The Times, London – Wednesday, September 11, 1822

Many details of the horrible barbarities committed by the Turks at Scio [Chios] have already been laid before the public. We refer to a paragraph in the German papers, where will be found, in few words, the amount and effect of those barbarities. A population of 120,000 souls has been reduced to about 900! and of them a considerable portion were dying every day of pestilence produced by multitudes of unburied corpses.

The most beautiful and flourishing island of the Archipelago is a desert. The most civilized, cultivated, and interesting people, the flower of Greece have been the greater part, exterminated—the residue expatriated, or sold for slaves by the unbelieving butchers …

So far as can be judged from late advices, a spirit, which practically speaking, is one of direct alliance and co-operation with the destroyers [Turks] of the Sciot [Chiote] race, now actuates the counsels of more than one Christian Sovereign. We subjoin a letter from Smyrna, containing intelligence that the Austrian Government has enjoined its navel commanders in the Archipelago to resist and violate the maritime blockade which the Greeks have established before certain of the Turkish harbours. Now, legitimate Powers, who stand upon law, ought to pay some respect to the recognized law of nations. Here were Greeks, at open war [War of Independence] for their existence.

Forthcoming book: Before the Silence: Archival News Reports of the Christian Holocaust That Begs To Be Remembered, Researched and edited by Sofia Kontogeorge Kostos, Foreword by Dennis R. Papazian, Ph.D.

Cf. Victor Hugo on the Massacre of Chios (L’ Enfant – from “Les Orientales”), and The Massacre of Chios, by the French Artist Eugene Delacroix, 1824. Delacroix’s painting shows Greek civilians on the Greek Island of Chios about to be slaughtered by the Turks.