Henry Morgenthau
US Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire
Constantinople
July 31st, 1915
Dr Charles Stewart
Mushar
Trebizond
Dear Charles,
I am writing as your friend and ambassador to keep you abreast of recent developments in the capital and further afield. What I am about to relate may change your thinking on a possible return to America, and although I would not presume to influence any decision you might make I urge you to give serious consideration to the following.
Although America has not yet declared against the Empire, you are probably aware that the United States joining the Allies is inevitable. Following the April 24th assassination of high-ranking Armenians, which I mentioned in my last letter, all remaining Armenians have been systematically rounded up and taken from the city. The arrests were initially confined to men who had reached the age of majority, but in recent weeks have included women, children and the elderly. The official statement from the Government claims that they are to be interned in camps in the interior and at Deir al-Zor in Syria, but I am hearing accounts from our consuls countrywide that many of them are dying of starvation and exposure on the roads.
Of immediate concern to yourself, Charles, is the extension of these marches across the Empire and into eastern territories. As you are aware, I had attempted to intervene with the Government, but to no avail, and have redirected my energies into publicising the story in the American papers. I had hoped that international opprobrium might shame the powers that be into more humane treatment of the Armenians, but thus far without success. The dissemination of the story in the New York Times and other broadsheets has resulted in an avalanche of donations, and I have established a relief fund which I hope will help ameliorate conditions in the camps. Should there be camps established in Trebizond, I will make funds available for you to disburse in any way you see fit. While I am humbled, Charles, by the largesse of the American people, I fear that what little we can do will not nearly be enough.
Forgive the gloomy tone of this letter, Charles, but it reflects in no small way my fears and misgivings on the Armenian question and life in Turkey generally. I sometimes wonder about the wisdom of raising a family here. I would urge you to give what I have written due consideration, and if you do decide to return to America let me know if I can be of help with travel arrangements, etc.
Please give my fond regards to Hetty and the family,
I am, as always, your friend,
Henry Morgenthau
Diary of Dr Charles Stewart
Mushar
Trebizond
August 5th, 1915
One of the calls I have always enjoyed making is to the Armenian Children’s Orphanage at the top of the hill on the southern side of the village. The children are well, by and large, and if it wasn’t for the Matron, who talks too much, I would happily visit more often. Today I was calling because the orphanage was commemorating its 15th year in the village and Matron had decided to celebrate the occasion.
As I rode up the hill, I wasn’t thinking of the orphans but mulling over Henry Morgenthau’s latest letter. The news was disturbing, but there is no question of leaving Trebizond. War hysteria is the order of the day. If there is a bias against Armenians it is because of old alliances with the Russians, just as there is an anti-Turkish bias in the Caucasus. Added to which, the country cannot survive without its Armenian population as most of the hospitals are staffed by Armenian doctors and nurses. What government would cripple its emergency services in wartime?
By the time I got to the orphanage I was late. I rang the bell and the twins Adom and Aleksander opened the gate and took my horse to the stable yard. Inside, Manon and most of the hospital staff were already seated as well as the orphanage patrons and some of the local dignitaries. Hetty threw me a look as I took my seat between Matron and Meraijan Assadourian. At a signal from Matron, the side door to the hall opened, and all the children filed into the room. They stood before us, boys to the right, girls to the left, smallest children sitting cross-legged at their feet. On cue they started to sing. Armenian songs, Greek songs, Turkish songs, even a Russian lullaby. For a finish they belted out the ‘Star Spangled Banner’ and had all the ladies in tears. Afterwards, Matron gave a little speech about my work at the orphanage and announced that the children had made me a gift. She clapped her hands and Aleksander and Adom marched in, carrying a rolled-up rug between them. Unrolling it, they stood back to watch my reaction. It was a colourful Turkey rug in shades of reds, blues and yellows, much sought after in the salons of New York. As the twins pointed out the patterns woven by the various groups of children, I thought to myself that a rug like this would raise a pretty penny for our much-needed hospital funds.
Thanking the children and the matron, I assured all those assembled that the monies from the sale of the rug would go directly towards the TB sanatorium. The gathering broke up quickly after that, and people drifted to the refectory for tea. Hetty was waiting for me by the door. She wanted to know why I had said I was going to sell the rug when the children had been working on it for months. I explained that I appreciated the children’s efforts but that it was worth a lot of money and would be turned into some badly needed cash. Hetty then suggested I hold on to it for a time, for a couple of months at least, which made no sense because I would only become attached to it. I urged her to think of all the good the money would do, but she was not in the frame of mind to hear it.
‘One rug is not going to fund an entire unit!’ she said sharply and turned on her heel.
Before I had time to digest this, my nurse came marching across the hall and praised my ‘discours magnifique’. I ignored the caustic tone and asked if there was any news of Mari and Patil.
‘Do not talk so loudly,’ she said, looking around her. ‘They are on the boat. That is all I know.’
I told her then that I had spoken with Ozhan. This business with Patil was all a misunderstanding, and Ozhan had merely wanted to check her papers. In the coming weeks, he told me, all citizens’ papers would be checked systematically, including my own. The man had been convincing. Everybody, he claimed, had to present papers and Armenians were no exception.
