.com/books?id=22EtAQAAIAAJ&q=%22the+loveliest+and+richest+suburbs+of+Smyrna%2C+the+Turks+brutally+killed+an+elderly+English+doctor%2C+D.+Murphy%2C+and+a+Dutch%22. live.
  49. Papoutsy, Christos, Ships of Mercy: The True Story of the Rescue of the Greeks, Smyrna, September 1922 . Portsmouth, N.H.: Peter E. Randall, 2008, p. 36. "Doctor Murphy, a retired British army surgeon, was attacked in his home at Bournabat... but Murphy was beaten to death while trying to prevent the rape of a servant girl."
  50. Naimark. Fires of Hatred, p. 249.
  51. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p. 49.
  52. Milton. Paradise Lost, pp. 306–07.
  53. Dobkin. Smyrna 1922, pp. 156–157. Emphasis in original.
  54. Dobkin. Smyrna 1922, p. 231.
  55. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p. 51.
  56. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p. 50.
  57. Kasaba, Reşat. "İzmir 1922: A Port City Unravels," in Modernity and Culture: From the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean, eds. Leila T. Fawaz, Christopher Alan Bayly, Robert Ilbert, p. 207.
  58. News: Smyrna's Ravagers Fired on Americans . The New York Times . 18 September 1922 . 14 June 2018 . 25 July 2021 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210725054733/https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1922/09/18/99073767.pdf . live.
  59. Clogg, A Concise History of Greece, p. 99.
  60. Book: Irving Louis Horowitz. Death by Government. Rudolph J. Rummel. Transaction Publishers. 1994. 978-1-56000-927-6. Turkey's Genocidal Purges. Irving Louis Horowitz., p. 233.
  61. Dr. Esther Lovejoy, "Woman Pictures Smyrna Horrors," New York Times, 9 October 1922.
  62. Dobkin. Smyrna 1922, p. 71.
  63. "Japanese at Smyrna", Boston Globe, 3 December 1922.
  64. Stavridis, Stavros. "The Japanese Hero," The National Herald. 19 February 2010.
  65. http://www.greece.org/arts-culture/palikari/history_outline.html
  66. Rummel-Horowitz, p. 233.
  67. "U.S. Red Cross Feeding 400,000 Refugees," Japan Times and Mail, 10 November 1922.
  68. Edward Hale Bierstadt, Helen Davidson Creighton. The Great betrayal: A Survey of the Near East Problem. R. M. McBride & Company, 1924, p. 218.
  69. Moderator-topics, Volume 43 (1922), p. 60
  70. Book: Djordjevic. Dimitrije. Ninic. Ivan. Migrations in Balkan History. 1989. Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Institute for Balkan Studies. 9788671790062. 121.
  71. Book: Abulafia, David. The Great Sea : A Human History of the Mediterranean. 2011. Oxford University Press. New York. 9780195323344. 588. ... and at least as many were deported into the Anatolian interior, where most vanished.. 23 September 2016. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141659/https://books.google.com/books?id=dKcQPBV0UdQC&pg=PA587. live.
  72. Onassis, The Richest Man in the World (1988), movie for television, directed by Waris Hussein.
  73. Web site: Ben-Halliday. Reginald. 2020-10-13. The Shipping Tycoon Who Married The Wife Of A U.S President.. 2021-08-16. Medium. 16 August 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210816205913/https://historyofyesterday.com/the-shipping-tycoon-who-married-the-wife-of-a-u-s-president-887b9c09e80a. live.
  74. Web site: Slippery Facts About Aristotle Onassis, The Two-Faced Millionaire. 2021-08-16. www.factinate.com. 19 July 2021. 15 September 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210915120524/https://www.factinate.com/people/facts-aristotle-onassis/. live.
  75. Neyzi . Leyla . The Burning of Smyrna/ Izmir (1922) Revisited: Coming to Terms with the Past in the Present . The Past as Resource in the Turkic Speaking World . 2008 . 23–42 . 10.5771/9783956506888-23. 9783956506888 . 127362302 . free.
  76. Martoyan, Tehmine. "The Destruction of Smyrna in 1922: An Armenian and Greek Shared Tragedy," in Genocide in the Ottoman Empire: Armenians, Assyrians, and Greeks, 1913-1923, ed. George N. Shirinian. New York: Berghahn Books, 2017, pp. 227–252.
  77. Milton, Paradise Lost, pp. xx.
  78. Book: Llewellyn Smith. Michael. Ionian Vision: Greece in Asia Minor, 1919–1922. 1973. C. Hurst & Co.. 308.
  79. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, pp. 47–52.
  80. Jensen. Peter Kincaid. 1979. The Greco-Turkish war, 1920–1922. International Journal of Middle East Studies. 10. 4. 553–565. 10.1017/S0020743800051333. 163086095. 14 September 2021. 28 July 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210728121301/https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-journal-of-middle-east-studies/article/abs/grecoturkish-war-19201922/095D39E46B5B6249E2CF85204327DA50. live.
  81. Book: Erickson, Edward J.. The Turkish War of Independence: A Military History, 1919–1923. 2021-05-24. ABC-CLIO. 978-1-4408-7842-8. 295. 14 September 2021. 26 March 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141716/https://books.google.com/books?id=Yl8tEAAAQBAJ. live.
  82. Book: Naimark, Norman M. . Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth Century Europe . 1998 . Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, University of Washington . 20. 5 February 2023 . 5 February 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230205160421/https://books.google.com/books?id=tpBwAAAAIAAJ . live.
