The daily star-mirror. (Moscow, Idaho) 1911-1939, 1921-07-07
YOUTH SOLD AS
SLAVE BY TURKS
Armenian Lad Tells Thrilling
Story of His Escape
from Arabia.
SAVED BY BRITISH SOLDIERS
Father, Mother and Sister Exiled Into
Mesopotamia Desert Die Of Starva-
tion-Reaches Chicago Through
Help of Near East Relief.

than fiction is illustrated by the story
told by Bedrus Sislian seventeen
year-old Armenian boy, who escaped
from slavery in Arabia and arrived
in Chicago recently.
His story of slavery and flight; the
! exiting of his father, mother and sis
ter into the Mesopotamia desert and
their subsequent death from starva-
ton; the meeting in ConStantinople
between Bedrus and his brother, Ed
ward, who is seaman on the United
States destroyer No. $780, was told in
the office of the Near East relief, with
Mrs. Ardashes Sislian of TAO North
Wells street, Bedrus sister-in-law.
acting as the interpreter.
Until about three years ago the Sis
liam family was living in comparative
comfort in the city of Adana. which is
close to Tarsus in Cilicia. One day
the Turkish soldiers came into the
city and ordered all the non-Moham-
medan people to leave their homes and
go toward the Mesopotamia desert.
Hastily, the mother and father cut
the hair of the three girls in the fam
lily and daubed their faces with mud
to prevent their sale into slavery.
Bedrus, then fourteen years old, did
not escape that fate because, he says,
he was strong and the Turks saw in
him the making of a farm laborer.
Family Separated; Boy Sold.
The family was separated--the
father, mother and girls being driven
to Mosul near Nineveh, a distance of
about 500 miles from their nome, and
the boy was sold to caravan of Ar
abian traders for sum equivalent to
an English pound The traders in turn
sold him to a rich farmer for a sum
equivalent to somewhat less than
three English pounds.
This farmer told Bedrus that he
would adopt him as his son and make
him his heir if the Armenian lad
would renounce his Christian faith and
become Mohammedan. The lad kept
his own counsel until they arrived at
a small hotel in Haman The hotel
keeper, an Arabian Christian, whis-
pered to the boy that in three days
he would help him to escape. While
the farmer was busy with his affairs
in the town. the hotelkeeper sent the
boy to a friend, another Arabian Chris
tan. who owned lunch room in an
other part of the town. Here Bedrus
worked for seven months as waiter
detachment of the British army
came to the village and picked up
many of the Armenian orphans, in
Guiding Bedrus, and took them to a
newly organized orphanage in Mosul.
The boy did not know his parents
we're refugees in that city until they,
with other Armenian parents seeking
lost children, came to the Orphanage
md found .Bedrus.
Die Of Starvation.
The family reunion was happy
0ne, but food was scarce. Within the
year the eldest sister, eighteen years
Of age, died of starvation. Five
months later the father died Of the
same cause The mothers death fol-
owed in two weeks. The boy man.
aged, with the help Of the English
army, to get back to Adana, accom-
panied by his two younger sisters, who
alter were taken by the British to Port
Said. Bedrus found job In tailor
shop In his home town, where he
worked for four months, when Turk
sh soldiers again looted the homes OF
he Armenians and sold the boys and
girls into slavery and he fed toward
Beirut.
There he worked as dock labOrer
or three months, when, fearing the
Turks would find him and return him
o slavery, he started to Constantine |
de There an Armenian society gave |
lin job without pay except his
BOARD, in a general store, where he |
stayed for six months.
The boy told of meeting his brother
edward In Constantin6ple. The other |
brother, Ardashes, in Chicago, was |
with and through the |
Chicago headquarters Of the Near |
Cast relief this brother and his wife |
ent money for the transportation OF |
he ex-slave to the ''land of the free"
rhe youth plans to work to get enough I
money to bring his fOurteen-year-O |
lister, who is IN an orphanage in Cy-
rus, to this country.
LII. A.&~. NaII>a