Student Ercüment Gürkut, 26, died in Taksim

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Ercüment Gürkut was born in 1951, his place of birth was registered as Kadıköy, Istanbul.

He started studying at Galatasaray High School in 1962. Nedim Gürsel, Ferhan Şensoy and İzzet Yaşar were among his peers.

He was a final-year student in the Istanbul University Faculty of Literature when he died in Taksim on 1 May 1977.

Autopsy report

According to the autopsy report, the cause of death was mechanical asphyxia as a result of compression of the chest accompanied by the effects of cerebral oedema. The report states that the external cuts, bruises and lesions on various parts of his body may have been caused by falling or being pushed to the ground.

I tried to find Ercüment Gürkut's family so that I could learn his story, but had no luck. I then tried to reach out to his peers from Galatasaray High School. Ferhan Şensoy said of Gürkut: "He was my classmate at Galatasaray High School. We studied together for seven years. Ercü wasn't a confrontational person, that's what I remember."

I then made contact with Nedim Gürsel, after reading his piece Aldırma 1247!, and Gürsel told me about his friend who died at the age of 26.

I would like to thank Ferhan Şensoy and Nedim Gürsel for their contributions to the writing of Gürkut's life story.

Nedim Gürsel, friend, tells

Just as you were moving forward with confidence in your step, your life suddenly clouded over. Like so many athletes of our generation, you peaked too early. As children, two boarders studying on a scholarship, fans of football and poetry, we sat together in the prep class of Galatasaray High School, do you remember?

Hello, I'm 1133 Nedim... 

Hello. And I'm Ercü, 1247!

I'm sending you some lines, slightly modified, of an Ece Ayhan poem. I'm doing this so that you won't forget the first day we met, or our friendship upon which a shadow never fell. I won't forget.

Don't you worry, 1247! In the small, free, strict boarding schools of death

Every child's heart holds a bigger child

Every Children's Day, the entire class will send you birds unfettered by envelopes.

1977[1]

Many years have passed, honouring the memory of Ercü would be a meaningful act.

I graduated from Galatasaray High School in 1970. Ercü was my classmate. We studied in the same class for eight years.

I vaguely remember our time at Galatasaray High School. There's a photo of us that was taken in the yard behind the school. We're next to each other in the photo. Ercü lived in Kadıköy. On weekends he'd go to see his family, stay at home, and return to school on Monday.

Because we were both boarders, we became even closer friends. And for a year we sat in the same row, right next to each other. So I was a close witness to Ercü's teenage years.

Ercü was a very funny kid. He was clever.

I would never have expected this, that we would lose Ercü at such a young age.

Our last meeting

His father was our "study supervisor". And he had an older brother in the year above us, or in the final year. He was so proud of his big brother, because he was a very good student; he was always on the honours list. A few years ago I managed to meet up with his brother in Ankara.

One time, before he died, Ercü and I had the chance to meet up in Paris. It was in the early 1970s. We were able to wander the streets of Paris together. But I couldn't have known that this would, unfortunately, be our last meeting.

I came to Paris in 1971. Not out of choice, but out of necessity. After the Military Memorandum of 12 March 1971, I was taken to court for a piece I wrote about Lenin and Gorky that was published in Ataol Behramoğlu and İsmet Özel's magazine Halkın Dostları [Friends of the People]. I was 20 years old. Years later, when Ecevit came to power in 1973, there was an amnesty and my case was dropped. I started visiting Turkey again.

An unhealable wound

I often asked myself why he was there on 1 May 1977, because from what I remember of our high school years, Ercü wasn't very involved in politics. For example, I don't know enough to tell you what organisation he went with, or whether he went to the First of May rally on his own. [At school] there were three or four of us who were interested in politics, and Ercü wasn't one of them; that much I can tell you.

In those years, I had discovered a poem by Nâzım Hikmet. I would secretly read the Kuvâyi Milliye Destanı [The Epic of the National Forces] in the dorm. Those were the years when the Workers' Party and the workers' movement were on the rise. In the 1965 elections, the Workers' Party of Turkey (TİP) received a lot of votes, in fact they were even able to form a parliamentary bloc. These were long before the days of the Behice Boran and Mehmet Ali Aybar debate. We were teenagers, around 15 or 16, but we followed what was going on. Ercü wasn't so involved in these discussions.

He was very interested in cinema, he really got into it. In fact we had plans for films we wanted to make together. But unfortunately in the dark climate of the country at that time, it never happened.

And anyway, we lost Ercü in 1977. Since then, his loss has been like an unhealable wound in my heart.

There are people who are responsible for this incident, but nobody was punished. We need to learn the conditions under which this tragedy happened, we need to know the details. (TY/NÖ/SD)

[1] "Aldırma 1247!" in Paris Yazıları, Nedim Gürsel, Doğan Kitap.

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