Armenians Are Left to Starve

London, Sept 25, 3:30a.m-‘The Turks are gradually but effectively exterminatinog the Armenian people,’ asserts the Dedegahatch correspondent of the Times. ‘The modus operandi is to send from each Armenian village day by day as many persons as a train can carry. When they arrive at Konish, or some adjacent station they are turned out and an escort supplied over the Taurs mountains.

‘Once on the other side they are supplied with enough food for a few days and told to continue their journey to the neighborhood of Mosul as they will not be in perfect safety. But, in point of fact the region is nothing but a desert and before many hours marauding bands of Kurds or Bedouins rob and pillage these helpless men, women and children so that those who are not actually slain die of hunger or thirst. Not one ever reaches the intended destination, for should any one try to escape in another direction. Turkish shepherds have orders to shoot them at sight.

Mothers are Distracted

‘The consequence is that many distracted mothers throw their children into the Euphrates rather than see them suffer. Some even sell them for what they will bring before starting on the journey,

‘A widely known American missionary who arrived at Constantinople the first week in September, declared he saw as many as fifteen thousand Armenians collected around one station waiting to be sent on this journey from which none would ever return. American missionaries scattered about Asia Minor and particularly in the Armenian districts gradually are leaving upon the advice of their ambassador. The attacks upon the Armenians are said to be excused upon the ground that they assisted the Russians in the occupation of the town of Van.’

Eye Witness of Massacres

The Chronicle prints what it declares to be accounts by eye witnesses of Armenian massacres asserting that besides many thousands killed, a half million have been deported in a systematic manner by local authorities, while thousands of others have been imprisoned. The charge is made that after the men are massacred the women and children are sent into slavery to be converted to Islamism.

The Chronicle’s informants charge that many children are sent out alone along the roads to Fall victims of starvation or robber bands.

Many Die of Hunger

Massacres are reported to have taken place in the provinces of Kharput and Diarbakir, especially at Mardin. Women deported from the province of Erzerum, it is said, were left for several days on the Karput plains where they died of hunger. At Sari Kichila a caravan is reported to have been compelled to proceed, leaving the children of both sexes behind.

Armenians living in Turkish towns along the Black sea, the Chronicle asserts, have been compelled to accept Islamism and have been sent into town inhabited by Moslems.

Chabik-Arrissar, which resisted disarmament and deportation is reported to have been bombarded with the result that the entire population, including the bishop, was killed.