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Boston Globe
April 24 2005
Armenians remember the horror
By Yvonne Abraham, Globe Staff | April 24, 2005
Today is the 90th anniversary of the Armenian genocide, the mass
killings and deportations by Ottoman Turks that led to the deaths of
as many as 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 and 1923. Few survivors
of those attacks -- which the Turkish government says were part of a
civil conflict, not a genocide -- remain. Some settled here in
Massachusetts, where Armenian-Americans now number about 30,000.
In the excerpts below, they share some of their memories.
Yeghsa Giragosian, 105, North Andover (native of Harput)
'You don't know who's coming. And you don't know what's going to
happen. But you're young and you take it.'
''I was 14. Everything was going good, then the genocide started one
morning. In every village, Armenian people, everybody has to go to
the cemetery. We are in the cemetery and the soldiers right away
start to take the girls. Turkish men took my two sisters [and married
them]. A Turkish man, a friend of my grandfather's, he held my hand
and took me to his home. I lived with them. He had a wife and
children, and I didn't know so much of what was happening. I was
young. And I didn't know life. The wife was so good to me. She never
says, 'You are Armenian girl,' or this and that. They didn't use me.
She wash me, she cook for me, she was good just like a mother. They
had two boys and a girl, and she talk Armenian and she was my age,
and we became two sisters. About three years later, my aunt, she come
back. And she told me my mother died. She told me, 'If you can, run
away, because the war is stopped and the Turks can do nothing.' I
did, right away. . . . My mind grew up and now I know the difference.
I run away. I didn't say nothing . . . even [to] the girl I was with.
My second sister ran away too. I went to [an] Armenian orphanage. Two
years I stay over there. We come to Aleppo . . . and Marseilles. Then
we are here [in America], then a couple of years later, my sister
says she finally found out where [our older sister] is. She was still
in Turkey. My second sister, she went to her house [in Turkey] and
she says 'Sister, run away, come on.' She says, 'I can't, I have five
children.' Last time I saw [my eldest sister] was in that cemetery. I
don't know if she died. . . . She's going to be 108. It must be she
died."
Peter Bilezikian, 92, Newton (native of Marash)
''The dream I used to have, a Turk would cut my ears off, cut my
nose, pull my teeth, gouge my eye out.'
''All I remember is, we were hungry, and I thought that was a normal
thing. . . . There were so many people dying. . . . I remember
children dying with the big stomachs . . . dropping dead right in the
middle of the street. And a cart would come along, pick them up as if
they were nothing, and throw them up on the cart and keep going.
There'd be a big hole somewhere, they'd just dump it in there. During
the 1919 war, when the . . . Turks rebelled against the French . . .
there was a war in the city. We were in one place and it was fenced.
A lady was baking bread. I was hungry and I went over there and asked
for a piece of bread. She wouldn't give it to me: 'This is for my
children. If I give it to you, then my children won't have any.' So I
waited, I was hoping she would take her eyes off the bread, I could
steal. She never took her eyes off it, but they were shooting from a
minaret . . . I had a cowlick, like an Irish boy, you know . . . [the
bullet] singed my hair and hit her between the eyes. She died. I
grabbed all the bread that she had baked, ran under a stairway and
ate it all up. I didn't care what anybody [thought]. It wasn't a nice
thing to do, looking back. Poor woman died, and do you know, I never
thought anything of her dying? These are all dreams to me today. When
I came to this country I lived in Newtonville. At night I used to
find myself under the bed in a cold sweat. The dream I used to have
was, a Turk would cut my ears off, cut my nose, pull my teeth, gouge
my eye out. I would wake up all wet. . . . I never had these dreams
in the old country."
ADVERTISEMENT
Arminé Dedkian, 92, Watertown (native of Tekirdag)
'I didn't know so much of what was happending. I was young. And I
didn't know life.'
''I was just born when they killed my father. Everybody had to keep
going. We were walking towards the desert . . . to Syria. My mother
got a job in a hospital over there. Then this young man, he was
Armenian, he was working there too. They got married. He was ashamed
to say he had married a widow . . . you know, 17, 18 years old, she
had a child. They [left me with my grandmother]. They told her,
'After we settle, we are going to come and get her.' But then, again
things happened. The Turks chased us three times, we had to abandon
everything. We didn't know where [my mother] was. . . . We didn't
know who had died, who hadn't. We found a way of finding each other
by writing in the Armenian papers. [We placed an ad, looking for my
mother.] My mother's cousin saw the ad and he knew my mother was in
America. I was seven days on the boat by myself. I was 15. Whoever
had sponsored you had to be there to pick you up. My mother wasn't
there. She had made a mistake. So they took me to Ellis Island. Six
or seven days there. You just sit there and your ears are wide open
and you hope that you are going to hear your name. You don't know
who's coming. And you don't know what's going to happen. But you're
young and you take it. When my mother opened the door I just had a
feeling it was her, she was a very pretty woman. But because we never
knew each other, like two strangers we stood together, you know, no
hugging, no kissing, no nothing. That's why my family always tell me,
'We're not a kissing family.' I made something out of my life, but I
feel cheated that I didn't have a childhood. I should have talked to
her: 'What happened? Why did you leave me?'"
