Armenian Genocide Timeline: 1915

1/1/1915
The Ittihad representative of Bursa reports to the Ittihad Central Committee that local criminals and bandits have been registered in the Special Organization.
1/1/1915
Nuri, the vice-governor of Gavar District in Van Province, receives orders from the military governor to kill the Armenian soldiers in the Turkish Army who were stationed in his district.
1/5/1915
The Turkish government publicly charges that Armenian bakers in the army bakeries of Sivas were poisoning the bread of the Turkish forces. The bakers are cruelly beaten, despite the fact that a group of doctors prove the charge to be false by examining the bread and even eating it. As this marks an attempt on the part of the government to incite massacre, the government does not rescind the charge.
1/8/1915
Turkish and Kurdish chetes (Halil Pasha's "First Corps") attack Armenian and Assyrian villages in northwest Persia. They remain around the city of Tavriz (Tabriz) and the city of Urmia from January 8 until January 29, 1915. From Urmia alone, more than 18,000 Armenians, together with many Assyrians and even Persian Muslims, flee to the Caucasus.
1/12/1915
Ahmed Muammer, the governor-general of Sivas Province, orders the destruction of Tavra-Koy and other strategically located villages around the city of Sivas in order to make future defense impossible for the Armenians. Inside the city of Sivas strategically-located buildings were requisitioned.
1/16/1915
The last actions of the Battle of Sarikamish are reported. The Turkish army is totally defeated and almost destroyed with a loss of 70,000 men out of 85,000.
1/19/1915
Enver arrives in Sivas by automobile from Erzerum after his calamitous defeat at Sarikamish. He instructs the Army to accept only his orders and none hereafter from the German commanders and to draft at once all those deferred in the 20 to 40 age group, along with all males between the ages of 18 and 20 and 45 to 52.
1/22/1915
Enver arrives in Constantinople by automobile from Sivas. After his arrival, he makes a speech congratulating the Armenians for admirably doing their duty on the Caucasian Front and elsewhere. Enver seeks to lull the Armenians of Constantinople who had not yet experienced the general persecutions in the provinces because of the presence of a large European community in the city.
1/23/1915
Enver, now actively Minister of War again, issues a general order to shoot all persons resisting his orders.
2/2/1915
Talaat advises German Ambassador Count Hans von Wangenheim that the war is the only propitious moment to conclude the Armenian Question.
2/10/1915
S. Pasdermadjian, the Second Director of the Ottoman Bank, is murdered in the presence of German Major-General Posseldt, who reported that no investigation was carried or was any attempt made by the Turkish authorities to apprehend the guilty parties.
2/10/1915
Enver's brother-in-law, Hafiz Hakki, dies of typhus and is replaced by Mahmud Kamil as Commander of the Third Army (Erzerum).
2/14/1915
Tahir Jevdet, the governor-general of Van Province, is reported saying that the government must begin finishing the Armenians in Van at once.
2/16/1915
The vice-governor of Mush orders 70 gendarmes to attack the village of Koms and to kill the Armenian Dashnak leader Rupen and all persons with him. Rupen and his companions resist and eventually escape to the Caucasus.
2/19/1915
Talaat, Osman Bedri, and other Ittihadist leaders decide in a meeting that should Allied naval ships force the Dardanelles, the Turks would burn Constantinople, blow up the Hagia Sophia, and slaughter the Christian inhabitants. Kerosene is distributed to all police stations in Constantinople for ready use in such an eventuality.
2/21/1915
An attack by chetes on the village of Purk near Shabin-Karahisar results in looting, murder, rape.
2/26/1915
Vramian, an Armenian parliamentary deputy from Van, writes Talaat advising him to remove the large number of chetes in Van Province.
2/27/1915
In Sivas Province a general attack is reported on many Armenian villages accompanied by raping, looting, and an increasingly larger number of killings.
2/27/1915
In the village of Chomaklu in Kayseri Province and in other places, the government demands all weapons from the Armenians.
3/1/1915
In Marash, the Armenians in the Turkish Army are deprived of their uniforms and arms.
3/3/1915
A dispatch from the Ittihad Central Committee is released announcing the decision to exterminate the Armenians.
3/3/1915
Armenian soldiers in the Erzerum army area are deprived of their uniforms and arms.
3/3/1915
The British decide to attack the Dardanelles.
3/5/1915
In Van Province, regular gendarmes and chetes are reported attacking many villages inhabited by Armenians and Assyrians.
3/7/1915
A search for weapons is conducted in Iskenderun (Alexandretta) and a mass arrest of Armenians carried out.
3/9/1915
Chetes and regular Army units attack Zeitun. Six Turkish gendarmes are killed by individuals resisting the attack.
3/12/1915
Massacres and robberies are carried in Alashkert District as part of a general campaign led by the chetes forces against the Armenian villages of the district.
3/12/1915
Mass arrests of Armenians are carried out in Dortyol and a public announcement is made that those arrested would be sent to work on road construction near Aleppo. They are never heard of again.
3/12/1915
Enver leaves for Berlin to see Kaiser Wilhelm II.
3/13/1915
A traveling commission of parliamentary deputies tours all the cities of Anatolia. The commission includes Dr. Fazil Berki, parliamentary deputy from Chankri, Ubedulla, parliamentary deputy from Smyrna, and Behaeddin Shakir, member of the Central Committee of the Ittihad Party. They address the Turkish population in the mosques describing the Armenians as internal enemies which must destroyed.
3/13/1915
In Sivas Province the population in all the Armenian villages is disarmed.
3/14/1915
Sahag, the Catholicos of Cilicia, advises the Armenians of Zeitun not to resist under any conditions.
3/16/1915
Russian forces advance between Urmia and Tavriz.
3/18/1915
An Allied attack on the Dardanelles begins.
3/18/1915
In Zeitun, the Turkish forces arrest many of the remaining Armenian notables and intellectuals whom they torture and finally kill.
3/19/1915
Six Armenian soldiers from the town of Gurun are publicly hanged in Sivas to frighten the Armenian population.
