The War on the Caucasus Front and the Armenians

“The Great War was not simply a clash of armies in the field but a total war in which civilians would suffer as much if not more than the combatants,” holds Ronald Suny.Footnote 1 The war that erupted between the Ottoman and Russian Empires in late 1914 was a calamity for both states and their populations. Hundreds of thousands of Ottoman Armenians as well as Russian Armenians living in the vicinity of the Russo-Turkish border were displaced from their homes and forced to move back and forth as a result of military developments, rapidly changing borderlines, and the policies pursued by the two empires toward their Armenian subjects. This chapter examines those population movements and analyzes how tsarist Russia confronted the refugee humanitarian crisis that ensued. It addresses such key questions as: Who was and who wasn’t a refugee according to the imperial Russian laws? How were those refugees to be fed, and assisted? Where were they supposed to be sheltered, and by which organizations, institutions, or agencies? The situation of refugees varied from place to place. This chapter demonstrates how the military and civil authorities, as well as the multiple organizations operating in the field, tried to control and coordinate the relief work while simultaneously modifying the policies and practices of assistance dependent on the military developments and according to the refugees’ needs.

Following the declaration of war to the Ottoman Empire, in November 1914, Tsar Nicholas II proclaimed: “[W]e believe without fail that Turkey’s reckless intervention in the present conflict will only accelerate her submission to fate and open up Russia’s path towards the realization of the historic task of her ancestors along the shores of the Black Sea.”Footnote 2 And although the struggle for Gallipoli between the Ottoman army and British and French forces that lasted from February 1915 to January 1916, ended with the disastrous defeat of the Allies, on the Caucasus front, Russian forces mainly prevailed against Ottoman advances.Footnote 3 The Russian military command had calculated that Ottoman troops would not have enough time to shift their forces to Anatolia, and in January 1916, they began an offensive on the strategically crucial fortress of Erzurum. By mid-February Erzurum was under Russian control which was considered a major victory for the Russian Empire on the Caucasus front. It was followed by another defeat of Ottoman forces in the Black Sea region, the fall of Trabzon in April, and the capture of Bayburt and Erzincan by Russian troops in July 1916.Footnote 4 Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, the Caucasus Viceroy, appointed General Peshkov as the Governor-General to the newly occupied eastern territories of the Ottoman Empire.Footnote 5 As one historian asserted: “Russian occupation of Erzincan meant Turkish loss of the entire Armenian theater of military operations.” Footnote 6

The Russian Empire’s inconsistent policies toward her Armenian subjects during the war were defined predominantly by military developments and by the empire’s geopolitical interests in the Caucasus; hence, they fluctuated over time. As Peter Holquist has explained, the policies of the Russian military authorities in the occupied regions of the Ottoman Empire were part of the “standard operating procedure,” and the people living and temporarily sheltered in those areas were a secondary concern.Footnote 7 Meanwhile, in the Ottoman Empire, Armenians became the target of the state-orchestrated and systematically implemented genocide.Footnote 8 Thus, many Ottoman Armenians saw the Russian troops approaching from the east as a chance to escape the wholescale massacres, deportations, forced conversions, and enslavement.

Karo Sasuni, an Ottoman-Armenian activist, who shared his accounts of the genocide and war, as well as the immense relief work for refugees and their conditions in the aftermath, reflected on the feelings of both Ottoman and Russian Armenians during this period. He described their feelings of “excitement,” “confusion,” and “fear”.Footnote 9 With every Russian retreat and exodus of Armenians, Sasuni witnessed panic and distress. He noticed the disappointment among the refugees treated violently by Russian soldiers. Describing the first and long-awaited encounter of Ottoman Armenians with Russians and the latter’s first retreat from Basen (Pasin), Sasuni noticed: “the merciless and hard retreat inflamed hatred [among Ottoman Armenians] towards their “Christian liberator.””Footnote 10 At the same time, with each advance of Russian troops, with each effort by refugees to return and reconstruct their houses and farms in their homeland, Sasuni noticed hope for and trust in a better future among the Armenians.Footnote 11

