Life of Lady Nalan

Charapter 2nd: Greek Occupation

In 1919, it Turkish War of Independence started in Samsun, the province where l lived. This war literally lasted until 1923. We suffered many losses in this process. Lady Nalan's grandfather is also one of the lost ones.

Today, Lady Nalan told me this story in detail;

"At that time, my grandmother was still pregnant with my mother. Since our village is on the Türkiye-Greece border, the Greeks raided the village during the war. The Greeks killed many innocent people in the village. Meanwhile, when the Turkish army defeated the enemy in other cities and advanced, they reached our village, which was occupied by the Greeks. When the Greeks heard that the Turkish army was coming, they loaded their goods onto horse-drawn carriages, took two people from the village captive, and started to flee towards the Greek border. They told their captives that they could leave after taking them to the Greek border. By the way, the people they took prisoner were my grandfather and one of his friends.

Anyway... When we came to the Greek border, the Greek soldiers did not leave my grandfather and his friend. They captured them again and took them across the border.

Towards night, all the Greek soldiers in that region gathered in one place and organized a drunken celebration. Now that most of the soldiers were drunk, they started killing the Turks captured from other villages. They were killing Turks with swords just for fun and then throwing them into a large pit they dug.

When my grandfather's friend saw this, he said, 'They are already drunk. Let's run away before they kill us too.' said. However, my grandfather did not find this suggestion reasonable. Then his friend said, 'At least untie my hand so I can go. 'You can not come with me if you want.' said. Thereupon, my grandfather untied his friend's hand, and although his friend asked him for the last time if he wanted to come, my grandfather's answer did not change.

Then his friend started running away. At first, the drunken Greek soldiers did not notice that my grandfather's friend had escaped. Of course, the man has come a long way in the meantime. Afterwards, when a few sober soldiers noticed the man's absence, they chased after him. They also had hunting dogs with them. Due to the rain and darkness at that time, the soldiers could not find any trace of my grandfather's friend, but hunting dogs followed the man by smell. Finally, they saw my grandfather's friend as a result of the tracks found by the dogs. The Greeks shot after the man as if the magazines of their rifles were empty. However, these were all bullets fired randomly. One of the bullets hit my grandfather's friend above his right ear, shattering it.

When the Greeks went to see if the man was dead, they got angry when they couldn't find the body. The hunting dogs went after the Turk, again using their sense of smell. Thereupon, his friend went into the thick bushes despite his bare feet. When the man passed through them, the dogs could not approach the bushes. But they kept barking into the bushes. Thereupon, Tür climbed a large tree with broad leaves and thick branches in the area. At that time, although the Greeks looked into the bushes, they could not find anyone. Thereupon, they returned thinking that the man might have died after all those bullets.

My grandfather's friend threw himself into the Meriç River that night, and that day the man swam across the huge Meriç River with the power of faith, saying "Allah(c.c.) helped me!" When he crossed the river, he was in Türkiye.

When the man returned to his village, he told my grandmother what happened. We only know this much of the story about my grandfather."

Lady Nalan gave me some more information about the story today. It was the first time I heard these. According to what he said, his mother was born 40 days after the incident, and our country, Türkiye, was declared a republic at that time. After a while, his grandmother realized that his grandfather had died and married a man from another village. For this reason, his mother never got to know his real father.

23rd July 2024
Tuesday 16.07