Armenians Taxed Heavily by Turks
Eyewitness Accounts of Armenian Massacres in 1894
The region was surrounded by soldiers of the army and twenty thousand Kourds also are said to have been massed there. Then they advanced upon the centre, driving in the people like a flock of sheep, and continued thus to advance for days. No quarter was given, no mercy shown. Men, women, and children shot down or butchered like sheep. Probably when they were set upon in this way some tried to save their lives and resisted in self-defense. Many who could fled in all directions, but the majority were slain. The most probable estimate is fifteen thousand killed, thirty-five villages plundered, razed, burnt.
Women were outraged and then butchered; a priest taken to the roof of his church and hacked to pieces; young men piled in with wood saturated with kerosene and set on fire; a large number of women and girls collected in church, kept for days, violated by the brutal soldiers, and then murdered. It is said the number was so large that the blood flowed out of the church door. Three soldiers contended over a beautiful girl. They wanted to preserve her, but she too was killed.
Armenian Highlands
Saimbeyli
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