Assisting Refugees

Trust in the successful solution of the Armenian question following the victorious end of the war for the Russian Empire and her allies, was among the major catalysts for Armenian leaders and activists working with Russian imperial authorities and organizations to save refugees. In one historians words, “[T]he outbreak of the war incited much enthusiasm and optimism among the Armenian intelligentsia and political circles in the Caucasus.”Footnote 12 Over 200,000 refugees from Turkey had reached the Caucasus by July–August 1915.Footnote 13 While the tremendous efforts of central imperial and local Armenian organizations to assist the displaced had started as early as the fall of 1914, the relief work perpetually changed, evolved, and adapted to the new circumstances.Footnote 14

Among the agencies assisting the refugees in Transcaucasia and in the Russian occupied regions of the Ottoman Empire were Russian organizations, such as the All-Russian Union of Towns (Vserossiĭskiĭ Soiuz Gorodov, hereafter VSG), and the Committee of Her Highness Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna (hereafter Tatiana Committee), as well as Armenian organizations, such as the Caucasus Armenian Benevolent Society, the Armenian Central Committee in Tiflis (Tbilisi), the Committee of Brotherly Aid, and the Moscow Armenian Committee. These organizations were responsible for providing shelter and emergency relief to the refugees by establishing medical and food stations on the main routes of the population movements. They also organized long-term assistance for and registration of the refugees in their new settlements and refugee hubs in Alexandropol, Etchmiadzin, Igdir, Tiflis, and elsewhere.

The tsarist government attempted to augment and systematize the humanitarian relief efforts starting in August 1915. A number of decrees were adopted, and laws passed to create legal basis for this work. The Special Council for Refugees was established under the Ministry of Interior to supervise and coordinate it.Footnote 15 The Special Council appointed General Vasilii Mikhailovich Tamamshev the Chief Plenipotentiary for Refugees in the Caucasus.Footnote 16 With the aforementioned advance of Russian troops toward the southwest and their military success in 1916, the humanitarian efforts for the refugees also expanded to new regions and created new opportunities for relief work.

On 13 July 1916, Aleksandr Khatisyan, Head Plenipotentiary for the Caucasus Committee of VSG, learned that more than a hundred women and children were found alive in Bayburt. The number of refugees was expected to rise, and they did not possess the necessary means to survive. Among the refugees found there, only two were men, who had spent an entire year in hiding. A majority of the women were pregnant (the report did not specify whether that was or was not a result of a sexual abuse),Footnote 17 and ate at the expense of the soldiers residing in Bayburt. “They [the refugees] should be evacuated soon, especially because the military units will be moving forward and they may appear in even worse a situation,” explained Khatisyan in his telegram.Footnote 18 To this alarming message Chief Plenipotentiary for Refugees in the Caucasus General Tamamshev responded with an instruction to organize an evacuation of women and children to Sarikamish, and send the bill for all expenses to his office.Footnote 19 While this emergency assistance was necessary, General Tamamshev also realized the importance of investigating the refugee situation in the area, in order to prepare a more long-term plan.

“Special” Category of Refugees in Bayburt and Erzincan

In late July 1916, General Tamamshev decided to delegate plenipotentiary Dmitry Strelkov to the regions of Bayburt, Dersim, and Erzincan to determine the number of refugees in those areas, and to help with organizing an evacuation and establishing food stations. If necessary, Strelkov was permitted to make independent decisions and to take measures for the provision of food supplies to those in need.Footnote 20 Strelkov together with Sharafean, representative of the Caucasus Armenian Benevolent Society, and Dr. Pirumov, from the Refugees’ Department of the Erzurum VSG, traveled to Erzurum, Mamakhatun, Erzincan, Kalkid-Chiftlik, and Bayburt regions (from 1 to 17 August 1916). During that inspection visit, Strelkov met with General Iudenich, Commander of the Caucasus Army, General Tomilov, General Kalitin, Commander of the First Army Corps, and General Przhevalskii, Commander of the Second Turkestan Army Corps, to discuss refugee relief efforts. Strelkov submitted a detailed report upon his return, on 22 August 1916, which included information about the condition and needs of the refugees, region by region.Footnote 21 Strelkov’s delegation—comprised of representatives from both local-national and central relief agencies—demonstrates the diversity of actors involved in almost every aspect of refugee assistance. Meanwhile, the mentioned meetings that took place at the very beginning of this visit show how these efforts had to be closely monitored, negotiated, and coordinated with the military authorities in the region.

