Chapter 2
In the evening we arrived at Kara Jevren, and slept there till morning. At sunrise we went on towards Sivrek, and half-way on the road we saw a terrible spectacle. The corpses of the killed were lying in great numbers on both sides of the road; here we saw a woman outstretched on the ground, her body half veiled by her long hair; there, women lying on their faces, the dried blood blackening their delicate forms; there again, the corpses of men, parched to the semblance of charcoal by the heat of the sun. As we approached Sivrek, the corpses became more numerous, the bodies of children being in a great majority. As we arrived at Sivrek and left our carts, we saw one of the servants of the _khân_ carrying a little infant with hair as yellow as gold, whom he threw behind the house. We asked him about it, and he said that there were three sick Armenian women in the house, who had lagged behind their companions, that one of them had given birth to this infant, but could not nourish it, owing to her illness. So it had died and been thrown out, as one might throw out a mouse.
DEMAND FOR RANSOM.--Whilst we were at Sivrek, Aarif Effendi told me--after he had been at the Government offices--that the Commandant of Gendarmerie and the Chief of Police of that place had requested him to hand over to them the five Armenians who were with him, and that on his refusal they had insisted, saying that, if they were to reach Diarbekir in safety, they must pay a ransom of fifty liras for themselves. We went to the _khân_, where the officer summoned the priest Isaac and told him how matters stood. After speaking to his companions, the priest replied that they could pay only ten liras altogether, as they had no more in their possession. When convinced by his words, the officer took the ten liras and undertook to satisfy the others.
This officer had a dispute with the Commandant of Gendarmerie at Aleppo, the latter desiring to take these five men on the grounds that they had been sent with a gendarme for delivery to his office. Ahmed Bey, the Chief of the Irregular band at Urfa, also desired to take them, but the officer refused to give them up to him--he being a member of the Committee of Union and Progress--and brought them in safety to Diarbekir.
After passing the night at Sivrek we left early in the morning. As we approached Diarbekir the corpses became more numerous, and on our route we met companies of women going to Sivrek under guard of gendarmes, weary and wretched, the traces of tears and misery plain on their faces--a plight to bring tears of blood from stones, and move the compassion of beasts of prey.
What, in God's name, had these women done? Had they made war on the Turks, or killed even one of them? What was the crime of these hapless creatures, whose sole offence was that they were Armenians, skilled in the management of their homes and the training of their children, with no thought beyond the comfort of their husbands and sons, and the fulfilment of their duties towards them.
I ask you, O Moslems--is this to be counted as a crime? Think for a moment. What was the fault of these poor women? Was it in their being superior to the Turkish women in every respect? Even assuming that their men had merited such treatment, is it right that these women should be dealt with in a manner from which wild beasts would recoil? God has said in the Koran: "Do not load one with another's burthens," that is, Let not one be punished for another.
What had these weak women done, and what had their infants done? Can the men of the Turkish Government bring forward even a feeble proof to justify their action and to convince the people of Islam, who hold that action for unlawful and reject it? No; they can find no word to say before a people whose usages are founded on justice, and their laws on wisdom and reason.
Is it right that these imposters, who pretend to be the supports of Islam and the _Khilâfat_, the protectors of the Moslems, should transgress the command of God, transgress the Koran, the Traditions of the Prophet, and humanity? Truly, they have committed an act at which Islam is revolted, as well as all Moslems and all the peoples of the earth, be they Moslems, Christians, Jews, or idolators. As God lives, it is a shameful deed, the like of which has not been done by any people counting themselves as civilised.
THE INFANT IN THE WASTE.--After we had gone a considerable distance we saw a child of not more than four years old, with a fair complexion, blue eyes, and golden hair, with all the indications of luxury and pampering, standing in the sun, motionless and speechless. The officer told the driver to stop the cart, got out alone, and questioned the child, who made no reply, and did not utter a word. The officer said: "If we take this child with us to Diarbekir, the authorities will take him from us, and he will share the fate of his people in being killed. It is best that we leave him. Perhaps God will move one of the Kurds to compassion, that he take him and bring him up." None of us could say anything to him; he entered the cart and we drove on, leaving the child as we found him, without speech, tears, or movement. Who knows of what rich man or Notable of the Armenians he was the son? He had hardly seen the light when he was orphaned by the slaughter of his parents and kinsmen. Those who should have carried him were weary of him--for the women were unable to carry even themselves--so they had abandoned him in the waste, far from human habitation. Man, who shows kindness to beasts, and forms societies for their protection, can be merciless to his own kind, more especially to infants who can utter no complaint; he leaves them under the heat of the sun, thirsty and famishing, to be devoured by wild creatures.
