By GEORGE FRED WILLIAMS*
Part Four
Memorie.al – “Bah! Look at these barbarians!” has cried every tyrant who has driven his victim into misfortune, when he finally found it impossible to make a slave of them. The painful event of Albania has not been shown to the people of the United States of America. It had been hidden away in the land of Byron and of the great states, which have decided to erase this heroic people from the face of the earth. In the dark halls of European diplomacy for centuries, the fate of Albania has been tormented. Even now, with tears in its eyes and utterly weakened by the slavery and injustice of centuries, it stretches out its withered hands to seek justice and freedom; but still in vain. Yes, the wages of sin is death, and the righteous care of God brings forward the fact that the present evil state of Europe stems directly from that very policy which it used for Albania.
Continued from the previous issue
The officers informed me in the morning that they had sent about 15 men into the swamp to search for the dead and wounded, but their men, remembering that these were the approaching enemy, fired upon them and killed them all. I left this scene of sins, filthy quarrels, and bloodshed with a heart full of anger against the great crime of Europe and full of sympathy for the people who had to shed blood to keep the yoke away and [to avert] one of the most scandalous mistakes in the history of Europe.
Three months after this, the Prince, his family, his Court and cabinet, the International Commission, the foreign ministers, the gendarmerie, and the warships, left Durrës and Albania was left as it is today, without a government. (Meaning at the time of the First World War – trans. note).
THE RESCUE MEASURE
The next day, after leaving Durrës, I arrived in Vlorë. The leaders of Vlorë were loyal to Prince Wied and had given him soldiers to fight the rebels of Central Albania and the “Epirotes” in the south of Vlorë. Therefore, they were in daily fear of an attack by their own brothers. To prevent further destruction among them, I advised them to declare independence and make peace with their brothers.
In their name, I went to Delvinë and met the head of the provisional government of Epirus, Zografo, who was heartbroken as he was returning from the burial of 14 young men from Delvinë who had just been killed on the mountain slope, while 40 men lay wounded. He was ready to make peace with the people of Vlorë, and when this news arrived in Vlorë, it was received with great pleasure and applause.
That afternoon, two warships of the Great Powers that were part of the International Commission anchored in the port, and under the shadow of Europe’s cannons, they did not allow the union I had proposed. They knew well that their government was tottering on its throne and would fall. They also knew that the content of their actions would cause even more fraternal bloodshed. From that time onward, the “Epirote” forces and the rebels of Central Albania advanced.
More than 100,000 shepherds and peasants, women, men, children, and infants, left their homes, which they burned and destroyed, and these very people emigrated to Vlorë. When I left Greece, smallpox was spreading among these emigrants who, without aid and without hope, were dying in the District of Vlorë. Shortly after my departure, it was reported that of these 100,000 emigrants, 30,000 had died of starvation and had neither cover nor shelter to lay their heads. I am informed that there is famine throughout Albania. In the spring, there will be no corn at all for those who survive.
DISCOVERY OF INJUSTICE
It would have been good if the London ‘Times’ had described the scene of Durrës as a tragic comedy, where within the Royal Palace the greatest cynical jokes were played, where behind the smiling masks of Europe’s diplomats hid dark and criminal faces, the cause of the death of these people, while outside in the swamp lay hundreds of Albanians, defenders of their own hearths, strong and frozen, their pitiful eyes turned toward the heavens which seemed merciless to them.
It seems a human duty, openly, to tear the mask that covered European diplomacy and to expose its face stained with the blood of patriots and its weak gaze upon the fiery desires for freedom of a strong race. I returned to Athens and, as I was constrained, I revealed this inhumanity and this injustice of the European powers and resigned as minister of America to Greece and Montenegro, as I was necessarily constrained to do.
Justice and truth are not defenses in the halls of diplomacy! It was my lot to raise the curtain to shed light on this comedy, which was the most tragic, play ever staged by human hands. This act was the one that opened the way for me to beg the free people of America to help the Albanians who are struggling with war and with death for their freedom and independence.
When Europe, blood-soaked, wretched, devastated, bankrupt, and broken, will limp into a new era of civilization, then let it learn from its own sufferings the mercy it should have for the small mountain nation; which amused itself with the torments of its spirit and with the death cries of its people, acting shamelessly, calling the horrors and sufferings of this people for freedom nothing, and the loss of freedom of a people it called a common sacrifice for their own pleasure.
