The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1921-05-18
Erivan: Capital of
a Hunted Nation
Graphic Description of Pictures
cue Section of Armenia

cue Section or Armenia
Washington, May 14-Erivan, lat
est capital of Armenia, which press
reports say has been recently piilaged
by Bolshevik conouerors,f is n
subject of the following communica-
ton to the National Geographic So
ciety from Maynard Owen Williams,
Mr.. Williams, who has been collect
ing information and pictures for the
Society in the new countries OF Eu-
rope and Asia. writes:
.sIn Vain and Erivan the Armenians
had two of the most Delightfully."- sit
uated of cities. Van, the ancient cap
itaI, backed by ten thousand foot
mountains, looks across the wonder
fully blue. lake of the same name to
: the rough crater rim Of Nimrud and
the perfect cone of Sipan, with the
snowy ridge Of the mountains OF
Kurdistan to the south. Since the
spring of 1918 when the Turks swept
through toward TabriZ. no Armenian
has lived in that Inflated city over
which war has washed in repeated
waves of terror and destruction.
Centre of Armenian Nationality
Eriyan, the new capital. is situated
on the northern edge OF the wide plain
OF the River Arax, which stretches
from that city toi the slopes Of 1900
foot Ararat, one OF the worlds lord
uest mountains. It was the city to-
ward which the Armenians retreated
time and again during the war and
it has been the city around which Ar
menian nationality has centered dur
ing the stormy period since the Arm
istice.
Behind Erivan rises line of hills
which strech northward to lofty
Lake Gokcha, with a famous old
monastery ON an island near its wes-
tern shore, and through these noun
tains, some of them more than two
miles high, there winds the well built
military road which leads to Akstafa
and to Tif1is. Steep ascents are nego-
tiated by intricate hairpin turns and
the views as one dashes. along in
motor car are a lovely succession Of
prosperous valleys and wooded smoun-
tain sides.
sErivan is also connected with Tiff
lis. Georgia. and Tabriz. Persia, by a
railway, which however has been in
operation very little since 1918. In
March of 1918, the American relief
workers who had built UP a large
warehouse and many kinds of work
shops in Erivan. were forced to leave.
Two OF them, John Elder and James
Arrol, who had gone down through
the Caucasus to open Y. M. c. A.
work, remained behind and did what
they could to alleviate the sufferings
Of the people until the road to the
outside world was open.
Pass From Terror to Terror
surrounded as they have been by
many foes, the Armenians of Erivan
have passed from one terror to an
other. They have had dealings with
Turk and Bolshevik in an effort to
save what is left Of the vanishing
race.
Twelve miles away toward the
River Arax, the Armenian Swanee,
there is the quaint little town Of
Etchmiadzin, the home of the Ar
menian KathoIikos, who is chosen by
the entire Armenian nation, including
those in India and Russia as we'll as
those in Turkey and Persia. and who
is the spiritual head Of the national
church which has been the kernal
OF Armenian national life for CEN
turses.
s'Eriyan itself is a place of little in
terest, although it contains the ruins
of Turkish fortress four centuries
old and the Blue Mosque of Hussein
All Khan, whose enameled tiles rival
those at the Tombs of Shakh Zindi
in San1arkand Each year in this
Christian city there is a passion play
depicting the sassination Of Hus-
sein, the son Of Ali, enacted by the
Moslem population.
Plain Dotted With Village Ruins
There it stands, nondescript
city between the mountains into
which the helpless people have re-
peatedfy retreated and the rich plain
of the Arax, dotted with the ruins Of
Armenian and Tatar villages And
across the hazy plain, standing alone
IN it's majesty rises the huge mass
Of Ararat, snow-capped and impress
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