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
(1.) At the present moment there are at —— more than 10,000 deported
widows and children (among the latter one sees no boys above eleven
years of age). They had been on the road for from three to five
months; they have been plundered several times over, and have
marched along naked and starving; the Government gave them on one
single occasion a morsel of bread—a few have had it twice. It is
said that the number of these deported widows will reach 60,000;
they are so exhausted that they cannot stand upright; the majority
have great sores on their feet, through having had to march
barefoot.
(2). An enquiry has proved that, out of 1,000 people who started,
scarcely 400 reached ——. Out of the 600 to be accounted for, 380 men
and boys above eleven years of age, and 85 women, had been massacred
or drowned, out of sight of the towns, by the gendarmes who
conducted them; 120 young women and girls and 40 boys had been
carried off, with the result that one does not see a single pretty
face among the survivors.
(3.) Out of these survivors, 60 per cent. are sick; they are to be
sent in the immediate future to ——, where certain death awaits them;
one cannot describe the ferocious treatment to which they are
exposed; they had been on the road for from three to five months;
they had been plundered two, three, five, seven times; their
underclothes even had been ransacked; so far from being given
anything to eat, they had even been prevented from drinking while
they were passing a stream. Three-quarters of the young women and
girls were abducted; the remainder were forced to lie with the
gendarmes who conducted them. Thousands died under these outrages,
and the survivors have stories to tell of refinements of outrage so
disgusting that they pollute one’s ears.
(4.) The massacres have been most violent in the eastern provinces,
and the population has been deported wholesale towards the Hauran
Desert, Gereg and Mosul, where the victims are doomed to a death
from natural causes more infallible than massacre. When one
remembers that these people were leading a comfortable European
life, one is forced to conclude that they will never be able to
survive in an alien and inhospitable climate, even if the knife and
the bullet do not previously do their work.
My friends, I have not time to tell you more; one may say with truth
that not a single Armenian is left in Armenia; soon there will be
none left in Cilicia either. The Armenian, robbed of his life, his
goods, his honour, conveys to you his last cry for help—help to save
the lives of the survivors! Money to buy them bread! There is a
rumour here that the Government will allow the women and the
children under seventeen years of age to leave the country. How are
they to do it? Where are they to go? What ship is to take them? Who
will provide the funds? From moment to moment we are waiting for
relief, to stave off the death of the Nation. Be quick, never mind
how; send us money, we have no means of communication!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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