Paradise Lost: Smyrna 1922 - The Destruction of Islam's City of Tolerance (51 page)

PART ONE: PARADISE

Wheel of Fortune

Alexander MacLachlan’s 1938 memoirs have never been published. Parts of them are accessible at
www.levantine.plus.com
under the title ‘A Potpourri of Sidelights and Shadows from Turkey’, henceforth referred to as MacLachlan, ‘Potpourri’. I printed them on 25 January 2006. Letters and memos written by MacLachlan and others – and now held in the NA – confirm all the principal episodes that are described in his diary. The most informative are listed in the relevant sections below.

Smyrna’s early history stretches back into antiquity; it was already an ancient city when Christianity arrived in the first century: see The Revelation of St John the Divine, Chapter 1, verse 11.

Hortense Wood’s manuscript last diary, henceforth referred to as ‘Last Diary’, is a day-by-day account of events in Bournabat and Smyrna, covering the period from June 1922 until May 1923. The original is still in the possession of Hortense’s great-niece, Renée Steinbuchel.

Grace Williamson’s fascinating account has never been published. It is also available on
www.levantine.plus.com
under the title ‘Grace Williamson’s Diary of the September 1922 Events in Smyrna’, henceforth referred to as Williamson, ‘Diary’. I printed it on 25 January 2006. This, too, is complemented by records in the NA.

I interviewed Petros Brussalis at his home in Athens on

2 November 2005.

The description of Smyrna’s various quarters in the years prior to the First World War is based on the many accounts listed below.

Laurence Abensur-hazan,
Smyrne: Evocation d’une échelle du Levant, XIX-XX siècles
, France 2004, is an excellent book with many citations from foreign travellers.

Annuaire Oriental, Commerce, Industrie, Administration, Magistrature de l’Orient
, The Annuaire Oriental and Printing Company Ltd, Constantinople, 1913; this is a most useful resource as it details every aspect of the city’s population, as well as listing all the different businesses in the city.

Karl Baedeker,
Baedeker’s Mediterranean
, Leipzig, 1911; Fred Burnaby,
On Horseback through Asia Minor
, London, 1898; Gaston Deschamps,
Sur les routes d’Asie
, Paris, 1894; Hervé Georgelin, ‘Aperçu sur les relations entre millets à Smyrne à la fin de l’empire ottoman, d’après les sources diplomatiques’, published in the 2004 edition (no. 14) of
Deltio Kentrou Mikrasiatikon Spoudon
(Bulletin of the Centre for Asia Minor Studies). Georgelin is also the author of the excellent
La fin de Smyrne: du cosmopolitisme aux nationalismes
, Paris, 2005.

Louis de Launay,
La turquie que l’on voit
, Paris, 1913;
Macmillan’s Guide to the Eastern Mediterranean
, London, 1906; Mirtil Marcel,
Le Tour du Monde
, G. N. Michail,
Smyrna before the Catastrophe
(in Greek), Athens, 1992. This is a re-edited facsimile of a 1920 Greek-language city guide.

John Murray,
Murray’s Handbook for Travellers in Turkey in Asia
, London, 1878; Bülent Senoçak,
Levant’in Yildizi: Izmir
, Izmir, 2003. Senoçak kindly met me in Izmir and gave me a detailed and large-scale map of Smyrna’s different quarters in the period prior to the First World War.

Marie-Carmen Smyrnelis,
Smyrne, la ville oubliée, 1830–1930: Mémoires d’un grand port ottoman
, Paris, 2006, is a most useful collection of essays on all the different communities that had made Smyrna their home. Sir Charles Wilson,
Murray’s
Handbook for Travellers in Asia Minor
, London, 1895.

I interviewed Alfred Simes at the British consulate in Izmir on 28 April 2006.

Garabed Hatcherian’s chronicle,
My Smyrna Ordeal
, was translated from Armenian and edited by Dr Dora Sakayan, who published it in her book, entitled
An Armenian Doctor in Turkey
:
Garabed Hatcherian: My Smyrna Ordeal of
1922
, Arod Books, Montreal, 1997. This book contains a biography of Dr Hatcherian, an introduction analysing and describing his chronicle, annotations and a bibliography. Hereafter cited as Sakayan,
An Armenian Doctor in Turkey.

There is much of interest about Smyrna’s American community in George Horton,
The Blight of Asia
, Indianapolis, 1926, republished by Taderon Publishers, London, in 2003. For more background information on the role of American charity workers in the declining Ottoman empire, see James Barton,
Story of Near East Relief
, New York, 1930; and Robert L. Daniel,
American Philanthropy in the Near East, 1915–1930
, Athens, Ohio, 1970.

