Between Anti-Semites and Armenophiles: Armenians, Ambiguity, and the Dreyfus Affair in France

Jennifer Manoukian, Columbia University

Yervant Odian (1869-1926)

As Abdul Hamid II’s grip on Ottoman society tightened in the 1890s, more and more intellectuals began to seek refuge abroad where they could live and write more freely. 

Below is an excerpt from «Տասներկու տարի Պոլսէն դուրս» [Twelve Years Away from Constantinople], the memoir of Ottoman-Armenian novelist and satirist Yervant Odian. The book chronicles Odian's self-imposed exile during the final years of Sultan Abdul Hamid II's reign, and delves into the activities and preoccupations of pre-1915 diasporan Armenian communities in Athens, Cairo, Alexandria, Paris and London.

Besides its value as a great ethnographic study of the early Ottoman-Armenian diaspora, Odian’s text also gives vivid descriptions of the small ways Armenians were enmeshed in the big social and political issues taking place in their new countries.

And in France at the turn of the century, there was no bigger social and political issue than the Dreyfus Affair. The Dreyfus Affair, which polarized French society from 1894 to 1906, concerned the wrongful treason conviction of Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish captain in the French army. The defenders of Dreyfus and his innocence—the Dreyfussards—pitted themselves against the anti-Dreyfussards, those convinced of Dreyfus’ betrayal of the French State. Everyone had an opinion about the case, and, as we can see in the text, these differing opinions often turned violent.

The Dreyfus Affair exposed an intense form of anti-Semitism that had been simmering just below the surface of some segments of French society. But while the Dreyfus Affair served as an impetus for some to air their prejudices more openly, it also brought the matter of ethnic- and religious-based persecution to the forefront in French intellectual circles.

With the spotlight already on ethnic and religious persecution, the stage was set for the same French intellectuals to condemn Sultan Abdul Hamid II's massacres of his Armenian subjects, and begin advocating for the end of ethnic persecution in the Ottoman Empire. Odian mentions a couple of French intellectuals (see endnotes for more details) actively involved in the debates surrounding both the Dreyfus Affair and the Armenophile Movement, but the list is significantly longer and filled with most French politicians and intellectuals of the day. But while the Dreyfus Affair divided French society, the Armenophile Movement seemed to unite it, counting both Dreyfussards and anti-Dreyfussards among the staunchest advocates for the Armenian cause. 

The following excerpt from Odian's memoir richly captures the profound ambiguities of a time when a French anti-Semite might lend a hand to the Armenian peanut sellers of Paris and an Armenian might pose as an anti-Semite to avoid a beating on the street, all while the Freemasons and the Socialists agitated for justice on behalf of Armenians and Jews alike.    

***

Twelve Years Away from Constantinople

An Excerpt from Chapter 8

When I returned to Paris, the Dreyfus Affair was at its height.

Every day, there was a demonstration; every day, there was turmoil; every day, there were beatings in the street.

We, as Armenians, were almost entirely on the side of Dreyfus, but we were careful about participating actively in the demonstrations, because the French government would kick foreigners meddling in their internal affairs out of the country. Nevertheless, they found some Armenians who were vocal about advocating for Dreyfus to be released, and those people were beaten by the crowd.

In Paris during the same period, there were more than one hundred Armenians who made their living selling pistachios and peanuts on the street. Among them were graduates of the Getronagan School,[1] revolutionaries, former terrorists, future members of the Ottoman Parliament, ne’er-do-wells, and the like, who used to earn 10-15 francs a day. Later, Jews were also involved in this line of work, but it was the Armenians who first started it.

The French, who were not yet in the habit of having something to eat while sitting at a café, slowly began to get used to it. They used to eat peanuts in large quantities. French women would buy ten packets at a time to feed to their parakeets.

And so one day, a nationalist newspaper wrote that all of the peanut sellers were Jewish, and that people should not give them any business.

In circles unsympathetic to Dreyfus, that article had an immediate effect. Not only did the number of customers decrease overall, but people also started to insult the poor peanut sellers on the street.

