ABSTRACT
By listening to the stories told by survivors, who followed panic-stricken in the wake of the retreating Russian army, Armenian volunteer Soghomon Tehlirian experienced his first attacks of giddiness and migraines. When the Ottoman Empire entered the war in 1914, the town, situated west of the province of Erzerum, had 20,000 Armenian inhabitants, including several families which, like the Tehlirians, had converted to Protestantism. The retaking of Erzerum in 1916 enabled Armenian volunteers to return home. Tehlirian, weakened by his fits of dizziness, was among them. In the town where he had grown up, he found the Armenian district a sea of ruins. There was no trace of his family. The empty house had been transformed into some sort of barracks. This chapter informs of Tehlirian's mission of spying on Enver, who was held up to public scrutiny by the Turkish press for having dragged the country into a disastrous war without the consent of the government cabinet.
