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| Untold stories: Blessed assassin of armenian people |
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Soghomon Tehlirian Soghomon Tehlirian locked eyes with Talat Pasha as he passed him, then turned, whipped out a revolver and shot the Turk once in the back of the head. He started to run, but was quickly cornered by a mob of local people, some of whom started to beat him. The Armenian cried, in broken German, “I foreigner, he foreigner, this not hurt Germany”, but he did no good. Finally, the police came to take him into custody. It is one of the many ironies of this story that Soghomon Tehlirian was beaten by a citizens of a country that would soon perpetrate another slaughter. March from Erzincan The genocidal Turkish forces caught up with the eighteen-year-old Soghomon Tehlirian and his family in June 1915, in their home in Erzincan. The Turks ordered that the entire population of the town – about twenty-thousand in all-turn over their valuables to the T  urkish authorities and form a column. They were than marched away by Turkish soldiers. With Tehlirian were his mother, his three sisters, his sister’s husband, his two brothers and a two-year-old niece. After marching for several hours, they heard gunfire coming from the head of the column. Suddenly, all was chaos. Turkish troops descended on Tehlirian ’s group, shooting, clubbing, and stabbing. Tehlirian’s mother was shot dead. His sisters was dragged away into the bushes and raped. An axe cleaves Tehlirian’s brother’s skull right in front of him. And then something smashed into Tehlirian’s head and he fell unconscious. Overwhelmed with horror, he realized he was the only survivor from the column. According to Tehlirian he found his way to a remote mountain village, where a kindly woman gave him clothes to replace his bloodstained once. After resting a short time, he began long journey eastwards toward the Russian border. While living and working in Constantinople, Tehlirian had noticed that many of the Armenian refugees with whom he spent his time in cafes were trying to forget the genocide, to banish the awful memories, to move on with their lives. Tehlirian was unable to do this. The images of his murdered family were with him everywhere. He began to have epileptic seizures that were almost certainly a result of the blow he had taken on the head. He bought a pistol and carried around with him. In meantime, with the war over, Western powers put pressure on the new puppet Turkish government to punish those responsible for the genocide, which has been reported throughout the war by some news organizations. The trials began in January 1919 and a good deal of evidence was brought out to show Turkish involvement in the killings. In the end, the only Turk who paid a high price was Governor Kemal Bay, who was charged with organizing the killing of the Armenians of an entire district. The three Young Turk leaders, Talat, Enver and Cemal, had escaped to Odessa in a German submarine at the end of the war. The military tribunal sentenced them to death in absentia, but no attempt was made to track them down and carry out the sentences, As far as the Turks and most of the Western powers were concert , the matter was now closed. The trial Tehlirian was defended by three defence attorneys, including Dr. Kurt Niemeyer, professor of Law at Cologne University. The defense attorneys made no attempt to deny the fact that Tehlirian had killed a man. They focused on the influence of the Armenian Genocide on Tehlirian's mental state. It took the jury slightly over an hour to render a verdict of "not guilty" on grounds of temporary insanity. Tehlirian was tried and acquitted of all charges by the German court. The trial examined not only Tehlirian’s actions but also Tehlirian's conviction that Talat Pasha was the main author of the Armenian Genocide. From:"History's great untold stories"
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| Last Updated ( Thursday, 25 June 2009 20:27 ) |
