The Armenian Atrocities.

Hastings Standard, Issue 205, 24 December 1896, Page 4

The Armenian Atrocities.

The Armenian Committee in Berlin is now distributing its appeal to the public for subscriptions. It is signed by several hundreds of the clergy, amongst them a large number of Superintendents-General. The appeal is brief but impressive. It runs as follows:—" Before the eyes of Christendom more than one hundred defenceless Christians have been butchered in Turkish Armenia during the last twelve months. Two thousand five hundred villages have been plundered and destroyed, and 568 churches and 77 convents ; 0-1(5 Christian villages have been converted by force to Islaiu, 328 Christian churches turned into mosques, 170 (iregoria.il priests and 21 Protestant pastors murdered because they refused to become converts to Islam. A cry of indignation goes through the whole educated world, ami the conscience of Christianity awakens. In Germany the feeling of solidarity with the Christians of the Kast, ami indignation at the orgies of Mohammedan fanaticism, will no longer be silenced. It is rightly asked whether the German people can any longer be deaf to the voice of truth and justice, and deny the duties of humanity in face of the indescribable distress of the Armenian people. For now not only is the honor of Christendom concerned, but every humane feeling is roused by the unheard of fact that the age of humanity and civilisation must be the witness of such bestial cruelties and barbarous atrocities. The undersigned Germans therefore summon the German people, without distinction of confession or political opinion, to help to rescue from extreme starvation a Christian people doomed to annihilation, a half million of plundered homeless human beings almost completely destitute of clothes, bedding, and daily bread, and hundreds and thousands of widows and orphans."