Fire of Manisa

Fire of Manisa
Part of Greek retreat during the Greco-Turkish War (1919–1922)
	Map of the town and its neighborhoods before the fire.
Date	5–8 September 1922
Location	Manisa, Greek Zone of Smyrna (now Republic of Turkey)
Participants	Hellenic Army; Greek and Armenian irregulars (per Turkish sources)
Outcome	Destruction of 90% of the town (~10,000 buildings)
Deaths	Exact number unknown; Thousands according to US consul James Loder Park; 4,355 according to Turkish sources

The Fire of Manisa (Turkish: Manisa yangını) refers to the burning of the town of Manisa, Turkey, which started on the night of Tuesday, 5 September 1922 and continued until 8 September. The fire was started and organized by the retreating Hellenic Army during the Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922, and as a result 90 percent of the buildings in the town were destroyed. The number of victims in the town and adjacent region was estimated to be several thousand by US Consul James Loder Park. Turkish sources says that 4,355 people died in the town of Manisa.

Background

Manisa is a historic town in Western Anatolia beneath the north side of Mount Sipylus that became part of the Ottoman Empire in the 15th century. During Ottoman rule, the town was governed by several princes (called Şehzade) and so is also known as a "town of the princes" (Şehzadeler şehri). Many examples of Ottoman architecture were built over the next few centuries, such as the Muradiye Mosque, designed by the famous architect Mimar Sinan in 1586, and built for Murad III who was a governor of the town.

By the 19th century, Manisa was among the largest towns in the Aegean region of Anatolia, and its population before the fire is estimated to have been between 35,000 and 50,000. Manisa had a religiously and ethnically diverse population made up of Muslims, Christians and Jews but Turkish Muslims were the largest group. During the 19th century, there was an increase in other groups, most notably Greeks. In 1865 the population was estimated by the British at 40,000 with minorities of 5,000 Greeks, 2,000 Armenians and 2,000 Jews. In 1898 the population was estimated by the Ottoman linguist Sami Bey at 36,252 of which 21,000 were Muslims, 10,400 Greeks, and 2,000 Armenians.

After World War I, Greece, supported by the Allied Powers, decided that the area known as the "Smyrna territory" would be occupied and could later be incorporated into Greece. In accordance with this plan, Greek forces (with Allied support) landed in Smyrna on 15 May 1919 and the town was occupied on 26 May without armed opposition. During the Greek Occupation, which lasted more than three years, there were complaints by the local Turks of bad treatment. During the Greco-Turkish War that followed the Greek invasion, atrocities were committed by both Turks and Greeks.

Fire

A Turkish offensive started in August 1922 and the Greek army retreated towards Smyrna and the Aegean coast. During their retreat they carried out a scorched earth policy, burning towns and villages and committing atrocities along the way. Towns to the east of Manisa, such as Alaşehir and Salihli, were burned. Several days before the actual fire in Manisa, rumours had started that the town would be burned. Turkish sources claim that the Greek army had permitted the Greek and Armenian population to leave and that they had already evacuated the area. Other sources confirm that the Christians fled before the Turkish advance. The Turkish sources claim that the local Turks and Muslims were ordered to stay in their houses, which most did until the day the fire was started.

The burning of the town was carefully managed by the Greek army, and fires were started at multiple places by specially organized groups. According to Turkish sources, a significant number of the arsonists were local Greeks and Armenians. During the night of Tuesday 5 September and the morning of 6 September, fires were started in the commercial Çarşı district (while looted was taking place) and at various other sites. Many people left their houses and fled to safety in the mountains and hills. During this chaos some people were killed by the Greeks or burnt to death. The population hid in the mountains for several days. Meanwhile, the Turkish army continued its rapid advance and, after some fighting with remaining Greek troops, they took control of the remains of the town on 8 September. By then most of the town had been destroyed.

Gülfem Kaatçılar İren, witnessed the fire as a little girl and remembers when she fled to the hills with her family:

After escaping the militia towards dawn, we climbed up a dry stream bed to hide in the hills. As we climbed, the city was burning, and we were lit by its light and warmed by its heat. It burned for three days and three nights. I saw the windowpanes of houses explode like bombs. Sacks of grapes stuck together, bubbling like jam. Dead cows and horses, balloons with their legs in the air. Ancient trees keeled over, their roots burning like logs. I did not forget these things. The heat, the hunger, the fear, the smell. After three days we saw the dust rise in the valley below. Turkish soldiers on horseback; we thought they were Greeks come to kill us in the hills. I remember three soldiers carrying green and red flags. People kissed the hooves of their horses, crying "Our saviors have come."

