Yesterday, after service, a nice looking middle-aged woman came to me with her arm in a sling and said it pained her, and could I do something for it. I took her upstairs and called Nurse ——, and we found a stab in her shoulder and dressed it. She said she and her son were stabbed by bashi bazouks on the way. To stop the bleeding they had stuffed in earth, and this and the blood had caked well.
I took Nurse —— to see some other patients. The old woman who usually raises herself and asks for water seemed unconscious, and didn’t answer even when I said “cold water” and put a few drops on her head. She was alive but getting cold, and died in the night. This morning the man in the corner was also released. He came only two days ago, and was in a most wretched condition.
The other night I found the woman with short grey hair just able to reach up and call: “Water, water.” An Armenian woman lifted her head and she drank, but fell back at once, and we found her hands icy cold, and saw she was dying. We straightened out her rags, and got an old pillow under her head. She was soon released.
This morning Nurse —— and I started out again for the churchyard. Sitting opposite the gate was the fat police commissioner who is so cruel. He called out to “Madame ——.” I stopped and explained that we were only looking after a woman who had met with an accident on the road. But I was told decidedly that I was not to go into that yard again; that the Government would send food! doctors! medicines! and foreigners were not to help or interfere. So I returned.
So many young women and pretty girls come to me here and in the street, asking with tears what is to become of them.
7th September.
The woman and her son with sword-cuts came this afternoon. No one was around, so the gate-man let them in and I dressed the wounds. Both doing well. I gave new bandages and other needfuls, so that, if they could not come again, or were driven on the road to-morrow, they could care for the wound. They were most grateful. They are Protestants, and intelligent; were robbed of money. I gave them a little for food—shall give more if I see them again. AC. got through; no trouble about keeping boys in the yard now. Little fellows run for all. Massacre near Yozgad; the air heavy with the odour of unburied bodies. Some of our travellers came by them. Dr. BB.[[159]] and the hospital still in X. when the exiles left, but things in a bad way generally. AD.’s postcard tells of AC. BM. seems quiet at present.
—th September.
The woman I was forbidden to nurse got over here yesterday leaning on a friend and by help of a cane. George was here, and we gave the heel a good dressing but couldn’t get all the broken bone out. The flesh is getting clean. The poor old woman cried and said she was hungry. I fed her and gave her a little money. She hopes to get here again to-morrow, but she suffers excruciating pain when her foot rests on the ground.
There will soon be a lull, I suppose, as the town is getting well emptied, not a Christian butcher left, and only two Moslems.