Armenian fedayi


Fedayi, also known as the Armenian irregular units or Armenian militia, were Armenian civilians who voluntarily left their families to form self-defense units and irregular armed bands in reaction to the mass murder of Armenians and the pillage of Armenian villages by criminals, Kurdish gangs and Turkish forces, and Hamidian guards during the reign of Abdul Hamid II in late 19th and early 20th centuries, known as the Hamidian massacres. Their ultimate goal was always to gain Armenian autonomy or independence depending on their ideology and the degree of oppression visited on Armenians.
Some of the key Fedayi figures also participated in the Iranian Constitutional Revolution that commenced during the same period, upon agreement of the ARF leaders.
The Armenian term fedayi is ultimately derived from Arabic fedayeen: فدائيون fidā'īyūn, literally meaning "those who sacrifice".

Goals and activities

Armenian fedayis' main goal was to defend Armenian villagers from persecution and at the same time, disrupt the Ottoman Empire's activities in Armenian populated regions. Armenian volunteers fought during Hamidian Massacres, Sasun Resistance, Zeitun Rebellion, Defense of Van, and Khanasor Expedition. They were the leaders and members of the Armenian national movement. These bands sabotaged telegraph lines and raided army supplies. They also committed assassinations and counter-attacks on Muslim villages. They helped Armenians defend themselves during village purges by Ottoman officials. They were supported by Armenians and quickly gained fame, support and trust by them.
Their activities in the Ottoman Empire dissipated after the Second Constitutional Era of the Ottoman Empire, when the Committee of Union and Progress came into power and, for a time, granted the Empire's Armenian citizens the same rights as its Turkish and Kurdish citizens. Most fedayi groups then disbanded, their members returning to their families.

Persian Constitutional Revolution

Several fedayi and ARF key figures such as Aram Manukian, Hamo Ohanjanyan and Stepan Stepanian agreed upon joining the ongoing Iranian Constitutional Revolution in neighboring Qajar Persia.
They established that the movement was one that had political, ideological and economic components and was thus aimed at establishing law and order, human rights and the interests of all working people. They also felt that it would work for the benefit and interest of Armenian-Iranians. The final vote was 25 votes in favour and one absentia.

World War I

Some fedayi groups joined the Ottoman army after the Ottoman government passed a new law to support the war effort that required all enabled adult males up to the age of 45 to either be recruited in the Ottoman army or to pay special fees to be excluded from service. As a result of this law, most able-bodied men were removed from their homes, leaving only the women, children, and elderly by themselves. Most of the Armenian recruits were later turned into road laborers, out of which many were executed.
The Genocide, committed during World War I by the Ottoman Empire, gave way to the return of the fedayis, who reorganised themselves once again inside the borders of the Ottoman Empire. In turn, tens of thousands of Armenians volunteered to be drafted in several different armies. These Armenian volunteer units were formed inside the Russian army to fight against the Ottoman Empire.
The Russian Caucasus Front collapsed following the abdication of the Tsar. In 1917, the Armenian Congress of Eastern Armenians asked the Armenian soldiers and officers scattered throughout Russian occupied regions to gradually be brought together. The plan was to mobilize Armenians on the Caucasian front. With that purpose in view, an Armenian Military Committee was formed with General Bagradouni as its president. That year, the Armenian National Congress created the Armenian National Council which created to the First Republic of Armenia. These Armenian conscripts and volunteers from the Russian Army later established the core of the armed forces of the First Republic of Armenia. Armenians refugees from the Ottoman Empire were flooding to the newly formed Armenian state. Further southeast, in Van, the fedayis helped the local Armenians resist the Turkish army until April 1918, but eventually were forced to evacuate and withdraw to Persia.
To consider emergency measures, the Western Armenian Administration sponsored a conference which adopted plans to form a 20,000-man militia under Andranik in December 1917. Civilian commissioner Dr. Hakob Zavriev promoted Andranik to Major General and he took the command of Armenia within the Ottoman Empire. They fought in numerous successful battles such as the Battle of Kara Killisse, the Battle of Bash Abaran and the Battle of Sardarapat, as fedayees merged with the Armenian army under the General Tovmas Nazarbekian.
The total number of guerrillas in these irregular bands was 40,000–50,000, according to Boghos Nubar, the president of the Armenian National Delegation in the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 who wrote:
Boghos Nubar, as a part of the Armenian Delegation, intended to expand the independent First Republic of Armenia. Thus, he might have elevated the number of Armenian fedayees who were able to fight in order to show that the Armenians are capable of defending an eventually large Ottoman-Armenian border. In reality, their numbers at that time were much lower, considering that there were no more than a few handfuls of fedayees in most of the confrontations between them and Kurdish irregulars or Turkish soldiers, even according to foreign accounts. Moreover, many of the fedayees were the same and reappeared in various places and battles. One should also note that many Armenian irregular fighters died defending regions of Western Armenia during the Armenian genocide.

Notable fedayis

Nom de guerre
Years active
Operation location
Political affiliation
Arabo1880s - 1893Western ArmeniaDashnak
Girayr1880s - 1894Western ArmeniaHunchak
Papken Siuni- 1896Western Armenia, ConstantinopleDashnak
Aghbiur Serob1891–1899Western ArmeniaDashnak
Hrayr Dzhoghk1880s - 1904Western ArmeniaHunchak, Dashnak
Kevork Chavush1890–1907Western ArmeniaHunchak, Dashnak
Sevkaretsi Sako- 1908Western Armenia, IranDashnak
Yeprem Khan1880s - 1912Western Armenia, IranDashnak
Nikol Duman- 1914Western Armenia, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Medzn Mourad1880s - 1915Western ArmeniaHunchak
Ishkhan- 1915Western ArmeniaDashnak
Paramaz1890s - 1915Eastern ArmeniaHunchak
Keri1880s - 1916Western Armenia, Iran, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Hovsep Arghutian1889–1918Western ArmeniaDashnak
Armenak Yekarian1890s - 1918Western ArmeniaArmenakan
Sebastatsi Murad1890s - 1918Western Armenia, Eastern Armenia, BakuHunchak, Dashnak
Andranik1895–1919Western Armenia, Bulgaria, ZangezurHunchak, Dashnak
Aram Manukian1903–1919Western Armenia, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Sose Mayrig1890s - 1920Western ArmeniaDashnak
Hamazasp1890 - 1920Western Armenia, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Dro1914–1920Western Armenia, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Vartan1890 - 1920sWestern Armenia, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Garegin Nzhdeh1908–1921Iran, Balkans, Eastern Armenia Dashnak
Makhluto1880s - 1921Western Armenia, Eastern Armenia, ZangezurDashnak
Armen Garo1895–1922Western Armenia, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Tuman Tumyan1901–1906Western Armenia, Eastern Armenianone
Sarkis Kukunayn1890–1910Western Armenia, Eastern ArmeniaDashnak
Balabekh Karapet1890s–1915Western ArmeniaDashnak