PERSECUTIONS OF THE GREEKS IN TURKEY SINCE THE ...

8 PERSECUTIONS OF THE GREEKS
financially even those over whom the Turkish government
had legally no right.
But most of those thus conscripted were not in a position
to pay the military exemption fee. The Turks bethought
themselves, therefore, of subjecting the Greeks
who came into the ranks of the army to such deprivations
and hardships as to compel them to dispose of their small
properties in order to pay the exemption fee and obtain
their release, or else not to enter the service at all, in
which case they were proclaimed deserters. In this way,
the actual object of the conscription, i.e., the destruction
of Hellenism, was attained.
In order to succeed more fully in this, they established
by law the system of the so-called battalions of
laborers into which the Christians were drafted on the
ground that they could not be trusted to serve under
arms. These divisions of laborers were for the most part
sent into the interior of Asia Minor in order to build
public roads, to construct Mussulman houses, to work
in quarries and to cultivate the fields of the Turkish
immigrants and they were, in general, subjected to
enforced labor of various kinds. What the situation of
these unfortunate men was like is confirmed by various
official reports, some extracts of which are here presented
by way of proof.
Thus a report from the consular office in Bryoulla of
August 15, 1915, Number 319 (Ministerial Archives No.
11536) describes their condition as follows: "One of the
causes of the wretchedness of the Greeks in Turkey is,
as is well known, the drafting of Christians into the army.
For those serving in the army are subjected to such privation
and hardship, and their condition, differing not a
whit from that of those condemned to hard labor in the
galleys, is so miserable, that in spite of all the drastic
efforts of the authorities no one of the Greeks here has
come forward to enlist voluntarily."
Another report of the Greek Legation in Constanti-