The Chickasha daily express. (Chickasha, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1899-current, 1920-03-06
american Women Stirred
by Armenian Horrors
Eleanor Franklin Eean In Saturday
Evening Post Describes Conditions
Among People Of Western Asia.

Among People of Western Asia.
"NHERCIFUL GOD, it's all truei
AVA Nobody has ever told the
whole truthl Nobody couldr"
Thus Eleanor Franklin Egan, in
the Saturday Evening Post, quotes
Howard Heinz of Pittsburgh, Her
bert Hoover's representative in the
Near East, on the real conditions in
Armenia as he saw them with his
own eyes.
Mr.. Heinz had been one OF those
who had believed the stories Of star
vation and death in Armenia had
been exaggerated. Not until he went
himself to the Caucasus did his
views change. Then he was shaken
to the foundations of his soul by
what he saw.
Mrs. Egan, herself, admits she
went to Armenia in doubtful frame
of mind, She had been told by Mr.
Heinz after his return:
"'You will be sorry all your life
that you did go. What you will see
will make sears on you that YOU will
never get rid of. But, nevertheless,
you must so. 1t IS duty.
Fearful Awful Horrible !!
Unbelievable I" are some of the ad-
1ectlves Mrs. Egan says must be used
in speaking of conditions in the Near
East, where Near East Relief,
Madison Avenue, New York, sup
ported by contributions from the
American people, is conducting the
only organized effort TO save the
lives of these utterly destitute mil
lions. Everything she saw and heard
justified the necessity for quick and
generous aid from America. Her
story OF what she witnessed rein
forces the call OF the Near East Re
lief for aid for stricken Armenia.
""The Hunger grin is everywhere
evident" Mrs Egan writes. "Hhe
pitiful hundreds seemed to me to be
weeping constantly. Not profoundly
as in grief, but whimperngIy, ap-
pealingly MS in unbearable physical
distress A terrible population. Tn
speakably filthy and tatterdemalon
throngs; shelterless, death stricken
throngs milling from place TO place,
children crying aloud, women sobbing
in broken inarticulate lamentatiOn !;
men utterly hopeless and reduced to
staggering weakness, needless of the
tears rolling down their dirt-streaked
faces"
That is her picture of the Ar
menians most in evidence in Ar
menia. These are the throngs. Then
she turns to the mobs. "Large num-
bers here and there wide-eyel,
eager, hands outstretched in woltish
supplicaton teeth barred in a ghast-
ly grin that had long since ceased to
smile-an emacated skin-stretched
grin, fixed and uncomfortable"
as 1t any wonder" She asks, "that
l could not swallow my food?
threw it to the children in the raven
ing hordes and started small riots
The children fought together snarl-
cd and clawcd at one another for
small bits of army biscuit or morscls
of bully beef.
"And then was told that many Of
them were so starved thal solid food
was likely TO Kill thon instantly,
This was too terribly true, Yet in the
whole length and breadth Of the
land there was not an ounce of food
OF the kind necessary for such cases.
At Kars | saw one man die with
bread in his teeth. And H you will
consent to look with me upon a too
awful thing, ] viii add that he show
ed evidence of having eaten too much
grass.
Il went hungry in Armenia and
associate remembered pangs Of my
own with all my recolections Of the
terrible land. | had plenty of food
nth me but for days on end I could
not eat II was physical impos
sibiiiiy.