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Lincoln Journal, MA
Sept 7 2006
Preserving his story
By Cheryl Lecesse/ Staff Writer
Thursday, September 7, 2006 - Updated: 07:59 AM EST
For Henry Haroian, writing his memoirs was an emotional roller coaster.
"I would sit at the computer and stare at a blank screen," he said, as
anger, sadness and happiness would pass as he tried to get his memories
on paper. "There was this urge within me to get the story out."
The story Haroian refers to is not his own, however - it's that of
his parents, Arakel and Dalitah, survivors of the Armenian Genocide
of 1915-1923.
"It's been called a forgotten genocide," he said, recalling that some
members of his writing class had never heard of it.
After two and a half years, Haroian, 85, has published "Remembrances,"
a book that tells the story of his parents' struggles to survive in the
Middle East and in Europe, their eventual move to the United States
for a better live, his upbringing in Watertown - where he changed
his name from Hampartzoom to Henry as an elementary school student
because it was too difficult to write - a foray in World War II,
and life in Lincoln.
Today, Haroian and his wife of 60 years Jessica live in the same
house on Lincoln Road that he worked hard to build 50 years ago.
Residents can hear about Haroian's experience Thursday, Sept. 21,
when he gives a talk and signs copies of his book at the Council on
Aging in Bemis Hall.
Haroian will donate all proceeds from his book's sales to the Friends
of the Council on Aging and the Friends of the Lincoln Library. A
similar talk and book signing is planned at the library this fall.
It was a memoir-writing workshop at the Council on Aging that first
got Haroian writing about his family's experiences.
"I wanted to write my memoirs and I didn't know quite how to do
it," he said, crediting Kathleen Lundgren, who ran the workshop,
for helping him work through it.
Haroian said the writing process was similar to his work on his
dissertation in graduate school: difficult to start and difficult
to finish.
"I finally had to listen to my editor [Jack MacLean] who said,
'You have enough here,'" he said.
Pointing to a photograph in his book of his mother's family, Haroian
began to tell his family's story. His mother's side, coming from
Erzerum, Turkey, would sustain many losses while on what became
a death march to a refugee camp in Mosul; five of the family's 13
members would survive.
"My mother was a young girl when the gendarmes knocked on the door
and said, 'You have 10 days to vacate,'" Haroian said.
His father had a harrowing escape after his family was wiped out in
Tadem, the village where he was born. When he was either 12 or 13
years old, Arakel was forced to march through the der zor, or fiery
deserts, by the Turkish gendarmes.
In a book titled, "Our Village, Tadem," written in Armenian in 1958
by a group of genocide survivors, Haroian's father writes, "More than
forty years have passed, yet nightmares and flashbacks of horrific
scenes of murders continue to haunt my sleep...we were whipped by
Turkish gendarmes and driven like animals - half naked, in bare feet -
falling, rising, stumbling and yet moving again through an endless,
hot and trackless desert - weary, starving men, women and children,
half crazed from thirst, falling down, some for the last time, dying
where they fell."
But Arakel was saved; during the march, a band of nomadic Kurds on
horseback charged through the killing field, and one reached down
and grabbed Arakel by the collar.
"For two and a half to three years he was with the Kurds taking care
of horses, gathering firewood, and doing whatever chores needed to
be done," Haroian said. "One day he escaped and found his way to
a mission."
The mission, in Mosul, is where Haroian's parents met. Because he
could speak Armenian, Turkish and Kurdish, he would help translate for
newcomers. The mission was trying to help reunite families; once Arakel
was called in to translate, and was reintroduced to his first cousin.
Haroian's mother Dalitah, a 15-year-old teen, stumbled to the mission
with her shellshocked mother, who willed herself to survive to protect
her daughter. It was Arakel's cousin who proposed the marriage,
and Dalitah's mother agreed.
Although the first part of his book is not his own memories, Haroian
said his parents' story was an important one to preserve not only for
his own family but for others to know the truth about what happened
in Mesopotamia during World War I.
Haroian said his father and mother were not generally open to him
about what they experienced; much of what he knows he gathered by
listening to his parents and their friends talk around their round
dining room table in Watertown as a young boy.
"I can still smell the coffee and the cigarette smoke swirling around
the light fixture," he said.
And once his parents went to work, he would sit on the front porch
of his paternal grandmother and hear more.
"She would tell me endless stories about what happened," he said.
Education was the constant talk at the house, Haroian said, remembering
how he learned to read and write Armenian from the wives of editors
of two Armenian newspapers in town in a rented storefront in Watertown.
And although at the time Haroian would rather have been somewhere else,
he never forgot what he learned - or where he came from.
"Remembrances" is available for purchase at the Council on Aging.
