SANJAKS (Divisions of vilayets)

	Servia		Salonica		Serres		Drama		Total
Orthodox greeks	111 000	(119 466)	224 000	(233 508)	92 000	(96 513)	46 000	(47 852)	473 000	(497 339)
Exarchist Bulgarians	1 500		75 000	(70 096)	121 000	(98 586)	2 000	(2 120)	199 500	(170 802)
Moslems	59 000	(80 702)	200 000	(189 600)	118 000	(122 303)	105 000	(124 100)	482 500	(516 705)
Wallachians	760	(1 460)	6 000	(3 928)	1 350	(980)			8 110	(6 368)
Jews		(43)	61 800	(65 730)	1 400	(3 005)			63 200	(68 778)
Gypsies			900		7 500		250		8 650
Serbs			1 400
Miscellaneous		(3)		(2 314)
	172 260	(201 674)	569 100	(565 176)	341 250	(321 387)	153 250	(174 072)	1 236 360	1 262 309

Clearly, in the Greek statistics, the Moslem total is swollen by the addition of the pomaks (Bulgarian Moslems), from whom, in the Bulgarian statistics, the Turks are separated. In the Greek figures the "orthodox" Greeks include the patriarchist Bulgarians and Wallachians, whom they call "Bulgarophone Greeks" or "Wallachophones" (Roumanianizers). With these exceptions, the difference is not considerable, when it is remembered that the territory is not quite the same; and it may be admitted that if language rather than the religion is used to determine nationality, Mr. Ivanov's figures are or were nearer the truth. The polemics of the Servian press put the number of "Slavs" annexed by Greece at 260,000; a figure which the Greek press reduced to 120,000. The secret Greek-Bulgarian treaty, as we know, contained no indication as to the frontiers on which the two parties had agreed. This was one more incitement to "Hellenic irridentism." In Greece, as in Servia, two opposing tendencies were af work after the first successes of the Hellenic army. Like Mr. Pachitch, of Belgrade, and Mr. Guechov, of Servia, Mr. Venizelos was for moderation, seeing therein the sole means of safeguarding their common creation, namely,
 

196 

 
the Balkan alliance. The discontent of the military party grew more and more outspoken, and as in Servia so in Greece, found a leader and interpreter in the person of the heir to the throne. The Greek diaspora was a much stronger and older organization than the scattered colonies gathered round the Servian schoolmasters and band leaders. Here the patriotic organization was based on a considerable settlement of really Greek population, and was accustomed to obey the word of command from Athens. From the months of January and February onwards, a regular campaign was organized, with addresses, memoranda, telegrams, congress resolutions, etc., despatched to the Ambassadorial Conference in London and to the Hellenic government, all demanding annexation by Greece. On March 1/14, one of these memorials was presented to the Hellenic chamber in the name of the "Hellenes of Thrace and of Eastern Macedonia, who constitute almost the whole of the Christian population of these regions." The petitioners "proudly proclaim that Hellenism alone has, in the present war, made more moral and material sacrifices than any other of the allies or than all the allies together"; and demand their national regeneration through union with their mother country, Greece. [See this and the sixty-two other memorials published in the appendices to the interesting and instructive work of Mr. Charles Bellay, L'irredentlsme hellenique, cited above.] Mr. Venizelos entered an interpolation here, and his reply afforded a remarkable example of a political wisdom, soon to find itself swept away by the chauvinistic passion of the dominant party: "Necessarily," said the initiator of the alliance, "Greek populations and groups composed of these populations will pass under the domination of our allies. And the reason is not that these countries have been conquered by our allies, or that our allies demand it, but the force of geographical considerations. This is so true that even were our allies disposed to allow us to extend our frontiers towards their regions, and encompass the Greek populations, I at least, in my capacity of responsible Minister, would never accept a line of demarcation which for us is full of peril. If we are to go on extending in unbroken continuity along the sea, to encompass all the Greek population of Thrace, Greece thus extended and without any vertebral column, would be weaker than if its frontiers were rounded off differently. * * * I hope that no one from these benches will encourage resistance on the part of these disturbed and troubled populations." When he was violently attacked for these words, Mr. Venizelos added: "A similar declaration was made three or four weeks after the declaration of the war of liberation. * * * From that time on I have stated that I was making the sacrifice of a large part of Hellenic Thrace. * * * I felt it my duty to communicate this statement to the Chamber because * * * I knew that a movement was being worked up among their Greek populations which are destined to remain inside of Greater Greece. * * * Those who are urging such an attitude upon them are the true enemies of their country."
 

