Destruction of the Thracian Bulgarians in 1913

Ethnic map of the Adrianople Thrace in 1912 according to academician Lyubomir Miletich. The areas with Bulgarian majority coloured in green, Turkish – in red, Greek – in brown.
Balkan Wars boundaries.

The Migration of the Thracian Bulgarians in 1913 (Bulgarian: Разорението на тракийските българи през 1913 г., Razorenieto na trakiiskite balgari prez 1913 g., also translated as "The Devastation"[1] or "The Ruin of the Thracian Bulgarians in 1913"[2]) is a book published by the Bulgarian academic Lyubomir Miletich in 1918, which describes the mass extermination and ethnic cleansing of the Bulgarian population in Eastern Thrace and Eastern Rhodope Mountains (now mainly in Edirne Province, Kırklareli Province and Tekirdağ Province in Turkey and in Evros Prefecture in Greece) during the Second Balkan War and in a short period after it.

Content

When the military actions between Serbia, Greece, Montenegro and Romania against Bulgaria were in full progress, the Ottoman Empire took advantage of the situation to recover some of its former possessions in Thrace including Adrianople. In the beginning of July 1913 its forces crossed the Bulgarian border on the line Midiya-Enos, settled by the Treaty of London in May 1913. Because the Bulgarian troops had all been allocated to the front with Serbia and Greece, the Ottoman armies suffered low combat casualties and moved northwards and westwards without battles. Thus reoccupied territories were given back to the Ottoman Empire by the Treaty of Constantinople, signed on September 16. Shortly after the end of the hostilities, the author interviewed hundreds of refugees from these regions, traveled himself in the places where these tragic events happened and systematically depicted in detail the atrocities, committed by the Young Turks' regular army, Ottoman paramilitary forces and partly by local Greeks. As a result of this violent process approximately 200,000 Bulgarians were forced to leave their homes and properties forever, seeking salvation in territories, controlled by Bulgarian army and paramilitary formation IMORO. The entire community of the Thracian Bulgarians was wiped out. Their descendants in contemporary Bulgaria are about 800,000 people.

Population estimates

Alongside the 1911 official Ottoman figures, Lyubomir Miletich made the following estimates of the ethnic composition, using linguistic criteria rather than religious affiliation:

Population estimates of Edirne Vilayet
Group Ottoman 1893[3] Ottoman 1911[4] Miletich estimate[5]
Muslims434,366795,706
Muslim TurksNA
Muslim Bulgarians (Pomaks)95,502
Greeks (EOC members)267,220395,872
(ethnic) Greeks200,000–250,000
Bulgarians (BOC members)102,245171,055
Orthodox Bulgarians203,224
Armenians16,64233,650
Catholics1,02412,783
Other82744,552
Total836,0411,426,632

The Ottoman authorities divided the population by religion, so all Patriarchists were counted as Greeks and the Pomaks as Muslims. The other two sources divided the population by language, so for example 24,970 Bulgarian patriarchists and 1700 Uniates were added by Miletich to the total figure for Orthodox Bulgarians.[5]

Illustrations

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Magdalena Elchinova (2016). Memory, Heritage and Ethnicity: Constructing Identity among the Istanbul-based Orthodox Bulgarians. Ethnologia Europaea. 46. p. 113.
  2. ↑ Valentina Ganeva-Raycheva (2012). Migration, Territories, Heritage: Discourses and Practices in Constructing the Bulgarian-Turkish Border. Migration, Memory, Heritage: Socio-cultural Approaches to the Bulgarian-Turkish Border. IEFSEM-BAS. p. 62.
  3. ↑ Kemal H. Karpat. Ottoman Population Records and the Census of 1881/82-1893 Int. J. Middle East Stud. 9 (1978), 237–274, p. 37.
  4. ↑ Valery Kolev; Christina Koulouri, eds. (2009). Teaching Modern Southeast European History: Alternative Educational Materials (PDF) (2nd ed.). Center for Democracy and Reconciliation in Southeast Europe. p. 24. ISBN 978-960-88963-7-6.
  5. 1 2 The Destruction of Thracian Bulgarians in 1913, Lybomir Miletich, 1918, pp. 291 and 301
  • On-line publication of the phototype reprint of the first edition of this book in Bulgarian here (in Bulgarian "Разорението на тракийските българи през 1913 година", Българска академия на науките, София, Държавна печатница, 1918 г.; II фототипно издание, Културно-просветен клуб "Тракия" – София, 1989 г., София; in English: "The Destruction of Thracian Bulgarians in 1913", Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia, State printing house, 1918; II phototype edition, Cultural and educational club "Thrace" – Sofia, 1989, Sofia).
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