Strelkov’s report asserted that the majority of people crowded into Erzincan were Armenian residents of the Ottoman provinces occupied by Russian troops at that point. According to Strelkov, they did not fit into the “refugee” category defined by the 30 August 1915 decree, because they were neither “individuals who left their localities threatened or already occupied by the enemy,” nor “displaced from the military zones at the command of either military or civil authorities.”Footnote 22

“They are a very special kind [sovershenno osobago roda] of refugees,” he asserted.Footnote 23 Strelkov went on explaining his claim about this “special” group of refugees.

Since the outbreak of war, the Armenian population of regions close to the sea [pribrezhnye raĭony] and to us [the Russian Empire], such as Trabzon, Bayburt, Erzurum, Khnus, among others, were moved [sdvinuto] from their places of permanent residence and resettled [pereseleno] to the country’s interior by the order of Turkish authorities. During that process, according to eyewitness testimonies, the majority of the men who did not manage to escape were slaughtered, and women, girls, and children were either abducted by Turks or in hiding in the houses of Turks they knew or the Kurds who were more pro-Armenian [raspolozhennykh k armianam kurdov]. After Russian troops took over Erzincan, Armenians of the mentioned category, predominantly women and children, that had been hiding behind the lines of our military, as well as those hiding in houses of local Kizilbash-Kurds in Dersim,Footnote 24 fled here [to Erzincan].Footnote 25

Strelkov also mentioned that a smaller percentage of Armenians residing in Erzincan was comprised of people originating from the interior of the Ottoman Empire, such as Kharpert (Harput), Diyarbekir, or they were indigenous to Erzincan. These Armenians, Strelkov believed, could be identified as refugees by the 30 August 1915 decree, since it stated: “individuals originating from Russia’s enemy states are to be identified as refugees.”Footnote 26

Strelkov’s description of refugeedom in these areas elucidates the complexity of population movements throughout the changing Ottoman-Russian borderlines and in the Ottoman interior. By reflecting on the status and condition of the so-called “special kind” of Armenian refugees, he presented another important aspect of the humanitarian crisis, which materialized during the war, yet, was not caused by the war directly: it was the consequence of massacres and deportations of Armenians organized by the Ottoman authorities and implemented throughout the Ottoman Empire. With the advance of Russian troops to the southwest, the survivors of these atrocities emerged from hiding and hoped for safer conditions under Russian protection.

Refugees of this “special” category were found in Bayburt, Erzincan, and other areas that were occupied by Russian troops. Every day new groups of Armenians—sometimes forty to fifty people—came out from the forests and mountains in desperate need of help.Footnote 27 According to the reports of local correspondents, most of these Armenian survivors were women and children. They shared stories of “humiliation and torture,” stories of how they had lost their “honor, relatives, and possessions.” They could imagine or hope for a safe and secure future only under Russian patronage.Footnote 28

