George Horton

George Horton (1859–1942) was a member of the United States diplomatic corps who held several consular offices in Greece and the Ottoman Empire between 1893 and 1924. During two periods he was the U.S. Consul or Consul General at Smyrna (known as Izmir, Turkey today), 1911–1917 and 1919-1922. The first ended when the U.S. entered World War I and diplomatic relations with the Ottoman Empire were terminated. The second covered Greek administration of the city during the Greco-Turkish War. The Greek administration of Smyrna was appointed by the Allied Powers following Turkey's defeat in World War I and the seizure of Smyrna.

Today Horton is best remembered for The Blight of Asia, his 1926 book about the events, notably the systematic ethnic cleansing of the Christian population, leading up to and during the Great Fire of Smyrna. He briefly summarizes events from 1822 to 1909 and covers in more detail, with eye-witness accounts, events from 1909 to 1922. The title refers to what he considered the abominable behavior of the Ottoman Turks, and by extension, all of Islam. The book, has been criticised as anti-Turkish by a number of scholars and Horton himself accused of bias against Turks and Muslims.

George Horton was born on October 11, 1859 in Fairville in Wayne County, New York. In 1909, Horton married Catherine Sakopoulos and they had one daughter, Nancy Horton.

Horton was a literary man. He was a scholar of both Greek and Latin. He translated Sappho. He wrote a guide for the interpretation of Scripture. He wrote several novels and was a renowned journalist in Chicago, a party in the so-called Chicago Renaissance.

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