Illustrated Armenia and the Armenians / by the Rev. Ohan Gaidzakian.

  • Ohan Gaidzakian
Date:
[1908?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Illustrated Armenia and the Armenians / by the Rev. Ohan Gaidzakian. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    301/318 (page 243)
    Fifty young women and girls were selected from one vil- lage and placed in a church, when the soldiers were ordered to do with them as they liked, after which they were butchered. In another village fifty choice women were set aside and urged to change their faith and become Hauums (or lady) in Turkish harems, but they indignantly refused to deny Christ, preferring the fate of their fathers and husbands. People were crowded into the houses, which were then set on fire; in one instance a little boy ran out of the flames, but was caught on a bayonet and thrown back. Children were frequently held up by the hair and cut in two, or had their jaws torn apart. Women with children were ripped open, and older children were pulled apart by their legs. A handsome recently wedded couple fled to a hill top; sol- diers followed and told them that they w^ere pretty and would be spared if they would accept Islamism, but the thought of the horrible death they knew would follow did not prevent them from confessing Christ. “the ixe.xpiable wrong, the unutterable shame.” If the Turks and the Kurds only killed and killed clean, there would be less indignation in the heart of mankind. But they, of all savages, least hearken to the well-known prayer— “Spare us the inexpiable wrong, the unutterable shame That turns the coward's heart to steel, the sluggard’s blood to flames.” In all the atrocities of the Armenian charnel-house nothing can for a moment vie in hideous and unspeakable horror the continuous and never-ending string of narratives of the foulest of outrages on women and children. It is assumed too often that the continual liability to viola- tion with impunity of generation after generation would have somewhat deadened the sense of female honour in the unfortu- nate Armenians. Dr. Dillon, however, confirming many other witnesses, says that this is by no means the case.