Disturbances in Sasun
In 1894, the Sultan began to target the Armenian people in a precursor to the Hamidian massacres. This persecution strengthened nationalistic sentiment among Armenians. The first notable battle in the Armenian resistance took place in Sasun. Hunchak activists, such as Mihran Damadian, Hampartsoum Boyadjian, and Hrayr, encouraged resistance against double taxation and Ottoman persecution. The Armenian Revolutionary Federation armed the people of the region. The Armenians confronted the Ottoman army and Kurdish irregulars at Sassoun, finally succumbing to superior numbers and to Turkish assurances of amnesty (which was never granted).
In response to the Sasun Resistance, the governor of Mush responded by inciting the local Muslims against the Armenians. Historian Lord Kinross writes that massacres of this kind were often achieved by gathering Muslims in a local mosque and claiming that the Armenians had the aim of "striking at Islam." Sultan Abdul Hamid sent the Ottoman army into the area and also armed groups of Kurdish irregulars. The violence spread and affected most of the Armenian towns in the Ottoman empire.
Read more about this topic: Hamidian Massacres
Famous quotes containing the words disturbances in and/or disturbances:
“Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs.”
—Denis Diderot (1713–1784)
“When a poor disconsolated drooping creature is terrified from all enjoyment,—prays without ceasing ‘till his imagination is heated,—fasts and mortifies and mopes, till his body is in as bad a plight as his mind; is it a wonder, that the mechanical disturbances ... of an empty belly, interpreted by an empty head, should be mistook for [the] workings [of God].”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)