Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-03-31

choly professions have been formed
and have been strewing the land with
the bodies of their helpless victims.
A half dozen populous vilayets of in
terror Turkey have been to a large
degree stripped of their Armenian in
habitants. OF the two million which
was the estimated number of Armen-
lans In Turkey, it is estimated that
one-half have died; that 250,000
more are refugees in Russia, Persia,
Egypt and elsewhere; that there are
perhaps 500, 900 still in the land,
mostly women and children left home
less and destitute. besides thousands
OF the more attractive Armenian girls
who were seized from their homes
or on the march and carried off to be-
come the possession of Turkish men.
1T is not necessary here to relate
the stories of suffering and outrage
which have attended this persecution.
They are too horrible to be described
in detail: too brutal to be believed
were they not reported by host of
witnesses. The Turk has been seen at
his worst; in his most cruel and IA
matte temper He has struck his Ar
menian subjects indiscrminately, re-
morselessy and with murderous in
tent. And he has wrought with Il
system and persistence quite unlike
his usual fiery but unstable self He
has done his best to clear his land Of
people whose thrift, industry, pa
uence and growing prosperity made
him insanely jealous. He has done
1t even to his own hurt, as he has
robbed his country of its efficient
men; from many city and town the
shoemaker, the tailor, the baker, the
dentist, the artizan, the banker, all
are gone: and the Turks are crying
~ zfrr1 11Vs
us?'
Americans Standing BY
If American Board missionaries
were war correspondents, there would
be some thrilling stories in the papers
these days. For instance, Rev. Rob-
ert 5. Stapleton has remained in Err
zerum all through the siege and since
the Russian occupation. His wife,
DR.. Stapleton, accompanied her poor
and sick people as refugees to Err
zingam. These were the only Ameri-
cans in the city. There is a little
hospital at Erzingam. and here one
of the missionaries, Miss Zenger, died
of typhus a year ago when she went
to bS,p in the epidemic that had laid
the city low.
DR.. and Mrs. l.. S. Crawford have
staid by their work at Trebizond, be-
ing with the consul, the only Ameri-
sion property to the consulate, it is
hoped, will have saved it from bonn
bardment.
Bitlis, a city in the Businesses of
Armenia, has figured of late in the
cablegrams owing to it's capture by
the Russians. The American board
has three educational institutions here
including a Mount Holyoke school.
The head of the mission, Rev George
p. Knapp, was forcibly removed by
the Turks to Diarbekir, where he died
Immediately and mysteriously. This
left two young women, one of whom
had gone to Turkey only in 1913, in
charge of all work in Bitlis, and the
more experienced Miss MacLaren
came down with the typhus. Miss
Shane gave a superb exhibition of
what an American girl can do in an
emergency by nursing her companion,
directing the mission, caring for the
native Christians and dealing with the
authorities. When affairs become too
acute, however. the American en-
bassador sent a government "kavass"
to remove the two girls to Harpoot,
where they joined the larger station.
The Russian troops are headed to-
ward Sivas, an important mission CEN
ter. where three American women,
Miss Willard, Miss Gage and Miss