“They took all the articles which were useful and broke everything they had no use for. They tore up every place in the hope of finding something valuable.”
A letter received from an Armenian resident on the seacoast of Cilicia, said:
“The government has taken away all the arms from the Armenians of Chok Marsovan, who were armed to protect themselves against fifteen thousand Bashi-Bazouks, who were marching on them. Since then the Turks have reduced to ashes the villages of Engerli and Ojakli, which contained respectively three hundred and two hundred and fifty houses. They have plundered seventy-five houses in the Armenian village of Najarli. They set on fire the houses in the presence of the regular soldiers. Now all the villagers are reduced to the utmost distress. More than one hundred farms have been plundered, and many people butchered in the houses and in the gardens.”
Every account from survivors of the massacres who succeeded in reaching places of safety, disclosed some new and revolting trait of Moslem ferocity and hatred against Christianity. A veritable crusade of Mohammedan fanaticism ruled the hour. Whole villages and towns, and whole Christian quarters in cities were driven like helpless sheep into the Moslem fold.
Aintab, a city of forty-five thousand inhabitants had its baptism of blood. The massacre and pillage began in the markets and in those parts of the city where Christian houses offered easy points of attack, crowds rushed in every direction while pistol and gun shots with cries of fear, anger and defiance made an exhibition of the most fearful tumult and confusion.
After the Kurds and Turkish soldiers of Harpoot had plundered and burned nearly all of the Christian houses in the missionary quarter of the city, including eight of the mission buildings which were then in flames, when massacre was rife and the air was rent with the cry of the wounded and dying, nearly five hundred Christian refugees with the missionaries, driven from place to place by fire and bullet, found themselves in the large, new stone building of Euphrates College. The Turkish officers, seeing that in order to reach the refugees they must withdraw the Americans whom they feared to kill, attempted to induce the missionaries to come out from the building “that they might be the better protected.” Dr. Barnum (a missionary for thirty-nine years) replied, “You can protect us here better than anywhere else; we shall remain and if you burn the building we will die with these Christians.” They were all spared. Certainly the age of heroism is not past.
The city of Oorfa is one of the most ancient in the world. It is the Edessa of the time of Christ where Abgar reigned as King (see Chapter I.)—the Ur of Chaldea, where the patriarch Abraham was born.
It was one of the great heathen cities to which the disciples went immediately after Pentecost and where they were most gladly received. In this city, on October 27th, 1895, began an awful slaughter, which continued for two days. When the massacre was yet proceeding, a Muezzin ascended to the steeple of the Armenian church and began to call the faithful to prayer. During the two days’ disturbance three thousand Christians were slaughtered by a single Hamidieh regiment and a force of Bedouins and all their property was either looted or destroyed. Among other horrors, one hundred and fifty wounded Armenians were thrown down a well and petroleum having been poured over them the whole mass of human beings were set on fire and perished in most awful agony.
For two months, the Christian population of Oorfa experienced all the vicissitudes of a veritable “Reign of Terror.” During all this time the Christians ventured beyond the precincts of their own homes only at the risk of their lives. Nor were they secure even in their homes. For six or seven weeks the soldiers of the government went from house to house almost daily, and after forcing an entrance, offered the inmates the option of becoming Moslems, or being killed on the spot.
When the general onslaught began on December 29th, the Christians sought the refuge of their churches and every other possible place which they hoped might shelter them from the fury of their fiendish assailants. Many took refuge in wells, some under manure heaps, while others had their friends cover them under piles of charcoal. For some of these their shelters proved to be a living grave. Two hundred and forty-six persons took refuge in the home of the American Missionary, Miss Shattuck.