Marjorie HOUSEPIAN
( 1922 - 2013 )

An historical account of the great fire of 1922 that destroyed the city of Smyrna is long overdue, yet until now no one has told the full story.
This timely volume reveals how—with the assistance of western officials, missionaries, and historians—the Turkish policy of mass extermination was explained away and the spectacular destruction of a great city minimized as "an incident." Marjorie Housepian has set these events in their historical context. She has exposed the economic motives behind the western posture and the importance of oil in forming Near Eastern policy. She has researched exhaustively through official documents and interviewed scores of eyewitnesses. The result is an authoritative piece of historical scholarship as vivid and compelling as a novel.
The Smyrna Affair is the story of outrageous international chicanery and double talk. It is also a rich human document describing the courage of the Greeks and Armenians who were the victims of the Turks in the holocaust —as well as that of the relatively few Europeans and Americans who fought the cynical inhumanity of their own officials. It is an important contribution to setting the historical record straight.

In September 1922 the Turks, following their defeat of the Greek armies in Asia Minor, set fire to and totally destroyed the city of Smyrna. The crisis in the Near East had widespread political repercussions—among other things, it brought about the downfall of Lloyd George's coalition government and forced the Greeks to abandon their hopes of re-establishing their capital in Constantinople. But the plight of the Armenians, the innocent victims of the tragedy, was either ignored or explained away as 'an incident'. The Western powers, anxious to avoid war with Turkey and to protect their oil and trade interests, condoned the massacre by their silence.
Marjorie Housepian, herself of Armenian descent, has written the first account of events within the city, using as sources the diaries, letters and eyewitness reports of the participants themselves, chiefly Armenians and American diplomats and missionaries. The result is an authoritative piece of historical research, as vivid and compelling as a novel, told with restraint and dignity. As C. M. Woodhouse says in his Introduction, it is an unforgettable memorial to the guiltless victims of the fire.