Nevertheless, while speaking against the procedure of the patriotic Hellenic

197 

organizations in Thrace, Mr. Venizelos said nothing about Eastern Macedonia, which came within the scope of the "Deliannis formula," nor about Southwestern Slav Macedonia, at whose expense it was evidently hoped to accomplish the "rounding" of the Greek frontiers. As a matter of fact, the common Greek-Servian frontier had been already discussed in the "Salonica-Monastir train,” and it is clearly in this sense that Mr. Venizelos understood the division among the allies of which he spoke in the chamber. This idea of a "division" of the territories in condominium among all the allies has already been substituted for the idea of Serbo-Bulgarian "arbitration." Some days after Mr. Venizelos's declaration, the heir. Prince Constantine, became King of Greece (March 6/19).

The effects of this change made themselves felt on the relations between the Greeks in occupation and the indigenous population. We may begin our examination of these relations with Castoria. From the beginning of the occupation, the authorities there pretended to ignore the very existence of the Bulgarian population. It is true that Prince Constantine's proclamation on November 14/27 announced that in the occupation regions the Greeks would respect the language and religious customs of the nationalities. That however did not affect the Bulgarians, who evidently were no more than "Bulgarophone Greeks" in the eyes of authority. Announcements and appeals to the population were published in Greek, Turkish and Yiddish, exactly as though the Bulgarian language did not exist, and Bulgarian remonstrances remained unheeded. To make the reality harmonize with this theory, the occupation army had recourse to the acts of violence which we know. After a sufficient demonstration had been made by the population, of the fate awaiting those who persisted in calling themselves Bulgarians, formal retractations began to be demanded. These declarations, which the villagers were forced to sign, conformed in the Castoria region to tv/o types. According to one of the two declarations, the people were made to say that they had been Greeks from the most ancient times, but had called themselves Bulgarians under the influence of Bulgarian propaganda. According to the other, they were made to say that up to 1903 the population had been Hellenic, but that between 1903 and 1906, they had been forced to call themselves Bulgarians by the threats of the Bulgarian bands and comitadjis. The two models ended with the same declaration, namely, that immediately on the army's arrival the population felt its Hellenism and asked to be received into the bosom of the "Great Church of Jesus Christ." The Bulgarians were not "Christians" in "our sense." The Greek bishop of Castoria received the deputations sent to him from all the villages, and was in fact the center of this active assimilation. The evsones played the part of apostles in this conversion at the bayonet's point. As examples we may cite the villages of Gabreche, Drenoveni, Tchernovitsa, Tourie, Ragoritchani, Dembeni, etc. In the villages of Breznitsa, Gorno and Doino Nestrame, all the inhabitants were thrown into prison and driven thereby to call themselves Greeks. The reply given to a man who said he was a Bulgarian was: "Wast thou born at Sofia; there are no Bulgarians in

198 

Macedonia; the whole population is Greek." To maintain this principle, a passport was given to those few natives who had to be admitted to be Bulgarians, declaring them to have been born in Bulgaria. The Commission knew of a passport of this kind given to the incumbent of the Bulgarian diocese of Castoria, although the man was born at Resen (in Macedonia) the Greek passport stated that the place of his birth was in Bulgaria. He was in fact permitted:

nameiaqh eiV Qessalouikgu kai ekeiqin eiV ihu boulgariau ex aV katagetai.

and this was not an isolated case. The Mahometan pomaks of the village of Gerveni were also entered as Greeks by the enumeration commission; from the moment at which they spoke Bulgarian and not Turkish, they were revealed as Greeks.

