31.
Information obtained verbally and accompanied
with a
photograph that was handed over
to the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs in February 1916 by the American Embassy:
The prisoners on Nargin Island
are kept barefoot and cruelty
has been inflicted on the Ottoman prisoners for a
long time.
* * *
Nargin Island is directly south of Baku city.
32.
Report dated 7 October 1917 about the things Mr.
Tenman,
a member of the Swedish Red Cross, witnessed on Nargin
Island:
There are 74 Ottoman prisoner
officers on Nargin Island. The
shacks
they are made to live in have neither walls nor frames.
The officers have to cook their food in the
shacks they sleep in.
There are flies in
the shacks and it is impossible for them to sleep
on the wooden boards. The so-called cleaning efforts of the
Russians are laughable. The officers
are given 50 rubles to take
care of all their needs and food. Shopping is done 3 time each
week by just
one officer who goes to the city.
Everything is
100% expensive. The
officers’ lives are dreadful and there is
no difference between the housing for
the officers and for the
soldiers. There
are 4,000 Turkish prisoners on the island and
they are housed in floorless,
windowless, poorly-made barracks
holding between 200-250 people. Although according to
Russian law there
should be materials for cleaning, none are
provided. All of the items of prisoners are taken away
for
cleaning when transport is supposedly imminent, but 75% of
their clothes
are stolen in this process. New clothing
provided
is actually quite old. When
complaints are made to the
Russian officers there is no follow-up. They prisoners go
without clothes. The stored food given to the prisoners is
moldy. Because of poor nourishment the
soldiers have
stomach and intestinal illnesses.
The treatment of the
Turkish
prisoners is quite horrible and brutal.
In particular,
there is no importance given to the sick and
crippled. On
the contrary, they are
forced to work like healthy men and
are whipped and prodded with sticks going
to the work site.
The death rate is more
than 33%. No medicine is provided
for
treatment. The food given to the sick is
bad and
insufficient. A third of the
food and bread given to the sick
is held back and sold at the market by the
wife of the highest-
ranking Russian of the garrison, named Didivevich. Even
those patients who have been operated on
are beaten.
* * *
33. Report dated 1 November 1917 from Mr. Rydberg of
the
Swedish Red Cross delegation, who visited the Ottoman
prisoners camp in
Kostroma:
The prisoners barracks in
Kostroma is a brick building formerly
used as a wine factory. There are 103 Turkish officers and 23
of
their orderlies here. Each officer is
permitted to walk about
the city until 6 o’clock accompanied by a guard. There are no
separate rooms for
senior-ranking officers, with two officers
sharing each room, where they cook
and eat their food. The
officers are
given 50 rubles. Everything is
expensive. The
officers complain that
this amount of money is insufficient and
that they are in need of
everything. I loaned them money for
underwear, shoes, towels, socks and plates, in return for receipts.
* *
*
34. Report dated 5 May 1918 given to the Spanish
Consul in
Tbilisi by Colonel İvanof of the Castanskiold delegation:
As of 1 July 1917, the number of
Turkish prisoners in
Transcaucasia was about 33,000. As of 1 December 917, this
number was 30,000
and it is now 25,000. Besides the 4,000
prisoners on Nargin Island, there are another 4,000 in
Transcaucasia. The delegation visited 5,200 prisoners in
Kars,
Gümrü, Batumi and Guri. Of these,
4,000 were registered.
The delegation
distributed 47,000 rubles and another 23,000
rubles were deliverd to the
Tbilisi Consul Berberof to be
distributed to the prisoners. Because of the continuing state
of war, we
could not visit the prisoners on Nargin Island.
Here, though, the housing situation of the prisoners is rather
good. Only the 1,800 prisoners in the
Karanof barracks in
Gümrü are living in squalor. So, with the exception of
Karanof, attention
to the prisoners is not too bad.
Clothing
is generally quite bad and, for the most part, there is no
underwear and shoes. Because of the filth in Karanof and
the resulting spotted
fever cases, it has become a haven for
microbes. Otherwise, the health situation is rather
good. The
Ottoman prisoners are very
afraid of the Armenians because it
has been verified that in Kars and Gümrü the
Armenians have
killed Ottoman prisoners.
Turkish prisoners are made to work
hard and although many of them have
successfully fled to the
Turkish Army, the Armenians are intent on preventing
any
more escapes.
There are approximately 22,000
prisoners in the Caucasus.
The delegation
visited 3,000 prisoners and registered them.
Information was obtained about 4,000 prisoners. The
remaining prisoners either died or are in
the Kuban region
or they have sought asylum in Moslem villages in the
Caucasus
mountains. The delegation saw prisoners
working
on the rail line from Vladikavkaz to Stavropol. In addition,
prisoners work in agricultural
jobs. There is a general
warmth toward
the Turks but soon the local people will want
these jobs for themselves and the
prisoners will be unemployed.
The
prisoners’ housing conditions are good.
Since they are
working their food is good but when they lose their jobs
they
will go hungry, because the local government has no money
and the depots
are empty. The prisoners’ clothing is
quite bad.
Previously, 60% of the
prisoners died from malaria and typhus.
These
illnesses were most prevalent in Maikop, Tuays and
Bielaritzenskaya. Hereabouts, the health situation is
especially
bad. The delegation provided
treatment wherever it went but
there are no doctors and the Ministry of Health
is nowhere to
be seen. The prisoners can
not communicate with their
homelands so we collected letters from the prisoners
and
sent them to Petrograd.
//END of PART VI//
//END of PART VI//
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