Mehmed VI
January 14, 1861 – May 16, 1926
Last sultan of the Ottoman Empire, reigning from 1918 until the sultanate was abolished in 1922; he died in exile in 1926.
Biography
Mehmed Vahideddin was born in 1861, the youngest son of Sultan Abdulmejid I, and lost both parents as a small child. Far down the line of succession, he spent decades as a prince outside politics, studying religion, Arabic and Persian, calligraphy and music with private teachers, and he was close to his half-brother Abdul Hamid II.
He became sultan and caliph on 4 July 1918, on the death of Mehmed V, as the Ottoman Empire was losing the First World War. His government accepted the Armistice of Mudros in October 1918 and Allied forces went on to occupy Istanbul. Seeking British goodwill, he relied on Damat Ferid Pasha, dissolved the Chamber of Deputies in 1920 and condemned the nationalist movement led by Mustafa Kemal, whom he had himself sent to Anatolia. His government signed the Treaty of Sèvres, which would have partitioned the empire.
After the nationalists won the War of Independence, the Grand National Assembly abolished the sultanate on 1 November 1922 and Mehmed left Istanbul on a British warship later that month. He never accepted his deposition and died in exile in San Remo, Italy, in 1926.
