Today in Labor History March 15, 1921: 23-year-old Armenian, Soghomon Tehlirian, assassinated Talaat Pasha, former Grand Vizir of the Ottoman Empire and chief architect of the Armenian genocide. Tehlirian had previously assassinated Harutian Mgrditichian, who worked for the Ottoman secret police and helped compile the list of Armenian intellectuals who were deported on 24 April 1915 at the beginning of the genocide. After the deportation, they sent over one million women and children on a death march to the Syrian desert. During the march, they starved and raped the Armenians. Overall, they killed one million people, or 90% of the Armenian population. After a two-day trial, a German court acquitted Tehlirian.
I recently had a student with this last name. When I asked her about it, she proudly proclaimed that Soghomon Tehlirian was her great grandfather.