The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-01-29
ARMENIAN AGITATION.
BLUE BOOKS ISSUED CONTAINING
OFFICIAL INFORMATION.
Number Killed Has Been Very Much
Exaggerated, and 1t Is Hardly
Probable the Truth Will Ever Be
Told.


been issued containing all the official
dispatches relative to Armenia be-
tween July "a, 1894, and October 16,
1895, and the reports of the consular
delegates attached to the Sassoun
commission.
The report gives the history of the
Armenian agitation for several years
and records the obstacles thrown in
the way of the commission by the
Turkish delegates. 1t also acquits the
Armenians of the charge brought
against them of burning their own
property to incite an outbreak among
their people, adding that the facts
ELECTED failed to prove that the Arme-
enians were in revolt, but show that
the agitator Murad instigated several
Armenian outrages on Kurds. The lat
ter then retaliated and the Armenians
fed to their villages.
The conflicts between the Arnlenians
and Kurds followed and the govern
ment did nothing to arrive at q
peaceful settlement or to protect Wo-
men and children.
The report shows that the number of
but the report admits that owing to
the absence of registration it is i'm
possible even approximately to fix the
number of victims There is however,
appended to the report a tabulated list
Of all evidence rendered the committee.
Six villages mentioned show a total of
265 victims. These villages were all
burned and the inhabitants scattered.
The British Delegate Shipley, in a
memorandum attached to the joint re-
port from the evidence gathered by
Consul Hampson during his tour, esti-
mates the total number of victims in
the Sassoun district, including deaths
from starvation, at about 300. One Of
the worst cases of coldblooded cruelty,
Delegate Shipley says, was the murder
of prisoners in the camp at Ghellguzan
under a promise of safe conduct But
the number of those murdered was
only forty or fifty and not hundreds as
has been stated.
Delegate Shipley, While he admits
that there were violations of women
asserts that alleged Wholesale butchery
of women was not confirmed. He points
out that while an agitation subversive
Of the Ottoman authority has existed
amongst the Armenians in Turkey and
abroad, and had exasperated the
Turkish government, it must be ad-
nitted that the government had failed
in its duty o affording protection to
all classes of it's subjects. He COM
plains of the suppression of evidence
before the commission by Turkish Of
ficialS as not calculated to advance
the interests Of the truth.
The report Of the consular delegate rec
ords that the protest made by the dele
gates against the intimidation of wit
nesses and the suppression of evidence
q md
TO remedy this state of things were al
ways fruitless, so that the calculation of
the truth was very difficult Especially
on the question of the violation of wo-
ner 10 ihe commission display the great
est repugnance at discovering the truth.
Only four female witnesses were heard.
The commission refused to hear more
Mr.. Shipley further declares that the
Armenians were hunted like wild beasts
and if the slaughter was not greater it
was solely owing to the vastness of the
mountain ranges which facilitated the
escape Of the Armenians. He was con
WINGED that the Turks aimed at the COM
plete determination of the Aremnians in
the GhalleguZan and Talori districts. He
priest at Ghellaguzan seems to have some
foundation, but the alleged flaying of the
Armenian shero by Colonel Tewfk is ex-
trenlely doubtful
Without desiring to appear partial to
the Armenians Mr.. Shipley emphasizes
the fact that they were exposed to the
rapacity of government officials and to the
exactions of the Kurds, who would have
burned their homes and stolen their
cattle unless they had paid their demands.
Consul Hampson also attaches report
of the inadequacy of and the obstacle to
the distribution of relief
Among the official dispatches is one
from c. NJ. Hallward, the British vice
consul at Van, written in November, 1894,
which describes a horrible butchery by
the kurds at SaSSoun, when men were
burned alive, a Ghelleguzan priest was
tossed on bayonets and sixty girls were
driven to the church and the soldiers
then ordered to dispose of them as they
liked and then to massacre them.
Mr.. Shirley doubts this stnr-v