The treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire: Documents presented to Viscount Grey of Fallodon
History
The treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire: Documents presented to Viscount Grey of Fallodon
Armenian question; Armenians; World War, 1914-1918 -- Atrocities; World War, 1914-1918 -- Refugees
Four thousand refugees are concentrated in the 26 villages which he
visited in the districts named above, the more wealthy villages
housing a greater number of fugitives than the less important ones.
He found that, as a rule, two refugees are quartered in each house.
In the whole of this district, excepting at Karakeliss, the refugees
are everywhere gratuitously lodged. The same rations are issued to
the refugees in all the villages; they consist of one-and-a-half
pounds of flour and a cash allowance of five copecks (one penny) per
diem per person. Children under two years old receive no rations or
money allowance; they are, however, very few in number. Most of the
children coming under this denomination have died from hunger, cold
and the other fearful sufferings to which the refugees have been
subjected since last summer.
At Karakeliss all dwellings are in satisfactory condition. In some
of the villages fuel—mainly wood procured in the neighbouring
forests—is served out to the refugees. In this district the latter
possess about 1,000 head of cattle.
The exceedingly well organised Relief Committee of the Karakeliss
Brotherhood is very attentive to the needs of the refugees. Their
registration has been admirably arranged by this Committee. Full
particulars of the refugees, and the relief received, are entered in
the register book kept by the Committee. The latter has two
representatives who periodically visit the refugee villages, attend
to the issue of rations, and inquire into the urgent needs of the
refugees and their other requirements. The Committee further
endeavours to find work for the refugees.
The Committee has recently prepared two hundred stoves and a
quantity of warm clothing for the refugees. They are daily furnished
with boiling water and sugar. An unsatisfactory feature of relief
work at Karakeliss is the difficulty experienced in receiving flour
and money from Alexandropol. At times it takes twenty days to obtain
them. Owing to the short cereal crop of 1915 in the district, no
local flour is procurable; consequently the refugees frequently
remain in a practically starving condition. The Prince Argoudinsky
was surprised to find that no means had yet been devised by which
the transport of flour and the transmission of money over so short a
distance could be accelerated.
The Urban Union maintains a fairly well organised and equipped
hospital for fifty beds at Karakeliss. This establishment, however,
lacks an operating room, a mortuary and a disinfecting camera.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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