3/19/1915
Greek recruits are massacred near Smyrna.
3/20/1915
Omer Naji, a circulating Ittihad propagandist, travels to Aleppo, Adana and nearby towns to arouse the Muslims.
3/24/1915
Chetes and gendarmes attack Armenians in the towns of Bayburt (Papert) and Terchan in Erzerum Province, and in Bitlis.
3/26/1915
Sahag, Catholicos of Cilicia, renews his instruction to the Armenians of Zeitun not to resist.
3/26/1915
Thirty more Armenian community leaders are arrested in Zeitun.
3/28/1915
The Armenian Dashnak leader, Murad, resists arrest in Sivas and flees to the mountains, and after many daring escapes reaches the Caucasus.
3/28/1915
Hamid, the governor-general of Diyarbekir Province, is removed for opposing the order of massacre, and is replaced by Dr. Reshid.
3/29/1915
In Aleppo, the capital of the province, Jemal Pasha falsely announces that the Armenians of Zeitun are in revolt and therefore he is instructing the military authorities, to the exclusion of the civilian government, to take measures to punish the Armenians.
3/29/1915
Artillery and three regiments of the regular army are sent to Zeitun as reinforcements for the three battalions which had arrived in the town in January and February.
3/30/1915
Mass beatings and tortures are inflicted on the Armenians of Chomaklu.
3/31/1915
In Marash, Turks announce a mass meeting to prepare a massacre. Acting under the terms of the March 29 order, the government forbids civilians to take matters into their own hands.
3/31/1915
Deportation of Armenians from Zeitun begins. Some of the inhabitants are sent to the Konia Desert in central Anatolia. The rest are sent to Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor) in the Syrian Desert.
3/31/1915
Azadamart, the leading Armenian newspaper in Constantinople is closed by an order of the government issued through the office of the Police Commissioner of Constantinople, Osman Bedri. 300 Turkish pounds in the petty cash box are stolen. The printing presses are removed to the Ittihad Press, where the organ Tanin was published by the CUP, with Huseyin Jahid (Yalchin) as editor-in-chief, and Ahmed Emin as associate editor.
4/1/1915
The mass arrest of Armenian political leaders is carried out in Sivas and other provinces.
4/2/1915
General robbery and arrests of Armenians are reported throughout Bitlis and Erzerum Provinces.
4/2/1915
In Sivas Province, battalions of gendarmery and 4000 chetes begin regular attacks on Armenian villages with increasing brutality.
4/3/1915
(Easter week) Mass arrests and a search for weapons are carried out in Marash and Hadjin (Hajen), with the seizure of all arms, including household knives. Numerous rapes during the house searches are reported.
4/5/1915
In Marash Turks demand 5,000 jackasses from the Armenians in an excuse to loot.
4/8/1915
Turkish emigrants from Bosnia are settled by the government in the villages of Zeitun District. 8,000 Turkish regulars are reported in Zeitun.
4/8/1915
The famous monastery of Zeitun is burned by the Turks.
4/9/1915
Turks declare a meeting in Marash to deport the Armenians. The Turkish government forbids civilian action on the ground that the March 16 Army command covered the situation.
4/11/1915
Talaat tells the Armenian parliamentary deputy Bedros Halajian that there will be no massacres.
4/12/1915
Widespread attacks on, and looting of, Armenian villages in Bitlis and Erzerum Provinces are fed by the accusation that the Armenians caused the war.
4/13/1915
(toward the end of the month) The Turkish government forbids American Ambassador Henry Morgenthau to send coded messages to the American consuls and deprives him of his diplomatic prerogative of receiving communications uncensored.
4/14/1915
The governor-general of Van, Tahir Jevdet invites the Armenian parliamentary deputies from Van and the Dashnak leader Ishkhan to attend a conference.
4/15/1915
Armenian refugees from villages surrounding the city of Van arrive and notify the inhabitants that 80 villages in Van Province were already obliterated and that 24,000 Armenians had been killed in three days.
4/16/1915
The Armenian leaders Vramian and Ishkhan are slain during the night in the Kurdish village of Hirj by chetes on orders from Governor-general Tahir Jevdet.
4/17/1915
Friendly Kurds inform the inhabitants of Van of the assassination of Vramian and Ishkhan.
4/17/1915
The Armenians organize defense against the sudden attack by Turkish forces on the city of Van. (They hold out until advance units of the Russian Army consisting of Armenian volunteers arrive to their rescue on May 23, 1915).
4/18/1915
Until the end of April 32,000 more Armenians are slain in the villages of Van Province, including the inhabitants of remote villages.
4/18/1915
In Erzerum, Turkish civilians declare intentions to hold a meeting. The Army forbid it. Similar gatherings in other centers are also forbidden on the grounds that the Army is the agency responsible for handling the Armenians.
4/18/1915
The Governor-general of Van Province demands that the Armenians of the city of Van surrender their weapons. The Armenians refuse as chete units were harassing the surrounding villages.
4/19/1915
House searches are made in Diyarbekir and widespread persecution takes place.
4/20/1915
The deportation of the 25,000 Armenians of Zeitun is completed.
4/20/1915
The first large-scale arrests of Armenians are made in Diyarbekir upon the orders of Governor-general Reshid.
4/20/1915
Twenty Armenian Social Democratic Hnchak Party members are brought to the Central Prison in Constantinople to face court martial. They are hanged publicly on June 2, 1915.
4/24/1915
250 Armenian intellectuals and community leaders are arrested in Constantinople and sent to Chankri and Ayash, where they are later slain.
4/24/1915
The editors and staff of Azadamart, the leading Armenian newspaper of Constantinople, are arrested, and on June 15 are slain in Diyarbekir, where they had been transported and imprisoned.
4/24/1915
The Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople and Zohrab, Armenian deputy in the Ottoman Parliament, petition the Grand Vizier, Said Halim, the Minister of the Interior Talaat, and the President of the Senate, Rifat, on behalf of the arrested Armenians of Constantinople. Though approached separately, all three give identical answers; that the government is isolating the Armenian leadership and dissolving the Armenian political organizations.
