Collections
One of thousands of children turned away from the relief orphanages. Erivan, c. 1920–1921.
Location
Erivan (Yerevan), Armenia
Year
c. 1920–1921
Item Detail
The album says thousands of children were turned away from the relief orphanages "to make possible the admission of worse cases." From 1915, during the Armenian Genocide, Armenians from eastern Turkey fled by the tens of thousands into the Russian Caucasus. At the height of the typhus epidemic in Erivan (Yerevan) in 1919, dead Armenian refugees from Turkey were gathered from its streets at the rate of 190 a day.
Context
The American Relief Administration (ARA), Herbert Hoover's relief agency in postwar Europe, was re-formed in July 1919 as a volunteer, non-profit body. From August 1919 to July 1920 it worked jointly with Near East Relief in the Caucasus under Colonel William N. Haskell, joint relief administrator and high commissioner for Armenia. Near East Relief agreed to pay the administrative, orphanage and transportation costs, and its workers took their assignments from Haskell and ran the orphanages. The people they served included Armenian refugees who had fled Turkey during the Armenian Genocide. When Haskell withdrew to Constantinople in 1920, Ernest A. Yarrow took charge of the workers who stayed.
This photograph is one of 67 prints from the ARA European operational records at the Hoover Institution Library & Archives. Seven show child feeding and institutions in Tiflis (Tbilisi). Nineteen filed as ARA operations in Armenia are mostly marked "Near East Relief" on the back, and one is an American Red Cross photograph. Four more, filed as starving children, are marked as Armenian refugees and an Armenian child. Thirty-seven come from an album that Hoover describes as work of Near East Relief in Erevan. Its captions also name places in Georgia and Turkey.
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Holding Institution
Hoover Institution Library and Archives
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External Link
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Attribution
Photograph of a child turned away from the orphanages, Erivan, c. 1920–1921, American Relief Administration European operational records, Box 855, Folder 11, Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
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Rights
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Notes
Album caption (typed on the album page, page shot asset 11055): "Erivan - One of thousands turned away from the relief orphanages to make possible the admission of worse cases."
Hoover title: "Album containing 37 prints depicting work of Near East Relief in Erevan." Box 855, Folder 11 (Armenia). Hoover record: https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf9779p02m_aspace_d508570211510b5474ee72ab3afb4b0f
Sources for the Item Detail:
• Barton, p. 10 ("It was learned that Armenians from the eastern part of Turkey, alarmed by the hostile attitude of the Constantinople government, were in exodus by the tens of thousands into Russia" ... "there was an assemblage of more than two hundred thousand Armenians, Assyrians and Nestorians in abject destitution in the Russian Caucasus"), from the State Department dispatches the committee read when it was formed in 1915. James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679
• Barton, p. 336 ("She arrived in Erivan during the height of the typhus epidemic when dead Armenian refugees from Turkey were being gathered from the streets at the rate of 190 a day."). James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679
About this group: American Relief Administration European operational records, Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
• Hoover Institution Library & Archives, American Relief Administration European operational records, collection guide, biographical note quoting Herbert Hoover, An American Epic, vol. III ("to set up a volunteer successor under the same name" ... "On July 12, they formed the new American Relief Administration, which was registered as a non-profit corporation"): https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf9779p02m
• Barton, p. 124 ("the appointment of Col. William N. Haskell as joint relief administrator and high commissioner for Armenia ... The Near East Relief agreed to pay all administrative, orphanage and transportation charges, which were estimated at $500,000 per month."). James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679
• Barton, p. 124 ("Col. Haskell and his mission took charge of the relief activities in August, 1919, and remained in the Caucasus until July, 1920. The Near East Relief workers were given assignments by Col. Haskell and were made responsible for the care of the children and the orphanages."). James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679
• Barton, p. 10 ("It was learned that Armenians from the eastern part of Turkey, alarmed by the hostile attitude of the Constantinople government, were in exodus by the tens of thousands into Russia" ... "there was an assemblage of more than two hundred thousand Armenians, Assyrians and Nestorians in abject destitution in the Russian Caucasus"), from the State Department dispatches the committee read when it was formed in 1915. James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679
• Barton, p. 127 ("Col. Haskell and his military aids withdrew to Constantinople and Ernest A. Yarrow was placed in charge of the civilian workers, who remained to carry on the relief activities."). James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679