Challenges of the Relief Work

Erzincan

Although on 25 July 1916, Chief Plenipotentiary Tamamshev had ordered the Caucasus Committee of VSG to begin the immediate organization of medical-food assistance to refugees in Erzincan, when Strelkov arrived in town on 12 August, the VSG had still not launched anything.Footnote 29 Initially, there was no specific organization responsible for meeting the needs of refugees in Erzincan. Therefore, Colonel Poghos Bezhanbek, Commander of the First Armenian Rifle Battalion,Footnote 30 established a local Yerznka (Erzincan) Committee, run by Military Doctor Terterov, Ensign of the same battalion Ter-Abramyan, and others.Footnote 31 Before the VSG could begin the necessary relief work, these local committee members found two buildings to serve refugees as a shelter and a hospital. They also organized food provision for refugees, distributing goods purchased partly with raised money and partly with funds provided by Colonel Bezhanbek.Footnote 32 Furthermore, in July 1916, Dr. Asriev from the Moscow Armenian Committee arrived in Erzincan and handed over to the newly established committee another 1,600 rubles for refugee relief work.Footnote 33 This shows that, despite the efforts of the central administration to take the relief work under control and manage the necessary assistance for refugees, the local military authorities and national committees were the first to respond to the crisis. In some cases, they had to find temporary shelter and initiate fundraising to support the refugees.

One of the important decisions made by the local committee was to request the permission of the Commander of the First Corps to settle the newly arriving refugees in Erzincan into neighboring “vacant [pustykh] Armenian villages,” where they could harvest that year’s crops and prepare for winter, while also providing half of the food to the army.Footnote 34 As there were “no doubts about the strength [ustoichivyĭ] of the frontline”—50 verst south and west from Erzincan—a decision was made to evacuate the orphaned children and some women to Erzurum, and to settle the remaining families (preferably with a surviving male member) in the surrounding “vacant” Armenian villages.Footnote 35 Hence, by 17 August 1916, 1,200 people were allowed to settle in seven villages adjacent to Erzincan.Footnote 36 Two groups of children and women—respectively consisting of 292 and 125 people—were evacuated to Erzurum by car, while another 700 had to make their way to Erzurum on foot.Footnote 37 Families that did not have male members were to stay in Erzincan; the plan was to open workshops for women to produce woolen clothes for the army—socks, sweaters, and other items. Sharafean, the representative of the Armenian Benevolent Society, was in charge of this task.Footnote 38 To ensure the participation of representatives of different public and benevolent organizations as well as local activists in the relief work, a Special Erzincan Committee was established, with Colonel Antonov, commandant of the city of Erzincan, as its chair.Footnote 39 Once again, the relief administrators’ decisions about the resettlement and/or evacuation of refugees in and from Erzincan depended greatly on the military developments in the area and, most importantly, they were made only after consulting with and receiving the permission of the local military officials.

Bayburt

The town of Bayburt, too, needed a local organization to assist the refugees, as Strelkov observed.Footnote 40 The relief work here was first organized by Captain Andryushenko, Commandant of the Second Turkestan Corps, and later by one of his officers, Ensign Pirumov, and by the veterinarian Oganezov. These individuals collected donations from their compatriots—Armenians from military units stationed in the area. Then, they used one part of the funds to procure food supplies for the refugees and the other to obtain livestock.Footnote 41

As there was a shortage of food supplies in Bayburt, and the refugees came mostly from villages close by where the crops had not yet been harvested, 425 refugees were resettled in their villages; each village was provided with two bulls to facilitate the harvest. Ensign Pirumov and others assured Strelkov, that the refugees in those resettled villages did not require food assistance and could even manage to store supplies for the winter.Footnote 42 Meanwhile, refugees of the same “special” category as in Erzincan, arrived in Bayburt every day. They were exhausted, malnourished, humiliated, and in need of urgent help. On 13 August 1916, there were 170 refugees in Bayburt—including fifty orphans—who were to be evacuated to Erzurum.Footnote 43

A small number of refugees were found in the town of Kalkid-Chiftik: twenty Armenians and nine Greeks. According to the report of General Przhevalskii, Commander of the Second Turkestan Corps, there were no Muslim refugees there. However, they expected the arrival of Muslim refugees in the area, because as General Przhevalskii explained, there was a pending plan “to relocate the Turks from villages close to the frontlines to the rear.”Footnote 44 While Strelkov’s report focused on the condition of Christian—mostly Armenian—refugees, his conversation with the Commander of the Second Turkestan Corps indicates that the status of and plans for the Muslim refugees and locals were critical issues discussed among Russian military and civil authorities during this period.

