volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

Turkish Atrocities in the Sinjdr Hills. 217
the streets. Several of the Yazidis who refused to accept
Islam had been tortured in the town, and several others
had been shot as they came home in the evening from
the plain. I went about in the town with Muhammad
and our two soldiers, and I saw enough in the houses
to convince me that the iniquities of the Turks, in 'Iran
at least, had not been overstated.
In the evening Muhammad told me that we should
have trouble with the soldiers of Ayub Beg, and he
insisted on my keeping my large service revolver conveniently
near me. He proposed that we should send on
ahead of us our two soldiers and all our animals, except
two camels, with our tent and bedding and other baggage,
so that we might be able to leave the town quickly if
it were necessary to do so, but to keep back the box containing
our supply of food to lull the suspicions of the
Turks, if they had any. He watched his opportunity,
and having started them on their way about ten o'clock
in the evening, he hired a courtyard with one-half of
it roofed over, and a couple of lihdfs,^ and having eaten
our supper we lay down to sleep on the quilts by the
side of our camels. Presently several soldiers came
into the comtyard, evidently with the view of talking
to Muhammad, and I soon saw that their talk was not
friendly. As Muhammad told me to " sleep, sleep," I
pretended to do so,, and a soldier came and sat down
close to me. After a short time I felt his hand moving
about under the lihdf trying to find my revolver, and
as soon as he touched the lanyard which was round
my body, I grasped the revolver quickly and discharged
it from one side of the lihdf into the ceiling. The bullet
(size '420) hit a plank and knocked it aside and
let down a lot of dry earth and stones, which made a
great noise. The soldier close to me jumped up in a
fright and shouted out that he was killed, and several
people from the street came rushing in to see what had
^ The lihaf is practically a couple of blankets with padding sewn in
between ;
it is generally covered with some sort of gaudy cotton stuff,
and looks like a very thickly padded qmlt.