IMMEDIATE CONSEQUENCES OF THE GEMIDZII ACTIONS

IMMEDIATE CONSEQUENCES OF THE GEMIDZII ACTIONS

All diplomatic representatives in Solun reported the Solun events to their governments. Most concerned about the Gemidzhii actions were those who had the most to lose, such as the French Consul General and the Greek Consul General. For every revolutionary act in Macedonia, the Greek consul saw it as a deadly danger working against Greek “interests”. The diplomatic dispatches from Solun sent out on April 28, 29, and 30, 1903 were extensive and dealt mostly with the explosive situation in Solun. Unfortunately nowhere was there a mention of explosions on May 1, 1903. On April 30, 1903 Evgeniadis sent a telegram in which he stated that around 8 pm (April 29) about 20 bombs were thrown over cafés and other places in the Solun centre and on its periphery, causing a lot of panic. “Large crowds, well excited and in desperation, were running around on the streets. Bombs were thrown all over the place... a fire was started at the Ottoman bank. Casualties were minor because the bombs thrown at the cafés caused little damage. The army began to arrest people... At this moment, at midnight, there is a lot of

continuous shooting and bomb blasts on the outskirts of the city... The situation is serious...”

In his next telegram, again sent on April 30, 1903, Evgeniadis wrote: “The great panic continues... There are new bomb attacks tonight. I have information that the conspirators decided to blow up our Consulate tonight. I discussed with the city Vali how to overcome this danger. So far about 300 people have been arrested...” The telegram also stated that since Wednesday (after what happened on the evening of the 29) all kinds of bombings have taken place, but the house searches and arrests continue. “It was decided to kill anyone who resisted or tried to run away. Today I have been officially notified that 30 people have been killed. But according to unofficial information I have learned that one hundred and fifty people were killed yesterday and today. Starting at 6 o’clock in the evening all people have been locked up in their houses and movement in the streets has been forbidden.” (Ibid, 62-63.)

Similarly, telegrams were sent by other diplomats from Solun to their governments during this time also describing the events. Most of their descriptions were correct but there were also inaccurate descriptions. It is understandable that when the city was thrown into chaos, particularly by bombs and violence as the Gemidzhii did, no one knew exactly what was happening and the authorities were inclined to conceal or distort the truth by giving information which was often quite opposite to what was happening. The Greek consul for example, when referring to the Macedonian revolutionary movement and to any action that did not coincide with the wishes and aspirations of the Greek propaganda in Macedonia in general, could neither be and did not want to be objective. For him the Gemidzhii were, above all, a bunch of “Bulgarians” who loved Macedonia for themselves and, therefore, could be nothing more than criminals. So it’s no wonder that he stopped reporting on Gemidzhii actions after April 29, 1903, even though he heard bombs exploding on April 30. The bombs he heard exploding after April 29, 1903 he explained as the “perpetrators using bombs against the army to defend themselves and that they were caught or killed by the army.” So, according to him, even though the perpetrators were present, they were unable attack! But then, again according to him, they were “planning” to attack the Greek consulate!

It is interesting what the foreign consuls initially wrote to their superiors about the events in Solun, especially about the bombing of the Ottoman bank. None of the consuls knew or assumed that the bank attack was carried out from underground. This is what Di Revel, the Italian consul, wrote: “A wagon stopped at the door of the Ottoman bank from which people got off and were followed by others who, pretending they were arguing amongst themselves, killed the guard and two night watchmen. Because of the noise a patrol of 12 soldiers killed one of the conspirators, but the others, using the confusion as cover, entered the bank building and threw dynamite bombs in all directions. Three blasts were heard in the second part of the building, a wall collapsed on the neighbouring “Colombo” hotel and buried the German club called “Kegel Club”... Many of the conspirators remained buried in the bank building, others were killed or arrested.”

The diplomatic reports coming out of Solun, especially from the Greek consul, composed 7 to 10 days after the Solun events, were far more revealing and, of course, more accurate. We will talk about them a little later.

The actions perpetrated by the Gemidzhii with dynamite were as follows: bombed were the ship “Guadalquivir”, the Ottoman bank, the “Alhambra”, the “Nonio” and the “Boshnak” Inn. As was mentioned earlier, after Kirkov damaged the gas pipeline he returned to the city and threw a bomb in front of the Grand Hotel. The bomb exploded but did not cause any damage. Mechev also threw two bombs in front of the “Egypt” café. The German club was demolished and so were some houses.

Included among the Gemidzhii killed during these heroic events were Iordan Popiordanov-Ortse, Kosta Kirkov, Dimitar Mechev, Vladimir Pingov, Ilia Trchkov and Tsvetko Traikov.

Included among the Gemidzhii who survived the heroic events were Pavel Shatev, Georgi Bogdanov, Milan Arsov and Marko Boshnakov.

For as long as these “destructive incidents” lasted, the Macedonian people in Solun were outlawed de facto. This was true of all Macedonians, regardless of whether they belonged to the Exarchate or to the Patriarchate Church, or whether they were called “Bulgarians” or “Greeks”. However, the Exarchates were the first to find themselves in an extremely difficult situation. They were seen as the “revolutionaries” and therefore a “dangerous” element. As a result the authorities decided to use this occasion to drive them out of Solun by force. Steg and the other Great Power consuls feared that the same thing that had happened with the Armenians earlier could happen in Solun and in Macedonia in general.

In the struggle for their rights (Article 61 of the Berlin Agreement envisaged the implementation of reforms in Armenia, similar to Article 23 referring to Macedonia), in August 1896, Armenian revolutionaries, supporters of the Dashnak Committee, carrying 16 kg of dynamite in bags, entered the Ottoman bank in Tsari Grad, locked the door and occupied it. Through the bank director they then made demands of the Great Power MPs to initiate a reform project for the six Armenian vilayets, threatening that if they did not do it they would blow up the bank. As soon as the Armenian plot was discovered a crowd of Kurds and Lazis, armed with sticks and yataghans, attacked and slaughtered the Armenian population in Tsari Grad. So, instead of seeking reforms from the Sultan, lawmakers put their entire effort into stopping the immortal slaughter of Armenians. The Sultan promised that he would allow those Armenians who occupied the bank to leave the country safely. He fulfilled his promise. Unfortunately the slaughter continued. The government organized a fast-paced funeral service and took the corpses off the streets. A special group of people was put together to follow the crazed killers and pick up the killed and badly wounded victims. Their bodies were thrown into trash carts. Tens of thousands of Armenians were killed this way in the streets, in their homes and in their shops in Tsari Grad. More than 25,000 Armenians were killed in the Armenian vilayets.

The killers stopped their violence the day after the Sultan received a telegram with an ultimatum from the Great Power MPs. This proves that this genocide against the Armenian population was not a spontaneous act, but was organized by the bloody Sultan.

The European public was appalled by the ghastly cold-blooded act against the Armenian population. Protests against this criminal act turned into a movement that constantly reminded the people and the European statesmen that the Ottoman Sultanate was an anachronism in modern society and that if measures were not taken and if the oppressed were not helped in receiving their human and political rights, bloody events such as these would be repeated.

The Armenians had a strong echo in Europe, especially in the countries with democratic traditions, such as England and France. Then, seven years later, when similar incidents began to appear in Macedonia, such as the Solun assassinations and the Ilinden Uprising, much was written and spoken about the Armenians and their tragedy as if it had happened yesterday.

So naturally the question raised before the foreign consuls in Solun was: “Look what the Ottomans did to the poor Armenians who just threatened to blow up the bank? This, by the way, was the same bank Merdzhanov’s group was supposed to mine. The Ottomans killed several tens of thousands of Armenians for just threatening to blow up the bank. So the question was: “What will the Ottomans do to the Macedonian people for the Gemidzhii ransacking Solun and beyond for 3 to 4 days?” The consuls were wondering the same thing when they went looking for the Solun Vali as soon as they figured out what was going on.

Steg, the French general consul, together with the general consuls of England and Italy, who lived close to each other, without taking the exploding bombs into consideration, began to look for the Ottoman Solun Vali in order to be more closely informed of the situation in the city and the measures the Ottoman authorities would take to restore peace in the city. The Vali met them on his way to the Ottoman bank and invited them into his car. On the way they were joined by the Austro-Hungarian general consul. The Vali promised the consuls that he would do everything in his power to protect the European citizens. In doing so, the consuls insisted that he promise them that he would not allow the Ottoman population to interfere with the introduction of order in the city. (A.M., F. 238, French Consulate in Solun - to Delkase, Solun, May 7, 1903.)

And even though the Vali promised the consuls he would do everything in his power, the massacres in Solun and Macedonia were not prevented. What happened to the Armenians also happened to the Macedonians, but on a smaller scale. The pogroms in Solun, while the Gemidzhii acted, were committed more by the soldiers and less by the Ottoman, European and Greek population. After the most intense Gemidzhii actions took place on Wednesday night, the Ottoman army and police, the next day, began to arrest the exarchates en masse. About 50 Albanian soldiers, armed only with daggers, were divided into 5 or 6 groups and led by fanatical Ottoman citizens. They ran around the streets on the pretext that they were helping the army round up the exarchates, broke into Macedonian houses, attacked the closed inns and café’s in the “Vardar” settlement and plundered everything they found. These vigilantes arrested and killed anyone who they thought was “Bulgarian” or as such, pointed out by others. Many people from the Exarchate and other Christian populations in Solun were “slaughtered” that Thursday. (Makedonika, 65, 78. The Greek consul Evgeniadis saw the killing of “Bulgarians” in Solun as a normal thing, but was alarmed by the fact that “Greeks” were also killed. He was upset that the killers did not want to distinguish between the “types” of Christians and that they thought that all Christians were at fault.)