Victory secured in the villages which were disarmed, then came the turn of the intellectuals, the Bulgarian clergy, schoolmasters and officials. A number of persons whose names and cases are cited in the documents in the possession of the Commission, were arrested, beaten, put in prison and even killed. The Bulgarian Metropolis of Castoria was, at first, ignored by the authorities so far as its legal institution went; then cut off from the population under severe penalties for any communication; and finally, about the beginning of June, formally blockaded by twenty or thirty soldiers and searched by the police. Afterwards, by order of the government, all the officials and schoolmasters were shut up in their own houses until further orders. At this moment the Greek papers were already talking of the war as imminent. The Embros, in a letter from Salonica, said on June 14/27, "the great struggle for the existence of Hellenism will begin in a few days." On June 14/27, Proodos said, "We are on the eve of war. * * * On his departure for Salonica the king took his field uniforms with him. * * * The war proclamation * * * is ready." War began on the 17/30, and the Greek citizens of Castoria were singing before the Metropolis verses inviting "A draught of Bulgarian blood." On July 31, after the conclusion of the treaty of Bucharest, the frourarque of Castoria summoned the head of the diocese, the officials of the Metropolis, and the schoolmasters, and told them "By order of the new government I give you forty-eight hours delay, in which to quit Greek territory." The expatriated, all natives of Macedonia, were given certificates to the effect that "they were returning to Bulgaria, where they were born." "He who goes to live in Bulgaria," was the reply to the protests, "is Bulgarian. No more Bulgarians in Greek Macedonia."

We have also sufficiently complete data on events at Vodena (now called Edessa). Our informant there, as at Castoria, remembers how the Hellenic army entered in triumph on October 18/31, amid cries of joy from the population. Each house harbored ten to twenty soldiers, freely and without asking pay, and the town distributed gratuitously 6,000 okas of bread per day. The

199 

time had not come of forced requisitions, without receipt, demanding everything without allowing any merit to the giver, who had to obey. Ten days later the Greeks were beginning to say, '"We shall cut your tongues to teach you to speak Greek." They began confiscating private property, and sending things they liked to Greece; furniture, cattle, etc. The churches and schools were immediately taken, the Slav inscriptions destroyed, the offices burned, the priests beaten and driven out. Then began the arrest of influential persons in the different villages, such as Vestchitsa, Tsarmarinovi, Piskopia, Arsene, St. Elvas, Vettecope. The soldiers said to the notables in prison in Vestchitsa, "If you want to be free, be Greeks."

War once declared—June 20, 21/July 3, 4, as many as 200 Bulgarians, the vicar, priest, notables, schoolmasters, inhabitants of the town and of the villages, were arrested. They were beaten and sent in fours to Salonica. On June 30 the last Bulgarian church was confiscated; the Slav national images of St. Cyril and St. Methodius were burned and their ashes covered with dung. (The Greeks and Servians regarded these images, symbols of the independence of the Slav church, with special detestation.) At the beginning of July the population was asked to sign the following declaration: "Under compulsion from the exarchist propaganda, and terrified by the comitadjis, we became Bulgarian. We now confess the true orthodox faith and our Hellenic nationality." Emissaries v/ere then sent to Salonica to offer liberty to the prisoners from Vodena if they would declare themselves to be Greeks. "We remained pure," Mr. Atanasov, one of these prisoners, records, "our consciences immaculate, and we were all thirty-three freed without making any engagement on August 7/20. [See the story of Mr. G. Atanasov, published in the Mir, September 30/October 13.] But a Bulgarian schoolmaster from the village of Palati, who became a Greek, wrote in a Greek paper, Imera, that the prisoners had not suffered in any way and that "not a hair of their heads had been touched." He only forgot one thing, according to Mr. Atanasov: that had they remained in prison a month after this, not one would have come out alive. Mr. Atanasov gives a picture of the Salonica prisoners, which is known to be unhappily too correct. "There were 130 of us in a single room," he said, "and often we had to stand throughout a whole night, waiting our turns to lie down. For fifty days we remained in this same room without crossing the threshold. The air we breathed can be imagined. There were others who had been there 100 days and more without having been interrogated. Their shirts were indistinguishable from their coats. In addition to this filth and to the infection of the air, our food was ill-cooked bread, full of impurities. We were as though buried alive, waiting for death to set us free. I intentionally omit the moral suffering caused by the soldiers who were let in for the purpose. Among us there were wretched prisoners from Gumundje, Yenidje-Vardar, Florina, Castoria and Salonica. After a delay of five to six days at Salonica, they were sent into exile. Some were sent directly from the

