But even as he worked in this way the tide of the great war flowed towards Urumia. The people there were mostly Assyrians with some Armenians; they were Christians. They looked southward across the mountains to the British Army there in Mesopotamia for aid.
But, as the Assyrians looked up from Urumia to the north they could already see the first Turks coming down upon the city. Thousands upon thousands of the Assyrians from the country villages crowded into the city and into the American missionary compound, till actually even in the mission school-rooms they were sleeping three deep—one lot on the floor, another lot on the seats of the desks and a third on the top of the desks themselves.
"Hold on; resist; the help of the British will come," said Dr. Shedd to the people. "Agha Petros with a thousand of our men has gone to meet the British and he will come back with them and will throw back the Turks."
The Turks and the Kurds came on from the north; many of the Armenian and Assyrian men were out across the plains to the east getting in the harvest; and no sign of succour came from the south.
II
Through the fierce hot days of July the people held on because Dr. Shedd said that they must; but at last on the afternoon of July 30th there came over all the people a strange irresistible panic. They gathered all their goods together and piled them in wagons—food, clothes, saucepans, jewelry, gold, silver, babies, old women, mothers,—all were huddled and jumbled together.
The wagons creaked, the oxen lurched down the roads to the south, the little children cried with hunger and fright, the boys trudged along rather excited at the adventure yet rather scared at the awful hullabaloo and the strange feeling of horror of the cruel Kurdish horsemen and of the crafty Turk.
Dr. Shedd made one last vain effort to persuade the people to hold on to their city; but it was impossible—they had gone, as it seemed, mad with fright.
He and his wife went to bed that night but not to sleep. At two o'clock the telephone bell rang.
"The Turks and Kurds are advancing; all the people are leaving," came the message.