A Russian lietunant's memories: Another must read! Part I

I WITNESSED and LIVED THROUGH
(Erzurum 1917-1918)
Lt.Col. TVERDOHLEBOV

"The things I personally witnessed and heard during the two months
that passed until the Turkish forces’ delivering Erzurum are beyond all
the evil one would think of the Armenians.
None of the Armenians were allowed to enter neither in the city nor
in its environs during the occupation of Erzurum by the Russians in
1916. During the office of the Commander of the 1st Corps General
Kaltin, who was the commander of the forces in Erzurum and its
environs, no military units having Armenian troops were sent to this
region.
After the lifting of all the measures, following the Revolution,
Armenians attacked Erzurum and its environs in waves.
Synchronous to those attacks, the houses in Erzurum and in the
villages were pillaged and people were killed. The presence of the
Russian units and Russians were keeping the Armenians from
committing massacres. They were conducting massacres and
pillaging in secret and cautiously.
In 1917, the Erzurum Revolutionary Executive Committee, mainly
composed of the Armenian military personnel, launched a search for
confiscating the firearms the people had. As the searches could not
have been carried out properly, troops of uncontrollable mob
gradually started full scale pillaging. The Armenian troops did their
best to tyrannize and torture people during battles.
One day, as I was riding through one of the streets in Erzurum I saw
a group of soldiers, lead by an Armenian, dragging two elderly
Turkish people, both about 70 years old, along the street. An
Armenian soldier was carrying a whip made of wire fencing. Streets
were all covered with ditches and mud.
This mob, composed mainly of the Armenian soldiers, was dragging
these two poor elderly men in mud all over the street. The elderly
men were drenched in mud, and whenever they found an opportunity
to stand up they would drag them again and commit all sorts of
torture.
I tried hard to persuade them to behave in a civilized manner
towards those two poor elderly men. The Armenian soldier leading
the mob, walked over me with his whip made of wire fencing, and
shouted, “You are backing them are not you? They are killing us, and
you are backing them!” The mob started walking over me. At that
time, the Russian soldiers were so out of control that they were
beating, and even murdering the Russian officers. Situation was
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getting worse. Upon arriving of a patrol column under the command
of an officer the situation changed. Armenians disappeared all of a
sudden. The patrol column saved those men and took them to their
homes without uttering any words of insult.
There was a danger of Armenians’ rushing into the region, right after
the withdrawing of the Russian units at their own initiative, and
committing massacres on the Turks until the arrival of the units of
other nations.
The prominent Armenians were guaranteeing that no such thing
would happen again. They were trying to make everybody believe
that all the measures for the establishment of neighborly relations
between the Armenians and the Turks were taken.
It was believed that peace and order would be established. After the
Revolution, the mosques used as dormitories and depots by the
Russian forces were all cleaned and evacuated. A joint police force
was set up with the inclusion of the Turks and Armenians. Armenians
were loudly advocating the setting up of Martial Courts and practicing
of capital punishment for those who committed massacres and
pillaging.
It was soon discovered that all were nothing but wiles and traps.
Turks who were taken into this police force started abandoning their
places immediately. Because, the Turkish night patrols started to
disappear all of a sudden and nothing was heard of them ever. Even
the Turks who were taken out of the city to work were not coming
back. The members of the Martial Courts established did not try or
punish any of the criminals as they feared to be sentenced to capital
punishment.
The number of the massacres and pillaging started to increase
steeply. One night, at the end of January according to old calendar in
other words at t the beginning of February; Armenian gangs
murdered Hacı Bekir Effendi, one of the most prominent people in
Erzurum, at his home. The Commander-in-Chief Odichelitzé1 ordered
the unit commanders the finding of the murderer within 3 days.
The Commander-in-Chief talked at the commanders of the Armenian
units condemning them, in its most general terms, about the
disgraceful deeds of their troops. He also said that he was extremely
offended by the pillaging and the brutal force exerted on the people.
1 Georgian origin Commander of the Russian Caucasian Army.
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He voiced his anger about the Turkish people, who were taken out
from their homes under the pretext of having them work on the
roads, most of whom were somehow kept from returning. He
reiterated his ideas saying if the Armenians are really the owners of
the occupied Armenian territory, they ought to display their honesty
and the level of their moral values as a nation, thinking of the honor
of the Armenian nation; and that they ought to act within frame work
of the law; and do everything possible to curb all the barbarousness
and brutality committed by the mob. He pointed out that the
intellectuals were obliged to do it. Moreover, he said, at a time when
the handing of the occupied region over to the Armenians was not
yet decided at a peace conference, and at a time when the First
World War had not come to an end, the Armenians ought to obey the
rules of the law much more carefully.
The Armenian commanders of the Armenian units, and the
representatives of the troops declared that it was not appropriate to
libel the name of the Armenian nation by just equating them with a
couple of murderous gang members; that some of the deserters
might have wanted to take revenge on the past deeds of the Turks;
that the Armenian intellectuals were doing their best to curb those
events; and finally that they were thinking of taking decisive
measures and implement those measures.
Soon I heard that the Armenians were massacring the Turkish people
in Erzincan. I heard all the details of the massacres directly from my
Commander-in-Chief Odichelitzé in person.
The event happened as follows. The massacres were organized by a
doctor and a contractor. In other words it was not conducted by one
of the gang members. I cannot write the names of those two
Armenians as I do not remember their last names. More than 800
unarmed innocent Turks were massacred. Only an Armenian was
killed while the massacred were trying to defend themselves. They
slaughtered the people as if they were sheep. They had the people
whom they sentenced to death dig large ditches. They took the
people to edges of those ditches in groups and after having
butchered them like beasts they dumped them into those ditches.
One of the Armenians was counting the corpses thrown into ditches
and upon his saying, “Is there only 80 people? It can take 10 more!
Slaughter another 10!” disdainfully ten more people were slaughtered,
thrown into the ditch and the corpses were covered with earth.