John D. Kasparian, 98, Worcester (native of Van)
''There was nothing to be eaten. I ate grass for days. That's the way
we live. ...It was a hell life to live.'
ADVERTISEMENT
''All I know, I was 7 years old, and I seen this fighting . . . all
the time. You get kind of sick of it, you get used to it in a way.
But things got so much worse, that Turks in 1915 start to go from
house to house, take the people out -- father, mother, children, they
don't care. One night . . . a Turkish friend of my father . . . woke
my house . . . and took my father and says 'You know this is the
section they coming after tonight, you get out right away. If not
then you won't be living to see the light tomorrow.' We run away for
life. . . . By early morning the [same] man came and says . . .
'After you left, they gathered 200 men, women, and children and put
in the armory. They closed the door and put kerosene, and lit up that
place.' Men, women, children, they perished that particular night. If
we didn't get out we would have been gone, for sure thing. We would
have been dead. We couldn't eat nothing [on the road]. There was
nothing to be eaten. I ate grass for days. That's the way we live,
till we came to Yerevan. It was a hell life to live. My brother got
lost . . . on the road to Yerevan. Somebody [found him] and brought
[him to Yerevan]. Now we were looking for our brother and we went
every place. Finally we went to this park, he was all by himself
sitting on a huge stone, so everybody could see and recognize him. He
was crying. 'Where's my parents? Where's my folks?' My father
naturally grabbed him and broke down and we got all together. But
unfortunately he didn't last long. He died because of starvation and
no water. . . . Thank God we find him. That was a sad day for me
really. I don't look back. I forget about it, just looking forward.
Thank goodness, I live in such a heavenly country."
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
April 24 2005
Armenians remember the horror
By Yvonne Abraham, Globe Staff | April 24, 2005
Today is the 90th anniversary of the Armenian genocide, the mass
killings and deportations by Ottoman Turks that led to the deaths of
as many as 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 and 1923. Few survivors
of those attacks -- which the Turkish government says were part of a
civil conflict, not a genocide -- remain. Some settled here in
Massachusetts, where Armenian-Americans now number about 30,000.
In the excerpts below, they share some of their memories.
Yeghsa Giragosian, 105, North Andover (native of Harput)
'You don't know who's coming. And you don't know what's going to
happen. But you're young and you take it.'
''I was 14. Everything was going good, then the genocide started one
morning. In every village, Armenian people, everybody has to go to
the cemetery. We are in the cemetery and the soldiers right away
start to take the girls. Turkish men took my two sisters [and married
them]. A Turkish man, a friend of my grandfather's, he held my hand
and took me to his home. I lived with them. He had a wife and
children, and I didn't know so much of what was happening. I was
young. And I didn't know life. The wife was so good to me. She never
says, 'You are Armenian girl,' or this and that. They didn't use me.
She wash me, she cook for me, she was good just like a mother. They
had two boys and a girl, and she talk Armenian and she was my age,
and we became two sisters. About three years later, my aunt, she come
back. And she told me my mother died. She told me, 'If you can, run
away, because the war is stopped and the Turks can do nothing.' I
did, right away. . . . My mind grew up and now I know the difference.
I run away. I didn't say nothing . . . even [to] the girl I was with.
My second sister ran away too. I went to [an] Armenian orphanage. Two
years I stay over there. We come to Aleppo . . . and Marseilles. Then
we are here [in America], then a couple of years later, my sister
says she finally found out where [our older sister] is. She was still
in Turkey. My second sister, she went to her house [in Turkey] and
she says 'Sister, run away, come on.' She says, 'I can't, I have five
children.' Last time I saw [my eldest sister] was in that cemetery. I
don't know if she died. . . . She's going to be 108. It must be she
died."
Peter Bilezikian, 92, Newton (native of Marash)
''The dream I used to have, a Turk would cut my ears off, cut my
nose, pull my teeth, gouge my eye out.'
