Yeprem Khan

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Yeprem Khan as police chief of Tehran.

Yeprem Khan Davidian ( Armenian Եփրեմ Խան, Եփրեմ Դավթյան , Persian یپرم‌خان داویدیان), also Yefrem Khan or Ephraim Khan , (* 1868 in Barsum; † May 19, 1912 ) was an Armenian revolutionary leader and Iranian national hero.

Life

Yeprem was born in 1868 in the village of Barsum ( Armenian Բարսում ) in what is now Azerbaijan . At that time, the village was in the Elisabetpol Governorate of the Russian Empire . Even in his youth, Yeprem supported Armenian nationalist groups and took part in the actions of Armenian partisans against the Ottoman Empire . In September 1890, Yeprem was arrested by Russian Cossacks and exiled to Siberia in 1892. In 1896 he managed to escape from Siberia to Iran to Tabriz . In Tabriz he became a member of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation , whose activities in Iran were mainly directed against the Ottoman Empire .

Armenian freedom fighter

Major Haase (standing center) with Yeprem Khan, Sardar-e Baradur in 1911

→ Main article: Constitutional Revolution

Yeprem took an active part in the Constitutional Revolution of Iran and convinced the members of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation to support the constitutional movement. Yeprem Khan allied himself with Sattar Khan and other leaders of the constitutional movement against Mohammed Ali Shah .

With the backing of Russia , Mohammed Ali Shah dissolved the newly created parliament in July 1908 and had the prime minister and several leaders of the constitutional movement arrested. Revolts broke out in Azerbaijan and the northern provinces around the Caspian Sea. At the end of February 1908 there was an attempted assassination on Mohammed Ali Shah. A bomb was dropped on his car but did not seriously injure the Shah. The dispute between the regent and parliament over future policy turned into a power struggle, in which Great Britain and Russia intervened directly in June 1908. They put pressure on the government and parliament to give in to the Shah's demands. At the end of June 1908, open fighting broke out on the streets around the parliament building between troops loyal to parliament and troops loyal to the Shah. A little later street fighting broke out in Tabriz . The whole country was in turmoil. In October 1908, during the uprising in Tabriz and Rasht , Yeprem Khan founded a secret Sattar committee (named after the revolutionary leader Sattar Khan ) and established contact with the Social Democrats and the Armenian Revolutionary Federation in the Caucasus. With the support of thirty-five Georgians and twenty Armenians from Baku , Yeprem Khan occupied Rasht and shortly afterwards raised the red flag of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation on the town hall of Anzali . United with other troops led by Mohammad Vali Khan Sepahsalar , a large landowner and former Qajar commander , Yeprem Khan marched towards Tehran to support the constitutional movement with militarily organized forces.

On June 22, 1909, "freedom fighters", as the constitutionalist troops were now called, stood in front of Qom , which they captured on July 8, 1909 , from the southwest . The way to Tehran was clear. A little later there was street fighting in Tehran between the constitutionalist troops and the Cossack brigade loyal to the Shah . On July 16, 1909, Mohammed Ali Shah fled his palace to the Russian embassy. On the same day, in an extraordinary session, parliament deposed Mohammed Ali Shah in favor of his son Ahmad Shah . With the deposed Mohammed Ali Shah and the representatives of Russia and Great Britain, negotiations began on the conditions under which Mohammed Ali Shah could leave the country and the parliamentary government under Ahmad Shah would be recognized by the great powers. Agreement was reached after Mohammed Ali Shah was promised a pension of $ 80,000 a year. On September 10, 1909, Mohammed Ali Shah left the Russian embassy and went into exile in Odessa in Russia .

Police chief in Tehran

In November 1909, Yeprem Khan, who alongside Sattar Khan was instrumental in the overthrow of Mohammed Ali Shah, was appointed police chief of Tehran by the Iranian parliament . In 1910, Yeprem Khan fell out with Sattar Khan, who refused to surrender his weapons or submit his troops to the supreme command of the constitutional government. After a brief but violent exchange of fire between the Tehran police and Sattar Khan's troops in Tehran's Atabak Park, Sattar Khan gave himself up and was disarmed. Sattar Khan died shortly afterwards from an injury sustained in the exchange of fire.

Yeprem Khan deserves the credit for thwarting Mohammed Ali Shah's attempted coup against the constitutional government in 1911 and thus saving parliament and the newly emerging, parliamentary state. Mohammed Ali Shah, who was meanwhile living in exile in Russia, had returned to Iran by ship across the Caspian Sea. He had recruited 2,000 Turkmen and devoted Persian soldiers and marched into Asterabad ( Gorgan ) on July 22, 1911 . At the suggestion of Morgan Shuster , who works for the constitutional government of Iran as Chancellor of the Exchequer , the government in Tehran put 100,000 tomans (about $ 90,000) on the head of Mohammed Ali Shah and 25,000 tomans each on the head of his two brothers who had invaded Persia from the west of the Ottoman Empire. When the news of the suspended bounty reached Mohammed Ali Shah, he fled to the Caspian Sea and waited there for further events. The 2,000 armed Turkmen and Persian soldiers loyal to Mohammed Ali Shah had meanwhile advanced into Tehran under the leadership of Arshad-ud-Dawla. Yeprem Khan and the German Major Haase, who was in Persian service and commanded a small artillery unit, advanced towards them with 350 lightly armed policemen and gendarmes , a machine gun and two field guns . 50 km southeast of Tehran near the village of Veramin, the unequal forces clashed. Major Haase took up position on a small hill and fired machine guns at the approaching Turkmen. Up to this point they had never seen a machine gun, were horrified by its deadly effect and fled. What remained were 60 fallen and 400 captured Turkmens and the wounded Arshad-ud-Dawla. Arshad was interrogated and shot dead the following day . His body was brought to Tehran and publicly displayed there. Tehran and the constitutional government were saved.

Yeprem Khan died on May 19, 1912.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Aram Arkun: Eprem Khan. In: Encyclopedia Iranica. Online edition.
  2. ↑ Aram Arkun: Dashnak (Armenian Revolutionary Federation). In: Encyclopedia Iranica. Online edition.
  3. ^ Houri Berberian: Armenians and the Iranian Constitutional Revolution, 1905-1911. Westview Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8133-3817-4 , p. 132.
  4. ↑ Yeprem Khan: Ittila'at-i Mahaneh. (Recollections), 2 (July 1948), pp. 19-21.
  5. ↑ Ervand Abrahamian: Iran between two revolutions. Princeton University Press, 1982, ISBN 0-691-10134-5 , p. 99.
  6. ^ Morgan Shuster: The Strangling of Persia. New York 1912. pp. Xxii.
  7. ↑ http://www.iranchamber.com/history/constitutional_revolution/constitutional_revolution.php
  8. ↑ Morgan Shuster: The strangling of Persia. New York 1912, pp. 85-133.
personal data
SURNAME Yeprem Khan
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Yeprem Khan Davidian; Yefrem Khan; Ephraim Khan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Leader of the constitutional movement and chief of police of Tehran
DATE OF BIRTH 1868
PLACE OF BIRTH Barsum
DATE OF DEATH May 19, 1912