Germany -- Foreign relations -- Turkey; Turkey -- Foreign relations -- Germany; World War, 1914-1918 -- Turkey
While waiting for his arrival I delayed the operations of the policemen,
and my wife, who fortunately speaks French, was obtaining all the
details from the Sisters. Mrs. Morgenthau understood the Turks well
enough to know that they had other plans than the mere expulsion of the
Sisters and their charges. The Turks regard these institutions as
repositories of treasure; the valuables which they contain are greatly
exaggerated in the popular mind, and it was a safe assumption that,
among other things, this expulsion was an industrious raiding expedition
for tangible evidences of wealth.
“Have you any money and other valuables here?” Mrs. Morgenthau asked one
of the Sisters.
Yes, they had in fact quite a little; it was kept in a safe upstairs. My
wife told me to keep the policemen busy and then she and one of the
Sisters quietly disappeared from the scene. Upstairs the Sister
disclosed about a hundred square pieces of white flannel into each one
of which had been sewed twenty gold coins. In all, the Sion Sœurs had
in this liquid form about fifty thousand francs. They had been fearing
expulsion for some time, and had been getting together their money in
this form, so that they could carry it away with them when forced to
leave Turkey. Besides this, the Sisters had several bundles of
securities and many valuable papers, such as the charter of their
school. Certainly here was something that would appeal to Turkish
cupidity. Mrs. Morgenthau knew that if the police once obtained control
of the building there would be little likelihood that the Sion Sisters
would ever see their money again. With the aid of the Sisters, my wife
promptly concealed as much as she could on her person, descended the
stairs, and marched through a line of gendarmes out into the rain. Mrs.
Morgenthau told me afterward that her blood almost ran cold with fright
as she passed by these guardians of the law; from all external signs,
however, she was absolutely calm and collected. She stepped into the
waiting auto, was driven to the American Embassy, placed the money in
our vault, and promptly returned to the school. Again Mrs. Morgenthau
solemnly ascended the stairs with the Sisters. This time they took her
to the gallery of the Cathedral, which stood behind the convent, but
could be entered through it. One of the Sisters lifted up a tile from a
particular spot in the floor, and again disclosed a heap of gold coins.
This was secreted in Mrs. Morgenthau’s clothes, and once more she filed
past the gendarmes, out into the rain, and was driven rapidly to the
Embassy. In these two trips my wife succeeded in getting the money of
the Sisters to a place where it would be safe from the Turks.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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