Initially the interactions between the Russian military authorities and the Muslim population were strained. The military command had ordered “the deportation of all Kurds from the occupied areas.”Footnote 45 Yet, the situation was changing in 1916. Continuous negotiations with French and British representatives regarding the future division of the Ottoman Empire into influence zones resulted in a compromise (the Sykes-Picot-Sazonov agreement) according to which after the war imperial Russia would keep control over Erzurum, Bitlis, Van, and Trabzon vilayets.Footnote 46 This was a major turning point that shaped the Russian approach to the occupied eastern territories of the Ottoman Empire and its attitude to various peoples—especially Armenians and Kurds—living within those areas. Annexation was an actual plan, confirmed by the Great Powers, and not a mere probability. The Russian Foreign Minister Sazonov’s correspondence with the Caucasus Viceroy Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich (July 1916) demonstrates his concern for the organization of the occupied regions and the establishment of certain guidelines for future governance of the territories and equal treatment of the populations—both Christian and Muslim—residing there.Footnote 47 Tsarist officials’ desire to ensure equal treatment of Christians and Muslims in the region, as we shall see, was not shared by all the officials and agencies working with the refugees. Furthermore, this approach eventually led to new complications. The Armenian survivors of Kurdish and Turkish attacks raised questions and complaints: they were confused and appalled by that new behavior of Russian authorities.Footnote 48

Erzurum

Erzurum was not among the regions Strelkov was sent to investigate. Nonetheless, he found it important to examine the condition of refugees and report about the relief efforts there, too, since “depending on future developments, possibly, some refugees might have to be transferred there from frontline areas.”Footnote 49 Maksimov, the Head of the Civil Administration of Erzurum, reported, that one of his major tasks was the relocation of the populations from areas within 10 verst of military operations to villages close to Erzurum.Footnote 50 Maksimov emphasized that the relocation was terrible for the people who were forced to move, and also for the Erzurum population: in addition to their own problems, they had to feed and assist the newcomers.Footnote 51

The situation of Muslims, according to Maksimov, was the worst. There were about 10,000 refugees in need of assistance and the Muslim Benevolent Society did not provide it despite many appeals for help.Footnote 52 The Caucasus army command furnished 100,000 rubles to the Military Governor General of Turkish territories occupied by right of war in order to fight against epidemics and starvation in this region.Footnote 53 However, the latter’s reaction to Maksimov’s request to help the Muslim population was negative: “such assistance was categorically denied.”Footnote 54 Chief Plenipotentiary Tamamshev received complaints (June 1916) from the Baku Muslim Society’s plenipotentiary Dr. Sultanov regarding the uneven distribution and sometimes lack of aid to Muslims in other areas as well, including Trabzon and Erivan (Yerevan). Sultanov had even warned Tamamshev that he might contact the Caucasus Viceroy directly, relying on the Grand Duke’s “sympathetic attitude towards the Muslim population.”Footnote 55 These discrepancies in the provision of assistance shed light on the complexity of the relief networks in the empire. While, as mentioned before, some tsarist officials, such as Foreign Minister Sazonov and the Grand Duke, insisted on equal treatment of all refugees and intended to modify the relief work according to the changing political concerns of the Russian Empire, other military officials or local administrators refused to transfer and distribute funds to Muslim organizations and institutions.

Meanwhile, in the case of Armenian refugees, only a verbal order was given to assist their evacuation from Erzurum to the Caucasus. Due to the lack of a formal written document or passes, the evacuation was not possible to carry out. The Civil Administration had to contact the Chief Plenipotentiary Tamamshev and the Armenian Central Committee, to find solutions.Footnote 56 Thus, even though the work on behalf of Armenian refugee was not as disputed as the relief for Muslim refugees, the assistance could still be inconsistent and problematic.