EFFORTS FOR FREEDOM
Every oppressed people have the right to shake off its yoke, and if the Albanians are annoyed and tired of the Turkish yoke and its bad governance and wish to be independent, they have my most heartfelt blessings. It is true that I cannot do anything directly for them, but when your plan has truly emerged victorious, the Turkish flag has disappeared, and Albanian independence has been declared, let your government declare it officially, and England will be the first power to recognize Albanian independence. I will try with all my soul to influence others to follow this example.
As far as modern history goes, this is the best word for Albania to come from an official source. This had at least the spirit of sympathy, and if the present Prime Minister of England says this, and no more, regarding the formation of a provisional government in Albania, it will be an easy task to make Albania free and independent. When I spoke of the slavery of Albanians under Turkey, I did not have in mind cruelty, torture, murder, and slaughter.
These actions fall upon isolated individuals who suffer, die, and are forgotten. The science of torture, the essence of tyranny, and the devilry of murder, are at their peak when directed at a group and the spirit and life of a state. It seems impossible for a government to openly show its decision to destroy a community and to deny the hopes and desires of a people under its rule. But this is the terrible history of Turkey in Albania.
The brave highlanders never submitted, and most of them even resisted paying taxes. They died in groups because they stuck together to defend themselves from the occasional attacks of the Turkish armies, to whom they never surrendered their homes. But they could not defend the plains either, where the greatest possibility of progress and civilization lay. For Turkey, the plains had two values: first, as a source of revenue, and second, for gathering soldiers.
The people were subjected to heavy taxes which were collected mercilessly. Taxes were sent to Turkey and very little was spent locally. In this way, Turkey drained the country’s wealth. San Giuliano, recently the Foreign Minister of Italy, says that the city of Vlorë paid 1,000,000 francs a year and only 20,000 were spent there. Likewise, in the Vilayet of Ioannina, 9,000,000 francs were collected, of which only 2,000,000 were spent on that vilayet.
RECRUITMENT
But the other revenue was even more valuable. Albania provided almost the bravest soldiers in Europe. The tall, strong, fearless Albanian highlanders formed the Sultan’s guard. The Mirditas and highlanders in general were placed in the most important parts of the Turkish armies. Many of them received praises and high positions both in the army and in the administration.
Even in the days of Rome, there was the idea of making Albania a breeding ground for producing warriors, but the Turks fulfilled this idea. It should be noted that if Albania had been advanced, educated, and happy, it would not have given soldiers to Turkey. For this reason, ignorance, its isolation from the advanced world, and poverty were chosen by the Turks as tools to keep this brave people under their heel.
DISMEMBERMENT OF THE COUNTRY
As it seems, it was determined in every intellectual faculty to morally, intellectually, spiritually, economically, and politically devalue this people. The officials were all rude; the so-called halls of justice, the courts, protected neither persons nor property. People were put in prison on secret evidence.
All movements for unity were broken up by heartless officials, and all measures for work and industry were hindered by tax collectors. It might be said that these are conditions in other subordinate countries as well, but not so systematically. Gold mines had been worked by the Romans and silver by the Venetians. These had been closed long before by government order, and now even their location is unknown.
Large forests went to waste and rotted for legal reasons and lack of transport. While in other European states there is a great network of railways, this country has no railway from North to South. Great water powers are unused; very good ports are without protection and without customs buildings. Rivers, among which steamships should have sailed to transport timber to world markets, are dead and useless.
Apart from what the Romans left, there are no other roads; a man to travel from the coast to the interior, or from one city to another, must go by trails or along some dead-end road. Safe ports and railways would have been means to unite Albania with the outside world, and wide roads would have made it easy to pass from one city to another.
But such connections would remind the people of the benefit of civilization and would become a cause of opposition and rebellions. The accursed principle of keeping this country isolated, both internally from one another and from the outside world, was the reason that left this country blind and dark, while the officials of Turkey filled the outside world with propaganda about the savagery of this people and the dangers of traveling in this country. / Memorie.al
*George Fred Williams (1852-1937) American diplomat, former ambassador of the United States of America to Greece and Montenegro, in the years 1913-1914.
To be continued in the next issue
