Armenian genocide survivors

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Settlement and routes for Armenian refugees during and after the Armenian Genocide, up to the Hatay Referendum.

Armenian genocide survivors were Armenians in the Ottoman Empire who survived the Armenian genocide. After the end of World War I, many tried to return home in Western Armenia but most were prevented by the Turkish nationalist movement which considered Armenian survivors to be a mortal threat to the Turkish state.[1][2] Thousands of Armenians who tried to return were killed.[3]

Roughly half of the survivors fled to neighboring countries in the Middle East[4] with the other half fleeing to Eastern Armenia which later became the First Republic of Armenia. A further wave of Armenian refugees was created by the Turkey's invasion of the new Armenian Republic, and another 100,000 Armenians were uprooted from their homes in Cilicia following the French withdrawal in 1920.[5] Between 1922 and 1929, the Turkish authorities eliminated surviving Armenians from southern Turkey, expelling thousands to French-mandate Syria.[6][7] Fearing renewed persecution, the last Armenian communities of Cilicia fled after France ceded the territory to Turkey in 1939.[8][9][10]

Many of the survivors who remained in Turkey were women and children who were subsequently endured forcible conversions, abuse, or hard labor without pay.[11] Though Armenians in Constantinople faced discrimination, they were allowed to maintain their cultural identity, unlike those elsewhere in Turkey[11][12] who continued to face forced Islamization and kidnapping of girls after 1923.[13][14]

Distribution

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The US State Department document of the Armenian population in 1921

According to the US State Department, in 1922 there were 817,873 Armenian refugees who had originated from Turkey.[15] This figure was based upon information provided by the British Embassy in Constantinople and 1921 data from the Near East Relief Society. The total given did not include able-bodied Armenians detained by Kemalist Turkey, nor Armenian women and children - approximately 95,000, according to the League of Nations – who have been forced to convert to Islam.[16]

According to the same source, there were 281,000 Armenians still living in Turkey in 1921: 150,000 in Istanbul and 131,000 in Asia Minor.

Middle East

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By 1925, nearly 275,000 Armenian refugees had fled to Middle Eastern territories not controlled by Turkey.[17]

Population by country
Country Refugees
Syria 100,000
Lebanon 50,000
Palestine & Jordan 10,000
Egypt 40,000
Iraq 25,000
Iran 50,000
Total 275,000

Eastern Armenia

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See also: First_Republic_of_Armenia § Refugees_and_winter_of_1918

Between 350,000[18] to 600,000[19] refugees fled from the Ottoman Empire to the new Armenian republic in Eastern Armenia. In addition due to the Pan-Turkic military actions, additional Armenian refugees fled from Azerbaijan and the North Caucasus.[20] By late 1920, about 360,000 (almost half of Armenia's population of 720,000)[21] or 200,000 refugees remained.[22] This proved an insurmountable humanitarian issue for the First Republic of Armenia. Typhus was a major sickness, because of its effect on children. According to the data of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, 192,000 people died due to the typhus epidemic and famine by the summer of 1919.[23][citation needed]

Districts Number of refugees
Yerevan 75,000
Ejmiatsin 70,000
Novo-Bayazit (Gavar) 38,000
Daralagyaz (Vayots Dzor) 36,000
Bash-Abaran (Aparan) 35,000
Ashtarak 30,000
Akhta - Yelenovka (Hrazdan - Sevan) 22,000
Bash-Garni (Garni) 15,000
Karakilisa 16,000
Dilijan 13,000
Armenia 350,000

The government of Hovhannes Kachaznuni was faced with a most sobering reality in the winter of 1918-19. The newly formed government was responsible for over half a million Armenian refugees in the Caucasus. It was a long and harsh winter.[24] The homeless masses, lacking food, clothing and medicine, had to endure the elements. Many who survived the exposure and famine succumbed to the ravaging diseases. By the spring of 1919, the typhus epidemic had run its course, the weather improved and the first American Committee for Relief in the Near East shipment of wheat reached Batum. The British army transported the aid to Yerevan. Yet by that time some 150,000 of the refugees had perished. Vratsian puts this figure at around 180,000, or nearly 20% of the entire nascent Republic. A report[by whom?] in early 1919 noted that 65% of the population of Sardarabad, 40% of the population of eight villages near Etchmiadzin and 25% of the population of Ashtarak had died.[citation needed]

