Your Highness, subsequent to my telegraphic report of the 2nd inst. (No. 11), I have the honour of respectfully reporting that the Vali from Adana, who was in charge of suppressing the Armenian revolt in the area around Marash, [This very probably concerns the occurrences in Fundadjak.] returned here after completing his mission. He reported the following results of the clashes to Djemal Pasha: while there was a loss of 46 men on the side of the Turks, who sent two battalions, 464 Armenians died and 200 were taken prisoner.
Naturally, the prisoners’ fate has been settled from the start; there was no mention of any wounded, so that it seems reasonable to assume that they were later slaughtered.
There is no doubt that the reason for this punitive expedition suited the government extremely well; I have learned that a Turkish officer explained that Hakki Bey was selected to be the leader of this expedition because of the Vali’s especially “useful” characteristics for such business.
Contrary to the events in the Vilayet of Aleppo and particularly in Sivas, on which I am not qualified to make a report, nothing has yet become known of cases of violence, defilement, and similar expressions of national outbursts within the district on this side. This is not a case of any special philanthropy, however, but merely of saving attacks on life and limb for a more suitable place in the interior. Isolated cases of the sale of Armenian children that were also carried out here, e.g. in Osmania, were later cancelled.
There is an impression that the authorities particularly enjoy putting the Armenian nation, which in principle is destined to be destroyed, in a complete panic by means of issuing orders almost daily concerning their evacuation, which directly contradict each other. Numerous families have been brought to Adana and are anxiously awaiting their future fate here. Entire armies of Armenians are camping without protection from the sun and the dust in the fields by the stations of the Baghdad Railway, particularly in Osmania.
The measures which the authorities have taken to transport the people make the situation far more difficult than they ease the tribulations of the journey, because although the hired coachmen and camel drivers do transport the people assigned to them, they let them out after a short distance in the open desert under the excuse that the government has not paid them.
Many people see this as being the government’s intention to let the Armenian people become destitute. At any rate, a government that gave such bloody proof 6 years ago that it has these views is capable of wishing to exterminate everything that is Armenian.