Sept 7 2006
Preserving his story
By Cheryl Lecesse/ Staff Writer
Thursday, September 7, 2006 - Updated: 07:59 AM EST
For Henry Haroian, writing his memoirs was an emotional roller coaster.
"I would sit at the computer and stare at a blank screen," he said, as
anger, sadness and happiness would pass as he tried to get his memories
on paper. "There was this urge within me to get the story out."
The story Haroian refers to is not his own, however - it's that of
his parents, Arakel and Dalitah, survivors of the Armenian Genocide
of 1915-1923.
"It's been called a forgotten genocide," he said, recalling that some
members of his writing class had never heard of it.
After two and a half years, Haroian, 85, has published "Remembrances,"
a book that tells the story of his parents' struggles to survive in the
Middle East and in Europe, their eventual move to the United States
for a better live, his upbringing in Watertown - where he changed
his name from Hampartzoom to Henry as an elementary school student
because it was too difficult to write - a foray in World War II,
and life in Lincoln.
Today, Haroian and his wife of 60 years Jessica live in the same
house on Lincoln Road that he worked hard to build 50 years ago.
Residents can hear about Haroian's experience Thursday, Sept. 21,
when he gives a talk and signs copies of his book at the Council on
Aging in Bemis Hall.
Haroian will donate all proceeds from his book's sales to the Friends
of the Council on Aging and the Friends of the Lincoln Library. A
similar talk and book signing is planned at the library this fall.
It was a memoir-writing workshop at the Council on Aging that first
got Haroian writing about his family's experiences.
"I wanted to write my memoirs and I didn't know quite how to do
it," he said, crediting Kathleen Lundgren, who ran the workshop,
for helping him work through it.
Haroian said the writing process was similar to his work on his
dissertation in graduate school: difficult to start and difficult
to finish.
"I finally had to listen to my editor [Jack MacLean] who said,
'You have enough here,'" he said.
Pointing to a photograph in his book of his mother's family, Haroian
began to tell his family's story. His mother's side, coming from
Erzerum, Turkey, would sustain many losses while on what became
a death march to a refugee camp in Mosul; five of the family's 13
members would survive.
"My mother was a young girl when the gendarmes knocked on the door
and said, 'You have 10 days to vacate,'" Haroian said.
His father had a harrowing escape after his family was wiped out in
Tadem, the village where he was born. When he was either 12 or 13
years old, Arakel was forced to march through the der zor, or fiery
deserts, by the Turkish gendarmes.
In a book titled, "Our Village, Tadem," written in Armenian in 1958
by a group of genocide survivors, Haroian's father writes, "More than
forty years have passed, yet nightmares and flashbacks of horrific
scenes of murders continue to haunt my sleep...we were whipped by
Turkish gendarmes and driven like animals - half naked, in bare feet -
falling, rising, stumbling and yet moving again through an endless,
hot and trackless desert - weary, starving men, women and children,
half crazed from thirst, falling down, some for the last time, dying
where they fell."
But Arakel was saved; during the march, a band of nomadic Kurds on
horseback charged through the killing field, and one reached down
and grabbed Arakel by the collar.
"For two and a half to three years he was with the Kurds taking care
of horses, gathering firewood, and doing whatever chores needed to
be done," Haroian said. "One day he escaped and found his way to
a mission."
The mission, in Mosul, is where Haroian's parents met. Because he
could speak Armenian, Turkish and Kurdish, he would help translate for
newcomers. The mission was trying to help reunite families; once Arakel
was called in to translate, and was reintroduced to his first cousin.
Haroian's mother Dalitah, a 15-year-old teen, stumbled to the mission
with her shellshocked mother, who willed herself to survive to protect
her daughter. It was Arakel's cousin who proposed the marriage,
and Dalitah's mother agreed.
Although the first part of his book is not his own memories, Haroian
said his parents' story was an important one to preserve not only for
his own family but for others to know the truth about what happened
in Mesopotamia during World War I.
Haroian said his father and mother were not generally open to him
about what they experienced; much of what he knows he gathered by
listening to his parents and their friends talk around their round
dining room table in Watertown as a young boy.
"I can still smell the coffee and the cigarette smoke swirling around
the light fixture," he said.
And once his parents went to work, he would sit on the front porch
of his paternal grandmother and hear more.
"She would tell me endless stories about what happened," he said.
Education was the constant talk at the house, Haroian said, remembering
how he learned to read and write Armenian from the wives of editors
of two Armenian newspapers in town in a rented storefront in Watertown.
And although at the time Haroian would rather have been somewhere else,
he never forgot what he learned - or where he came from.
"Remembrances" is available for purchase at the Council on Aging.