The resettlement of Armenians to the territory of Azerbaijan

The resettlement of Armenians to the territory of Azerbaijan

Under the Treaty of Turkmanchai and the peace treaty concluded in Edirne in 1829, the Armenians then inhabiting Persia and the Ottoman Empire were relocated to Azerbaijan, primarily to the khanates of Nakhchivan, Erivan and Karabakh.
Thus, the Russian scholar K. Shavrov records that, over the period 1828-1830 alone, some 40,000 Persian and 84,000 Turkish Armenians were relocated in the Trans-Caucasus, where they were settled in the best indigenous lands of the Yelisavetpol (Karabakh) and Erivan provinces, where the Armenian population had previously been negligible and where they were allocated 200,000 dessiatines (225,000 hectares) of State land.
In his notebooks, the Russian diplomat and playwright Alexander Griboedov wrote: "For the most part, the Armenians were settled on the estates of Mohammedan landowners (...). These new settlers are crowding out the Mohammedans (...). We have also given careful thought to the council which must be given to the Mohammedans, so as to reconcile them to this aggravation, which will not be long in duration, and to dispel any apprehensions which they may have that the Armenians will take permanent possession of the lands where they have been initially settled."
The American academician Justin McCarthy adduces the following facts on the settlement of the Southern Caucasus and, in particular, Azerbaijan, by Armenians. Between 1828 and 1920, in pursuance of a policy aimed at changing the entire demographic make-up of Azerbaijan so that Armenians would outnumber Azerbaijanis, more than 2 million Muslims were forcibly expelled and an unknown number killed. On two occasions, in 1828 and 1854, the Russians invaded eastern Anatolia and on both occasions they left, taking with them 100,000 Armenian sympathizers to the Caucasus, where they took the place of Turks - i.e. Azerbaijanis - who emigrated or died.
In the war of 1877-1878, Russia seized the district of Kars-Ardahan, driving out the Muslim population and settling 70,000 Armenians in their homes. Some 60,000 Armenians resettled in the Russian Caucasus during the troubles of 1895-1896. Finally, the migrations of the First World War resulted in an almost even exchange of 400,000 Armenians from eastern Anatolia for 400,000 Muslims from the Caucasus.
According to McCarthy's information, between 1828 and 1920 some 560,000 Armenians were resettled in Azerbaijan. In other words, it was actually after the conquest of the southern Caucasus by Russia that the Armenian population of the Azerbaijani lands north of the river Araxes increased so dramatically.
When we look at Karabakh, we see from official records for 1810 - in other words, shortly before its annexation by Russia - that the khanate of Karabakh had some 12,000 households, of which 9,500 were Azerbaijani and a mere 2,500 Armenian. According to data for 1823, there was one town in the Karabakh khanate - Shusha - and some 600 villages, 450 of which were Azerbaijani and about 150 Armenian, with a total population of some 90,000. The relative figures for Azerbaijani and Armenian households in Shusha were 1,048 and 474, and in the countryside, 12,902 and 4,331, respectively.
Under a decree promulgated by Tsar Nicholas I on March 21, 1828, the Azerbaijani khanates of Nakhchivan and Erivan were dissolved and replaced by a new administrative entity known as the "Armenian oblast", administered by Russian officials; in 1849, the Armenian oblast was renamed the province ("guberniya") of Erivan.
In pursuit of their ultimate goals, the Armenians persuaded the Russian authorities to abolish the Albanian Christian patriarchate, which had been in operation in Azerbaijan, and to transfer its property to the Armenian Church. Following the loss of their state sovereignty and distinct confessional identity, the local Albanian population in the western regions of the former Albania - the Karabakh region - into which Armenian settlers continued to pour, gradually started to undergo a process of Gregorianization or Armenianization.