<P> During the 19th and early 20th centuries, Greece sought to enlarge its boundaries to include the ethnic Greek population of the Ottoman Empire . Greece played a peripheral role in the Crimean War . When Russia attacked the Ottoman Empire in 1853, Greek leaders saw an opportunity to expand North and South into Ottoman areas that had a Christian majority . However, Greece did not coordinate its plans with Russia, did not declare war, and received no outside military or financial support . The French and British seized its major port and effectively neutralized the Greek army . Greek efforts to cause insurrections failed as they were easily crushed by Ottoman forces . Greece was not invited to the peace conference and made no gains out of the war . The frustrated Greek leadership blamed the King for failing to take advantage of the situation; his popularity plunged and he was later forced to abdicate . The Ionian Islands were returned by Britain upon the arrival of the new King George I in 1863 and Thessaly was ceded by the Ottomans . As a result of the Balkan Wars of 1912--1913, Epirus, southern Macedonia, Crete and the Aegean Islands were annexed into the Kingdom of Greece . Another enlargement followed in 1947, when Greece annexed the Dodecanese Islands from Italy . </P> <P> In the late 19th century, modernization transformed the social structure of Greece . The population grew rapidly, putting heavy pressure on the system of small farms with low productivity . Overall, population density more than doubled from 41 persons per square mile in 1829 to 114 in 1912 (16 to 44 per km). One response was emigration to the United States, with a quarter million people leaving between 1906 and 1914 . Entrepreneurs found numerous business opportunities in the retail and restaurant sectors of American cities; some sent money back to their families, others returned with hundreds of dollars, enough to purchase a farm or a small business in the old village . The urban population tripled from 8% in 1853 to 24% in 1907 . Athens grew from a village of 6000 people in 1834, when it became the capital, to 63,000 in 1879, 111,000 in 1896, and 167,000 in 1907 . </P> <P> In Athens and other cities, men arriving from rural areas set up workshops and stores, creating a middle class . They joined with bankers, professional men, university students, and military officers, to demand reform and modernization of the political and economic system . Athens became the center of the merchant marine, which quadrupled from 250,000 tons in 1875 to more than 1,000,000 tons in 1915 . As the cities modernized, businessmen adopted the latest styles of Western European architecture . </P> <P> The outbreak of World War I in 1914 produced a split in Greek politics, with King Constantine I, an admirer of Germany, calling for neutrality while Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos pushed for Greece to join the Allies . The conflict between the monarchists and the Venizelists sometimes resulted in open warfare and became known as the National Schism . In 1916, the Allies forced Constantine to abdicate in favor of his son Alexander and Venizelos returned as premier . At the end of the war, the Great Powers agreed that the Ottoman city of Smyrna (Izmir) and its hinterland, both of which had large Greek populations, be handed over to Greece . </P>

Who controlled the area of greece in the early 19th century