Paradise Lost: Smyrna 1922 - The Destruction of Islam's City of Tolerance Read Online Free PDF Page B

to the elderly Magdalen, who would be flanked by her bodyguard, ‘staff in hand, [who] stood by her side like a guard of honour. The leaders of all the caravans passing through the village had to get off their donkeys and bow to her,’ recalled one. ‘If they neglected to do so, the kavass quickly taught them manners.’
    The mansion that stood next to the Big House was owned by the Wood family, another formidable dynasty that lived under the patrician care of Mr Ernest. He was a starched and steely individual who, even by Edwardian standards, seemed to belong to another era. He saw it as his duty to take the ladies of the family for rides in his carriage and was punctilious in his observance of correct etiquette. ‘No one quite equalled the flourish of these expeditions,’ recalled one. ‘The handling of the ladies, the correct disposal of their trailing skirts, the arrangements for the comfort of the pugs and the last-minute alterations of these all took time.’ The pugs were a source of constant annoyance, as was Yanko, the stone-deaf coachman. ‘Whenever Aunt Luisa wanted him to stop, she would batter him with the handle of her umbrella.’
    There were many other eccentrics who had made Bournabat their home. ‘Uncle Frank’ used to walk around the village with two loaded revolvers, which he would fire into the bushes whenever he was angry. Wallace Turrell was similarly explosive. ‘[He] was a lawyer by profession,’ recalled Eldon Giraud, ‘but never won a case as he always came to blows with the judge and would often be put in the same cells as the person he was defending.’
    Although the Levantines were the most visible inhabitants of Bournabat, the village was also home to a large number of wealthy Greeks and Armenians – families like the Gasparians and Elmassians – who had elected to build their villas alongside those of the Levantines. The Whittall children mixed freely with the offspring of these families and often accompanied them to services at the local Orthodox church. Years later, one of those children could still recall the Greek priest ‘with his long black robes, his stove-pipe hat and his long hair done up in a bun . . . [He] was an awe-inspiring figure’. She added that ‘you could imagine him determinedly going up to heaven in a chariot of fire, whereas our quiet, sober little parson would have hesitated to summon a cab’.
    The Greek priest was a close friend of the Whittalls and a regular visitor to the Big House. ‘[He] came to visit the servants and to bless the house at certain times of the year.’ So, too, did the local Catholic priest, Père Innocent. ‘[He] was nothing if not worldly [and] came to breakfast with my uncle and to have long, philosophical discussions with him.’
    The patrician families of Bournabat felt at ease in any society, whether Levantine, Greek, Armenian or Turkish. One of the Whittalls remembers her father undertaking winter business expeditions into the heart of Anatolia, dressed in a cloak and astrakhan hat, and looking much like a Turk. ‘When he stayed in the houses of his Turkish colleagues, he merged into the surroundings and was perfectly at home. He was used to their ways and their conversations and was always treated as if he were one of themselves. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, he would eat from the communal dish.’
    The working lives of the Levantines were punctuated by long hours of leisure and play. Boating was one of the most popular activities in Edwardian Smyrna and many families owned at least one yacht or yawl. The largest of these was a veritable leviathan, the 160-ton Abafna owned by Albert Aliotti, a descendant of one of Smyrna’s richest families. The La Fontaines possessed three motor cruisers, as did the Whittalls, while the Giraud family owned a yacht and a motor cruiser. This latter craft was called the Helen May and was the plaything of Edmund Giraud, who was married to one of Magdalen Whittall’s numerous