The Great Fire of Thessaloniki – 1917

 

On the 18^th of August 1917, Thessaloniki, the second-largest city in Greece, home to thousands of refugees and one of the largest and most modern cities in Europe at the time, went up in flames destroying two thirds of the city, leaving more than 70,000 homeless, two thirds of whom were Jews.

 

 

The 1913 census states the city’s population was 157,889, including 61,439 Jews, 39,956 Orthodox Greeks, 45,867 Turks, 6,263 Bulgarians and 4,364 “foreigners”.

Salonika, as it was then known to the locals, recently freed from Ottoman rule in 1912, was a city of many nationalities; Greeks being the minority whilst Jews were the majority.

 

 

The devastating fire was the beginning of the end for the “Jerusalem of the Balkans”, which had evolved during Ottoman occupation, as most of the 52,000 Jews left destitute, fled from the city, heading mainly for France and the United States, while others made for Palestine.

Other ethnic groups of Thessaloniki included Turks, Armenians, Albanians and Roma as well as a host of other nationalities.

 Added to this melting pot of humanity, were thousands of Italian, French and British soldiers.

Even though Greece officially maintained neutrality at the beginning of World War I, after the abdication of King Constantine I, in June 1917, Greece entered the war on the side of the Allies and Thessaloniki soon became a transit center for Allied troops and supplies.

 

Salonika Burning

 

 

The fire, which started on Saturday 18 August 1917, at around 15:30, is said to have begun in the house of some refugees, at the corner of Ayiou Dimitriou Street, in the Mevlane; the Turkish district, when sparks from a kitchen fire, accidently set fire to a pile of straw.

The fire raged for thirty two hours, fanned by the famous “Vardaris” of Thessaloniki (a strong north wind), which helped the fire spread to the city centre before changing direction only to cause another fire front; eventually the whole commercial center was but a pile of ashes and rubble.

 

 

By the evening of the 19^th of August, the fire had reached the waterfront where it then set alight the caiques and boats bobbing in the sea, this, at last, brought the inferno to an end; by evening the fire was completely extinguished.

 

 

250 acres of building area, 9,500 houses and most of the city’s churches, banks, schools, printing presses, hotels and shops were now only memories of the past.

Thessaloniki, the Northern capital of Greece, would never be the same again.

 

 

Surprisingly, owing to the direction of the wind, most of the Turkish area, where the fire had started; higher up by the city walls, remained mostly untouched and can still be seen today.

 

How Did the Fire Manage to Reach Such a Magnitude?

What Went Wrong?

 

 

At the time of the fire, the city plans of Thessaloniki were rather chaotic; the houses built more or less on top of one another in narrow streets barely three meters wide, did not help matters, add the strong north wind and you have a recipe for disaster.

 

 

To make matters worse, the city had no official fire brigade, only a rather motley, disorganized crew of fire fighters, privately owned by insurance companies, armed with only decrepit or no equipment, who were only at the service of their customers.

If you think that’s bad enough, there was a distinct lack of water for firefighting, not only owing to a severe drought that summer but also to the fact that the thousands of allied forces stationed in the city, had total control of the water reserves in order to serve their camps and hospitals!

They were not too keen on giving up their precious water supply for firefighting.

Add to all the above the fact that the French allies, attempting to create “Fire Safe Zones”, accidentally blew up entire blocks which only ended up in adding fuel to the fire.

 

 

Several reports stated that the  French soldiers also looted stores and businesses and forbid victims from rescuing their goods unless they paid the French drivers, whilst British soldiers, on the other hand, helped out as long as they could, using military lorries to transport fire victims and their belongings to refugee camps.

 

The Day After

 

 

Help for the approximately 70.000 fire victims began immediately after the fire with Greek authorities constructing around 100 houses to shelter 800 families.

The British created three camps with 1,300 tents, which provided accommodation for about 7,000 homeless.

 The French authorities set up a camp for 300 families and “The Union of French Ladies” a smaller camp for 100 families.

More than 5,000 refugees, with no charge, were transported by train and relocated in Athens, Volos and Larissa.

 The Greek authorities set up food distribution points throughout Thessaloniki providing free bread for more than 30,000 people.

 The American, French and British Red Cross also distributed food among the homeless.

 

Out of the Ashes

 

 

After the great fire of Thessaloniki the Greek government declared that the city would not be restored to its original state but was to be given a totally new look.

 

 

The “International Committee for the New Plan of Thessaloniki”, was formed and French architect, Ernest Hébrard, who, During WW1, in 1916, was the Director of the Archaeological Service of the Army of the Orient based in Thessaloniki and was present in the city when the fire broke out, was commissioned to get the job done.

 

 

With the help of Greek architects Aristotelis Zachos and Konstantinos Kitsikis, British designer Thomas Hayton Mawson and fellow Frenchman Joseph Pleyber, the former medieval and Ottoman Street layout was replaced with European-style boulevards and open squares, cleverly integrating the surviving ancient Byzantine churches and mosques.

 

 

Ernest Hebrard’s designs are still recognizable in Thessaloniki, the best example being Aristotelous Square (Above).