ON THE TRACK OF THE TURK
A rude shaking roused me from my slumbers at the early hour of
4.30 A.M., and I discovered myself in the clutches of a tremendous
Albanian, a skirted fellow wearing wicked weapons. His remarks were
unintelligible to me, but he presented a card containing a few words in
bad English. It was from a consul, a man who gave me much assistance,
and read:
‘Be ready for ten o’clock Turkish; an Albanian which can be trusted
shall bring horses, and you shall be taken to Krushevo.’
I surrendered.
This was the morning after my interview with Hilmi Pasha, at which
I had received the Turkish version of the Krushevo affair. Was I to
defeat the Governor-General again?
My dragoman and I were ready when the guide arrived, and in less than
eight hours we were ‘taken to Krushevo.’
The Monastir Valley was almost deserted. Bridges were down, and we
forded the rivers. Occasionally parties of soldiers and bashi-bazouks
were potting at something, perhaps at peasants. Near Krushevo we
passed Turks on the road, some carrying short adzes and axes in their
sashes, as the Albanian wears his yataghan; others bore hand-pumps of
reed.
Our difficulties were not serious. We traversed the long plain without
mishap, and began at noon to climb the tall mountain to the Vlach town
in the sky.
A party of Albanians drove pack-animals to the ruins of a Greek
monastery half-way up the mountain, to gather the petroleum tins, still
lying about the walls. There were tracks of the Turks everywhere. Here
a company had camped, there a battery had been posted, across a fissure
in the mountain Adam Aga’s bashi-bazouks had divided booty; barricades
of stone where the tents had been, earthworks for the guns, the carcase
of a stolen ass, killed to settle dispute between Moslem claimants.
There was trace of the insurgents, too; a dozen Turkish graves on a
level bank, around them a score of black ghosts, the wives of the slain
officials.
We reached the ruins of the guardhouse at the high point in the road
and dropped into the wrecked town; there was not a moment to lose. Our
stay in Krushevo was of doubtful duration; how long we could avoid the
clutches of the garrison was a question. There was yet daylight, and
the use of the camera might be restricted to-morrow. A Turk saw me hand
over my tired horse and anxiously unstrap my kodak. He knew what it
was, and told me not to use it. But this took a minute to translate,
and my instrument but a second to snap. He was a mild-mannered man, and
instead of taking me in hand himself, he set off to the kaimakam for
instructions, and I plunged into the wreckage, lost to him for an hour.
Natives in long gabardines and fezzes emerged from holes and hollow
walls and followed me. A young girl spoke English; she attended the
mission school at Monastir. A Vlach home from Rome to marry also spoke
English. He and his sweetheart had survived, though they had lost
everything they had. The insurgents had made him pay fifty pounds
(Turkish), for which he held a paper note redeemable with interest by
the Principality of Macedonia! Another Vlach invited me to his home,
which the Turks had not visited till the petroleum gave out; it was,
therefore, only pillaged.
The doors were splintered where the adzes had been applied. The
house was bare, stripped of every rug. A rough wooden table had been
constructed of a barn door and blocks of wood. The younger members of
the family were sent scurrying to the neighbours. From one came a bowl,
from another two iron forks and a spoon, which had been saved from the
Turks. We got a supper, all eating from the big bowl, the family with
their fingers.
We spent the night here. It was a memorable night.
The house stood high upon a rock and overlooked the area of hollow
walls. Ruined Vlachs slunk in through the night, sat with us on the
balcony, and, whispering, told us the tale of their city. In the dim
light of a crescent moon they pointed out the Konak where the Turks had
been killed, the woods above where the spies had been executed, the
Greek school which the insurgents had used as Government offices, and
‘Hell Hole,’ still containing bodies.
Once the Vlachs stopped abruptly and changed the subject to England.
What sort of a place was Angleterre?
‘A pretty good place,’ I replied, ‘but you should see America.’
‘They are the same country.’
I reverted to Krushevo.
The Vlach who spoke English interrupted:
‘The man who has just arrived is a spy.’
The Vlach traitor knew he was known, and looked sheepish. He did not
remain long, and I got the rest of the account that night, making notes
in the dark.
