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Fesa Evrensev

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Mehmet Fesa Evrensev (1878 – 9 April 1951) was a Turkish aircraft pilot and aviator, known as the first Ottoman pilot and first general manager of the Turkish State Airline. Evrensev graduated from the Turkish Military Academy in 1899 as a lieutenant and spent his early military years in the cavalry. In 1911, following a series of exams, Evrensev and Yusuf Kenan Bey were selected to be the first pilots of the Ottoman Army. The two were sent to the Blériot Aéronautique flight school on 9 July and completed their trainings in February and March 1912 respectively. When Evrensev and Yusuf Kenan returned, the army had started to set up its own flight school where the two would be the first instructors. During the opening day of the school on 26 April, Evrensev made his first flight as a certified pilot and became the first Turk to do so. During the Balkan Wars, Evrensev was active in Thrace and conducting reconnaissance flights from Thessaloniki.

Mehmet Fesa Evrensev
Evrensev in 1911
Born1878 (1878)
Gedikpaşa, Istanbul, Ottoman Empire
Died9 April 1951(1951-04-09) (aged 72–73)
Istanbul, Turkey
Buried
Karacaahmet Cemetery
Allegiance
Service/branch
Battles/wars
Other workMember of the Turkish Aeronautical Association

Evrensev was set to participate in the Caucasus campaign during World War I, but the ship he boarded was sunk by Russians in October 1914 and he was captured as a prisoner of war. He was kept in a camp in Siberia, from which he escaped in 1917 and made his way to Moscow using freight trains. He returned to the Ottoman Empire in 1920 after spotting a group of Turkish soldiers. During the Turkish War of Independence, he was again active at the Western front. He retired from the military in 1925 and later became the first general manager of the Turkish State Airline. In 1942, he joined the Turkish Aeronautical Association. After suffering from health problems such as tuberculosis due to the conditions in the Russian camp, Evrensev died on 9 April 1951. 26 April has been named the World Pilots' Day since 2014 in honour of his first flight. The date was already locally recognized as the Pilot's Day by the Turkish Airline Pilots Association in 2000.

Early and personal life edit

Mehmet Fesa Bey[a] was born in 1878 in Gedikpaşa, Istanbul, Ottoman Empire.[1] After finishing his primary education in Istanbul,[2] he attended the Galatasaray High School in 1887 for ten years and switched to the Turkish Military Academy in 1897. He graduated two years later in 1899 as a lieutenant in the cavalry.[3] Following his graduation, Evrensev was sent to the Davutpaşa Barracks in Istanbul, which was determined by a lot.[3] While in the cavalry, he was kept 97 days in jail and later sent to Erzincan in exile. Following the start of the Second Constitutional Era in 1908, Evrensev was pardoned and returned to the cavalry in Istanbul as the commander of the fifth company in the first regiment.[4][5] He spent the first ten years in the military as a regular lieutenant in several missions and was later promoted to a captain.[2][6] Evrensev got married with Gül Hanım before World War I and had two children. In 1922, he married Hatice Sabiha Hanım and had four daughters.[7] Apart from Turkish and English, he was also a fluent speaker of French, Greek and Arabic.[8]

Military career edit

Flight training edit

In February 1911, the Ottoman Army announced that it would send two people to a European flight school.[6] The two pilots would be decided by a series of exams. The first exam was taken by 80 people, with number of attendees decreasing after every exam. The final one was attended by ten people;[9] Evrensev and senior lieutenant Yusuf Kenan Bey got the two highest scores with 92 and 91 respectively. The two went through a medical check and were cleared to be sent abroad. The army initially wanted to send them to Germany, but due to France having more advanced technology at the time and lower costs, they were sent to the flight school of Blériot Aéronautique on 9 July.[10]

Evrensev completed his training on 19 February 1912 and became the first licensed Turkish pilot. Yusuf Kenan completed his training a month later. Around the same time, the army planned to open its own flight school, for which it bought two aircraft.[11] In March, Evrensev and Kenan Bey were requested to return to Istanbul by a lieutenant colonel to take delivery of these aircraft, which they did on 20 April. The two became the first instructors of the school. The aircraft were moved to San Stefano. British pilot Charles Gordon Bell came to Istanbul to attend a ceremony at the school with his R.E.P. airplane. On the morning of 26 April, Bell flew several times in front of high-ranking Ottoman officers, including a flight over the Sea of Marmara. Later that day, Evrensev made his own flight with a Deperdussin airplane, which became the first flight by a certified Turkish pilot.[12]

Participation in wars and capture by Russians edit

When the Balkan Wars started in October 1912, Evrensev was still an instructor at the flight school.[13] A crew consisting of some Ottoman and French pilots and technicians—including Evrensev—were sent to Thessaloniki by train, where they arrived on 14 October.[14] The Balkan Wars were the first time the Ottoman Army used aircraft in battle, with Evrensev and his crew conducting many reconnaissance flights over Thrace.[15] After the Greek Army advanced into the city, the crew burnt its aircraft to not allow the Greeks to use them and hid in the homes of Turks living in the area.[14] Evrensev escaped to İzmir with a ferry and later returned to Istanbul.[16] He made another reconnaissance flight on 22 February 1913 as part of the Second Battle of Çatalca.[17] Evrensev was the commander of the air corps in Thrace. Throughout July, he was involved in a series of flights around the area, most notably assisting in the liberation of Edirne.[18] Following the war, he was part of the first Ottoman formation flight on 13 November from Istanbul to Edirne.[16]

