Adana Massacre - Bloodshed

Bloodshed

Nearly 4,437 Armenian dwellings were torched which led to nearly half the towns razing, which made people to describe the incidents as a "holocaust".

The tension erupted into riots on April 1, 1909, which soon escalated into organized violence against the Armenian population of Adana and in several surrounding cities.

By April 18, over 1,000 people were reported dead at Adana alone, with additional unknown casualties in Tarsus and Alexandretta. Thousands of refugees filled the American embassy in Alexandretta, and a British warship was dispatched to its shores; three French warships were dispatched to Mersin, where the situation was "desperate", and many Western consulates were besieged by Armenian refugees. The Ottoman military was struggling to subdue the violence.

Similar violence consumed Marash and Hadjin, and the estimates of the death toll soon grew to exceed 5,000. The British cruiser Diana was hoped to provide a "tranquilizing" effect at the port of Alexandretta, where violence still raged. Reports surfaced that imperial "authorities are either indifferent or conniving in the slaughter."

Some order was restored by April 20, as the disturbance in Mersina had abated, and the British cruiser Swiftsure was able to deliver "provisions and medicines intended for Adana". A "threatening" report from Hadjin indicated that well-armed Armenians were held up in the town, "beleaguered by Moslem tribesmen who are only awaiting sufficient numerical strength to rush the improvised defenses erected by the Armenians." 8,000 refugees filled the missions of Tarsus, where order had been restored under martial law, the dead numbering approximately 50.

An April 22 message from an American missionary in Hadjin indicated that the town was taking fire intermittently, that surrounding Armenian properties had been burned, and that siege was inevitable. The entirety of the Armenian population of Kırıkhan was reported to have been "slaughtered"; the Armenian village of Deurtyul was burning and surrounded; additional bloodshed flared up in Tarsus; massacres were reported in Antioch, and rioting in Birejik. At least one report praised the "Turkish Government officials at Mersina" for doing "everything possible to check the trouble", though "the result of their efforts has been very limited". As Ottoman authorities worked to contain violence directed at the Christian minorities of the Empire, the Armenian population "look(ed) to the Young Turks for future protection."

An American missionary stationed in Tarsus but visiting Adana during the period, Reverend Herbert Adams Gibbons of Hartford, described the scene in the days leading up to the 27th of April:

Adana is in a pitiable condition. The town has been pillaged and destroyed ... It is impossible to estimate the number of killed. The corpses lie scattered through the streets. Friday, when I went out, I had to pick my way between the dead to avoid stepping on them. Saturday morning I counted a dozen cartloads of Armenian bodies in one-half hour being carried to the river and thrown into the water. In the Turkish cemeteries, graves are being dug wholesale. ... On Friday afternoon 250 so-called Turkish reserves, without officers, seized a train at Adana and compelled the engineer to convey them to Tarsus, where they took part in the complete destruction of the Armenian quarter of that town, which is the best part of Tarsus. Their work of looting was thorough and rapid.

The Ottoman government sent in the Army to keep peace, but it was alleged to have either tolerated the violence or participated in it. An unsigned newspaper report of 3 May 1909 indicated that Ottoman soldiery had arrived, but did not seem intent upon effecting a peace:

Adana is terrorized by 4,000 soldiers, who are looting, shooting, and burning. No respect is paid to foreign properties. Both French schools have been destroyed, and it is feared that the American school, commercial, and missionary interests in Adana are totally ruined. The new Governor has not as yet inspired confidence. There is reason to believe that the authorities still intend to permit the extermination of all Christians.