THE GHOULS OF ASIA MINOR

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2631, 29 November 1915, Page 5

THE GHOULS OF ASIA MINOR

ANOTHER DREADFUL RECITAL MASSACRE AND OUTRAGE <iy T«legrapli—Press Association—Copyright (Rec. November i! 8, 5.5 p.m.) London, Novomber. 27. word Bryce, in si letter to tlio newspapers, ears: "The latest evidence of atrocities ill Northern and Eastern Anatolia confirms the dreadful certainty of this horrible story. The civilised world is powerless to intervene at presents, but we must bear .'these unspeakable crimes in constant memory against the final day'of reckoning'. A careful estimate ot the loss of life up to August 15 places the total l at over lialf a million. The Turkish police are constantly using whips and clubs, and many of flip women axe black and blue.

"A writing from Tifiisj states that Djavid Bey was expelled from Van at the end of May, and iled southward, with eight-thousand soldiers, whom he oalled his 'Butcher Battalions.' They massaored most of the Christians at lairt, Djavid ordering his soldiers to burn two' Armenian bishops in the public ! "The Turks at Mush, early in July, disarmed the Armenians, and in order ' to secure a largo ransom, the notables of the town and the headmen of the villages were subjected to revolting tor- • ■ tures, their finger-nails, and then their toe-nails, being forcibly extracted, their teeth knocked out; and, in some oases, ■ their noses whittled, the victims dying in. lingering agonies. ,"The Armenians of Mush then entrenched themselves in the cliurohes and stone-built houses and fought for four days, but the Turkish artillery, manned by German officers, broke s down the positions, and every man was killed.. The. Moslem, rabble then descended' upon the Armenian women and children, and drove them into la,rge camps. A ghastly scene, incredible, but 1 confirmed, beyond a doubt, then followed. The . Turks fired large wooden sheds at Aliejan, Mograkom, Uhaskegh,' and other villages, roasting helpless women , and children to death. ■ Many of the women threw their children away, .and some knelt down and prayed amid the flames, while others shrieked for help, but tho executioners were unmoved; With unparalleled savagery they grasped the infants by tho legs and hurled them into the fire, calling out to their burning mothers: 'Here are your cubs!' . "Thirty thousand Turks and Kurds surrounded fifteen hundred Armenians in .the Hill Country of Sahun. The mountaineers put up a desperate struggle: men, women, and children fought . with knives and scythes, and rolled blocks, of stone down the steep slopes. During the final hand-to-hand combat women were seen thrusting knives into the throats of the Turks. 'When every man had been killed several of the young women, some with infants ill their arms, threw themselves from the rocks to avoid capture."