writer was chasing Greek bandits in the Armutlu peninsula
north of Bursa in August 1920, just as the Greek army took
control in nearby Gemlik.
The report is harrowing, like all the others, and includes
a rape the writer witnessed at a Greek military prison in
Pireaus near Athens.//
Presented below is the important statement of the fomer Armutlu
Gendarmerie Commander:
On 18 August 1920, based on an order I received from my
government
superior to track and capture
Hacı Penayutoğlu Anastas Kapudan of
Arnavutköy and his 17 bandits, who
had been plundering the Armutlu
region for quite some time, I set out with my
5-member team to track the
bandits. In
the course of my pursuit there was a clash in the Arnavutköy
forest I was
successful in recovering the Kapudan’s body and seizing
Hayrili Yosi, one of
his men, alive. I collected the other weapons
his
cohorts left behind and delivered them to the central district.
General Mezaraki, the Gemlik Greek occupation commander,
heard
about this incident and ordered the Greek warships patrolling the Gulf of
Gemlik to bring me to Gemlik, which he had seized and taken under his
control. A company of Greek infantrymen
was dispatched to Armutlu
and myself and two of my men were taken under
guard to Gemlik. The
reason why the Greeks acted this way was
the presence of Second
Lieutenant Kadri, who was at that time the Gemlik
company commander
under the supervision of the Eskişehir Gendarmerie Command,
and who
did everything in his power to accommodate the Greeks. And this
individual did not just inform on
us. He also did the same thing to many
officials and notables of Gemlik, causing some to be sent to Athens and
others
to be otherwise exiled. The current
district chief of Gemlik,
İbrahim Bey, is completely aware of these
occurrences.
I was put in the Gemlik jail on 19 August 1920. On that day, the Greek
soldiers, under a
first lieutenant, came to me and without asking anything,
they began cursing
the religion of Islam and beating myself and my
companions. Of course, out of fear, there was nothing we
could say and
we didn’t. We were kept
hungry and without water for 18 hours.
After
two months of this misery and degradation we were transported to
the
Izmir jail. The day we were thrown into the Izmir jail we saw that it
was
filled wretched fellows. There was
no room for us to sit or lay down so,
at best, we were only able to snatch a
few minutes of sleep on the floor
of the latrine or in the doorways. There,
too, we got no bread or food. The
only thing they gave us were two olives they
distributed each day.
The inmates in the jail moaned and groaned and finally,
unable to take
anymore, we rose in rebellion.
During a 6-hour clash 4 of my friends died
and 15 were injured. The desperate inmates, blinded by hunger,
flung
rocks at the Greek soldiers who were firing rifles from outside. So it was
like a clash between two armed
groups. Ultimately, the prison inspector
came and that is when the real oppression began. Before long, we were
sent to Anabli military
prison in Pireas in February 1921.
The torments
we suffered there cannot be desribed either with pen or
with words.
On the first day we went to Anabli prison all of the guard
soldiers there
came after us like murderers.
Without saying anything, they beat us will
all their might. After that were thrown into a putrid, fetid
dungeon unfit
for human life, which was dark and intensely humid. Spiders were
crawling all over the walls.
Perhaps, not having seen a human face for
years, the creatures were quite
happy. That night we got neither bread
nor any other food. Even if they had
given us something, though, none
of us had any strength left, after being
beaten so badly, to eat it. The next
day
we were put into forced labor to carry 70-kilogram sacks for the
military,
although we were so hungry and frail.
Without any regard for
our health and weakness, two sacks were loaded
onto our backs, as a
guard with a bayonet accompanied us. If someone collapsed from the
weight of the
sack and one of went to help him, right away a soldier
would hit him with his
rifle’s butt without a second thought.
So imagine that a poor fellow is writhing with pain under a sack and no
one has the guts to say anything. But if
that wasn’t enough, they didn’t
even refrain from rape, among their
depredations. According to what I
remember, a nice young fellow from Uşak named İzzet was taken out
of the jail at about 11.30
o’clock one rainy day and they tried to rape
him outside the dungeon. İzzet’s İslamic blood boiled with
resistance,
but in vain. The jail’s head cook, Sarı Yani, cut him to
pieces, put his
remains in a sack and had the sack disappear. Although complaints were
made to the prison
warden, the result was nothing other than a smirk and
jeering. Sarı Yani’s appetite for these abominable
acts only increased
but although he tried to do the same things to some others
he was
unsuccessful, having to satisfy himself with stealing all our
belongings.
We lost of few of our
companions to the hunger and beatings here.
The way we were treated over the course of two years with this torture
and the oppression, was over and above anything the Inquisition could
inflict.
On 10 June ((1923)), at the Gudi prison camp in Athens as we
prepared
to go to Izmir, the money, items and clothes we had somehow been able
to secret away were stolen from us. We
were given a blanket to wrap
ourselves in and stuffed into a ship. Weary and afraid, we reached Izmir.
At the Gudi prison camp they gave all the
prisoners acidified bread, to try
to kill some of them and they succeeded. Once we came to Izmir, we were
very well
treated by the Red Crescent and they gave us each a new set of
clothes. We are very grateful. In fact, we will never forget the support we
received from our national government at Izmir.
17 July 1923.
Former Armutlu Gendarmerie Team Commander
Sergeant-Major Akifoğlu Nedim
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