4/26/1915
Three Armenians are hanged publicly in Mush without trial.
4/27/1915
A second meeting in Erzerum to organize a communal massacre is disbanded by the government as interference in the affairs of the Army.
4/27/1915
26 Armenian leaders are arrested in Marsovan (Merzifon). A two-week-long search for weapons is started accompanied by acts of violence and the abuse of women.
4/29/1915
Russian citizens of Armenian origin are arrested in Constantinople.
4/29/1915
The disarming of the Armenians of Constantinople is carried out with many outrages.
4/30/1915
The vice-governor of Erzinjan begins the persecution of the Armenians with the arrest of many intellectuals.
5/1/1915
The arrest of the Armenian professors and teachers of the American Euphrates College in Kharput is started.
5/2/1915
Halil Pasha's forces are defeated by the Russian Army in the Caucasus and in northern Iran, and retreat to Van, Bitlis, and Mush, where they participate in the massacre of the Armenians.
5/2/1915
3,000 English and French civilians are arrested in Constantinople.
5/3/1915
House searches are made in Aleppo.
5/3/1915
Macedonian Turkish immigrants are installed in Zeitun by the government.
5/3/1915
The deportations from the villages of Erzerum Province are started.
5/4/1915
The mass arrests of Armenian leaders in Aintab are begun.
5/4/1915
200 Armenian leaders in Erzerum are arrested.
5/5/1915
Arrests and persecutions begin in Kharput.
5/6/1915
Allied nationals in Beirut (Beyrut) are deported to Damascus and dispersed from there.
5/6/1915
The New York Times reports that the Young Turks had adopted a policy to annihilate the Armenians.
5/9/1915
Lord Grey, British Minister of Foreign Affairs, sends a message to Enver holding him personally responsible should anything happen to the 3,000 captive English and French civilians.
5/10/1915
950 prominent Armenians are arrested in Diyarbekir on orders from Dr. Reshid, the governor-general of Diyarbekir Province.
5/10/1915
The Armenian refugees from Zeitun found in Marash, who had previously been spared deportation, are removed to the Syrian Desert.
5/12/1915
Vartkes, an Armenian deputy in the Ottoman Parliament, visits Talaat to protest the arrests of April 24.
5/14/1915
English and French civilian prisoners are deported to the interior of Anatolia.
5/14/1915
38 Armenian community leaders are arrested in the town of Chomaklu in Kayseri Province and shortly thereafter executed.
5/15/1915
The Armenian community leaders in the town of Bayburt are arrested and subsequently killed in Urbajioghli-Dere.
5/15/1915
Armenians are deported from the northern villages of Erzerum Province.
5/18/1915
Courts martial are set up in Marash to try the Armenian leaders arrested there shortly earlier.
5/19/1915
Advance troops of the Russian Army in the Caucasus led by Armenian volunteers reach Van and lift the siege of city.
5/19/1915
Armenians in the Khnus region of Erzerum Province are massacred.
5/21/1915
Regular Russian Army forces arrive in Van. They begin the cremation of the dead in the city and in the villages of the province. 55,000 dead are identified as Armenians.
5/21/1915
Armenian parliamentary deputy Vartkes visits Police Commissioner Osman Bedri to protest the arrests of the Constantinople Armenian community leaders.
5/22/1915
Turkish refugees are settled in the emptied Armenian villages of the Tortum District of Erzerum Province.
5/24/1915
A note is sent by the Allied Powers to the Turkish Cabinet holding it responsible for the massacres of the Armenians.
5/25/1915
Armenian parliamentary deputies Zohrab and Vartkes are arrested in Constantinople and later murdered while in custody in Kara-Kopru.
5/27/1915
German Marshal Otto Liman von Sanders reports that the deportations were planned by the Committee of Union and Progress, and received the approval of all the ministries, and that the execution of the plans was placed in the hands of the governors-general, their subordinates, and the police.
5/27/1915
The promulgation of the Temporary Law of Deportation, months after the depopulation of the Armenian settlements had been initiated.
5/27/1915
2,000 Armenians are deported from Marash.
5/27/1915
300 Armenians arrested on May 10 in Diyarbekir are murdered while in custody.
5/29/1915
Talaat is reported to have said that he was going to give to the Armenians a new and final residence.
5/29/1915
630 Armenians arrested on May 10 in Diyarbekir are murdered in the village of Bisheri while in custody and their bodies are thrown in the Tigris River.
5/31/1915
Two weeks of outrages perpetrated against the Armenians of the town of Chomaklu under the guise of forcing the Armenians to give up their arms are ended.
5/31/1915
German Ambassador Hans von Wangenheim advises against German interference in the deportations.
6/3/1915
Ayub Bey, an arch-assassin, leaves Adana for Aleppo in connection with the organizing of massacres.
6/4/1915
Enver issues a circular dispatch classified secret and urgent concerning the deportations.
6/7/1915
The first convoy of Armenian deportees leave Erzinjan toward Kemakh on their way to the Syrian Desert.
6/7/1915
The Armenian Prelate of Shabin-Karahisar, Vaghinag Vartabed, is assassinated.
6/7/1915
The Armenians of Constantinople appeal to the German and the Austrian Embassies to prevent the deportations and associated outrages, but receive no satisfactory reply.
6/7/1915
The Armenians arrested in Sivas on April 1 and transported to Angora Province are murdered in the woods of Meshedler-Yeri. The mass slaughter is witnessed by Greek woodcutters who report the news to the Armenians of Sivas.
6/8/1915
The second convoy of deportees from Erzinjan leaves for the Syrian Desert.
6/9/1915
The third convoy of Armenians departs from Erzinjan.
6/9/1915
Three Armenian medical officers, Dr. Hairanian, Dr. Baghdasar Vartanian, and Dr. Maksud, serving in the Turkish Army are murdered in the city of Sivas.