200 

station to the steamer; on embarkation their money and watches were taken from them; they were ill-treated; sometimes they were thrown from the top of the ladder into the hold. A man from Gumundje had his ear cut open, another his head broken; some had bayonet wounds, and all had been struck with the butt. end of musket or stick."

We have before us also depositions of witnesses as to what happened at the Kailare sub-prefecture. Situated between Vodena and Castoria, it was naturally treated in the same way. There, too, Bulgarians were forced to become Greeks, and the peasants made to sign a declaration testifying that they had become Bulgarians only fifteen years ago and under compulsion from the comitadjis. The Slav offices were destroyed; the Bulgarian clergy were not allowed to administer the sacrament until they had been ordered to do so by the Greek bishops; the schoolmasters were driven out and the scholars forced to attend Greek schools under threats of punishment for the parents. Soldiers were billetted on the Bulgarians, and requisitions made without either payment or receipt; andartes, placed in control of the administration, persecuted the Bulgarian population in every way, killing the men, outraging the women and burning the houses with impunity. We could give names of the persons and villages which suffered. The villages most often mentioned are Embore, Rakita, Biriatsi, Kontsi, Debretse, etc.

Despite all these persecutions, it may be said that in Greek Macedonia the simple fact that the ethnic difference between conquerors and oppressed is greater than in Servian Macedonia did serve to protect the Bulgarian population against assimilation. Although the victors were satisfied with having changed names and statistics and teaching the peasants to say "Good morning" and "Good evening" in Greek instead of in Bulgarian, there was no real change in national consciousness.

There was indeed one thing which hampered the assimilation by the Greeks of the Slav element, namely, the presence of that same element in the immediate neighborhood. True, in Servian Macedonia the elements which outside still call themselves Bulgarian, are forced to give themselves out as pravi srbi,— true Servians. But that does not prevent the conservation of the sentiment of Slav affinity. In the allied Servian government, this sentiment found expression in a tendency to desire the conservation and protection of the Slav element in Greek Macedonia. It is interesting that the first news received from Salonica by the Commission of the Greek drownings, was given by a citizen of the allied nation which had just taken precautions against the importunate curiosity of the Commission as to its own relations with the "Macedonian Slavs." The oppressed Slavs in Greek Macedonia in their turn seemed to look more favorably on the oppressors of their brothers in Monastir and Okhrida. If they may not have Bulgarian schools, some of them are ready to ask for Servian ones,—so long as they may keep their Slav school. The only objection of the Greek ally to the

201 

Servian ally is that the latter does not reciprocate by tolerating Greek schools in Servian Macedonia, or, if he allows them to be opened, forbids school children to attend them. Tit for tat. The Greek papers only disagree as to the number of Slavs with a moral right to protection by the Slav ally. Recognition of the very existence of the Slav element, although reduced to 120,000, is thus implied beyond dispute.