This is the story of Krushevo:
Just after midnight on the morning of August 2, 1903 (this was the
day that the general rising was proclaimed), a rattle of rifles and a
prolonged hurrahing broke the quiet of the peaceful mountain town. Some
three hundred insurgents under ‘Peto-the-Vlach’ and four other leaders
had taken the town by surprise. In the little rock-built caserne were
fifteen Turkish soldiers, and in the Konak and private houses were ten
or twelve Turkish officials and their families and a few soldiers. The
inhabitants of the town were Christians, Wallachians (or Vlachs) in
the majority, and a colony of Bulgarians. The soldiers were able to
grab their rifles and escape from the caserne, killing eight or more
insurgents as they fled. The night was black, and a steep, rocky slope
behind the building lent an easy exit. The Turkish telegraph clerk
likewise escaped; but the Government officials who were in the town
died to a man. The kaimakam was absent on a visit to Monastir.
After surrounding the Government buildings to prevent the escape of the
Turks, the insurgents broke into the shops and appropriated all the
petroleum they could find. This they pumped on the Konak, the caserne,
and the telegraph offices with the municipal fire-pump, and applied the
torch. From fifteen to twenty Turkish soldiers and officials were shot
down as they emerged from the flames; but the women and children were
given safe escort to a Vlach house, with the exception of one woman and
a girl who fell as they came out. Whether they were shot by accident or
intention on the part of a committaji is not known.
The flames spread, and a dozen private houses and stores were burned
with the Turkish buildings. Some, I believe, were set afire to light
the Konak and make certain the death of the Turks.
In the morning the insurgents placed red flags about the town and
formed a provisional Government, appointing a commission of the
inhabitants, consisting of two Bulgarians and three Wallachians, ‘to
provide for the needs of the day and current affairs.’ Without
instruction all the inhabitants discarded the fez.
[Illustration: VLACHS.]
Three chiefs of bands were appointed, a military commission, whose
duties were drastic. Their first act was to condemn to death two ardent
Patriarchists who had spied for the Turks on the organisation and
preparations of the local committee for insurrection in the district.
The men were made prisoners, taken into the woods, and slain.
On the first day the insurgents made a house-to-house visitation
and requested donations of food, and later required any lead that
could be moulded into rifle balls. More bands arrived, and a number
of Bulgarians and Wallachs of the town joined the insurgent ranks,
altogether augmenting the number to over six hundred. They began at
once to raise fortifications, and made two wooden cannon such as had
been used in the Bulgarian revolt of the ’seventies. The cannon were
worthless, and were left to the Turks, who brought one of them into
Monastir.
On the second day the men of the town who possessed wealth were
summoned to appear before the military commission. A list had been made
(the information given by members of the organisation whose homes were
in Krushevo) of the standing and approximate wealth of each ‘notable’
in the community. As these headmen appeared before the triumvirate a
sum in proportion to his means was demanded from each. No protests
and no pleading affected the commission, and in every instance the
money was forthcoming within the time limit. More than 1,000_l._ was
collected in this way, and in exchange was given printed paper money,
redeemable at the liberation of Macedonia.
On the following Sunday the priests of both the Greek and the Bulgarian
churches were ordered to hold a requiem for the repose of the souls of
the committajis who had fallen in the capture of Krushevo. Detachments
of insurgents were present, in arms, and gave the service a strange
military tone. Open-air meetings were held on the same day, and the
people were addressed by the leaders of the bands.
During the ten days of the insurgent occupation sentinels and patrols
saw to the order and tranquillity of the town, and no cruelties were
committed. Business, however, was paralysed. The market place was
closed and provisions diminished; and attempts to introduce flour
failed, the emissaries to the neighbouring villages being stopped by
Turkish soldiers and bashi-bazouks, who were gathering about the town.
The news of the capture of Krushevo reached Monastir August 3, but not
until nine days later was an attempt made to retake the place. By that
time three thousand soldiers, with eighteen cannon, had been assembled.
About the town, also, were three or four thousand bashi-bazouks from
Turkish villages in the neighbourhood.
When the guns were in position on favourable heights above the town,
Bakhtiar Pasha, the commander of the troops, sent down a written
message asking the insurgents to surrender. The insurgents refused,
and an artillery fire was begun. Most of the insurgents then escaped
through a thick wood which appeared to have been left open for them,
but some took up favourable positions on the mountain roads leading
into the town, others occupied barricaded buildings in the outskirts,
and resisted the Turks for awhile. Two of the leaders, Peto and
Ivanoff, died fighting.
Peto-the-Vlach was a picturesque character. He was thirty-five years
of age, a native of Krushevo. He had been fighting the Turks for
seventeen years. He was made prisoner in 1886 and exiled to Asia Minor.
But benefiting by one of the frequent general amnesties he returned
to Macedonia, rejoined the insurrectionary movement, and led the
organisation of Krushevo and the neighbouring district.
At a conference of the leaders immediately prior to the Turkish attack,
Peto declared that he would never surrender his town back to the
oppressor; the others could escape if they would, the Turks could not
again enter Krushevo except over his dead body. With eighteen men who
elected to die with him, he took up a position by the main road and
held it for five hours. It is said that he shot himself with his last
cartridge, rather than fall into the hands of the Turks.
The natives put on their fezzes again, and a delegation of notables
bearing a white flag went out to the camp of Bakhtiar Pasha to
surrender the town. On their way they were stopped by the soldiers
and bashi-bazouks and made to empty their pockets. Further on more
Turks, whose rapacity had been less satisfied, demanded the clothes
and shoes they wore. Arriving at headquarters of the general, situated
on an eminence from which there was a full view of the proceedings,
the representative citizens, left with barely cloth to cover their
loins, offered a protest along with the surrender. Bakhtiar had their
clothes returned to them, and told them he could do nothing with ‘those
bashi-bazouks’--though beside him sat Adam Aga, a notorious scoundrel
of Prelip, who had brought up the largest detachment of bashi-bazouks,
and with whom, subsequently, Bakhtiar is said to have shared the
proceeds of the loot.
The Turks entered the town in droves ready for their work, rushing,
shouting, and shooting. The bashi-bazouks knew the town, its richest
stores and wealthiest houses; they had dealt with the Vlachs on market
day for years. They knew that the Patriarchist church was the richest
in Macedonia. The carving on the altar was particularly costly, and
there were rich silk vestments and robes, silver candlesticks and
Communion service, and fine bronze crosses. They went to this church
first. Its doors were battered down in a mad rush, and in a few minutes
it was stripped by the frenzied creatures to the very crucifixes. Then
a barrel of oil was emptied into it and squirted upon its walls; the
torch was applied, and the first flames in the sack of Krushevo burst
forth.
The Greek church was on the market place among the shops. The Turks who
were not fortunate enough to get into the church went to work on the
stores. Door after door was cut through with adzes, the shops rifled of
their contents, and then ignited as the church had been. Two hundred
and three shops and three hundred and sixty-six private houses were
pillaged and burned, and six hundred others were simply rifled--because
the petroleum gave out.
Some of the inhabitants escaped from their homes and fled into the
woods. Turks outside the town met them and took from them any money
or valuables they had, and good clothes were taken from their backs.
A few pretty girls are said to have been carried off to the camps of
the soldiers. But the Turks were mostly bent on loot. The people who
remained in their homes were threatened with death unless they revealed
where they had hidden their treasure. Infants were snatched from their
mothers’ breasts, held at arm’s length, and threatened with the sword.
Krushevo, with its thrifty Wallachian population, was the wealthiest
city in Macedonia. It was not many hours’ ride from the railway
terminus at Monastir, and, for the purpose of making this journey,
many of the Vlachs possessed private carriages. There were pack and
draught animals and cattle to the number of many thousands. The Turks
appropriated these, drove off the cattle in herds, and loaded the
spoils from the stores and homes in the carriages and carts, and on the
backs of the Vlachs’ pack-animals. Seven thousand animals were taken by
the Turks--and not one went back.
This work went on for forty-eight hours. The first night was
demoniacal. Three hundred houses were in flames, and dashing in
and out among them were yelling fiends, firing rifles, slashing
Christians who happened to be in their way, fighting among themselves,
breaking in doors, splashing oil and firing houses, loading waggons
and pack-animals. Money, jewellery, silver plate, linen, furniture,
bedding, clothes, carpets went away to the Turkish villages in the
neighbourhood.
Vlachs are rich and thrifty, Turks indolent and poor. They are pleased
when the Sultan issues orders to suppress giaours.
Krushevo was built on rock in a slight depression in the top of a
range of mountains. The houses were constructed solidly of stone, with
thick slate roofs all cut from the mountain-side. Hilmi Pasha had
explained to me that the ‘unfortunate’ conflagration was caused by the
explosion of shells, which, he argued, any civilised nation would have
employed in capturing the town. Every house in Krushevo was ignited
individually. The gates of six hundred houses which suffered only
pillage bore the hacks of adzes and axes. Soldiers and bashi-bazouks,
holding hands--as Turks do--still lurked about with their adzes in
their belts. On the walls, most of which still stood, stains of
petroleum trailed down. I entered one house through which two cannon
balls had passed. But there was not a mark of flame as a result.