6/10/1915
Over a period of four days the Armenians deported from the towns and villages of Erzerum Province are slaughtered in a major massacre at Kemakh.
6/13/1915
The War Ministry orders the seizure of all the domestic animals of the Armenians.
6/13/1915
The War Ministry notifies that the permits given to Armenians exempting them from the deportations and safety certificates are only provisional and temporary.
6/13/1915
25,000 Armenians are murdered by the fourth day of the Kemakh massacre. The 86th Cavalry Brigade with its officers and the 2nd Reserve Cavalry Division of the Turkish Army participate in the slaughter.
6/13/1915
Instructions concerning procedures for the deportations and urging extreme strictness are sent to provincial governors.
6/14/1915
Subhi Bey, the assistant to the Undersecretary of the Interior Ministry asks for a list of Armenians working in the shipyards, docks, and arsenals of the Ministry of the Marine.
6/14/1915
The third convoy of Armenian deportees from the town of Bayburt departs.
6/14/1915
300 Armenian community leaders are arrested in Shabin-Karahisar.
6/15/1915
Twenty members of Armenian Social Democratic Hnchak Party are publicly hanged in Constantinople as a signal to the provinces to intensify measures.
6/15/1915
Twelve Armenian community leaders are publicly hanged in Sivas.
6/15/1915
The Armenians of Shabin-Karahisar organize defense against chete forces and the regular Turkish Army.
6/16/1915
3,500 Armenian men are seized in a mass arrest in Sivas Province.
6/17/1915
Talaat is reported to have declared that he will uproot the internal enemy.
6/17/1915
1,213 Armenian men are arrested in Marsovan (Merzifon).
6/17/1915
8,500 Armenians withdraw into the ruined castle of Shabin-Karahisar to defend themselves against the Turks.
6/18/1915
160 families are deported from city of Erzinjan.
6/19/1915
A second convoy composed of 300 families leaves the city of Erzerum.
6/21/1915
The governor-general of Aleppo, Jelal Bey, resigns in protest against the deportation order and the massacres.
6/21/1915
Talaat sends instructions to prevent the populace from robbing the abandoned goods of the Armenians.
6/23/1915
The Interior Ministry advises provincial governors that the Commission on Abandoned Goods will have charge of the resettlement of Turkish Muslim immigrants.
6/23/1915
The Interior Ministry advises taking the precaution of separating the convoys of Armenian deportees by a distance of five hours.
6/23/1915
The wholesale arrest of 1,500 men is carried out in Sivas Province.
6/23/1915
First large-scale massacre of Armenian men is carried out in the town of Kharput.
6/23/1915
Wholesale arrests are made in Bitlis of the scattered remnant Armenians who had escaped the previous series of massacres.
6/23/1915
Massacres of Armenian Christians, Maronites, Nestorians, Europeans, Catholics, and other non-Muslim people in the city of Mardin are carried out under the direct order of Dr. Reshid, the governor-general of Diyarbekir Province.
6/23/1915
The Armenian notables of Trebizond are sent by boat toward Samsun, and on the way are thrown, tightly bound together, into the Black Sea.
6/25/1915
The massacre of Armenians of Bitlis is carried out under the direct orders of Mustafa Abdulhalik Renda.
6/25/1915
A government decree instructs the 30,000 Armenians in Trebizond to leave the city within 5 days.
6/26/1915
An decree issued in Erzerum orders all Armenians to leave for Syria.
6/26/1915
A decree issued in Samsun orders all Armenians to leave within 15 days.
6/26/1915
The remaining Armenian men in Sivas are arrested.
6/28/1915
The previously arrested Armenian educators and community leaders in Kharput are transported from prison to be murdered.
6/29/1915
Vartkes and Zohrab, two Armenian deputies in the Ottoman Parliament, deported from Constantinople, arrive in custody in Aleppo.
6/30/1915
3,000 Armenians from the city of Erzerum are murdered while being deported.
6/30/1915
6,000 Armenians from Zeitun arrive in the Konia Desert and nearby malarial marshes.
7/1/1915
2,000 Armenian soldiers in the Turkish Army used as laborers are massacred near the city of Kharput.
7/1/1915
The first convoy of deportees leaves the seaport of Trebizond for the south.
7/1/1915
The governor-general of Sivas announces that the first convoy of deportees from the city are to leave by July 5 in groups according to street residence. A total of 48,000 persons are deported. The governor, commissioner of police, two parliamentary deputies, the qadi (the chief religious judge), and the mufti (the religious chief) tell the Armenians that they were being resettled for the duration of the war in order to forestall any resistance.
7/2/1915
Bands of 4,000 chetes operating out of the mountains around Erzinjan begin daily raids against the southward bound convoys of Armenian deportees.
7/2/1915
The deportation decree is issued in the city of Mush.
7/4/1915
For the record an official German protest is registered with the Grand Vizier. The protest is left unanswered by the Turkish government.
7/4/1915
Neshed Pasha leaves Sivas with three regiments and artillery to subdue the Armenians resisting in Shabin-Karahisar.
7/5/1915
In Diyarbekir 2,000 Armenian soldiers working in labor corps are killed.
7/5/1915
The first convoy of deportees leaves the city of Sivas. Every day for 16 days an average of 400 families leave, the overwhelming majority being slain on route to the Syrian Desert. The last convoy departs from the city on July 20.
7/6/1915
By this date up to 1,000 Armenian families had left Trebizond in convoys headed south.
7/7/1915
The male members of 800 Armenian families in the town of Kharput are killed.
7/8/1915
Zaven, Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople, appeals to the Minister of Justice, Ibrahim Bey, who replies that he cannot intervene in matters concerning the War Ministry.
7/10/1915
2,700 persons are killed in a second massacre in Mardin.
7/11/1915
The beginning of a four-day massacre in Mush under the combined orders of parliamentary deputy Elias, vice-governor Servet, and Governor-general Mustafa Abdulhalik Renda, Talaat's brother-in-law.
7/11/1915
The Interior Ministry instructs that the Armenian villages be settled with Muslim immigrants.
7/12/1915
The government advises all governors-general that Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor) District is saturated and that the rest of the deportees be routed to Kirkuk District in northern Iraq, to the south of Aleppo, and to the east of Syria.
7/12/1915
Instructions are issued to distribute Armenian orphans to Turkish homes.
7/13/1915
The Muslim holy month of Ramadan begins. During the whole month the greatest concentration and universalization of massacring and murdering occurs in every province of Turkey.
7/13/1915
The last convoy, containing all the remaining Armenians in the city, leaves Kharput.
7/13/1915
Zaven, Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople, is declined an audience with Talaat.
7/14/1915
Jemal, Commander of Aleppo's Fourth Army Corps, protests to Dr. Reshid, the governor-general of Diyarbekir Province about the dumping of dead bodies in the Euphrates River and advises burial. From June 22 to July 17, a period of 25 days, a steady stream of bodies of massacred Armenians floats down the Euphrates River.
7/16/1915
Bodies from Kharput Province and Erzerum Province float down the Euphrates to Jerablus, where they are seen and identified by German officers.
7/18/1915
In the region of Dersim, 3,000 Armenians are killed by the Turks. Almost all of the large Kurdish population of Dersim refuses to participate in the massacres and even shelters many Armenians.
7/21/1915
First day of the Turkish attack on Musa Dagh (Musa Ler in Armenian).
7/23/1915
The Italian consul at Trebizond reports about the barbarities he had witnessed.
7/23/1915
The seventh anniversary of the 1908 restoration of the liberal Constitution of 1876 is celebrated.
7/24/1915
Talaat sends instructions to Urfa, Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor), and Diyarbekir to bury the bodies of those fallen by the roadside and not throw them in ditches, lakes, or rivers.
7/24/1915
The registration and classification of all prisoners from Sivas is carried out. This was done in accordance with a directive in general circulation.
7/25/1915
Behaeddin Shakir, chief of the Special Organization in Erzerum Province, telegrams Nazim Bey Resneli via Sabit Bey, the governor-general of Kharput Province, inquiring whether the Armenians deported from there are being exterminated or just being convoyed.
7/25/1915
Behaeddin Shakir instructs the governor-general of Kastamonu Province to begin the deportation of the Armenians there.
7/26/1915
Talaat informs the Ittihad party organization in Malatia explaining that half of the loot captured from the Armenians is being assigned to the Central Committee of Ittihad in Constantinople, and the other half is to be distributed to chetes. (On December 12, 1918, the Turkish newspaper, Sabah, reported that each chete in the Malatia area received as a result 15,000 Turkish pounds.)
7/27/1915
Governor-general Reshid Pasha reports to the Interior Ministry that the deportation of the Armenians from Kastamonu Province is completed.
7/27/1915
Behaeddin Shakir sends a cipher telegram to the governor-general of Adalia Province, Sabur Sami Bey, asking him what steps he was taking at a time, when in Erzerum, Van, Bitlis, Diyarbekir, Sivas, and Trebizond Provinces, not a single Armenian remains because they have all been sent in the direction of Mosul and Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor). Sabur sends a copy of the telegram to Talaat to show that he had received these indirect instructions.
7/27/1915
The vice-governor of Yozgat District, in Angora Province, reports to the Interior Ministry that 68,000 Armenians had been slain in the district.
7/28/1915
Sabit, the governor-general of Kharput Province, informs the Interior Ministry that all the road are filled with the bodies of women and children and time cannot be found to bury them.
7/28/1915
The governor-general of Erzerum Province reports of widespread looting and rape.
7/28/1915
The Interior Ministry issues a circular telegram instructing that the Muslim population be settled in the large Armenian villages.
7/28/1915
The deportation of the Armenians of the town of Aintab begins.
7/28/1915
The deportation of the Armenians of the town of Kilis begins.
7/28/1915
The deportation of the Armenians of the town of Adiaman begins.
7/28/1915
Professor Kakig Ozanian of the American College and others from Marsovan (Merzifon), together with the Armenian community leader Dikran Diranian and others from Samsun, are transported to the prisons of Sivas to be killed.
7/30/1915
A mass arrest of Armenians in the city of Angora is carried out. Those arrested are slain the next day at a place six hours distance from the city of Angora.
7/30/1915
The withdrawal of the Russian Army from the city of Van begins.
7/31/1915
The mass murder of Armenian community leaders of Constantinople imprisoned in Ayash and Chankri is carried. They are killed along with the Armenians of Angora arrested the day before.
8/1/1915
The deportation of 25,000 Armenians from Adabazar, near Constantinople, begins.
8/1/1915
20,000 deportees arrive in Aleppo.
8/1/1915
Mass torture inflicted on 500 Armenians in the prisons of Adabazar.
8/2/1915
Ambassador Henry Morgenthau reports that on this day Talaat told him that the Ittihad Committee had carefully considered in all its details the matter of crushing the Armenians, and that the policy which was being pursued was that which had been officially adopted. He also told Morgenthau that the deportations were not the result of hasty decisions but of careful and prolonged deliberation. Talaat, moreover, indicated that three quarters of the Armenians had already been disposed of, and none were left in Bitlis, Van, and Erzerum.
8/2/1915
For six nights, Armenian prisoners, mostly intellectuals, held in Gok-Medrese in Sivas, which was a Seljuk structure in use as a temporary prison, were taken out and slain.
8/3/1915
150,000 deportees arrive in Aleppo from various unspecified places.
8/3/1915
4,500 Armenian deportees from Seghert and 2,000 deportees from Mezre arrive near Aleppo.
8/3/1915
15,000 Armenians arrive in Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor).
8/3/1915
In response to unofficial German protests about large-scale murders, rapes, and tortures inflicted on the Armenian deportees on the highways, which was creating a bad impression on the Americans, a circular telegram is sent advising against attacking and raping Armenians on the highways.
8/3/1915
Officials are instructed not to appropriate the 'abandoned goods' of the Armenians for personal use.
8/3/1915
60,000 Armenian deportees from unspecified places arrive near Aleppo.
8/4/1915
Talaat sends a circular telegram to all governors and officials expecting accountability for the 'abandoned goods.'
8/6/1915
Eighteen Armenians are publicly hanged in the town of Everek near Kayseri.
8/7/1915
The Armenians of Mersin (Mersine) are deported.
8/7/1915
The listing of all real estate seized from the Armenians is requested by the Interior Ministry.
8/10/1915
All the Armenians of Chorum are deported via Boghazli and Bozanti with the Syrian Desert their purportedly ultimate destination.
8/10/1915
A circular telegram calls for the registration of all Muslim creditors of the Armenians.
8/11/1915
Instructions are issued that Turkish settlers be sent via Angora, Sivas, and Kayseri to Kharput and others via Konia (Konya) and Adana to Diyarbekir.
8/11/1915
Armenian women married to Turks are deprived of the right of inheritance.
8/11/1915
The last of 84 Armenian intellectuals, who were brought to the Ayash prison and who over the course of the weeks had been taken out in small groups to be murdered at various times, was killed. The longest-held was in prison in Ayash for 105 days.
8/11/1915
The Armenian intellectuals imprisoned in the Sifahdiye Medrese (a Muslim religious school) in Sivas, are taken out from the city and slain. There were 36 extermination centers in the area of Sivas. 5,000 Armenian intellectuals imprisoned in the Gok Medrese and the Sifahdiye Medrese, both Seljuk structures in use as temporary prisons, were taken to these 36 execution centers and slain.
8/12/1915
The end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. First day of the three day holiday of Bairam. No massacres were carried during these three days as it was time off for rest.
8/12/1915
Enver reports that to date 200,000 Armenians had been slain.
8/12/1915
In Aleppo Province 200,000 Armenian deportees are reported in transit to the desert.
8/12/1915
Boghos Nubar, a leading Armenian from Egypt, who had never been in Turkey, but who had been instrumental in Paris in pressing Turkey to introduce reforms in the Armenian provinces, was tried in absentia by a Turkish court martial and sentenced to death for treason.
8/13/1915
The deportation of the Armenians of Izmid (Izmit), Baghchejik (Bardizag), Bursa, and Adabazar begins.
8/13/1915
Instructions are issued to avoid deportees from coming to rest near military installations.
8/13/1915
From the Central Prison of city of Sivas where many Armenian intellectuals, political leaders, and the leading men of the villages surrounding Sivas were imprisoned, 15,000 Armenians were taken out and slain in the 36 extermination centers of the region.
8/13/1915
Instructions are sent out to the committees liquidating the 'abandoned goods' of the Armenians and directions given about methods for depositing the moneys obtained.
8/14/1915
Saturday, the third and last day of Bairam.
8/16/1915
50,000 deportees are observed on the road from Bozanti to Aleppo.
8/18/1915
The New York Times reports of a plan for the destruction of the whole Armenian nation.
8/19/1915
250 Armenians are killed in the city of Urfa in a massacre by Turks inaugurating the first attempt to uproot the Armenians of Urfa. The Armenians of Urfa begin the defense of their city
8/19/1915
Lord Bryce reports that 500,000 Armenians had been murdered in Turkey.
8/21/1915
The War Ministry requisitions for the military forty-one kinds of articles of merchandise from the Armenians.
8/21/1915
A general order is issued for the liquidation of the closed commercial stores of the Armenians.
8/23/1915
A second massacre of Armenians in Urfa is organized.
8/25/1915
The War Ministry requisitions all soap found in the homes and stores of the deported Armenians.
8/26/1915
The War Ministry requisitions for its military supply depots all wood, coal, and copper found in the homes and stores of deported Armenians.
8/26/1915
The Armenian poet, Daniel Varoujan, together with the poet physician Rupen Sevak, and others, are murdered by chetes while incarcerated in the Ayash prison.
8/26/1915
60,000 deported Armenians in the Aleppo area are ordered to leave for Hawran, an Arab district in northern Trans-Jordan.
8/26/1915
The Armenian Catholics in Angora are arrested.
8/28/1915
Instructions are issued forbidding the purchase of property from Armenian deportees.
8/28/1915
The students of the Sanasarian Academy in the city of Sivas are murdered in the town of Gemerak some thirty miles southwest of Sivas.
8/31/1915
Talaat tells the German ambassador, Prince Ernst Hohenlohe-Langenburg, that the Armenian Question no longer exists. Hohenlohe had assumed the German ambassadorship on July 20.
9/2/1915
4,750 Armenians are murdered in Jezire.
9/3/1915
10,000 survivors from the Armenians deported from Bursa and Izmid (Izmit) arrive in Konia (Konya).
9/3/1915
The New York Times reports that Izmid (Izmit) had been put to the torch and the Armenians massacred.
9/3/1915
15,000 Armenian deportees are reported at Eskishehir, 5,000 at Alayund, and 2,000 at Chai.
9/6/1915
In Marsovan (Merzifon), of the 62 Armenian girls who had been saved by American missionaries, on this date only 21 remained. 21 others had been abducted by Turks.
9/6/1915
The Interior Ministry orders all Armenian schools to be placed at the disposal of Turkish authorities.
9/7/1915
Massacres of Armenians are carried out in Yozgat District.
9/7/1915
The War Ministry instructs that the goods requisitioned from the Armenians are to be distributed to the Third, Fourth, and Iraq Armies.
9/7/1915
The second Liquidation Commission in Kayseri is organized.
9/8/1915
5,000 Armenian deportees are reported at Bozanti.
9/10/1915
On the fifty-third day of the Armenian defense in Musa Dagh, 4,058 persons are rescued by three English and one French warship, which transport the survivors to Port Said in Egypt.
9/11/1915
6,000 Armenian deportees in transit left Adana in the direction of Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor).
9/12/1915
A Fifth Army notice advises that the Islamization of Armenian soldiers is the responsibility of the civilian authorities.
9/13/1915
The Turkish Red Crescent Society asks that all cotton goods, and other necessities be granted to the organization from the 'abandoned goods' of the Armenian deportees.
9/14/1915
The New York Times reports the murder of 350,000 Armenians.
9/14/1915
The survivors of Musa Dagh arrive in Port Said.
9/15/1915
In a circular letter Talaat explains that the real intention of sending the Armenians to the Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor) Desert is to annihilate them.
9/16/1915
Talaat sends instructions by circular telegram to mete out the same fate to the Armenian women and children that had been dealt to the Armenian men.
9/16/1915
A circular dispatch is issued advising caution against the looting of the property of foreigners, with special mention of Singer Sewing Machine Company property.
9/16/1915
Talaat send a telegram to Ali Suad Bey, Governor of Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor), explaining his responsibilities.
9/17/1915
A circular telegram instructs all district attorneys to sign and seal the account books cataloguing the properties seized from the Armenians.
9/18/1915
In Aleppo, Nuri and Ali Bey consult about the future massacre of the Armenian remnants in the Syrian Desert at Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor).
9/21/1915
A circular telegram authorizes the seizure of all Armenian schools and authorized their placement under the control of local education committees.
9/22/1915
Weekly reports on the number of Armenians dead is requested.
9/22/1915
The War Ministry requisitions for the use of the army all wood and coal in the homes and stores of Armenian deportees.
9/23/1915
300 Armenians are killed in a massacre at Urfa.
9/23/1915
11,000 Armenian deportees from 26 different villages are observed at Afiyon-Karahisar.
9/24/1915
The vice-governor of Bolu, Mufid, wires the Interior Ministry that the Armenians of Bolu are about to be deported.
9/24/1915
The local Ittihad Secretary informs the Interior Ministry that 61,000 Armenians had been deported up to this date from Chankri and Angora. He also reports that the Muslims of Angora Province worship the Ittihad party and government for its committed deeds and that the same can be secured in Bolu if the same measures are taken there.
9/25/1915
The Sanitation Division of the War Ministry requisitions all the medical implements and pharmaceuticals held by Armenians.
9/25/1915
24 Armenian schools in Kayseri alone are requisitioned in four days.
9/26/1915
A Law on Abandoned Goods is ratified by the Ottoman Senate legalizing ex post facto the looting by the government of the properties of the Armenians.
9/27/1915
The Interior Ministry by circular telegram orders the deportation of all Armenian women, children, and the sick.
9/28/1915
The German ambassador in the United States, Johann Heinrich Count von Bernstorff, suggests that the stories about massacres in Turkey are fabricated.
9/28/1915
A circular telegram advises that all Armenian property now belongs to the Turkish government.
9/28/1915
The governor-general of Diyarbekir Province, Dr. Reshid, reports to the Interior Ministry that more than 120,000 Armenians have been deported from Diyarbekir Province.
9/29/1915
By this date 10,000 Armenian deportees had arrived at Afiyon-Karahisar, 50,000 had arrived at Konia (Konya), 10,000 had arrived at Intille (Intili), while 150,000 were reported at Katma.
9/30/1915
The deportees from Yalova, Angora, and Kastomuni (Kastamoni) are numbered at 250,000.
10/1/1915
U.S. Secretary of State Robert Lansing delivers a note to German Ambassador Bernstorff relating to the massacres of the Armenians.
10/1/1915
The governor-general of Sivas Province, Ahmed Muammer, travels to Amasia and elsewhere to inspect the completion and effect of the massacres in preparation for Talaat's inspection trip.
10/1/1915
600 Armenian orphan boys are Turkified in Herek.
10/2/1915
(General Vehib Pasha reported during the postwar court martial that in September 1915, Behaeddin Shakir assembled and used murdering cutthroats in the Third Army Zone [the six eastern or Armenian provinces of Turkey].)
10/4/1915
The Interior Ministry advises against the need of opening orphanages and prolonging the life of Armenian children.
10/7/1915
By this date the number of deported Armenians still living is estimated at 360,000 minimum, and the number of Armenians dead is estimated at 800,000 minimum.
10/7/1915
$75,000 is collected in the United States for relief for the Armenian deportees.
10/7/1915
In the British House of Lords a general discussion of the Armenian situation takes place. Lord Bryce, Lord Crewe, and Lord Cromer condemn the Turkish barbarities.
10/8/1915
Talaat requests from provincial officials documents proving Armenian 'treason' against Turkey to justify the massacres.
10/10/1915
45 Armenians are arrested in Adrianople (Edirne), and 1,600 Armenians are deported.
10/12/1915
Orders are issued forbidding marriage with Armenian women.
10/13/1915
In Berlin an announcement is made that the story of the Armenian massacres is an Allied fabrication.
10/15/1915
The dean of the Realschule (the German technical school) in Aleppo and German professors there protest against the massacres of the Armenians to the German Foreign Office.
10/15/1915
16,000 Armenian deportees are observed at Afiyon-Karahisar and 80,000 at Konia (Konya).
10/15/1915
6,000 Turkish soldiers stage the final attack on the Armenians defending themselves in Urfa. 400 Turkish troops are killed as Armenians defend to the last.
10/16/1915
Immunity from prosecution is guaranteed to those carrying out the massacres of the Armenians in Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor).
10/16/1915
16,000 Armenian deportees from Bursa and Izmid (Izmit) leave Afiyon-Karahisar for Konia (Konya).
10/16/1915
Lord Bryce remarks that Germany could stop the massacres if it wished to do so.
10/16/1915
20,000 Armenian deportees in transit are murdered in the city and environs of Urfa.
10/18/1915
The governor-general of Sivas Province, Ahmed Muammer Bey, inspects the carrying out of his orders for the deportation and destruction of the Armenians in the province, in anticipation of Talaat's inspection trip which occurs shortly thereafter.
10/18/1915
A large public gathering to protest the massacres of the Armenians by the Turkish government is held in the Century Theater in New York. Rabbi Wise, B. Cochrane, Dr. Barton, and H. Holt are the main speakers.
