The 20 Hunchakian gallows

The 20 Hunchakian gallows, also known as Ksan Gakhaghan, The 20 Martyrs or The 20s,^[1] is the common name for the Hunchakian activists who were hanged in the Sultan Bayazid square of Constantinople on June 15, 1915.

History

The 7th General Convention of the Social Democrat Hunchakian Party which was held in Constanţa, Romania, in 1913, had a unique and great importance not only for the Hunchaks, but in the history of the Armenians as a whole. During the Convention, members stressed their concern of the Young Turk government's anti-Armenianism. The Hunchaks feared that this disregard would escalate as time passed, which ultimately did.^[2]

The Hunchaks also stressed the importance of a United Independent Armenia which would be impossible under the racist and autocratic Islamist Young Turk regime. Thus, the convention adjourned with two main objectives:

I - As stated in its original program, the party was to move from licit to illicit activities, thus becoming once again a covert organization. II - To plan and assassinate the leaders of the Ittihad (Young Turk) party, the same leaders that carried out the Adana massacres of 1909, and thus the same leaders who at that moment were planning the annihilation of the Armenian people. ^[3]

Unfortunately, these secret objectives were passed on to the Turks by an Armenian agent for the government; consequently as soon as the delegates arrived in Constantinople, they were arrested. By the end of the year a total of one hundred and forty Hunchak leaders were arrested.

The 20 Hunchakian gallows

After spending two years in terrible conditions in Turkish prisons, and undergoing lengthy mock trials, twenty prominent figures were sentenced to death by hanging. A few weeks after the beginning of the Armenian genocide on June 15, 1915, all twenty men were hanged in the central square of Constantinople, known as Sultan Bayazid Square. Paramaz's last words before his hanging were:^[4]

“

You can only hang our bodies, but not our ideology. ...You will see tomorrow on the Eastern horizon a Socialist Armenia.

”

Since their execution, the Twenty Martyrs have been a source of inspiration for thousands of young Armenians worldwide. In 2001, the monument of Paramaz and his 19 Hunchakian comrades was opened in Meghri, Armenia.

Gallery

Paramaz
Dr. Benne
Aram Achekbashian
Kegham Vanigian
Mourad Zakarian
Yervant Topuzian
Hagop Basmajian
Smpat Kelejian
Roupen Garabedian
Armenag Hampartsoumian
Apraham Mouradian
Hrand Yegavian
Karnig Krikor Boyajian
Hovhannes D. Ghazarian
Mgrdich Yeretsian
Yeremia Manoukian
Tovmas Tovmasian
Karekin Boghosian
Minas Keshishian
Boghos Boghosian
Russian soldiers pictured in the former Armenian village of Sheykhalan near Mush, 1915.
In 1922-23, the Near East Relief evacuated 22,000 children from ophanages in interior Turkey to Syria and Greece. This picture shows some of the 5,000 children from Karput en route on donkey back and foot.
The eternal flame at the Tsitsernakaberd Memorial in Yerevan, Armenia, on Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day 2014.
Young woman with the eternal flame at the Tsitsernakaberd Memorial in Yerevan, Armenia.