Chapter I: Preface

In offering to the public this volume on Bleeding Armenia under the Curse of Islam the writer does not seek to harrow the feelings of sensitive readers by the recital of blood-curdling outrages, tortures, murders, and butcherings; neither does he aim to discuss at any length the involved problems of the Eastern Question, but he does definitely seek to awaken interest in the history and fate of what may truly be called the Martyr Nation of the World.

It is not the isolated fact that Armenia is now undergoing a most terrible persecution, that fifty thousand or sixty thousand helpless men, women and children have already suffered death in every form which the most depraved nature, the most cruel instincts, the most bitter and fanatical hatred could devise, that so deeply arouses us; but the fact that for more than a thousand years this has been the bitter and bloody story of her wrongs--this is what staggers us.

That the reader may have some clearer conceptions of the present terrible situation in Armenia and of the causes which make her general condition one most deplorable to contemplate, its early history, civilization and conversion to Christianity is briefly sketched, and attention is called to the fact that its very geographical position has for many centuries made it the highway for the contending armies of the East and West.

Armenia has been the battle ground where diverse systems of religion and civilization have fought for supremacy. Its fate has always been to suffer, whichever power was for the time victorious. It has been sometimes ground to powder between the upper and nether millstone.

The rise of that alien system of religion which is the most bitter and relentless persecutor of the Christian faith the world has ever seen is accurately sketched, and careful attention given to it because Christian people believe it to be true that the cause of the fiercest and most vindictive hatred of the Turk to Greek, Bulgarian or Armenian is primarily his loyalty to Mohammed and his hatred of Jesus as the Christ.

It were not in the heart of humanity to kindle the passions into a flame so fierce as to consume every element of mercy and compassion, unless these were set on fire by fiendish fanaticism or religious bigotry.

In this light these persecutions are but the irregular outbreak of that spirit of opposition which will never cease so long as Islam has power to draw the sword. From the hour that the Ottoman Turk was securely seated on that eastern throne of the Cæsars, there never has been peace, and there never can be while he holds the keys to the gateway of nations.

Without laborious disquisition, with only a sincere desire to let history tell its own story, some phases of the struggle for place, preëminence and power between England and Russia, which form the heart of the Eastern Question are also presented.

No one can be in the slightest doubt as to which side of the Turkish-Armenian question the policy of England leans. There is no question as to the fact that England has been the firmest friend to Turkey for more than sixty years, and that the more she has feared the growing power of Russia the more resolutely she has stood by the Porte in spite of the atrocities which have marked the frequent persecutions of the Christian races under the sway of Islam.

Her purely selfish and commercial "interests" have caused the English government to be deaf to the cry of the decimated Bulgarians, and of Armenians to-day. The part that England played in elaborating the great treaties of Paris and of Berlin which controlled the issues of the Crimean and the Russo-Turkish wars stamps the character of her interests in the affairs of Turkey.

There is thus furnished in this historical data a broad ground on which public opinion in this country may call upon Great Britain in this hour of remorseless cruelty that she shall fulfil the treaty obligations which she most solemnly and publicly accepted and assumed and demand of the Porte at the mouth of shotted guns if need be, that the rights of Christian Armenians shall be defended and maintained by the whole power of the Turkish Empire.

The situation in Armenia is given with considerable fulness, though volumes could not contain a complete account of the sufferings that this long-doomed race has endured under the Curse of Islam.

The position that our government should occupy is that of high moral equity, the insistence upon the preservation of common rights of humanity irrespective of race or creed.

The immediate duty lying at our doors is to assist in relieving the distress even unto starvation, which hundreds of thousands of Armenians are now enduring. Many will perish before aid can reach them. What is to be done must be done quickly.

This book while making little pretension to literary polish is the result of wide historical research and has been carefully written and edited, and is now cast upon the great tide of public opinion with the hope that it may stimulate permanent interest in the great problems which are at issue in the conflict between Christianity and Islam--that it may reach and move the springs of deepest sympathy for suffering Armenians; that it may rouse a more vigorous moral indignation against such crime and cruelty, and thereby assist in creating such a just and righteous public sentiment that our government may take such a stand as shall tell speedily for the bettering of the conditions of human existence in far off Armenia.

Thus confiding in the kindly consideration of a generous public, I send forth this book on the mission to which it is hereby dedicated, viz:--to plead the cause of Bleeding Armenia which is being done to death under the Curse of Islam.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

EARLY HISTORY OF ARMENIA.

A Martyr Nation--Need of a Voice--Historical Annals at
Nineveh--Abgar's Letter to Jesus of Nazareth--Acceptance
of Christianity--Council of Nice--Persian Conquests--Bible
Translated--Great Persecutions--Dying for the Faith--Magi
Driven Out--Saracens in Armenia--Fearful Tortures--Burned
Alive--Bogha the Tyrant--Sultan of Turkey--Islam or Death
--Yussuf the Persian--Great Horrors Repeated--Starvation
--Peace Returns 21

CHAPTER II.

THE RISE OF ISLAM.