‘He knows the nurses are gone,’ I continued. ‘I told him they went back to Trebizond to finish their training, but I think he knew I was lying. I did make it clear that there is to be no further interference with my staff.’
Manon did not react. It was as if she hadn’t heard a single word.
‘As you are talking of staff,’ she said instead, ‘I must discuss with you about Anyush.’
Just then a latecomer arrived.
‘Is everything over?’ Paul asked. ‘My horse threw a shoe and I had to walk the last four miles.’
‘If you had come last night as I told you there would be no walking,’ Manon said irritably but she was obviously glad to see him.
I was happy to see Paul myself, and relieved. He hadn’t been to the village since our last meeting and I knew I was somehow to blame. He was my oldest friend in this country, and it pained me to think that our regard for each other might have changed. Still, he had made an effort to be there and that was something in itself.
‘Paul,’ Hetty said, kissing him on both cheeks. ‘I’m so glad you made it. I’m on my way back to the house. Why don’t you join us for supper? You too, Manon.’
Manon said she had a few things to attend to at the hospital and would join us shortly. Hetty went on ahead and Paul and I walked with the horses together. Our conversation was stiff and awkward, inevitably turning to the one subject we should have avoided. I asked how things were at the hospital, and he told me they hadn’t changed. There was just himself and Professor Levonian.
‘What about the others?’ I asked. ‘The nurses?’
‘Gone. Almost all of them.’
‘Gone?’
‘Yes, Charles. I told them to leave.’
‘Like Mari and Patil?’
To my surprise, Paul smiled. ‘You shouldn’t complain, Charles. You still have Manon. And Anyush of course.’
‘Unless you arrange for her to leave also.’
‘I was rather hoping you might do that yourself.’
It took a considerable effort to control my temper, so I said nothing and we walked on in silence. At the house Arnak came out of the stable yard to take our horses, and Robert and Milly came running down the path.
‘Papa!’ Robert burst out. ‘There’s a wedding at the church.’
‘We saw it, Papa,’ Milly said. ‘We were there.’
Hetty came out of the house with a pitcher of lemonade and asked the children what exactly they meant.
‘The church door was open,’ Robert said. ‘Milly and I looked inside and Father Gregory was at the top with a man and a woman.’
I reminded them of the Aykanian wedding where the whole village was present. It couldn’t be a wedding, I assured them, if nobody knew about it.
‘It was, Papa,’ Milly insisted. ‘I saw them doing that thing with the string.’
‘Are you sure?’ Hetty asked doubtfully. ‘Was the woman dressed like a bride?’
‘No.’
‘What about the groom? How was he dressed?’
‘You know him, Papa,’ Robert said. ‘It was Husik.’
‘Husik? The trapper?’
‘You don’t mean Husik Tashjian?’ Paul asked, a cigarette halfway to his mouth. ‘Who was the girl?’
‘Well …’ Robert glanced at his sister, ‘… we think it was Anyush.’
Paul’s hand froze.
‘Now listen to me,’ he said, bending down to the children. ‘Think carefully. This is very important. Are you sure it was Anyush?’
‘It was,’ Milly said belligerently. ‘I know it was.’
‘But if she was wearing a scarf, how can you be certain?’
‘Because I saw her plait. It was Anyush’s hair.’
‘Lots of girls have plaited hair. You might think you saw her but it could have been someone else.’
‘It was Anyush,’ Milly said and started to cry.
I’d had enough. ‘For God’s sake, Paul, you’re frightening her.’
‘Don’t you understand anything?’ He rounded on me. ‘Didn’t you hear what they said? Anyush is marrying Husik Tashjian.’
It was a little strange but not unheard of. I told him that the girl may marry whomsoever she chooses, but Paul was beside himself. He insisted I put a stop to it and that I had no idea who she was marrying. Naturally I refused.
‘Look, Paul, I don’t know what you’ve got against him, but Husik is not the worst.’
‘It’s not Husik I’m concerned about.’
‘Then who?’ Hetty asked.
‘His father!’
The garden was suddenly quiet. The birds, the dog that had been barking in the yard and even the creaking boughs above our heads seemed moved to silence.
‘Oh my God!’ Hetty whispered. ‘Jane!’
The children’s confused faces looked from one adult to another. What Paul was telling me didn’t seem possible. Anyush Charcoudian, my assistant nurse, the little girl who had taken her first American cookie from my hand, would be living in the same house as a sadistic rapist. Paul grabbed my arm. ‘We still have time. We can put a stop to this.’
‘You’re too late.’ Walking beneath the fig trees, Manon came slowly along the path. ‘It is over. The marriage is done.’