  • Armenian refugees from Turkey carding wool in Tiflis, Georgia. Photograph by Melville Chater from the National Geographic Magazine, 1920.
    Armenian refugees from Turkey carding wool in Tiflis, Georgia. Photograph by Melville Chater from the National Geographic Magazine, 1920.
  • Armenian refugees in Aleppo, Syria
    Armenian refugees in Aleppo, Syria
  • Armenian refugee camp In Beirut, Lebanon
    Armenian refugee camp In Beirut, Lebanon
  • Greek and Armenian refugee children near Athens, Greece, in 1923, following their expulsion from Turkey
    Greek and Armenian refugee children near Athens, Greece, in 1923, following their expulsion from Turkey

Notable survivors

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Documentary films

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Bozarslan et al. 2015, p. 311.
  2. ^ Nichanian 2015, p. 242.
  3. ^ Nichanian 2015, pp. 229–230.
  4. ^ Cheterian 2015, pp. 103–104.
  5. ^ Nichanian 2015, p. 238.
  6. ^ Kévorkian 2020, p. 161.
  7. ^ Vahé Tachjian (2004). La France en Cilicie et en Haute-Mésopotamie aux confins de la Turquie, de la Syrie et de l'Irak, 1919-1933. KARTHALA Editions. p. 249. ISBN 978-2-84586-441-2.
  8. ^ Kalpakian, Jack (2004). Identity, conflict and cooperation in international river systems. Aldershot: Ashgate. ISBN 978-0-7546-3338-9.
  9. ^ Ufheil-Somers, Amanda (2001-06-13). "In the Shadow of Kurdish". MERIP. Retrieved 2025-08-05. The Armenian Christians, furthermore, were refugees of the earlier expulsions from Anatolia and had good reason to fear Turkish governance...Arabs and Armenians saw the acquiescence of the French to the annexation as a betrayal. Subsequently, large numbers of refugees left for Syria; within two months of Hatay's transfer, 22,000 Armenians, 10,000 Alevi, 10,000 Sunni Arabs and 5,000 Christians fled.
  10. ^ "The expulsion of non-Turkish ethnic and religious groups from Turkey to Syria during the 1920s and early 1930s | Sciences Po Mass Violence and Resistance - Research Network". www.sciencespo.fr. 2019-04-15. Retrieved 2025-08-05.
  11. ^ a b Cheterian 2015, p. 104.
  12. ^ Suciyan 2015, p. 27.
  13. ^ Cheterian 2015, p. 203.
  14. ^ Suciyan 2015, p. 65.
  15. ^ "Approximate number of Armenian in the world, November 1922".
  16. ^ Akçam, Taner (2012). The Young Turks' Crime against Humanity: The Armenian Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing in the Ottoman Empire. Princeton University Press. p. 331. ISBN 978-0-691-15333-9.
  17. ^ Migliorino, Nicola (2008). (Re)Constructing Armenia in Lebanon and Syria: Ethno-Cultural Diversity and the State in the Aftermath of a Refugee Crisis. Berghahn Books. p. 32. ISBN 978-1-84545-352-7.
  18. ^ Hovannisian 1971, p. 127.
  19. ^ Kazemzadeh 1951, p. 211.
  20. ^ Hovannisian 1982, p. 6.
  21. ^ Herzig & Kurkchiyan 2005, p. 113; Suny 1993, p. 137.
  22. ^ Walker 1990, p. 349.
  23. ^ Petrosyan 2012, p. 35.
  24. ^ Hovannisian, Richard G. (1971). The Republic of Armenia: The First Year, 1918-1919, Vol. I. Berkeley: University of California Press. pp. 126–155. ISBN 0-520-01984-9.
  25. ^ Family
  26. ^ "Grandma's Tattoos".
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