Boston Herald, MA
March 6 2010
When toll is personal, you don’t forget Armenian genocide
By Joe Fitzgerald
Saturday, March 6, 2010
This one’s for John Baronian, known as Mister Jumbo because of his
passion for Tufts University, but whose foremost identity in his own
eyes was that he was an Armenian born in America.
Though he cherished his American citizenship, John considered it a
sacred trust to never forget his Armenian heritage, which is why his
story is shared here again this morning, almost two years after his
death.
Once again, the 1915 slaughter of 1.5 million Armenians by the Turkish
government is in the news as civil rights attorney Harvey Silverglate,
representing Turkish activists, claims Massachusetts schoolkids are
being proselytized because they aren’t being exposed to the views of
those who deny that an Armenian genocide occurred.
Baronian didn’t need a lawyer or scholar or bureaucrat to shape his
understanding of one of history’s bloodiest chapters; his mother’s
endless flow of tears was compelling enough.
`My parents lived in Turkey in a place called Harput,’ he said. `When
the genocide began, the Turks were immediately brutal. Women were
beaten and raped by the soldiers while men were hanged in the square
or shot in the woods, just for being Armenian.
`Then came the death march. That’s what we call it, though the Turks
called it a relocation march, which was ridiculous, because thousands
were forced into the Der El Zor desert with no water, no food, no
anything.
`My mother was among them with her three little children, all under 5:
my sisters Helen and Azadouhi, and my brother Sirak. All around her,
people were dying needlessly while her own children kept crying from
hunger and thirst until they died, too.’
Sarah Baronian eventually made it to America, where she gave birth to
John, who grew up in Medford, serving in the Pacific in World War II.
`I can still see her crying,’ he said, decades later. `She tried to
hide it, but she never stopped hearing the voices of the sisters and
brother I never knew, pleading for something to eat or to drink as
they died in her arms in the desert.
`You know, just before he began slaughtering Jews, Hitler asked, `Who
remembers what happened to the Armenians?’ In other words, people will
eventually forget whatever you do.
`I can assure you, Armenians have never forgotten. And that’s why I
tell this story. God forbid that anyone forgets.’
ists/view/20100306when_toll_is_personal_you_dont_f orget_armenian_genocide/
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
