SAIT KAYA

SAIT KAYA
Mother's name : Emine
Birth Place: Van Province Ercis District
Birth Date: 1898

I am living in Ercis since I was born. The Armenians revolted a Friday and planned to kill the Moslems in masses. When this was heard our man got together and killed the Armenian leaders by swords. I mean the only leader males, because our religion prohibits the killing of children, women and innocent and armless people.

Later when the Armenian priest was together with the Armenian Nishan Subgovernor, he said "It is a pity that you did not allow us, we should have killed them one week earlier." Then became spring, we migrated from the Armenian tyranny. We escaped but the majority stayed. The Armenians captivated them and put them inside the barns and killed them. Just because we migrated early, no one from my family was killed by Armenians. However several Moslems were slaughtered and burned by the Armenians. We first moved to Diyarbakir and then to Urfa.

We stayed there for three years. From there, we moved to Antalya. As we were not in peace with Italy, the governor did not allow us to the city, so went to Denizli and stayed there for eight years. Finally we returned back to our hometown Ercis. They had already burned and destroyed most of the houses. We worked for years and rebuilt them.