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 The Defense of Van was an act
of self-defense of the Armenian population in
Van
against the
Ottoman
Empire in June, 1896.
While
Van had avoided the earlier part of the
Hamidian
massacres in 1895, the Ottomans eventually sent an
expedition to attack the panic stricken Armenian population in
June of 1896.
Defense and
Massacre
The Armenians, with several hundred men,
defended themselves in the Aigestan (Garden City) region
adjacent to the city. After a week of fighting, the sultan
sought assistance from Western powers to end the fighting, in
exchange for the safety of the Armenians in Van. After some
negotiations making clear they were acting only in self defense,
the Armenian defenders agreed to leave for Persia escorted by
Ottoman troops. En route, as nearly 1,000 Armenians marched
towards the border, they were massacred by Ottoman troops and
Kurdish tribesmen. Before the month was over, hundreds of
villages were destroyed and 20,000 Armenians in Van were
massacred.
In
1897, an
Armenian
Fedayee group conducted the
Khanasor
Expedition in response to the Kurdish massacres of
the defenders of Van.
The Resistance at
Van was an insurgency against the Ottoman Empire's attempts
to eliminate the Armenian population in the vilâyet of Van
Based mostly in the city of Van, it was one of
the few instances during the Armenian Genocide when Armenians,
in an act of self-defense, fought against the Ottoman Empire's
armed forces. The fighting lasted from
April 19, 1915 until
May 4 of that year, when the Ottoman
army retreated as Russian forces approached the city.
The city of Van during the Resistance
 During the late Ottoman
period, Van was an important center of Armenian cultural, social, and
economic life. Khrimian Hayrik established a printing press in Van,
and thereafter launched Artsiv Vaspurakan (Eagle of Vaspourakan),
which was the first periodical publication in Armenia. In
1885, the Armenakan party was established in the city of Van.
Soonafter, the Hnchak and Dashnak parties, whose missions were
basically the overthrow of the Ottoman rule in Eastern Turkey
(Armenian Revolutionary Federation), established branches in the city.
Throughout 1895-96
Armenians in the Ottoman Empire suffered in a wave of violence
commonly known as the Hamidian massacres. While Van largely avoided
massacres in 1895, the Ottomans send a military expedition in June
1896. Armenians were initially able to defend themselves in Van, but
upon agreeing to disarm in exchange for safety, massacres continued,
culminating in the death of over 20,000 Armenians.
 There are different sources
for pre-war (World War I) demographic values of the Van Province,
Ottoman Empire. In 1914, Armenians lived on the shores of the lake
Van. The major Armenian inhabited localities included the city of Van
(consisted three sub-sections; Havasor,
Timar and Ercek (Arshak - Archag)),
at the north of the province district Erciş (Ardjish - Akantz), and at
the south of the province district Çatak (Shadakh - Shataq - Shattakh),
district Başkale (Bashkaleh - Bash Kaleh) and district Bahçesaray (Moks).
In 1896 census, there were 79,998 Armenian, and they were located in
the city of Van 35%, Erciş 64%, Çatak 37%, Başkale 18%, Bahçesaray
48%. The 1912 local Patriarch statistic states that there were 110,000
Armenians The original 1914 Ottoman census stated that Armenian
population was 67,797 and Muslims population was 179,422. The 1914
official census was challenged both on Armenian and Muslim population
size. The original 1914 Ottoman statistics claimed to be under
representative for the children.
The corrected values for Van province
was; 313,000 Muslim, 130,000 Armenian (25%), and 65,000 or so Syrian, Chaldean, Nestorian and others Population estimates for the Van city
itself is more difficult. There were extensive population movements in
and around the city as the economic and political situation
deteriorated rapidly before at the dawn of the World War I. Ottoman
population count at the time recorded 79,000 Muslims and 34,000
Armenians in the Van district, which included the immediate
surrounding areas too. The city of Van's Armenian population was about
30,000 people in the fall of 1914.Christopher Walker states "in Van
province they [Armenians] constituted an absolute majority [more
than %50] over the combined Turkish and Kurdish [Muslims] population,
the source of this information is not cited by this author.
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