  83. Lowry, Heath. "Turkish History: On Whose Sources Will it Be Based? A Case Study on the Burning of Izmir," Journal of Ottoman Studies 9 (1988): 1–29; Justin McCarthy, Death and Exile. The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims. Princeton: Darwin Press, 1995, pp. 291–292, 316–317 and 327.
  84. [Yair Auron|Auron, Yair]
  85. [Israel W. Charny|Charny, Israel W.]
  86. [Vahakn Dadrian|Dadrian, Vahakn N]
  87. [Richard G. Hovannisian|Hovannisian, Richard G.]
  88. Michael Mann, The Dark Side of Democracy: explaining ethnic cleansing, pp. 112–114, Cambridge, 2005 "... figures are derive[d] from McCarthy (1995: I 91, 162–164, 339), who is often viewed as a scholar on the Turkish side of the debate."
  89. Neyzi. Leyla. Remembering Smyrna/Izmir. History & Memory. 2008. 20. 2. 10.2979/his.2008.20.2.106. 159560899. 4 July 2016. 25 December 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20211225184056/https://core.ac.uk/download/files/393/11740141.pdf. dead.
  90. Book: Byron, Robert. Europe in the Looking Glass. 2012. 9781843913573. 180. Hesperus Press .
  91. Book: Ambler, Eric . https://books.google.com/books?id=4av1ppc2tfkC&pg=PT31 . Chapter 3 . The Mask of Dimitrios . 28 May 2009 . Penguin UK . 9780141924540 . 23 September 2020 . 26 March 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141619/https://books.google.com/books?id=4av1ppc2tfkC&pg=PT31 . live.
  92. Book: Steinberg, Theodore Louis . Twentieth-century Epic Novels . 175–176 . University of Delaware Press . 2005 . 9780874138894 . 23 September 2020 . 26 March 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141632/https://books.google.com/books?id=Z85YwWg4vCUC&pg=PA175 . live.
  93. Book: Mustard Stewart, Fred . The Titan . 180 . 1985 . Simon and Schuster . 9780671506896 . 23 September 2020 . 26 March 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141633/https://books.google.com/books?id=fltOUFGECMMC . live.
  94. Book: Vries, Susanna De. Blue Ribbons, Bitter Bread: The Life of Joice NanKivell Loch. 9 October 2017. Pandanus Press. 9780958540858. Pirgos Press/Dennis Jones Melbourne 2012, 2014, (6 editions).
  95. News: Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides . Julie . Wheelwright . . 19 October 2002 . 20 September 2020 . 7 September 2021 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210907184012/https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/middlesex-by-jeffrey-eugenides-128315.html . live.
  96. presumably same as "The Ashes of Smyrna" listed on author's page
  97. Book: Bellér-Hann, Ildikó . The Past as Resource in the Turkic Speaking World . 27 . Ergon . 2008 . 9783899136166 . 23 September 2020 . 26 March 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141633/https://books.google.com/books?id=iTwMAQAAMAAJ . live.
  98. Book: ΠΟΛΛΕΣ ΖΩΕΣ ΣΤΗ ΣΜΥΡΝΗ . el . Βιβλιοπωλείο Πολιτεία . MANY LIVES IN SMYRNA . 20 September 2020 . 30 March 2021 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210330100704/https://www.politeianet.gr/books/9789600431902-coral-mehmet-kedros-polles-zoes-sti-smurni-155623 . live.
  99. Web site: Artist on Artist: Diamanda Galas talks to Mark Solotroff . Mark . Solotroff . Chicago Reader Book Club . 23 February 2012 . 20 September 2020 . 5 March 2016 . https://web.archive.org/web/20160305071919/http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/diamanda-galas-mca-mark-solotroff-anatomy-habit/Content?oid=5676851 . live.
  100. Book: Barclay, Jennifer . Wild Abandon: A Journey to the Deserted Places of the Dodecanese . 137 . 2020 . Bradt Guides . 9781784777906 . 23 September 2020 . 26 March 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326141707/https://books.google.com/books?id=HCz4DwAAQBAJ&pg=PT137 . live.
  101. Home and Displacement: The Dynamic Dialectics of 1922 Smyrna . 1 May 2013 . Synthesis: An Anglophone Journal of Comparative Literary Studies . Konstantina . Georganta . 5 . 138. 10.12681/syn.17435 . free.
  102. Web site: Smyrna: The Destruction of a Cosmopolitan City – 1900–1922. 2012. www.imdb.com. 15 October 2019. 1 January 2020. https://web.archive.org/web/20200101184615/https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2168820/. live. uses contemporaneous film footage and photographs, and the testimony of surviving witnesses, to tell the story of the city and its destruction.
  103. Web site: Ellen Sarkisian Chesnut – Deli Sarkis: The Scars He Carried. www.scarshecarried.com. 22 October 2014. 11 January 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20150111220056/http://www.scarshecarried.com/. live.
  104. Web site: Papadopoulos . Stephanos . 18 December 2021 . A Lifeline to Greece: On Homero Aridjis's "Smyrna in Flames" . 10 September 2022 . Los Angeles Review of Books. 2 September 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20220902223340/https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/a-lifeline-to-greece-on-homero-aridjiss-smyrna-in-flames/ . live.
  105. News: Keane . Joseph C. . 12 July 2022 . Damergis' Film on Smyrna Catastrophe Tells Asa K. Jennings' Story . . 23 July 2022 . 23 July 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20220723062444/https://www.thenationalherald.com/damergis-film-on-smyrna-catastrophe-tells-asa-k-jennings-story/ . live.

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