Because many of them were friends of mine, they came to me to complain and ask me to think of a solution.

I went to the publishing house of La Libre Parole and saw Édouard Drumont.[2] I explained the problem to him, saying that the peanut sellers were Armenian—meaning they were Christian—and that apart from their noses, they bore no similarities to the Jews.

Édouard Drumont, a fervent Catholic and a fierce anti-Semite, was nonetheless a great Armenophile who always advocated for our cause against Sultan Abdul Hamid II. He listened to me very sympathetically. The following day, he explained the mistake in his newspaper, and encouraged people not to insult the peanut sellers, who belonged to a martyred race of Christians.

The harassment ended right away.

***

One night, in a big hall belonging to the Freemasons[3] on rue Cadet, there was a meeting where Pressensé,[4] Pierre Quillard, [5] and others gave speeches in support of Dreyfus.

Many Armenians went too, especially since we knew that Quillard was also going to mention the Armenian massacres[6] in his speech.

Once the meeting had come to an end and everyone moved outside, we were met with insulting remarks from the frightful crowd of anti-Dreyfussards waiting outside. 

I was walking with Setrag Ambarian, who, still buzzing from the speeches during the meeting, could not control himself and called out:

--Vive les Youpins! [Long live the Jews!]

At that time, even the fiercest, most fervent supporters of Dreyfus did not dare call out something like that on the streets of Paris.

Across from me on the sidewalk, I saw about twenty enraged anti-Semites rush towards us with their canes raised.

I, who prudently stayed silent, was about to become a victim of my friend’s unnecessary outburst. Driven by the instinct to protect myself, I laid two magnificent slaps across Setrag’s face, and screamed:

--Sal Juif! [Dirty Jew!]

To which I added with all the strength my lungs could muster, the standard:

--Vive l’armée! [Long live the army!]

My despicable, cowardly behavior saved me, while Setrag endured a few strikes to the head.

Later, supporters of Dreyfus slowly started to form the majority, and began to rule the streets. Because of this, we could calmly read L’Aurore,[7] Les Droits de l’Homme and those kinds of newspapers in the streets and cafés, while before we were forced to read them in secret to avoid looking suspicious.

It is impossible to imagine how this issue incited one segment of French society and turned them into ferocious fanatics.

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[1] The Getronagan School was an Armenian-medium secondary school in the Galata neighborhood of Constantinople. Opened in 1886, it was designed to provide young men with an education in Armenian comparable to that offered in French or English at other schools in the city. Its graduates comprised many Ottoman-Armenian community leaders, intellectuals, and writers of the late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century.

[2] Édouard Drumont (1844-1917) was a journalist and writer. He was also the founder of the Anti-Semitic League of France and of La Libre Parole, a newspaper active between 1894 and 1924 known for disseminating anti-Semitic propaganda. His newspaper was popular among anti-Dreyfussards during the Dreyfus Affair.

[3] At the time, the French Freemasons were known to be defenders of oppressed minorities.

[4] Francis de Pressensé (1853-1914) was a Socialist politician, a founder of the Human Rights League (Ligue des droits de l’homme) and one of the most influential French intellectuals to speak out against the persecution of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. He and his league advocated on behalf of people struggling against religious- and ethnic-based persecution in France and elsewhere.

[5] Pierre Quillard (1864-1912) was a poet and journalist, and one of the first French intellectuals to raise awareness in France about Armenian persecution in the Ottoman Empire.  He taught at the Getronagan School in Constantinople in the mid-1890s, and after his return to France, founded the newspaper Pro Armenia (1900-1914). The newspaper sought to galvanize Europeans to favor imposing reforms on Sultan Abdul Hamid II to guarantee freedom and security for all Ottoman subjects, while at the same time, preserving the integrity of the Ottoman State.

[6] This is a reference to the Hamidian Massacres of 1894-1896, which horrified many French intellectuals and drove them to advocate on behalf of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.

[7] L’Aurore was a socialist, Dreyfussard newspaper founded in 1897 by Georges Clemenceau. This was the paper than ran Émile Zola’s famous article in favor of Dreyfus, “J’accuse…!”

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