According to news received by the Greek consul, 10 people were killed by the Ottoman army on the Wednesday when the Gemidzhii began their actions, 30 people were killed on the Thursday and, along with the people killed later, the total number had reached 50.

A “crazed crowd” had gathered to search for the culprits. The culprits, according to the “crazed crowd”, were all those people who for years, they heard, were fighting against the Turkish authorities in the mountains and the villages. The culprits were known as the “Komiti”. While the police searched the houses of the Exarchates and arrested the men, the soldiers and the “crazed crowd” known as the “Bashibozuks” raged in the streets. H. Kotsev, while attempting to hide so that he would not be arrested, took refuge in the home of teacher F. Iosevova. Iosefova, not taking the situation seriously, decided to go to work and her father decided to go out to the store

and buy something. But both of them came back very quickly. The father returned home first followed closely by the daughter who told Kotsev what was happening outside.

He said: “The situation outside is very bad. I was unable to go to the main road. The Ottomans, the Greeks and the Jews were all yelling furiously as if chasing a rabid dog... The Ottomans had bayonets on their rifles and the Greeks and Jews (may God strike them dead) were carrying stones and clubs and were beating up people and, dead or alive, were throwing their bodies onto carts...”

She said: “All the streets in the bazaar were occupied by Ottomans, Greeks and Jews who had come here to hunt down and kill Exarchates. Without knowing, our people (Macedonians) went to work, to open their stores and, as they showed up on the main street, the Ottomans, Greeks and Jews pounced on them with knives, sticks and stones, and killed them. Whoever went to the bazaar did not return. There was no one in the school – everyone was hiding.” (H. Kotsev, 52.)

Fortunately the damage done was not as bad as that perpetrated against the Armenians. There were several reasons for that. The Ottoman authorities could not afford to do here in Europe what they had done in Asia against the Armenians. Memories from the Armenian massacre were still fresh in people’s minds and the Sultan could not afford a repeat of the Armenian incident in such a short time afterwards. A repeat of the same act would have gravely damaged relations between the Ottoman Empire and the Great Powers. The Solun Vali had to act fast in order to prevent the “crazed crowds” from taking the law into their own hands. A massive massacre in Macedonia was prevented, not because it was inspired by some kind of humanitarian deed but for higher state interests.

This sort of Great Power intervention, in this case, had significant impact on the Ottoman military and police and on the Solun “Bashibozuks”. The first demand the consuls made to the Vali was to do everything in his power to prevent “irresponsible” people from interfering in bringing order to the city. Putting military pressure on the Ottomans to enforce this was of paramount importance. On May

1, 1903 an Italian warship arrived in Solun port and was followed by Austrian and French warships. There could have been a repeat of what happened in 1876, when the German and French consuls in Solun were violently murdered by the fanatic Muslim masses. At that time the city found itself occupied by the Great Power navy. The same could have easily happened this time as well. But, before the Great Powers had a chance to threaten with invasions, the Ottoman authorities and the “Bashibozuks” decided to end the atrocities. They decided to wash the blood-stained streets and to re-open the stores. It was of paramount importance that Solun get back to normal life as soon as possible.

The appearance of the warships had a calming effect on the Macedonian population belonging to the Exarchate Church. This unfortunately created the false hope that with their self-sacrifice the Gemidzhii had actually yielded some results. Here is how H. Kotsev, an educated man, a professor at the Exarchate gymnasium and a politician, described the situation: “...I heard thunder. I looked and what did I see? Several black bears appeared on the horizon and entered the bay while shooting their usual salvos. They responded to them from “Edi Kule” (the notorious prison in Solun) with the usual greeting. I understood that it was an Italian squadron, which had received orders to come to the aid of the Christians who were being slaughtered. One or two hours later, new thunder drew my attention and I saw a dozen new bears - an Austrian squadron. A while later just as many French and English warships arrived, overwhelming the Ottomans: the autonomy for Macedonia was coming. I was overwhelmed with joy, I went downstairs to the host (Kotsev was in hiding in another friend’s place) and asked him to go outside for a bit and look around. I thought he might learn something comforting. He was happy when he returned.”

‘Tell me quickly what did you see?’ I asked him impatiently.

