GAZİANTEP IN TURKISH INDEPENDENCE WAR

            Montrose Agreement, signed on 30 October 1918, was the end of Ottoman Empire, and the Allies acted immediately to own the lands that they had shared. In 1914, when the First World War started, Gaziantep was a subdivision of a province with a population of 80.000 This magnificent city was being the scene of the most inequitable invasion of the history.

            The English troops in Aleppo, based on the article 7 of Montrose Agreement, invaded Antep with cavalry brigade and the other forces on 15 January 1919.

            Armenians, who were full of ambition and hated Turkish, affected the English and made them to govern cruelly. They seized by violence the Turkish goods which were for sale under the guise Armenian goods. Under the guise of weapon search, they kept the city under thumb. All the houses were searched, it was announced people not to go out of their homes. Turkish people had to hand in all their weapons to the English even their bread knives.

            The severity of invasion, the cruelty of the enemy, strengtened the deciveness and resistance of Turkish people. English have realized this mood of the people and tended to govern the region without any discrimination between Turkish and Armenians, and left Antep to the French invasion in October 1919.

            French soldiers attacked Antep for the second time on 11 August 1920 and people started to starve. General Gourad, trying to benefit the situation, offered people in Gaziantep to capitulate. In this offer, he wanted Serves Agreement to be applied. The French governing would be accepted, ammunition and the people whose names had been given would be capitulated.

            Finally, the capitulation agreement of the city was signed in French headquarter at 10:00 on 9 February 1921.

            According to the agreement consisted of 11 articles.. 'Antep would be  under the control of French governing, the troops would be accepted as prisoner of war, all weapons and ammunition would be handed in to French, Turkish and Armenian people would be equal and safe. After this agreement French troops occupied the city.

            Gaziantep Defence, starting on 1 April 1921, received the recognition from all over the world for its brave defence and tremendous heroism, lasted 10 months 9 days and ended because of starvation.

            At last, on 15 March 1921 Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs Bekir Sami Bey and French Delegation came to an agreement on giving back Adana, Antep and the land around to the Turkish. Especially Armenians and French were in mourning because of this agreement. So, this agreement had been finalized with the Ankara Agreement and French troops left the city on 25 December 1921.

            Gaziantep's people had defensed their city  against occupation forces magnificiently with the leadership of ?ahinbey, martyr of flag, in spite of 6317 martrys.

            Due to this, Atatürk praised Gaziantep's people with his famous sentence; 'Every Turkish city, every town and the smallest Turkish village can accept people in Gaziantep as an example of heroism.'