Mortality Matters: Sources on Population Health and Mortality during the First World War in Iran

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Notes

1 This has pitted the lower casualty estimates of Ervand Abrahamian, Homa Katouzian and other scholars against the significantly higher assessment of others, most notably Mohammad Gholi Majd’s contention that 8–10 million Iranians lost their life during the famine. Ervand Abrahamian’s views on Majd’s mortality estimates is illustrative of the acrimony in the field: “A contemporary Iranian historian recently made the wild accusation that British food exactions to feed its army of occupation during World War I resulted in 10 million dead—half the population. He accuses the British government of ‘covering up’ this ‘genocide’ by systematically destroying annual reports.” See Abrahamian, The Coup, 26–7.

2 Sadegh Abbasi, an MA candidate in history in Iran, wrote the blog entry on Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s website (khamenei.ir) attacking Willem Floor’s “mocking tone toward the well- documented work of Mohammad Gholi Majd to undermine the devastation caused by the British-instigated famine in Iran, to the point of total denial of the existence of such a genocide” and “inaccurate or untrue information.” See Abbasi, “8–10 Million Iranians.”

3 Ghaffari, “Threat of War.”

4 Heider, The Psychology.

5 Ayatollah Khamenei’s motives were likely more existential in nature, driven by a need to exert control over his environment in which he felt deeply insecure. See Douglas et al., “The Psychology,” 538–9.

6 The Anglo-Persian Oil Company records are principally kept at the British Petroleum Archive located in the University of Warwick, Coventry (UK).

7 Wright, The English, 125–6; Longhurst, Adventure in Oil, 62.

8 “Dispute between the United Kingdom and Persia,” 201.

9 Williamson, In a Persian Oil Field, 123–37.

10 Williamson, In a Persian Oil Field, 139.

11 Gilmour, Report on an Investigation, 38–9.

12 The Overseas Missions Archives of the Church Mission Society (CMS) are mainly held at the Special Collections department of the Cadbury Research Library at the University of Birmingham.

13 Elgood, A Medical History, 534–5.

14 Nadjmabadi, “Les relations médicales,” 705–6; Stuart, “Medical Mission,” 1.

15 Elgood, A Medical History, 535.

16 Rice, Persian Women, 261–2; Gilmour, Report on an Investigation, 28.

17 IOR, Charles M. Marling, Secret Telegram (no. 202), Tehran, March 10, 1918; Secret Telegram (no. 220), Tehran, March 16, 1918.

18 See correspondence in IOR/L/PS/10/646, File 179/1917 “Persia: famine relief.”

19 IOR, Charles M. Marling, Secret Telegram (no. 118), Tehran, February 18, 1918.

20 Afkhami, A Modern Contagion, 32–3, 39–46; Browne, A Year amongst the Persians, 107.

21 Browne, A Year amongst the Persians, 107.

22 Afkhami, A Modern Contagion, 129–30.

23 Ibid., 140–6.

24 Ibid., 145–50.

25 The vice presidents who directed the Sanitary Council’s affairs during the war years included Mirza Zain al-ʿAbedin Khan Adham (Loqman al-Mamalek) (1852–1957), the shah’s physician in chief; Karoly Feistmantel, Austro-Hungarian delegate to the Sanitary Council; Heydar Mirza Shahrokh Shahi (Shahzadeh), physician and MP from Kerman in the second National Assembly; ʿAli Partow (Hakim-e ʿAzam) (1877–1938), professor of medicine at the Dar al-Fonun and undersecretary at the ministry of public instruction; Anthony Richard Neligan (1879–1946), British delegate to the Sanitary Council; ʿAbd al-Ahad Sulayman Qazala Bey (1854–1929), Ottoman delegate to the Sanitary Council. See Afkhami, A Modern Contagion, 244 (n. 117).

26 IOR/L/PS/10/284, File 2612/1912.

27 Procès-Verbal 147 ème Séance, 307–8.

28 Neligan, “Public Health,” 693.

29 Chronic urethritis was a common outcome of untreated gonorrheal infection. This recurrent inflammation of the urethra led to strictures and other complications that caused sterility in men.

30 Neligan, “Public Health,” 693.

31 Afkhami, A Modern Contagion, 159.

32 Ibid., 147.

33 Cambridge Dictionary.

34 Afkhami, “Compromised Constitutions.”