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China as Refuge for Armenian Genocide Survivors

October 31, 2017 By administrator

The Armenian community in Manchuli (1919) (Meltickian Collection at Fresno State University)

Khatchig Mouradian,

In a letter to his brother Krikor,[2] who had arrived in Boston in 1914, Rev. Asadoor Z. Yeghoyan wrote from Kharpert, “Krikor you traveled all around the world, now you know by experience that the world is round, take care so you will not fall off it.”[3] The reverend’s words were not true, yet they were prophetic. At that point, Krikor had not traveled around the world—he had left the Ottoman Empire and crossed the Atlantic for the United States. However, Krikor returned to his home town shortly thereafter and was caught in the maelstrom of World War I. He survived the Armenian Genocide with the help of Kurds from Dersim and eventually arrived in the Caucasus. Yet conflict in the region kept pushing him eastward, until he reached China. In 1919, he finally arrived in the U.S. via Japan, with help from Diana Apkar, the honorary consul in Japan of the first Republic of Armenia. At that point, he had indeed traveled around the world. In this article, I present a brief history of the several thousand Armenians who, like Krikor, escaped the genocide and found safe haven in China.

Armenians in China (1880s-1950s)

Hundreds of Armenians, primarily from Russia, journeyed eastward to China in the late 19th century in search of opportunity, anchoring themselves in major cities, as well as in Harbin, a town that rose to prominence with the construction of the Chinese Eastern Railway.

Initially, Armenian railroad workers and merchants formed the core of the community in Harbin. Their numbers were small—no more than a few dozen. A larger number of Armenians lived in Manzhouli (Manchuli), which had risen to prominence in the early 20th century also thanks to railway projects. A group photograph of the Armenian community in Manzhouli (circa 1919) depicting around 150 men, women, and children, complete with the Armenian tricolor, stands as testament to the size of the Armenian community in the city.

A few thousand Armenians, including Yeghoyan, arrived in the region escaping genocide in Ottoman Turkey and turmoil in the Caucasus. Often, those who followed this path hoped to get to the United States. American missionary Ernest Yarrow encountered some 200 Armenian refugees in Vladivostok in late 1918, most of whom “have friends in America and are hoping in some way or other to get there.”[4] Yet most stayed in East Asia for years, even decades, helping build communities that thrived, despite conflicts, war, and foreign occupation.

Many of these Armenians coupled their personal success with a dedication to community life, helping develop small but vibrant communities. Despite conflicts, war, and foreign occupation that beset the history of China in the first half of the 20th century, Armenians built a church (Harbin), community centers (Harbin and Shanghai), and established relief organizations, choirs, and women’s groups. In the years following the 1949 Chinese revolution, Armenians fled the country (like most Christians in China) mainly in two directions: Soviet Armenia and the Americas.[5]

Garabed Meltickian was a survivor of the genocide who joined the stream of Armenian refugees traversing the Caucasus and Siberia all the way to China. Originally from Maden, Diyarbakir, Meltickian was conscripted into the Ottoman military in 1914 and dispatched to Erzincan. In 1915, he was among 120 Armenian soldiers who were handcuffed and taken away to be killed. He miraculously survived the carnage, was given shelter by Kurds, saved by advancing Russian troops, fought with Armenian forces in Kars, and after their withdrawal from the city, went to Tiflis, from there to Siberia, and finally arrived in Manchuria.[6]

Continue  reading : http://www.agos.com.tr/en/article/19035/china-as-refuge-for-armenian-genocide-survivors

Filed Under: Articles, Genocide Tagged With: armenian genocide, China as Refuge, survivors

Play featuring Armenian Genocide survivors goes on stage in Istanbul

April 14, 2017 By administrator

Istanbul’s Muhsin Ertugrul theatre has staged a peformance telling the story of Armenian Genocide survivors.
The Grief, written by Salih Elfioglu, Director of the Istanbul City Theatres’ Association, features a family whose members narrowly escaped the big horror to face tragedy and plights in other countries abroad.
But emigration was not the only trouble of the heroes who headed to Istanbul from Western Armenia to later settle in Paris. The journey into uncertainty begins in 2013, with the nostalgia for homeland haunting the family all the time, and the wars and political tensions in Europe keeping them in a state of permanent anxiety.

The performance will run through April 22.

Filed Under: Genocide, News Tagged With: Armenian, Genocide, İstanbul, play, survivors

Montreal, Armenian genocide survivors share stories of loss and regret (Video)

May 9, 2016 By administrator

Anahit Voskericyan Kuyumcu (left) has passed on her family's stories of survival during the Armenian genocide to her daughter, Celine Kuyumucu (middle) and her grandchildren. (CBC)

Anahit Voskericyan Kuyumcu (left) has passed on her family’s stories of survival during the Armenian genocide to her daughter, Celine Kuyumucu (middle) and her grandchildren. (CBC)

(CBC) Thousands marched through downtown Montreal to honour victims and call for genocide prevention,

Caroline Nammour says the story from the Armenian genocide that has marked her more than any other is the one about her mom’s great uncle, who had to leave his mother behind in the desert.

“At some point he couldn’t carry her anymore so he told her that he was going to get some water and he put her under a tree and he left. And every few steps he would turn and wave. She would wave back, until he just couldn’t see her anymore,” Nammour said.

She was one of thousands who attended a march for humanity and genocide prevention on Sunday in Montreal.

An estimated 1.5 million Armenians were killed during and after the First World War, rounded up and executed by Ottoman authorities. Many died after being forced to march into the desert in present-day Syria.

At Sunday’s walk, the descendents of survivors shared their painful stories, with a message that people can’t sit idly by and allow something like that to happen again.

Filed Under: Articles, Genocide Tagged With: Armenian, Genocide, share, stories ' loss 'regret, survivors

Breaking News Rare images of Armenian genocide survivors on show in Italy

June 30, 2015 By administrator

By Laure Brumont,
d6984d78504d5d7c0719538ee94f0bbad57dd923

An employee of film restoration laboratory Cineteca di Bologna works on the restoration of a film ab …

Bologna (Italy) (AFP) – Rare, moving images of survivors of the 1915 Armenian genocide will be shown in Bologna on Thursday as part of the 29th edition of the city’s “Cinema Ritrovato” (Rediscovered Cinema) festival.

A significant historical source that was discovered completely by chance, buried away and forgotten in the US Library of Congress, the silent film dates from 1923 and includes images of children packed onto boats in Turkey and lines of refugees trudging along roads.

The film is being shown as part of a selection intended to honour Armenian cinema a century after the beginning of the slaughter of Armenians at the hands of Ottoman Turkish forces.

Also on show during the festival are “Namus” (Honour), a 1925 work by Hamo Beknazarian that is considered the first Armenian film, “Sayat Nova” (The Color of Pomegranates) a 1969 film by Sergei Paradjanov and “Naapet”, Henrik Malyan’s 1980 film about a genocide survivor.

Other rare documentary images include a five-minute film shot by the French army of Armenian refugees in camps at Port Said in Egypt.

But the jewel in the festival’s crown is the four minutes of “Armenia, Cradle of Humanity” shot in Turkey soon after the end of the killing – a time thought previously to have only been recorded in still images such as those of German photographer Armin Wegner.

Mariann Lewinsky, one of the festival’s curators, came upon the film by “a miracle” as she clicked through the internet data base of the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF).

Who shot the film and how it got to the Oregon Historical Society before being deposited in the Congress library is a mystery, says the Swiss researcher as she runs the recently-restored reel.

new orphans-2– Orphans in Istanbul –

“I sent a little email to my colleagues in the library and they told me, ‘Yes we have something, but we don’t know what.’

“I insisted a bit and asked if I could come and see the condition of the film.”

Normally such a demand would take a bit of time to get a response but Lewinsky was quickly sent some photos and a telephone contact number. “The images were extraordinary, boats full of children, trains.”

Having obtained the reel, she quickly dated it to 1923, but her first thought was the people shown could be displaced Greeks — a theory that was dropped when she recognised a well-known Istanbul palace in the background of one shot.

Colleagues confirmed that, after the end of World War I, British forces assembled Armenian orphans in the building for evacuation.

 

 

New Armenian Orphans“It is a miracle,” Lewinsky said.

An estimated 1.5 million Armenians were killed as the Ottoman empire disintegrated during World War I, according to a version of events now accepted by much of the world but disputed by Turkey.

Authorities there say only 300,000 to 500,000 Armenians died, and that the term “genocide” is inaccurate and offensive for what they depict as civil strife provoked by the Armenians siding with invading Russian troops. An equal number of Turks died in the fighting, Ankara maintains.

A century on, Lewinsky believes a new Turkey is emerging in which Kurds, Greeks, Armenians and ethnic Turks are moving towards “moments of reconciliation”.

Films like “Armenia, Cradle of Humanity” can only help this process, she says, invoking her hope that it could be shown at a small silent film festival in Istanbul in the near future.

 

also published on http://news.yahoo.com/rare-images-armenian-genocide-survivors-show-italy-033116906.html?soc_src=copy

Filed Under: Genocide, News Tagged With: Armenian, Genocide, Images, Italy, Rare, survivors

Turkey, Stories of Armenian survivors of 1915 compiled in new book

December 19, 2014 By administrator

n_75826_1The stories of Armenians who survived the mass killings of the late Ottoman era have been gathered in a book titled “100 years… Real Stories.”
The 47 stories inside the book – which were collected as part of the “Turk Who Saved Me” project supported by the U.K. Foreign and Commonwealth Office and realized by the Armenia-based Armedia Agency and the European Integration Non-Governmental Organization – are presented in the words of the survivors with minimal editing, bilingual Turkish-Armenian newspaper Agos has reported.

The book has been translated into Armenian, English and Turkish, and will be distributed free of charge as part of the project.

Lilit Gasparyan, who translated the book into Turkish, said they had selected 47 stories for publication but received many more after initially calling for contributions.

“We deliver the verified, real stories of the people who survived the genocide thanks to the efforts of their Turkish neighbors, friends or ordinary Turks,” said Gasparyan.

Journalist Aris Nalcı, who coordinated the project, said similar projects also needed to be conducted in Turkey.

The year 2015 marks the centenary of the 1915 Ottoman Armenian mass killings during World War I. While Armenia and some countries legally refer to the incidents as “genocide,” the Turkish state does not accept the term and says the issue should be reviewed from a wider perspective.

Filed Under: Genocide, News Tagged With: Armenian, book, survivors, Turkey

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