Abram Kazaryan

The Armenian Abram Kazaryan, a war veteran and resident of Baku since 1920 reported:

"The pogrom started on the tenth of January. A man came to my door and said: 'Leave, old man. Your time is up. Your people have left. and you should leave.' If he had been alone. I'd have chased him away. But there were three of them. I said: I'm an old man, I have no place to go.' On the twelfth, about twenty of them came, and they broke down the door. I tried to fight them, and yelled for help. On the morning of the thirteenth, I went to the police and filed a complaint. They said 'O.K.' and did nothing. I stayed at home and propped the door up as best I could, but there was nothing to repair it with. That evening, at six, they came again. They rang the bell and knocked. I could see there were a lot of them in the courtyard. I put my coat on and went to open the door. As I got there, it came down on me. It fell on me. I think they had an axe. There were four of them. and then it seemed like forty. They beat me and threw me on the floor and started trarnpling me. They broke three ribs, right. . . and threw me down the stairs. I lost consciousness. When I opened my eyes, they were carrying my things away - the rugs, the TV, everything. My pockets and clothes were torn, and they'd taken my documents. Two of them stood guard over me to keep me from running away. I said to them: 'Why are you beating up an old man?' They didn't answer. They put me in a car and took me to a movie theatre and threw me into a basement with some others. We were there for a day and a half." (Cullen, pp. 69-70)

Mr. Kazaryan was deported across the Caspian Sea to Turkmenistan on a steamer together with 1,500 other Armenians. Eventually he reached Yerevan.