Arabia--Mecca--Idolatry--Mohammed's Birth--Carlyle on Islamism
--The Hegira--Battle of Beder--Mecca Captured--Death of Mohammed
--Golden Era of the Saracens--Khaled at Damascus--City Captured--
Jerusalem Besieged--Capitulates--Persia Conquered--Egypt Won
in a Day--Constantinople Besieged 44

CHAPTER III.

THE STORY OF THE FIRST CRUSADE.

Origin--Jerusalem Captured by the Turks--Peter the Hermit--
Pope Urban--Crusade of the Mob--Walter the Penniless--Battle
of Nicomedia--300,000 Perished in all--Crusade of the Kings
and Nobles--Godfrey of Bouillon--Europe Moves Westward--
Antioch--Jerusalem Captured July 14th, 1099--Godfrey
Elected King 72

CHAPTER IV.

THE GREAT TARTAR INVASIONS.

The Turcomans--Seljuks--Persia Conquered--Armenia Wasted--
140,000 Slain--Ani with 1,001 Churches Falls--Awful Slaughter
--Asia Minor Ravaged--Emperor of Constantinople Defeated--
Damascus Falls--Saladin--Jerusalem Capitulates--Silence on
the Coast--Jenghiz Khan--Armenia in Great Distress--Turks in
Europe--Tamerlane--Armenia again in Torture--Pyramids of
Human Skulls--Death of Tamerlane 104

CHAPTER V.

THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE.

Ottoman Empire Rising--Danger to Europe--Mohammed II. the
Conqueror--Fortress Built at Gallipoli--Emperor Alarmed--
Europe Indifferent--First Great Siege with Artillery--Seven
Weeks Bombardment--Final Assault--50,000 Ottomans Fall--Charge
of the Janissaries--Constantine Died at His Post--Church of
St. Sophia is turned into a Mosque--Islam sits on the Throne
of Christianity 135

CHAPTER VI.

THE BULGARIAN MASSACRE.

Four Centuries of Misrule--Chios, 40,000 Slain--Christians
in Turkey Persecuted--Russia Demands their Protection--France
and England against Russia--Czar's Army Crosses into
Moldavia--Sultan Declares War--Siege of Sebastopol--Treaty of
Paris 1856--Turkish Loans--Revolt in Servia--Andrassy Note--
Reforms Promised--Bulgarian Massacres--England Horror Struck--
Gladstone on the Massacres--15,000 Butchered--Russia Arms for
the Deliverance of the Christians 159

CHAPTER VII.

THE RUSSO-TURKISH WAR.

War Declared--Crossing the Danube--Siege of Plevna--
Skobeleff's Gallant Charge--Third Siege--Plevna Reduced and
Surrenders--Alexander at the Danube--Shipka Pass--The Valley
of Roses--Turkey Conquered--Adrianople--San Stefano--Berlin
Treaty--Russia Robbed of her Victories 185

CHAPTER VIII.

THE SULTAN ABDUL HAMID.

Questions of Policy--Palace Rule--Alarm of the Porte--Shrewd
Diplomacy--Playing off the Powers--Balance of Power--Reforms
Promised--Never Fulfilled 213

CHAPTER IX.

PROGRESS AND POWER OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS IN THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE.

The First Chapter in Turkish Missions--Have Missions been a
Failure--Modern Triumphs of the Gospel 250

CHAPTER X.

THE KURDS AND ARMENIANS.

Territory--Origin--Occupation--Character--Agriculture--Robbers
--Cruelty of Warfare--Language--Homes--Women--Ruined Castles--
Churches 277

CHAPTER XI.

THE REIGN OF TERROR--SASSOUN 303

CHAPTER XII.

THE REIGN OF TERROR--TREBIZOND AND ERZEROUM 341

CHAPTER XIII.

THE REIGN OF TERROR--VAN AND MOUSH 360

CHAPTER XIV.

THE REIGN OF TERROR--HARPOOT AND ZEITOUN 383

CHAPTER XV.

RELIEF WORK IN ARMENIA.

Mission Stations--The Christian Herald--Red Cross Society--
Miss Clara Barton 400

CHAPTER XVI.

THE CURSE OF ISLAM.

Despotic in Government--Intolerant in Religion--Evils
of Polygamy--Degradation of Women--Ignorance--Cruelty of
Officials--Extortion--Universal Distress--No Advance Possible
--The Turk never Improves--Islam--Worse and Worse--Its Rule is
against Humanity 423

CHAPTER XVII.

THE GREATEST CRIME OF THE CENTURY.

England's Inactivity--Her Solemn Obligation--Treaty of San
Stefano--Berlin--Convention with Turkey--Cyprus--Occupation
of Egypt--Position of the English Government--Difficulties
in the Way--But the Suffering Awful--Freeman--Gladstone 433

CHAPTER XVIII.

AMERICA'S DUTY AND PRIVILEGE.

Possible Solution--Universal Arbitration--Constantinople a
Free City--Europe Free--Armenia's Sorrows Healed--The Dawning
of the Twentieth Century 470