I interviewed Esma Dino Deyer in Izmir on 24 April 2006. She kindly granted me access to her private collection of documents, including letters written by Rahmi Bey, Liman von Sanders, Admiral Peirse, Talaat Bey and Enver Pasha.

The descriptions of life in Levantine Bournabat, both here and elsewhere in the book, are taken from memoirs, both published and unpublished. The most evocative is Ray Turrell’s
Scrap-book
, privately printed by Richard Bell, n.d.

Other accounts of interest are as follows: Samuel Bird,
And Unto Smyrna: The Story of a Church in Asia Minor
, London, 1956; Edward Alfred Edwards,
Family Notes
, 1974; Edmund Giraud,
Days off with Rod and Gun
, n.d.; Eldon James Giraud,
Days of my Years
, 1971; Tom Rees,
Merchant Adventurers in the Levant
, 2003; Mary Whittall, ‘A Book of Thoughts: Memories of my Childhood in Turkey’, unpublished manuscript. I was kindly sent this by Barbara Jackson, a Whittall descendant now living in Canada. I (an) Richard Wookey,
Fortuna
; he remembered the Big House when it had a team of forty gardeners. A. C. Wratislaw,
A Consul in the East
, 1924, contains many anecdotes about the British Levantines.

A very good essay on the Levantine community is Oliver Jens Schmitt’s, ‘Levantins, Européens et jeux d’identité’, in
Smyrne, la ville oubliée
, Marie-Carmen Smyrnelis, 2006. Another excellent essay is A. J. Hobbins, ‘Paradise Lost: The Merchant Princes and the Destruction of Smyrna’, published in Fontanus, vol. XI, 2003. I am most grateful to John Hobbins for his advice and help.

A most interesting, though dated, guide to the remaining houses of old Bournabat is Evelyn Lyle Kalças,
Gateways to the Past: Houses and Gardens of Old Bornova
, Izmir, 1983. A more recent article about the Giraud family’s garden can be found in Rosemary Baldwin, ‘A Garden in the Levant’,
Cornucopia
, 1992, vol. 1.

Among the many books in Brian Giraud’s private collection are those relating to the Anglican community of Smyrna and its suburbs: ‘St Mary Magdalene Anglican Church, Bornova’ (unpublished), ‘Vestry Minutes Book, 1871–1930’ (unpublished): ‘Miss Gladys Routh’s Buca Notes and Correspondence’ (unpublished), circa 1958; Donald H. Simpson,
Anglican Church Life in Smyrna and its Neighbourhood, 1636–1952
, 1952; ‘Buca: General Meetings and Special Meetings of the Congregation, 1897–1957’ (unpublished).

A scholarly background to the Levantine business magnates can be found in E. Frangakis-Syrett,
The Commerce of Smyrna in the 18th Century
, Athens, 1992.

My account of the Whittall family is based on the above accounts, as well as the following: ‘Whittall Family of Smyrna’, (family papers), Exeter University Library (Special Collections): MS 259. See also ‘Trading in the Levant: Centenary of C. Whittall and Co., Smyrna’, which is in this file.

Gertrude Bell’s letters and papers are held at the University of Newcastle. They can be found online at
www.gerty.nel.ac.uk
. See especially her letters of 3, 4, 11 and 19 March 1902, and 3 April 1907. See also Edmund H. Giraud,
Family Records
, n.d.; Betty Ann McKernan,
The Genealogy of the Whittall Family of Turkey
, privately published, 1996; Yolande Whittall and Benjamin Perkins,
The Genealogy of the Whittall Family of Turkey
, privately published, 1967;
The Whittalls of Turkey, 1809–1973
, n.a., n.d.

The Great Idea

William Childs’ description of his journey through Anatolia is to be found in his 1917 account,
On Foot Through Asia Minor
published by Blackwood, Edinburgh. For background on Childs, see John Fisher,
Gentlemen Spies
, London, 1952.

For more on the Greeks of Asia Minor, see Gerasimos Augustinos,
The Greeks of Asia Minor
, Ohio, 1992; Burnaby,
On Horseback; Foreign Office, Peace Handbooks (No. 59), Anatolia
. This was one of numerous Foreign Office publications prepared for diplomats attending the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. Louis de Launay,
Chez les grecs de turque
, Paris, 1897; Deschamps,
Sur les routes
; A. J. Toynbee,
The Western Question in Greece and Turkey
, London, 1922; and Wilson,
Murray’s Handbook
.

For a scholarly analysis of the situation, see Dr Karl Dieterich,
Hellenism in Asia Minor
, 1918; Paschalis M. Kitromilides, ‘Greek Irredentism in Asia Minor and Cyprus’, published in
Middle Eastern Studies
, vol. 26, no. 1, 1990.

