Click on the names of highlighted cities, towns, and other locations to view a map of the genocide.

January 9

The Aleppo Police Department obtains the list of all the Armenian labor battalion workers constructing the Aleppo Normal School for the selection of those to be killed.

January 28

The German General Hans Friedrich von Seeckt, at the time Chief of Staff of the Turkish Army, is instructed to prevent Turkish atrocities against the Armenians of the Caucasus, since the Russian armies had fallen apart in the aftermath of the Russian Revolution and the Turks were advancing almost unopposed.

February 27

The Interior Ministry requests without delay the lists of Armenian employees on the railways.

March 3

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk is signed by Russia, Turkey, and Germany. The hostilities with Russia are officially ended. Talaat declares that he will grant amnesty to the Armenians.

March 12

Enver orders the killing of all civilian Armenians over five years of age and remaining Armenians in the Turkish military within 48 hours. The Germans attempt to stop the Turks from committing this massacre.

March 12

Turkish forces reoccupy Erzerum.

March 26

The governor-general of Aleppo Province sends a list of the Armenian railway employees to the Military Commissioner for Railways.

April 1

The Military Commissioner for Railways sends a reply to Osman Bedri, the governor-general of Aleppo Province, relating to the destruction of the Armenian railway workers, and on the same day the list is delivered to the Aleppo Police Department, which was serving as the concentration and transit center for the deportations and massacres.

April 5

Turkish forces reoccupy Van.

April 13

Turkish forces occupy Kars.

April 14

The registration book of all the remaining Armenian construction workers (the labor battalions of the Turkish Army) is sent to the Aleppo Police Department.

April 15

The Turkish government announces that upon his return from the Peace Conference at Brest-Litovsk Talaat will grant amnesty to the Armenians in Turkey. In reality, it is an empty gesture for the benefit of the Europeans, as most surviving Armenians are living outside of Turkey proper and those still left in Turkey are being systematically destroyed.

April 24

Enver returns from Batum to Constantinople and reports that he will be issuing instructions for the return of 'peaceful' Armenians.

April 28

Turkey formally recognize the Transcaucasian Federative Republic consisting of Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. (The Federation dissolves on May 28.)

May 28

An Armenian Republic is proclaimed in Russian Transcaucasia.

June 9

Hindenberg wires Enver asking Turkish forces to evacuate all Caucasian areas except Kars, Ardahan, and Batum. The Turks ignore the demand. Local massacres are reported throughout the occupied areas.

June 28

Sultan Mehmet V Reshad, who had been a complete rubber-stamp for the Ittihadists, dies. He is succeeded by Mehmet VI Vahideddin.

June 24

Two thousand remaining Armenians are massacred in Kara-Kilise in Turkey.

June 28

The Turkish government condemns 14,000 Armenians to hard labor and near-certain death.

July 5

Avedis Aharonian, President of the Armenian Delegation, meets with German ambassador to Constantinople, Count von Bernstorff, on behalf of the Armenian Republic.

July 29

Hindenburg sends a message to Enver urging restraint in the treatment of the Armenians in the Caucasus.

July 24

The Armenians are supposedly granted amnesty, and Ismail Janbolat, the Deputy Minister of the Interior, is given charge of the return of the Armenian deportees.

September 15 to September 17

The three-day massacre by Turkish military forces under the command of Nuri Pasha (Enver's younger brother) and Halil Pasha (Enver's uncle) results in the death of 30,000 Armenian civilians in the city of Baku.

September 19

Allied forces open a large-scale offensive on the Syrian Front, aided by an Armenian Legion recruited from Armenian colonies throughout the world.

October 1

Allied forces capture Damascus.

October 2

Bulgaria signs an armistice with the Allies. The Armenian refugees in Bulgaria are now safe as the Bulgarian government stops returning them to Turkey.

October 8

Allied forces capture the city of Beirut (Beyrut).

October 8

The Ittihad Cabinet of Enver, Jemal, and Talaat resigns. All three prepare to flee the country.

October 26

Allied forces occupy the city of Aleppo. With the arrival of the British and French armies and the Armenian Legion, 125,000 remnants of the deported Armenians are rescued from the desert

October 29

The Ittihad Central Bureau resigns and the Party decides secretly to reorganize as the Tejeddut Firkasi (Regeneration Party). Talaat, Enver, Osman Bedri, Behaeddin Shakir, and more than thirty other Ittihadist ringleaders decide to flee to Germany.

October 29

One hundred and twenty thousand Turkish gold pounds and jewelry is transferred from the Ittihad Party to the Tejeddut Party, the newly-organized front of the Ittihadists. This money and jewelry was just a small part of the property of the Armenians misappropriated by the Ittihad Party.

October 29

Dr. Nazim takes with him to Germany 65,000 Turkish gold pounds and 600,000 Turkish gold pounds of valuation in jewelry from the so-called abandoned goods of the Armenians.

October 30

An armistice is signed at Mudros between Turkey and the Allies. The armistice agreement makes provisions for the release of Armenian internees and the return of the Armenian deportees to their homes.

November 1

The Ittihad Party, with 120 delegates attending, convenes under the guise of the Tejeddut Party.

November 2

Talaat, Enver, Jemal flee Turkey on a German freighter.

November 3

The second session of the Ittihad convention as the Tejeddut Party is held under the chairmanship of Ismail Janbolat Bey, Talaat's former assistant. An Executive Committee of twenty-one members is elected.

November 4

The third session of the Ittihad convention instructs its provincial branches to go underground and announces their abolishment.

November 5

All Ittihadist clubs in Anatolia are closed. The units go underground.

November 11

A general armistice is declared between the Allies and the Central Powers.

December 11

Talaat, Enver, and Jemal are summoned by the Fifth Committee of the Turkish Parliament to appear for an inquiry within ten days.

Next Segment — 1919 Segments of the Chronology