This is not the case with the Moslem element, though equally numerous in Greek Macedonia. True, our documents prove that at the beginning of the occupation, when it was a question of ferreting out the Bulgarian committees, the help given by the Turkish element was highly appreciated by the andartes. Their end once accomplished, however, and especially after the treaty of Bucharest, the tactics adopted towards the Moslems were entirely changed. The Jeune Turc seems justified in its complaints of the lot of its co-religionists in Macedonia. "Mass arrests of Turks and Jews," it states towards the middle of October, "take place daily in Salonica on the most ridiculous grounds. Espionage is widely developed and persecution is attaining revolting dimensions." Unhappily the truth is worse. Another Turkish paper, Tasfiri Efkiar, [These two quotations are from the Mir, of October 24 and November 2 (old style).] adds that persecution extends from town dwellers to simple villagers. "The Moslems of the neighborhood of Poroi (between Doiran and Demir-Hissar), were shut up in forty wagons and conveyed to Salonica. The Greek authorities also persecuted the Moslems of Langadina (northeast of Salonica); on pretext of disarmament all the young people were conveyed to Salonica and ill treated. At Saryghiol (near Koukouche), all the men were conveyed to Salonica and the Greek soldiers then outraged the women and young girls. At Sakhna, at Serres and Pravishta, conversion was carried on with such success that in the case of Sakhna not one Moslem is left." "The number of Turkish prisoners in the Salonica area amounts to the enormous total of 5,000," adds the Echo de Bulgarie (December 20/January 2). Some months later, Mr. Ivanov remarks in his "Explanatory Notes" that "the Turkish groups of Saryghiol (south of Kailare), Kailare and Ostrovo, strong in numbers and prosperity, were particularly severely tried after the Greek invasion. All the towns and the villages of the region were laid waste and the population sought safety in flight. Flight, too, was the resource of the Moslem population of the towns in the Yenidje valley, especially Voden, Negouche (Niansta), Karaferia (Veria), Yenidje-Vardar. This last town suffered most of all; the whole market and the Moslem quarters were laid in ruins."

We must now glance at Eastern Macedonia, of which we spoke in chapter II, and whence the Bulgarian population fled en masse to Bulgaria, the Turks and Greeks taking the road to Salonica. Documents not hitherto mentioned complete the picture of what is almost a total extermination. As the most authoritative document for the violence with which the Turkish population was treated

202 

by the Greeks, we publish in Appendix A, 13 a, a complete list of persons killed and pillages effected in one casa in Pravishta (O. de Kavala). The original document was given to the Commission in Turkish; it is an official proces-verbal, drawn up and sealed by the Moslem community of Pravishta. It contains names and facts solely; but these names and facts have a dreary eloquence. "Of the 20,000 Turks of this casa only 13,000 remain." "Among the persons killed there are unhappily many imams, Turkish notables and men of education. This shows that the Greeks were pursuing a definite object." Here is the picture of the central city of Pravishta, taken by the Bulgarian comitadji, Voyevoda Baptchev, but where the Greek Bishop, presiding at the improvised tribunal, pronounces the sentences of death executed by Baptchev, while protecting the young Turkish girls and the mosques against the fanatical chauvinism of the Archbishop."

As to atrocities committed by the Greeks in the northern part of eastern Macedonia (principally populated by Bulgarians), the Commission collected at Sofia a portion of the depositions afterwards published by Professor Miletits. [See his Greek Atrocities in Macedonia during the Greek Bulgarian war, Sofia, 1913, and Documents, extracts from this book, published with certain changes in style, Sofia, 1913.]

