A.J.Arnold was the secretary of the Evangelical Alliance. In February 1894 he observed that the leaders of the Armenian terrorist movement were attempting to divide Turkey for their own selfish motives. The secretary noted how the Armenians were smart enough to spread stories about the persecution of Christians to influence Protestant Britain against Turkey. The missionaries were in agreement about "the wickedness of the Armenian revolutionary movement» (22).

Arnold later wrote in a Presbyterian publication: "Has this Armenian trouble been, after all, a persecution, on religious grounds, of law - abiding, God - fearing men, or has it been a civil and military prosecution of reckless, misguided men for high treason and murder?" (23). Arnold answered his own question: The Armenians were reckless, misguided men who were committing high treason and murders.

In 1894 British embassy officials assigned to Istanbul reported that the Armenian revolutionary movement did not begin in the Ottoman Empire and the leaders were Russian Armenians. The British had learned that the organizers were actually a very small group of men who came into the Ottoman Empire in 1892 and during a meeting in Kars planned their campaign of terror (24).

The Armenian terrorists were so ruthless they even made an attempt to assassinate their own church patriarch. The French ambassador in Istanbul wrote a report about the criminal act. The ambassador stated that on Sunday, April 27, 1894, Patriarch Ashikian, while returning to Istanbul after a religious ceremony at the Kumkapi church, was attacked by an eighteen - year - old Armenian boy who attempted to shoot the patriarch but his pistol failed to fire. The eighteen - year - old stated that he was a member of the Hunchak terrorist organization (25).

In February 1895 Sir Ellis Bartlett, a member of British parliament, published a pamphlet about the Armenian campaigns of terror. He stated that "most of the tales so widely circulated in connection with the Turco-Armenian incidents, were manufactured and directed by the most imaginative and malevolent spirit. The deliberate object of the agitators was not to obtain redress for the Armenian sufferings, but to excite feelings in their country (England) against Turkey and the Turks».

Bartlett went on to explain that the stories had been, in many cases, made up for the purposes of those who had invented them. "The tall tales were the wicked inventions of Armenian Revolutionary Committees" and had been "wantonly spread over Europe in the interests of these mad agitators and their paymasters, the Russian Panslavic societies». After the Turco-Bulgarian incidents of 1876, the same war game was being played with these so - called Armenian atrocities in 1894 and 1895.

Bartlett pointed out clearly the Armenian claim "that the Christian subjects of the sultan were denied all liberty, and atrociously presented was a thoroughly false one». He continued by saying "no other government had for the past four centuries shown so much toleration, or given so much religious freedom as that of the Ottoman Empire. Every form of religion – Greek, Jewish, Nestorian, Roman Catholic and all others – were allowed perfect liberty of practice and doctrine. Had the Turks been less generous in the past, they would have escaped many of their present troubles. When heretics were being burnt to death in France and Germany, and even in England, the Ottoman Government allowed its subjects entire religious freedom».

Bartlett stated that M. Ximeues, "a Spanish geographer and a man of science, a gentleman of much ability and general information," was "an eyewitness to the rebellion and that he, too, contradicted the Armenian `massacre` allegations. Ximeues was a visitor to many of the places where the Armenians "alleged outrages "had taken place. He stated in clear and simple terms that the "stories so widely circulated in such a horrible language and with such circumstantial detail, was a gigantic fraud». Ximeues stated that "the stories of thousands of Armenians being murdered, their women being raped, of scores of villages being destroyed, of tortures and outrages of many kinds being inflicted upon the priests, women and men, are simply the wildest invention of falsehood». Bartlett also quoted from Ximeues, who observed that "Armenians are, of all the oriental races, the most subtle, adroit and prone to lying».

Bartlett concluded by saying that "England and, to a certain extent, Europe, have been imposed upon by a gigantic deception. In particular proprietors and editors of the great English journals have incurred a very serious responsibility by printing, as they recklessly have done, every tale – many of them so absurd and impossible as to bear their contradiction on the face of them – which has been poured forth by the Armenian manufacturing of lies. Such specimens of manufactured atrocities all came from Armenian sources and were published in British press» (26).

Captain Charles Norman, a British artillery officer sent to the Ottoman Empire, wrote of what he witnessed in 1895. The captain observed that England had yet to learn the "disturbances in Asia Minor are the direct outcome of a widespread anarchist movement of which she has been the unconscious supporter. Nothing that so much had been written for the avowed purpose of proving the Armenians to be a model of all weakness, and the Turk a monster of cruelty». Norman believed that it was important "in the interests of peace, truth, and justice to point out the aims and objectives of the Armenian revolutionaries». Captain Norman reported that "the Hunchak committee was directly responsible for all the bloodshed in Anatolia for the past five years.` He stated that Armenian allegations that the Muslims had started the incidents were just not true.

British Captain Norman referred to an Armenian manifesto, dated November 19, 1895, addressed to the Armenians of the Adana region he had in his possession that stated: "Armenians, arm your people now for the battle. Let us draw our swords and fall on the foe». He said British journalists were "duped by Armenians». Norman added that the British press reports of what he called "the touching story of Armenian matrons throwing their children over the cliff at Antakh Dagh (Sasun), and their jumping over themselves to avoid dishonor, is an absolute myth». The captain questioned the Armenian use of population numbers and said they were "very much exaggerated as were the figures listing their victims».

In 1894 the Ottoman government established the Sasun Inquiry Commission to evaluate the allegations made by the Armenians. In addition to Muslim members, there were also British, French and Russians on the commission. The commission made a finding that Armenians and Turks were equally guilty of attacking each other. However, H. S. Shipley, the British delegate, filed a separate report. He stated that "the stories of the wholesale butchery of the Armenians by the Turkish soldiers, especially the slaughter of Armenian women in the church at Geliguzan, and the convent of Surp merapa in Talari, were without foundation» (27).

British vice consul Captain Dickson wrote a report to Ambassador Lowther on September 30, 1908: "The Armenian in subjection, such as I have seen him, is an unsympathetic, mean, cringing, unscrupulous, lying, thieving, and, given his freedom, he loses none of these bad qualities, but in addition becomes insolent, domineering, and despotic. He is endowed with a sort of sneak thief sharpness, which among ignorant people in these parts passes for intelligence» (28)

Dickson also reported that the goals and objectives of the Dashnak Society were "preposterously ambitious" and they were seeking to establish an Armenian republic created from parts of the Ottoman, Persian, and Russian lands. The Dashnak Society was proposing that all non - Armenians would be removed from these lands once it was in control. Dickson stated that the Armenian Church was so involved in the scheme to help the Dasknaks, their priests were telling members they must marry young and create large families so they could "swamp" all other nationalities who lived in the regions the Armenians coveted (29)