Samsunhaber news website of Turkey’s Samsun Province reflected on the past of the once densely Armenian-populated Samsun town, which used to be a subdivision of Trabzon Province, in the Ottoman Empire.

Before the proclamation of the Turkish Republic, more than ten thousand Armenians lived in the center of Samsun, and most of them resided in Selahiye neighborhood, reported Samsunhaber.

Samsun Local History Group President Emin Kırbıyık noted that several houses in this neighborhood still preserve the traces of that time.

“The Imam-Hatip [i.e. Muslin religious] Secondary School and the Selahiye Mosque used to be Armenian churches,” added Kırbıyık. “And the Gazi Pasha Primary School used to be an Armenian orphanage.”