Out of all our documents we select as a specimen the story of a merchant, Nicolas Temelkov, which gives a general picture of the state of the country after the retreat of the Greek army, which as regards the whole region traversed between Strumnitsa and Djoumaya, was picturesquely characterized by another witness in the phrase "There was not a cock left to crow." Mr. Temelkov, whose evidence is not included in Professor Miletits's document, allows us to give his name. Towards the end of August (old style) he was returning from Bulgaria with some refugees. He crossed the Kresna Valley, in the upper Strouma. In the village of St. Vratche there were only some men feeding on the corn which had fallen on the road from the military convoy. The women did not dare to appear; they remained hiding in the mountains. The priest of the village, Constantine, and five notables, had been killed, and no one knew where their bodies were. Passing through the village of Lechnitsa you met nobody. The village of Sclara had been burned, but twelve or thirteen families were left. The other families were still in the mountains, in fear of another Greek invasion. All the women of the village between the ages of ten and fifty had been collected by the Greeks in the house of Mito Konstantinov, and divided among the soldiery one woman to every thirty soldiers. A girl of eighteen years old, Matsa Andone Pantcheva, who had finished her school time, would not give herself up. She offered them money to give to the women of the streets if they would leave her in peace. The soldiers got sixty Turkish pounds. When, after that, they still tried to outrage her, she resisted, crying, "I had rather die honest." She was killed by bayonet thrusts.

203 

Mr. Temelkov and his companions then passed through the villages of Khotovo and Spatovo. There was nobody there; the population still kept to the hills. The villages had been burned to the ground. They passed through Mandjovo and Tchiflitsi, which the Greek press stated had been burned by the Greek population, who would no longer live there under the Bulgarian regime. Mr. Temelkov, like the other witnesses, states that the town had not been burned; only the military casino, hotel and post office (in the same building as the casino), had been burned. The Greek houses were empty; the Greeks had taken their furniture with them. Mr. Temelkov was told that the Greeks emigrated by the express orders of the Greek government; the order being given when it was known that Melnik was to remain Bulgarian. Automobiles and carts were supplied to enable the Greeks to take all their goods with them to Demir-Hissar. The men were beaten to make them take the carts and go. The same order was given and executed at Nevrocope, where force had to be employed to make the Greek inhabitants depart. By order of the officers, all the contents of the big Bulgarian shops in Melnik belonging to Temelkov Nadjiyanev (the father of Temelkov), and Constantine Pope-Tachev, were seized. The little Bulgarian shops and private houses were left to be pillaged by the population.

Mr. Temelkov had news from his father and mother, who remained in Melnik, while he fled to Bulgaria. The military authorities sent for his father and said to him, "What are you going to do now ? We want men here, not bears. Become a Greek, if you want to live here." Mr. Temelkov's father, an old man of sixty, replied, "I was born in this country and I shall remain here without changing my nationality." He was summoned a second time and asked, "Where are yonr sons?" "They are in Bulgaria." "You must give up their property." "They have none." Then some officers ransacked the house and found the dowry of Mr. Temelkov's wife, which amounted to ?T250. This money was seized. Then Temelkov, the father, a rich merchant, was asked for 400 pairs of empty sacks for aniseed, and 100 for cotton, which had cost him eighty Napoleons. Then Mr. Nadjiyanev was taken to Ormane-Tchflik and to Livounovo, under pretext of taking him before the commander. When they arrived at Ormane, he was threatened with death and asked for money. He promised to give it and the same Greek officers took him back to Melnik. He paid them ?T180. He however possessed another property at Scalve. All his corn, wheat and barley were seized (30,000 and 40,000 okas) and his sixteen bullocks. For all that ?T200 was paid him. Finally on the Greeks' departure, it was decided to kill him and his wife. But a Greek friend, Nicolas the bazardji, [Coppersmith.] warned him, and advised him to flee with the Greeks without delay, since within a few hours they would come to look for him. He agreed, took flight and hid in the Bulgarian village of Kaikovtsi. While he was being searched for at Demir-Hissar, he escaped on horseback across the Pirine mountains. But he did not return to Melnik. Worn out, he stopped at Scalve, and died there of exhaustion.

204 

Counting the Bulgarian villages whose burning he remembers, Mr. Temelkov names: Marikostinovo, Morino Pole, Koula, Kapatovo, Kroumidovo, Dzigvelia, Mandjovo, Tchiflitsi, Khotovo, Ladarevo, Laskarevo, Sclave, Spatovo, half of Livounovo (after the departure of the general staff), Ormane Tchiflik, St. Vratche, Polevitsa, Khrsovo, half of Vrana, Katountsi, Spantchevo, the upper and the lower town. He told us that only the mountain villages are left. The whole of the furniture, cattle and grain was taken by the Greeks. But the last stroke certainly was the destruction of the town of Strumnitsa, almost under the eyes of the Commission. An Austrian officer, Mr. Br—, tells us that he was taken by the population of Strumnitsa for a member of the Commission, when, after the end of the war he was making his way on horseback between Sofia and Salonica in company with a German officer, Mr. de R. T. Mr. Br— published his story in the Vienna Reichspost, and sent a report to the Austrian consulate at Sofia. This is his story, which thus falls within the scope of the Commission's inquiry:

On July 28 (old style), peace was concluded. On August 8 [the day before he started on his journey], that is to say, ten days after the conclusion of peace, the Greek military element began burning and pillaging the town. The method of incendiarism was as follows: benzine was poured on the different buildings, they were then set on fire and blown up with pyroxiline bombs. I have never been able to discover the chemical composition of these bombs. They did not explode until thrown upon the fire. I sent a piece to the Austrian Legation at Sofia. At the same time the Greek soldiers compelled the inhabitants to hide in their houses, and cut off all the water pipes and fountains, so that there were no means of putting out the fire. Throughout the whole time, between August 8 and 15, motors came and went three times a day to carry off the stolen property. Everything was carried off that the people had not succeeded in hiding, even chairs, boxes, frames, portraits, beds, etc. Anything that could not be taken was destroyed. All the cattle of one of the biggest proprietors in the region, the Moslem Nasif-effendi was stolen, and his house burned after his wife had been so outraged that she died of it. His child was taken from him and not found again. All the goods of the Jew Novak Koze were taken from him, and his wife outraged. A rich merchant, Bandesev, had all his goods taken, and motors came and went for two days to take everything out of his house. His wife, too, was outraged, "and so on."

Mr. Br— left Strumnitsa on August 24 (old style). But the Commission has highly trustworthy evidence from a person who was at Strumnitsa August 15/28—i. e., who saw the end of the fire. The evidence of another witness, a Strumnitsa governess, Miss Itcheva, who remained in the town throughout this time, has been published by Mr, Miletits. [Documents, pp. 166-168. We have also the evidence of a Bulgarian schoolmaster, who reached Strumnitsa on August 19.] From all these sources we know

205 

that the destruction of Strumnitsa was but the execution of part of a plan drawn up at the conclusion of peace by the Greek authorities. "From July 27 on," says Miss Itcheva, "the Greeks began a propaganda among the Greek population, and invited them to leave the country. They put into their minds the fear of being tortured or even killed by the Bulgarians. They promised the people to build them a 'new Strumnitsa' in the town of Koukouche. [Vladevo, a village near Vodena, has actually been called "New Strumnitsa."] The Greek king himself was going to look after the population. As a matter of fact it was known beforehand that after the forced expatriation of the Greeks, Jews and Turks, the town itself was dedicated to destruction like Xanthi, Gumuldjina, and 'the other places in Thrace.' The foreign consuls at Strumnitsa thus informed, consulted together and telegraphed to their representatives to make representations at Athens. The Greek government agreed to keep all these places until the arrival of the Bulgarian army. But this news was received at Salonica on August 8/21, the very day on which the fire began in Strumnitsa. During the ten previous days the Greek inhabitants had come and gone in the town at their leisure, carrying off their goods in motors put at their disposal by the government. The Turks and Jews had been compelled to follow them. This operation completed, the Greeks set fire to the markets in the southwest portion of the town, near the house of the Greek doctor, Rixopoulo. The idea was that the news being spread in Salonica before the catastrophe, international opinion might be made to think that the population had set fire to their own houses, out of fear of remaining under the Bulgarian yoke. The population of the Bulgarian quarters (but a quarter of the whole), seeing the market on fire, came out into the empty streets, and during the night of the 8th and 9th they succeeded in putting out the fire. They thought then that the Greek army was gone; in reality it was only hidden. On the morning of the 9th, the Greek soldiers appeared and threatened to kill the Bulgarians. From that time the Bulgarian population retired to its houses and did not dare to come forth and put out the fire. It was then that the Greeks cut the water pipes and broke the fire engines. In the evening the fire was relighted, and during the night the Greek and Turkish quarters began to burn. The Greek soldiers no longer hid—a great number of witnesses saw them at work. They had bombs in their hands, which they put under the buildings, and in a few minutes the houses were in flames. Six or eight soldiers were seen setting fire to the barracks three times before they got it going." A vlach told our witness that a uniformed Greek policeman had awakened him and his family and told him to come out at once, as his house was going to be burned, and would be as soon as they had cleared out. This lasted a whole week, until by the 15th the entire town, with the exception of the two Bulgarian quarters, lay in ashes. Three days later the Bulgarian army arrived. One of our informants told us that

