London, Nov. 16, 1895.--The representative of the United Press
at Constantinople reports, under the date of November 15th, that
at six o'clock, on the evening of November 14th, M. A. Jewett,
United States consul at Sivas, sent a telegram to United States
Minister Terrell informing him that in the disturbances which had
taken place at Sivas, eight hundred Armenians and ten Turks had
been killed, and that, according to official reports, a large
body of Kurds were then approaching the town. Mr. Jewett gave
no details of the disorders, but the discrepancy in the figures
shows that the Turkish allegations that the Armenians were the
aggressors are absolutely untrue, and that the Armenians were
deliberately massacred.
From a private letter from Sivas, Nov. 21, 1895.
"The air was full of wild rumors--but we could get at nothing that
seemed to have any substantial truthful basis. Dr. Jewett--our
consul--was on the alert. He interviewed the Governor-General,--and
asked for protection for us, for the U.S.A. vice-consul, for our
schools, and for the American Consulate. These were cheerfully
promised, and the next day, Tuesday, November 12th, at midday, like
a cyclone, Sivas was smitten, as I wrote you last week. Mr. P. and
I had steadfastly refused to believe that such violence could
take place in our city, and we were totally unprepared for the
shock. Our walls had been taken down,--that is, our front wall
had been,--a distance of 125 feet. Our girls' school-building had
been cut off seven and a half feet on the southwest corner, and
both our schools and our dwellings were in an entirely unprotected
state. The day of the terrible disaster, the city water was cut
off from our street, and for several days the heat was unusual
for this time of the year. The dead were buried on Thursday,
under the direction of the government, in the Armenian graveyard,
a priest of the Gregorian faith being present to offer a prayer.
"Our good native pastor was in the market to attend to the
interests of his people, when, at a given signal, a tribe of
mountaineers, known as Karsluks suddenly fell upon the Armenians
with clubs, and were soon followed by Circassians and local
Mussulmen, with knives and pistols; quickly and lastly the
police force and regular soldiers joined in with their Martini
rifles. It was a combined onslaught of four other races against
the Armenians. It has been declared that the Armenians were in
armed revolt against the government, and this was done to put
down the revolution. When the attack was made against them, we
fail to find that there was any armed resistance, so far as we
can learn. If the Armenians were premeditating an armed attack
upon the Mussulmen, we never could find it out, but that proves
nothing here or there, as missionaries are well known not to
sympathize with revolutionists.
"Badveli Garabed died a martyr; his life being offered him three
times if he would deny Christ. He bore noble testimony before
many witnesses, then fell in their presence, sealing his faith
and testimony with his blood.
"Yours affectionately,"
Further Information about Sivas by the Missionaries who wrote to
their friends Nov. 12, 1895.
"The cyclone which struck on the 12th reached Marsovan on the
15th. Don't be deceived by any of the silly government statements
which attribute all these massacres to the Armenians. It was
a deliberate plan on the part of the government to punish the
Armenians. The Sultan was irritated because he was forced to give
them reforms, so he has had 7,000 Armenians killed to show his
power since he signed the scheme of reform.
"The killing was permitted to go on here all last week; forty-six
were killed Saturday, November 16; sixteen on Sunday, and many
more on the following day. The total number killed is about 1,200
Armenians and ten Turks.
"It is a fact that the Kaimakam of Gurun telegraphed to the Vali
at Sivas, saying in effect that there is not an Armenian left at
Gurun. The Armenians at Sivas made no resistance, but at Gurun
they tried to defend themselves from the butchery, and suffered
the worse for it.
"In order to have an excuse for attacking the Armenians at Sivas,
the government smashed the windows of Turkish shops and charged
it to the Armenians. Food is scarce, and everything was carried
off from the Armenian shops. There will be terrible suffering
all over this country."
Another letter from Sivas, according to the Constantinople
correspondent, gives many details which all go to show that the whole
movement against the Armenians is directly traceable to the head
of the Turkish government, who proclaimed that his great desire was
to keep always in view, "The safeguard of the rights of the people,
and the maintenance of public confidence."
"What cruel mockery; Trebizond, Erzeroum, Bitlis, Marash,
Harpoot and how many more towns rise up and point the finger
of everlasting scorn and indignation to fix on Abdul Hamid
Khan the stigma of everlasting infamy! The deliberate murder
of thousands of innocent and industrious men, the exposure of
ten times that number of women and children and aged persons to
absolute degradation and destitution, will justify the name of
Kanukiar--the Bloodletter--which has been applied to the head
authority of the Empire."
The Riot in Sivas.
"Last week, Monday, November 11, was one of the loveliest days
Sivas ever had. Although there were many rumors of trouble afloat,
we could get at nothing which seemed to have any greater foundation
than the fear that something might happen.
"I went unattended to the boys' school. On my way to school
that afternoon, I met a group of excited soldiers. They said
nothing to me, but their strangely excited manner impressed me
as being out of the usual order. When I began my class work,
the boys, instead of answering my questions, broke forth with
inquiries. They wanted to know if the soldiers were going to
shoot them, and if they were going to be killed. That was the
rumor afloat. I hushed them up as best I could, and told them it
was not right to speak of such things. I succeeded in quieting
the children, but went home full of anxiety.
"The next day, Tuesday, a large gang of Turkish workmen gathered in
our street to continue the public work of building up some walls
which had been torn down at the Vali's orders, for the purpose
of widening the street. Armenian carpenters were employed on our
building. Nothing out of the ordinary occurred until the workmen's
'bread time,' about 11 o'clock, was finished.
"Then all the Osmanli (Turkish) gang suddenly raised a hue and
cry; each one grabbed a pick or club, anything he could lay his
hands on, and a wild rush was made for the market-place. The air
was filled with yells of the furious men, who rushed along madly.
"The Protestant pastor remained at home on the day before,
but on Tuesday was in a shop when the signal for the raid was
given. A perfect cyclone of marauders rushed in and clubbed the
unsuspecting men in the stores to death before they could offer
any resistance. After the outbreak there was not a single Armenian
place of business left in the market.
"No list of the dead was made out, and none could be. The victims
were all buried in an immense trench in the Armenian burying-ground
two days afterwards. There were between seven and eight hundred
bodies thus buried."