Ekizian Collection – Athens

Author: Ani Apikian, 27/08/2024 (Last modified: 27/08/2024) - Translator: Simon Beugekian. This page was prepared collaboratively with the “Armenika” periodical of Athens.

The family history published on this page was provided to Houshamadyan by Kerop Ekizian, during Houshamadyan’s workshop in Athens (2022).

The primary figure in this family history is Kerovpe, Kerop Ekizian’s paternal grandfather. Some of the information in this article is based on Kerovpe’s memoirs, which he wrote in the years 1917-1919. These memoirs are a valuable source of information on the formation of the Armenian (Eastern) Legion; and shed light on Kerovpe Ekizian’s experiences as a legionary and a soldier.

This family history is also partly based on the writings of Dikranuhi Ekizian, the granddaughter of the brother or sister of Kerovpe’s wife, Srpuhi Ekizian. This information was first provided orally to Kerop Ekizian, when he visited the United States in 2000. Later, Kerop dictated this information to Dikranuhi.

Kerovpe Ekizian was born in 1884, in the village of Chomakhlu/Chomaklu (Çomaklı) of Gesaria (Kayseri). He had three brothers, Papel, Harutyun, and Setrag.

Harutyun and Papel emigrated to the United States at a young age. There, Harutyun married Nectar (surname unknown). The couple had two children, Hampar and Mgur. Papel also married and had two daughters, Verjin and Gyulizar. Later (in 1922), Verjin married Dikranuhi Ekizian’s uncle, Nerses, and had two sons, Garabed and Elon. Garabed had two sons, and Elon had a son and a daughter. Nerses died suddenly at the age of 44. After a year, Verjin remarried. After the First World War, Papel left America and moved to Adana, where he remarried (his second wife’s name is unknown). He had three sons, Hampar, Kapriel, and Setrag.

Kerovpe Ekizian’s fourth brother, Setrag, became a teacher in Chomakhlu and taught at the Khrimian School, which was administered by the Grtasirats Society. Setrag married Yeva and had a son, Hampar. During the years of the Genocide, Setrag and his family were deported. It is said that Setrag drowned in the Seyhan River in Adana when he jumped into the water after seeing a corpse in it that he thought was a relative. After the Armistice, Yeva was able to emigrate to America, where she married John Der Hagopian. Hampar, meanwhile, remained with Kerovpe Ekizian’s family (in Greece) until 1932, when his mother was able to travel to Greece and take him back with her to the United States.

At a young age, while still in Chomakhlu, Kerovpe became a member of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF) and the village fedayee squad. He met Srpuhi, and the two married in 1909. After experiencing political persecution, Kerovpe was forced to flee his homeland and emigrate to the United States, leaving his new wife behind. In New York, he and his brother Harutyun managed a restaurant. In 1915, Srpuhi was deported with the other Armenians of Chomakhlu.

This military unit was created during the First World War, on November 15, 1916, in Egypt. The unit fought under the French flag against Ottoman forces. Initially, it had two divisions, one consisting of Armenian volunteers, and the other of Syrian Arab volunteers. The first Armenians to volunteer for this legion were refugees who had fled Musa Ler and had settled in Port Said in the fall of 1915. Soon, Armenian volunteers from Egypt and the United States arrived. The Legion participated in military operations on the Palestine Front and was later part of the Allied detachment occupying Cilicia. In January 1919, the detachment of the legion consisting of Armenian volunteers and stationed in Cilicia was renamed the Armenian Legion, while the contingent stationed in Lebanon was renamed the Syrian Legion.

Kerovpe was in the United States at this time. Inspired by the spirit of patriotism, he enlisted in the Eastern Legion. He describes the years of his service in his memoirs. He boarded a ship in New York, and after traveling for 13 days, arrived at the port of Marseille on August 30, 1917. Aboard were 400 soldiers, including the Armenian volunteers. Among the latter was Ardavazt Hanumian, who, according to Kerovpe, motivated his fellow Armenians on the ship with patriotic speeches. In Marseille, French officials welcomed the Armenian volunteers warmly. In his memoirs, Kerovpe describes, with great emotion, his thirst for revenge, which had been kindled by the news that reached him in America from his homeland.

After staying in France for a few days, the Armenian volunteers proceeded to Egypt, where they joined the Eastern Legion. Kerovpe and the other volunteers were then sent to Cyprus, where they stayed near Famagusta, in the village of Monarga (present-day Boğaztepe). There, the legionaries trained under the supervision of French officers for four months. Among these officers were two Armenians, Vahan Portukalian and John Shishmanian (the latter from the U.S. Army).

