Rural Retreat times. [volume] (Rural Retreat, Va.) 1892-1918, 1903-10-02
Nearly 1000 Women and Children
Roasted or Suffocated in One
Forest Or Tortured in Flight
SENDING OIL BY The TRAINLOAD
To Rebel Districts Hideous Mementos
Of Horrors at smerdesh Taken
Home to Ottoman Soldiers

1lOllC " OIUOIldn SOlulGrS,
While the sultan is solemnly negoti-
ating with the great powers of Europe
about depressing the horrors in Mace
donia, special trains loaded with petro-
leum are being despatched almost daily
to the soldiers who are rayaging the
condemned districts.
This petroleum is used not only for
burning villages, but also woods and
thickets in which women and children
take refuge.
At Kirk, in the Kilisse district a
wood was fired and more than nine
hundred women and children were
either roasted or suffocated, or in try
ing to escape were caught and horribly
sorturned before they were killed.
The soldiers who were engaged in tbe
destruction by bringing back indescrib-
able mementoes of the atrocities thew
|perpetrated.
The big military display which Tur-
key is, making is designed to give
Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria an excuse
for refraining from attack. No doubt
is entertained in the diplomatic circles
at Constantinople that Ferdinand has
been acting in collision with the
sultan.
1t is calculated that by the middle Of
October there will be nothing left in
Macedonia or Thrace to intervene
about
Germany is the sultan's great main
stay in pursuing the present policy
and the Bulgarian army with it's Ger.
man officers, can be relied on to make
victory easy for the sultan if war is
forced
The Germans scored a most import
mt success at Gonstantinople in OBJ
saining the conversion Of the old Turk.
lsh debt. the essential purpose of which
is to liberate the Turkish revenues sc
they may be used in building rail
way to the Persian gulf.
One-third of the German railroad
system in Asia Minor has already beer
built The port of Haidar Pasha, fac
Ing Constantinople, is being now con
|nected by rail with Angora and Koniah
in the heart of Asia Minor, with an out
let to Smyrna by the way of EslSiche
air. In another ten years the system
unbroken line of German or Austro
German influence from the presen
southern frontier of Austria through
Macedonia, Constantinople and Asia
Minor to the Persian gulf.
In view of the collnter-ambitions 20
iussia, the present exterminating o,
The Ssav element in European Turkey
CONSTITUTES a further important advan
tage for Germany in her policy OF ex
pansion toward the East. Germany il
undoubtedly displaying far more energy
and intelligence than her rival in pros
ocuting her schemes in Turkey, and i
Hook as if eventually she would sue
Iced in heading Russia off from he,
Iiong-dreamed-of outlet to the Mediter
ranean.
Turkish troops continue to slaughter
refugees who return home at the invi-
tation Of the government, which prom
ised them protection. Near Zlatan vii
ilage troops found fifteen returned re-
lfugees working in field. They
bound their hands, drove them into
ditch and massacred fourteen of the
peasants. One of them survived his
wounds. The refugees women subse-
quently discovered the bodies and car
ried. the survivor before the lieutenant
governor of Resna, who refused to hear
their story.