10/18/1915
Mufti Zade Zia, a Turkish propagandist, writing in New York describes the Armenians as traitors.
10/22/1915
The Turkish Embassy in Washington accuses the Armenians of treason against the Ottoman state.
10/25/1915
Halil Bey of Menteshe, the Vice-President of the Turkish Chamber of Deputies and president of the State Council, becomes Minister of Foreign Affairs.
10/25/1915
Instructions are issued requesting that within one week documents be sent to the Interior Ministry indicting the Armenian people as traitors.
10/27/1915
20,000 Armenian deportees are reported in Konia (Konya) on this date.
10/28/1915
Numerous Armenian families are deported from Adrianople (Edirne) at midnight without prior notice upon the order of Acting Governor-general Zekerie.
10/28/1915
Per earlier instructions sent by Talaat, 80,000 Armenian deportees left the Konia (Konya) station for Bozanti on this date on their way to their 'final destination.' These 80,000 were deportees from cities near Constantinople and from the Armenian communities in the western parts of Turkey.
10/31/1915
Instructions are issued advising that the special measures taken against the Armenians be conducted in places beyond the view of foreigners and especially the American consuls.
10/31/1915
Instructions are issued for the trial by court martial of any Armenian reporting the events of the deportations to any foreigner.
11/3/1915
Doctor Schacht, a German army physician, stationed near the village of Der-el-Zor (Deir el-Zor) village, reports counting 7,000 severed Armenian heads (skulls) in Sabgha District near the Euphrates River.
11/4/1915
The German consul in Mosul reports that Halil Pasha's soldiers had massacred the Armenians north of Mosul and were preparing to massacre the Armenians in the city of Mosul.
11/5/1915
On this date, 10,000 Armenian deportees are reported in Bozanti, 20,000 deportees in Tarsus, 40,000 deportees in Islahiye, and 50,000 deportees in Katma.
11/5/1915
150,000 Armenian deportees are reported scattered between Adana and Aleppo crossing the Amanos Range.
11/5/1915
20,000 Armenian deportees are reported in Adana.
11/8/1915
The Turkish authorities again make preparations to deport the 200,000 Armenians of Constantinople.
11/11/1915
Jemal Pasha, as commander of Syria, seeks to court martial the dean of the Realschule in Aleppo and other German signatories of the protest of October 15 for publicizing the Armenian events in Cilicia.
11/13/1915
20,000 Armenian deportees are reported in the Hawran District of Trans-Jordan. (On November 15, 1918, only 450 of this group of 20,000 were reported alive.)
11/13/1915
On this date, 10,000 Armenian deportees were reported in Intille (Intili) and 150,000 deportees were reported in Katma living under terrible conditions, disease-wracked and starving.
11/14/1915
The Anglican and the Orthodox Churches ask U.S. President Woodrow Wilson to pressure the German government to intervene with the Turkish government to stop the massacre of the Armenians.
11/15/1915
The German Charge d'affaires Baron Konstantin von Neurath, welcomes the new ambassador, Paul Count von Wolff-Metternich, who represented Imperial Germany from this date until October 3, 1916. The Charge d'affaires had been in charge of the German diplomatic representation in Turkey since October 2, 1915, when Hohenlohe had departed.
11/16/1915
The fields in Bakche District were reported littered with the corpses of many thousands of Armenians who had starved to death while being deported through here.
11/17/1915
Sir Robert Cecil protests the Turkish charge that the massacres were a response to an Armenian revolt, and charges that they were the result of a premeditated plan on the part of the Turkish government.
11/18/1915
A circular telegram is sent ordering the deportation of Armenian children.
11/18/1915
Talaat leaves Constantinople for an inspection tour of Anatolia. He returns on December 18.
11/25/1915
Up to this date, 500,000 Armenian deportees are estimated to have passed through Bozanti (northwest of Adana).
11/26/1915
1,010 Armenians are deported from the village of Mamure (Mamura) in Adana District.
12/1/1915
The fields around the village of Mamure (Mamura) are reported littered with several thousand corpses of starved or murdered deportees who had been traveling through.
12/4/1915
10,000 Armenian bachelors are deported from the city of Constantinople up to this date. A list is prepared of 70,000 Armenian individuals to be deported from Constantinople.
12/6/1915
A circular telegram instructs that no Armenian is to be left alive in the eastern provinces.
12/7/1915
The German ambassador Wolff-Metternich goes to the Sublime Porte in connection with the massacres and is told that nothing could be discussed until Talaat's return.
12/9/1915
Orders are issued in Aleppo Province for the deportation of 400 Armenian orphans previously placed in an orphanage.
12/12/1915
180,000 Armenian refugees from Turkey who had reached Tiflis (Tbilisi) are reported to be in dire conditions.
12/14/1915
Orders are issued for the killing of Armenian priests.
12/15/1915
A circular telegram clarifies that the purpose of the deportations is annihilation.
12/16/1915
Instructions are issued advising against slowing the deportations and urging the dispatch of the deportees to the desert.
12/18/1915
Talaat returns from Anatolia. German Ambassador Wolff-Metternich is told by Talaat that the Turks are not killing innocents.
12/22/1915
Orders are issued forbidding the acceptance from any Armenian of an application of exemption from the deportations.
12/25/1915
Orders are issued for the deportation of all children except those who did not remember their parents.
12/29/1915
On this date, of the estimated 210,000 refugees who had reached the Caucasus, only 173,000 are reported still living, almost 40,000 having died as a result of privations and disease. Of the remaining 173,000, 105,000 were from Van Province, 48,000 from Bayazid (Bayazit) District, 20,038 from Mush District.
12/30/1915
A circular telegram, as a follow-up on the telegram of December 15, instructs that Armenians desiring to convert to Islam are to be notified that their Islamization must take place after they reach their final destination. In view of the earlier instructions clarifying the purpose of the deportations as annihilation, the new instructions imply that Armenians are no longer to be allowed to escape destruction for any reason.