There was no special central committee to assist refugees in the town of Erzurum, nor in the region. A local Armenian committee chaired by Sedrak Ananyan, who also was the supervisor of the food-station established by the VSG, coordinated most of the work. Dr. Zavriev, an Armenian physician and activist, was also engaged with these relief efforts (Fig. 1).Footnote 57 He appealed to the Army Commander to allow refugees to settle in “vacant” Armenian villages and harvest half of the crop for their use, just as it was organized in the Erzincan and Bayburt regions. After receiving the Russian authorities’ response, he realized the risks of misunderstanding and antagonism regarding the rules related to land and farming between the local Russian administration and the Armenian peasants. To prevent any such issues, Dr. Zavriev developed a directive listing the peasants’ rights and responsibilities. It emphasized that the peasants were to harvest crops only from those fields identified by the Russian authorities and they were obliged to deliver half of the harvest to the government’s storehouse.Footnote 58 He also collected funds from the local Armenian population to purchase livestock for the refugees.Footnote 59 As we see, once again, local individuals and committees had to work hand in hand with Russian organizations and military authorities to ensure continuity of relief efforts and to avoid complications that could potentially cause delays and cost lives.

In the meantime, the cost to transport supplies to Erzurum (mostly from Sarikamish) was very high. Food supplies for each refugee cost twice or even three times more than normal.Footnote 60 Moreover, in the fall, providing supplies would become even harder because of the deteriorating weather conditions. Strelkov saw the solution in the establishment of a food depot in Erzurum by the Armenian Benevolent Society and the Central Committee, considering their successful experience in handling food provision in other regions.Footnote 61

Medical assistance to the refugees in Erzurum was provided by the Moscow Armenian Committee, which had opened a hospital there run by Military Doctor Bagdasarov, together with one female paramedic and two female nurses. Nonetheless, conditions were far from ideal. There was no separate department in the hospital for the contagious patients. Furthermore, children and adults were treated together, since there was no pediatric department. There was neither enough equipment nor enough clothes at the hospital.Footnote 62 Instead of opening a new hospital run by the VSG in the region, Strelkov, considering the financial restrictions, advised the Moscow Armenian Committee to use the available funds to hire a special doctor to supervise the existing hospital, and to equip it with the necessary tools, thus improving the quality of care.Footnote 63 Sharing Strelkov’s view with regard to the medical emergency and the condition of the Erzurum hospital, General Tamamshev appealed to Mamikonyan of the Moscow Committee to “pay closer attention to the unsatisfactory condition” of the hospital and to “take all the necessary measures for its improvement and expansion.”Footnote 64

Fig. 1
A photograph depicts Doctor Zavrean.

Dr. Zavrean (Source: Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF) Archives, Photographs, Box 6, N 80/front)

Full size image

According to reports of contemporary newspapers, in May 1916, the population of Erzurum was 28,000, of whom 9,554 were Turks [Muslim refugees] who had arrived from surrounding areas, 503 were Armenians from Mamakhatun, Derjan, Kghi and Alashkert, 327 local Armenians from various villages, and there were another 350 Armenian refugees in Erzurum.Footnote 65 By 9 August 1916, the Armenian committee reported that there were 850 Armenian refugees in thirty-one villages of the Erzurum region: 750 of them were in the town of Erzurum, including 200 orphans.Footnote 66 Toward the end of August, the number of orphans had already increased to 300 in Erzurum, as the population movement from Erzincan did not stop. By late September, another 114 orphans had arrived and needed a transfer to the Caucasus.Footnote 67 Arriving in Erzurum, refugee orphans were sheltered in the orphanages of the Moscow Armenian Committee and the VSG. The local Armenian committee, with the support of Dr. Zavriev, had requested permission to establish an orphanage in village of Dzitogh, 12 verst away from Erzurum, as appropriate buildings for that purpose were available at that location.Footnote 68 The main obstacle to establishing that orphanage was the high price of products, which could be solved with the help of donations.

