The herald., 1895-02-03
RED HORRORS IN THE SASOUN.
The Atrocities in Armenia Not
Exaggerated.
Revolutionary ConspiratOrs Are to
Blame.
What q Correspondsnt Learned in ths
BIood-stRined COuntry-B ombs
Made of Human Beings

of the Associated Press who WAS sent
TO Armenia from London to investigate
the reported Armenian atrocities, and
who at present is in Armenia. For
\ reasons thst will be resdily understood,
the name of this correspondent is with
E held, but he is a newspaper man well
known ia America, and he was in
structed to make an impartial inveati-
CATION of the stories told of Turkish
cruelty. The correspondent spent a
week or more in Constantinople before
starting for Armenia, during which
time he Investigated the reports current
there and continued his journey. His
first letter has just reached here after
having been posted by trusted messen-
ger at Tihis, Russia. 1t containH the
first authentic news from Armenia
direct and says:
Whatever secrets may lie under the
Hnow on the Armenian mountains, it
seems hey ond dispute, from what L
have heard from many lips, that the
published stories of ferocious butchery
and red horrors in the Sasoun villages
have at least reasonable foundation Of
truth. and that any change, authorized
by further investigation, will deal more
with numbers than with the degree OF
the horrors.
HUMAN BOMBS.
'But no matter what light We throw
upon the spssmodic wickedness of the
Turk or upon tho ingenious deviltry Of
/. the revolutionary conspirators, we find
that it is still the innocent thst suffer
Tho Dr do ha
menisns have inflicted shocking out,
RACES upon Turkish men and women,
and from what is already known of con-
spiracy methods it 10 quite likely that
the assertion is true.
For instance, it ia reported that as
means of inciting the Turks to commit
outrages that will bring down upon them
the wrath of civilized world, Armen-
ians have thrust gun cartridges into the
bodies of living Turkish men and
women and have exploded them and
that in the case of one man, hole was
made just below the bones of the chest
for the insertion of a quantity OF gun
powder which was then ignited as @ sort
y of bomb.
These facts are known to the embas-
sizes at Conatantinople and probably
they have been transmitted in reports TO
1.-THE impartial truth OF the Sasoun
massacre will probably never be known,
for the dead tell no tales. A careful
sitting of all the facts obtainable from
trustworthy sources in Constantnople,
Sasoun, Kerasund, Trebzonde and
Bitlis indicates that this is what hap
pened:
THE CRUEL KURDs.
Certain Armenian peasants to the
number of several thousand were tend
ing their herds and focks in their sum-
p mer pastures in the Sasoun mountains
along the borders of Kurdistan. They
were living in mere temporary villages
which they inhabited only during the
summer pasture season, their winter
herds going far down the valley. They
were under contract to defend them
against the raids of cattle stesers and
Kurdish bands. A short time before
- the villagers were ready to return to
their homes in the valleys with their
fattened cattle, band of Kurdish
bandits, industriously searching for a
winters supply of provisions, rsided
their stock. The villagers and their
Kurdish protectors made vigorous de-
tense. They would have ended it but
before the fighting wss over the Turk
! ish government came into the affair and
then the real troubl began. Some of
them telegraphed that conspiracy was
in progress among the Armenians in the
mountain villages and the order came
straight from the palace:
Punish the villagers TO the utmost
extremity"
The palace has not paused to inquire
into the truth OF the rumor and the off.
GERS entrusted with tho execution of the
order did not investigate the facts when
the troops arrived on the ground. The
Kurdish band Joined forcea with the
Turkish regulars and even the Kurds,
who had been defending the Armeniane,
turned traitors and swelled the mum bers
OF the government troops. The poor
Armenian peasants were then left at the
mercy Of q force of Turkish regulars and
two banda of Kurds. The massacre
began. For the Armenisns it WAS
fight without hope, but atill they fought
as only men can to defend theis
wives and children from out
rage and death. They took refuge
in their houses and barricaded them.
selves in, but the Kurdish cannon made
short work of these, and when the men
in terror from their hiding places ran,
they were slain without mercy, man,
woman and child. The outrage of Ar
menian women and children by the
Turks in that part of the country is 80
common thing, even at times of abso-
lutte quiet, that there can be no doubt
this massacre was attended with out
rage and atrocity to horrible too think
Of The Armeuans in Athena and
Constan tinople assert that 40 villages
were destroyed and nearly 10000 per.
sons mssaacred; but more impartial
and equally informed persona put the
mum ber at 25 villages and from 1000 to
5000 peraons killed. The exact number
will never be known.
FRAUDULENT COMMISSION.
As for the Turkish com mission, n ia
auch frsud that it is waste OF breath
to talk about it, The sultan's promise
of reform will not be binding upon the
Armenian revolutionary agents, no
matter what may come. and until the
revolutionary agitation is provided for
one way or another by the Christian
powers Of the world, there will bs no
end TO the disturbances in Armenia.
This s the revolutionary party's oppor-
tunity and it will make the most of it.
II Christianity doea not step in now and
put an end to the question once iof ALL
crinnas massacres and the nameless