The Dalles times-mountaineer. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1882-1904, 1895-07-20
HAPLESs ARMENIANS.
The Hardships of Turkish Prisons Rival
Those of Siberia.

VAN, June 3.-(From the Associated
Press correspondent in, Armenia
The prison of Van, where the Armenian
prisoners are confined, is located under
the shadows of the city wall and at a
point where the ground is so low as to
receive the drainage of the rest of the
city. Like the other buildings of the
city it is built of sun-dried brick laid
in the mud. The prison is only one
story building, and with no provision
for keeping 1t dry.
The prison consists of six long
rooms, three on each side of common
passage-way, into which they open.
Each room is about IL feet wide and
from 80 to 40 feet long, and has two
windows at the outer end and two
small windows and door at the inner
end opening into the passage. During
the last winter from 80 to 20 men were
crowded into each of these rooms,
sleeping on the floor, row along each
wall, so that if their feet were a little
more than ordinarily extended the
two rows would interfere with each
other. Sometimes there were % men
in each row, allowing only about 18
inches for each person.
The five small cells mentioned are
damp, dark and entirely unwarmed for
winter. A prisoner, Karakeen Pagh-
eshtecan by name, was kept in one of
the cells IA consecutive months with
foot-fetters all the time, and with hand
and neck-fetters much of the time.
Afterwards he was removed to one of
the inner cells, which are even worse,
and where he now is, He was flogged
on an average of once day.
Apart from the actual butchery of
SassOun, the most. painful feature of
the situation Is the position of Arme-
nian women. One cannot investigate
this phrase of the subject without
feelings of rage and horror. After
the most careful personal inquiry the
correspondent is able to state that in
hundreds of villages in Armenia there
is hardly one woman, old or young,
who is not from time to time made the
victim of passion of the Kurds and
Turks. In all the villages of Armenia,
the Christian women, both old and
young, are absolutely at. the mercy of
their Kurdish and Turkish neighbors.
This is not the case in the larger cities
of Van, Bitlis, Moush and Erzeroum,
because in these cities the large
Armenian population is in itself
protection to the women, but in the
villages, where the Armenians are in
the minority, protection is not possible,
and the women are at the beck and
call of any Turk or Kurd who happens
to take fancy to them. Moreover,
this state of things is said to be we'll
known to the Turkish government.
1t is the custom of the government
to sell to the highest bidder the tax
privileges OF the various villages, the
purchaser having the right to collect
all OF the taxes from the people. In
very many cases the number of young
Armenian women in a village has q
great deal to do with the price paid for
the tax privilege. When the public
sale is made of the tax privilege it is
no uncommon thing for the auctioneer
to call cut in the market-place that so
many girls are available in the village.
When a man has purchased the tax
privilege of a village, he considers
that he also bought and paid for the
women of the village, and any attempt |
On the part of the husband, brother or
Father to resent this Interpretation of |
.he law is looked upon as high treason, |
punishable with death. If the Arme-
man men object to this they are |
beaten and driven from the villages
Ind. in many cases, killed. The |
women who suffer the most are the
,rides. -Kurds and Turks think it
yreat sport to carry off a bride from
he very arms of her husband, and to
1eep her in their house until they
AYE become tired OF her presence.