Sivas did not forget the betrayal of the Armenian doctor Ihlas News Agency

The betrayal of 40 Ottoman soldiers and doctors who were poisoned and martyred by the Armenian doctor they trusted and surrendered to in Sivas in 1915 has not been forgotten despite the passage of more than a century.

According to historical data from 1915 to the present day, the Merzifon battalion stayed in the Çınarlı village of Hafik district of Sivas due to the harsh winter conditions when it went to the front. During the stay, the soldiers fell ill. An Armenian doctor martyred 40 soldiers by giving lethal injection to the soldiers under the pretext of providing treatment. When it was understood that the Armenian doctor died as a result of giving poisonous injections to the soldiers, the doctor was also killed. A martyrs’ cemetery was built in the village for 40 Ottoman soldiers who were martyred as a result of betrayal.

“He poisoned him with an injection and martyred him.”

Giving information about the incident that took place in 1915, retired religious officer Şemsettin Özkan stated that the soldiers who went to the infirmary because their feet were injured were martyred with lethal injection and said, “After the battalion from Merzifon stayed here, the doctor and forty-four of our soldiers came from the road, their boots were swollen, their feet were swollen and they were tired. They go to the doctor, to the infirmary. The soldiers who came to the infirmary were tired and their boots were tight. Later, some of the soldiers became ill and some even died. By the way, when you say one, two, three or five, they say ‘there is something wrong with this’. A person does not die from being squeezed by a boot, nor does one die without strength. Meanwhile, blackness appears on their bodies. They look at the needle, everyone eats it, but unfortunately the soldiers who come to the infirmary die. They see that the doctor is poisoning the non-Muslim soldiers who went to the infirmary. They poison forty-four soldiers. Rumor has it that they are arresting the doctor. The doctor strangles himself with his bandolier while in custody. According to a rumor, on the way from here to Hafik, the guards and soldiers shot him. “It is said that the doctor is Armenian,” he said.

“We did not oppress, we were betrayed and oppressed”

Özkan stated that although the Muslim Turks never oppressed the Armenians, they were betrayed and oppressed by the Armenians, and said, “In the past, Armenians also lived in this vicinity. They lived more like brothers than brothers to Muslim Turks, and they met as a family. The Muslim Turks did not cause the slightest harm to the Armenians. We had Armenian income from our village until recent times. There was absolutely no distinction made between Armenian and Christian. This is written in history. But they committed massacres in our villages. There is Kayabaşı village in Zara’s Şerefiye township. There, they ambushed our soldiers in the İnönü location and fired at them. I heard it from a 90 year old person. “The Turks never betrayed or oppressed them, but they both betrayed and oppressed their Ottoman and Muslim Turkish neighbors,” he said.