‘It would appear that the Ottoman goose has been cooked. The bears are coming to evict the Ottomans and introduce autonomy. The ‘crazed’ people have stopped the killing... There is blood in the streets, in the bazaars… everywhere. But, to prevent the Europeans from seeing it, they forced the Gypsies to wash away the puddles.

They issued an order to open the bazaars and declare that everyone was free to go about doing their business...’ he replied.” (Ibid, 54.)

The more Europe interfered in Ottoman internal affairs, the more the ruling circles in Tsari Grad became sensitive and irritable. Among other things, they regarded the outside interference as an encouragement for the Macedonian revolutionary movement, which was now seen as the “guilty” party for having committed the Solun events. It was not difficult for the Ottoman authorities to notice the kind of impact the warships had on the Macedonian population which, using the assassinations as an occasion, planned to do more serious damage. That is why the High Port did everything it could to convince the Great Powers to pull their ships out of Solun. The basic Ottoman argument, of course, was that by bringing their ships to Solun, the Great Powers encouraged the Christians to rebel. It was a “logical” argument which the ambassadors in Tsari Grad understood and decided to take action upon. The ships were withdrawn after the Grand Vizier promised them that the authorities would capture all the perpetrators and punish them in the spirit of their laws. And for the Ottomans, the entire Macedonian population was guilty and responsible for this. That is why the arrests and terror continued in Macedonia.

The Gemidzhii were planning to sink the “Guadalquivir” close to shore. It was necessary to destroy and sink the ship without causing any casualties among the passengers and the crew. But when Shatev saw the ship slowly moving away from the port he became very upset. Circumstances, as we mentioned earlier, did not allow him to light the fuse at the appropriate time. But after the explosion took place and the passengers were loaded onto the rescue boats, he declared with satisfaction:

“I rejoice with all my soul to see the ship burning and with no human casualties because it was never our intention to seek human sacrifices, even more so since the passengers on this ship are innocent in terms of our Macedonian cause…” (P. Shatev, 365.)

As mentioned earlier, the dynamite bombs the Gemidzii threw at the cafés were made with long fuses to give the café customers the opportunity to leave the shops in a timely manner. The goal,

therefore, was to create attention, to make as much noise as possible, to create panic and to attack the enemy. And all this was to be done, if possible, with as few casualties as possible. And fortunately it was carried out exactly the way it was planned.

Casualties among the civilian population were minimal. When the Bank was dynamited one of its walls collapsed and part of it fell on the German club and the rest of it fell inside the courtyard of the “Alhambra”, one of the main hotels in Solun. Because of this a French subject, a merchant, and an Italian shoemaker were killed. Some Germans and Austrians were wounded, as was an Italian dress maker. When the bank collapsed debris from it also landed on a horse drawn wagon and killed a German engineer named Heckel. There was also the body of a Greek waiter extracted from the ruins of the “Alhambra”. (P. Shatev, 386, Makedonika, 76, cited report of the French Consul in Solun. May 7, 1903.)

There were no Muslim or European civilian casualties reported. We could find no such references in our existing sources.

The number of Ottoman soldiers killed is also unknown. Given the fact that the bombs made of dynamite and thrown at the Ottoman authorities by the Gemidzhii were primitive, we can assume that the number of soldiers and gendarmes killed was probably insignificant. Three officials were killed at the bank and one at the post office.

There were also inaccurate reports being circulated that implied that the Gemidzhii were planning to attack Greek properties in Solun. It was unknown if the Gemidzhii had such intentions but we can say that dynamite was far too expensive and hard to come by to be used against Greek educational institutions. At some point in time even Evgeniadis felt obliged to say something about that. He wrote: “I find it necessary here to say that, despite all the rumours, none of the Greek community facilities or numerous churches in the city were attacked...” (Makedonika, 79.)

Fears expressed by the Great Power consuls that the conspirators would attack their consulates turned out to be unwarranted. Steg, for example, after hearing the loud explosions, ordered his people to keep their eyes open as to who was entering and leaving the

consulate, “knowing that the revolutionaries would not spare foreign officials”. The consuls, of course, could not have known if their buildings would be attacked or not. The bombing of the ship, the railway and the bank caused them to suspect that anything belonging to the Great Powers would be attacked. Their families, as we said earlier, were taken to the French hospital where they were guarded by the Ottoman army. On May 4, 1903 Sister Pisi wrote: “...We are beginning to be convinced that the assassins have nothing against us. The consuls have taken their families back to their own homes. Only the family of the bank director is still here with us because his home has been burned down.”

As for the material damage caused by the Gemidzhii, that too did not seem to be as significant at it appeared at first glance. Outside of the ship and the beautiful Ottoman bank building, the damage was not so great. The inside of the bank, where the money and other treasures were kept, was not damaged. About 150,000 Ottoman liras in cash and other valuables as well as important documents and books, were all recovered. (Ibid.)