The Great Fire (64 page)

Sara Corning, one of two Near East Relief nurses at Smyrna, cares for refugee children on the pier during the evacuation. On the first day of the fire, Miss Corning helped bring refugee children through the burning city to the Quay, where they were placed aboard an American merchant ship, SS
Winona
. She was from Nova Scotia, Canada, and received a commendation from the King of Greece. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

Two American sailors pull an Armenian woman dressed in an evening gown from the harbor. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

Refugees sought safety from the Turkish soldiers by climbing aboard cargo barges in Smyrna’s harbor. A Turkish order prevented British attempts to feed them. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

Before the fire, American citizens sought refuge in the Smyrna Theater, otherwise known as the American Theater because it was owned by an Armenian-American. It was from this theater that Americans were escorted to the whaleboats that carried them to the USS
Simpson
and then to Greece. The theater’s American flag survived the fire. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

The gutted remains of Quay buildings and refugees running from the fire as seen from the stern of an American destroyer in the harbor. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

Refugees await rescue on the Smyrna waterfront. Two weeks elapsed between the Nationalist army’s occupation of Smyrna and the start of the evacuation. In that period, the city was burned and soldiers and bandits freely killed and raped the city’s Christian population. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

Refugees on the bow of an American destroyer. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

A line of boys, probably from one of the Smyrna’s orphanages, salute American sailors as they come aboard an American destroyer. The sailors and officers of the USS
Edsall
pooled their money to provide for the care of orphans in Constantinople. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

Asa Jennings at Mytilene, where more than a hundred thousand refugees were brought from Smyrna. At Mytilene, Jennings found the Greek naval captain who helped him get ships for the evacuation, and the island became the main staging area after Smyrna for the transport of refugees to other parts of Greece. (
Roger Jennings
)

Dr. Esther Pohl Lovejoy on the railroad pier on the Smyrna waterfront (right foreground in dark hat) where tens of thousands of weak and starving refugees were loaded on ships for transport to Greece. Dr. Lovejoy, a public health pioneer and women’s rights activist from Seabeck, Washington, delivered babies and cared for the sick in the final days of the September evacuation. She was also an outspoken critic of Admiral Mark Bristol. (
Thomas Kinkaid Collection, The Naval History and Heritage Command
)

American doctor Esther Lovejoy said the buildings that remained after the fire reminded her of tombstones. (
Courtesy of A. Karamitsos
)