Correspondence Relating to Executions in Turkey for Apostacy from Islamism
Various
French
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This is approximatly the first 1,000 words of Correspondence Relating to Executions in Turkey for Apostacy from Islamism
CORRESPONDENCE
RELATING TO
EXECUTIONS IN TURKEY
FOR
APOSTACY FROM ISLAMISM.
[stamped:] BIBLIOTHÈQUE DU PALAIS DE LA PAIX
Presented to the House of Lords, by Her Majesty's Command.
May, 1844.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY T. R. HARRISON.
CORRESPONDENCE
RELATING TO
EXECUTIONS IN TURKEY
FOR
APOSTACY FROM ISLAMISM.
No. 1.
_Sir Stratford Canning to the Earl of Aberdeen_.--(_Received
September_ 20.)
(Extract.) _Buyukderé, August_ 27, 1843.
Within the last few days an execution has taken place at
Constantinople under circumstances which have occasioned much
excitement and indignation among the Christian inhabitants. The
sufferer was an Armenian youth of eighteen or twenty years, who
having, under fear of punishment, declared himself a Turk, went to
the Island of Syra, and returning, after an absence of some length,
resumed his former religion. Apprehensive of the danger but resolved
not to deny his real faith a second time, he kept out of sight till
accident betrayed him to the police, and he was then thrown into
prison. In spite of threats, promises, and blows, he there
maintained his resolution, refused to save his life by a fresh
disavowal of Christianity, and was finally decapitated in one of the
most frequented parts of the city with circumstances of great
barbarity.
Inclosed herewith is a statement of the particulars drawn up by Mr.
Alison.
It is not merely on grounds of humanity that I would draw your
Lordship's attention to this incident: political considerations of
serious importance are connected with it; and on this account, no
less than from regard for the tears and entreaties of a distracted
family, I exhausted my influence in vain endeavours to divert the
Porte from its purpose. Every Member of the Council to whom I
applied, returned the same answer, expressing a willingness to meet
my wishes, and regretting the inexorable necessity of the law.
For my own part I do not believe that any such necessity exists. The
determination of the Government to sacrifice the Armenian youth, in
spite of my earnest solicitations, unless he recanted publicly, is
part and parcel of that system of reaction which preceded my arrival
here, against which I have constantly struggled, and which,
notwithstanding the assurances given to me, and the efforts of its
partisans to conceal it, is day by day gaining strength, to the
despair of every enlightened Turkish statesman, to the prejudice of
our relations with this country, and to the visible decline of those
improvements which, in my humble judgment, can alone avert the
dissolution of the Sultan's empire.
The law, which, in this instance, has torn a youth from the bosom of
his family, and consigned him to an ignominious and cruel death,
would apply with equal force to a subject of any Christian Power.
Such of my colleagues as I have consulted upon this subject appear
to take a view of it similar to my own, I refer, in particular, to
the Austrian, French, Russian, and Prussian Ministers: each of them
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