Microsoft Word 1 Arif thesis cover final doc

CHAPTER 2 – HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 
71 
withdrawal. Much more chaotic and hurried was the flight from western Anatolia 
before the advancing Turkish army
157
. Except for the men of military age who were 
detained by the Turks this flight was over by October. It is not possible to produce 
exact estimates either of the number of refugees or the mortality in excess of a 
normal peacetime rate among the populations which fled. The Greek census of 1928 
gave a total of 1.22 million persons of refugee origin, of whom about 627,000 were 
from Asia Minor, 257,000 from Thrace and 182,000 from the Black Sea region; the 
total was considered an underestimate by a chairman of the Refugee Settlement 
Commission, who preferred a figure of 1.3 million; this total, however, is not broken 
down by origin
158
, The figures for Asia Minor and the Black Sea region (unadjusted 
by any proportional increase to reflect the higher aggregate) are about 300,000 less 
than the number of Rum stated for the Anatolian provinces in the Ottoman pre-war 
figures
159
. Adjustments need to be made for census undercounting, onward migration 
to countries outside Greece, “natural” mortality for the years after 1922 and the birth 
rate in the years before it. McCarthy has suggested a total death rate of around 25% 
of the pre-war population or just over 300,000 people
160
. By implication, although it 
is not said expressly, these numbers are meant to represent excess mortality; they 
would need to be increased to the extent that the pre-war Ottoman figures were 
underestimates
161
. 
157
Mango 346 
158
Pentzopoulos, 98-99 
159
Karpat 1985, 168 and 188; Mutlu, 11 
160
McCarthy, 147 
161
Kitromilides and Alexandris, 28, report the “patriarchal figure” at about 1.5m which would leave another 
300,000 to account for. 

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