Between Greek Thessaloníki and Ottoman Istanbul, 1912–1923 With respect to the history of her family, Sertel observes that shortly
after Greece took over the city, some wealthy Dönme sold their goods and
property and migrated to Istanbul.^54 Sabiha Sertel’s older brothers Celal
Dervish and Mecdi Dervish made the move in 1912.^55 Then her older
brother Hidayet decided that the entire family should move. As Ottoman
bureaucrats—their father, Nazmi Efendi, was a retired head Customs in-
spector, and he himself worked for the Post and Telegraph Department—
they should be well taken care of in Istanbul, he reasoned.^56 Celal became
a lawyer in Istanbul, owned a beautiful apartment in Nişantaşı, and trav-
eled to Vienna on holiday. Mecdi and another relative Avni also settled in
Nişantaşı, in a nice home. Another relative, Neşet, was in Sofia, Bulgaria,
but would also migrate to Istanbul. Sertel concludes: “In addition to the
Dervish Ali family, many Dönme families also were part of this [ 1912 – 13 ]
migration.” Although they were able to make a smooth journey to a new
life, it was a nevertheless sad departure from the city in which they had
been born and raised.^57
After his French-speaking Kapancı Dönme family had settled in the
Osmanbey-Şişli area, in Istanbul, next to Teşvikiye and Nişantaşı, Osman
Ehat Tevfik was enrolled, appropriately, in the Lycée de Galatasaray,
where French was the main language of instruction. He later became
a tobacco importer, moving to Izmir in 1920 , where he bought tobacco
from the Aegean region to send to the main factory in Vienna for pro-
cessing. He was transferred to the headquarters of the family business in
Vienna in 1922 , and then sent to a branch office in Brussels in 1925 – 26.
In the early 1930 s, he moved back to Istanbul and left the tobacco trade
in order to enter the textile business.
Racializing the Dönme
The arrival of so many Salonikan Dönme in the Ottoman capital caused
alarm in some circles, and accusations were voiced that foreshadowed the
attacks they would face in the early years of the Turkish Republic. In 1919 ,
at a time of heightened insecurity for Muslims owing to the British and
French occupation of Istanbul ( 1918 – 23 ), there burst upon the scene an
anonymous treatise on the Dönme that significantly illustrates a new, rac-
ist attitude to them, entitled Dönmeler: Hunyos, Kavayeros, Sazan.^58 The
most striking aspect of this publication is how it reflects an era in which
having a “pure race” suddenly became important. Accordingly, groups