The sacking of Krushevo made a deep impression in Monastir, where
the news soon arrived, and instructions came back to the Turkish
commander to secure a paper signed by all the townsfolk declaring that
the work had been done by the insurgents. A few of the inhabitants
signed from fright, but most of the Vlachs were not intimidated.
The Governor-General concocted a story to tell foreign consuls and
correspondents.
A strange fact which puzzled many was that, with the exception of the
Bulgarian church, no section of the Bulgarian quarter was plundered.
It was said by the Greeks--who tried by every means to incriminate
the insurgents--that the leaders of the bands bought immunity for
the Bulgarian inhabitants by a payment to Bakhtiar Pasha of the
money they had collected from the Vlachs. But this widely circulated
statement, which went out from Athens, could hardly be true. That
such a negotiation could have been conducted at such a moment is
hardly probable. The ranks of the insurgents were largely filled by
Wallachians; the insurgents had lost two hundred men in resisting the
Turks; it is doubtful that the leaders could have got alive to close
quarters with Bakhtiar Pasha; and most doubtful of all is that the Turk
would have respected any terms made with the committajis. The reason
that the Bulgarian houses were not entered is either that the Turks
dreaded dynamite or that the poorer Bulgarian quarter was not worth
plundering; perhaps both these reasons applied. It was well known to
the Turks that the Bulgarians, who are small farmers, sheep raisers,
and labourers, were miserably poor; while the Wallachs, who travelled
as far as Salonica, were mostly merchants and comparatively well to do.
The soldiers, having captured no insurgents, made prisoners of 116
innocent Vlachs, chained them together, two by two, and marched them to
Monastir, taking along a wooden cannon as evidence of their guilt. On
the road they brained five men. The surviving prisoners were at once
released, through consular intervention, I think.
After remaining in the woods for two days the terror-stricken people
who had escaped from the town began to return. They found bodies of
their relatives and friends lying about the streets, Turkish dogs, I
was told, gorging upon them. The people sought to bury their dead,
but that was not generally permitted. With some exceptions the bodies
were gathered by the soldiers and thrown into shallow trenches in the
streets. But this was done with no thoroughness, and three weeks after
the recapture I saw in a dry canal, which ran through the town under
many of the houses, thigh bones and backbones, ribs, and skulls, picked
clean. Many of the inhabitants had hidden in this partly covered ‘hell
hole,’ and some, driven out by chills and the pangs of hunger, had been
shot on emerging.
[Illustration: ‘HELL HOLE,’ KRUSHEVO.]
The drug store of the town had been sacked and burned, and the doctor
who owned it had been killed. A young and less efficient medical man
was left alone to care for 150 wounded. The Roman Catholic sisters at
Monastir applied to Hilmi Pasha for permission to go to the relief of
Krushevo and take medicines. But they had told foreign consuls and
correspondents what they had seen at Armensko, and Hilmi replied, in
Mohamedan fashion, ‘Those who will die, will die, and those who will
live, will live.’
I attempted to enter some of the Bulgarian homes at Krushevo, but they
were still tightly barred. The inmates pleaded with me to pass on lest
the Turks should come after me and punish them for telling tales. But
the Vlachs were bolder; they besought me to enter and see the havoc
the Turks had wrought, to see the wounded women, children, and infants
lying on the floors, their injuries barely tended, the wounds of many
mortifying, as the stench told too well. And men, women, and children
died from wounds not vital.
Each evening at sundown the awful stillness of Krushevo was shocked by
three long-drawn, triumphant shouts from a thousand throats. They were
Turkish cheers at evening prayer for Abdul Hamid, the Padisha.
We were mounted ready to leave Krushevo when a native woman came out
of the crowd bringing a small boy. She went up to the interpreter and
spoke to him in a whisper.
‘She wants you to take the boy back to Monastir,’ said my man. ‘She
says no native is allowed to leave Krushevo, and she wants to get her
boy to a safer place.’
‘We can’t do that,’ I replied. I was apprehensive about the journey
back.
But the woman wept, so I took the boy, and she kissed my hand. He
was about eight years old. He had no luggage but a loaf of heavy
bread, and he wore but a single garment, a gabardine. He sat quietly
behind my saddle and did not bother me much, and towards sundown we
reached Monastir safely. The horses picked their way slowly over the
rough cobble stones. As we wound into a side street the grip about me
loosened, and I turned to see the youngster slip down from the horse.
He waved his hand to me and ran like a hare down a narrow lane.
‘That is all right,’ said the dragoman, as we went on our way to the
mission.
We never saw the boy again.