One year later
The baby had fallen asleep at Anyush’s breast and her head lay heavy in the crook of her mother’s arm. Her tiny, perfect lips were parted, making small sucking noises in her sleep. On the skin of her chest, just visible under the loose cotton shift, was her birthmark. Anyush touched it with her finger. It was in the shape of a tulip, rose pink and perfectly formed. Gohar had frowned when she had seen it, pinning on the atchka ooloonk to ward off the evil eye. Anyush loved the mark, as she loved everything about her baby daughter. Jahan was stamped all over her, from the long lashes and brown eyes to the silky-fine black hair. It hurt they were so alike. She tried not to think of Jahan, but every time she looked at her daughter he was there. Anyush bent her head to kiss the baby and put her in the crib she had been given by the Stewarts.
The pregnancy had been a long and frightening time. So many changes, so many lies. That day on the beach she had taken Husik by the hand and led him to the wood. What happened after was something she tried to forget, but weeks later when she told him she was pregnant he took the news calmly. Telling his father had been a different matter. He called Anyush every devil’s name and damned her to Hell, but some days later he had a change of heart and agreed she could marry his son.
Others took the news badly. Sosi burst into tears and Parzik refused to believe it. It was to settle the debt her family owed Kazbek, Anyush told them, and to protect her mother and grandmother. Parzik knew she was lying, but Anyush could not tell her that she’d had a Turkish lover and that the father of her child was an Ottoman soldier.
Throughout those long months dark thoughts troubled Anyush. What if she didn’t love this child? What if she had no feelings for the baby as Khandut had none for her? She worried that her mother’s strangeness was buried inside her all along, but the moment the midwife put Lale into her arms she felt nothing but love for her child. Her friends came to bless the baby and celebrate the arrival. Sosi made infant clothes, and Parzik, who had lost her first pregnancy and was with child again, held her and said how lucky Anyush was. Havat came with her mother and bestowed one of her rare and heartbreaking smiles. The three friends saw a lot of each other during Anyush’s lying-in, but when she moved back to Kazbek’s house after the birth, it came to an abrupt end.
Anyush’s father-in-law was a man who liked his clothes clean and his shoes polished but whose house was stiffening into its own filth. He swung his beads like a jailer and shouted his prayers like an assault, but was too strong, too fleshy to give himself to any power greater than his own. There was little in his manner that spoke of a fear of God, only a will to instil it in others. Because she was afraid of him, and partly in an effort to please, Anyush tried to win his favour. She washed and scrubbed the house until it shone. She convinced Husik to repair the window sashes so that they opened again and let in air to blow away the smell of male sweat. With Gohar’s help, she planted a small vegetable garden at the back of the house and put back the potato drills that had been there in Husik’s mother’s time. Kazbek complained constantly. Nothing was done to his satisfaction and the harder she tried the more bad-tempered he became. He liked to drop to his knees praying aloud that she might be forgiven for her laziness and sinfulness, and forced her to kneel beside him on the newly cleaned floor.
Then there was Husik. Her husband was as strange as his father but without the same malice. Anyush tried not to compare him to Jahan, but it took all her strength not to recoil from him. She thought he would consume her in the close confines of their bed, his eyes pinning her to the mattress and his rough hands exploring her body like a blind man. He baited her into the bedroom they shared with the baby, heedless of Lale’s cry or his father on the other side of the wall or anything else that might distract him from his needs. He was a man obsessed, and yet she couldn’t bring herself to hate him. She was touched whenever he held Lale, a name he had suggested and which meant ‘tulip’. After the birth, Anyush had cried bitter tears when she saw the mark on her baby’s chest, but it was Husik who persuaded her that it was beautiful. She was thankful to him then, and grateful for the kindness he showed her grandmother. It was this she kept in mind when his thick fingers pulled impatiently at the ties of her dress, and when he squeezed her breasts painfully as he reached the peak of his excitement, and when he lay spent beside her as she battled with tears and shame.
Beyond the house other battles were being fought. Raids on farms and shootings became common. Every other week someone was hanged in the
square like Mislav Aykanian. The villagers hid away their women, but there was no protection from Ozhan and his men. Armenian girls were theirs for the taking and any girl would do. It was a relief whenever Ozhan disappeared to the city and a torment when he returned. The Stewarts were doing their best for the villagers, but the soup kitchen was no longer enough. People took to the roads to beg and some tried their luck in the city, where they fared no better. The Talanians and the Setians, who now had Parzik and Vardan living with them, were barely eking out an existence.
After Lale’s birth, the Stewart family paid Anyush a visit, bringing Lottie’s old crib as a gift. Millie touched Lale’s birthmark and said that having a tulip mark on her skin meant that she would always be a very lucky baby indeed. Bayan Stewart and nurse Manon had visited often during her confinement and Anyush had lived for those visits. Kazbek did not like the women calling and became difficult and rude in their presence. He never moved from his chair in the corner so that Anyush couldn’t talk freely and neither could anyone else. Finally he forbade her to have visitors altogether. At first, Bayan Stewart ignored him, but Kazbek frightened the doctor’s wife with his long body and yellow eyes. Nurse Manon continued to come as far as the wood and whistled for Anyush to come outside. It was better than seeing nobody, but everything changed for the worse after Dr Trowbridge called. She watched from the window as he approached along the path, getting off his horse and walking to where Kazbek was driving the cattle back from the river. They talked quietly at first, but soon Kazbek was shouting and waving his stick at the doctor.
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