Sütçü İmam incident The Sütçü İmam incident ( ) also known as Uzun Oluk incident ( " Uzun Oluk olayı " ) is a term used in modern Turkish historiography to refer to the purportedly first armed action against the French occupying forces in Marash ( present day Kahramanmaraş , Turkey ) on October 31 , 1919 . As such , it is considered among Turkish historians as the beginning of the Battle of Marash . Background . After the Armistice of Mudros was signed , Marash , Aintab and Adana ( Çukurova ) came under the occupation of British forces . In the autumn of 1919 , the British handed control over of these regions to the French , who in October entered Marash . The French occupation force was primarily made up of troops from the French Colonial Forces and the French Armenian Legion . The Armenian Legion , comprising 2000 armed auxiliaries entered the city the day after , on 30 October . Incident . Turkish view of events . According to the version found in Turkish sources , on the night of 31 October , three Muslim women who were coming out of a public bath ( hamam ) on Uzunoluk street were accosted by an Armenian legionnaire and harassed and molested . The soldier attempted to tear off the veil of the women stating , " This is no longer the land of the Turks , you cannot walk around with a veil in French territory . " The women started to scream and ask for help . A neighbor , Çakmakcı Sait , who ran forth without carrying a weapon was then shot and killed by the Armenian legionnaires . Soon after , an individual by the name of Sütçü İmam ( literally , milkman Imam ) opened fire on the Armenians , killing or wounding ( depending on the version ) one or more of the soldiers . After the incident , Sütçü İmam escaped and took refuge in a village nearby . The troops from the French Armenian Legion who arrived allegedly opened fire in retaliation at the civilians present on the spot and also killed a certain Hüseyin , son of Zülfikar Çavuş . French soldiers arrested Sütçü İmam ' s cousin , Kadir , and tied his hands and feet from behind submitting him to torture and mutilation , by cutting his nose and ears . He died of suffocation while in custody . The tension sparked by these incidents increased gradually and led to the armed uprising against the French army in February 1920 ( Battle of Marash ) . Conflicting version . A much less dramatic account of the event is presented by an American relief worker who was working in Marash at the time , Stanley E . Kerr . According to an Armenian he interviewed years later for his book ( who was unaware of the Turkish version ) , an Armenian " rakiji " ( that is , a person who prepares the popular alcoholic drink rakı ) was serving several Armenian legionnaires with his drink when one of them , who was intoxicated after drinking one cup too many , approached a Muslim woman exiting the bath and removed her veil . An altercation followed and an unknown assailant shot and killed one of the legionnaires , but incidentally not the offending one . Memory . In memory of this incident , Kahramanmaraş Sütçü İmam University is named after Sütçü İmam in 1992 . Necmettin Erbakan tended to reference the role of Islamic notables during the Turkish War of Independence - such as Sütçü İmam and Rıdvan Hoca .