This Armenian contractor is said to have ordered the taking out
innocent Turks from a building one by one. And he, just for fun,
chopped the heads of some 80 people one by one as they were
coming out of the door.
The deserter Armenians who were equipped with the most modern
weapons started to retreat towards Erzurum after the Erzincan
massacres. The Russian artillery officers, who were to protect the
logistics lines from the kurdish attacks, were forced to retreat with
their guns.
In one of those lines a necessity of placing a unit for a probable clash
occurred. The Armenians, who were discomforted with the orders,
set the Russian officers’ houses a fire while they were sleeping,
Russian officers barely managed to get out. Most of their war gears
were burned into ashes.The Armenian mobs retreating from Erzincan to Erzurum
exterminated all the Muslim villagers they met on their way. The
artillery guns that were being withdrawn from the logistics support
lines were being transferred on the covered wagons. The wagons
were under the care of the hired, civilian and unarmed kurds. As the
convoy came closer to Erzurum, the Armenian deserters and the
troops started to kill those kurds at the places where they stopped for
a rest. They realized their evil deeds whenever the Russian officers
entered their rooms. Whenever the Russian officers came out of their
rooms on hearing the clamors, and tried to save the kurds, the armed
mob walked over, and threatened them with the same end.
Those massacres were carried out in the most repulsive manner. For
example, at a meeting held by the artillery officers at the Erzurum
Garrison, Lieutenant Mzivani narrated an incident he witnessed: an
Armenian soldier approached a kurd who was dying in agony,
running, and tried to push the stick in his hand into his mouth. As he
could not manage to push the stick into his mouth that was tightly
closed, he took the dying man’s clothes off, and started to kick his
naked body with his iron heeled boots.
All of those who could not manage to flee from Ilıca2 were
massacred. The Army Commander [General Odichelitzé] said he saw
lots of corpses belonging to children whose throats were butchered
with blunt knives, and bodies cut into thin and long strips.
2 Ilıca district affiliated to Erzurum.
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Lieutenant Colonel Gryaznof, who went to Ilıca three weeks after the
massacres, on his return on February 26 told me about a scene he saw
there: “the corpses are lying along the village roads in the open air. All
the Armenians going in the front were spitting on the corpses and
cursing at them. A mosque yard about 12-15 square sagenes [an area
roughly equal to 55-70 square meters] was covered with the corpses
of the senior Turkish citizens as well as of men, women, and children
that formed a pile reaching 1.5 meters in height. The traces of vile
assaults were observed on the women’s corpses. Rifle cartridges were
pushed into the genital organs of most of the women.”
Lieutenant Colonel Gryaznov said he had called two Armenian girls,
who were following a series of courses, to the mosque. They were
working as telephone operators at the detachment. He told them to
witness what the Armenians had accomplished there. Lt.Col.
Gryaznov found their joyous laughter bizarre.
Lieutenant Colonel reproved them severely expressing his anger and
indignation in fury. He asked, “How could the well-bred and welleducated
Armenian girls laugh and exhibit joyous behavior at the
sight of such an event?” He said, “This is an enough proof for
Armenians’, even their women’s, being more contemptible than the
wildest animals. This is even much more than an officer, who is
shaken by this sight, and who has seen many battles and terrible
events, can bear!” The Armenian girls replied him saying that they
laughed as a result of nervous breakdown.
A contractor working at the Alaca3 Logistics Support Command, told
us about a despicable event that took place in Alaca on February 27.
The Armenians nailed a Turkish woman upon a wall alive; took her
heart out and placed it on her head.
The first full scale massacre in Erzurum started on February 7. As it is
now claimed, the soldiers of the artillery regiment gathered some 270
Turks from the streets by force. They captured them and locked them
up in the baths in the barracks displaying their true intentions. I
managed to save only 100 of them. I have just learned that the others
were released by the soldiers after their learning about my arrival.
Under the light of the testimonies of the rescued, this vile attempt was
realized by the Armenian Reserve Officer Karagadayev, who was
temporarily appointed to the artillery regiment from the infantry units.
I still could not have determined his role in this event clearly.
3 A village affiliated to Ilıca district of Erzurum.
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Several other Turkish people were killed in the streets that day.
Several Armenians, forming an execution squad, shot more than 10
unarmed civilian Muslims at the railroad station on February 12. This
gang threatened to kill the officers who tried to save those Muslims.
Meanwhile, I ordered the arresting of an Armenian who had murdered
a Turkish person for no reason at all. The General Commander of the
Caucasus Army had already given his permission for the founding of a
Court Martial in Erzurum in line with the previous stipulations prevailing
before the Revolution, with an authority give death penalty.
When one of the Armenian officers told this arrested Armenian that he
was going to be hanged he started to shout, “Where on earth have
you seen an Armenian hanged for killing a Turk?” offended.
Armenians started to set the all the Turkish markets in Erzurum afire. I
learned that all the Muslim villagers of Tepeköy4 – where Combatant
Artillery Regiment was situated – were massacred, regardless of their
age and gender by unidentified members of a gang on February 17.
I informed Antranik5 who came to Erzurum the same day. He ordered
the finding of the murderers. I do not know what came out of it."