THE MASSACRE OF KAVARNA.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5215, 8 December 1877, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE MASSACRE OF KAVARNA.

Great indignation has been excited against the Turks by the massacre at ICavarna, a small village in the Eastern Lobrudscha close to the Black Sea. It forms part of a Greek colony, and was, till the war commenced, a very thriving place. The Governor at Varna sent a detachment of Circassians to protect it from the Cossacks, who were reported to he in the neighborhood. Many other Circassians seem also to have taken the same road on their own account. About 700 of them were collected in the neighborhood of the village, and they com- - pletely invested it. Having closed all communication by telegraph and otherwise, they tried to start a panic among the vilagers and get them to leave their homes. What the Circassians wanted was too obvious, and the Greeks refused to leave them in charge of their property. They contrived to have a message conveyed to the Greek Consul at Constantinople, and next day a police sergeant came from the adjoining village of Baltchik to persuade them to quit their homes. The Tcherbadjis or head men refused, and he advised them to go to the Konak—the Governor's house. They went, but instead of admitting only a deputation from each side, the police admitted a great mob, Circassians and Greeks indiscriminately. The Governor is accused of having proposed that the Greeks should pay the Circassians an indemnity of 100,000 piastres. One of the head men was protesting against such irregular exactions, when a Circassian chief pointed a pistol at him and shot him. A general fight ending in iu the massacre of the Greeks ensued. Most of the head men were shot down or sabred. One or two escaped during the confusion, and one, hastily drawing his pocket-book, purchased his life for 1000 piastres caimiJ (about £6). The Greeks outside hearing the shots, put themselves on the defensive, and fired upon the Circassians with the shot guns, &c, with which they were armed. Of course this was the signal for a general fight, and the Circassians, as if by a preconcerted arrangement, immediately set fire to the town in several places, and many lives were lost in consequence, some by being burnt to death and others by being shot down. The Circassians were armed with Winchesters, and the Greeks with shot guns, muzzle-loaders, and perhaps a few revolvers. It is easy to imagine in whose favor this unequal combat ended. The affray was terminated by the arrival of the Kaimakam (sub-governor) of Baltchik, and the appearance of a Turkish ironclad off Kavarna.

The fugitives brought up by this ironclad, by the English guard-ship Rapid, and by the Austrian Lloyd's steamer, were taken down to' Varna, where they were accommodated for a time in the Greek schools. The massacro has infuriated the Greeks both in Constantinople and in Athens, where the war party is now in the ascendant. Troops aro being despatched daily to the frontier of Thessaly, where Greek brigands are busy inciting insurrection. The Government has demanded reparation from the 3?orte, and a more inopportune affair could riot have happened for the Turks, as it may turn the scale in favor of a Greek rising. Mr. Layard has caused inquiries to be made on the spot as to who sent the Circassians into the district, and what was the nature of the demands made upon them, which they refused to comply with. After the massacre there was great alarm n*. Constantinople lest these Circassian scoundrels should be brought back to the capital, where they are already well known, but they had been disposed of iu some other quarter.