Peter Balakian

Henry Morgenthau

Originally published in 1918, this book is one of the most insightful and compelling accounts of what became a recurring horror during the 20th century: ethnic cleansing and genocide. While he served as the U.S. ambassador to the Ottoman Empire under Woodrow Wilson from 1913 to 1916, Henry Morgenthau witnessed the rise of a new nationalism in Turkey, one that declared "Turkey for the Turks." He grew alarmed as he received reports from missionaries and consuls in the interior of Turkey that described deportation and massacre of the Armenians. The ambassador beseeched the U.S. government to intervene, but it refrained, leaving Morgenthau without official leverage. His recourse was to appeal personally to the consciences of Ottoman rulers and their German allies; when that failed, he drew international media attention to the genocide and spearheaded private relief efforts.--Publisher.

Ambassador Morgenthau's Story

I was Sent to Athens

Morgenthau Diary (China)

Poetry. The poems in A SUNDAY IN PURGATORY combine memoir, reflections on aging, sexuality, and wrestling with the tension that exists between being part of a famous American family and wanting to be an individual, separate from family history. Morgenthau writes, "In these precious days I dress my private demons in scribblings to come out from behind the shadows that have darkened my long and privileged life in a purgatory where I wait to pass through the open gates." 2016 Pulitzer Prize winner Peter Balakian calls these poems "crisp, elegant forays into memory both personal and cultural His surgical examinations of self and his unflinching stare into mortality define the unique and honest voice of this remarkable first book of poems."

A Sunday in Purgatory

Barbara W. Tuchman

New York Public Library. Dorot Jewish Division. Oral History Collection

American Jewish Committee. Oral History Library

"Secrets of the Bosphorus" by Henry Morgenthau. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

Secrets of the Bosphorus

WHEN I began writing these reminiscences of my ambassadorship, Germany's schemes in the Turkish Empire and the Near East seemed to have achieved a temporary success. The Central Powers had apparently disintegrated Russia, transformed the Baltic and the Black seas into German lakes, and had obtained a new route to the East by way of the Caucasus. For the time being Germany dominated Serbia, Bulgaria, Rumania, and Turkey, and regarded her aspirations for a new Teutonic Empire, extending from the North Sea to the Persian Gulf, as practically realized. The world now knows, though it did not clearly understand this fact in 1914, that Germany precipitated the war to destroy Serbia, seize control of the Balkan nations, transform Turkey into a vassal state, and thus obtain a huge oriental empire that would form the basis for unlimited world dominion. Did these German aggressions in the East mean that this extensive programme had succeeded? As I picture to myself a map which would show Germany's military and diplomatic triumphs, my experiences in Constantinople take on a new meaning. I now see the events of those twenty-six months as part of a connected, definite story. The several individuals that moved upon the scene now appear as players in a carefully staged, superbly managed drama. I see clearly enough now that Germany had made all her plans for world dominion and that the country to which I had been sent as American Ambassador was one of the foundation stones of the Kaiser's whole political and military structure. Had Germany not acquired control of Constantinople in the early days of the war, it is not unlikely that hostilities would have ended a few months after the Battle of the Marne. It was certainly an amazing fate that landed me in this great headquarters of intrigue at the very moment when the plans of the Kaiser for controlling Turkey, which he had carefully pursued for a quarter of a century, were about to achieve their final success. For this work of subjugating Turkey, and transforming its army and its territory into instruments of Germany, the Emperor had sent to Constantinople an ambassador who was ideally fitted for the task. The mere fact that the Kaiser had personally chosen Baron Von Wangenheim for this post shows that he had accurately gauged the human qualities needed in this great diplomatic enterprise.

Henry Morgenthau

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