MASSACRE OF ARMENIANS.

Wanganui Herald, Volume L, Issue 14773, 29 November 1915, Page 3

MASSACRE OF ARMENIANS.

A HORRIBLE STORY. LONDON, November 27. Lord Bryce, in a letter to the new.,papers, says the latest evidence of the atrocities in northern and eastern Anatolia confirms with dreadful certainty the horrible story. Tho civilised worm is powerless to intervene at present, but must bear the unspeakable crimes in constant memory against the final day of reckoning. A careful estimate of the loss of life to August 15th is over half a million. The Turkish police are constantly using whips and clubs. Many women have boon made black and blue.. A correspondent at Tifiis states that Djevd Bey was expelled from Van, and many fled southward. Eight thousand soldiers, whom he called tho “butcher battalions,” massacred most of the Christians. At larit be ordered the sol diers to burn two Armenian bishops iu a public square. The Turks at Mush early in July disarmed the Armenians in order to secure a large ransom for notables of tho town. The head men of tho villages were subjected to revolting tortures. The tinge: nails and then their toe nails were foicibly extracted and their teeth knocked out. In some cases ncses were whittled away, the victims dying after lingering agonies. Armenians at Mush theu entrenched themselves in churches and stone-built houses, and they fought four days, but the Turkish artillery, manned by German officers, broke down tire positions and every man was killed. The Moslem rabble then descended on tho Armenian women and children, and drove them to' large camps, where occurred a ghastly scene—incredible, hut confirmed beyond doubt. The Turks set five to largo wooden sheds at Aliejan, Mograkoin, Uhaskegh and other villages, roasting helpless* bromon and children to death. Many threw their children away. Some knelt down and wayed amid the flames: others shrieked for help, but the executioner i were unmoved. With unparalleled savagery they grasped infants by one leg and hurled them into the fire, calling out to burning mothers; ‘‘Here are youi culis, ” Thirty thousand Turks and Kurds surrounded 1500 in tho hilly country at Saliun. The mountaineers put up a desperate struggle. Men, women aiid children fought with knives and scythes, and rolled blocks of stone down steep slores. During tho final hand-to-hand combat, women wore seen thrusting knives inf > the throats of Turks. When every man was killed, several young women—some with infants in (heir arms—threw' themselves from the rocks to avoid capture.