The Iolkos refugee settlement

On June 17, 1921, the English steamship Relchers arrived at the port of Volos carrying 3,500 refugees, mostly women and children from Turkish and Circassian families who had abandoned Nikomideia (İzmit). This was the third steamship to arrive at the port, after Polis tis Toulon, travelling under a French flag and carrying 2,000 refugees, and Evangelos, which brought approximately 1,800 refugees from Yalova to Volos. The refugees were taken to the northern part of the city, on Iolkos Street, where they were housed in makeshift shacks made of wood and tin. Two years later, the exchangeable refugees displaced as a result of the Lausanne Treaty would also settle in the area, drastically expanding the Iolkos refugee settlement. The photographs depict the makeshift dwellings of the settlement and the people living in them. In 1935, the settlement’s population was about 2,500, with most of them originating from the provinces of Nikomideia, Kaisareia (Kayseri) and Ikonio (Konya).

The housing rehabilitation of the refugees proved an intractable, long-standing problem, not just for Iolkos, but for most urban refugee settlements across the country. Finally, in 1932, after refugee committees had submitted a series of memoranda and placed intense pressure on the state to grant the refugees land where they could build their own houses, the joint ministerial decision 11202/8.2.1932 by the Ministries of Welfare and Agriculture finally stipulated the appropriation of 65,000 square metres of land.

Two years later, following the approval of Law 6076/34, known as the ‘Refugee Rehabilitation Act’, 400 families from the Iolkos refugee settlement submitted applications requesting a land grant. In 1936, another 180 applications were submitted and approved. However, it wasn’t until the first decade after the Second World War that the process of land appropriation was completed and the grant deeds were issued to settlement residents along with the first loans towards their self-housing. In total, for the urban agglomeration of Volos, 18,500,000 drachmas were allocated towards the rehabilitation of 670 families over the period 1954-1958. Of these families, 560 were housed within the boundaries of the Municipality of Volos.

An article in Anagennisis, the local paper of Volos, describes the situation in the Iolkos refugee settlement in 1946, more than 20 years after its establishment. The article gives a detailed account of the adverse living conditions in the settlement due to the flimsy construction and overcrowding of the dwellings, the lack of basic infrastructure and the total absence of healthcare for the residents. The writer also criticises the state for its chronic inability to solve these long-standing issues.

A few years later, on 11/9/1951, the local paper Tachydromos revisited the issue of the horrible living conditions in the Iolkos refugee settlement, highlighting the need for land distribution and permanent housing rehabilitation for the refugees. The article also paints a grim picture of the settlement’s basic infrastructure, or rather the lack of it, underlining the absence of a reliable water supply network. The writer then draws attention to the delays in the land distribution process and makes a demand for state welfare and public health measures to protect the residents of the settlement. The descriptions of Tachydromos bring to mind the image of a shantytown similar to those found in other major Greek cities at the time.

 ‘The settlement at the end of Iolkos Street is the most populous and one of the most wretched. Stone houses are scarce in the area. Instead, both to the east and the west of Iolkos Street, the area is covered in wooden and tin shacks which hardly deserve the title of human dwelling. Still, 500 families live their lives there. It is hard for us to conceive their tragic circumstances unless we actually see the interior of these dwellings. The floor in most of them is just wet dirt. Even a slight breeze could knock the tiles off the roof and the door is too flimsy to withstand the force of the water that often floods the area. Size-wise, they are nothing but small cages. It’s a mystery how they can house entire families with babies and children who desperately need space and clean air… If these people’s needs are not met, their health will be constantly at risk. Indeed, they were the ones who were disproportionately affected by water shortages this year. Throughout the summer, the settlement used its seven wells for its water supply but the wells contained mud instead of water. How can we even talk about the city’s appearance, how can we discuss beautification and solutions to the housing crisis, when just a few streets past majestic mansions and lovely gardens there is a shantytown? What would foreigners say if they were to see a crowd which can barely move and breathe living right next to grand houses in the same city?’  

Even three decades after the refugees’ arrival and settlement, the lack of quality housing and basic infrastructure, such as road, electricity and water supply networks, remained major issues for a large part of Volos’ refugee population. The shacks and hovels, ‘the crowd which can barely move and breathe’, are juxtaposed with ‘majestic mansions and lovely gardens’, attesting to the social differentiation of urban space.