Leaving the boy, our hearts burning within us, and full of grief and anguish, we arrived before sunset at a _khân_ some hours distant from Diarbekir. There we passed the night, and in the morning we went on amid the mangled forms of the slain. The same sight met our view on every side; a man lying, his breast pierced by a bullet; a woman torn open by lead; a child sleeping his last sleep beside his mother; a girl in the flower of her age, in a posture which told its own story. Such was our journey until we arrived at a canal, called Kara Pounâr, near Diarbekir, and here we found a change in the method of murder and savagery.
We saw here bodies burned to ashes. God, from whom no secrets are hid, knows how many young men and fair girls, who should have led happy lives together, had been consumed by fire in this ill-omened place.
We had expected not to find corpses of the killed near to the walls of Diarbekir, but we were mistaken, for we journeyed among the bodies until we entered the city gate. As I was informed by some Europeans who returned from Armenia after the massacres, the Government ordered the burial of all the bodies from the roadside when the matter had become the subject of comment in European newspapers.
IN PRISON.--On our arrival at Diarbekir the officer handed us over to the authorities and we were thrown into prison, where I remained for twenty-two days. During this time I obtained full information about the movement from one of the prisoners, who was a Moslem of Diarbekir, and who related to me what had happened to the Armenians there. I asked him what was the reason of the affair, why the Government had treated them in this way, and whether they had committed any act calling for their complete extermination. He said that, after the declaration of war, the Armenians, especially the younger men, had failed to comply with the orders of the Government, that most of them had evaded military service by flight, and had formed companies which they called "Roof Companies." These took money from the wealthy Armenians for the purchase of arms, which they did not deliver to the authorities, but sent to their companies, until the leading Armenians and Notables assembled, went to the Government offices, and requested that these men should be punished as they were displeased at their proceedings.
I asked whether the Armenians had killed any Government official, or any Turks or Kurds in Diarbekir. He replied that they had killed no one, but that a few days after the arrival of the Vali, Reshîd Bey, and the Commandant of Gendarmerie, Rushdi Bey, prohibited arms had been found in some Armenian houses, and also in the church. On the discovery of these arms, the Government summoned some of the principal Armenians and flung them into prison; the spiritual authorities made repeated representations, asking for the release of these men, but the Government, far from complying with the request, imprisoned the ecclesiastics also, the number of Notables thus imprisoned amounting to nearly seven hundred. One day the Commandant of Gendarmerie came and informed them that an Imperial Order had been issued for their banishment to Mosul, where they were to remain until the end of the war. They were rejoiced at this, procured all they required in the way of money, clothes, and furniture, and embarked on the _keleks_ (wooden rafts resting on inflated skins, used by the inhabitants of that region for travelling on the Euphrates and Tigris) to proceed to Mosul. After a while it was understood that they had all been drowned in the Tigris, and that none of them had reached Mosul. The authorities continued to send off and kill the Armenians, family by family, men, women and children, the first families sent from Diarbekir being those of Kazaziân, Tirpanjiân, Minassiân, and Kechijiân, who were the wealthiest families in the place. Among the 700 individuals was a bishop named--as far as I recollect--Homandriâs; he was the Armenian Catholic Bishop, a venerable and learned old man of about eighty; they showed no respect to his white beard, but drowned him in the Tigris.
Megerditch, the Bishop-delegate of Diarbekir, was also among the 700 imprisoned. When he saw what was happening to his people he could not endure the disgrace and shame of prison, so he poured petroleum over himself and set it on fire. A Moslem, who was imprisoned for having written a letter to this bishop three years before the events, told me that he was a man of great courage and learning, devoted to his people, with no fear of death, but unable to submit to oppression and humiliation.
Some of the imprisoned Kurds attacked the Armenians in the gaol itself, and killed two or three of them out of greed for their money and clothing, but nothing was done to bring them to account. The Government left only a very small number of Armenians in Diarbekir, these being such as were skilled in making boots and similar articles for the army. Nineteen individuals had remained in the prison, where I saw and talked with them; these, according to the pretence of the authorities, were Armenian bravoes.
The last family deported from Diarbekir was that of Dunjiân, about November, 1915. This family was protected by certain Notables of the place, from desire for their money, or the beauty of some of their women.
DIKRÂN.--This man was a member of the central committee of the Tashnagtziân Society in Diarbekir. An official of that place, who belonged to the Society of Union and Progress, told me that the authorities seized Dikrân and demanded from him the names of his associates. He refused, and said that he could not give the names until the committee had met and decided whether or not it was proper to furnish this information to the Government. He was subjected to varieties of torture, such as putting his feet in irons till they swelled and he could not walk, plucking out his nails and eyelashes with a cruel instrument, etc., but he would not say a word, nor give the name of one of his associates. He was deported with the others and died nobly out of love for his nation, preferring death to the betrayal of the secrets of his brave people to the Government.
AGHÔB KAITANJIÂN.--Aghôb Kaitanjiân was one of the Armenians imprisoned on the charge of being bravoes of the Armenian Society in Diarbekir, and in whose possession explosive material had been found. I often talked to him, and I asked him to tell me his story. He said that one day, whilst he was sitting in his house, a police agent knocked at the door and told him that the Chief of Police wished to see him at his office. He went there, and some of the police asked him about the Armenian Society and its bravoes. He replied that he knew nothing of either societies or bravoes. He was then bastinadoed and tortured in various ways for several days till he despaired of life, preferring death to a continuance of degradation. He had a knife with him, and when they aggravated the torture so that he could endure it no longer, he asked them to let him go to the latrine and on his return he would tell them all he knew about the Armenian matter. With the help of the police he went, and cut the arteries of his wrists[B] ... with the object of committing suicide. The blood gushed out freely; he got to the door of the police-office and there fainted. They poured water on his face and he recovered consciousness; he was brought before the officer and the interrogatory was renewed.[B] ... The Chief of Police was confounded at this proceeding and sent him to the hospital until he was cured. I saw the wounds on his hands, and they were completely healed. This was the story as he told it to me himself. He desired me to publish it in an Armenian newspaper called _Häyrenîk_ (Fatherland), which appears in America, in order that it may be read by his brother Garabet, now in that country, who had been convinced that the Government would leave none of them alive.
I associated freely with the young Armenians who were imprisoned, and we talked much of these acts, the like of which, as happening to a nation such as theirs, have never been heard of, nor recorded in the history of past ages. These youths were sent for trial by the court-martial at Kharpout, and I heard that they arrived there safely and asked permission to embrace the Moslem faith. This was to escape from contemptuous treatment by the Kurds, and not from the fear of death, as their conversion would not save them from the penalty if they were shown to deserve it. Before their departure they asked me what I had heard about them, and whether the authorities purposed to kill them on the way or not. After enquiring about this, and ascertaining that they would not be killed in this way, I informed them accordingly; they were rejoiced, saying that all they desired was to remain alive to see the results of the war. They said that the Armenians deserved the treatment which they had received, as they would never see the necessity for taking precautions against the Turks, believing that the constitutional Turkish Government would never proceed to measures of this kind without valid reason. The Government has perpetrated these deeds although no official, Kurd, Turk, or Moslem, has been killed by an Armenian, and we know not what the weighty reasons may have been which impelled them to so unprecedented a measure. And if the Armenians should not be reproached with a negligence for which they have paid dearly, yet a people who do not take full precautions are liable to be taxed justly with blameworthy carelessness.
[Footnote B: Episodes in the original are here omitted.--TRANSLATOR.]
MY TRAVELLING-COMPANIONS.--From time to time I visited the men who had been in my company during the journey, but after my release the director of the prison would not permit me to go to them. I used, therefore, to ask for one of them and talk with him outside the prison in which the Armenians were confined. After a while I enquired for them and was told that they had been sent to execution, like others before them, and at this I cried out in dismay. One day I saw a gendarme who had been imprisoned with us for a short time on the charge of having stolen articles from the effects of dead Armenians, and as he knew my companions I asked him about them. He said that he had killed the priest Isaac with his own hand, and that the gendarmes had laid wagers in firing at his clerical headdress. "I made the best shooting, hit the hat and knocked it off his head, finishing him with a second ball." My answer was silence. The man firmly believed that these murders were necessary, the Sultan having so ordered.
THE SALE OF LETTERS.--When the Government first commenced the deportation of the 700 men, the officials were instructed to prepare letters, signed with the names of the former, and to send them to the families of the banished individuals in order to mislead them, as it was feared that the Armenians might take some action which would defeat the plan and divulge the secret to the other Armenians, thus rendering their extermination impracticable. The unhappy families gave large sums to those who brought them letters from their Head. The Government appointed a Kurd, a noted brigand, as officer of the Militia, ordering him to slaughter the Armenians and deliver the letters at their destination. When the Government was secure as to the Armenians, a man was despatched to kill the Kurd, whose name was Aami Hassi, or Hassi Aami.
SLAUGHTER OF THE PROTESTANT, CHALDEAN, AND SYRIAC COMMUNITIES.--The slaughter was general throughout these communities, not a single protestant remaining in Diarbekir. Eighty families of the Syriac Community were exterminated, with a part of the Chaldeans, in Diarbekir, and in its dependencies, none escaped save those in Madiât and Mardîn. When latterly orders were given that only Armenians were to be killed, and that those belonging to other communities should not be touched, the Government held their hand from the destruction of the latter.
THE SYRIACS.--But the Syriacs in the province of Madiât were brave men, braver than all the other tribes in these regions. When they heard what had fallen upon their brethren at Diarbekir and the vicinity they assembled, fortified themselves in three villages near Madiât, and made a heroic resistance, showing a courage beyond description. The Government sent against them two companies of regulars, besides a company of gendarmes which had been despatched thither previously; the Kurdish tribes assembled against them, but without result, and thus they protected their lives, honour, and possessions from the tyranny of this oppressive Government. An Imperial Irâdeh was issued, granting them pardon, but they placed no reliance on it and did not surrender, for past experience had shown them that this is the most false Government on the face of the earth, taking back to-day what it gave yesterday, and punishing to-day with most cruel penalties him whom it had previously pardoned.
CONVERSATION between a postal contractor from Bitlis and a friend of mine, as we were sitting at a café in Diarbekir:
Contractor: I see many Armenians in Diarbekir. How comes it that they are still here?
My Friend: These are not Armenians, but Syriacs and Chaldeans.
Contractor: The Government of Bitlis has not left a single Christian in that Vilayet, nor in the district of Moush. If a doctor told a sick man that the remedy for his disease was the heart of a Christian he would not find one though he searched through the whole Vilayet.
PROTECTION AFFORDED BY KURDS TO ARMENIANS ON PAYMENT.--The Armenians were confined in the main ward of the prison at Diarbekir, and from time to time I visited them. One day, on waking from sleep, I went to see them in their ward and found them collecting rice, flour and moneys. I asked them the reason of this, and they said: "What are we to do? If we do not collect a quantity every week and give it to the Kurds, they insult and beat us, so we give these things to some of them so that they may protect us from the outrages of their fellows." I exclaimed, "There is no power nor might but in God," and went back grieving over their lot.
DESPATCH OF THE ARMENIANS TO THE SLAUGHTER.--This was a most shocking proceeding, appalling in its atrocity. One of the gendarmes in Diarbekir related to me how it was done. He said that, when orders were given for the removal and destruction of a family, an official went to the house, counted the members of the family, and delivered them to the Commandant of Militia or one of the officers of Gendarmerie. Men were posted to keep guard over the house and its occupants during the night until 8 o'clock, thereby giving notice to the wretched family that they must prepare for death. The women shrieked and wailed, anguish and despair showed on the faces of all, and they died even before death came upon them.[C] ... After 8 o'clock waggons arrived and conveyed the families to a place near by, where they were killed by rifle fire, or massacred like sheep with knives, daggers, and axes.
[Footnote C: A few sentences of immaterial description are here omitted.--TRANSLATOR.]
SALE OF ARMENIAN EFFECTS, AND REMOVAL OF CROSSES FROM THE CHURCHES.--After the Armenians had been destroyed, all the furniture of their houses, their linen, effects, and implements of all kinds, as well as all the contents of their shops and storehouses, were collected in the churches or other large buildings. The authorities appointed committees for the sale of these goods, which were disposed of at the lowest price, as might be the case with the effects of those who died a natural death, but with this difference, that the money realised went to the Treasury of the Turkish Government, instead of to the heirs of the deceased.
You might see a carpet, worth thirty pounds, sold for five, a man's costume, worth four pounds, sold for two medjidies, and so on with the rest of the articles, this being especially the case with musical instruments, such as pianos, etc., which had no value at all. All money and valuables were collected by the Commandant of Gendarmerie and the Vali, Reshîd Bey, the latter taking them with him when he went to Constantinople, and delivering them to Talaat Bey.[D] ...
The mind is confounded by the reflection that this people of Armenia, this brave race who astonished the world by their courage, resolution, progress and knowledge, who yesterday were the most powerful and most highly cultivated of the Ottoman peoples, have become merely a memory, as though they had never flourished. Their learned books are waste paper, used to wrap up cheese or dates, and I was told that one high official had bought thirty volumes of French literature for 50 piastres. Their schools are closed, after being thronged with pupils. Such is the evil end of the Armenian race: let it be a warning to those peoples who are striving for freedom, and let them understand that freedom is not to be achieved but by the shedding of blood, and that words are the stock-in-trade of the weak alone.
I observed that the crosses had been removed from the lofty steeples of the churches, which are used as storehouses and markets for the keeping and sale of the effects of the dead.
[Footnote D: Some remarks in this connection are omitted.--TRANSLATOR.]
METHODS OF SLAUGHTER.--These were of various kinds. An officer told me that in the Vilayet of Bitlis the authorities collected the Armenians in barns full of straw (or chaff), piling up straw in front of the door and setting it on fire, so that the Armenians inside perished in the smoke. He said that sometimes hundreds were put together in one barn. Other modes of killing were also employed (at Bitlis). He told me, to my deep sorrow, how he had seen a girl hold her lover in her embrace, and so enter the barn to meet her death without a tremor.