Çanakkale Cephesi'nden Milli Mücadele'ye Bir Zabit (Hasan Remzi Fertan ve Hatırâtı)

The most important time period of Turkish history is, without doubt, the chain of wars and battles starting from the Balkan War and ending with the Turkish War of Independence. Exluding the Battle of Gallipoli, this process had deep adverse effects on both the soldiers and on the country itself. People most affected by this process were thousands of soldiers who experienced these battles. One of these soldiers was Hasan Remzi Bey born in 1308 [1892]. His memoirs entitled by himself as "Pieces from my Life: to my Children" was a summary of the history of the wars that lasted a decade starting from the Battle of Gallipoli and ending with the Turkish War of Independence. When the Balkan War began, Hasan Remzi Bey was still a cadet in the Turkish Military Academy of Harbiye. When the enemy forces advanced towards the Turkish capital and the sound of artillery coming from the Çatalca defensive lines could be heard from Istanbul, he was eager to rush to battle as, according to his own expressions, the entire Rumelia was lost, hundreds of thousands of Turks and Muslims were massacred, many were raped, Turkish honor was tainted and both the courage and the fighting power of Turkish soldiers were rendered ineffective due to incapable administrators. Hasan Remzi Bey, who fought in the Balkan War, also served in almost all of the Turkish fronts of World War I including the Battle of Gallipoli. He witnessed the British withdrawal from Gallipoli and he was later sent to serve in the 2nd Army fighting in the Caucasian Front in July 1916. Following the withdrawal of Russian forces from the eastern frontier as a result of the February Revolution, he was transferred to the Palestinian Front where he would be captured as a prisoner of war by the British forces during the retreat of the Turkish armies from Palestine. His life of captivity, arrival in Istanbul and crossing over to Anatolia to fight in the Turkish War of Independence would form the outlines of his memoirs.