Evrensev was sent to participate in the Caucasus campaign during World War I. The ship he boarded was sunk by Russians on 24 October 1914 off the coast of Amasra in the Black Sea. He was captured as a prisoner of war and subsequently sent to camp in Siberia. While in the camp, he taught people to make clothes from calico that was used to send supplies.[15] He was trusted by the guards and was allowed to be the personal driver of a Russian general.[19] Aided by the chaos created due to the October Revolution in the country, he escaped the camp in 1917. Evrensev made his way to Moscow using freight trains. While begging at the Red Square, he spotted a group of Turkish soldiers, whom he identified by their clothes. Upon identifying himself, the commander of the group told Evrensev that he was presumed to have died and that they did not know that he was still alive.[20]

He stayed with the group for three weeks.[20] When the group was working on returning some of its equipment to the Ottoman Empire, Evrensev said that he could travel across the Black Sea with a taka if he was allowed to go to Crimea. He managed to convince the commander and sailed across the sea alone in a small taka. He arrived at Trabzon on 14 June 1920. After he explained his story to a commander, he was restored to his former rank of captain.[21] During the Turkish War of Independence, he was stationed at the Western front, and was later promoted to a major during the war.[22]

Later military career and retirement edit

Evrensev was a part of the group that included aviation pioneer Vecihi Hürkuş that was asked to tour Europe to study European aviation. They left İzmir with a ferry on 20 December 1923 and arrived in Marseille, France, eight days later and first visited the factory of Chantiers Aéro-Maritimes de la Seine. They later went to other factories, including a return to Blériot Aéronautique.[23] They left the country in February for Italy, and moved to Germany that same month.[24] The group toured Great Britain from March to May, during which Evrensev also met a British general that he had known from his time at the flight school in France.[25] He continued to be an inspector and instructor at the Air Force in İzmir until his retirement from the military on 18 November 1925 as a major.[5]

Civil career and later life edit

From 1925 to 1933, Evrensev worked in the Air Force Undersecretary.[21] In the early 1930s, he was involved in the creation of the first Turkish airline, the Turkish State Airline, present-day Turkish Airlines.[26] He was appointed as the first general manager of the airline on 3 June 1933, a position which he held for a year until 13 June 1934.[27][28] He joined the Turkish Aeronautical Association in 1942 and served as a translator for Polish and Russian technicians in the association as well as its foreign visitors.[22]

Evrensev's health worsened in the final ten years of his life, mainly due to the poor conditions he was subjected to in the Siberian camp. In 1943, he was diagnosed with lung tuberculosis and spent three months in the Heybeliada sanatorium. In September 1947, he was treated at a military hospital due to symptoms such as fatigue and coughing, and was put on leave for three months. He retired from the Turkish Aeronautical Association in 1950.[8] Mehmet Fesa Evrensev died on 9 April 1951 and was buried at the Karacaahmet Cemetery.[21]

Legacy edit

Evrensev is a recipient of the silver Liakat Medal, the Medal of Independence and the Fifth Class Order of the Medjidie for his service in the military.[21][22]

In 2000, the Turkish Airline Pilots Association (TALPA) recognized 26 April as the Pilot's Day in honour of the first flight by Evrensev.[21] The first occasion that same year was celebrated with the Turkish Air Force.[21] In 2013, the International Federation of Air Line Pilots' Associations (IFALPA) decided to create a World Pilots' Day, and picked 26 April as the date because it was "a day that saw a prominent figure in aviation history taking to the sky for the first time".[29] Since 2014, the World Pilots' Day is celebrated internationally on 26 April.[29]

Notes edit

  1. ^ Standard naming convention in the Ottoman Empire and early Turkish Republic until the Surname Law of 1934. "Mehmet Fesa" is the given name, and there is no surname. "Bey" is used to note the gender.

References edit

Citations edit

  1. ^ Dalkılınç 2021, p. 45.
  2. ^ a b Oğuz 2016, p. 46.
  3. ^ a b Adıgüzel 2019, p. 35.
  4. ^ Nergiz 2020, p. 45.
  5. ^ a b Köksal 2022, p. 171.
  6. ^ a b Kurt & Korkmaz 2018, p. 219.
  7. ^ Adıgüzel 2019, p. 31.
  8. ^ a b Adıgüzel 2019, p. 33.
  9. ^ Dalkılınç 2021, p. 46.
  10. ^ Kurt & Korkmaz 2018, pp. 219–220.
  11. ^ Kurt & Korkmaz 2018, pp. 223–226.
  12. ^ Kurt & Korkmaz 2018, pp. 233–235.
  13. ^ Yalçın 2022, p. 75.
  14. ^ a b Yalçın 2022, p. 81.
  15. ^ a b Oğuz 2016, p. 47.
  16. ^ a b Köksal 2022, p. 168.
  17. ^ Yalçın 2022, p. 86.
  18. ^ Yalçın 2022, p. 91.
  19. ^ Oğuz 2016, p. 48.
  20. ^ a b Dalkılınç 2021, p. 47.
  21. ^ a b c d e f Oğuz 2016, p. 49.
  22. ^ a b c Dalkılınç 2021, p. 48.
  23. ^ Hürkuş 2000, pp. 143–145.
  24. ^ Hürkuş 2000, pp. 149–151.
  25. ^ Hürkuş 2000, p. 154.
  26. ^ Adıgüzel 2019, p. 32.
  27. ^ Albayrak 1983, p. 17.
  28. ^ Nergiz 2020, p. 119.
  29. ^ a b "IFALPA – International Federation of Air Line Pilots' Associations". International Civil Aviation Organization. Retrieved 26 January 2024.

Bibliography edit

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