When Tamamshev received the request for a new orphanage close to Erzurum, he was also informed by the Commander of the 1st Army Corps General Kalitin, that honorary secretary Bekstone of the Lord Mayor’s Fund had allotted 10,000 rubles for an orphanage.Footnote 69 If it were to be established near Erzurum, secretary Bekstone was authorized to transfer that amount to the respective organization, with General Tamamshev’s consent. However, the general believed that their goal was to evacuate children from the Erzurum region to the Caucasus and not to settle them in the area.Footnote 70 Therefore, a redistributing orphanage was set up there, to prepare the children for transfer to the Caucasus, to Elisavetpol guberniia.Footnote 71 General Tamamshev also supported the idea of opening workshops for women to produce wool socks, sweaters and other clothes for the army in Erzurum. Just as in Erzincan, this project was to be implemented in cooperation with the Armenian Benevolent Society.Footnote 72

The correspondence between the Chief Plenipotentiary’s office and the army command regarding the involvement of the Lord Mayor’s Fund to assist the refugees demonstrates the complexity of the humanitarian relief work in Transcaucasia and the occupied territories of the Ottoman Empire during the genocide and the Great War. It shows that, in addition to the multilayered and intricate structure of the imperial Russian response to the refugee crisis in the region, other international actors and institutions were engaged with extensive humanitarian activities.

Conclusion

The assistance provided to the refugees in Erzincan, Bayburt, Erzurum and the surrounding regions in summer 1916 represented an interplay of non-state actors, such as local and international organizations and individual activists, and government entities—both military and civil. Imperial authorities and numerous agencies and organizations had begun immense relief efforts on behalf of the refugees from the very first days of the population movements across the Russo-Turkish border. Yet the gigantic scale of assistance required and the complexity of the situation in which all these displaced people and the committees assisting them found themselves, created new challenges and obstacles to the timely and comprehensive implementation of their plans. While the plenipotentiaries and imperial administrators in charge of refugees envisioned and supervised these largescale operations from Moscow, Tbilisi and elsewhere, the situation on the ground could change rapidly with the deployments of Ottoman or Russian troops. The shifting borderline and new population movements led to the emergence of new refugee hubs and even new refugee categories, such as the discussed “special kind of refugees.” They required more assistance and supervision and they put immense pressure on local populations, individual actors and organizations.

In addition to these relatively objective and operational issues, the relief workers and agencies faced a number of hardships linked to the changing agendas and differing policies of the Russian Empire’s military and civil leadership toward the refugees. At the outset of the war, the Russian imperial authorities did not have a concrete vision for the eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire. As Peter Holquist has explained, the Russian government did not have a coherent plan or project for those regions as the war raged, and annexation was not officially considered or confirmed at that point.Footnote 73 As discussed earlier, from spring 1916, after Russia joined the Sykes-Picot agreement, that attitude changed. The tsarist army successfully annexed these regions and had to make long-term plans and adjustments. That included a shift in policies toward the local Muslim—particularly Kurdish—populations.

Russian imperial policies toward all the populations in the annexed areas and the border regions were to be based on principles of justice and equality, as Minister of Foreign Affairs Sazonov had expressed, “not providing exclusive protection to any one particular nationality at the expense of the other.”Footnote 74 Therefore, if at some point, the Muslim relief societies complained to General Tamamshev about lack of proper financial assistance to refugees and especially about the military command’s reluctance to help Muslims, the situation soon shifted. The Armenian refugees who had escaped the attacks of their Turkish and Kurdish neighbors on their villages, houses, families, and lives, and had settled in refugee camps or temporary places of residence, complained to the tsarist authorities. They saw how once the Kurds, who had attacked and violated them, pledged loyalty to Russia, they were pardoned and released.Footnote 75

These nuances display the complex nexus of relationships between the local—both Christian and Muslim—populations and the imperial Russian government. They also demonstrate the fluctuating attitudes and policies of Russian military and civil authorities toward all these populations depending on military developments on the warfronts, the negotiations between the Russia Empire and her allies, and Russia’s growing interests in the eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire.