American National Red Cross; Red Cross and Red Crescent
Miss Barton received in all about $116,000, and an unexpended
balance of $15,400 was committed to Mr. Peet, the treasurer of the
American Missions in Turkey, to be held as an emergency fund,
subject to Miss Barton's orders. No expense has been incurred for
Miss Barton or her agents save for traveling expenses and the wages
of interpreters, and with this exception the entire sum expended has
gone to the actual relief of the sufferers. While the fund committed
to the Anglo-American Committee, of which Mr. Peet is a member--a
sum four to five times the amount committed to Miss Barton--has been
expended through the missionaries, largely to save the hungry from
starvation, the relief through the agents of the Red Cross has for
the most part been wisely devoted to the putting of the poor
sufferers on their feet again, and thus helping them to help
themselves. Some 500 liras (a lira is $4.40 of _good_ money) were
given for the cure and care of the sick in Marash, Zeitoun and
elsewhere, and some 2,000 liras' worth of cloths, thread, pins and
needles were sent inland; but many times this amount was expended in
providing material for poor widows, seeds, agricultural implements
and oxen for farmers; tools for blacksmiths and carpenters, and
looms for weavers. In some places Miss Barton's agents had the
pleasure of seeing vegetable gardens coming forward from seed
furnished by the Red Cross, and village farmers reaping the grain
with sickles which the Red Cross had given. The great want now--a
want which the funds of the Red Cross agents did not permit them to
any large extent to meet--is aid to the poor villagers to help them
rebuild their burned and ruined houses, and thus provide for
themselves shelter against the rigors of the coming winter. The Red
Cross agents have, however, gathered a great stock of information;
and passing by the horrors of the massacres and the awful abuse of
girls and women, as unimpeachable witnesses they can bear testimony
to the frightful sufferings and needs of the people. We most
sincerely hope and pray that Miss Barton and the agents and friends
of the Red Cross will not esteem their work in Turkey done, but
knowing now so well just what remains to be done, and what can be
done, will bend every effort to secure further relief for the widows
and orphans of the more than sixty thousand murdered men--mostly
between the ages of eighteen and fifty--whose lives no earthly arm
was outstretched to save.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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