The San Francisco call., 1895-12-02
Troops Sent to Preserve Order
Joined in the Murder
and Pillage.
HORRIBLE WAS THE BARBARITY
Hundreds of Defenseless Persons
Butchered by the Merciless and
Bloodthirsty Mob.

WORCESTER, MASS, Dec 1.-The fol-
lowing petitions, sent by the Armenians Of
Erzingan to Monsignor Izmirlian, Ar
menian Patriarch of Constantinople, have
been forwarded in duplicate to this city,
where they have been translated and made
public:
'To His Holiness, Monsignor Izmirlian,
Armenian Patriarch of Constautinople:
On Monday, October 81. while the people
from the towns and villages surrounding
Erzingan were gathered together on mar
ket day in a public market place of this
city, vulgar mob, composed of Turks and
Kurds, fully armed, attacked the Armeni-
ans at o'clock I'll o'clock A. M. and be-
gan wholesale massacre of them, beat
ing, wounding, killing and slaughtering
them, and then dismembering the bodies
Ct many OF them, and tearing them limb
from limb.
During the six hours of this slaughter
the ferocious mob murdered the unarmed
Armenians with swords, sabers, knives.
hatchets, clubs and guns with such horri-
BILE barbarity as has never been seen or
heard of before.
Before this, the Armenians, anticipating
from the threats of the Turks which they
heard, shat horrible calamity was await
ing them. had sent their clergy to the
local commander of the Turkish army
many times during the weeks preceding,
imploring his protection. He told them
twice that 80 long as he was in Erzingan,
a massacre would never take place, and
said that he considered it unreasonable
nd TO toi, of
defenseless and peaceful people.
"Relying upon these ssurances of the
commander, part of the Armenians, feeling
safe, went about their daily business.
Those especially who went to the market
early in the morning, saw with great salts
faction the soldiers, gendarmes and guards
scattered about everywhere, watching to
maintain peace. In the four quarters of
the city the soldiers were searching the
Armenians, and if they found any arms
upon them. they took them away. After
they had thus deceived and robbed and
entrapped the Armenians, they began to
kill them most savagely. These soldiers
and guards, who had apparently come to
maintain order, not only did not stop the
massacre, but themselves rushed savagely
upon any of the Armenians who dared to
try to defend themselves, desperately as
any man would do; so that the greater
number of the victims were sacrificed to
the bayonets of the reg ular soldiers.
"This very same day hundreds of our
kindred were sacrificed to that merciless
and bloodthirsty mob, and ninety of their
dead bodies have already been found.
.'After they had thus butchered the in
offensive Arme mans they rushed upon
their dead bodies in most beastly man.
ner and robbed them, and stripped them
from head to foot. On many of the dead
bodies, especially upon the faces and
heads, there were deep marks and cuts of
knives and clubs, and others of them had
been beheaded. Two days after the
massacre the corpses were carried in cart
to certain place and buried in one pit.
which we will have to call Martyrs
Sepulcher.' There are also many wounded,
the greater portion OF them fatally.
'The pitiful population of Erzlngan
might have endured this massacre if it had
brought calamity and loss to few lives
only, but it was not so. The real purpose
of this massacre was to rob the Armenian
stores and houses and make abject beggars
of the people, in which purpose they were
perfectly successful.
"a savage mob composed of 10000 or
15, 900 Turks and Kurds, after putting the
Armenians in state Of terror and fight,