Refugee children in the Ottoman State

In the XIX century, rapid change was a stage in the world. Nationalist and neo-nationalist ideas were transforming societies' mentality and states' political structures. While the cosmopolitan forms were becoming uniform, this change also affected the Ottomans. The process that started with Greece gaining its autonomy and leading to the establishment of the Republic of Turkey is one of the results of the nationalist movement. An intense migration wave started from the newly established states in the lost lands to the Ottoman geography. In addition, as a result of Russia's oppression and intimidation policies, a large number of refugees from Crime and the Caucasus were forced to seek refuge in Ottoman lands. While protracted wars decreased the population, especially the male population, most immigrants were women and children. The high population of women and children has led to an increase in the number of people in need of support. The arrival of more immigrants than the Ottoman Empire expected caused the measures taken to be insufficient and new solutions were needed. Immigrants increased exponentially with the Crimean War, the Ottoman-Russian War of 1877-1878, the Balkan Wars, and the First World War, and the migrations reached massive dimensions. During the First World War, the number of orphaned children in the Ottoman lands came to hundreds of thousands due to war and immigration. Since the second half of the XIXth century, there has been a severe increase in the number of orphaned children with immigration. The Ottoman State took some measures to protect these children and produced solutions. These solutions were studied, such as adopting, enrolling in boarding schools, ensuring that children learn a profession through industrial schools and correctional institutions, and placing them in orphanages. However, the unfavorable conditions of the state, especially the bad state of the economy, caused serious grievances for institutions and organizations. The language and adaptation problems experienced by the Caucasian immigrants in the first place also delayed the solution. While this study tries to reveal the trauma experienced by the immigrant children who migrated to the Ottoman lands during the migration and resettlement process, it focuses on the state and society's management of this process and the transformation of children into a part of society. Keywords: Ottoman State, Emigrant, Child.