''All I remember is, we were hungry, and I thought that was a normal
thing. . . . There were so many people dying. . . . I remember
children dying with the big stomachs . . . dropping dead right in the
middle of the street. And a cart would come along, pick them up as if
they were nothing, and throw them up on the cart and keep going.
There'd be a big hole somewhere, they'd just dump it in there. During
the 1919 war, when the . . . Turks rebelled against the French . . .
there was a war in the city. We were in one place and it was fenced.
A lady was baking bread. I was hungry and I went over there and asked
for a piece of bread. She wouldn't give it to me: 'This is for my
children. If I give it to you, then my children won't have any.' So I
waited, I was hoping she would take her eyes off the bread, I could
steal. She never took her eyes off it, but they were shooting from a
minaret . . . I had a cowlick, like an Irish boy, you know . . . [the
bullet] singed my hair and hit her between the eyes. She died. I
grabbed all the bread that she had baked, ran under a stairway and
ate it all up. I didn't care what anybody [thought]. It wasn't a nice
thing to do, looking back. Poor woman died, and do you know, I never
thought anything of her dying? These are all dreams to me today. When
I came to this country I lived in Newtonville. At night I used to
find myself under the bed in a cold sweat. The dream I used to have
was, a Turk would cut my ears off, cut my nose, pull my teeth, gouge
my eye out. I would wake up all wet. . . . I never had these dreams
in the old country."
ADVERTISEMENT
Arminé Dedkian, 92, Watertown (native of Tekirdag)
'I didn't know so much of what was happending. I was young. And I
didn't know life.'
''I was just born when they killed my father. Everybody had to keep
going. We were walking towards the desert . . . to Syria. My mother
got a job in a hospital over there. Then this young man, he was
Armenian, he was working there too. They got married. He was ashamed
to say he had married a widow . . . you know, 17, 18 years old, she
had a child. They [left me with my grandmother]. They told her,
'After we settle, we are going to come and get her.' But then, again
things happened. The Turks chased us three times, we had to abandon
everything. We didn't know where [my mother] was. . . . We didn't
know who had died, who hadn't. We found a way of finding each other
by writing in the Armenian papers. [We placed an ad, looking for my
mother.] My mother's cousin saw the ad and he knew my mother was in
America. I was seven days on the boat by myself. I was 15. Whoever
had sponsored you had to be there to pick you up. My mother wasn't
there. She had made a mistake. So they took me to Ellis Island. Six
or seven days there. You just sit there and your ears are wide open
and you hope that you are going to hear your name. You don't know
who's coming. And you don't know what's going to happen. But you're
young and you take it. When my mother opened the door I just had a
feeling it was her, she was a very pretty woman. But because we never
knew each other, like two strangers we stood together, you know, no
hugging, no kissing, no nothing. That's why my family always tell me,
'We're not a kissing family.' I made something out of my life, but I
feel cheated that I didn't have a childhood. I should have talked to
her: 'What happened? Why did you leave me?'"
John D. Kasparian, 98, Worcester (native of Van)
''There was nothing to be eaten. I ate grass for days. That's the way
we live. ...It was a hell life to live.'
ADVERTISEMENT
''All I know, I was 7 years old, and I seen this fighting . . . all
the time. You get kind of sick of it, you get used to it in a way.
But things got so much worse, that Turks in 1915 start to go from
house to house, take the people out -- father, mother, children, they
don't care. One night . . . a Turkish friend of my father . . . woke
my house . . . and took my father and says 'You know this is the
section they coming after tonight, you get out right away. If not
then you won't be living to see the light tomorrow.' We run away for
life. . . . By early morning the [same] man came and says . . .
'After you left, they gathered 200 men, women, and children and put
in the armory. They closed the door and put kerosene, and lit up that
place.' Men, women, children, they perished that particular night. If
we didn't get out we would have been gone, for sure thing. We would
have been dead. We couldn't eat nothing [on the road]. There was
nothing to be eaten. I ate grass for days. That's the way we live,
till we came to Yerevan. It was a hell life to live. My brother got
lost . . . on the road to Yerevan. Somebody [found him] and brought
[him to Yerevan]. Now we were looking for our brother and we went
every place. Finally we went to this park, he was all by himself
sitting on a huge stone, so everybody could see and recognize him. He
was crying. 'Where's my parents? Where's my folks?' My father
naturally grabbed him and broke down and we got all together. But
unfortunately he didn't last long. He died because of starvation and
no water. . . . Thank God we find him. That was a sad day for me
really. I don't look back. I forget about it, just looking forward.
Thank goodness, I live in such a heavenly country."
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress