MASSACRES IN ASIATIC TURKEY

HON. LLOYD W. BOWERSMASSACRES IN ASIATIC TURKEY

HON. LLOYD W. BOWERS

The spirit of unrest was seething in Turkey and the old antagonism that from the time of the crusades has existed between the cross and the crescent was ready to break out into action. On the 10th of April, at Adana, a town in Eastern Turkey, not far west of Alexandretta, an Armenian and a Turk were killed. This kindled into life the flames of hatred and on the 14th they burst forth in ferocious massacres. The Moslems being in the majority the Armenians suffered terribly. Throughout that part of the country it is estimated that some twenty-five thousand persons have been massacred during this reign of terror. Their houses and shops were pillaged and burned, and those who escaped fled in terror for their lives. The Government, in the person of the Vali, was either unable or unwilling to put a stop to this appalling destruction of human life and property. Once started the scenes of horror were repeated in town after town in the eastern provinces. At Tarsus several hundred Armenian houses were burned and in the yard of the American College were sheltered andprotected 4,000 refugees. At Antioch, forty miles south of Alexandretta, the Armenian population of 7,000 was nearly annihilated. Kurds, Arabs and Circassians besieged the small Armenian villages, pillaging and burning the houses, killing the men and carrying the women into captivity. At Adana and Tarsus 15,000 and at Mersina 5,000 refugees were in dire distress and need while many more women and children escaped from the villages and were hiding in the mountains. The atrocities perpetrated reduced the people to a state of terror and despair. If some small village of Armenians succeeded in resisting the besiegers its inhabitants were soon reduced to the verge of starvation. Mr. Kennedy, an American missionary, secured some 450 Turkish soldiers and went to the relief of Deurtyul, an Armenian village of 10,000 inhabitants, on the coast, which was being besieged by hordes of Kurds and Circassians. The water supply having been cut off, the people were dependent upon the rain that fell, the children drinking from the water that collected in the footprints of animals. Frantic appeals for help and protection came down from scores of villages and the foreign consuls at Aleppo cabled to their Governments word of the great distress of thousands of refugees.

GEN. G. H. TORNEY, U. S. A.Copyright, Harris-Ewing, ’08.

Turkish Woman, Emergency Surgical Case. American Christian Hospital.(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

Turkish Woman, Emergency Surgical Case. American Christian Hospital.

(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

Armenian Children in American School at Adabazar.(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

Armenian Children in American School at Adabazar.

(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

Thanks to the efforts of our Consul General, Mr. Ravndal, at Beirut, assisted by the French Cruiser “Jules Ferry,” Latakia in Syria was relieved. Thousands of women and children, most of the men having been killed, were being besieged there. Appeals to the Vali of Adana continued useless. Conflagrations were continually breaking out and often the entire city was threatened. Thousands of the refugees were homeless and without any means of earning their livelihood. Bodies of the dead were scattered through the streets and the pedestrian who ventured forth had to pick his way so as not to step upon them. One writer says in half an hour he counted twelve wagon loads of Armenian dead being carried to the river and in the Turkish Cemetery graves were being dug by the wholesale.

At Adana four hospitals were established; doctors and nurses were sent from Beirut and Tarsus. Women, children and even babies suffered from severe wounds. Among the hundreds in one hospital the average of wounds to each person was four. Thousands of refugees were without food, clothing and bedding. Those sheltered at the American Missions were completely disarmed before being received so that, to obtain as far as possible immunity from attack for the missions. There was not enough water to drink nor to dress the wounds. Garbage and filth collected in the streets and diseases of all kinds began to reap their harvest.

On April 28th, in response to an inquiry if financial assistance was advisable addressed to the American Ambassador at Constantinople by the State Department, at the suggestion of the Red Cross, the following dispatch was received:

“Secretary of State, Washington:“As distress among population is very great, I am convinced that American Red Cross could not better fulfill the noble purpose for which it was founded than by such a contribution. If desired, money could be sent to the Embassy for transmission to Mr. Peet, treasurer of the American Missions in Turkey, and it would be a most humane act if our charitable organizations could be induced to follow suggestion, as thousands of the poor people are without food and shelter. If American Red Cross will wire amount of draft they are donating, I will hand over immediately such sum, as funds are urgently needed.“LEISHMAN (Ambassador).”

“Secretary of State, Washington:

“As distress among population is very great, I am convinced that American Red Cross could not better fulfill the noble purpose for which it was founded than by such a contribution. If desired, money could be sent to the Embassy for transmission to Mr. Peet, treasurer of the American Missions in Turkey, and it would be a most humane act if our charitable organizations could be induced to follow suggestion, as thousands of the poor people are without food and shelter. If American Red Cross will wire amount of draft they are donating, I will hand over immediately such sum, as funds are urgently needed.

