The Sun.
London, England, 1870-05-07 00:00:00

TIIE RECENT EVENTS IN GREECE.

The most circumstantial details which have yet ap-
peared of the murders in Greece, are given in a letter from
the Times Athens correspondent. It appears that after
the fruitless negotiations the Greek troops pressed closer
to Oropos, where the brigands were entrenched, and the
latter accordingly crossed the swollen stream of the
' Asopos. Why the soldiers advanced, and why the
robbers were allowed to get across the stream are
difficulties v.-hich remain unexplained. The troops ap-
pear to have thought they had orders to prevent the
brigands carrying away their prisoners from Oropos, yet
they did not prevent it ; while the brigands believed they
had the consent of the King and Ministry that they
were free to choose their quarters as long as they
treated the prisoners well. Some say that before
quitting Oropos the 'chiefs had consented to emigrate.
There appears to have been great mismanagement on one
side, and great distrust on the other. The minds both of
the brigands and the troops were irritated by what they
thought an infraction of the terms supposed to have been
arranged, and in this state of things the engagement and
the murders ensued. The letter continues :—" The
brigands crossed the swollen stream of the Asopos near
its mouth with their captives on horseback, and proceeded
to the undulating ground, covered with high tufts of brush
wood, near Delisi on their way to Sykaminos. Here they
perceived that the troops, both infantry and cavalry
were in considerable numbers before them. They sent
Alexandros, the courier who had accompanied the
travellers from the Hotel d'Angleterre, with either a
written or a verbal message to demann why the troops im-
peded their progress to Sykaminos, and repeating their
threat to murder their prisoners if they were attacked.
The courier Alexandros never returned, and no message
came from the troops. They then made. their arrange-
ments for escape, and divided the band into two parties.
The one, under Chrestos Arvanitaki, was to pass through
the troops before them on the road to Sykaminos,
guarding Mr. Lloyd and Mr. Herbert ; the other, under
the chief brigand, Takos Arvanitaki, with Count de Boyl
and Mr. Vyner, was to move round the left of the troops,
seeking to evade notice, and taking the direction of
Skoimatari. The soldiers opposed the passage of the
party under Chrestos ; an engagement commenced, and
the brigands, seeing that each must provide for himself,
and that they could not carry off their prisoners, murdered
Herbert aud Lloyd. Herbert fell by the yatagan of a brigand,
and Mr. Lloyd was shot. The soldiers did their duty welL The
chief, Chrestos, and six of his followers were killed, and their
heads were exposed at Athens on Sunday last with their
names written above them, and the others were taken ;
the party of Takos succeeded in getting round the troops,
and carrying off Count de Boyl and Mr. Vyner for some
distance. They were soon pursued, and Count de Boyl
was shot ; but Mr. Vyner being of a vigorous frame,
kept up with them a long way on the road to Skoimatari,
where, either from fear that he might escape or in an
attempt to escape, he was shot through the heart."
The negotiations which preceded this catastrophe were
miserably mismanaged. The Prefect of Eubata kept back
a telegram intended to bring a peaceable brother of the
chiefs of the brigands, who was living respectably on Mr.
Noel's property in Eubmea, to serve as a means of con-
vincing his brothers that the English Minister would
both insure them that the money would be paid and
that their escape from Greece should be secured.
This caused irreparable loss of time. Then orders were
sent to raise the peasantry in pursuit of the brigands—a
sort of general hunt which is called a pagania. This
mode of " aiding j astice " often leads to deplorable results
in the shape of accusing innocent persons, but on
the present occasion the peasantry disobeyed
the order. The writer adds :—" There was plenty
of time for the Minister of War to have sur-
rounded them with 5,000 men of the 13,865 that compose
the Greek Army, and to have them placed in a semicircle
from shore to shore of the channel of Eubcea, enclosing
the brigands in a triple military cordon, while Greek
steamers were stationed before the port. The brigands
might have been informed of the position of this
blockading force, and of the precise limits between the
Asopos, the mountains, and the port within which their
movements were free, and that by exceeding these
limits they would violate the conditions they had
accepted. They would have then seen clearly that,
though the lives of the captives were in their hands, their
own lives were in the hands of the Greek Government.
Can it be supposed that in such a state of things they
would have refused t,) accept k;25,000, and a secure
retreat under a foreign flag. and have murdered their
prisoners ?"