Page 244 - A Helping Hand for Refugees

The Circassian migration was another mass movement that had
results at least as dramatic as that of the Crimean Tatars and that influ-
enced the demographic make-up of Anatolia. Some 2.5 million Cir-
cassians were forced to migrate in intervals up to the eve of the First
World War. A large part of these migrants, however (approximately
one million) lost their lives en route.

Many migrants began arriving from Azerbaijan from the early 19th
Century onward. Migration was particularly intense during the years

1877-1878. During the First World War alone, some 10,000 more people
migrated from Azerbaijan to Anatolia. 50
Georgian migration, which began after the 1828–1829 Ottoman-

Russian war continued until 1921. The Albanians first came to Anatolia
in 1468, and these migrants were
adopted by the Ottoman Empire
without being exposed to the
least discrimination so much so
that 35 of the 215 appointed grand
viziers in the Ottoman Empire

were Albanians. Today, there are
thought to be some five million
people of Albanian origin in
Turkey. 51

Migrants to Turkey do not
solely consist of those with close
ethnic or religious ties to it. Some
100,000 people migrated from
Poland from early 1831 onward
following the Kingdom of Poland
being made part of Russia, and

some of these people reached the
Ottoman Empire. The Russians

242 A Helping Hand for Refugees