The best and most detailed study of Lloyd George’s foreign policy towards Greece and Turkey (and, indeed, Greece’s own foreign policy towards Asia Minor) is Michael Llewellyn Smith,
Ionian Vision
, London, 1973 (republished with an extended bibliography in 1998).

For more on Lloyd George, see John Grigg’s excellent four-volume biography,
The Young Lloyd George; Lloyd George: The People’s Champion; Lloyd George: From Peace to War; Lloyd George: War Leader
, London, 1978–2002. The author died before completing the final volumes of his work. For the end of Lloyd George’s career, see Lord Beaverbrook,
The Decline and Fall of Lloyd George
, London, 1963. See also Kenneth O’Morgan,
The Age of Lloyd George
, London, 1971. For Lloyd George’s own version of events, see
The Truth about the Peace Treaties
(2 vols), London, 1938. Frances Stevenson,
Lloyd George: A Diary
, London, 1971, provides interesting insights into Lloyd George’s character.

See Sir John Stavridi’s papers in St Anthony’s College, Oxford, particularly the following entries in his diary: 10 November 1912, 31 January 1913, 2 February 1913, 12 March 1915, 15 April 1915, 22 May 1915 and 24 June 1915.

For more on Venizelos, see Llewellyn Smith,
Ionian Vision
; Doros Alastos,
Venizelos: Patriot, Statesman, Revolutionary
, London, 1942. Many of Venizelos’s speeches and writings were published in English by the Anglo-Hellenic League.

My account of Rahmi Bey is derived from the following: Horton,
The Blight of Asia
; references in letters written by the Whittall and Giraud families; an interview with his daughter-in-law; and numerous references in the National Archives. A brief but interesting account of Rahmi Bey and the sumptuous dinners of the Levantines is to be found in Paul Jeancard,
L’Anatolie
, Paris, 1919.

For more on George Horton’s early career, see Marjorie Housepain Dobkin’s essay ‘George Horton and Mark L. Bristol: Opposing Forces in U.S. Domestic Policy, 1919–1923’,
Deltio
, (Bulletin of the Centre for Asia Minor Studies), vol. 4, Athens, 1983. (This was a special issue on the Asia Minor catastrophe.) For more on friendly relations between Smyrniot Greeks and other nationalities, see Georgelin,
La fin
,

Scherzer’s visit to the city can be found in Charles de Scherzer,
La province de smyrne
, Vienna, 1873.

Many original diplomatic documents are cited in Georgelin,
La fin
,. For the events on Long Island, see Giraud,
Days off
. I consulted five other accounts of interest: ‘Le sac de Phocée et l’expulsion des grec ottomans d’asie mineure en juin 1914’, n.a., published in
Revue des Deux Mondes
, vol. 24, 15 December, 1914; Edouard Chapuisat, ‘L’opinion genevoise contre les persécutions anti-grecques’,
Les Etudes Franco-Grecques
, July 1918; ‘L’oeuvre germano-turque d’extermination en Asie Mineure’, n.a.,
Les Etudes Franco-Grecques
, April 1920; ‘Les persécutions antihelléniques en turquie’, n.a., published by Centre des Liberaux Hellènes de Lausanne, 1918; and Archimandrite Alexander Papadopoulos, ‘Persecutions of the Greeks in Turkey before the European War’, American-Hellenic Society, no. 6, 1919.

Enemy Aliens

A full account of the
Sultan Osman I
debacle can be found in Richard Hough,
The Big Battleship
, London, 1966. See also Winston Churchill,
The World Crisis: The Aftermath
, London, 1929.

Much of the information in this chapter was gleaned from local newspapers, especially the
Newcastle Daily Chronicle
(31 July 1914, 6 August 1914); the
Newcastle Daily Journal
(30 July 1914, 3/4/5/6 August 1914); the
Newcastle Weekly Chronicle
(11 July 1914).

The best general study of the ailing Ottoman empire is Alan Palmer,
Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire
, London, 1992. See also N. M. Turfan,
The Rise of the Young Turks
, London, 1999; F. Ahmad,
The Young Turks
, Oxford, 1969.

A most interesting account – and enlivened with diplomatic gossip – is Henry Morgenthau,
Ambassador Morgenthau’s Story
, 1918, republished in 2003 by Sterndale Classics, London. See also his often amusing
Secrets of the Bosphorus
, 1918.

For more on German military involvement in Turkey, see Liman von Sanders,
Five Years in Turkey
, Annapolis, 1927. See also Ulrich Trumpener,
Germany and the Ottoman Empire, 1914–1918
, Princeton, 1968. This excellent volume also offers some interesting information about von Sanders. Another worthwhile volume is Edward Meade Earle,
The Great Powers and the Bagdad Railway
, New York, 1923.