“LEISHMAN (Ambassador).”

Immediately upon receipt of the above cablegram the Red Cross appropriated one thousand dollars from its General Emergency Fund which was cabled by the Secretary of State to Mr. Leishman; and the Branch Societies were requested to announce through the press that the Red Cross would receive and forward to the Ambassador at Constantinople any contributions for relief work in Turkey.

On May 6th a further remittance of $5,000 was sent by the Red Cross to the Ambassador.

The Relief Committee at Beirut, of which the American Consul General, Mr. Ravndal, is chairman, cabled to the Red Cross on May 10th, requesting that it be permitted to act regardless of source of funds as Red Cross agents, rendering full accounts. This Committee had already raised about ten thousand dollars and had dispatched to Adana for doctors and trained nurses. With the full approval of the American Ambassadorthis Committee was recognized as its agent with full power to use the Red Cross flag to protect its hospitals and field force.

On May 13th $5,000 more was cabled to the Ambassador by the Red Cross as a contribution from theChristian Herald, with the request that $2,000 be sent to Mr. Nesbit Chambers, of Adana, $2,000 to Thomas D. Christie, Tarsus, and $1,000 to Mr. Ravndal, Chairman of the Relief Committee at Beirut.

On May 6th the Armenian Relief Committee organized in New York sent a special Committee, Dr. A. Ayvazian, Chairman, and Col. Mesup Newton Kahn, to the New York Red Cross Branch to ask if the American Red Cross would receive and dispense the funds raised by their Committee. In reply to this inquiry forwarded from New York the National Headquarters telegraphed its consent to receive and administer such funds, stating its desire to be as efficient in Armenia as it had been in other theatres of relief and that in this work it had the co-operation of the State Department and the American Ambassador at Constantinople.

Women in Waiting at Aintab Dispensary. Moslems on Left, Armenians on Right.(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

Women in Waiting at Aintab Dispensary. Moslems on Left, Armenians on Right.

(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

On May 19th, $2,500 received from this Armenian Committee was cabled to the Ambassador with the request that it be distributed to Armenian sufferers of all denominations with the co-operation of the Armenian Patriarch in Adana, the Reverend Kevrok Arslandan.

On May 28th a further remittance of $1,500 was sent with a like request. This included a second remittance of $1,000 from the Armenian Committee, making a total of $20,000 sent for the relief in Turkey.

On June 16 an additional $5,000 was received from theChristian Herald, and was cabled to Turkey on the same day with instructions to distribute it in the same manner as the remittance of the 13th of May.

The last dispatch received by the State Department on June 3rd, and transmitted by the First Assistant Secretary of State to the Red Cross, reads as follows:

“Mr. Peet makes the following statement:“‘Relief work prosecuted in nine centers where thirty thousand people are now supported. Present endeavor to rehabilitate refugees thus making possible to earn livelihood and reduce list. Permanent provision for orphans also required. Generous help now will (word indecipherable) thousands dollars relief and put thousands of people on feet again.’“I have great confidence in Mr. Peet’s judgment, as he is eminently qualified by his long experience to speak authoritatively of such matters and the Relief Committee at Adana, although international in character, is largely composed of American missionaries headed by the British and United States Consuls, which furnishes an unquestionable guarantee that the relief funds will be fairly and judiciously expended. So far, the subscriptions from England and America have been comparatively small considering the enormous number of widows and orphans who, for the moment, are entirely dependent upon public charity, and I am sure that if the generous American public more fully realized the great distress prevailing in the Adana and Aleppo districts it would respond more liberally to the appeals which are being made.“LEISHMAN.”

“Mr. Peet makes the following statement:

“‘Relief work prosecuted in nine centers where thirty thousand people are now supported. Present endeavor to rehabilitate refugees thus making possible to earn livelihood and reduce list. Permanent provision for orphans also required. Generous help now will (word indecipherable) thousands dollars relief and put thousands of people on feet again.’

“I have great confidence in Mr. Peet’s judgment, as he is eminently qualified by his long experience to speak authoritatively of such matters and the Relief Committee at Adana, although international in character, is largely composed of American missionaries headed by the British and United States Consuls, which furnishes an unquestionable guarantee that the relief funds will be fairly and judiciously expended. So far, the subscriptions from England and America have been comparatively small considering the enormous number of widows and orphans who, for the moment, are entirely dependent upon public charity, and I am sure that if the generous American public more fully realized the great distress prevailing in the Adana and Aleppo districts it would respond more liberally to the appeals which are being made.

“LEISHMAN.”

Armenian Orphans from Massacres of 1894-5, in School Supported by Second Evangelical Church of Aintab.(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

Armenian Orphans from Massacres of 1894-5, in School Supported by Second Evangelical Church of Aintab.

(By Courtesy of the National Geographic Society.)

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