Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1894-11-17
THOUSANDS SLAUGHTERED
Armenian Women and Children Ruthlessly
..---.. Butchered.
officials Try to Explain 1t Away by
Declaring There Was an Up
rising Of the People.

The chairman OF the Armenian Patriotic
Association, q. Hagopian, has sent the
following letter, received from an Armen-
ian. whose name is not given. because it
would jeopardize his life, to the Earl Of
Kimberley, the British secretary of state
for foreign affairs. The letter is accom-
panied by one from Hagopian, in which he
says:
II have no reason to doubt the anthem
ITCHY OF the details. They will be borne
out by fuller official reports which have
been, or which will soon be received,
from the British agents in Armenia. The
events reported are the re-enactment or
the bulgarian atrocities, with all their
most sickening details of fiendish lust and
atrocfous cruelty, on unarmed Christians
and defenseless, innocent women and chill
dren, deliberately planned and ruthlessly
executed under orders received from Con-
stantinopIe."
The letter from Hagopian concludes by
saying that the time has come to Abolish
the existing administration of Armenia
and replace 1t by another regime approved
by Great Britain and the other signatories
of the treaty OF Berlin and worked under
their immediate supervision.
How the Trouble Arose.
The letter OF the Armenian thus pre-
faced is dated Bitlis, October o. After say
ing that the chief magnate appears to be
a second Nero, the writer continues
1.-The so-calIed rebellion of the Armenians
in 1893 was got-up affair, for the repres-
sion of which the chief magnate got a
decoration. This year, the Kurds carried
eff Armenian oxen and the Armenians
appeal for their restoration was refused.
A fight ensued, two kurds were Killed ana
three wounded The Kurds Immediately
hot hQf
declaring that the Armenian soldiers had
overrun the land killing and plundering
the kurds.
This furnished a pretext for massing
the troops from far and near. The troops
were commanded by pasha and a Elar-
s;ial and were hurried to the district. The
pasha is said to have hung from his breast,
after reading 1t to his soldiers, an order
from ConstantinopIe to cut the Armenians
up root and branch. and abjuring them to
do so II they loved their king and govern
ment.
here and there by soldiers who took part
in the horrible carnage. Some OF them,
weeping, claim that the kuIds did more
and declare That they only obeycd the Or
ders Of others.
No Mercy shown.
TT is said that 100 fell to each OF them
to dispose Of. No compassion was shown
to age or sex even by the regular soldiery,
Lot even when the victims fell suppliant
at their feet. Six to ten thousand per-
sons met such a fate as even the darkest
ages of darkened Africa hardly witness,
for there women and tender babies might
at least have had a chance OF life or
slavery, while here womanhood and in
nocence were but a mockery. before the
cruel lust that ended it's debauch by stab
bling women to death with the bayonet,
while tender babes were impaled with the
same weapon on their dead mothers
breasts or perhaps seized by the hair to
have their heads Topped OF with the
sword.
I'm one place three or four hundred
women, after being forced to serve vile
purposes by the merCiless soldiery, were
hacked to pieces by sword and bayonet
in the valley below In another place
some two hundred weeping and wailing
women begged for compassion, falling at
the commanders feet, but the bloodthirsty
wretch after ordering their violation d.
| rccted his soldiers to dispatch them in a
similar way.
In another place some sixty young
brides ana the more attractive girls were
were slaughtered and human gore was
seen flowing from the church door.
a Hideous Alternative.
AT another place still large company
under the leadership Of their priest, fell
down before them, begging for compassion,
and averring that they had nothing to do
with the culprits. But all TO no purpose
All were called to another place and the
proposal was made to several Of the more
attractive women to change their faith
in which case their lives were to he spared.
They said: Why should we deny Christ :?
We are no more than these pointing to
the :nangled forms of their husbands and
brothers, kill us too and they did So A
great effort was made to save one beauty,
bur three or four Quarreled over her and
she sank down like her sisters.
But why prolong the sickenng tale i?
There must be a God in heaven who will
do right in all these matters or some OF
us would lose faith. One or more consuls
have been ordered that way to investigate
the matter. If the Christians. instead of
the Turks, reported these things in the
city of Bitlis and the region where l have
been touring, the case would be different.
Rut, now We are compelled to believe 1t.
The magnates are having papers circu-
lated, and are trying to compel the Chris
tians to sign them, expressing satisfac-
ton that justice should be dealt to the
Iebels and thanking the king and the chief
magnate himself. The Christians of Bit
lis will not sign, though 1t is said that in
some of the outlying districts some of the
Christians have signed. The circulars have
not yet been offered to Protestants. and as
yet the Professionals have not been thrust
into chains or hlackmailed very much.
Though, lately, things are beginning to
look that way
Another letter says that some of the reg
ular soldiers themselves admit that they
killed 100 persons each in a fendish man.
Eer and that rape was followed by the
bayonet.
Twenty or thirty villages, it would seem,
nave l.een wholly destroyed and some
persons were burned to death with kero-
sene III their own houses.
Turkish Side of 1t.
The following official account of the Ar
.menian troubles was issued yesterday at
Constantinople:
Some Armenian brigands. provided with
arms of foreign origin, Joined an insurgent
Kurd tribe for the purpose of committing
excuses They burned and devastated sew
eral Mussulman villages. AS an instance of
the ferocity of the Armenians 1t is reported
that they burned alive a Mussuman.
Regular troops were sent to the scene In
order to protect peaceable inhabitants
against these depredations.
The Ottoman troops not only protected
and respected the submissive portion of the
population, and the women and children
but they re-estabished order and tran
guilty. 1t is not true that the Kurds seized
the furniture, effects and cattle of the fu-
gitive Armenians. The latter took their