Sétif death toll estimates range widely from 15,000 to 50,000
Evidence
In an interview with the author in October 1973, President Bourguiba of Tunisia persisted in the belief that “more than 50,000” had been killed after Sétif. Maître Teitgen, the liberal secretary-general of the Algiers prefecture in 1956–7, told the author that he reckoned the Muslim dead at “probably 15,000”. The discrepancy in the figures may (according to Robert Aron) be partly accounted for by the fact that many of the inhabitants of suspect mechtas “disappeared” into the hills in advance of the army ratissages, and were thus subsequently accounted for among the presumed dead. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 124
Categorization
- QUESTION: The wide figure discrepancy based on oral recollection vs. administrative estimate is worth investigating further for historical accuracy.
Related
- Muslim deaths at Sétif outnumbered European deaths by at least ten to one (similarity 0.82)
- Sétif reprisal casualties overkilled Europeans ten to one (similarity 0.81)
- Sétif reprisals killed at least ten Muslims for each European death. (similarity 0.79)