Bleeding Armenia: Its history and horrors under the curse of Islam

by Augustus Warner Williams; M. Smbat Gabrielean

America and Armenia both owe more than words can ever express to the energy, devotion and abundant generosity that sent Mr. W. W. Howard, in 1895, to investigate the situation in Armenia. In a later chapter the story of the great relief work will be told, meanwhile Mr. Howard will tell his story. “I have just returned from the interior of the devastated region of Armenia and the English language is impotent to produce a true picture of the actual condition of that distressed country, and a just regard for the conventionalities of civilized speech will not permit that the whole truth be told. The refined Christian mind can understand wickedness and iniquity up to a certain point, but beyond that point, it either refuses to believe, or it is incapable of receiving additional impressions.

“There are in Armenia at the present moment at least two hundred thousand persons fighting a death fight with famine! In the one province of Van, which is the center of Armenia, there are fully one hundred thousand persons, out of a total Armenian population of one hundred and forty-five thousand, in actual want of food.

“Many have already died of starvation, and thousands of villagers are barely keeping soul and body together by eating roots and herbs and sort of bread made of clover seed, flax or linseed meal, mixed with edible grass. I have brought to peaceful, prosperous America specimen loaves of this hunger-bread. Starving villagers, reduced to the verge of despair, are crowding into the cities to beg for food and work. Three thousand unwilling beggars walk the streets of the city of Van, like spectres of famine, asking bread from door to door, who six months ago were comparatively prosperous. Others, too proud to beg, but in as desperate condition, crouch in their ruined homes, waiting for a merciful death to end their sufferings.

“These are not hallucinations on my part, but are things which I myself have lately seen with my own eyes. Unless these wretched people receive immediate help, they will perish of starvation. They must have food and clothing or they cannot possibly survive the winter. They are now living on roots and herbs and edible grass, together with this terrible hunger-bread, the mere odor of which is enough to make a strong man shudder; but when winter begins, in October, the supply of edible grass and roots and herbs will be cut off. What will become of them then?

“The Armenians have no wheat, and no money with which to buy food. The Kurds and the Turks have taken everything, and the Armenians have nothing.

“The Armenians planted only half a crop this year, owing to the persecutions and exactions which beset them on all sides. In the early summer, when the young grain was green, the Kurds pastured their buffalos and their cattle in the growing wheat. Much of the crop was thus destroyed. Later, when that which remained of the wheat was ready for the harvest, the Kurds came down, cut off the heads of the ripened grain, and left the worthless stubble for the Armenians to live upon during the long and bitter winter. Even a persecuted Armenian cannot hope to maintain his family on wheat straw.

“Now, we have this condition at the present moment in Armenia: The crop planted this year was entirely inadequate to the needs of the population, and when the Kurds got through pasturing their cattle in the growing fields they harvested the ripened grain for their own use, leaving only dry grass for the Armenians. The systematic persecutions of the people, the exactions of the tax-gatherers, and the repeated robberies by the Kurds have left the Armenians absolutely penniless and foodless. Utterly unable to maintain life in their nearly ruined and wasted villages, the country people are wandering about from place to place, and crowding into the cities. There is no work for them to be had, and no chance of earning enough to keep starvation at bay.

“It is for the youngest Christian nation on earth to say whether the oldest shall perish and be no more, and whether the followers of Mohammed shall be the sole inhabitants of that land which, in the beginning of all things, was the Garden of Eden. If we turn a deaf ear now to the supplications of the starving thousands of fellow-Christians in Eastern Turkey, the coming of spring will see the troublous Armenian question forever at rest. There will be no more Armenian question, for there may be no more Armenians.

“If, on the contrary, the practical Christians of our own land desire to assist in preserving this ancient Christian race in the land in which it took descent from the grandson of Noah, the way is clear. A little help extended now, will not only save the lives of those who are dropping dead of hunger from day to day, but will provide work during the coming winter.

“I have necessarily been brief, and have dwelt entirely upon the starvation in Armenia, because it is the most urgent feature of the situation. I have not touched upon the Sassoun massacre, because as the Grand Vizier of Turkey truthfully says, ‘that is an old story.’ The victims of Sassoun were in many respects more fortunate than their fellows, for they had at least the privilege of dying quickly. They escaped persecution, torture, and starvation. There are very many hopeless creatures in Armenia to-day who would welcome a second Sassoun as an easy release from the burden and shame of living.