Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 129, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 June 1914 — BRAVE DEED OF TURK [ARTICLE]

BRAVE DEED OF TURK

HOW FISHERMAN SAVED A TOWN FROM BULGARS. By Remarkable Feat of Oarsmanship He Reached the Greek Fleet ■ Time to Save Kavala From Pillage and Ruin. Here is a dramatic story of war which shows how a brave Turkish fisherman saved the town of Kavala from massacre by the retreating Bulgarian army. It is a on the horrors due to the reopening of the war. • "I have heard from an eye-witness most striking and picturesque details as to the way in which Kavala was saved just in the nick of time from fire and slaughter,” says the Salonika correspondent - of the London Telegraph. “The mass of the Bulgar army, In danger of having its retreat cut off from the north, had evacuated the town, leaving behind only a small force of 200 men, commanded by a lieutenant, with orders to burn and sack the town next day. The terrified people had hidden themselves in their darkened houses, behind locked doors and barred windows. Rumors had gone about that , the garrison quartered in the fortress overlooking the town was laying in large stores of petroleum, and that bayonets were being sharpened and guns loaded. ; There was nothing to hope for or to do; only with unavailing curses and prayers await the coining of death in its most hideous form. “Through the pitch-black streets a Turkish boatman crept down to the port. No boat was allowed to leave the bay,- patrols faced the quay, searchlights flashed over the still and silent waters. Very quietly, lying fiat on the gray stones, he loosened his little craft, crawled In, and, with-muf-fled oars, pulled away. None heard him, and the searchlights playing all around him left him In darkness. It was, he says, as if a great hand were stretched over him, and its shadow lay around his boat. -“He cleared the bay, and with all his might and main bent to his oars. Far across the sea, 18 miles away in the bay of Thassos, lay the Greek fleet Through the long hours of the night he rowed, heedless of aching arms and limbs, rowed for his life and the Ilves of thousands who lay behind him in the quaking town. In the early morning the port of Thassos - opened before him. The great ships were there, always under pressure, straining at their anchors. "With a last effort he pulled up to the side, and the startled sailors banging over the gangway heard a cry of warning, a cry for help, rise up Into the night: ‘For the sake of Allah and for the sake of your God, come quick, for at sunrise the Bulgars sack the town.’ “At morn a thick column of smoke rose behind the promontory. What could It be? With beating, shaking hearts they watched the nose of a ship creep round the corner, a long, low, gray thing with protruding guns and funnels vomiting smoke. “It was a destroyer. At the stern floated something they equid not see. Yet, God in heaven, it was blue with a white cross! The next Instant the bell was clanging out a crazy, jerky peal, and a frantic creature was tearing down the streets shrieking ‘The Greek fleet! The Greek fleet!’ "In one moment shutters were let down, doors burst open, and a shouting, sobbing crowd rushed down to the sea. The destroyer had stopped, a boat was lowered, the captain was rowed ashore. He hardly had time to reach the ground before 50 strong arms had caught him up and 'with weeping and with laughter,’ carried him shoulder high through the cheering streets, while behind him, contentedly nodding his red-fezzed head, unobtrusively walked the simple Turkish fisherman .who had saved the town.” v