Boys of the Sidon orphanage gather on the steps. Sidon, 1919–1920.

Location

Sidon, Lebanon

Year

1919–1920

Item Detail

William Stoltzfus directed the relief work of the Sidon district, and Hertzler had charge of three hundred boys in the orphanage. They fill the steps and the arcade of the orphanage building in matching white sun helmets and light tunics. The children were Syrian and Armenian, orphaned by genocide, war, famine, and disease.

Context

Silas Hertzler (1888–1975) served in Syria from January 1919 to March 1920, first under the American Red Cross and, from 1 April 1919, under the American Committee for Relief in the Near East. He was one of seven young volunteers the Mennonite Relief Commission for War Sufferers sent on the relief ship Pensacola on 25 January 1919. After a few months in the Beirut transport department, he went to the Sidon district, where William Stoltzfus directed the work, and Hertzler was responsible for three hundred boys in the orphanage. Many of the children had been orphaned by the Armenian Genocide or by the wartime famine in Mount Lebanon. He taught at Goshen College from 1920 to 1958.

The collection draws on his loose prints and relief photograph album at Goshen College Archives. It records the Sidon orphanage and its trade shops, the Armenian refugee barracks at Aleppo, the Syrian Orphanage at Jerusalem, and the Antoura orphanage, where Ottoman authorities had tried to make Armenian children Turkish. Three portraits follow one girl, Miriam Moosa, from her arrival to six months later. Some prints show places he is not known to have worked, among them Konia and Smyrna.

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  • Holding Institution

    Goshen College Archives, Goshen College. Goshen, Indiana.

  • External Link
    https://archives.mhsc.ca/index.php/silas-and-anna-weaver-hertzler-papers-1904-1975

  • Attribution

    Silas and Anna Weaver Hertzler Papers. Middle East Photographs, 1919–20. HM1/197, Box 19–20. Goshen College Archives, Goshen College, Goshen, Indiana.

  • Rights

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  • Notes

    Print title: "Boys of Sidon Orphanage, 1919-1920."

    HM1/197, Box 19, photo 1793.

    Two independent sources place Hertzler in charge at Sidon. Orie O. Miller, "Our Relief Work in the Near East," in J. S. Hartzler, Mennonites in the World War (1921), ch. XIV records that "Bro. Stoltzfus became the director of the work in this district, and Bro. Hertzler had charge of three hundred boys in the orphanage." Christian Graber reached Sidon on 13 October 1919 and wrote in his diary: "Silas Hertzler is in charge of orphanage here."

    The scale of the need was set out before the orphanage existed. James H. Nicol's 1918 report, quoted in James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930): "Mr. Jessup, who has been placed in charge of the whole Sidon district, reports about 5,000 destitute children, many of whom will die this winter if not cared for by us. This represents about one-fifth of the field that we are trying to cover. We are planning orphanages in Sidon, Beirut, Brumana, Tripoli and perhaps in other sections of the mountains." Graber dined with the Jessups at Sidon on 29 March 1919, with Hertzler.

    Sidon Station drew 1,600 Egyptian pounds of Near East Relief's 13,690-pound Syria appropriation for January 1920, second only to Beirut. (The New Near East, March 1920, p. 23.)

    The sun hats and tunics here match those worn by the boys at the outdoor meal photographed elsewhere in the album.

Boys of the Sidon orphanage gather on the steps. Sidon, 1919–1920.