GERMAN-OTTOMAN HEALTHCARE MISSION

Abstract

After the Ottoman Empire entered the First World War, organizations such as the German Red Cross (Das Deutsche Rote Kreuz) and the German-Ottoman Healthcare Mission (Deutsch- Osmanische Sanitätsmission) opened military hospitals in areas such as Istanbul, Gallipoli, Baghdad, and Tekirdag etc. to provide healthcare services to German soldiers fighting on the Ottoman fronts. These organizations also helped with the healthcare activities carried out by the Ottoman Red Crescent Society, Ministry of War Health Department
and Field Medical Inspectorate during the war; they tried to reduce their works by supporting Turkish healthcare personnel, especially in the referral and treatment of injured Turkish soldiers to health units. The German-Ottoman Healthcare Mission served an important healthcare service by dealing with the treatment of injured German and Turkish soldiers from Gallipoli at Istanbul Zeynep Kamil Hospital and German Military Hospital established in Tekirdag, between April and November of 1915, that is, during the most intense period of land battles in Gallipoli.

In this study firstly, it will be explained that under which conditions the German-Ottoman Healthcare Mission in early 1915 was founded by Captain Fritz von Trützschler-Falkenstein, who served in the German army, how the resource required for the mission’s activities was created and from whom the team going to Istanbul was formed; afterwards, information will be given about the start of the works after the delivery of the Istanbul Zeynep Kamil Hospital from the Field Medical Administration, the establishment process of the Tekirdag German Military Hospital and the health activities carried out in both hospitals. Finally, the issues experienced in the mission since October (1915) and the closure of both hospitals in mid-November will be evaluated in the light of the German and Ottoman archive documents.