themselves. Therefore there were virtually no residents wounded or

maimed by the Armenians among surviving local residents, witnesses

among them. This is furthermore supported by the report of the police

superintendent of Guba’s Section 1: “…no persons wounded or maimed

by the Armenian gangs were found in Section 1 of the town of Guba,

neither could they be found for they were sharp-shooters, and they did

not use 40-50 bullets when one bullet was enough. Besides this, any

person they got hold of was slaughtered by daggers and shot to death

from rifles with dead bodies mutilated afterwards”. (168)

In this respect, the document submitted to the AHIC by the town’s

police superintendents in response to the request regarding murdered,

wounded and maimed persons is of high importance indeed. The do-

cument reads: “The number of Guba residents who passed away out

of fear caused by advancing Armenian and Bolshevik units is above

100. Besides this around 300 persons were unidentified outsiders also

murdered by the Armenians and Bolsheviks. Their dead bodies were

buried in Guba, fifty per each grave”. (169)

However far not all victims of the Armenian violence were bu-

ried even in common graves. The same Abbasbey Hassanbeyov men-

tioned: “While traveling from Khachmaz to Guba in May I saw nu-

merous dead bodies of Muslims scattered along the road, in ditches

eaten by jackals and other beasts”. (170)

In this regard, further story of those masterminding and per-

petrating this horrible tragedy with dozens of thousands of innocent

Muslims’ deaths in Guba and around is interesting indeed. The major

“heroes’ are obviously D.Ghelovani and Amazasp.

***

Pursuant to the files of ACIC, David Ghelovani was interviewed

twice, his testimonies very confusing, contradicting, distrustful and far

not often coinciding with evidence provided by Guba residents, the

latter ones almost reiterating each other. From the very outset, it was

a bit unclear why a militia inspector (D.Ghelovani’s official position)

instructed “to restore proper railroad communication with Gudermes

station” was accompanies by troop trains with 2000 soldiers, domi-

nantly manned by Armenians, with no clear route to follow. Then, ha-

ving provided almost exact location of the place where he reportedly

came across “about 120 dead bodies of men, women and children…

Events of 1918 in Guba in the Context of Plans for Mass Extermination

of Azerbaijan’s Muslim Population