This witness testimony is also verified with the testimony of General Fahrettin Altay, the commander of the 5th Cavalry Army Corps, the Army Corps to save the remaining buildings and people of Manisa from fire on 8 September:

On the night of SEPTEMBER 7, we saw from afar with sadness that MANISA was burned and when we arrived there on September 8th, the people of Manisa, who fled from the fire to the mountains, came down from the mountains in heaps and began to hug us among the ashes. All possible help was given to the people of Manisa and the GOVERNMENT was ESTABLISHED. I gave the order to "ADVANCE TO IZMIR WITH HASTE the next morning".

Aftermath

The town is believed to have lost many buildings and objects of historical significance, but a small area around the two imperial Ottoman mosques was saved from destruction.

Damage

The Turkish government set up a commission called Tetkik-i Mezalim or Tetkik-i Fecayi Heyeti "the atrocity committee" to research and document the events and atrocities. The Turkish author Halide Edip saw the town after the fire, as did Henry Franklin-Bouillon, the French government representative, who declared that out of 11,000 houses in the city of Magnesia (Manisa) only 1,000 remained. Patrick Kinross wrote, "Out of the eighteen thousand buildings in the historic holy city of Manisa, only five hundred remained." The total economic damage was estimated to be more than fifty million lira (in contemporary value). Some of the captured Greek soldiers were employed in the reconstruction, such as in the rebuilding of the destroyed Karaköy mosque.During the Lausanne negotiations the Turkish delegation stated that 9,084 buildings in the Sanjak of Manisa, outside the city, town centres were burned by the Greek Army. More than 92% of all buildings in the centre of Manisa were destroyed - 13,638 out of 14,773 buildings. The Greek Delegation's reply on the same day does not contradict this claim.

Loder Park, who toured much of the devastated area immediately after the Greek evacuation, described the situation he had seen as follows:

Manisa ... almost completely wiped out by fire ... 10,300 houses, 15 mosques, 2 baths, 2,278 shops, 19 hotels, 26 villas ... [destroyed]..."
"1. The destruction of the interior cities visited by our party was carried out by Greeks."

"3. The burning of these cities was not desultory, nor intermittent, nor accidental, but well planned and thoroughly organized."

"4. There were many instances of physical violence, most of which was deliberate and wanton. Without complete figures, which were impossible to obtain, it may safely be surmised that 'atrocities' committed by retiring Greeks numbered well into thousands in the four cities under consideration. These consisted of all three of the usual type of such atrocities, namely murder, torture and rape."

Victims

The total number of victims during the fire is not known. Turkish sources estimate that 3,500 died in the fires and 855 were shot. The number who were wounded is also unknown. Turkish sources state that three hundred girls were raped and abducted by the Greeks. Many rape victims were thought to have remained silent out of fear or shame. A number of Greek troops were captured and some of them were lynched by the Turkish women they had raped. Colonel Stylianos Gonatas states that many of the Muslim victims were kept inside the houses while being burned just as in Kasaba. For that reason, the downtown was still dangerous for the Greek soldiers.

The Greek retreat was accompanied by looting and other people lost their possessions in the fires and lived for some time among the ruins of their homes or crowded together in the surviving buildings.

In Turkish literature

The event is mentioned in a work by Turkish journalist Falih Rıfkı Atay. The Turkish poet İlhan Berk was a small child living in the Deveciler neighborhood at the time of the fire and fled to the mountains with his family. His older sister burned to death in their house. He wrote that he could never forget the flight to the mountains and wrote of other childhood memories of the events in his work Uzun Bir Adam. The historian Kamil Su also witnessed the fire as a 13-year-old living in the Alaybey neighborhood. On the morning of 6 September he fled with his family to the mountains. When he returned to his neighborhood he found corpses in the streets and most buildings razed to their foundations, only the walls of the historic Aydın mosque still standing; the corpse of an unknown man lay in the street in front of where Su's house had stood. He later wrote Manisa ve Yöresinde İşgal Acıları, a book about the Greek occupation and the fire.

Gallery

A view from the hills above the town.
Picture taken from the north in southerly direction, showing Mount Sipylus and in the distance the Ulu Camii, grand mosque, built in 1366.
The reconstruction of the burned Municipal building.