Italian (?) map of the Caucasus Front in late 1914.
9.
The report of Sabri Efendi, 9th Army Corps/ 28th
Division/
87th Regiment/ 1st Battalion/8th Company, who was taken
prisoner near
Hasankale on 24 January 1915:
As soon as we were taken prisoner
the Russians seized all our
belongings.
On 12 February we were transported toward
Hasankale with 350
soldiers. Since the troops were hungry
and
worn out, they didn’t have the strength to march. The Russian
guards killed our innocent
soldiers. They put those that survived
inside four walls with no shirts. Six
soldiers froze to death.
The next day we
marched toward Sarıkamış and in the evening
we came to Karaurgan. Again, the Russians killed 80 our
soldiers
along the road. This 15-day trek was
made in hunger.
Up to Sarıkamış, the
Russian and Armenian soldiers cursed and
swore at us. From Sarıkamış, the officers went by train to
Baku,
suffering abuse from the populace along the way. En route they
gave officers 1.5 rubles and
commanders 3 rubles, as they sent
us to Nargin Island. There were 6,000 of our prisoners on the
island. Here, the officers got 50 rubles
per month and we weren’t
allowed to leave our shacks for 6 months. After that, we were
permitted to go outside
with a guard. Subsequently, we were
transported to Zih Island, where our conditions were even
more horrible. From there 102 of us officers went to Moscow,
Şarya and finally to the town of Nikolsk.
Along the way we
were jeered by the populace and the money we got wasn’t
even
enough for bread. It was next to
impossible to get any news from
Turkey.
The housing and food for our soldiers was quite bad, as
the Russians
took every opportunity to rob our soldiers
* * *
taken prisoner click here for a first-hand account of a
battle near Kelkit in July 1916.
10.
The report of the 13th Division Mobile Hospital
Head
Doctor Osman Bey, who was taken prisoner around Kelkit in
July 1916:
When I was taken prisoner, the
Russians took my clothes, cash
and all my vauables. In fact, some officers marched all the way
to
Bayburt shoeless. Even though complaints
were lodged with
the Cossack regimental command about the Cossacks who were
robbing the prisoners, we were
threatened with death and had to
keep quiet.
There’s was no care at all for our soldiers’ food and
medical treatment. We had to lie down in the hospital with
flea-
ridden blankets, covered with typhus microbes. In fact, our
soldiers on watch duty were made
to wrap themselves in these
very
blankets by the hospital’s head doctor. The number of our
prisoners who died at
Hamamlı prison camp, near Sarıkamış,
was about 30,000. From the 50 rubles given monthly by the
Russians, 35 rubles were deducted for officers’ meal money and
the remainder
was all that was left for the rest of our needs.
Both the soldiers and officers were in a very
wretched condition.
One of the doctors
from the Swedish Red Cross, Mr. Lindkolm,
saw this filth and was quite
disturbed by it. He said that he sent
a
report to the government official in charge.
The conditions for
our prisoners on Nargin Island were horrible.
* *
*
11.
Letter from First Lieutenant Mehmed Salih Efendi of the
57th Regiment 4th
Battalion 1st Company, a prisoner in Russia:
The Russian soldiers seized all
of my valuables. Although
prisoners from
the armies of the Allies were transported by
railroad, 21 Ottoman officers had
to march on foot to Bucaca.
During the
trip we slept on wooden boards and stayed in
soldiers’ barracks.
* * *
//Ed. Note: This Captain Bağdatlı Hamid Hakkı
was with Fuad Tokad in Vetluga prison camp.
See TNT Matchbox Diary for collateral info.
12. Letter sent by Artillery Captain Bağdatlı Hamid
Hakkı
Efendi, a prisoner in Russia:
The commander of the Vetluga
command in the district of
Kostroma would not give prisoners their
letters. We were
held in inhumane
conditions and under duress. Even though
we received a salary of 50 rubles, the value dropped to 2
kuruş. Purchase of officer prisoners’ food was taken
care of
by the guards so a third of our salaries went to the guards.
Petitions sent to the commander were ripped
up and thrown
away.
* * *
13.
Report of First Lieutenant Osman Nuri Efendi of
the 100th
Regiment 2nd Battalion 5th Company who was taken prisoner in
Bitlis
but returned in a prisoner exchange:
During the transport of sick prisoners to Chohloma and upon
arrival at
Tbilisi they lay on wooden beds and use very old and
dirty pillows. Nevertheless, the Russian doctors did not
treat the
sick prisoners badly.
14. Report of Captain Mehmed Zeki Efendi, Commander
of the
1st Company of the 1st Battalion of the 63rd Regiment of the
15th
Division, who returned by escaping while a prisoner in
Russia:
From the day our prisoners were captured
the officers were made
to march for 8 days although there were all sorts of
other means
of transportation available, during the 1.5 month transit to the
town of Chorinar. Subsequently,
transport was by animal carts
obtained from villages for 9 days, followed by
movement in
railroad boxcars made for animals.
En route to the city of Tisa,
on the pretext that there was illness
about, 500 of our prisoners
were transported with just undershorts and a
shirt. Because of
the harsh winter
weather only one soldier survived and the rest
died. Without exception, all of our captive
officers were forced
to salute even Russian officer candidates. During transport in
-22.5 degree weather from
Chorinar to Astrahan over 8 days the
soldier prisoners walked on foot. And although they
subsequently boarded trains
the feet of most of them froze.
* * *
15. Information from the Stockholm intelligence
office attributed
to the statement of the German Schuster , who returned from
Russia, in April 1917:
The Russians set up a large
prisoners barracks in a place they
chose for an agriculture exhibition in
Siberia. Here, the Ottoman
prisoners
were subjected to poor treatment and even the most
urgent needs of the prisoners
were not addressed. As the result
of
typhus fever that swept through among
the Ottoman prisoners
in the Fall, hundreds of them died. The sick prisoners
were denied
even the most basic treatment.
The bodies of the dead were not
buried but, rather, stuffed into sacks
and thrown away outside the
city.
* * *
16.
Report received from the military attaché in
Berlin,
attributed to the statment of the German Schuster, who returned
from
Russia:
The Ottoman prisoners held at
Noriyevski were naked and this
was very difficult to look at. They were not permitted to obtain
their needs
from the outside.
* * *
//END of PART IV//
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