The Great Fire (63 page)

Turkish soldiers robbing refugees of money and possessions. The robbing was incessant and often ended in death. (
Near East Relief
, Rockefeller Archive)

The body of a victim of the murder and pillage that spread through the city. Christians—Armenians, in particular—were pulled from their homes and businesses, killed and left on the street. A British officer estimated that most of the city’s Armenian population of about 40,000 was slaughtered before the evacuation was complete. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

This cabled message to the State Department quotes US Navy Lieutenant Aaron S. Merrill, an intelligence officer, attributing the fire to a Turkish plan to rid the country of Christians. (
The Library of Congress
)

A refugee woman with a child aboard a ship at Smyrna harbor. Most of the refugees were women and children. The men were taken out of the city and either imprisoned or shot. (
Courtesy of the National Archives
)

Smoke billows over Smyrna in this view from the southern end of the inner harbor. The fire could be seen for more than fifty miles out to sea, and within days the smoke had drifted hundreds of miles to Constantinople. (
Courtesy of George Poulimenos
)

Smoke obscures the Quay as the city burns. A British reporter described the fire as a series of volcanoes shooting smoke and fames into the sky. (
Courtesy of A. Karamitsos
)

The giant fire drove tens of thousands of people to the Quay, where many were crushed in the dense crowd. In the chaos, people jumped into the harbor to avoid the heat and many drowned. Some were shot as they tried to swim to Allied and American warships. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

An American skiff near the Quay. (The sailor is bailing the boat with a bucket.) As the fire burned, American ships were under orders not to rescue refugees, who were subjects of the Ottoman Empire. The skiff was used to evacuate Americans. The boats in the background are being swamped by panicked refugees. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

The Nationalist army was a mix of regular troops and irregulars called “chetahs,” back-country bandits or loosely organized local militias. After breaking the Greek line at Afyon-Kirahisar, the Nationalist troops drove the Greek army from Anatolia with astonishing speed. They were excellent cavalry, fighting with sword, lance and rifle. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

The destroyer USS
Edsall
arrived at Smyrna on September 14 and took 671 refugees to Salonika, then returned to play a central role in the rescue. The ship was commanded by Lt. Commander Halsey Powell, a WWI hero from McAfee, Kentucky. (
United States Navy Memorial Archive
)

Lt. Commander J. B. Rhodes feeding refugee children aboard an American destroyer in Smyrna harbor. A Naval Academy graduate from Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Rhodes was a complex figure. His flaws as an officer with a serious drinking problem were overshadowed by his brilliance and empathy. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)