In his memoirs, Kerovpe describes the difficulties faced by the Legion – the lack of food, the miserable conditions, the exceedingly arduous training regimen, and the inhuman behavior of some of the officers. Still, none of these challenges dissuaded Kerovpe or his comrades from serving their cause.

The memoirs mention that the barracks of the Legion in Cyprus was visited by high-ranking officers on March 13, 1918. Thereafter, probably thanks to this visit, the Armenian volunteers began receiving the essential supplies they previously lacked. After months of training, they were considered ready to be sent to the front, where they would participate in the Battle of Arara.

And thus, on September 19, 1918, the troops of the Armenian Legion participated in the battle that pitted the Allied Forces against German-Ottoman forces on the hill of Arara (Arabic: عرعر), in Palestine. The Allies eventually declared victory after capturing the hill. The casualties of the Armenian Legion were 23 dead and 76 wounded.

After this battle, the Armenian Legion advanced north alongside the Allied forces. They first reached Haifa, then, on October 12, they entered Beirut, where they were welcomed warmly by the Allied troops who had previously entered the city. Armenians who had survived the Genocide and lived in Beirut were enraptured when they heard soldiers in French uniforms speaking Armenian.

The Armenian volunteers were then transported, by ship, to Iskenderun (Alexandretta, in the Antioch region). In his memoirs, Kerovpe highlights the negative attitude of the population of Iskenderun towards the Armenian legionaries. Specifically, he describes attacks on the legionaries, the unfair prison sentences they received, the torture they suffered while in prison, and other punishments imposed on them. From Iskenderun, the legionaries proceeded to Cilicia, where they converged on two cities, Adana and Aintab.

In his memoirs, Kerovpe writes reverently about the Legion’s Armenian officers, John Shishmanian and Vahan Portukalian, underlining the important and influential role they played in helping the Legion in every way. Kerovpe also had a relatively positive opinion of the British troops who were part of the Allied occupation forces in Cilicia. Later, these British forces were replaced by French troops. This was when disappointment towards the Allies set in among the Armenian legionaries, including Kerovpe. After the capture of Cilicia, the legionaries were convinced that the Allied forces would establish an independent Armenian state in Cilicia, under the protection of the Allied powers. These hopes were soon dashed as it became clear that the French had simply used the Armenians as leverage to bolster their hegemony in the region. Later, French policies became openly pro-Turkish, with France ordering its troops out of Cilicia and handing the region back to Turkey.

Kerovpe’s memoirs chronicle the disappointment felt by the Armenian volunteers, which grew daily. The French authorities began disbanding the Armenian Legion, which was fully and officially disbanded in September 1920. This decision by the French shocked the Armenians of Cilicia, for whom the presence of Armenian soldiers was a guarantee of safety. Any legionaries who rebelled against the decision were arrested and imprisoned. Kerovpe, too, was jailed, but as he writes, on April 8, 1919, during a military parade in Adana, he and several other Armenian volunteers escaped.

Between 1918 and 1920, Kerovpe also dedicated himself to the efforts of finding and rescuing Armenian orphans. In Syria, he tracked down his wife, Srpuhi, who had been deported from Chomakhlu, as well as other family members who had survived. We know that in 1919, Kerovpe spent some time in Aleppo, where he served as a foreman at the city’s Armenian refugee camp, housed in a former Ottoman Army barracks.

Kerovpe and Srpuhi eventually left Cilicia and traveled, by ship, directly to Greece. They settled in the Moschato suburb of Athens. Their four children were all born in Moschato: Baydzar (died in infancy), Mary (1925-2014), Kapriel (Kerop’s father; 1927-1987), and Setrag (1929-1989).

In Moschato, with the help of several compatriots, Kerovpe founded an Armenian kindergarten, which was attended by a small number of Armenian children. This institution had a short life, and after its closure, Kerovpe worked as a carpenter. He was also a member of the board of trustees of the Saint Krikor Lusavorich Church, the seat of the Athens Prelacy. During the Second World War, when the German occupation forces drafted Greeks into forced labor, Kerovpe and his son Kapriel, who was 14 years old at the time, were put to work expanding the old airport of Elliniko.

After the war, in the 1950s, Kerovpe Ekizian and his sons, Kapriel and Setrag, opened a small shop in Faliro, a seaside district of Athens. In 1963, Kapriel married Gula Apkarian, the daughter of Armenians from Sis and Hadjin. Setrag married Alice-Elbiz Santourdjian in 1978.