206 

an attempt was made to get the Bulgarian Lieutenant Colonel sign an official declaration to the effect that the houses had been burned by their owners. The Bulgarian officer refused.

The Strumnitsa affair throws a vivid light on a number of similar events where the intention and preliminary organization are not so easily discernible. If it seems to transcend all the instances hitherto given, this is simply due to the fact that we have been better able to follow it up. In concluding this part of our report with this act of unqualified horror, we have only to set down the moral conclusion.

The events described above serve to afford one more confirmation of an ancient truth, which it is useful to recall. That legitimate national sentiment which inspires acts of heroism, and the perverted and chauvinistic nationalism which leads to crime are but two closely related states of the collective mind Perhaps indeed the state of mind is the same, its social value varying with the object to which it is directed. We regard as just and legitimate, we even admire the deeds, the manifestations by which nationality defends its existence. We speak constantly of the "good cause" of oppressed nationalities, or nationalities struggling against difficulties to find themselves. But when these same nationalities pass from the defensive to the offensive, and instead of securing their own existence, begin to impinge on the existence of another national individuality, they are doing something illicit, even criminal. In such a case, as we have seen, the theory of State interests and the State feeling or instinct, is invoked. But the State itself must learn to conform to the principle of the moral freedom of modern nationalities, as it has learned to accept that of individual freedom. It is not nationality which should sacrifice its existence to any erroneous or outworn idea of the State. In applying this sound maxim to the facts of the second Balkan war, the conclusion is forced upon one, that in so far as the treaty of Bucharest has sanctioned the illegitimate claims of victorious nationalities, it is a work of injustice which in all probability will fail to resist the action of time. Would it not be more in consonance with the real feeling of solidarity of peoples to re-cast the treaty, than to wait for the development and ripening of its evil fruit? The question of the moment is not a new territorial division, such as would probably provoke that new conflict which the whole world wishes to avoid. Mutual tolerance is all that is required; and it is justified by the fact that the offence is mutual. The confused tangle of Balkan nationalism can not be straightened out, either by attempts to assimilate at any price, or by a new migration. But in the question of the Macedonian Slavs in Greek Macedonia, each national group needs the protection of some neighboring State,—the Roumanians, the Bulgarians, the Turks, the Greeks, even the Servians. The way to arrive at such mutual protection is simple enough—a return to the Greek-Bulgarian proposals so wrongly rejected at the Bucharest Conference. All that is needed is an effective mutual guarantee of religious and educational autonomy. If there

207 

be any utility in the grave lesson of the events we have described, it must be to lead the allies of the day before yesterday, the impassioned foes of yesterday, the jealous and frigid neighbors of today to solidarity tomorrow in their work for the welfare of the Balkans. The treaty of Bucharest needs to be revised an completed in this sense, if it is not to be broken down by some new caprice of history.
 

[Previous] [Next]
[Back to Index]