DISTRESS IN CONSTANTINOPLE.

Thames Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2836, 18 March 1878, Page 2

DISTRESS IN CONSTANTINOPLE.

Our (Times) correspondent, under date Pera, January 23rd, telegraphs the following Appeal:— " " The distress in Constantinople is utterly appalling. About 80,000 fugitives from different Provinces, of all creed* and races in the Empire, have arrived within the last ten days, and continue to arrive by thousands a day. Mauy hate neither food nor shelter, and are scantily clad, although the winter is unusually severe. The present means, official and voluntary, are utterly inadequate to cope with this wide spread distress. Mosques, schools, barracks, and caravanserais are crowded. The Sultan has given up several Palaces, and many wealthy inhabitants of the town have filled their houses with fugitives^but the means of subsistence are altogether insufficient. "Accounts from Bourgas, Aides, Rodosto and Tcliolou are most heartrending. At the latter place, a station onv the line of railway, where about 8000 refugees, principally women and children, have collected, an eyewitness states that during the last few days about 200 hare perished of cold and hunger. During the transit many women and children died in the trains and were cast out into the snow. Those who arrirehero are scarcely better off*. Instances have occurred of women giving birth to children in the streets, and mother and infant being found frozen in the morning. "Immediaterelief is most urgently required to confront this increasing mass of misery, all existing sources of charity being nearly exhausted. ■ A committee was formed last night by the leading members of every foreign community represented in Constantinople, including the Consuls, the principal bankers, lead* ing merchants, and Correspondents of London newspapers and many Continental journals." ...