The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1919-01-10
The HORRORS OF ALEPPO
German Blames His People for
Terrible Conditions.

Extracts from report to the ger
man government by DR.. Martin Me-
page, higher grade teacher in the
German Technical School at Aleppo)
As teachers in the German Tech
meal School at Aleppo, we feel 1t our
duty to draw attention to the tact tnat
our educational work will forfeit ITS
moral basis and the esteem OF the
natives if the German government Is
not in a position to put a stop to tne
brutality with which the wives ana
children of slaughtered Armenlans are
being treated here.
Out of conveys numbering two or
three thousand men, women and chill
dren when they left their homes on
the Armenian plateau, only two or
three hundred survivors arrived here
in the south. The men are slaught-
cred on the way; the women and girls
dishonored and killed by Turkish sol
diers and officers. The thousands
shrink to hundreds and the hundreds
to tiny remnants, and even these rem
nants are driven on till the last is
dead.
Indeed, for the exile who came to
hlSpDO, uSlp was lCdiiy oSSASSS' W
could only afford those doomed to
death few slight alterations OF their
agony.
What we saw with our own eyes
here in Aleppo was really onlv the
last scene in the great tragedy OF the
determination OF the Armenians. 1t
was only minute fraction OF the hor-
rible drama that was being played OUT
simultaneously in all the other prov
inces of Turkey. Many more appalling
things were reported by the engineers
of the Bagdad Railway when they
came back from their work on the
section under construction, or by Ter
man travellers who met the conveys
of exiles on their journeys. Many OF
these gentlemen had seen such APP
palling sights that they could eat
nothing for days.
The Consuls are of opinion that, so
far, probably about one million Ar
menians have persisted in the mas
sacres of the last few months. OF
this number, one must reckon that at
least half are women and children
who have either been murdered or
have succumbed to starvation.
The object of the deportation is
the determination of the Armenian
nation.
The opinions of our German Con-
suls and of many foreigners resident
in the country, about the Armenian
massacres, will some day become
known through their reports. l can
say nothing about the verdict of the
German officers in Turkey. noticed,
when in their company, an ominous
silence or convulsive effort to
change the subject when any German
of warm sympathies and independent
judgment began to speak about the
Armenians' frightful sufferings.
The Young Turk has the European
ideal of united national state al
ways floating before his eyes. He
hopes to Turkify the non-Turkish
Mohammedan races. The Christian
nations - Armenians, Syrians and
Greeks-alarm him by their cultural
and economic superiority, and he sees
in their religion an obstacle to Turki-
flying them by peaceful means. They
have, therefore, to be exterminated or
converted to Mohammedanism by
force. The Turks do not suspect that,
in doing this, they are saving off the
branch on which they are sitting
themselves. Who is to bring progress
to Turkey is not the Greeks, Armen-
ians and Syrians, who constitute more
than a quarter of the population of
the empire1
We who have been teaching Greeks,
Armenians, Arabs, Turks and Jews in
German schools in Turkey for years
can only declare that the pure Turks
are the most unwilling and incapable
of all our pupils. While students from
Christian races are often brilliant and
as a rule patient and persevering.
We shall not be able to dissipate the
Turkish nations conviction that the
Armenian massacres were ordered by
Germany, unless energetic steps are
taken by German diplomats and Of
ficers.
Only just before l left Aleppo last
May the crowds of exiles encamped
at Ras-el-Ain on the Bagdad Railway,
estimated at 10000 women and chill
dren, were slaughtered to the last one